Page 10 of Aftermarket Afterlife

“I’m assuming you’re the one who called for me, then?” I asked, strolling closer. “Hey, Alice. Sally.”

“That’s my name,” said Sally blithely. “Sally Price. I’m still debating middle names. I want one—the one I used to have was Korean, and it feels appropriate to continue havingsomesort of name that doesn’t scream ‘generic white girl,’ but I haven’t decided what it’s going to be yet.”

“Sounds reasonable to me,” I said. “Congrats on the surname.”

“Seemed fitting,” said Thomas. “Given that she already shows up on your internal iteration of the family tree.”

We were moving toward the doors. Sally gave him, then me, a curious look. “Doesn’t everyone in the extended family?”

“Only the ones who’ve been well and truly adopted,” I said. “Uncle Al, who you just met, doesn’t, and neither does Uncle Mike, in Chicago. The caretaker bond seems to distinguish between ‘ally turned honorary family member’ and ‘actual member of the family.’ You crossed that line a while ago.”

“Oh,” said Sally, looking quietly pleased.

I looked to Alice and Thomas. “In case the two of you were wondering, the rest of the family, or at least the portion in this half of the country, has gathered to await your pleasure.”

Alice looked briefly uneasy. “All of them?”

“Everyone in this time zone.”

“Oh.”

“You were going to have to face her sooner or later, you know.”

“I know, I know. I was just sort of hoping for a little bit later.” She managed to muster a smile, which was impressive, given how clearly unsettled she was to know that Jane was already at the house.

“You don’t need to worry about sharing a bathroom with her, at least?” I offered. “She’s planning to sleep at home, so you’ll have your pick of the guest rooms.”

“Ah,” said Thomas. Unlike Alice, who looked relieved, he sounded more than faintly disappointed by this news. “Thank you, Mary. I called because I wanted to let you know we had landed safely, collected our luggage, but were having issues with the rental car.”

“Which I resolved,” said Sally, with an element of smugness. “James is there, right? Where we’re going? He didn’t chicken out and run off to hide in a cave somewhere?”

“He’s there,” I confirmed. “I worry about his blood pressure, but he’s been waiting for you all week, and I’m pretty sure nothing’s getting him out of that house today short of an actual act of god.”

“Good,” said Sally.

“Gang’s all here,” said Alice, pressing a button on the key fob she’d been given. One of the cars in the lot beeped, headlights flashing as the doors unlocked. “That’ll be us. Mary, you going to ride back to the house with us?”

“No, thanks,” I said. “I’m not a road ghost, and I don’t like to be crammed in. Besides, it looks like there’s already somebody in your back seat.”

All three of them turned to see what I was looking at. There was a figure sitting in the back seat of the car that had reacted to Alice’s key fob, head bowed and attention apparently focused on whatever they had in their hands.

Sally stopped dead. “I’m going to kill her,” she said, almost philosophically. “We call her on her bullshit, so she gives us a car that she’s already given to someone else? Nope. Not okay. I’m going to kill her.”

“You spent a little too long in the closed-off murder dimension,” said Alice. “We can’t just go around killing people because they’re assholes.”

“Wanna watch me?” grumbled Sally mutinously.

Alice laughed and turned back toward the car. “Maybe they just got into the wrong one,” she said. “A lot of these have to be keyed to the same fobs. I’m sure whoever it is will move when we explain the situation.”

She started walking again, faster this time, and for all her feigned certainty, I could tell by the way she was moving that she was on high alert. If that carwasthe one they were supposed to be taking, this person could be an innocent who’d made a mistake—or they could be a Covenant operative looking to spring a trap. I didn’t like it, but there was really no degree of paranoia that wasn’t justified, especially not when there was any chance a Covenant operative might have escaped New York with the news that Thomas Price was somehow mysteriously back from the dead.

Alice reached the car, paused, and bent to look in the rear window. Then she straightened, suddenly at ease as she turned back to the rest of us.

“It’s just Sarah,” she said. “Come on, let’s get this puppy loaded.”

“Just...But we left her in New York!” objected Sally. She scowled. “I do not appreciate how much of this family is cavalier about linear distance.”

“It’s only three of us,” I said, as reassuring as I could. “And Rose and I have limitations.”

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