Which shouldn’t be that surprising, I guess. I had a friend in grade school whose father was completely gray by the time he was a little older than Connor, after all. It was just weird to think of your idols as being mortal.
He froze at Alex’s gaze.
“Sorry, I’m not interrupting anything, am I?” Connor asked.
“Give us a sec,” Alex said, then kissed me in a way that literally made me weak in the knees.
Yeah…one of the things about dating Alex Gage? He has no qualms with PDA.
“D’aaw, don’t you two love birds worry about a thing,” Connor said, after Alex had pulled back. “She’s in good hands with Lilah. Without her to keep my brain on straight? Weeell…”
“Get out of their hair, Sil,” Lilah said from behind him in the hallway. “You two take all the time you need.”
“Oh, we’re good,” Alex said, then nodded toward me. “Good luck.”
“Good luck,” I repeated, squeezing his hand before I let it drop.
“Awesome,” Connor said, patting him on the shoulder as the two left the room. “Big guy, do we have a surprise for you.”
“Um…do I want to know?” I asked, turning to Lilah.
“Just a little something to help keep him safe,” she replied. “Are you ready to begin?”
Maybe? My mind whimpered. But on the outside, I said, “Yes.”
“Then let’s move over to the cot. You’ll be a lot more comfortable lying down.”
I nodded and complied. There was a scraping sound as Lilah pulled the only chair in the room toward the bedside.
“May I take your hand?” she asked.
“Sure,” I replied.
“Okay,” she said. “We’re going to do this linearly, starting with the first erased memory. At any time I feel like things are getting too intense, I’ll pull you out. The effect won’t be instantaneous, though. We’re dealing with a significant time differential here. What will be seconds here will feel much longer for you.”
“Okay.”
“Close your eyes.”
I followed her direction, surrounding myself with darkness. Darkness that seemed to pull me down, down, down, as if in sleep. With nightmares waiting on the other side.
And, hopefully, answers.
6
Alex
“Big guy, do we have a surprise for you.”
Connor patted me on the shoulder. I frowned but let him lead me down the hall and into the conference room where I had first talked to Riley and Jane about Calypso.
The table was still there, but this time it was covered in stuff. A long, black bag, probably made to hold clothing, lay across one end. A couple of travel bags, half opened, lined the middle. I caught sight of a toothbrush.
“Are you guys sleeping here?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Connor replied with an eye roll. “I mean, I know it’s standard for Field Agents, but would it kill the Forgers to spring for a nice hotel every now and then?”
“Especially when you’re not field agents.”
“Oh, I’m sure they’d appreciate it too!”
Connor rounded the conference table and pulled out a large case made of some sort of heavy-duty, familiar-looking plastic. No not, plastic.
“Is that what I think it is?” I asked, meeting Connor’s eyes.
In response, Connor opened the case to reveal a helmet on top of a set of dark gray body armor.
“No.” I shook my head.
“Come on! Give me a chance to say my piece.”
“I’m not becoming Faultline again.”
“Faultline? I said nothing about Faultline. It’s not like I’m asking you to rob a bank. Lawful good here!”
“Lawful…huh?”
“Aw, man, are you in the wrong line of work.”
“Not anymore. I’m not putting the armor back on.”
“In all fairness this isn’t as nice as your old armor. The Forgers wouldn’t spring for something that high ticket for their famously fragile field agents—”
“Is this supposed to be you saying your piece?”
“No, no!” He raised his hands. “Let’s try this again. We’re not asking you to take up your old name or anything like that. We just want to make sure that if we run into any problems out there, you have some protection. That’s all. I mean, think about it. Getting into a sticky situation without any armor? Not a good call. As a fellow glass cannon, trust me, I know how easy it is to break pretty much every bone in my body.”
I frowned, letting his words sink in. It made me think about the time when Black and Blue (who had really been Calypso in disguise) had attacked Edison Kent’s campaign rally. I had been without my armor, and Dawn had paid for it by being dragged up the side of a building. She was fine now, healing abilities and all that, but it had still been incredibly painful.
And what the hell was a “glass cannon?”
“Besides,” Connor finished. “Lilah suggested it, so it must be the smart thing to do.”
“Fine,” I said, reaching for the case. “But I’m leaving it off for now.”
“Yeah, I can’t imagine spending an hour in a car with that shit on is all that comfortable.”
I picked it up and frowned. Was this heavier than my last set had been?
“I’ll just pop it in your trunk,” I said.
“Yeah…about that.”
“What do you mean, we don’t have a car?” I asked. “What about that?”
The two of us stood in the back lot, a silver SUV in clear view. An SUV that I had seen parked behind Colossus Fitness on Saturday night.
“Yeah, that’s where we have a problem,” Connor replied. “You see, before Lilah and I came up here, we were helping out the Central Team. They’re the team of Actuals that keeps an eye on Los Angeles.”
“A city that’s not exactly located centrally. What does that have to do with the SUV?”
“Well, clearly we didn’t drive here. We flew. So instead of having our own vehicle, we borrowed one from the Forger Headquarters in Boston. And the only one available happened to be a stick shift.” He paused. “I’m gonna bet I don’t have to fill you in on the fact that I don’t drive stick.”
