by Sarah Fine
I rubbed the padded leather armrest of my cushy seat as we began to descend into the Bay Area. “I feel like a celebrity. Frank knows how to treat his employees, doesn’t he?”
Asa, who’d been staring out his window at the glowing lights at the edge of the ocean, leaned his head back against his seat. “That’s like saying a cat pampers the mice it catches.”
“I don’t think he’s planning to eat us.”
Asa pulled his gaze from the night sky and leveled it at me. “More like he’s playing before he bites our heads off.”
“Why would he do that? We can do stuff for him.”
“Sure,” he said faintly. “We’re useful. Just like Wendell was.”
“His magic sniffer who passed away? He seemed really sad about that.”
Asa rubbed his hands over his face. Dark circles lay beneath his eyes. “No doubt. Notice he didn’t mention how poor old Wendell died.”
“You think he had him killed?”
Very slowly, Asa raised two fingers to his temple, cocked his thumb, and pretended to blow his brains out. “Bet you everything I own.”
“But you don’t know for sure.”
Asa sighed, returning his attention to the view out the window. I eyed the taut lines of his shoulders and the sharp edge of his jaw, and then decided not to question him further. He obviously wasn’t eager to work for Frank, and I had a feeling if I talked up the job too much, Asa would be on to me in a second.
We arrived at the airport to find another car waiting, which took us to the Fairmont Hotel in a neighborhood called Nob Hill. I spent the ride reeling from the irony—I hadn’t done much traveling in my life, and already today I’d checked into two fancy hotels in two different states, flown on a private jet, and ridden in a few limos . . . but instead of sharing this experience with the love of my life, here I was with his surly brother. Asa had said he trusted me, but with the way he was acting now, barely looking at me, barely talking to me, I was starting to think he should have added “relatively speaking” to his declaration.
We had rooms on the same floor. Asa peeled off quickly, suggesting only that we meet for dinner late the next evening to talk over a plan for when we arrived in Bangkok. I was left standing in the hall with the bellboy, feeling strangely squirmy. It wasn’t that I was so eager to hang out with Asa, but it felt like we had things to talk about. Or, one thing at least. Ben.
Knowing my love was safe and sound for the moment, I woke up the next morning determined to make the most of my time in San Francisco. After calling my mother and assuring her I was still having a restful time—and then frantically dissuading her from joining me at my little lakeside spa for the weekend—I set out to explore the city. I stuffed my face with a hot fudge sundae in Ghirardelli Square, amused myself for a few minutes watching the sea lions sunning themselves on the little rafts at Pier 39, toured a bakery and ate a whole sourdough pepperoni pizza, then hiked up and down the ridiculous hills of the city. I didn’t want to stop moving, because then I would have to think. But just after the sun sank into the ocean, as if it were beckoning me from across the sea, luring me toward Bangkok, I started to make my way back to the hotel. It was a longer walk than I’d thought, though, and now I was going to be late. I had no idea how Asa had spent his day, but I hoped he was in a decent mood, because I was starting to get jittery as heck.
That might be why I realized I was being followed. I was nearing the edge of Chinatown when a little chill went right down my spine, and I looked over my shoulder to see a guy duck quickly into a shop. Telling myself it was nothing, I continued on, but my heart wouldn’t slow down. I was maybe six blocks from the hotel, but suddenly I couldn’t get there fast enough. I began to jog, glancing over my shoulder every few steps, slowing a little when I didn’t see anyone behind me. It was nearly nine, and I was no longer in a touristy part of town, so it wasn’t as if the sidewalks were packed. It would be tough to tail me without being spotted. I shook my head and laughed, then started to walk. “You’re acting like Asa,” I muttered.
I turned the corner and collided with someone coming the opposite direction. My breath was knocked out of me, and I stumbled back and had the impression of a man leaning forward to catch me.
As soon as his hands touched mine, my world exploded in a fiery burst of agony. Like my bones were its superhighway, the pain shot up my arms, across my shoulders, down my spine, and across my ribs. I tried to scream, but I couldn’t draw any air into my lungs.
