Adam Schonberg’s eyes blinked open and in the darkness of his bedroom he heard the undulating scream of a siren announcing yet another catastrophe. Gradually, the noise diminished as the police car or ambulance or fire truck or whatever it was receded into the distance. It was morning in New York City.

Snaking a hand out from beneath the warm blankets, Adam groped for his glasses and then turned the face of the clock radio toward him: 4:47 A.M. Relieved, he flipped off the alarm, which was scheduled to go off at 5:00, then pulled his hand back under the covers. He had fifteen more minutes before he had to haul himself out of bed and into the icy bathroom. Normally, he’d never take the chance of turning off the alarm for fear he’d oversleep. But as charged up as he was this morning that was not a possibility.

Rolling onto his left side, he pressed against the sleeping form of Jennifer, his twenty-three-year-old wife of one and a half years, feeling the rhythmical rise and fall of her chest as she breathed. Reaching down, Adam ran his hand lightly up her thigh, which was slim and firm from her daily dance workouts. Her skin was soft and remarkably smooth with hardly a freckle to mar its surface. It had a delicate olive tone that suggested southern European descent, but that was not the case. Jennifer insisted that her genealogy was English and Irish on her father’s side of the family, German and Polish on her mother’s side.

Jennifer straightened out her legs, sighed, and rolled over onto her back, forcing Adam to move out of her way. He smiled; even in her sleep she had a forceful personality. Although her strong character could at times present itself to Adam as frustrating stubbornness, it was also one of the reasons Adam loved her so much.

Glancing at the clock, which now said 4:58, Adam forced himself out of bed. As he crossed the room to shower he stubbed his toe on an old Pullman trunk Jennifer had covered with a throw to serve as a table. Gritting his teeth to keep from crying out, he hobbled to the edge of the tub where he sat down to survey the damage. He had a remarkably low tolerance for pain.