3:59

THIRTY-FOUR

4:10 P.M.

JOSIE COULDN’T CONTROL THE TEARS AS SHE raced back to Bowie. They poured down her cheeks, stinging her eyes and blinding her as she drove. She didn’t care about the speed limit. She didn’t care about her own safety. All she could think about was getting her mom out of that horrible place. Stat.

But a special agent she was not, and the security at Old St. Mary’s Hospital was like breaking into Langley. There was no way Josie could just waltz in there, overpower a few armed military guards, and carry her mom out.

The image of her mom—emaciated, tortured, and desperate to keep Josie out of harm—was burned into her brain. Her mom had always been so strong, physically and mentally, and to see her broken like that was devastating. Josie wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and tried to calm down. She had to focus her mind. She had a problem; she needed to find a solution. It was that simple.

She had to find a way if she was going to save her mom.

Okay, so if she couldn’t break into Old St. Mary’s Mission: Impossible style, she’d have to find another way to get her mom out. Who was the most logical person to do that?

Dr. Cho.

Josie set her jaw as she thought of the fake kindness in Dr. Cho’s face. She wanted to shove her into a room with the Nox and lock the door. A taste of her own medicine.

Still, Dr. Cho had the power to transfer Josie’s mom out of the hospital. But she’d have to want to do so. That was the only way.

How could Josie make that happen? She had no idea. She needed help.

Josie hit the hands-free button on her steering wheel and scrolled through the address book to Nick’s number. Come on, Nick. Please answer.

The phone barely rang before the voice mail picked up. “You’ve reached Nick’s cell phone,” his voice said. “You know what to do.”

Josie hung up before the beep. He might still have been at practice, but Josie remembered the warehouse. No cell phones there. Ever.

It was worth a shot. Josie needed to talk to him. She couldn’t wait.

It took some trial and error, but Josie was finally able to recognize the exit to the warehouse district. Nick’s route the other day had been so erratic, Josie was surprised she could re-create it at all, but she remembered train tracks, and she remembered the lonely off-ramp with no other buildings in sight. And it wasn’t too long before Josie found herself slowly driving down the abandoned street toward Nick’s off-the-Grid home away from home.

The roll-up gate was locked, and unlike Nick, Josie didn’t have a key.

So she knocked.

After a minute or so, she heard the sound of sliding metal. “Shit,” someone said under their breath. The gate rolled up partway, and Josie found herself face-to-face with Madison.

“What are you doing here?” she asked coldly.

“Looking for Nick,” Josie said.

“Nick’s not here.”

Yeah, like she was going to take Madison’s word for it. Josie gazed over Madison’s shoulder, trying to see if Nick’s SUV was in the parking area. “Any idea where he is?”

“Maybe you should try calling him. Phones are magical like that.”

Josie rolled her eyes. “He’s not answering.”

“Ever occur to you that maybe he just doesn’t want to talk to you?” Madison said with a half smirk.

“Ever occur to you that you’re a raging—”

“J-Jo?” Penelope shoved her head around the side of the wall.

“Damn,” Josie said with a side glance at Madison. “You guys don’t waste any time, do you?”

“Nick asked me to bring her over after school,” Madison said drily. “If it were up to me, neither of you would be here.”

Josie looked her straight in the eye. “Then I guess I’m lucky it’s not up to you.”

“Whatever.” Madison shoved the door. It rolled up so quickly it clattered to a stop, bouncing against the top of the frame from the violence of her push. “Get your car inside before someone spots it.”

Josie smiled as she climbed back into the black BMW. So Nick had overruled Madison on the issue of helping Josie get home. Considering what Josie assumed about their dating history, that was only going to make Madison hate her even more.

Madison relocked the gate but refused to acknowledge Josie’s presence, let alone talk to her as the three of them walked to the living-room area of the warehouse. It was almost ironic, really. The same anger Josie felt toward the Madison who had betrayed her, this Madison seemed to harbor for Jo. Was it all because of Nick? Suddenly, Josie’s and Jo’s realities seemed more parallel than ever.

Madison curled up on one of the sofas, arms crossed over her chest, staring into the recesses of the warehouse. Her hatred seemed to taint the air, and the whole atmosphere felt heavy and unwelcoming. Josie had viewed the warehouse as a safe haven, the only place in this world where she could actually be herself and not Jo. Without realizing it, she’d actually been looking forward to coming back to that place where people, regardless of whether they believed her, actually knew her secret. There was a sense of comfort in it that had now vanished in the face of Madison’s cold, impenetrable disgust, and despite herself, Josie yearned for Nick’s presence.

