“Then it would keep us out too,” Theo says.
“Well, okay. But still, there’s something here we’re missing. Wyatt is the only person with any chance of helping us figure out what that is.” I take a deep breath as I resume walking. “Except Mom and Dad. But we can’t tell them.”
“Because we still might have to saw them off at the knees.” Theo says it dully. “Moving on. Found this dimension’s Paul yet? I went through the whole Columbia student directory, and nada. He could be at Cambridge—”
“He’s in New York. I don’t know what he’s doing besides grad school, but he’s here. I sent him a Facebook message saying mutual friends wanted to fix us up.” I take my phone out of my leather backpack to check it. But the Facebook app has nothing more to offer me than a lot of FarmVille updates. Apparently I’m really into FarmVille here. Kind of sad. “He’ll write back. Probably.” Maybe I should have put up a hotter profile pic.
But Theo says, “Of course he’ll write. He’ll be freaked out as hell, but you know Paul. He can’t stand having incomplete data.”
“You’re right. He’ll have to know.” The thought soothes my raw nerves. I’ll find Paul here; it won’t be much longer. Another day, or maybe two. I can handle that.
“So,” Theo says. “Josie and Wyatt Conley. There’s not enough WTF in the world.”
“Nope. But at least we know where Conley’s vulnerable.”
“You think that’s true at home too? I mean, come on. They hardly know each other there.”
True. Yet I can’t forget how Josie’s always joked that she thought Wyatt Conley was hot; maybe she wasn’t joking. And now that I think about it, Conley’s always managed to avoid meeting Josie face-to-face. Before it simply seemed unlucky. Now I can’t help wondering if he avoided her on purpose because he knew she was a weakness he couldn’t afford.
Slowly, I nod. “Yeah, I do.”
Theo shrugs. His hipster-tight jacket crumples a bit at his shoulders, but that’s all part of the look. “That’s going to make for some interesting investigations back home. But for tonight, we try to talk with Conley about this without coming across as total lunatics. Tomorrow—I guess we go ahead and load the virus into your parents’ data.”
Although my heart aches, I can’t think of another way to successfully fake that sabotage. “Yeah, we’d better.”
If I told my parents the truth, they might help us; probably they’d play along just to stop anyone from attempting to dominate the dimensions. But I’m still heartsick to think that we didn’t really carry out Conley’s plan in the Warverse. I offered Paul that deal because we had no other choice, which means there’s always a chance Conley will figure out the truth. If he does, God only knows what will happen to Paul.
I can’t take that chance again. No, this time we have to play by Conley’s rules.
Finally we approach the hotel Josie mentioned. Its brilliant sign glows gold in the night, at least two stories high. “Looks pretty swanky,” Theo says, gesturing at the twin waterfalls on either side of the front door.
“Like Conley would stay anywhere else,” I sigh. “Come on, let’s—”
I hear the shriek of brakes just behind me, and whirl around, expecting to see a cabdriver getting into an accident. Instead, a black van runs up onto the curb before it skids to a halt.
Two men garbed in black, including ski masks that cover their faces, jump out and run in my direction—and I realize the person in trouble here is me.
Theo doesn’t even hesitate. He charges, only to have one of the guys slam a fist into the side of Theo’s head. Instantly he crumples to the sidewalk.
I turn to run, but a hand closes around my arm as tight as a vise. Even as I twist away, trying to scramble out of his grasp, someone else hoists me over his shoulder. I scream as loud as I can, which is when a black bag covers my head.
“Help!” I shriek. Someone’s got to hear me through the bag, right? I try kicking at my captor, but he’s running—and then there’s a dizzying kind of spin as he throws me into the van. I kick out with both feet, going for the bag with my hands, but my arms are yanked down, and someone very heavy sits on my legs. Oh God, oh God, what’s happening?
I hear Theo shout, “Marguerite! What— Police! POLICE!”
The van door slams shut, and my blood turns to ice.
I’m being kidnapped. Abducted. Taken against my will.
Again I scream, wordlessly, but it does no good. We accelerate so fast that I roll over and hit the side of the van, and once again, tires squeal against asphalt. I feel a plastic zip tie tighten around my wrists, and then someone does my legs. Thrashing, I try to shake off the bag, but two large hands push my shoulders down onto the floor of the van.
“Listen to me,” says a heavily accented voice. “You get that bag off, you see our faces. You see our faces, you don’t get to go home again. Maybe you like that bag now, huh?”
I hate the bag. But I’m keeping it on.
My heart pounds so hard it feels like my chest will crack. Tears well in my eyes, and I’m so scared I think I’m going to wet my pants.
Never let them take you to a second location. That’s what all the self-defense classes say. It doesn’t matter if someone holds a gun on you, you do not let them take you to a second location, because if they’d kill you where you stand, they’ll kill you wherever you’re going, except they’ll have control of you for hours or days before you die, and you Do. Not. Want. That.
Will they rape me? Will they kill me? My mind seems to have shattered into something that can only show me the thousand horrible things that might be about to happen. That are probably going to happen. All the dangers of traveling through dimensions, and yet I never thought about how the same dangers from my own world might be the ones that killed me.
The Firebird, I remind myself. You’ve got the Firebirds. If I can manage to touch it at some point, even with my wrists bound, I might be able to leap out of here. But then that leaves this Marguerite to suffer a terrible fate—and means Wyatt Conley might decide I’d broken our deal. What would happen to Paul then?
Paul wouldn’t want me to get hurt for his sake. I know that. But I’m not leaving him behind in this universe unless I have no other choice.
It seems like we drive forever. The van bumps and jostles me constantly, even though the guys continue holding me down; they talk the whole time, in what I’m increasingly sure is Russian, but in a dialect I’m not familiar with. Maybe my weeks in St. Petersburg will kick back in, and help me to understand them a little. All I know for sure is that we go over a bridge—the rhythmic thump-and-click unmistakable—and then keep driving for a long time more.
When the van comes to a halt, my pulse intensifies to the point where my chest hurts. I might be about to throw up. I don’t want to throw up in the bag. My brain seizes on that—don’t puke, don’t puke—because it seems like the only part of this I might be able to control. Once again, I’m hauled over someone’s shoulder and carried down a short set of stairs. Metal doors swing shut behind us; I hear locks being turned.
This isn’t some random vacant lot or warehouse. This is a space designed to be secure, and secret. Oh, my God, is this human trafficking or something?