Chapters (45)
- Cover
- Dedication
- Pulse
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY–ONE
- TWENTY–TWO
- TWENTY–THREE
- TWENTY–FOUR
- TWENTY–FIVE
- TWENTY–SIX
- TWENTY–SEVEN
- TWENTY–EIGHT
- TWENTY–NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY–ONE
- THIRTY–TWO
- THIRTY–THREE
- THIRTY–FOUR
- THIRTY–FIVE
- THIRTY–SIX
- THIRTY–SEVEN
- THIRTY–EIGHT
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- RESOURCES
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR
- What’s next onyour reading list?
“Perfect.” Maddie snapped on the light clipped to her bed, and Delia and Lucy both groaned. “I’ve been working on this all night.”
“Lit can wait until the morning,” Lucy said. “And if I’m saying that, even though the beta test is tomorrow, you know how very tired I must be. And I’m running out of concealer.”
“This isn’t about Lit.” Maddie climbed down from her bunk and plopped herself in the middle of the room. “It’s Pulse. It’s Ryan Thompson. Something’s not right.”
Lucy put a pillow over her head, muffling her words. “I swear, you mention Emma Santos, and I’m screaming bloody murder.”
“Emma?” Delia said. She and Eric had been doing a lot of their programming together. She’d always thought coding was a solo endeavor. But having someone to code alongside, to bounce ideas off of, and to brainstorm solutions with had shown her just how much she’d been missing and what she had to look forward to at a company, working as part of a team. And yet while she was able to spend time delving deeper into the complexity of database servers, Eric had been forced to learn more of the design elements. All while Emma’s “family emergency” seemed to be her need to play her guitar in dive bars, at least according to her Instagram. “You’re talking to Emma? The girl who left Eric’s team with some made-up excuse?”
“No, I’m not talking to Emma,” Maddie said. “I’m researching her. Because her Pulse shot up so fast, relatively speaking. I’ve compared her trajectory with a dozen others, and, Delia, I’d love your input since this is really your area of expertise, but it’s just not adding up. Things that should lift aren’t and things that shouldn’t are and it’s all—”
“A complete and utter waste of time,” Lucy said, tossing her pillow at Maddie. “You’re not even working on Lit? You’re keeping us up all night and you’re not even working on Lit? I swear, Maddie, I don’t understand what’s gotten into you.”
“It’s not me. It’s Pulse.” Maddie trailed her fingers through the shag rug. “You know, maybe I should reach out to Emma directly. There was this thing she wrote right after she left about Pulse having no heart or something. Sadie showed it to me. I checked her profile after I signed up for my account, but it’s not there anymore. But I know it was. So, I could contact Emma, or maybe even tweet something about Ryan and—”