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“I never said she was wrong.” Allen hunched over the schematics. “What’s the plan? Wait until Michael goes in, then use the building to contain him until we can bring him down?”
Harmony crossed her arms over her middle as if expecting him to protest. “That’s it.”
That’s it, Peri thought. They were going to die. All of them. “Michael has been known to draft up to a minute,” she said, not knowing why she was telling Harmony this. They could use everything she said to capture her as well. “If you don’t have Amneoset, you’re going to have to dart him with the sedative when he’s rewriting time. Otherwise, he’ll just draft his way out of it.”
“Rewrite,” Harmony echoed, eyes on a cracker as she carefully snapped it in two and ate the smaller piece. “What difference does it make?”
Allen chuckled and went back to flipping through the schematics, and Peri was satisfied that he’d find a way out when it all hit the fan. “You can’t draft within a draft, so a rewrite is the only span of time you have to make something stick,” she said, thinking Harmony should know this already. “You dart him with anything other than Amneoset, and Michael will simply rewrite time to avoid getting hit, and that includes being shot. Amneoset is wicked fast, but a sedative takes time before it shuts down the ability to draft, and that’s all he needs.”
“And that, Agent Beam,” Allen said distantly, stylus between his teeth, “is why Steiner wanted me here.” He looked up, taking the stylus out. “I’m the only one besides Peri who can tell you when you’re in a rewrite. It’s not hard to bring down a drafter when the timing is right. Unfortunately, you’re a three-dimensional person, and only someone who can see in four has a hope of bringing down someone who lives in four.”
Harmony brushed the crumbs from her, clearly trying to keep the distaste out of her expression. “Fine, so we sedate him during a rewrite. It shouldn’t be hard after that,” Harmony said, and Peri sighed. “You don’t agree?” Harmony said provocatively.
“Stopping a drafter from jumping doesn’t negate them,” Peri said. “It’s like shooting someone in the foot and expecting him to drop down dead.”
“No, we just fall down and roll around a lot,” Allen grumbled, eyes still on his tablet.
Harmony’s lips pressed together. “Then what do you propose we do?”
“Offhand? I don’t know,” Peri said honestly. “There’re too many variables, and I usually leave the planning up to my anchor. It’d be easier if I had something more lethal than an empty boot sheath, though.”
Her phone was buzzing, and Peri pulled it to her from across the table. Cam. Damn it, if Carnac had run off, she was going to be ticked.
“Go ahead and take it,” Harmony said as she stood. “I need to make a call.”
“I’m familiar with anything you have,” Peri offered, knowing Harmony was likely going to clear the ingoing assets with Steiner. “And Michael will be, too.” Shoulders tense, she muttered, “We aren’t just magic ponies.”
Motion stiff, Harmony made her way to the rear of the plane, settling herself in an aisle seat where she could watch everything, her phone already to her ear.
Smirking, Allen went back to the blueprints. “I don’t know why you have such a hard time making friends.”
“Hey.” Peri hit the connect button. “I’m not the one being stingy with the assets.” Hardly taking a breath, she said, “Hi, Cam. What’s up?”
“Good afternoon.” Cam’s cultured voice eased into her like melted chocolate, sweet, bitter, and addictive. “Should I let Carnac out if I won’t be awake to let him in until morning?”
“Ah, sure,” she said as Allen made a sad sound and focused on the intel. “Just make sure you leave a dish of water by your door.”
“The only reason I ask is that he didn’t come back last night when I called. He’s here now, but I’m worried he might try to go back to the coffeehouse.”
An unexpected heartache went through her at the missing rhythm of her coffeehouse, and she ate another cracker, not hungry. “If he came back once, he’ll come back again. You must be feeding him something he likes.”
“I took him into the store, and he picked it out.”
She could hear a coffee grinder, but it was low volume. He ground his own coffee? “You took him into the store?”
“Why not? People were taking their dogs in. And that’s another thing. The bag says half a cup per ten pounds of cat. He’s not eating it all.”
“You can leave it out,” she said, smiling from the mental image of Cam holding a cat up to the shelves and looking for a response. “He’ll eat when he’s hungry.”
“I thought so.” There was a slight hesitation, then, “What time zone are you in?”
“Huh?” Shocked, her eyes flicked to Allen, who’d caught the question as well.
“The only reason I ask is because I don’t want to call you at three in the morning. By the sound of it, your jet is too small to be going to the West Coast. Still Eastern?”
“Ah, Central.” Damn, he was good. “How—”
“I traveled a lot for a while. You get to know the sound of the engines. Are you okay? Need anything?”
Allen was silently laughing, and she made a face at him to keep quiet. “I’m fine,” she said, embarrassed. “It might take me longer than I thought, though.” Harmony was digging in a back locker, and the duffel bag she’d just dropped in the aisle held promise. “Ah, I’ve got to go,” she said, not liking that her pulse had quickened at the thought of some firepower. “Thanks again for watching Carnac. He means a lot to me.”
