“I’ll buy you a cake pop.”
“Fine.” David stomped across the apartment, grabbed his keys from where they hung near the door. “Anything to keep you from pining. Let’s go.”
“Yaaaay.”
Amie insisted they take her normal route to Eons. Despite Ziya’s hasty departure that morning, she was feeling good. It was Friday, her fourth day out of the time loop. She’d had three whole days A.L. to refamiliarize herself with experiencing a new day every twenty-four hours. Granted, she’d spent a significant part of those days investigating a murder, but she was still refamiliarizing while doing so. And other than almost walking into the path of a bicyclist and refusing to jaywalk (David waited patiently on the opposite curb until the crosswalk light turned white), she handled the trip like someone who’d done it seven hundred and sixty-ish times before.
“Well?” David asked as they sat down—him with his promised cake pop, Amie with her bagel and tea. “Did you think it over?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“Are you sure you want me to answer that?”
David looked unsurprised. “I guess not.”
“I’m gonna be careful,” Amie insisted. “You saw how I was back at the crosswalk. I’m not taking any more risks.”
“Until you find yourself dangling from a balcony three stories up,” David reminded her.
Amie scrunched up her nose in acquiescence. “Okay, fair point.”
“I really do believe I’m not a suspect anymore,” David said, unwrapping his cake pop. “Elena tracked me down to inform me that the police think Savannah interrupted a robbery.”
“Yeah,” Amie said absently, splitting her bagel in half.
David narrowed his eyes at her. “Did you already know this?”
“Huh?”
“Did you already know that the police think Savannah was killed because she interrupted someone mid-robbery?”
“Oh, uh …” Amie couldn’t see any way of getting around it. “I might’ve … heard something about that.”
Not seeming to notice (or, more likely, care) about Amie withholding information from him, David gestured at her with his cake pop. “Then there’s nothing to worry about. I’m in the clear. You can drop this investigation with a clean conscience. I’ll be okay.”
Amie took a bite of her bagel to avoid responding.
“Unless you have another reason to be doing this,” David said, studying Amie’s face. “Is it Ziya? Are you still trying to impress her?”
“Wub?” Amie asked through a mouthful of bread and cream cheese. She swallowed. “No. I’m not trying to impress Ziya.”
“So what is it? Why won’t you let this go?”
Amie shrugged. “I’m … bored?”
David made an incorrect buzzer sound. “Try again.”
“Why do I need a reason?” Amie demanded. “Maybe I just want to figure it out for my own curiosity!”
“That’s even more difficult to believe, somehow.” David’s shoulders slumped. “You still feel guilty.”
“No,” Amie said, far too fast to be convincing.
“I thought we talked about this.”
“We did.” Amie put down her bagel, crossing her arms self-consciously. “You told me it wasn’t my fault that I never managed to stop Savannah’s murder despite being giventwo yearsof attempts, and I appreciated you saying that, but realized it’s an undeniablefact that I was given far too many chances to save her and because I am the way that I am, I didn’t take any of them.”
