Priestly had also included a pair of sunglasses for Mal’s more casual days. Slipping them from his coat pocket, he put them on and enjoyed the displayed weather report. If need be, he’d see a lot more through those lenses soon enough.
Janey was working the shop without her grandmother, Mal noticed as they entered with the gentle ding over the door alerting their presence. She flashed Mal and Lucy a smile before saying, “I’ll be right with you, Mr. Cho.” Such a doll. But her good manners meant Dunkirk turned from where he stood at the counter. Not a problem; Mal didn’t need the element of surprise to handle him.
Sean was young. Ballsy. Angry. He had pale blond hair, a clean-shaven face, blue eyes, and a thin but well-muscled physique from years of bar fights and bad decisions. Not merely Water leaning, he was specifically Ice, which had been proven when he survived the Mendozas locking him in a freezer overnight a couple years back. If he’d been an Elemental and not so distinctly Irish, he would have reminded Mal of his own father even more.
But Dunkirk being able to resist intense cold didn’t mean Mal’s new amplifier wouldn’t be useful. It would be a good field test before the heist in only a couple days’ time. Whatever Dunkirk could withstand might be similar to Zeus’s tolerance from his enhanced healing.
“Do you know what you want, sir?” Janey asked Dunkirk, even though he hadn’t turned back to her. She wasn’t fazed by someone who looked tough and was capable of flashing several 100 dollar bills in her face.
“Sean isn’t here for the Danishes, Janey,” Mal said, keeping his hands folded and Lucy behind him. “Why don’t you step into the back?”
While Janey caught wise of the situation and gave a swift nod before making scarce, Dunkirk squared his shoulders. Thankfully, there were no other customers.
“Can’t a man order an afternoon snack in peace?” Dunkirk said with his faint Irish brogue, hand drifting inside his jacket.
“He can. As long as he doesn’t follow up his order by asking directions to where his ex and son live.”
“And unborn baby, you’ll recall.” Dunkirk flashed a nasty grin and took a slow step forward. “I’m entitled to what’s mine, Cho. Something you fail to understand. I know they’re still in the neighborhood. I know Carla works at that bar. Smart move, making sure she always has an escort when she leaves. You pay the bouncer extra? Or is that just part of the favors they owe you? And here I thought men like that usually paid you on their knees.”
Lucy’s hip subtly nudged Mal’s. Trash like Dunkirk wouldn’t rattle him, but he didn’t care for bigots falling to low tactics just to rile him. Flicking the switch for the cold field, he started to slowly expand the radius toward Dunkirk. With Lucy close behind him, she barely even shivered.
“I’ve warned you before, Sean. You stay out of my streets. Period. I don’t care what you think is yours. This neighborhood isn’t. It’s only a courtesy to your father that you’re still breathing. So back down, back off, and get the fuck out. Next time, I won’t ask nicely.”
The field encompassed Dunkirk before he could take another step, his expression instantly betraying that he felt the change in temperature. Shuddering, he scowled as a thin coating of frost began to form over his exposed skin—good. If it was powerful even against Dunkirk, it would work on Zeus too.
“You f-freak,” Dunkirk snarled. “Can’t even f-fight me like a man?”
“You only get a pass today because I’m in a good mood,” Mal inclined his head, “and Lucy does so love this bakery. Would be a shame to rough it up.”
“I don’t know, Mickey,” Lucy draped her arm over Mal’s shoulder, leaning tight against him but peering around his body with a wicked smile. She let a coil of vines grow from her fingertips gently down Mal’s arm, while keeping her other hand behind her, ready to summon the underground weeds through the floor to ensnare Dunkirk if he tried anything. “I could be persuaded to be bad. We could pay for any repairs. I’m sure Janey would understand.”
“True…” Mal expanded the radius as Dunkirk tried to back out of it, not allowing the man to escape its chill.
Teeth chattering now, Dunkirk raised his hands to show he hadn’t drawn his weapon. “I’ll b-be on my way.”
