Clara Vance held her right foot suspended in the empty air above the threshold.
The rubber sole of her sneaker trembled two inches off the linoleum. Blue static electricity crackled between the rubber tread and the floor, sparking like miniature blue lightning bolts against the floor wax. The muscles in her calf were bunched in iron knots, screaming with burning lactic acid.
Every nerve fiber in her right leg was firing at sixty cycles a second, driven by the alternating current surging through the foundation rebar.
In her right hand, the scalding glass carafe of black coffee swayed precariously.
Drops of two-hundred-degree liquid splashed over the lip, sizzling against the heavy blue denim of her work apron. The steam rose directly into her face, smelling of scorched Colombian beans and burnt paper.
“Julian, stay where you are!” Clara shouted, her voice tearing through the high-frequency hum in her throat.
Julian had both hands planted on the front edge of Register 1, his knuckles bone-white against the polished oak counter, his boots tensed to spring across the checkout lane.
“I can reach you, Clara!” Julian yelled back, his grey eyes wide with frantic urgency. “Two seconds!
