Running Dark Read Online Free PDF

duffel.
    She had a tiny makeup bag, a wallet that fit in the interior breast pocket of her blazer, as well as a thin metal case. The case contained a circle of lipstick, a square of eyeliner, a pot of transparent cheek color, and a small wand prefilled with mascara. The sleek case was designed by a high-end makeup brand, for sale to women who travel. Emma had formulated the colors inside it at Pure Chemistry. She placed a travel toothbrush and paste into an outside pocket of the duffel. She used the express checkout feature to pay her hotel bill and headed to the temporary labs.
    The Price lab was located in a sleek building in downtown Pietermaritzburg. A doorman stood behind the reception desk. He nodded at her after she explained why she was there.
    “Mr. Stark is waiting for you. Just take one of those elevators.”
    Stark was standing in the hallway when she stepped out of the car. He looked haggard, but Emma was aware of his reputation as a chronic workaholic, so his appearance didn’t surprise her. His dark hair was wet, as if he’d just showered. Only thirty-five years old, he was tall, with brown eyes and clean-cut dark hair. Handsome in an East Coast, well-bred way, he owed his meteoric rise in the business world to his ability to focus on work to the exclusion of all else.Married young and divorced three years later, Stark, Emma had heard, required only four hours of sleep a night, a trait that stood him in good stead as the head of one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world.
    His dark chinos and blue button-down shirt with sleeves rolled to the elbows was one of the rare relaxed outfits she’d ever seen him wear. She was interested to note that the casual clothes became him. They took the edge off his usual aloof manner. He still wore his expensive Patek Philippe watch. If not for that, he could have been mistaken for a “regular” guy, not the multimillionaire CEO of a Fortune 500 company. His eyes settled on her, not with a smile, nor a frown, but with a reticent air. He held the door to the lab open.
    “Ms. Caldridge, please, come in.” He looked at his watch. “I should warn you that I need to leave for the airport in two hours.” Stark turned right without hesitation. When he reached a door with the number 3 on it, he took out a key card that he placed on the magnetic reader. The door sprang open.
    Stark flipped on the lights. The lamp reflected off the room’s white walls, cabinets, and Formica countertops in a harsh glow, making Emma almost want to shield her eyes at first. The lab was large, but still a manageable size for one person to navigate, and laid out in a way that she thought was the most practical, with vials, pipettes, needles, and microscopes on long worktables within easy reach. Two Eppendorf microcentrifuges sat in the middle of each, along with test-tube holders. Emma headed to the nearest workstation, where labeled drawers itemized their contents. She removed surgical gloves, tubing, a needle with vials, alcohol swabs, and a Band-Aid and snapped on the gloves.
    “What are you doing?” Stark asked.
    “Drawing some blood.”
    “Whose?”
    “Mine.”
    “Can you do that?”
    “Yes. Unless you know how to do it?”
    “No.”
    She handed him the tubing. “Wrap this around my arm, could you? I’ll get the needle in, then you pull the plunger out. When the vial is full, you’ll need to pop on another.” She put three vials in a row.
    Stark looked nervous. “Why are you drawing your own blood? The urine sample should have caught anything untoward.”
    Emma went for the truth. “I was injected with something. During the bombing.”
    Stark froze. Emma pulled open an alcohol swab to clean the inside of her elbow. When Stark still hadn’t moved or said anything, she looked up. He was ashen. His face held a frightened look that was unlike any expression she’d ever seen on him.
    “You look scared to death. What is it?” She was holding a needle in one gloved hand