THE 4400® WELCOME TO PROMISE CITY Read Free

across the field. He grimaced as icy water trickled down the back of his neck; like most native Seattlites, he wouldn’t be caught dead carrying an umbrella. A quick dash brought him to an arched concrete doorway at the base of the nearest battery. A riveted iron door flanked the open threshold. He darted into the murky confines of an abandoned shot and powder room. The unlit chamber was as stark and barren as a prison cell. Greenish algae streaked the rough concrete walls. An empty elevator shaft connected the powder room with the guns mounted on upper levels. Rainwater sluiced past the doorway, pooling on the hard stone floor.

    Tom shook the rain from his hair and glanced around the shadowy bunker. At first he didn’t see anyone and wondered if maybe he had ducked into the wrong storeroom. The old fort was full of secluded nooks and crannies, which no doubt contributed to the location being chosen for this rendezvous. The dense concrete walls discouraged electronic surveillance.

    Not taking any chances, I see.

    He was about to venture out into the rain again when he heard a rustle of motion behind him. His hand went instinctively to his sidearm as he turned around to see a pair of figures emerge from one of the adjoining storerooms. One was male, the other female. The former was nobody he’d been in any hurry to see again.

    “About time you got here,” Dennis Ryland said. “You’re late.”

TWO

    T OM’S FORMER BOSS was a lean, dark-haired man about two decades older than Tom. A gray wool overcoat was draped over his gaunt frame. Shrewd brown eyes peered from his vulpine countenance. After being forced out of NTAC in the wake of a major scandal three years ago, Ryland had ended up at the Haspel Corporation, a private security firm that often worked hand in hand with the Feds when it came to cracking down on the 4400 and the other p-positives. If anything, Ryland had even more power now than before—and considerably less oversight. That made him a dangerous man. Too dangerous, as far as Tom was concerned.

    “Hello, Dennis,” he said coldly. His hand came away from his gun.

    Ryland glanced at an expensive Rolex wristwatch. Life in the private sector clearly had its perks. “I was starting to think you’d stood me up.”

    “I thought about it,” Tom confessed. He and Dennis had once been friends, but there was little love lostbetween them these days. Tom still regarded p-positives as people; Ryland saw them only as threats to be neutralized, and preferably eliminated. Their friendship had not survived that clash of viewpoints. “This had better be worth the trip.”

    A smirk greeted Tom’s hostile tone. “Sorry to drag you all the way out here today,” Ryland said, “but, as you know, I’m not exactly welcome in Seattle anymore.”

    “Imagine that,” Tom said. Among other things, Ryland had been behind a plot to poison the original 4400 with an experimental drug that had nearly killed all of the returnees, including Tom’s own nephew. Although Ryland had received only a slap on the wrist for his role in the infamous Inhibitor Scandal, Collier and his followers still regarded him as a “war criminal.” Banishing Haspelcorp from Seattle had been one of the first items on Collier’s agenda. Last Tom had heard, the company was based out of Tacoma now, which was still too close for comfort.

    Ryland overlooked Tom’s sarcastic tone. He gestured toward his companion: a young Asian woman wearing a belted white trenchcoat. A pixie cut flattered her lustrous black hair. Despite the gloom, a stylish pair of dark glasses concealed her eyes. “You may remember my associate, Ms. Simone Tanaka.”

    “How could I forget?” Tom said wryly. He and his partner had personally arrested Tanaka over a year and a half ago, after exposing her as part of a now defunct 4400 terrorist cell known as “The Nova Group.” He had lost track of her after the NSA took her into custody, and wasa bit surprised to find