Lin steps in and glances down at my left wrist. “You too, huh?” Then she bear-hugs me, which is interesting since she’s shorter and narrower than I am. It’s a little like being bear-hugged by a Barbie doll.

“Me too,” I say, laughing and crying at the same time.

After what seems like an hour, she releases me from her clutch and steps back. “You’re exactly the same. Maybe even younger-looking.”

“Well, it’s amazing what a year off of working for you has done,” I say.

The humor doesn’t work. She shakes her head and raises a hand, thumb and forefinger a fraction of an inch apart. “I was this close to going to Malaysia to visit my family. This close.” Her fingers fly apart into a starfish as she blows out air. “Gone. Gone in a bloody day.”

“You sound like the queen,” I say. “Except for that bloody part.”

“Don’t kid yourself. Even QE2 knows how to curse. Speaking of which, did anyone tell you about the latest model of wrist monster?” When she says this, it comes out like “mon-stuh,” r-less and elegant.

“They didn’t just tell me about it.” I explained my eight-hour experience with the upgrade. “If I’d had to read that manifesto shit once more, I would have cut out my own tongue.”

She perches on the desk, one bare leg swinging in the air, and lowers her voice after checking the door. “You know they’ll put them back on, Jean, don’t you? As soon as we finish.”

“We don’t have to finish right away,” I say, my back to the door. “Even if we can, we don’t have to.” I pick up the silk scarf. “Tell me you haven’t started wearing this on your head.”

“What do you think?”

I think that’s—in Lin’s terms—about as bloody likely as a pig with wings, and I tell her so, which gets a laugh.

Then she’s serious again. “We need to do something, Jean. Something besides working on the Wernicke project.”

“I know. How about we reverse the serum and spike the White House’s water supply?” I say this knowing it’s even less likely than Lin walking around with a head scarf and a Pure pin on her collar.

“Now, there’s an idea,” she says. I can’t tell whether her voice carries a hint of sarcasm or approbation.

She hops up and takes my arm. “Let’s go get an espresso before Morgan the Moron comes back.”

“They have an espresso machine here?” I say, letting her lead me out of the office and down the gray corridor. All the workstations and offices we pass are empty.

“No. But Lorenzo has his little coffee maker.”

Oh boy.

Chapter Twenty-six

TWENTY-SIX