into gear and ran through the red light that dangled ahead, nearly missing a bread van in the intersection. She turned toward the passenger seat. “I’ve warned you about prompting me. Next time, I swear I’ll—”
“Just get going, and try not to hit any more cars,” Sam said, then turned down to look at Cam. “Where’s Mom now?”
Cam looked up thoughtfully for a beat, furrowed his brow and said, “I can’t seem to isolate her signal on the network. Her phone could be off, or it just might be the wireless system is overwhelmed in the area. I’ll keep trying.”
Mara shook her head, wiping her forehead, attempting to keep water from streaming into her face. “We’ll have to assume that she’s going to head south, if she gets across the bridge. Hopefully we’ll be able to catch up to her before Ping leaves a trail of carnage all the way to Oregon City.”
That thought squelched all conversation. Sam stared into his phone and tapped its surface every few minutes, hoping to connect with his mother. Cam closed his eyes and didn’t say anything. Mara tried on focus on driving, not wanting to get into another accident. Still she worried about what she would do once they located her mother or, more specifically, when they located the dragon. Something must be done. Ping and the dragon could not continue to coexist if the beast ran wild every time it sensed danger, or if it had some need to stalk her mother, like the other reptiles that crossed over with her mother’s evil twin. Ignore a dragon’s folly. Like that’s gonna happen. She didn’t care what that little book from the future said, even if she did write it herself. There was no way she would simply stand by while all hell’s breaking loose, Chronicle of Continuity or not. What could her future self be thinking? The last thing she intended to do was ignore it.
So what’s the alternative? Kill Ping?
Cam’s eyes snapped open. “You’re getting a call. You want me to route it to your speakers?”
“Is it Mom?” Mara asked, glancing down at him, still sitting on Sam’s lap.
The head wobbled slightly. Mara took that as a shake of the head. Not Mom.
“Listed as DetBo in your contact list,” Cam said.
“Detective Bohannon. Yeah, put him through. He might have some info that can help,” she said.
Garbled static came from the hands-free speaker, then a voice said, “Mara, you there?”
“It’s me, Detective.”
“That your dragon flying around over the river dive-bombing the Ross Island Bridge?” he asked.
“I wouldn’t characterize it as my dragon, but, if you are asking me if that is Ping’s alter ego, the answer is yes. I think it might be chasing my mother.”
“Where are you?”
“I’m on Powell just past Thirty-Ninth, heading toward the bridge, but it looks like things are getting backed up pretty bad. I’m not sure I’m going to be able to get there,” she said. She tapped her brakes and came to a stop behind a sea of red taillights.
“The bridge looks like a war zone. There are several cars on fire out there. We’re getting calls about giant birds, dragons and UFOs attacking. We’ve got to do something. There are a lot of casualties out there, and it looks like it has the potential for fatalities as well,” the detective said, then asked, “Why’s this thing after your mom?”
“It’s complicated. A few creatures that passed over from another realm were stalking my mother, because they mistook her for their master, mistress or whatever. Most of them were just lizards, little stuff like that, and one big iguana.”
“Uh-huh. What happened to those guys?”
“Look, Bo, now’s not really the time to get into all this. I need to reach my mother. If I can get to her, maybe I can do something to address the dragon problem, but, right now, I’m stuck staring at the back end of a stationary station wagon.”
Cam cut in. “It appears your mother has made it across the bridge, at least her phone has. She exited the bridge onto McLoughlin Boulevard headed south.”
“Who’s is that?” Bohannon asked.
“Cameron. He’s able to track Mom’s phone,” she said.
“So you got him put back together?”
“No, it’s just his head.”
“So, you’re tracking your mother and a dragon with a disembodied robot head?”
Mara rolled her eyes. “You have a better idea, Detective? I’d love to hear one. Anything is better than just sitting here and doing nothing.”
“Pull over and wait for me. I’m a few minutes away, and