A mystery thriller YA book about a heart transplant and cellular memory
Hi everyone, I’m hoping you can help me find a YA espionage/techno-thriller book that has been driving me crazy for about 6 years. I read the beginning of it as a free "Book 1" promotion on Google Play Books around 2020-2022, but it has since been removed or the cover changed, and I can't find it in my history. Also I never use Reddit so please forgive me in advance for any problems with formatting.
It felt very much like an Alex Rider book but with a female lead. It had a British female narrator (for the audiobook version) and takes place in/near London.
Cover details:
It was a multiple-word title.
The cover was highly stylized with a strict Red, White, and Black color palette. The art featured half of a girl's face on one side, and something else stylized on the other. All the outlines/photos used on the cover were in white against a red/black background. The title text was black with a white outline. The Plot Details: The Opening: The book opens in a hospital. A dying, clandestine black-ops military contractor that we know works for some company (implied to be American, but not 100% sure) comes in, dies, and his heart is harvested.
The Protagonist:The recipient is a high school-aged girl living in London. When she wakes up from the transplant, she starts experiencing his muscle memories, personality tendencies, and flashes of his past life.
Memory 1: She remembers a flash of him in the Middle East desert. He was on his knees with his hands behind his head at the end of his line. By pure muscle memory, he secretly typed something into a tiny phone and called a woman. The woman was completely calm and unsurprised that he was alive. Right after, a Reaper-style drone rains down ordnance, blasting the area and saving his life.
Tendency/Memory 2: She randomly kisses her female friend out of nowhere due to the donor's personality tendencies. They are both surprised, but play it off awkwardly as "Oh, we're just girls experimenting, we aren't lesbians."
Memory 3 & Major Scene: She has a vivid memory of the donor being chased through city plaza streets by someone on a motorcycle. He runs into an empty church to hide, slips into a confession booth, and hides a small, lip-gloss-sized vial under the floorboard/carpet. *The Church Scene: The teenage girl tracks down this exact church in real life. When she walks in, the church is completely empty except for an African woman in traditional dress who is sitting there praying. The girl sneaks into the confession booth, frantically searches for the vial, and finds it. Just as she's about to leave, a priest unexpectedly enters the booth to give confession. It's written with a lot of suspense. She gets awkward, runs out of the booth, and the priest steps out to look after her, thoroughly confused, as she flees the church with the vial.
Does this ring a bell for anyone? Because it was a free indie or UK-published Book 1 on Google Play, the cover might have changed since, but these plot details are exact. Thank you so much for your help I'm almost at peace that I will never find this book again.