Mal waited for a fresh shiver to leave Dunkirk before he turned the cold field off completely. He knew this only postponed a future confrontation, but he didn’t look forward to an all-out war with the Irish if he killed the man. Another option would be preferable, but if such a thing presented itself, it would not involve this asshole getting his way.
When Mal and Lucy moved from the entrance to let him pass, he paused and said, “See you real soon, Cho,” even with the frost still flaking from his skin.
Removing his sunglasses, Mal watched through the shop windows as Dunkirk headed away from the neighborhood.
“Coast’s clear, Janey!” Lucy called, retracting her vines from Mal’s shoulder.
For now, but this problem was not going away on its own.
ß
The case against Ludgate had hit another dead end. Danny had nothing new to go on after failing to catch the man on his patterned routes, and he knew he wouldn’t get lucky twice. Sightings of Ludgate had grown fewer and farther between, and no new evidence from the heists had presented itself.
Old-fashioned legwork and investigating led Danny to the glassworks and other old acquaintances of Ludgate’s. None of them had seen him, and he didn’t have any real friends. But it was strange; Ludgate’s paper trail only went back so far. Before then, he didn’t seem to exist.
Danny knew the signs of a false identity when he found them, so he dug deeper and it didn’t take long to discover the truth. Ludgate’s real name was Cassius Dougal Junior. His mother had changed his name after she divorced the father. A Metal leaning mother and Dark leaning father had led to a Light Elemental—it wasn’t unheard of, even if elements tended to be hereditary, a recessive gene could still slip through. Ludgate had a record under his current name—petty thefts, mild public disturbances. There were similar charges for young Cassius.
“Maybe he isn’t targeting Zeus for the fame,” John said. “You might have had something to do with bringing him in once.”
“These cases were too long ago,” Danny argued. “Ludgate lost his mother a few years back. Instead of his record escalating, that’s when everything slowed down, after she died and he got his job at the glassworks. I didn’t meet him as Zeus until the other night.”
Ludgate had been fired from the glassworks for unprofessional conduct.
“He was always unstable. Had a temper,” the assistant manager, Chris Stantz, told Danny when he questioned him. “But, man, six months ago, he lost it.”
Six months ago, when Thanatos was defeated—that was too great a coincidence. There was a bigger piece to the puzzle Danny was missing. Rick would have been able to figure it out, even with the lacking evidence. They’d always complemented each other so well, noticed things the other didn’t. Danny and his father thought too much alike to make good partners in quite the same way.
Every time he passed other officers in the precinct, he felt their eyes on him, as if they were thinking the same thing—that Danny was useless without Rick. It didn’t help that John always lingered when he was in the office, like he wanted to take up Rick’s desk and fill the gap left behind, but he never asked. And Danny didn’t offer.
He gamed with Andre Thursday night as promised—not Heists. They played Diablo III; Andre a Crusader, Danny a Demon Hunter. It was definitely more fun than the previous game night. But something hung in the air, the sense that Andre was using kid gloves around him and trying too hard to cheer him up.
When Danny replenished his plate of food, he snuck away to take one of the pills from Lynn. He wasn’t sure if they worked, but when he felt his emotions spike, the act of taking one made him pause, think, breathe. He’d been taking them consistently ev
er since giving in and choking back the first one.
The week passed too slowly regardless, with too little progress at work, too much tension around family and friends, no opportunity to see Cho, and while the pills helped, they didn’t take the pain away completely. It all built up like a steadily sparking powder keg waiting to blow.
“Danny?” Joey said when the two of them were setting the table Friday night. This week, family dinner had been scheduled for the end of the week. Joey actually speaking to Danny was a nice change from the awkward silence that usually hovered around them. “What did you bring to add to the meal?”
Tonight they were having steak— à la John—while Stella provided most of the side dishes and Joey had made a salad.
