Chapter 1

For my eighteenth birthday, my adoptive parents went to a lot of trouble to give me a coming-of-age celebration.

After I blew out the candles, Mom pulled a plane ticket abroad out of her pocket and said gently,

"Our Zoe Fox's all grown up now. Your dad and I have worked half our lives for one thing—to give you the best life we can."

"The ticket's for tomorrow, and I've already wired five hundred thousand into your account as a travel fund. You leave at dawn."

I threw myself into Mom's arms, touched, and clung to her.

Beside us, Dad gave a jealous little huff.

"So it's only Mom who's good to you? Am I not good to you too? You ungrateful little thing."

I turned and kissed him on the cheek.

He laughed until the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes bunched together.

At two in the morning I woke up thirsty and came out for water.

Mom and Dad's bedroom door hadn't been shut all the way, and the light was still on.

I was about to sneak up and scare them.

Just as I reached the doorway, a voice came from inside.

"Raise your soldiers for a thousand days to use them for one. I've spent eighteen years on this research, and I'm finally about to see the results."

"Your plan really was the better one. Once she's out of the country, we tell everyone she vanished while traveling abroad. There'll be departure records at the airport too. No one will ever trace it back to us."

Mom gave a soft laugh.

"You men, your minds are just too simple. Get some sleep. Once morning comes, we'll be busy."

I stood outside the door, and every drop of blood in me froze at once.

1

My father was an expert in the medical field, specializing in the hardest cases of genetic disease.

What kind of research he meant to do, I didn't dare imagine.

Afraid of alerting them, I rose onto my toes and crept back to my room.

I set down the cup, crouched on the floor, and started stuffing things into my backpack.

ID card, bank cards—those all leave traces too easily in an age of information.

I didn't take them. I shoved them back into the drawer.

I packed only five thousand in cash.

And a bottle of iodine, just in case.

When I finished, I looked down at the sorry state of myself and laughed.

The eighteenth birthday I'd been waiting for so long.

The gift I'd been given was a one-way ticket abroad, with no coming back.

And a swindle they'd spent eighteen years carefully preparing.

I'd just shouldered my bag and was about to leave.

Then a car engine started up downstairs.

Very quiet. It stopped right at the building's entrance.

My chest tightened, and I pried apart the slats of the blinds to look down.

A black company car. License plate ending in 073.

It was from my dad's research institute.

They'd called someone in after all.

There was no time.

I put on my bag, pushed open the second-floor window, and climbed down clinging to the drainpipe on the outer wall.

The early-autumn wind poured in through my collar, cold enough to bite.

I twisted my ankle on the landing but bit down and made no sound.

Bent low, I ran along the base of the wall toward the back gate of the complex.

The gate needed a face scan, so I didn't dare use it. I climbed the low wall on the side instead.

Beyond the wall was the late-night street.

The streetlights were dim and yellow. There wasn't even a cab out.

I limped two blocks before I finally flagged down a night-shift cab.

"Where to?"

"The Old Town. The West Street alleys."

I gave the name, my voice shaking a little.

The driver glanced at me in the rearview mirror and didn't ask anything more.

As the car pulled away, I looked back toward the complex.

That house I'd lived in for eighteen years still had its warm yellow lights on.

I used to think it was the warmest place in the whole world.

I was adopted by the Fox couple when I was one.

The orphanage director said I was the luckiest child in the whole place.

Professor Fox and Dr. Pruitt were both well-known biomedical experts in their field.

They had no children of their own, and the moment they came to the orphanage, they picked me at first sight.

They really were good to me.

So good that at eighteen I'd barely ever washed my own socks.

So good that when my stomach cramped during my period, Mom would crouch by the bed and rub it for me until her own hands ached.

So good that to celebrate my birthday, Dad turned down an international medical conference and made birthday noodles for me with his own hands.

When I blew out the candles that afternoon, they pressed the plane ticket into my hands.

I hugged them and cried, promising I'd study hard and come back to take care of them.

Now that I think about it, the look in their eyes when they watched me was never the way you look at a daughter.

It was the way you look at a lab specimen you've finally raised to maturity.

The cab stopped at the intersection.