Page 27 of The Final Gambit

“What’s Xander Tag?” Max asked.

“Whatisn’tXander Tag?” Xander replied philosophically.

“Is this all a joke to you?” Eve asked sharply.

“No,” Xander said, his voice suddenly serious. “But sometimes a person’s brain starts cycling. No matter what you do, the same thoughts just keep repeating, over and over. You get stuck in a loop, and when you’re inside that loop, you can’t see past it. You’ll keep coming up with the same possibilities, to no end, because the answers you need—they’re outside the loop. Distractions aren’t just distractions. Sometimes they can break you out of the loop, and once you’re out, once your brain stops cycling—”

“You see the things you missed before.” Eve stared at Xander for a moment. “Okay,” she said finally. “Bring on the distractions, Xander Hawthorne.”

“That,” I warned her, “is a very dangerous thing to say.”

“Pay no attention to Avery!” Xander instructed. “She’s just a little gun-shy from The Incident.”

Max snorted. “What incident?”

“That doesn’t matter,” Xander said, “and in my defense, I didn’t expect the zoo to send anactualtiger. Now…” He tapped his chin. “What are we in the mood for? The Floor Is Magma? Sculpture Wars? Jell-O Assassins?”

“I’m sorry.” Eve’s voice was stilted. She turned toward the door. “I can’t do this.”

“Wait!” Xander called after her. “What are your thoughts on fondue?”

CHAPTER 21

In Hawthorne House,fondueinvolved twelve fondue pots accompanied by three full-sized chocolate fountains. Mrs. Laughlin had it all set up in the chef’s kitchen within the hour.

Distractions aren’t just distractions, I reminded myself.Sometimes, you need them to break the loop.

“In terms of cheese fondue,” Xander orated, “we’ve got your gruyère-based, your gouda-based, your beer cheddar, your fontina, your chällerhocker—”

“Okay,” Max cut in. “Now you’re just making up words.”

“Am I?” Xander said in his most dashing voice. “For dipping, we’ve got your baguettes, your sourdough, breadsticks, croutons, bacon, prosciutto, salami, sopressata, apples, pears, and various vegetables, grilled or raw. Then there’s the dessert fondues! For the purists among us, dark chocolate, milk chocolate, and white chocolate fountains. More inventive dessert combinations are in the pots. Ihighlyrecommend the salted caramel double chocolate.”

Surveying the vast array of options for dessert dippers, Max picked up a strawberry in one hand and a graham cracker in the other.

“Hit me,” Xander yelled, jogging backward. “I’m going wide!”

Max tossed the graham cracker. Xander caught it in his mouth. Grinning, Max dipped the strawberry in one of the dessert pots, took a bite, then moaned. “Fax me, this is good.”

Break the loop, I thought, so I began to make my way through the spread myself, dying with every bite. Beside me, Eve slowly started to do the same.

With a mouth full of bacon, Xander picked up a spare fondue fork and brandished it like a sword. “En garde!”

Max armed herself. The result was chaos. The kind of chaos that ended with Max and Xander both drenched from the fountains and Eve taking a dark chocolate banana to the chest.

“I beg your chocolatey pardon,” Xander said. Max whapped him with a breadstick.

Eve looked down at the mess that was her shirt. “This was my only top.”

I glanced at Max.You and I will be talking very soon.Then I turned to Eve. “Come on,” I said. “I’ll get you a new shirt.”

“Thisis your closet?” Eve was stunned. Racks, cabinets, and shelves stretched twelve feet overhead, all of them full.

“I know,” I told her, remembering how I’d felt when they’d brought the clothes in. “You should see the closet in the bedroom that used to be Skye’s. It’s nineteen hundred square feet, two stories tall, and has its own champagne bar.”

Eve stared at the clothes.

“Help yourself,” I told her, but she didn’t move.