And then it stopped suddenly, and I found myself crumpled against a brick wall in a little courtyard, its gate hanging open. In front of me was a playground, and to my left was a long narrow pathway, maybe to another side street. A man loomed over me, tall and thickly muscled, dressed all in black, with dark eyes and ebony hair. As he leaned into the light from a streetlamp, I recognized him as one of Zhong Lei’s crew who had chased us through Chicago. He was also, obviously, a Strikon. He flexed his fingers. “Make a sound, and I’ll do that again,” he said quietly.
“What do you want?” I asked, still trying to catch my breath.
“Information,” he said with a tilt of his head. “About the job you and Ward are doing for Brindle.”
I pressed my back against the wall as he took a step toward me. “No idea what you’re talking about. I just spent the day at Fisherman’s Wharf.”
The Strikon smiled. “Mr. Zhong is a collector, you see, just like Mr. Brindle. He is interested in relics of particular value. And we can think of only one reason for Mr. Brindle to hire Mr. Ward and send him here. He is seeking something.”
I glanced toward the street, wishing I had the strength to run. “Seriously. No clue.”
My attacker ran his tongue along his bottom lip. “Do you really want me to touch you again?”
“No,” I said, drawing my knees to my chest.
“Then tell me what you came here to find.”
“A-a relic,” I said.
He rolled his eyes. “Please do not insult me.”
“But that’s what it is! No—” My head slammed against brick as the Strikon stroked my cheek and sent a bolt of searing pain down my throat and into my gut.
“You really should be a nice girl and answer my questions honestly.” He stepped back and leisurely pulled a knife from beneath his shirt. “Because I can make this hurt so much it will carve new trails in your brain, and your thoughts will be trapped in those little ruts forever, like rats in a maze. You’ll never be the same.” He smiled, obviously enjoying my fear as I whimpered and flinched away from him.
“It would be such a shame, wouldn’t it?” he continued. “Because I know what you are. Zhi told Mr. Zhong everything. How would Mr. Ward feel if I broke his reliquary?”
“Mr. Ward would be pissed as hell.” The voice came from the darkness to my left—a split second before Asa stepped out of it. In his hand was that sticklike black handle thing he carried with him. He did indeed look pissed as hell. And I was really glad to see him.
“Mr. Ward,” said the Strikon, sounding amused as he twirled the knife in his fingers. “I was hoping you’d received my invitation.”
Asa winced as something invisible passed between them, and I remembered what Asa had said about Reza—I could feel your ooze the moment I hit the parking garage. This guy probably knew Asa would sense him here.
He looked like he’d been counting on it, actually. “Come with me quietly, or there’ll be more of that,” he said to Asa, whose skin was draining of color.
Asa flicked his wrist, and the handle extended into a baton about two feet long. “Sorry. I’ve got dinner plans.” He held his other hand out to me, but the Strikon stepped between us, the knife hanging from his fist—only a few feet from my face. With no warning, he slashed it forward, right at my cheek, and I didn’t even have time to move.
But Asa did. He thrust his baton out and deflected the slash, stopping the blade inches from my skin. The Strikon took advantage of Asa’s momentum and turned, grabbing Asa’
s outstretched arm and wrenching him forward. Asa hit the wall next to me with a crunch and a burst of breath, but then he ducked as the Strikon tried to stab him in the shoulder. I scrambled away as the blade hit brick, and Asa spun sharply and slammed his baton into the back of the Strikon’s legs. The man staggered, but as Asa tried to sweep his feet out from under him, the Strikon recovered and delivered a hard backward kick to Asa’s ribs. Blood trickled from the corner of Asa’s mouth, and his face was twisted into a tight grimace as he used the baton to block stab after stab. They moved so fast that I couldn’t tell who was winning, but Asa had begun to backtrack under the ferocity of the Strikon’s attack, and maybe under the force of whatever painful magical vibes the guy was giving off.
