“LB is my brother,” Fat Man said as he sat down with them, clearly having heard her.
Peri’s eyebrows rose. LB was American Indian, and Fat Man was . . . Germanic?
“Blood brother,” LB said as he slid his phone to Fat Man to continue monitoring.
“He’s your anchor,” Peri guessed. “He tells you what happened when you black out. Hides from everyone that you do. Covers for your lapses.”
Fat Man stiffened, and LB’s eye twitched. “Something like that.”
“Well, you’re doing a great job. Most untrained drafters are in a medical asylum.”
Fat Man’s thick lips cracked into a smile. “Where do you think I found the little shit?”
“Shut up!” LB exclaimed, smacking his shoulder, and Fat Man slumped.
“We were both in there, LB. It’s no big deal. They got good drugs.”
Peri hid a smile. “Really. You’ve been doing a good job. Can I have my stuff back?” It wasn’t just the Evocane. They had her diary. She’d known better than to put anything security related in there, but hell, it was her diary.
“No.” It was flat, but she could tell he’d only said it because he wasn’t ready to talk about it yet. “I looked up Opti on the Net. It just says a government special task force.”
Her eyebrows rose. He’d looked up Opti? Steiner would be here within half an hour. Maybe sooner, if those lights meant anything. “Nothing about the ability to rewrite small chunks of time, eh?” Chuckling, she reached for a piece of pizza, hesitating until LB nodded. “Yeah,” she said around a cold mouthful. “That’d go over really well. You don’t believe it, and you’re doing it. They find us, train us if we’re not too far gone thanks to well-meaning health providers, bribe us with gobs of money into doing what they want. We get paid extremely well, but it’s a tenth of what our bosses get.”
LB and Fat Man exchanged a knowing look. “And Jack?” LB questioned.
The pizza soured in her mouth, and she swallowed. “What about him? LB, you have to be careful. A trained anchor can wipe years of your memory right after a jump when the brain is trying to readjust, and if they find you, that’s exactly what will happen.”
LB brought his gaze back from Jack, now struggling violently to sit up. “He wiped your memory? No wonder you want to cack him.”
“Every time I started to figure out where the corruption started. Allen is very good at it.”
“But you don’t want to kill him.” LB leaned back, gaze flicking to and away from whatever Fat Man was showing him on his phone.
Feigning indifference, Peri picked off a piece of pepperoni and ate it. “Allen and I were moles in Opti, trying to shut down the corruption. I was young and idealistic. Thought I could make a difference. Allen wiped my memory so I’d have the plausible deniability to successfully infiltrate. Jack became my anchor, and with careful wipes and misinformation, I became part of the corruption instead.”
LB smiled knowingly. “It happens.”
“I didn’t do it intentionally,” she said hotly. “And when I found out, I brought them down. But Bill only went deeper. Hell, I think he enjoyed that I cleaned his house. He wants me back. That’s what the Evocane is about. You going to give it to me yet?”
“No.”
Peri dropped the half-eaten piece of pizza in the box, watching LB fiddle with the injector pen, messing with her. She gave him a moot look, and he stopped, nodding to Fat Man. His bulk shifting like rocks, Fat Man dug out two vials from his pocket and set them on the table.
“And you trust that that’s what’s really in them?” LB asked.
There was at least two weeks’ worth there, maybe more, and Peri forced her eyes off the vials. “Not until I get it checked out. Look. I just want my Evocane, Allen, Harmony, and Jack so I can beat his ass at my leisure. We’ll get out of your hair, and you’ll never see us again.”
“I find that hard to believe.” LB took his phone back, angling it so she couldn’t see.
“I’m a simple girl,” she said, then realized it had become quiet. Everyone had left but for the two men watching Harmony, Jack, and Allen. Something was clearly going on.
“LB,” she said, feeling the need to move. “You’re right. Drafters are rare. Drafters like you who have found a way to deal with it on their own are even rarer. Last year, I would’ve lied to you, walked out of here, then headed the task to pull you in, get you wiped and working. A year ago I thought Opti was Camelot. A year ago I didn’t think a drafter could survive without an anchor. A year ago I was a Barbie doll with a license to kill.”
