get a top-up. “We should at least wait until the morning.”
“Why?” Zoe demanded. “What difference does it make?”
“There will be a lot of people in there,” Flynn said. “Probably doing things they’re not supposed to be doing. What are we going to do, arrest the entire party?”
“If we have to,” Zoe said stubbornly. “We stay on track. Look at the clues we need to link this together. Starting with the… whatever they call it. Whoever is in charge.”
“The president?”
“The president of the fraternity.” Zoe looked up at the house one last time herself and took a deep breath. She tried not to think about what it would be like in there. The noise. The number of people. The confusion. “We are here now. We go in.”
She reached for the handle of her door and got out of the car, pleased at least to see that Flynn followed suit. It had taken pulling rank on him to at last get him to follow her orders, but now he was in line.
“I still think this is a bad idea,” Flynn muttered, falling behind Zoe as she strode toward the doors.
He didn’t have to think it was a good idea. He just had to do as he was told. Zoe took one last breath of the cold night air and reached for the doors, ready to burst in and fight through the numbers to get their man.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The music was like a real assault on Zoe’s senses, battering her from every side. It was turned up so loud that it didn’t just obliterate her hearing: she could feel it pulsing through the floor and the walls when she touched them, throbbing all the way through her body, the heavy bassline the only thing she could make out properly.
The numbers in her head kept up a running tally of the beats, the musical signature, the throbbing, counting it out over and over again. It was dark inside the first room, the lights turned all the way down and small lanterns and fairy lights instead illuminating the space with a strange purplish light, picking out glowing spots on the people’s skin and clothes. UV, Zoe dimly realized, watching a young man walk by in a white T-shirt that seemed almost bioluminescent.
And it wasn’t just the music. People were shouting to one another, college kids with chaotic markings painted across their faces and on bare chests and arms, dancing in a way that made the glowing spots of light seem to float against darkness, yelling to be heard.
Something touched Zoe’s shoulder and she almost shot up into the air; then something brushed her ear, and she recognized Agent Flynn’s voice dimly through the chaos. “Let’s split up to find the pres faster. You stay down here, I’ll go upstairs.”
She didn’t have time to argue, even to respond in any way. Flynn melted away from her into the dim light, disappearing into a mess of numbers dancing and fluctuating all around her. It was wrong—all wrong. Her normal pin-sharp accuracy was diluted by the light, confusing her senses, making her recalculate and recalibrate constantly. A painted line made her estimate a man’s height at five foot three; he turned around and she saw the darkness of his hair floating far above the line, realized it was painted mid-chest and not across his shoulders, had to adjust her calculations. Someone was shouting, words she couldn’t make out, only a staccato rhythm of syllables.
Zoe gasped for air, remembering belatedly that she had to breathe. The music pulsed through her, forcing her to count the beats as it changed and sped up. Some of the nearby kids cheered loudly and began to jump up and down in time to the music. Liquid spilled to the floor from a jumping cup, too dimly lit for Zoe to calculate it properly. Numbers flew confusedly around her everywhere, as she tried to figure out the remaining volume in the cup and subtract from the likely amount at full capacity, trying to count sips and gulps, to understand steps and moves.
This was a bad idea. She shouldn’t have risked coming inside. Zoe had always known she was bad with parties, but this was far too much. The stimuli was not just everywhere, but it was confused and twisted, leaving her gasping and groping ahead for something solid to cling onto. Even the walls glowed that sickly color under the blacklight bulbs, making her feel like the whole world was turning upside down above her