“Oh, uhh…bread,” Danny said. “Just need to heat it up in the oven. I better get on that.” Rushing back into the kitchen, he lightning jumped to the corner store and returned with a loaf of rosemary and garlic bread in only a few minutes. He knew he’d forgotten something.
When he returned to the dining room, he found John and Stella helping Joey finish the table. Walking in on the three of them like that gave Danny pause—the more comfortable laughter between them and the rhythm in which they moved was humbling to witness. Only six months since Joey had lost his mother, the only parent he’d ever known, and already he was so at home with a father and sister.
“This isn’t a spectator sport, kiddo,” John said with an authoritative point of his finger and teasing smirk. “Go get the napkins, huh? You’re about to be blown away by how I did these steaks.”
Danny tried to smile in kind, but once they were sitting at the table, playing at being a happy family, his attention drifted to Joey’s watch with a yellow lightning bolt decorating the face. Every time he looked at Joey there was another reminder of how he’d failed and of how someone half his age was handling that same loss so much better than he was.
They were halfway through dinner when Danny’s phone buzzed. He didn’t think much of it when he checked the message. He’d left things tentative about seeing Cho tonight—if dinner ended early, which was unlikely—so he knew it couldn’t be him.
Bow before my glory—The Invisible Man is ready. Come test out your new suit, bro!
Andre, it’s family dinner night, remember?
I know, I know, but this is just a quick field test to see if you can use your powers without the reflectors fritzing. Fifteen minutes tops. Say you’re running out for ice cream.
Danny was too sorely tempted to not accept the offer. That stealth suit could make or break his chances against Ludgate, and right now he had no idea when the thief would strike again.
“Something important, Danny?” Joey asked, noticing his diverted attention.
Typing quickly, Danny messaged Andre that he was on his way. “Yeah, actually. Andre needs my help with something back at the precinct. I wouldn’t normally duck out, but it’ll only be fifteen minutes. You mind, Dad?”
“Wouldn’t normally, right,” Joey muttered—softly, but not quite low enough not to be heard.
Danny turned his focus back to the boy. “Something you wanna say, Joey?”
Stella and John both shot him a reproachful look. He knew he didn’t have a right to snap when Joey wasn’t exactly wrong, but he’d always known he wasn’t imagining the sneers in Joey’s smiles.
He was smiling now, but nothing about it looked friendly. “Yeah, I do. Are you ever actually here when you’re with us? Half the time you don’t show, even though you live here. And when you do show up, half that time you’re on your phone. Or staring off into space. You know, if you don’t want to be here, it wouldn’t bother me to see you gone.”
“Joey,” John said sternly.
“What? Am I the only one who thinks Danny doesn’t want anything to do with this family? You really think that’s gonna change after it’s official?”
“Official?” Danny darted his eyes to his father. “What’s he talking about?”
Leaving his own meal unfinished, John gave a long, suffering sigh.
Stella didn’t look surprised. She’d already known. Of course she knew. She was Joey’s case worker; she was the reason they’d taken him in to begin with.
“Joey fits well here, Danny,” John said. “No reason for him to go anywhere else. I’ve been working on redoing the upstairs so he can move out of Stella’s old room—”
“And you weren’t even going to tell me you’re adopting him? No, I suppose not,” Danny looked across the table at the Dark leaning young man, “since I’m not a part of this family.” Throwing his napkin on the table, he snatched up his phone and stood.
“Danny, wait—” Stella cut in.
“You certainly don’t act like you want to be part of this family!” Joey shouted. “Not as long as I’m included.”
“Both of you, stop it. Listen to yourselves.” Stella rose before Danny could leave the room. “You’re both saying the same thing, thinking the other doesn’t believe they belong when you’re the one feeling excluded. You are both part of this family.”
“Damn right you are.” John stood up next. “I don’t want either of you thinking you have to fight over your place here. Danny, the reason I didn’t tell you about adopting Joey officially is because it happened just these past couple days, and you’ve…had your mind elsewhere.”
