JAYNEHELLER: Texas looks good. If we can get to Mexico, I think we’ll be all right. You keep them distracted for a few more days, and we’ll be just about ready to make a run for it. Cool?

EXTOJAYNE: I can do that. But let me know the details. I don’t want to do something that would get in your way.

JAYNEHELLER: You betcha.

Hey, Coin. What’s that over your shoulder?

Go ahead.

Look.

Twenty

The second report came from the lawyer in the morning, about half an hour before Aaron and Candace arrived.

I had cut the conversation with the fake Ex off after about fifteen minutes with the promise that I’d be in touch again soon. Afterward, it had been hard to sleep, so I didn’t drag myself out of bed until almost noon. My eyes felt gritty and my mind was stuffed with cotton, and the scent of Midian’s coffee was like the promise of spring in February. I struggled with last night’s square knot on my robe, gave up, and pulled on a pair of blue jeans and one of Eric’s white shirts. It was a little too sheer for polite company and the only bra I could find was way past laundry day, so I put one of his suit jackets on too.

Kim and Chogyi Jake were sitting across the kitchen table from each other, engrossed in a conversation about the relationship between parasitism and immaterial beings. It seemed to center on whether riders were really using people as a means to reproduce or if they had some other agenda. Midian took a look at me, chuckled like a chain saw, and poured me a cup of coffee.

“You still need new dishes, kid,” he said. “We’re eating off bakeware here.”

“I’ll get right on it,” I said.

Kim glanced at me, her expression closed and unreadable. Her hair was in place, her makeup perfect. I was willing to bet her bra was clean, and we’d lost her bag the day before. It was hard not to see the emptiness of her expression as criticism, and it stung a little. I’d thought we were working on being friends. But then I remembered her moment of candor at the hospital and her reaction to Eric’s voice. There was more going on than I knew about. I tried to keep my paranoia in check at least until the caffeine could work its way into my blood.

“Look,” I said. “There’s something I did that you guys should know about.”

I recapped Extojayne for Kim, then explained my plan to use the plant to mislead Coin. Chogyi Jake smiled all the way through it. I found myself wishing he would frown sometimes or express disapproval, just for variety’s sake. I topped off my cup.

“It’s a risk, but I think you’re wise to take it,” Chogyi Jake said.

“Thanks,” I said.

The doorbell rang, and Kim started at the sound. So did I, a little. Midian sighed.

“I’ll get the gun,” he said, but by the time we got to the door, the courier was gone.

The new report was as anonymous as its predecessor, but shorter. It was little more than an itinerary for Coin over the next seven days, starting with going to church tomorrow and ending with a concert next Friday night with a footnote disclaiming the reliability of the list, and pointing out that things change. Like I needed to be reminded of that.

“What about Tuesday?” Kim said. “He’s speaking at the convention center downtown. If we make our fake escape during that, we might be able to catch him coming out.”

“If he thought we were worth bothering with,” Midian said. “He might just send his bully boys.”

“Let me work on that with Extojayne,” I said. “If we make the cheese pretty enough, he might come out. It’ll take away some of his backup anyway. Are we sure about Tuesday night, or is there anything on the list that looks better? Where exactly is he supposed to be speaking?”

My cell phone went off. Kim only tensed at Eric’s voice this time. When I answered, it was Candace saying that she and Aaron were coming up the front door, and not to freak out.

Candace Dorn had changed from the first time I’d seen her. Her face looked stronger, more confident. She held herself with less reserve. It’s amazing how not having your boyfriend beating the crap out of you improves your appearance. Aaron, at her side, was a little under six feet tall with dark hair cut close, shoulders broad enough to build small townships on, and a demeanor that leaned in toward the world. Everything about him had me reaching for my license and registration.

I had my hand out to shake his, but he stepped inside my arm and lifted me up in a bear hug that had my ribs creaking. When he put me down, Candace echoed the gesture in a less painful way.

“I hope you don’t mind that I came too,” she said. “I’ve gotten to where I can stand to let him go to work, but this…after last time…”

“I totally understand,” I said. “Come in. Both of you. I have some people I’d like you to meet.”

Kim and Chogyi Jake greeted Candace and Aaron. Midian had the good taste to look uncomfortable, the only inhuman beast in the room. We sat in the living room, all six of us, and I launched into what felt like the hundredth retelling of the situation—the Invisible College, Eric, Coin, Aubrey, Ex, Extojayne, Chogyi Jake and Midian’s house arrest, the bullets designed to kill riders, the reports on Coin’s schedule, everything. I talked for twenty minutes, Chogyi Jake, Kim, and Midian interrupting occasionally to clarify one point or another, Candace and Aaron asking infrequent questions. Along the way, I started to notice something that unnerved me.

Without discussion or conscious intent, the room had divided. Candace and Aaron sat at the end of the couch, Kim leaning against the wall beside them, while Chogyi Jake sat at the far side of the hearth and Midian haunted the doorway that led to the kitchen. I remembered an image I’d seen in science classes—a cell pulling itself apart, dividing in two. Along one wall was the team I had assembled—Kim to work the magic, Aaron to provide the muscle and knowledge of violence, Candace to help however she could. Along the other, Midian and Chogyi Jake were the survivors of the team I’d begun with when I first dropped down this rabbit hole. Apart from giving advice and history and perspective, there was nothing for them to do. I was leaving them behind.

I didn’t want to.

“Seems like the first thing we ought to do,” Aaron said, “is drive his route. We know where he’s going to be Tuesday night. We know where he lives. It’d be a good idea to know what’s in between point A and point B, right?”

“I’d thought of that too,” I said, pulling myself back from the strange sorrow that had distracted me. “I printed out some MapQuest directions.” I pointed to them on the coffee table. “According to those, it’s about a twenty-minute drive from Coin’s place to the convention center. I don’t know that he’ll be taking the computer’s route, though.”

“That’s why you’ve got locals,” Aaron said with a grin. “We’ll figure it out. The bad guys have seen you and Kim?”

“Yes,” I said. “Not very well, though. The only one who really got a look at us was the one I kicked.”

“You two should sit in the backseat all the same,” Candace said. I must have looked surprised at her tone of voice, because she shrugged and went on. “It makes you harder to see. Basic tactics.”

I began to wonder if I’d underestimated the woman.

“All right,” I said. “I don’t know that it’s a plan, but it’s at least moving toward one. Give me a couple minutes to get presentable.”

Aaron nodded, but he was looking at the MapQuest printouts. Candace leaned over his shoulder, her brow furrowing.

“You don’t think he’d take Speer?” Candace said.

“I’d take Colfax and I-25,” Aaron said. “I don’t know why you’d want to keep to surface streets.”

“What about heading out Federal and going south?”

“Better than Speer,” Aaron agreed.

I snuck back to my room. I didn’t figure there was time for a shower, but I did my hair up in a bun and put on clothes that looked less like I was dressing myself out of Eric’s secondhand shop. Jeans, T-shirt, tennis shoes. I even dug up a mostly cleanish bra that wasn’t so dark it would show through the white of the tee. I hung my leather backpack on one shoulder and considered myself in the bathroom mirror. Halfway to respectable, me.