Page 16 of Into the Fire

Suddenly he was airborne, his boot ripped out from under him. He slammed down on his back next to the bed, his right foot twisted up, the boot magnetically adhered to the bottom of the slab.

Embarrassing.

He tried to yank his foot free. Aside from an ache that bloomed in his thigh, nothing happened.

With a groan, he hunched forward awkwardly, untied his laces, and ripped his foot out.

Standing, he tried to work the boot loose. It spun in a full rotation but would not pull off.

Stupid protective steel shanks.

Stupid floating bed.

Plus, the sheets were wrinkled all to hell.

In order to reclaim his boot, he’d require an Ampco non-sparking, non-magnetic, aluminum-bronze crowbar. The flat rectangular truck vaults in the bed of his pickup held weaponry, body armor, climbing equipment—a full array of good-to-go load-out gear equipping him for a variety of contingencies. Like, say, a full-frontal assault on a wayward boot.

He walked down the hall, grabbed his keys, and stomped to the elevator.

Of course the car stopped on the twelfth floor.

And of course, even before the doors parted, it was her voice coming through: “—because bubble gum isn’t a breakfast food, Peter.”

Peter looked up, spotted Evan, and transformed into a blur of flying nine-year-old. “Evan Smoak!”

He bulldozed into Evan’s side, his Batman lunch box swinging dangerously close to Evan’s groin. Evan patted his back in an awkward hug of sorts, using the diversion to avoid Mia’s stare.

She was wearing her good-luck court-motion suit—midnight blue, subtle lapels. The California-in-a-pie-tin was balanced atop her briefcase, which she held horizontally like a server’s tray.

“Hello,” she said.

Evan said, “Hi.”

Sensing the tension, Peter released Evan and stood beside his mom.

He glanced over at Evan and then over at him again. “You’re missing a boot.”

Evan looked down. “Yup.”

“Where you going with one boot?”

“To get a crowbar.”

“Why?”

“To get my other boot.”

Peter said, “Oh.”

Evan looked at Mia. She looked at the wall.

“Adulthood is complicated,” he said.

Back in his bedroom, armed with a crowbar, Evan reapproached the boot. First he dug the forked end beneath the tread, then pried it up a few centimeters before it snapped back against the slab.

He wiped his brow, took a moment to regroup. Then he got after the boot again, hooking it and setting his full weight on the end of the bar. It was right on the verge. As he repositioned, he felt the drift of his left boot and had precisely enough time to say “Goddamn i—” before he hammered the floor once more, the crowbar clattering at his side, his left boot cemented in place beneath the lip of the slab next to its mate.

Lying flat, his leg raised as if in traction, he blew out a breath and let his head thunk against the concrete floor.