Jackson Ford - The Girl Who Could Move Sh*t with Her Mind

We don’t carry guns. We’re not that kind of outfit. Guns, Tanner once explained, complicate a situation. They remove options, instead of adding more of them. It’s one of those things that sounds wise and profound until you think about it for more than two seconds and realise it makes absolutely zero sense whatsoever.

Bob’s expression is thunderous. “You aren’t on my detail. Who are you people?”

Annie doesn’t hesitate. “Head office sent us over,” she says. “They got some VIP coming in tomorrow, wanted us to make sure the place was clean.” She flashes a knowing smile, as if she can’t believe the higher-ups could be this dense. In my ear Paul says, “Annie, Teagan, what’s happening? Over.”

The chief’s expression doesn’t change. “Bullshit. Why wasn’t I told?”

Annie shrugs, the same can-you-believe-this grin on her face. “Beats me. I just go where they say.”

There’s a moment where I think it’s going to work. Then it’s like a shutter comes down on the chief’s face. “Stay right where you are,” he says, gesturing to the two rookies alongside him. They both take a step forward, drawing their guns.

Or trying to, anyway. It’s awfully hard to pull a gun when a psychokinetic force is holding it in the holster. Their matching expressions are ridiculous: identical confusion, followed by annoyance, followed by anger as they both try and yank their weapons out.

I’m not supposed to use my ability like this. Not in front of people who aren’t on the team. It’s part of the deal: never reveal what I can do, to anyone, ever. Then again, it’s not like I’m being obvious about it. In my experience, the conclusion people jump to when something like this happens is usually not OMG! That woman over there has astonishing psychokinetic powers!

“What are you doing?” the chief says to the other two. He goes for his own gun, which also manages to miraculously catch on its holster.

Annie glances at me. “Are you—”

“Yup. Run .”

We take off in the opposite direction, sprinting down the corridor, the chief yelling at us to stop. As we turn the corner, I lose hold of the three guns, the men falling out of my range. I’ve only got about ten feet in every direction to play with, and behind us there’s the rasp of leather on metal as all three of them finally manage to pull their pistols free.

Annie accelerates, charging ahead of me, long legs exploding out in front of her willowy body. She’s built for speed. I, on the other hand, am built for lounging on the couch watching Netflix. I’m not very good in foot pursuits.

Annie ignores the elevator doors, shooting right past them. Smart. No point trapping us in a metal box that the guards in the main security room can control—assuming we’d even have time to navigate the touchscreen next to the doors and wait for the elevator to arrive. It’s not like Bob will let us call a time-out.

Instead, Annie heads for another door, a little further down the corridor. One with a push-bar across it and big stencilled letters on its surface: fire door—keep closed. She slams through the door, and I tumble in after her. “Close it!” she yells.

I reach back with my PK, slamming the door shut. Then I reach deep into the push-bar mechanism, grabbing the latch, twisting it, jamming it in place. Let’s see them figure that out .

A split-second later, one of them reaches the door, his body slamming into the metal. The push-bar doesn’t move, the fucked-up latch refusing to give. Finally, a break. I sag back against the wall, panting, stitch burning a hole in my side.

Annie speaks rapidly into her earpiece. “Paul, we need an exit. And tell Carlos he might need to do some fast driving.”

“Copy.” This time Paul doesn’t bother giving her shit about not saying over . “What’s your location?”

“On the fire stairs.”

The stairs are bare, dusty concrete, well lit by glowing fluorescents. Our footsteps thud loudly in the enclosed space as we move down, going so fast that our feet barely touch each step. I’m concentrating so hard on not falling over that I don’t see that Annie has stopped until I almost crash into her.

“What the shit?” I say, only just keeping my balance.

“Listen.”

Footsteps. A lot of them. Coming from below us, and coming fast. Annie turns and starts heading back the way we came, taking the stairs two at a time.

I take a second to ask God, really and truly, why he hates me so much. Then I start climbing.

The chief and his compadres are still banging at the door I jammed shut. Annie moves past with a glance, leaping up the stairs to the floor above.

“Paul,” she says, pulling at the fire door. The footsteps from below are louder now, maybe twenty seconds away. “Thirty-first floor. Pull up the schematics. And get Reggie on the cameras.”

It’s easy to see what she’s thinking. We can’t go down using the stairs, and it’s a sure bet they’ll be watching the elevators, ready to lock us in the second they see one moving. That leaves hiding—holing up somewhere until the heat dies down.

It’s a great idea, except for the tiny detail that it sucks. They’ll just tear the place apart looking for us—assuming we even find a decent, non-obvious place to hide. It creates more problems than it solves.

There’s another solution. A better one. Annie might be too dopey to realise it, but luckily for her someone else brought her A-game tonight.

I picture the outside of the building, the construction, the floors cordoned off. Yeah. Got it. We can do this. I never thought I’d go for an idea that involved more stairs, but you can’t have everything.

“Paul,” I croak. “Hold off on that.”

“Say again? Over.”

“What are you doing?” Annie hisses, half in and half out of the fire door.

In answer, I sprint past her, lurching onto the next flight of stairs. “Just follow me.”

“Teagan, what the fuck?”

“ Follow me! ”

She makes a grab for me, misses. Just as well. I really don’t have time to explain this to her, because the running footsteps from below are closing fast.

There’s a moment when I think that’s she going to ditch me, running off by herself to hide. Then she hits the stairs, swearing, shouting that she’s going to kill me. Good thing I have a head start, or I’d be legitimately terrified.

I ignore her, concentrating on making it through my own personal hell. My legs feel like they’re going to separate at the knees, like an overheated machine spinning itself apart.

Somehow, we manage not to lose ground to the security guards coming up from below. And finally, finally , we reach the 50th floor, where the construction starts. The fire door has a notice taped to it, a lot of fine print about not entering the site without a hard hat and all visitors reporting to the foreman. I yank open the door, and a gust of wind from the change in pressure nearly shoves me back down the stairs. I force myself through, wait for Annie to come charging past, then slam it shut. My mind scrunches the lock closed.

The floor is wide open to the outside world, a skeleton version of the ones below. It’s an incomplete maze of bare plywood walls and bundles of dusty electrical cables, metal sheets stacked in neat piles. The only light is a bare bulb, a few feet away from us. A cement mixer sits off to one side, lurking in the half-darkness.

Annie puts her hands on her knees. “You. Stupid. Why.”

“Not stupid.” I can barely get the words out.

“We should have. Hidden. Waited for—”

“Yeah. No.” I stagger away from the fire door, picturing the outside of the building in my head again. South-west side—that’s where we need to go. And I’m pretty sure west is on my left, so that means…