Her voice had risen, and she caught her anger. “I have little left now except the killing part. You’ve got a good thing here. Keep your nose clean and I won’t be back to bother you.”
Fat Man looked affronted, but LB was thinking even as he scrolled through the incoming texts. “Say I let you walk out of here. You said you could help me control it.”
Peri nodded. “There’s a man named Silas Denier. Doctor. Psychologist. He’s good at bringing drafters back from the brink when things get confusing. You can trust him to do what he thinks is right for you, not himself or anyone else. He won’t turn you in—especially if you drop my name. You got a pen? I’ll give you his number.”
“And what assurance do I have that he won’t sanitize me?”
“It’s called wiping, and he won’t. He hates Opti more than I do. Call him if you start to hallucinate,” she said, taking her own pen pendant that LB slid across to her and writing his number on the pizza box. “Don’t wait. It’s a signal you’re trying to remember something, and if you do, you won’t come back from it.”
She hung her pen around her neck, feeling more like herself. Fat Man growled something inaudible, sullen and angry.
“Silas can tell you what’s going on, why you remember until the timelines mesh, and why you forget after they do. Oh, and trust Fat Man, especially if you start to hallucinate. It’s the only occasion your intuition will lead you astray.”
LB’s brow furrowed. “Fat Man?”
Peri warmed as she looked at the big man. “Sorry. That’s what I’ve been calling you.”
“No, I like it,” Fat Man said, preening almost.
“And your intuition?” Peri said, eyeing the drugs on the table. “As long as you’re not hallucinating, trust your gut. You never forget anything, you just can’t recall it. The emotions never go away.” Her thoughts went to Silas, remembering the feel of his hand on her face, the heartache in his eyes when she pulled back from him, the longing for her to remember, the wish in herself to remember . . . maybe.
“What if my gut is telling me to shoot you and dump you in Lake St. Clair?” LB asked as he closed his phone down and tucked it away.
Perhaps the danger is past. “If you were going to do that, you would’ve done it by now. There’s no profit in it, which is exactly why I’m not going to tell anyone about you.” She refused to look at the vials again, but it was getting harder. There was a thump in the distance, and dust shifted down from the ceiling. “Unless you start drawing attention to yourself,” she added, looking up. Perhaps not.
“LB,” Fat Man warned, and Peri shrugged.
“Hey, it’s what I do. You want me to lie about it?”
LB lifted his chin to indicate Allen, Harmony, and Jack. “Okay, I believe you. But what about them? Can they keep their mouths shut?”
Peri fiddled with her pen. “Harmony will, sure. Jack and Allen weren’t there, so they don’t know. You could always come in and be trained. Not Opti, but Harmony’s group. Bring Fat Man with you as your anchor. It will take longer, but they’d probably wet themselves to get someone with your background.”
Head cocked, LB looked over her shoulder to Harmony and Allen. “Is that what you would do? If you could start over?”
“Hell no. I’d do exactly what you’re doing. Minus the illegal stuff—of course.”
LB smiled, taking one of the vials and tucking it in his pocket as he stood. One
vial remained on the table with her injector pens; Peri’s smile vanished. “I don’t have the accelerator. It’s not going to do you any good.”
“It still looks rare to me.”
His eyes were bright in challenge, and she shrugged. Half was better than none, unless he got himself hooked. And it might not be bad having a potential source outside of her pocket. “Okay. Half.” Fingers shaking, she slid her injector pens and the last vial to herself. It was still warm from Fat Man’s pocket. Her shoulders slumped, and she took her first real breath in what seemed like hours. She had time now.
Fat Man dropped her belt pack and phone and diary on the table, and she put everything back on, starting to feel normal again. “What about my knife?” she asked as she tucked the loose pages back behind the cover of the journal, and LB grinned.
“It looks kind of rare to me, too,” he said, gesturing for her to join Allen, Harmony, and Jack, now freed apart from Jack’s hands still being cuffed.
“LB, don’t take this the wrong way,” she said as they merged into one group. “But I’m proud of you.”
