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“Just don’t go sacrificing yourself to save the world again. I’m not sure I could take it.”

Instead of replying, he craned his neck to look out the window behind the sofa. “I’m not seeing any gray guys. And there go Mac and McClusky. Let’s give it another half hour.”Advertisement

It ended up being more like two hours because both of us fell asleep snuggled together. It meant we had to creep home in the wee hours, but on the upside, anyone who’d been watching the building had long since given up by the time we left via our respective entrances.

Exhaustion from the late night made it a lot easier to play “normal” the next day, in spite of a higher-than-usual number of gray guys in and around the store. Mac and McClusky were in their usual spot in the park, and Earl was at work, so it looked like everyone had made it out okay.

The subsequent morning, as I passed the science fiction section on my way to the stairs, Earl stepped into the aisle and whispered, “We’re starting recon tonight.”

I nodded, then out of the corner of my eye I noticed a gray guy watching us, so I said, “I think the flavor of the day is snickerdoodle spice, but I’m not sure.”

Earl replied, “Oh, I was hoping for pumpkin.”

“That one may be tomorrow. See you!” I fought not to let my eyes focus on the gray guy as I brushed right past him.

If the elves were starting on their part of the plan, then we needed to get going on ours. We had to be on the lookout for anyone who might have been taken after us who might know more about what was going on. Unfortunately, I didn’t see anyone who looked familiar come through the coffee shop. Dan was the only MSI person I was sure of, and he’d only come the once.

I went to Perdita’s café for lunch to find out if she’d discovered anyone else. She leaned on the counter and ticked off her revivals on her fingers. “Let’s see, there were two ex-boyfriends, but neither of them knew anything—about any plots or about anything else, if you know what I mean. My next-door neighbor here is my cousin, but I think they got him when they got me. I dated the guy who runs the grocery store on the corner. I also dated the guy at the cleaners. Not quite to boyfriend status, but the kiss still worked. Who knew that would be my superpower? Anyway, they seemed to get here just for working for MSI.” She smiled and added, “And I think my future ex-boyfriend is part of your group. He stopped by to introduce himself.”

“Your future ex?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

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“My relationships never work out, but I want this guy.”

“Yeah, I guess Brad is pretty hot,” I said.

“Brad? No, I meant Earl.”

“Earl? Really?”

“What? He’s cute, seems smart, and he’s not at all my type, which means it might actually work.”

“Well, good luck. He is nice. You don’t mind playing messenger?”

“I love it! And, hey, anything that gets us out of here, right?”

After lunch, I updated Owen, and he said, with no enthusiasm, “I suppose I’d better update Mac.”

Taken aback, I said, “Why? You don’t report to him. I’m the leader of this little movement.”

“But it’s a sign of good faith if I’m not withholding information.”

“Seriously? You’re really going to keep updating him, even though he has no official authority over you, here or anywhere else? If he’s such a good monitor, let him figure it out for himself.”

Looking pained, he said, “It doesn’t work that way.”

“If you’re going to tell him everything I tell you, then I’m going to start treating you like any other member of the group and keep things on a need-to-know basis.” My words came out a little more harshly than I intended, considering my main gripe was with Mac and his bosses, not with Owen.

But Owen didn’t seem to take offense. He nodded and said, “Yeah, that’s probably the best policy. If I don’t know anything, I can’t share it. Only tell me what I need to know to do my part.”

“Okay, then,” I said, my anger fizzling from the lack of opposition. It was hard to fight with someone who was agreeing with me. “I was thinking of trying to find MSI people tonight—just going out and about. Maybe we’ll run across Dan again. There’s got to be some point behind an operation this elaborate, and if we know that, we might get somewhere.”

With a tentative smile, he said, “That seems like a minor enough development that I don’t have to share it.” pqdm.com