Johnny Quick: (The Flash Book 2) by Barry Lyga

Author:Barry Lyga
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Abrams
Published: 2018-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

20

Iris woke to the insistent ring of a phone. With a sleep-clotted groan, she rolled over and slapped her hand on the nightstand, feeling around until her fingers happened upon the rounded edge of the phone.

When she brought it to her eyes, she realized it was Barry’s. At the same time, she realized that the bed was half-empty, Barry’s side undisturbed. Exhausted by her day both physically and emotionally, she’d crashed as soon as she’d gotten home. Some part of her hoped that Barry would return as she slept, that she’d wake up with him next to her, safe and warm and so innocent and at peace.

But he was gone, and his phone, left behind when he went to Earth 2, was here in his stead. She stared at it. Was it cool to answer her boyfriend’s phone, or was that violating his privacy?

She sneaked a glance at the lock screen. Caller ID read “Frye.”

Iris answered. “Mr. Frye?”

There was a pause that, somehow, seemed annoyed. “Who’s this?” a gruff voice said.

“I’m Iris. Barry’s girlfriend.”

Darrel Frye grunted something noncommittal. He was Barry’s police union representative, the man charged with helping Barry keep his job.

“Put Allen on,” Frye said. “We need to talk.”

Iris bit her lip. “Well, he’s not around right now.”

Another annoyed silence. “Does he plan on being around?”

“I can’t really say—”

“He’s got a hearing tomorrow. If he wants to keep his job, it might be a good idea to talk to me for five minutes. If he doesn’t care, hey—I’ll go play golf. Makes no difference to me.”

Without so much as a good-bye, Frye hung up.

Iris stared at the phone. One day. Barry had only one more day to save his job, and he was nowhere to be found.

Before she could summon up the anger to throw his phone against a wall, her phone decided to beep for her attention. It was a text from Cisco:

get to —got the info you wanted

She rolled out of bed and threw on her clothes.

Wally’s first class was at the uncouth hour of 8:30 a.m. He was just dragging himself out of the room when his phone chirped for his attention. He fist-pumped when he saw the text from his sister, telling him to come to S.T.A.R. Labs as soon as possible.

A very cute woman from his Hydrodynamics elective happened to be walking by and smirked at his fist pump. Wally shrugged, abashed, and said, “Uh, I just found out my dad got tickets to the Keystone Jazz Festival.”

“Good for your dad,” she said.

“Uh, yeah.”

As soon as she was out of sight, Wally poured on the speed. He was at S.T.A.R. Labs in three seconds. It took so long only because he detoured to use the bridge rather than run over the river; he didn’t want to get his favorite kicks wet.

In the Cortex, H.R. was pouring a cup of coffee for Caitlin while explaining, “This bean, you see, is from Madagascar. The soil there is particularly . . .”

Wally tuned out H.R.’s drone.

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