The fake police officers seemed stunned to be turned down, and it took a moment for them to walk away. I could hear them mumbling about whether they should break in anyway, that this was the perfect place for me to hole up and finish my snack. If they only knew… I tracked them back to their car—not a patrol car—and watched them drive away. Echolocation let me see that they truly did drive down the road.
“Time to—” I said as I turned back to Wiley, but a voice spoke over me.
“I don’t know who orwhatyou are,” a homeowner said from a speaker somewhere downstairs, “but you will leave my home immediately. If you don’t, I’ll send the footage of you breaking in to every wannabe journalist on social media. You’ll be trending in under an hour.”
Wiley gasped, but I merely chuckled. Did he think he was saving those officers’ lives? He was. But though I didn’t want my two faces appearing online—for if he had a speaker inside, he might also have cameras—I knew The Coalition would have that recording erased as soon as I let them know it existed.
“Time to go,” I repeated.
“Yeah.” Wiley was done dressing, the turquoise dress shirt and charcoal slacks too large on his lean frame. He wore startlingly white tennis shoes that were laced up tightly and carried a dark gray sweater. “Dude, get dressed!”
Since I would be in front of several officials before the day was over, I selected my clothing with care. Wiley had given me a pair of dark brown trousers, so I found the suit jacket tomatch and selected a cream-colored shirt, turquoise tie to match my mate, and… “Ah, how nice,” I said as I stole the man’s Ferragamo’s.
“Hamilton, I swear to god, we’re notshopping. This is anescape.Anotherescape.”
“Yes, dear.”
I didn’t want to burden him with what awaited us just yet since he was already agitated. “Why don’t you find the garage and see what car we should take?”
“What? We can’t steal one of the man’s cars,” he whispered harshly. “He’ll definitely post the video then.”
I finished dressing and came out of the closet. “Who would believe such footage in the age of AI? And if he shows this face, I’ll sue him for defamation. Besides, there are people who would remove anything revealing, if necessary.”
We headed down the stairs, Wiley following me. “Like hackers and stuff?”
“Something like that.” In truth, I thought they might be witches.
The garage was off the kitchen on the other side of a long wall of windows with morning sunlight streaming in. I reached out, letting my fingers touch the light to test my theory that the glass was laminated against UV rays.
“Fuck. Really?” Wiley asked, his eyes wide.
When my fingers didn’t burn, I continued toward the garage. “Really, but apparently, not here.”
“What about in the car?”
We entered the garage full of various vehicles. “Most modern cars have windshields that would protect me.”
“That’s good.”
“However, most modern cars also have apps that would let the owner disable them.” I pointed down the line to a gorgeous classic. “So we’ll take that one.”
Wiley snorted. “Oh, will we? A ’67 Ford Mustang? I’m pretty sure that dude didn’t want us to take his TV. You really think he’s going to be cool with losing a car that sold at auction two weeks ago for a hundred eighty thousand?”
I paused in looking through the keys hanging on the wall by the door to pan over and stare at him. “You know this how?”
“Don’t get snotty. I like old cars.”
I selected the very clearly labeled set of keys and handed them to him. “Then you can drive.”
His face instantly brightened. “Seriously?”
“Of course.” Especially since I was more used to being driven and should, in fact, ride in the back to minimize my sun exposure anyway.
“Oh my god,” he practically giggled before running down to the shining cobalt-colored car. He had it started and the engine purring before I could dash to catch up with him. “It’s like that, huh?” he said when I squeezed into the back seat.
“Head North, Jeeves. Toward Parnell.”
“Yes, sir! Right away, sir!” He drove us out to the center of the garage, heading for the closed door. “Oops, forgot to open the door.”