“Let me guess—Lilah does?”
“Yep.”
I let out a groan of frustration. “Seriously, man, do you do anything?”
“I’ll say!” Connor raised his hands. “Shoot people from trees. Provide necessary banter. How can you be an Actual and not know about the necessary banter?”
“How the hell did I get caught up in this?”
“What did you expect when you took a job from a supervillain?”
“It’s not like Calypso wore a mask!”
“And I’m sure you thought her given name was Calypso.”
“Fuck.” I shook my head. “I don’t know. How did you think we were gonna get out there if you can’t drive stick?”
“I assumed we’d take your Jetta.”
“We have one car we split between three people. Mariah needed it today.”
“Well, shit.” Connor paused. “I don’t suppose you drive stick?”
“Clearly, I don’t, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation!”
I sighed, rubbing my eyes with my palms. Sparks flew everywhere. This wasn’t good. Lilah had been right in giving me something to do. Feeling helpless was not good for me.
Especially when this was something that could have been avoided.
Looked like we were going to have to find an alternate solution. And it wasn’t like that one was just going to just drop out of the sky.
“Do you guys need a ride?”
The two of us spun simultaneously to see Alan Takahashi. He wasn’t wearing a suit or anything this time, but he still was insanely dressed up for a day when he wasn’t going to work. He wore dress pants, a white button-up shirt, and a black leather jacket I’m pretty sure his little sister hadn’t found for him in a thrift store like Claire had done for me. This corporate lackey outfit wa
s complete with douchey sunglasses and a cup of coffee. From Starbucks, of course.
I swallowed, remembering my promise to Dawn. That I would at least try to get along with her own flesh and blood.
Fortunately, Connor spoke up first.
“Hey, man! How does it feel to not be drugged!”
“Considering I’ve been so for much of the past thirty-six hours, perfectly fine.” Alan’s eyes flickered toward the case slung over Connor’s left shoulder. “I take it there’s not an instrument in there?”
“Gotta bring my bow around with me somehow,” the archer replied with a smile. “Kind of makes me look like a gangster, right?”
“Not really, no.”
“Why are you here?” I asked.
“To wish Dawn good luck, of course,” he said, raising a single eyebrow.
“You didn’t say good-bye to her this morning?”
“I was stuck on a conference call.”
Of course. Working when he should have been supporting his sister. She was only about to face her greatest fears, after all.
“Some guidance around the building would be appreciated,” Alan stated.
“Bad call, dude,” Connor replied. “Lilah’s already started her magic. Best to let her and Dawn work things out.”
“Is that why you’re out here?”
I quickly explained our current situation to Alan.
“And neither of us can drive stick,” I finished.
“I can,” Alan said with a shrug. “But if that’s the case, I would be more comfortable taking my own car. It will leave the others a spare vehicle in case they require it.”
As he spoke, he pointed his thumb back and over his shoulder toward a shiny silver vehicle. I didn’t know enough about cars to name it without seeing the logo, but I’m sure it was something elite like a brand-new BMW or Audi.
“Not a good idea,” I said. “We’re potentially going straight into the heart of Project Regen. The very people we’re trying to protect you from.”
“And how will you protect me if you’re an hour away? Especially when my sister and Golden Strike are both…indisposed.”
Shit.
“I have no desire to run headlong into danger,” Alan said. “But I also do not want to draw SynergyCorp’s agents to my childhood home, where my mother is. Driving you seems like a better option.”
“Fine,” I said, jaw stiff. “Can I throw this in your trunk?”
Alan lifted his set of keys and pressed a button. The trunk automatically popped open. He pressed another, and the car started up.
Wonderful. I bet that thing was filled with hundreds of tiny computer parts that could break on us at any moment.
If you would have asked me what type of music I thought Alan Takahashi listened to, I would have guessed classical. Something with violins and shit. But while classical music might have put me to sleep, that would have been fine. My tastes might be centered around classic rock, but I don’t mind most music, whether it be rap, country, or dance. Just because I don’t choose to listen to it doesn’t mean that I always need to be in control of the radio.
Unfortunately, I was wrong. Alan didn’t listen to classical. He didn’t listen to anything at all.
It was about as awkward as you might expect. Especially when Connor, sitting in the back, decided he needed to take a nap, meaning that Alan and I spent the next twenty minutes in total silence.
I was going go for small talk (Christ, I think it was even going to be about the weather) when the phone vibrated in my pocket. With a sigh of relief, I picked it up to see that Mariah wanted to…Facetime? She had never done that before.
I frowned, clicking the button, to see my sister looking over the phone.
“Oh crap!” she said. “Sorry, sorry. I meant to call you and I think I pushed the wrong button.”
“It’s fine,” I said with a laugh.
“No, it’s not,” she said. “I just can’t get a handle on this new phone. My old one was so much better.”
“Only if you didn’t need to make calls, receive text messages, or go for more than a couple of hours without a charge.”
“Shut up. Let me see if I can turn this into a call.”
