“I beg your pardon?”

“Don’t fuck with me. You know what I’m talking about.”

My hands closed in reflex over my knees. The right one hurt.

He saw it; it made him happy again. “Well, shit, Myra and Dusty work for me, you know. When Franny had her little joke on Myra the other night, don’t you think Myra would’ve told me?”

“She told you who it was?”

“She didn’t have to. Dusty told me some of the stuff Myra said when she wasn’t Myra, and I knew right off. There ain’t anybody jaws on like that but Franny.”

That didn’t explain how he knew someone had come up with me, or how he knew I wasn’t really there to sell A.A. Albrecht a faked videotape. The only thing that did -

“I expect she’s listening at a keyhole,” Tom said cheerfully. He stared at me as he added, louder, “So, Fran? You come in here, or I’m gonna break this kid’s neck. You know I can.”

Maybe she wouldn’t care. But I thought I ought to tell her, at least, that he hadn’t started yet. “I’d hate that,” I said. “Besides, you haven’t finished my hand.” Stall. You’ve lost the advantage of surprise, Frances. At least pick your moment.

“Thatagirl,” Tom called out, “come on in and have a seat. Hell, we got us enough folks for a party.”

I twisted around on the couch. The door beside Cassidy swung slowly open to admit Frances, alone, with her pistol. Why hadn’t she shot — ah, of course. She wasn’t here to kill Tom’s body. The head fight had begun already; I could see it in Frances’s tight-closed lips, the net of squint lines around Tom’s eyes.

I wanted desperately to know the range of a Horseman’s powers. Because I’d thought of another solution to the problem of isolating Tom Worecski. Frances could eliminate Tom’s options for switching bodies. Bang, bang, bang. Bang. Maybe she’d meant to all along, and it was my bad luck I’d ended up here, as one of Tom’s options.

“Someone gave us away,” I said to Frances.

“I was beginning to think someone must have. Everything was going according to plan.” She kept her eyes, and the pistol, on Tom.

By logic, someone in the room ought to have wrenched it out of her hand by now. No, if anyone approached her, anyone who wasn’t Tom, she could shoot. Tom could order one of them to get the gun. I began to think I ought to be doing something besides sitting and watching, but what could I do? I wasn’t supposed to be there. I wasn’t part of this fight. It had nothing to do with me. I was caught between the two of them.

“Go sit beside your friend, babe,” Tom said, and Dana let go of him. Her face, when she had her back to Tom, was vacant with fear. She sat down close to me and clung to my sleeve, where Tom couldn’t see it.