Fat Man snorted, and LB gave her a sideways smile. “It’s not you,” he admitted. “It’s the government choppers going overhead and the old white guy with the bullhorn. You’re hot goods, lady, and I want you off my island.”
“Steiner?” Harmony blurted. “He’s here? I thought we lost him.”
“LB did a search on Opti.” Peri zipped her belt pouch closed. “It probably pinged.”
“Tall, creepy man with gray hair?” LB said, and Harmony nodded. “That’s him. We either hand you over or they’re coming in to get you. Keep him out, okay?”
Steiner. They headed for the stairway, Peri’s head beginning to hurt. Her expression screwed up in distaste and frustration as she touched the vial LB had returned to her through her belt pack. Steiner was going to search her, find it, take it away, maybe start wondering why it had been included in the deal to get Allen. Steiner would be an idiot not to realize she was hooked on Evocane. “Move it, Jack,” she muttered, giving him a shove. “I’ve got a cell with your name on it.”
Jack turned to look at her over his shoulder, his stubble thick and his suit grimy. “Babe, I just wanted to be with you,” he pleaded.
It meant nothing. Her heart was cold. “Out,” she said as she pushed him into the stairwell. Jack caught his balance, his expression hurt as Harmony took control of him as the ranking agent. They hadn’t come away with Michael, and her bid for Evocane had backfired.
Someone opened the freezer door at the top of the stairway, and the sound of choppers and a bullhorn drifted down with the scent of snow. Yep, that sounded like Steiner. Her thoughts went to her diary. Son of a bitch. . . He’ll take that, too.
“Peri.”
It was LB, and she paused as Fat Man pushed past her, leaving her and LB alone. His eyes still held the wonder that she’d given him. “You’re not going to give me my knife back, are you?” she joked.
“You should have let me kill him,” he said, eyes finding Jack at the top of the stairway as he smacked the hilt of her knife into her hand.
She smiled at the weight of it, then leaned to slide it away. “I know. He’s really bad for my asthma. Will you do something for me?”
Hip cocked, LB eyed her. “Seriously?”
Her heart seemed to flutter as she handed him her journal. “I don’t want Steiner to have it, and he’s going to strip me to my skivvies. It’s my diary,” she said, face warming as he took it, expression puzzled at its torn and scuffed state. “Don’t read it. Just . . . hang on to it for me.” God, I feel as if I’m thirteen.
“You want me to hold your diary?” he said quizzically.
“There’s nothing important in it,” she said, fidgeting when Harmony shouted down for her to hurry up. “I don’t want Steiner to have it. I’d let you keep that second vial of Evocane for me, as well, but Jack is bound to tell Steiner he came in with two. Steiner might believe that you broke one, but not two, and if he thinks I left them here, he’ll tear your place apart for them.”
“Not to mention Steiner’s drug cabinet is going to be closer than mine.” LB tapped her diary against his palm. His brow furrowed as if he knew it wasn’t a diary but a piece of herself. “Sure. You’re coming back for it, right?”
Her eyes dropped to the pocket where he’d put that second vial of Evocane, then rose to find his. “I’ll be back for both. Count on it.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY
The operations van had Opti’s symbol on the steering wheel, making Peri think they were headed for Detroit’s old Opti complex. The vehicle’s acceleration was impressive for being electric, the quiet nothing of their swift passage pleasant. Even so, Peri thought a little engine noise might be preferable to the tense, one-sided conversation of Steiner standing in the middle of the van’s aisle, reaming out Harmony. Cold, Peri drew her coat closer, thinking it ironic that it had the WEFT logo on it, with her since the fiasco in St. Louis. God help me, I don’t even know when I lost my wool Reuso.
The man had started in even before they’d cleared the lines that WEFT had strung at the outskirts of the arena, questioning Harmony’s motives and loyalty both. As expected, everything on Harmony had been confiscated. They’d cleared Peri out as well, making her glad she’d left her diary with LB. It didn’t sit well that all her Evocane, right down to the two remaining pens, was in the van in front of them. That she was hooked on a drug that did nothing for her was worse. She didn’t think Jack would say anything to Steiner about there being two vials, but she wasn’t going to risk losing them both.
