Free Sideswiped by Kim Harrison Page A

I’ll prove it right now.”
    â€œSummer!” he exclaimed as he set the tablet aside, shifting sideways to take her hands. “Knowing I’m right doesn’t equal safe or even possible. You might have to hold uncountable timelines until I can defragment them. The human mind is not a circuit.”
    â€œThe human mind is the most flexible system ever created,” she said, flushed. “Isn’t that what you tell your students? Are you saying you don’t believe it?”
    â€œWell, no . . .”
    â€œYour theory is sound,” she said as she pulled away, her excitement undimmed but tarnished by his disbelief. “I’m not going to wait,” she said, cutting off his next protest. “I’m not going to wait until time and a partner assignment decide who I will love. Not if I can go back and maybe shift something. Make it better.”
    â€œMake it better?” he whispered, not believing his levelheaded, careful Summer was threatening to jump into the unknown, risk everything for . . . for them. “No.” Turning to face her even more, he took her shoulders, feeling her defiance. “There’s too much we don’t know.”
    â€œThen I’ll find out,” she said, and he gasped as vertigo swamped him. Sparkles so blue they glowed black rose like fireflies, blocking his vision. His grip on Summer became numb, indistinct. He scrambled for her, searching for her mind as she threw them both back far beyond her normal reach, the gravity sink of the double-draft pulling her. And she drafted.
    Silas spasmed as hot lances pierced his skull. He fastened on the thump of music, knowing immediately where they were. The dance club. It was the night they failed their test. She won’t survive, he thought, ignoring Professor Milo’s demand as he bolted out of the back room.
    He slid to a halt just past the door as his mind struggled to comprehend. Behind him the security room was stable—no choices to be made there—but before him . . . the bar was red-tinted shadows of alternate times. It was as if translucent pages fluttered before his vision, and he tried to comprehend, nothing real but Summer standing upon the dance floor.
    The pain of the universe being born shook him as she rifled through choices as if she were looking for a favorite recipe. She was the only thing clear as red-smeared shadows played out alternate timelines around her.
    With an angry, Doppler-tainted shout, the bouncer grew distinct as possibilities circled and steadied around the angry man. She’s trying to keep Professor Milo from getting shot , he thought as Summer focused on him. The pain was less as choices were cast aside, and feeling it, she smiled. Tiny shifts of probability haloed her in silver, and the knowledge that their love would survive made her achingly beautiful.
    â€œExcuse me,” Silas said as he tapped the bouncer on the shoulder. The man spun, and the red blur that was Allen became solid and real. Less pain, more reality. Silas jerked the rifle from the bouncer’s hand, and the drafter/anchor teams wavered into existence out of the red smear of possibilities. “Hold this,” Silas said, throwing the rifle to Professor Milo , who had emerged from the back room. If he had the rifle, he couldn’t be shot by it.
    â€œTake us home, Summer,” he said, and she nodded, love in her eyes. It was done, and there was no pain, just a euphoric rising of success.
    For an instant, the universe seemed to pause, assessing what Summer had done. And then . . . quietly, and quite decisively, the universe balanced its books.
    Silas gasped as time slid sideways through a billion ticks of electrons in the space of one. His head thundered and he hit the floor, his hands clenching the colorful rug. “Summer?” he moaned, trying to find himself. It hurt. Summer was beside him, her thin nightgown a whisper of sound