Danny’s stomach sank at the sorrowful look in John’s eyes—the pitying look. He was excluded because he’d excluded himself, made himself too much of a burden to deal with, so John hadn’t even bothered.
“And that’s just it, right?” Joey pushed from the table too. “Danny gets a free pass no matter what he does, because he’s your real son. You swear up and down that you were never treated differently,” he spun to face Stella, “but Danny bails and bails and bails on us, and his mind’s just elsewhere? Why does he even still live here?”
“Joey, you don’t understand—” John tried.
“No, I don’t!” The boy whirled on Danny again, glaring with all the hatred Danny felt toward himself. “You got to have both parents until you were twice my age, and you wallow around like the only thing in the universe is you. You’re not the only person who lost a mom that night! I can’t believe Zeus and someone as selfish as you can exist in the same city.”
Danny barked a laugh. Because it was too funny. Fucking hilarious that Danny Grant was the worst of this city and Zeus was the best, and somehow Danny was both. It made so much sense why he was torn up inside—because he was too halves that didn’t go together, maybe never would, and that…that was funny.
So he laughed. He laughed until the others were all staring at him. “Oh, come on!” he said, near hysterics when none of them joined him; of course they didn’t. “It’s funny, right? Isn’t it funny, Stella? Because you wanted me to tell him. Well, I think he’s in for a rude awakening.”
“Danny, stop…” Stella looked at him like she was fractured inside too. But that was normal, wasn’t it? It was normal for Danny to hurt the people he loved.
“Zeus couldn’t save either of our mothers,” Danny grit out at Joey. “It’s unfair that my mother died. It’s unfair that yours did too. I wish I could erase myself from everyone’s lives so none of it hurt anymore, but even that wouldn’t change what happened. You can blame me anyway though, Joey, go right ahead. I do. It is my fault.”
“Danny—” Stella reached for him.
“Don’t. Touch me.” He backed away, and his clenched fists shook and shook and…sparked in his fury, making Joey’s eyes, making all of their eyes widen. “I don’t want to be your charity case anymore, Stella. You think you need to be kind because it’s sad, because helping is the right thing, but you didn’t choose to be my friend, you had to be because we’re family. No one would ever choose me.
“Even you didn’t choose me, Dad,” he turned his words on his father, who looked anguished an
d speechless, but only because he was a good man who deserved better than Danny for a son, “you chose them. Me you were just stuck with. If you didn’t feel obligated to love me, you’d hate me for what I let happen. The best you can muster is pitying me. You’re pitying me right now. But you don’t need to feel obligated to love me anymore, Dad. You get to start over with Joey.”
“Danny—”
“Have a nice night.”
Joey stood in Danny’s path when he turned for the door, but the boy backed into Stella as if Danny carried a plague in his wake.
“Danny, get back here. Danny!” John called after him. “You promised you wouldn’t run!”
Coldly, Danny looked over his shoulder and saw how stunned and terrified they all were, even John, who didn’t know what to do because there was nothing to do. Danny couldn’t be fixed.
“I know. But running’s the only thing I’m good at anymore,” he said before he turned on his heels and lightning jumped straight to the precinct.
He didn’t tell Andre anything about what he’d left behind when he arrived at the morgue. Tossing his phone aside, he couldn’t have cared less if John or Stella called him and focused on letting his lightning run free. When it was clear that Andre had succeeded and Danny could use the new suit to his heart’s content without it becoming visible, he told Andre he was taking it on a trial run through the city and not to expect him back until morning.
Danny knew exactly who to test the suit out on first.
Chapter 19
Mal stared at his Netflix screen. Nothing sounded appealing. Tapping the remote against the cushion beside him like a metronome, he was clearly bored, and not the kind of bored that an old show or favorite movie could squelch.
There was nothing more to be done in preparation for the heist until the day of. He could fiddle with his amplifier, but he already understood the inner workings of the cold field and didn’t want to risk throwing something off. Besides, taking out his new toy to tinker with in his home could get risky if Danny showed up.
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