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building they’d been given permission to use. A narrow alley between two brick exteriors provided the right gap for her to spider-walk from ground level to the roof. With hands and feet pressed firmly against the opposing walls, she hopped upward a foot or so at a time.
    The crowd cheered, but the effort was so taxing, Jessie barely heard a thing over the sound of her breathing and the blood rushing through her veins. When she reached the top, she dug the fingers of her left hand into the lip of the roof to swing her body over.
    “Oh,” the crowd cried as she dangled by one arm.
    With a graceful arc, she lofted up and over the edge. Breathing hard from the effort, she bent over to watch her team follow. The script called for only one of the mock bad guys to make it, although both were perfectly capable of doing exactly what she did.
    She turned and danced across the edge of the roof, balancing like a gymnast above the street.
    “Be careful.”
    “Watch out.”
    “Oh, no,” people cried from their vantage point across the street.
    The wall she was running across was actually two feet wide, which is why she’d picked this building. That and the fact it had an exterior fire escape within view of the street. Made of wood nearly a hundred years ago, the rickety-looking structure was surprisingly sound. Jessie eschewed the steps, choosing to dive for the open railing then swing from level to level like a monkey in a rain forest until she reached the bottom landing.
    With only a few feet to get up to speed, she pumped her legs hard: step, step, go. She launched her body into the air, flying up and out toward the street. When she was certain she’d cleared the sidewalk, she executed a neat tuck and roll to come up on her feet in front of the climbing tower.
    J.T. was waiting for her.
    “You can’t do this trick,” she whispered, her breathing strained from the exertion.
    “Neither can you,” he said. “Not alone.”
    She looked over her shoulder. As scripted, only one bad guy was still on her trail. Marsh. Unfortunately, the script also had called for Zane—not J.T.—to lead the way up the tower. Partly because he was supposed to be her hero; partly because the two dismount lines that had been added to the tower were slightly outside Jessie’s reach. A design flaw she blamed on Zane’s ego. In practice that morning, Jessie had needed his help to reach her line.
    But Zane would not be waiting for her at the top. Was that J.T.’s plan? Had he convinced their friend to let Jessie face failure so she’d be forced to see that she needed him?
    She looked him straight in the eyes. “Watch me.”
    As planned, she ripped off her ugly blue shirt and kicked it to one side. The crowd cheered. Jessie knew her bright orange tank enhanced her image of a strong, fit, woman athlete. Now, she had to live up to her image.
    Instead of reaching for the blue route—the one she’d picked during the practice run—she chose Zane’s path. Black. “Scary enough to make the spectators piss their pants,” he’d crowed.
    In the back of her mind, she hoped Remy was positioned close enough to get the best perspective. She’d watched the others practice and had been impressed. The person climbing resembled a superhero…or a very large bug.
    Although her fingers were starting to cramp from a couple of the holds and her triceps burned, she ignored the discomfort and visualized hauling herself onto the very top where her dismount rope was waiting.
    She heard a muffled commotion below and assumed Marsh and J.T. were faking some kind of skirmish. The pounding in her head made everything surreal. For her, climbing produced a sense of moving in slow motion, even though she was pressing hard not to lose her momentum. Finally, after what felt like minutes but was probably only seconds, she took a deep breath and power-lifted herself up as high as possible to grasp one of the corner uprights and swing herself onto the top.
    The obelisk was