Harmony had been silent so far about her new addiction, but by the looks of it, Steiner was close to figuring it out, picking up on the slight hesitation in Harmony’s voice as she lied to her boss. The man hadn’t let up, making Harmony repeat her story a handful of times in the hope of finding an inconsistency, but seeing as Harmony was telling the truth—mostly—there’d been none.
A stone-faced man sat beside Harmony, facing both Peri and Allen. It would be absurdly easy to knock him out, take his holstered pistol, kill everyone, and flee. But she didn’t. It wasn’t who she wanted to be. Besides, Allen wasn’t in any shape to help, huddled in a CIA coat with an ice bag on his face and grimacing every time they went over a railroad trestle or hit a pothole.
“You removed Reed from her cell,” Steiner said flatly, and Peri frowned, her focus out the front window blurring to make Detroit’s midnight lights a kaleidoscope of sliding color as they headed to the repurposed Opti complex. “Transported her across state lines and into a high-risk area. Did it occur to you that she might be trying to return to Opti?”
“That was a very low probability, sir,” Harmony said, her voice having lost its respect about ten miles back. “Her goal was to retrieve her partner, not return to Opti.”
Steiner’s frown was obvious in the passing lights as he swayed with the van’s motion. Her gaze slid to the guard’s weapon, wanting it. She missed her Glock. She missed her knife. She missed everything they’d taken from her thirty seconds after crossing into WEFT jurisdiction, including much of her confidence.
“Peri isn’t a flight risk,” Harmony insisted. “We need Michael, and I wasn’t going to compromise anyone else again. Not after last time.” She hesitated. “We had a better chance with two.”
“We don’t work by chance,” Steiner said. “And without authorization, you were lucky no one was injured or killed. I wouldn’t have been able to protect you.”
Allen pushed his glasses back up his nose. “I was injured,” he muttered, but it was obvious Steiner meant protection from the law.
“I promised Reed we wouldn’t leave Allen Swift behind,” Harmony said.
“Congratulations,” Steiner said dryly. “Your honor is intact. Your ID, please.”
“Sir?”
Peri winced at Harmony’s shocked alarm. Harmony had trusted her, and in return, Peri had flushed the woman’s career straight
down WEFT’s toilet.
“Your badge?” Steiner repeated, reaching for the van’s wall as they wove through the slow turns of the technological park.
“But she didn’t run. We recovered Allen.” The light glinted on the holographic image as Harmony removed her badge from around her neck and handed it over. “And Jack. Peri is here. Right here!” she said, gesturing. “She could have run at any time, and she didn’t.”
“Which only means she hadn’t gotten what she wanted yet,” Steiner said, her ID in hand. “You took a flight risk out of custody. That woman is hooked on Evocane, and if we hadn’t gotten to you first, she would have left you dead in the arena and returned with her old partner to Bill Heddles. She used you, Beam.”
“You don’t know that,” Harmony whispered, and Steiner grimaced.
“That vial of Evocane we confiscated says otherwise.”
Peri stared at Steiner, the blood draining from her face. Across from her, Harmony choked back her next words, her sudden doubt cutting Peri to the quick. But what had sent Peri’s pulse racing was that Steiner knew. He was going to withhold the Evocane to prove his dominance, to force her to do what he wanted, when he wanted. Bill would never be this crass. He was an artist when it came to manipulation, so skilled that you didn’t even mind. Most of the time.
Peri looked at her hands, free for the moment, then Allen, his eyes suddenly bright, wide awake but clearly hurting from two days of beatings. Everything had changed. She couldn’t wait to see whether Silas could reproduce the Evocane. She wasn’t going to return to Opti, but she wasn’t going to dance to Steiner’s tune either. All she wanted was to be left alone, but the temptation of remembering her drafts had bitch-slapped her. Damn it, I’m hooked on Evocane, and everyone knows it. I have to get out of here.
“I disagree,” Harmony whispered, but it lacked conviction, hurting Peri more.
“With what?” Standing in the aisle, Steiner swayed with the motion of the van. “That she would return to Heddles? Or that she would leave you for dead?”