Free Sideswiped by Kim Harrison

sleep.
    Sighing, he swung his feet to the floor, reaching for his phone to see what time it was.
    â€œThree forty-five?” he whispered, knowing she probably hadn’t slept at all.
    Fatigue weighed him down as he rubbed his hand over his bristles and collected himself. Summer had been closed off and silent after Allen and Peri had left, depressed but not resigned. He loved her resilience and refusal to give up. Standing, he looked at her empty side of the bed, vowing that wouldn’t become permanent. They complemented each other too well. Tonight had proved it. Together, he and Summer could do more than he could ever do alone. It was more than her needs being a muse to his jumps of thought. She excelled where he faltered, and he excelled . . . well . . . Summer was good at everything Opti prized in their agents.
    Maybe that was the problem , he thought as he scuffed his way to the living room.
    Summer looked up as the door opened, her short hair catching the glow of her laptop in the otherwise darkened room. No, it was his tablet.
    â€œWhat are you doing up?” he said, voice rough from sleep, and she smiled, eyes bright with possibilities.
    â€œI think I have it,” she said, and he sat down beside her on the couch, liking how his weight slid her into him.
    But she shifted back, the excitement of discovery in her. “I’ve been looking at the data you got from the double-draft,” she said, and he squinted down, blinking through the glare. “Everything indicates that you’re right, that we’re not going back in time, but sideways, creating a temporary secondary existence for those within our reach, sort of like a closed oxbow of time.”
    â€œYeah?” He was too tired to think, and he reached for the tablet. Summer wouldn’t let go, and they slid together so they could both hold it. The thin fabric of her nightgown was almost not there, and he forced his attention back. “I could use some good news,” he added, but data supporting his theory was only half the battle. He had to prove it.
    â€œLook here,” she said, slim finger pointing at the three-dimensional graph on the screen. “The gravity sink parallels an individual drafter’s physical reach, and the Doppler shift is a direct correlation with the span of time we impact. You couldn’t see it until there was a double-draft. There wouldn’t be a gravity sink that large unless we were going sideways, creating a new reality that we drag back with us using the Doppler shift resonance echoes as a guide. And if you are moving sideways, not back, then you can do a long draft and change something beyond a drafter’s natural reach. Time is an artifact of distance moved, not the other way around. This proves it, Silas. You did it!”
    Summer was hugging him, and he blinked fast, pulse quickening as he lurched to keep his tablet from hitting the floor when she let go of it.
    â€œThis changes everything,” she said, positively glowing. “You’ll have all the clout you need to do whatever you want. Professor Milo can eat your silicon dust,” she said. “Silas,” she exclaimed, giving him a shake. “Say something!”
    A slow smile spread across his face, and he stared at the data, torn between studying it and holding her. “We only have this one data pool,” he said. “I’ll need more to prove it. Years,” he said, his excitement faltering at the idea of fighting Professor Milo for every scrap of computer time, the agony the drafters and anchors would have to endure to even gather the data. Years in which Summer would drift farther from him as she began her work as a drafter. “I can’t say a long draft is possible with just one twenty-second double-draft. I need more data.”
    Her lips pressed together, a vivid red against her cheeks, which were pale from lack of sleep. “Data? You don’t need data.