Peri thought for a second, then unfisted her hands. “You mind if we go back and get my jacket? And maybe my boots?” She hesitated, a smile quirking her lips. “Put Jack on the couch. He has a coat that might fit you, too. Unless you want to go traipsing around Detroit in that.” She could stash the accelerator in their apartment safe, too. She wasn’t going to risk taking it into the streets with this woman.

Rachel’s expression eased, going from a calculating determination to a friendly acceptance. “That would be nice. Thanks.” She hesitated, then added, “I sure could use the help.”

You got that right, Peri thought, deciding that if things went wrong, she could text Bill to come pick up the wack job. The Packard Mall would be as good a place as any, and better than most.

Chapter 2

2

Peri’s grip on the wheel of her Mantis tightened as they drove sedately through Detroit’s night-slow streets to Packard Mall. Rachel wouldn’t stop fiddling with the vents, and it was getting on Peri’s nerves, the woman angling them just perfect to shift the stray strands of her red hair. It was far too long for a proper agent, and Peri was beginning to wonder who she had in her car. Rachel was an odd mix of confidence and curiosity. This is very bad for my asthma, Peri thought dryly, the inside joke having nothing to do with her health, and everything to do with her unease.

“What did you mean when you said I’m human?” Peri asked, trying to get Rachel to stop touching her car.

Rachel stiffened and sat back. “Nothing,” she said, flashing her an empty smile. “Forget it. This is a nice car. It’s electric? When did they start making them?”

“Since forever.” Peri slipped off the interstate, and Rachel watched the passing mix of green space and old Detroit, carefully preserved and protected, glittering in the dark. “But they only became popular the last decade or so when the CO2 levels became an issue. When your choice is getting an electric car or losing half your population to a site-specific virus engineered by the United Nations, you take the car.”

Again Peri’s grip tightened. She was glad she hadn’t been part of the team that had delivered the virus, decimating Asia’s population when an entire continent had thumbed their noses at the UN’s guidelines and therefore threatened the entire world. Bill’s claim that it was perfectly acceptable to reduce a population at random when they had randomly increased it had never sat well with her.