I’d groped my way up the wall and gotten to my feet, but I was afraid to scream for help, because I didn’t want to distract Asa for even a second. I didn’t know how to help him. But then the Strikon’s knife clattered to the ground, and I nearly let out a cheer. Asa bared his teeth as he sliced that baton through the air, but the Strikon blocked his arm with a bone-jarring strike and drove his fist into Asa’s stomach. Asa bent double, and the Strikon kicked the baton from his hand and lunged at him. Asa landed on his back with the Strikon on top of him, the man’s hands closing around Asa’s throat.
Asa’s eyes went wide as their skin touched, and he let out the most horrible sound. The Strikon straddled his chest. Asa’s arms were free, but they were spread wide, twitching and flopping like they’d been disconnected from the rest of him. The Strikon’s face split into an ecstatic smile as Asa arched back, obviously in blinding pain. He was helpless, but I wasn’t. I ran forward and scooped Asa’s baton from the asphalt, then held it like a bat and smacked it across the Strikon’s back.
The Strikon cursed and twisted, lunging for me. I yelped and stumbled backward, swiping the baton through the air as the enraged agent powered himself to his feet. “Come here, little girl,” he said between heavy breaths. “I was gentle before, but now—”
Asa plowed into his legs, and I dodged out of the way as they hit the ground again. This time, Asa was on the guy’s back. Looking unsteady, Asa slammed his fist into the side of the Strikon’s head. Asa’s breath was harsh and his face was flushed. The Strikon shoved his hips up and rolled with Asa, slamming his elbow into Asa’s solar plexus. I raised the baton to try to help, and the Strikon must have seen the movement in his periphery, because he turned to look.
It was the moment Asa needed. He threw himself on top of the Strikon again and punched the guy in the face. Asa’s chin was smeared with blood, and his eyes were deep and dark as he jabbed his fist downward again and again. Veins stood out at his temples as he pinned the guy’s shoulders to the ground and knocked the Strikon’s scrabbling hands off his thighs. “Do you wanna see what’s in my pocket?” Asa said, his voice broken by his wheezing breath. “Just so happens it’s a present for you.”
He punched the guy again and cursed. His fingers trembled as he unbuttoned one of his thigh pockets and pulled out the alien Pez dispenser. “Mattie,” he snapped without looking at me. He extended his other hand. “Baton.”
I rushed forward and slid it into his palm. Instead of hitting the guy with it, though, he flipped it upward and jammed the handle into the guy’s mouth, prying his teeth open. As the Strikon continued to struggle, trying to buck Asa off, Asa lowered the dispenser to the guy’s mouth and clicked the back of the alien’s head several times.
The yellowish tablets fell between the guy’s lips one after the other, at least six of them disappearing into the blackness of his mouth. He started to gag and thrash as Asa tossed the baton away. He pinched the guy’s nostrils closed and clamped his hand under the guy’s chin, holding his jaw shut. Asa’s teeth gritted and his body shook, like it was taking all his strength to hold on.
Then he leaned down and said, very quietly, “Stop struggling.”
The Strikon blinked up at him and went still.
Asa threw me a sidelong glance before whispering something in the Strikon’s ear. After a few seconds, Asa straightened up and looked at me again. “That wasn’t so bad,” he said, his voice slurring—and then he slowly fell to the side. He didn’t even put his hands out to catch himself as he slid off the Strikon’s body.
I rushed forward and caught his head just before it hit the pavement, my heart in my throat. “Asa?”
He groaned. I cradled his head, my hands slipping into his dark hair. It was drenched with sweat, and so was the rest of him. His muscles were twitching. I leaned down to get a good look at his face, but a shadow passed over us and I looked up to see the Strikon standing right next to me. I opened my mouth to scream, but the Strikon bowed. “My deepest apologies for hurting you,” he said woodenly.
He turned and walked away, marching through the gate that led out to the street.
“Wow,” I murmured as I turned my attention back to Asa, whose head was in my lap.
“My baton.”
I leaned over and grabbed it. Asa took it from me and pushed it straight down, making the stick part disappear into the handle again. Shakily, he stuck it in his belt. “Hotel,” he whispered. “Can you give me a hand?”
“Sure.” As carefully as I could, I helped him to his feet, pulling his arm around my shoulders to help him stay upright as he swayed. “But do you want to maybe go to the hospital instead?”
