“I’ve seen him, too. That’s why I need your help.”

“Look at me. I can’t do anything.”

“You can send me after him,” I told her.

Eve stared nervously into the shadows. On the street behind us, headlights came and went in the alley. “I wasn’t always like this, you know. In college? I had a 4.0. University of Chicago, summa cum laude. Totally clean. No alcohol, no weed, no nothing. I went to medical school, and I was good, really good, but you can’t imagine the stress. You’re exhausted all the time. I needed something to keep me going, and a guy in the lab hooked me up. It was just supposed to be the one time, to get me through a rough patch, but the pills sucked me in. I tried so many times to stop, but I wasn’t strong enough.”

“I’m not blaming you, Eve.”

“Except you know a different me, don’t you?” she said. “One with a better life.”

“Yes.”

“How do you know her?”

“She wrote a book about the Many Worlds.”

“And why do you care about that?”

“Because of the other Dylan,” I said. “He came to my world and destroyed my life.”

“He destroys everything.”

“How do you know him?”

“I saw him on one of my rides. I do it a lot, you know. Ride. I was spying on one of my doubles in the park, and I saw him talking to her. I could see there was something wrong about him. Something bad. I don’t know how I knew, but I knew. So after they split up, I followed him. I saw him go into the park that night, and he met this woman and—oh, my God.”

She wrapped her arms tightly around her chest.

“Since then, I’ve seen him half a dozen more times in other worlds. I see the things he does. It’s always the same. He’s a killer.”

“I know.”

“The last time, he spotted me watching him. He recognized me. He knew I’d seen him, and he came after me. I had to say the escape word to get away.” Eve shivered. Her fingers twitched. “Since then, I’m afraid that wherever I go, he’ll find me. But I need to ride. I can’t stay here. I have to get away from this life, you know? It’s too much. I can’t take who I am.”

I grabbed both of her hands. “Eve, I want to stop this other Dylan. I never want him to hurt anyone else. I came here to do that, but I failed. He got away. Now I want to go after him again, but I need your help. I need you to get me to the Many Worlds again.”