He ignored the command. “I can help. Let me come with you.”
Not happening. He had shown a level of interest in my friend that I was not comfortable with. I wanted the two kept as far from each other as possible.
“I don’t think so.”
I shoved the bike forward a step. He threw his weight against the handle bars, and I was forced to awkwardly dig one foot in, trying not to lose ground. Straddling the bike made this back and forth awkward on my end. I did not see good things for me if we kept up this shoving match.
“I can be an asset to you.”
“How do you think you can do that? You have no powers.”
“If someone would remove the cursed genie cuff, that wouldn’t be a problem.”
Push.
“Like that’ll help. Your first move would be to kill me. You’ll either forget about or torture Caroline.”
Shove.
“Not true. I think Caroline has a brain in her head worth preserving. Unlike you.”
He pushed the bike hard. I hopped back, trying to keep it from banging into me.
“Not happening.”
I shoved the front wheel into him.
“I could be your backup.”
“Again, you have no power. You’ll just be cannon fodder.”
He and I reached an impasse. He glared at me over the bike’s handlebars.
“It’ll take you at least twenty minutes to get there by bike.”
This was true.
He saw the acknowledgement on my face. He played his trump card. “I have a car.”
“Let me put the bike away.”
Chapter Seven
The Ohio State University campus was a sprawling monstrosity that intertwined seamlessly with the city of Columbus. Although there is a campus district, it is only called that because it houses the majority of the buildings that make up OSU. Most of the students live on the edges in homes and apartments that were at times historic or falling apart. Sometimes both.
In the center of it all is the William Oxley Thompson Memorial Library. The name was a mouthful but matched the intimidating four story beast made of glass and metal. Despite the huge size it wasn’t the only library on OSU, there were actually fifty four others, but it was the one that housed the rare book and manuscript collection, which is where I was willing to bet Caroline would be this late at night.
I didn’t have a student ID to get in so I had to trail another student while silently castigating them for holding the door for me. It wasn’t safe behavior. It didn’t matter how updated your security protocols were if you’ve got people ignoring those protocols.
He probably thought I was a decent looking woman with no signs of mental illness or inebriation. There was no way I could have anything up my sleeve, right?
The bad guys know how people think. If you look like you belong, then you must belong. They use that kind of thinking to their advantage. Next thing you know you have a security breach at best. If you’re really unlucky, you’ve got a murder or something worse on your hands.
The kid’s inattention worked to my advantage, and I was in too big a hurry to give him a lecture on safety. Not that he would have listened. Kids his age all thought the bad things happened to someone else. Never them.
I headed for the escalators, the sorcerer tagging along at my heels. I took them two at a time until I got to the floor containing the archive section. My pace was fast, worry eating at me with every step. From Peter’s silence, I could tell some of my worry had infected him. Maybe he did care about Caroline. Just a little bit. I still wasn’t letting him around her if I could help it.
The customer service desk was empty and banging on the little bell didn’t bring anyone running. Not even when the sorcerer pressed it and then kept right on pressing it, making an annoying cacophony.
