“Whatever,” she said, running a hand along her body. “Apparently you’re not the only Harrison who wants this.”

“Ignore Lily,” Silas said. “She’s just trying to get a rise out of you.”

“It wasn’t Lily who told me.”

“Who?”

“He did,” she said, rolling away and facing the stars. Her speech was slowing under the blanket of Oxy. “Phil told me himself.”

“You’re lying.”

She sat up then, all the flirt drained clean out of her rage.

“Fuck you, Silas. Maybe I should be with him; maybe I chose the wrong brother. The weak one.”

“Sarah—”

“Fuck you!” she screamed so loudly that birds took flight.

Silas looked over his shoulder at the house, watching for a light to turn on. He checked the Watersons’ next door, but all windows stayed dark.

“Stop yelling,” he hissed. “They’ll find us.”

But she was done talking, he realized as she started to sit up. She was only going to be yelling now.

“Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck—”

Silas slapped a palm over her mouth, and her skull bounced the three inches back down to the float like a basketball.

“Shit,” he whispered, removing his hand almost as quickly as he had put it there. “Shit, are you all right?”

“Fuck you,” she said again, but at least she said it quietly.

—

SILAS HEARD A SPLASH and steadied himself on a tree, caught in the line between reality and memory. But the lake stayed dark. He reached again for the bottle, forgetting it wasn’t there. He wiped his hands on his jeans. His legs still vibrated from the bike, as if he were just another cricket in the dark.

“Phil,” he said to nothing, slamming his palm against the bark. “Goddamnit.”

Then he heard another splash, and there she was.

His wish that superseded all of his other wishes. The thing that would’ve saved them all. Sarah, leaving the water. Walking tall.

PEYOTE

RIGHT WHEN I RELEASED Cal, or rather, right as she broke, easily, from my grip, my tablet let out a series of insistent beeps.

I knew that sound.

One of my marks was disconnecting.

On the Fifth Floor, “disconnected” is the polite word for humans who die before we can sign them. Or maybe “polite” isn’t right. “Technical” would be better. Throughout my time in the Deals Department, millions of my targets had disconnected. But never once before had my heart gone anywhere in response, let alone to my throat.

Even before the screen loaded, I knew it was one of the Harrisons.

“Cal,” I said, tapping the screen, “I need to go.”

“What?”

“I know you have your own plan here, but I have another one. Just hear me out.”

Cal surprised us both by nodding, and I went on before she had time to change her mind.