I nodded and watched as Mariah played with the screen. She was dressed in a pair of purple scrubs, and while they were basically pajamas, I don’t think she had ever looked better. She was finally doing what she wanted to do. And sure, right now it was as an unpaid intern, but her bosses at Bailey General had already noticed that she was a hard worker. It was nice. Almost made me forget about the student loan debt that would start coming due six months after graduation.
Eventually, she figured it out. I held the phone up to my ear.
“Sorry about that,” she said.
“Don’t apologize! To be honest, I’m happy to find someone less tech-savvy in this family than I am!”
“Not sure if I agree with that.”
“I think we both can agree that Claire could mop the floor with us on her texting speed alone.”
“True, true.” Mariah took a deep breath before speaking again. “To be honest, Claire is kind of the reason I’m calling you right now.”
I felt my stomach sink. And Claire had been doing so well over the past few months…
“Shit,” I said.
“No, no! It’s not that. It’s just…you know what Friday is.”
“Hmmmm?”
And then it hit me. The fourteenth. The first-year anniversary of Mom’s death.
“Shit,” I said. “Ah…yeah, I remember.”
“And, well, I know that you don’t like to talk about it, but I was thinking that we could all go to Mom’s gravesite. I’m pretty sure Claire won’t agree to go unless she thinks both of us are going too. So, do you think…”
“Yeah,” I said, reaching up to run a hand through my hair. “I get it.”
“It’s just…I know that you and Dawn are going on this mini-vacation, which is great, and I don’t want this to be hanging over you for days, but I also didn’t want to just spring it on you last minute—”
“Mariah, it’s fine!” I said, voice firm. “You can let Claire know that it will be a family thing.”
“Thank you,” she said with a sigh. “I really appreciate it.” There was a pause before she spoke again. “Are you in the mountains yet?”
“Something like that.” I looked out the window.
It was strange how fast you could go from city to country. Just take the highway out of Bailey City and before you knew it, you had exited onto a long, winding country road with mountains in the distance. I looked out the window to see a large field on my left, half covered in snow.
“We still have a ways to go,” I finished.
“I bet. I’ll let you guys go. Although…”
“Yes?”
“I couldn’t help but notice—with the Facetime and all—that there’s someone else in the car?”
Crap, she must have seen Connor or Alan.
“Was that…Dawn’s brother? The one that lives in Boston?”
“Oh, yeah,” I said. “Sunshine invited him too.”
I bid my sister good-bye. And I don’t know what it was, but it didn’t quite hit me until after I had hung up. When Mariah had asked about Alan, she had sounded…interested.
“Was that your sister? The nurse?” Alan asked.
“Yep,” I said, my voice coming out more clipped than I had intended.
Alan didn’t respond for a moment, filling the car with silence again.
“Now that we have the time, I just want to apologize for how I behaved at dinner on Saturday.”
“Oh?” I turned to him in surprise.
“Given the events of the previous day, my encounter with SynergyCorp in Boston, I wanted nothing more than to talk to my sister, to see if it was somehow connected to what had happened to her. And then I came home and saw what was going on and I found myself on edge. I took that out on you, which wasn’t entirely fair.”
&
nbsp; “I’d say it wasn’t fair at all.”
“Adding to that is the fact that my sister…does not have the most adept taste in romantic partners. Ling from high school was fine. He was just a teenage boy. But Mark didn’t have that excuse. I’m glad it’s over.”
Which was a strange thing to say about a guy that was abducted and assumed to be dead, but I let it slide.
“Sunshine said she wasn’t much of a fan of him either.”
“It’s the one thing that Sunshine and I see eye to eye on.”
Poor girl didn’t have a chance with this guy.
“I kind of get it,” I replied. “You see, my sister Mariah used to date this real jackoff who went to St. Andy’s—”
Before I could dive in, another phone went off, Connor’s. He jerked awake, reached into his pocket, and pulled it out. When he answered his voice was half a yawn.
“Lilah?” He paused. “Yep.” Another pause. “Got it.” Another. “Yeah. That’s a good idea, can you hold on a sec?”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a pen, then began writing on the back of his hand.
“Great,” he finally said. “We’ll head there.”
“Is my sister okay?” Alan asked, glancing up at Connor in his rearview mirror.
“Oh yeah, how’s Hikari doing?” There was another pause. “I see. Thanks.”
And with that, he ended the call.
“Got the directions, complete with GPS coordinates,” Connor said. “Should bring us right to the place.”
“And my sister?” Alan asked, sounding slightly tense. “How is she?”
Connor’s lips twisted into a frown. “It sounds like she’s getting great information but is having a hard time of it.”
“What do you mean?”
In response, Connor looked up, the sadness on his face making him look older. Middle aged.
And then he told us.
7
Dawn
It all began with a party.
I reached out to scratch the head of a large orange cat whose fluffiness knew no bounds. The collar on her throat identified her as “Miss Muggles,” indicating that someone in the Hua household was a Harry Potter fan. Miss Muggles had been my constant companion for the past half hour, which is about how long it took me to convince the cat that I was a friend—or at the very least someone worth tolerating—rather than one of the scary, noisy party guests who seemed to occupy every other inch of Renee Hua’s vacation house, located right off the coast of Lake Breman.
Silver and Gold (Red and Black Book 3) Page 6