“Actually, no one’s in that office right now,” he replied. “The suite is vacant.”

“Do you know for how long?”

“Almost a year.”

“Was Eve Brier the previous tenant?” I asked. “Is it possible she moved?”

“Not according to my records. I ran the name, and there’s no Eve Brier in any other space inside the building. It doesn’t look like there ever was. I’m sorry, sir. She’s not here.”

I thanked him and walked away. Eve had no phone; she had no office in Hancock Center. I should have expected that her world had changed, just as everyone else’s had, but I was genuinely shocked to realize that she wasn’t here. Not just shocked—afraid. I was under the spell of her therapy, and she was gone.

I sat down in one of the lobby chairs and used my phone to run searches for Eve Brier.

For her psychiatric practice.

For her medical school and degree.

For her lectures.

For her bestselling book about Many Worlds and Many Minds.

For Eve Brier herself, with her swirls of highlighted brown hair and her distinctive, hypnotic eyes. If she wasn’t in Chicago, where was she? If she wasn’t living her life, what was she doing?

She had to be out there somewhere, but I found nothing. There was no record of Eve Brier, doctor, psychiatrist, philosopher, author. There was no record of Eve Brier anywhere, no one who even looked like her. She’d left no footprints in this world.

As far as I could tell, she didn’t exist.

I got up from where I was sitting. As I stood in the lobby, the Lucent sculpture engulfed me again. I found myself lost in its thousands of lights and endless reflections, and then my eyes focused on a single star among the many. That was me, one insignificant point of light, lost somewhere in an infinite number of universes.

Infinite.

I heard the word in my head.

All I had to do was say it. That was my way out. Roscoe had told me it would be better if I just went home, but I hadn’t finished what I’d come here to do. There was a Dylan Moran in this city who had already killed twice. Karly was alive and in his sights, and I had to save her.

Eve Brier couldn’t help me.

I was going to have to navigate this world on my own.

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 20

From downtown, I drove back to Northwestern.

I retraced my steps in the light of day to the residence hall where Karly lived, but like last night, I stopped before going inside. This wasn’t the way to approach a stranger. All I would do was alarm her. Instead, I needed a meeting with her that was innocent and accidental.