“So do I have this right?” Penelope said, breaking the uncomfortable silence. “You’re not actually Jo Byrne?”

“That’s right. I’m Josie.”

“Huh.” Penelope wasn’t quite convinced. She stood behind the table with a haphazard stack of books open in front of her, eyeing Josie with suspicion. Physics, quantum mechanics, string theory. Some were titles she recognized; some were completely foreign.

“Wow,” Josie said, examining one of the spines. “You have Feynmann here too?”

Penelope tilted her head to one side. “Yeah,” she said slowly, suspicion dripping from the long, drawn-out syllable.

Josie flipped through the book. “I’d never really thought about it before, but the laws of physics should—in theory—be uniform across both of our worlds. Which means the conclusions of science should be at least similar.”

“Einstein?” Penelope said. “Relativity?”

“E equals mc squared,” Josie recited.

“Quantum mechanics?”

“Copenhagen Interpretation or a many-worlds theory?” Josie asked quickly.

Penelope arched an eyebrow. “Unifying theories between the two?”

Josie smiled. “Too many to list. You want my favorite or should I give you the greatest hits?”

Penelope stared at her, eyes wide and gleaming in excitement, yet her face was still tense, her body closed off, and she stood angled toward the door as if she might make a break for it at any moment. She opened her mouth to say something, paused, then slowly scratched her cheek. Josie couldn’t help but smile.

“What?” Penelope said sharply. “Why are you smiling?”

“You’re scratching your cheek,” Josie said. “My friend Penelope always does that when she’s trying to figure out a problem.”

“Your friend Penelope?” Madison said with a breathy laugh. “That’s a good one.”

“Why?” Josie asked.

“Give it a rest,” Madison said. She shifted her position on the sofa to face Josie. “You’ve done nothing but bully Pen into doing your homework since sixth grade. Then when her dad lost his job last year, you promised you’d keep them off the No Access For Nonpayment list at the Grid, if she helped you pass physics. Not exactly the foundations of a friendship.”

“The Grid actually cuts people off for nonpayment? With the Nox out there?” Josie asked, horrified. “I thought Jo was just bluffing. What do you do if you can’t get power?”

Madison narrowed her eyes. “The shelters, duh. Like debtor’s prison for people who can’t afford to pay to keep the lights on.”

“We cut back on everything to keep up our Grid payments,” Penelope said softly. “Sold Mom’s car, shut off the cable, even cut back on food. We’re still barely making it.”

Josie felt sick. “That’s awful. Pen, I’m so sorry.”

“Sure you are.” Madison chortled. “Really sorry you have someone doing all your homework for you.”

Josie set her jaw. “Do I sound like someone who needs help with their homework? Or perhaps you’d like to explain the differences between the Heisenberg uncertainty principle and Schrödinger’s cat? Or riff on quantum field theory and how it might explain quantum gravity and, eventually, how the hell I ended up here in the first place?”

Madison shot to her feet. “I don’t care what words you memorized or how you’ve managed to fool Jackson and Nick and even Penelope over there.”

“Hey,” Penelope said, sounding hurt. “I’m in the room.”

Madison barreled on. “But you aren’t conning me with your sci-fi bullshit, okay? So give it a rest.”

“Just because you can’t wrap your brain around complex physics,” Josie said, “doesn’t mean it isn’t real.”

Penelope slapped her hand against the table. “Enough. Both of you.”

Her voice was so forceful it caught Josie off guard. She’d never so much as heard Penelope raise her voice, let alone snap at her. Madison must have had the same reaction. Both of them sat back and stared at Penelope.

“Good,” Penelope said, slightly out of breath. “You didn’t bring me here to referee, did you?” Her voice squeaked and her face was flushed pink.

Josie laughed. She couldn’t help it. “No.”

“That’s what I thought.” Penelope cleared her throat and took a deep breath. Josie watched with some amusement as Penelope muttered under her breath, as if she needed to calm herself down, then lifted her chin and smiled. “Now should we talk about quantum gravity?”

There was something inexplicably hilarious about Penelope’s statement. Just the facts, plain and simple. Josie was trying hard to suppress her laughter, struggling to keep the giggling under wraps. She looked up and saw that Madison was smiling too, her body jerking every second as she tried to keep from erupting into laughter as well.

Madison caught Josie’s eye and as the two girls looked at each other, Josie felt the tension between them ease. She wasn’t sure if she’d earned a smidgen of respect or if Madison was just tired of fighting, but with an almost imperceptible nod of her head—a cease-fire in the heat of battle—Madison swung around and got to her feet.

“I guess quantum gravity it is.”