Page 127 of The Savior

Zee Zee lowered her hand but didn’t put away the switch. The device was a thumb flick away from detonating the bag at their feet. “Why weren’tyouthere?”

Blanking, Chelsea asked, “Where?”

“Kentucky.” Zee Zee arched a dark eyebrow as if to question Chelsea’s sanity.

“The rest of the world was there. ” Her best update had come from the news. The FBI, US Marshals, and every ding dang news organization on the planet had descended upon the smoldering bits like fruit flies to a peach.

Zee Zee sawed her teeth. “I don’t care about them.”

“Me?” She shook her head. “You don’t need me to terrorize—”

“Yes.” Zee Zee hissed and shook the switch. “I do.”

“Careful, please.” She held her hands by her side. “Let’s go somewhere else.”

Zee Zee snorted.

“Come on.” Chelsea tilted her head. “We’re not on the same page, and I think that’s important to you.”

“You think!” Zee Zee shouted.

A few people stared. No one knew what she had in her hand. Chelsea wanted to wave them away, but the blast zone would be too large for them to escape.

Their conversation conflicted with everything Chelsea had known for years—the bombings, the motives.What is the point if not some kind of activism?Chelsea erased her long-understood beliefs on Zee Zee Mars. “Tell me what I should know.”

An agreeable expression softened Zee Zee’s face, but she added, “It hurts.”

“What does?”

“That all this time, you really didn’t know.”

Cheese and crackers, know what?“What do I do to make it right?”

“Don’t use your education and fancy job to talk down to me,” Zee Zee snapped.

Her choices, her opportunities, her education—was this abouther? “I’m sorry.”

Shock brightened in Zee Zee’s eyes. “You are?”

Carefully, Chelsea nodded.

“Is everything all right?” the Apple Lady asked at precisely the wrong second.

Zee Zee hardened again—and activated the dead man’s switch. “An apology won’t make up for it.”

“We’re fine,” Chelsea answered, praying that somehow, the Apple Lady could read between the invisible lines of the two words and clear the farmer’s market of people. When that telepathy didn’t work and the Apple Lady walked away, Chelsea tried again. “It’s time to leave. You and me. Or let me tell everyone else to go.”

“The churches,” Zee Zee said. “The law firms.”

Chelsea didn’t know what to say. Zee Zee wasn’t making sense.

“The libraries. The schools.”

Zee Zee’s pitch had increased, and Chelsea tried to guess how many seconds it would take to transmit the detonation. Enough that I could save some lives? Should I simply scream, “RUN”?

“You had all that.” Zee Zee dropped her voice low and strained to hold back tears. “You hadher. And you broke her heart.”

“Who?” Chelsea sputtered, terrified that she didn’t know if shouting or not would save lives. “How?”

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