His eyes were half-closed. “Nothing they could do for me.” He clumsily drew his sleeve across his chin to wipe away the blood. “Please, Mattie.”
With my hand on his waist, the tremors in his body were shaking me, too, and it only made me hold on to him tighter as we started walking. I wanted to celebrate each time he put one foot in front of the other, because as I looked at his face, I knew it was a struggle. We passed through the gate, and I glanced over to see the Strikon standing at the curb like he had nowhere to go.
“He’s not going to hurt us,” Asa mumbled as I paused, unwilling to turn my back to a guy who’d been trying to kill us a few minutes ago.
“Isn’t that manipulation stuff going to wear off, though?” The one tab he’d given me back in that hotel in Kansas City hadn’t seemed to last more than ten minutes or so.
“Yeah.” Asa’s head was bowed, and I tightened my grip on him as we turned to walk the final blocks back to our hotel. “But not soon enough.”
“If you say so.”
We had just crossed the street when I heard an engine roar, tires screech, a horn blare, and a woman scream behind us. Startled, I craned my neck and looked back.
A block away, a bus had come to a stop in the middle of the intersection. Lying crumpled against the curb was the Strikon, his head canted weirdly to one side. A cold chill spread through my chest as I looked up at Asa. “Oh my God,” I whispered. “You told him to walk into traffic.”
Asa’s bloodshot eyes opened and settled on me. Then he slowly brought his hand up and touched the tip of his crooked nose. “It’s them or us now, Mattie. And when it comes to that, I’m going to choose us every time.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Asa managed to wait until we made it through the door of his hotel room to start barfing, but it was a close call. He wrenched himself away from me and dove into the bathroom, landing in front of the toilet just in time. His entire body heaved as if it were trying to turn itself inside out. Having helped out a few sorority sisters after nights of over-the-top partying, I grabbed a glass and filled it with water, then cautiously edged over to Asa as he sank to the tiles.
I knelt next to him, reaching up to flush the toilet before touching his sweaty cheek. “Hey,” I said gently. “Sit up. Take a sip so you can rinse out your mouth.”
He rose on shaking arms, and I lifted the cup to his lips. But the moment the water hit his tongue, he grimaced. “Nope,” he said, lunging forward and retching into the toilet again.
I had my hand on his back and felt his muscles flex as he arched, as his body worked to rid itself of whatever the Strik
on had done to him. “Is the magic on you?” I asked. “Should you take a shower?” I didn’t know what to do for him—that Strikon had touched me, too, and I was a little achy, but otherwise fine. He’d had hold of Asa for a lot longer, though, and had seemed determined to damage him.
“I-I j-just need—” His body heaved again. “Time,” he said as he sank down again. “I’ll be okay.”
He sounded so weak that it made my throat tight. “You can have all the time you want, but I’m not leaving you alone like this.” He was soaked in his own sweat and shivering in the air-conditioned room. His eyes were so bloodshot that it looked like they might start to bleed. He had bruises on his throat, and the knuckles on his right hand were swollen. One was oozing blood.
I pressed a damp washcloth over the cut. “Thanks for saving my life, Asa.”
He let out a weak croak of laughter. “Thanks for saving mine.”
“Did I? You kind of look like death warmed over.”
“Stop hurting my feelings.”
I got up and rinsed the cloth with cold water, then ran it along his neck, smiling as he sighed and relaxed a little. “Strikon magic hurts you more than it does other people, doesn’t it?”
“Yep.”
“It makes you sick, when there’s too much.”
“Yep. But that’s true of nearly all magic.”
“You could have avoided him. But you came straight to us.”
He cracked one eye open. “We were supposed to meet at eight thirty. You were late.”
“I’m going to get you a fresh shirt,” I blurted out. His was clinging to his chest and abs like someone had tossed a bucket of water on him.
I got up and went to his duffel, grabbing a clean black T-shirt that was right on top. When I returned to the bathroom, he’d stripped off his soaked shirt and was kneeling next to the tub, wiping the wet washcloth over his torso. I was torn between turning away and helping him, because he looked so fragile. I told myself to get over it and moved forward to help him up.