My doorbell rang. That freaked me out, because nobody ever used the
doorbell. I only had a doorbell on the front door, and the only people who used
it were people I didn't know. Why would a stranger be ringing my doorbell at
nearly 3am on New Year's Day? My office window was on the back of the house, my
blinds and curtains were down to block out the cold radiating through the
glass, and there no lights on to let anyone know I was home or awake.
"Is something out there?" I asked, when the two AI's just
blinked at me.
"I can't really … tell," London said after a pause that felt
way too long for me. "We'll have to get back to you." The screen
blanked, and for a second I had to fight down a sense of being abandoned.
My legs started aching and jerking, with those near-cramps that I
could only deal with if I got up and walked around. I jerked myself up out of
my wheelchair, and suddenly I got a freaky, stupid, nasty idea. I snatched up
my phone from the side table where it was charging and unplugged it. As I
walked, carefully, out of my office and aimed for the front door, I texted
Kurt. Just in case whoever was outside had really sharp ears and could hear any
conversations going on inside. Which might mean it heard what London and
Sherwood and I had been discussing.
Something or someone at my door. How close are you?
By the time I got down the hall and turned to cut through the living
room, my phone pinged.
Over the schools.
Knowing how Kurt and Jane could go near-sonic speeds in the Ghost
field, they were probably over my house by the time I took five steps. Granted,
my steps were really slow. I put my phone in my pocket, mentally shrugging as I
realized I was in summer-weight pajamas and about to open my door to frigid
temperatures. I paused to study the silhouette visible in the little porthole
window of the front door. There were no lights on behind me. Not even the
nightlight in the fan over the stove. That had burned out two weeks ago, and I
had been too busy preparing for a full blow-out family Christmas to deal with
things like replacing the bulb.
The enemy couldn't see me. Unless he could see through solid objects,
and then the gig was up anyway.
Another knock. Then a voice that sounded like Daniel called through the door, "Lanie? Are you okay? I'm pretty sure you aren't able to get to bed after all that weirdness." He laughed, and it was Daniel's laugh.
His normal laugh. Not the ragged, kind of awkward laugh he had been
using the last few weeks.
The real Daniel would know that I couldn't sleep for all the ideas swirling through my head after what happened at Eden.
Right now, I was kind of hoping Daniel was at the door. Maybe we could finally have some privacy to discuss things, like why he couldn't seem to look me in the eye lately, or make jokes, and why he kept on the other side of the room during our Star Trek club Christmas party.
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