“What happened?”
“We’re short on bellhops today. It’s a madhouse. I’ve been delivering food all morning.”
Amanda looked over the cart. “Are you sure this is our order? Those drinks—”
“I threw in the complimentary mimosas as our way of saying sorry. If you don’t want them—”
“No, that’s fine. My sister loves those.”
Evan smiled. “Well then I hope you and your sister have a wonderful brunch.”
As Amanda processed him with her sharp green gaze, he fought the urge to rewind and start over. But soon she passed him a twenty-dollar tip and then pulled the cart inside. Evan grinned all the way to the elevator until he realized the bitch never once looked at his name tag.
Twelve minutes later, he sat on the balcony of his Tower Five rental, listening to Zack and Amanda’s giddy banter in his earpiece. When Evan first discovered they were staying in the Baronessa Suite, he rewound two days and became its previous occupant. Tiny listening devices were concealed in various parts of the living room, the balcony, and of course Hannah’s bedroom.
The hardest part of Evan’s week was having to once again hear her dulcet moans of pleasure, each one a pinch of salt in a very old wound. But he knew her fling with Theo never lasted long or ended well. Evan had only seen two men pierce the formidable shell around Hannah’s heart. He’d already killed one of them. The other would crash her life next year, with deliciously tragic consequences.
Evan had been wiping the makeup off the back of his hand, scrubbing his “55” tattoo back into visibility, when Hannah smashed her first flute glass. He launched forward with the binoculars, hoo-hooing and oohing as the sisters traded angry barbs. When the second glass cracked across Amanda’s forehead, Evan squealed with delight. This was a thing of beauty, a moment so perfect that he had to watch it six times.
His smile vanished when Amanda’s tempic hand knocked Zack off the balcony. Evan shot to his feet now, staring in alarm as Zack lost his grip and fell. Screaming, Amanda threw herself against the railing and launched a tempic arm at Zack. She caught him at the fifth floor.
Evan closed his eyes and moaned with hot relief. He didn’t want to reverse such a beautiful chain of events, but he would have done it to save Zack. The cartoonist was the focus of Evan’s next mission. More than that, he was a friend.
—
Amanda’s mind howled with chaos, a fire in a crowded theater. Panicked thoughts trampled each other on the way to her mouth as her body twisted painfully over the railing. Her hands were submerged in an enormous white arm, fifty feet long and as thick as a manhole cover. She could feel Zack’s body in her thoughts, resting limp and unconscious in her titan grip.
“I got him. I got him. Oh my God.”
David pressed up against her backside, holding her in place. “Okay. Good. Good, Amanda. Now you have to bring him back.”
“It’s not working! I can’t control it!”
“Yes you can,” said David. “Concentrate.”
Six weeks ago, Sterling Quint’s physicists had attempted to gauge the limits of Amanda’s tempic talent. Her creations took an increasing amount of willpower to maintain. At sixty seconds, it felt like squeezing a tight fist. At two minutes, it felt like squeezing a tight fist around thumbtacks. Czerny had stopped the endurance test at 148 seconds, when Amanda began to cry and bleed from her nose.
David laid his hands on Amanda’s wrists. She could feel the giant arm contract.
“What are you doing? David, how are you doing that?”
“I’m not doing anything,” he said. “It’s all you. Just keep focusing.”
Theo fumbled his way up the side of the hot tub, throbbing with pain. He yanked a small shard of glass from his thigh, then looked to Hannah. The actress lay motionless on the floor.
Amanda turned her head as much as she could. “Theo! Are you okay? Is Hannah okay?”
“Concentrate on Zack!” David yelled.
Theo took an anxious reading of Hannah’s pulse and future, then exhaled at the presence of both.
“She’s all right. She’s okay.”
“Don’t move her. She could have a broken—”
Amanda screamed when Zack slipped in her grasp. David seethed at her.
“Goddamn it, Amanda! If you care about him . . .”
“I do! I’m sorry!”
Theo looked to the patio doorway, where Mia stood frozen in dread. Her inner voice chanted Zack’s name over and over.
“Mia . . .”
The urgent note from the future still dangled from her fingertips, warning her of Evan’s drugged cocktails. If only she’d seen it sooner . . .
“Mia!”
She snapped out of her daze. Theo jerked his head at the living room.
“Security’s coming. We need to go fast. Gather as many bags as you can carry. Leave the stuff we don’t need. Can you do that?”