Free Run (The Tesla Effect #2) by Julie Drew

said, and if she had a job for us to do related to this, she’d be the one calling the meeting. Seems obvious that she’s not acting on this in any way that involves us.”
    Joley looked at him, considering. “Okay. True enough, as far as you go, but don’t be a prat, mate. What else?”
    Finn looked right back, and neither of them blinked. Finally, Finn surprised everyone but Joley by laughing. “You win,” he conceded. “I think Jane is too close to this—we haven’t come together to have this conversation because Tesla has used the time machine again. We’re here because of why Tesla jumped back, because there seems to be some mystery as to how Tasya Petrova Abbott died.”
    Joley’s obsidian eyes glittered suspiciously, though there was no trace of laughter about his mouth or in his voice when he said, “And?”
    “And,” Finn continued. “Tesla is suspicious of the role her father might have played in her mother’s death—and we all know that where Tasya and Greg Abbott were, Jane Doane was, as well.”
    Finally, Joley grinned. “That wasn’t so sodding hard, now, was it?”
    “Yes, where the Abbotts were, Jane was,” said Beckett slowly. “And, where Sebastian Nilsen was—and is again.”
    And there it was, now that Beckett had voiced the one thing they had all tried to avoid thinking, let alone saying out loud, the fact that Nilsen was alive eight years ago, skulking around the Abbott’s lab and their research into time travel, and the very confusing—and disturbing—fact that the older version of Nilsen had, just last summer, escaped from Jane Doane and her agents by jumping back in the time machine to that very time and place. So they understood, as much as they were able to, that there were two Nilsens at large doing who knew what, exactly when and where Tesla had arrived the night before.
    “So what are we saying?” asked Malcolm. “What can we possibly do about all this from eight years in the future?”
    “Research,” said Finn and Joley at exactly the same moment.
    “Courthouse?” Finn asked his best friend.
    “Obviously. Newspaper archives?”
    Finn nodded. “And maybe the police file room. They have an intern clerking there this semester, and she sometimes lets me sneak in and look at old case files. You know, off the books.”
    “‘Old case files’?” Beckett asked, one eyebrow raised. “Is that what the kids are calling it these days?”
    Keisha snorted.
    “I’m sorry, Ms. Isley,” Finn said. “I have not the pleasure of understanding you.”
    “God, Finn, we don’t need Max here to spot Jane Austen quotes. And, really? Jane Austen?”
    “The ladies love it,” Finn said with mock seriousness. “And what, pray tell, are you planning to contribute to this group effort?”
    “I’ve been researching a couple of hate groups through the Southern Poverty Law Center,” Beckett said slowly. “For my Honors thesis. Religious extremists. One of them—One God, One Truth, they’re called—is focused on scientific research that receives government funding. Yesterday I came across a mention of Dr. Abbott in an internal email of theirs and—look it’s got nothing to do with the death of Tesla’s mother. They didn’t even exist as a group eight years ago, but I feel like I want to follow up. The email called the work of Dr. Abbott and two other scientists, both physicists at the University of Connecticut, “an abomination against God.”
    Malcolm spoke up. “Are they dangerous?”
    “I don’t know,” Beckett said. “They could be. I’ve got a conference call with the Center tomorrow to see what they know about the group, if there’ve been any new developments.”
    “Can I be there?” Malcolm asked. “I won’t say a word, I promise, but I want to help. I’ve known Dr. A my whole life. How could his work be an abomination?”
    Beckett looked at him for a moment, his clear, light gray eyes, the long blonde bangs that fell into them. “Okay,” she said,