by AJ Larrieu
It was broad daylight, so I couldn’t exactly creep around in the azalea bushes. I opted for the hiding-in-plain-sight approach and strolled past the house as though I was on my way to my own overpriced monstrosity. I wished I were wearing tennis shoes so I could pretend to tie them. When I got in front of Annette’s place, I bent and fiddled with my sandal strap while I scanned the building with my powers.
The place was empty. No sign of life inside at all. No guards, no one sleeping in the upstairs bedrooms. Wherever Nick had taken Diana, it wasn’t here.
I stood up and walked closer, right to the edge of the drive. None of the lights were on. I felt inside the garage for the SUV I’d seen before. Nothing.
“’Scuse me?”
I jumped and looked up. It was the maid I’d seen earlier.
“You here working for Miz Perrin?”
“What?—uh—”
“Only I heard nobody can find her. I was thinking maybe you hadn’t heard. Miz Celia on the corner went to collect the subdivision association dues, and nobody answered.”
“Oh.” The relief was like a roar in my chest. “I was wondering why nobody was home. Wish I hadn’t had to drive all this way.” I laughed. It sounded fake. I shut up.
“Yeah, gas ain’t cheap these days.” The woman moved away. “Well, see you around, honey.”
“Wait!” I startled her with the loudness of my voice. “Wait—sorry—I mean, do you know where she is? What’s going on?”
The woman shook her head. “Nobody knows. She’s been gone for days now.”
I had to stop the triumphant smile before it took over my face. “Huh. Weird.”
“Yeah. Well, I better go. They don’t like it if I spend too much time talking to folks.”
“Oh.” How awful. “Well, thanks.”
She nodded and walked away, back to the minivan. I watched as she pulled a vacuum cleaner out of the back and went into the house.
I left the way I’d come and tried not to read too much into her words. It was far too soon to believe that Annette was dead. But I could hope.
* * *
The B&B was just as we’d left it, empty and quiet. It seemed impossible that it had been less than three days since we’d driven away. Mail had piled up beneath the mail slot, and I gathered it up and put it on the kitchen table. Bills, junk mail and a card for Lionel. My throat caught. I hid the card underneath a supermarket circular. Not now.
We’d shoved Ryan’s cash in a cardboard box in Lionel’s office. Not the smartest place, perhaps, but I couldn’t figure out how to explain a duffel bag full of wrinkled bills to the bank, and when we’d started sleeping at the B&B, we didn’t want to leave it unattended in the condo. Laundering someone else’s ill-gotten gains was way outside my skill set.
Lionel’s office smelled like coffee. The mug he’d last used was still sitting on the desk, a rim of brown residue in the bottom. I stared at it for a long time, not wanting to move it, or even touch it. As if it were a homing beacon that would bring him back if only I didn’t disturb it. Beneath it, his expense ledger lay open to a date five days past. Ever since Mina left, he’d insisted on keeping the books by hand. His neat handwriting spelled out bills paid for eggs and milk and cleaning supplies and payments received from the people who had checked out, bills still outstanding from past guests. Wasted Guy and his dead friend. They were probably both dead, now.
Annette. This all came back to Annette.
I ripped the box open and grabbed bundles of cash, glad we’d sorted it into hundred dollar chunks. All the ones meant it took up a lot of space. I closed the bag with a binder clip. Not as classy as a silver suitcase, but for John the Sleazeball Manager, it was more than good enough.
One withdrawal made. Time for another.
I put the cash in the trunk and drove out to City Park. There was a kind of nature area in the center with walking paths and lakes and swampy areas. Plenty of living things, most of them not people. Perfect. I wasn’t shaking yet, I wasn’t desperate yet, but I knew I would be, and I didn’t want to go back, be in the same room with Ian and Shane, without having the cravings under control.
I walked to the trailhead, passing a young woman with two boys on their way out. She waved cheerily at me, and I made myself smile back. More people were walking along the trails, bird-watching and pointing out live oaks. I walked until I found a stand of water oaks set back from the path, still in sight, but not obviously so. If I leaned against one of the trunks, I could pretend I was only resting.
The first pull was bliss. The tree groaned and cracked and I bit back a scream of animal ecstasy. It was over too quickly and I moved on to the next one, then the next. I was going to make a dead zone in the middle of the park, but I couldn’t make myself care. Power filled the hole I’d been battling all day. I finally felt like I could breathe.
I was so lost in the joy of it, I barely felt the sting in the side of my neck.
I put my hand to the spot. A dart. I pulled it out and looked at it, but my eyes wouldn’t focus. The dart slipped from my fingers and I fell sideways to the ground.
“I’m sorry, Cass.” A woman’s voice. Familiar. I tried to place it, but blackness encroached over everything, my vision, my hearing, my mind. I almost had her, then everything went dark.
Chapter Eighteen
When I woke, I couldn’t tell if it was day or night. I was on what felt like a bed, but the room was perfectly dark.
I sat up carefully and felt around. Sheets, a blanket, the edge of a mattress. My hands found a wooden surface and, on top of that, a squat ceramic lamp. I fumbled for the light switch and turned it on. Red light, like from a darkroom, bathed the room.
It was a bedroom, a perfectly normal bedroom. Bed, nightstand, dresser in the corner. I looked around for anything I might be able to use as a weapon. I reached out telekinetically, meaning to search the drawers, but my powers wouldn’t rise. I pushed harder, but it was like clawing at the inside of a smooth sphere. Even my telepathy—nothing—silence.
Whatever they’d given me, it had dampened my abilities. I got up, panicking, and scrabbled at the doorknob. Locked. I couldn’t reach into the mechanism and pick it, couldn’t feel what was on the other side of it. I kicked at it, trying to break it down, but it only rattled in its frame.
The sound of keys came from the other side.
I backed into the corner of the room. Some primitive instinct made me want walls behind me, and since instinct was all I had, I obeyed it.
The door creaked open. A man stood in there—the same guard I’d seen the first time I’d visited the house. He carried a gun. He didn’t raise it, but his finger was on the trigger.
“Don’t move.” He walked into the room.
I pushed myself farther into the corner. As he came closer, I noticed that his other hand held a syringe.
“No. No no no no...”
He reached me and raised the gun, pressed the barrel to my temple. The cold metal felt like a brand against my skin. I was shaking.
“Don’t. Move,” he said again. “I ain’t got no problem blowing your fucking brains all over the carpet.”
I stilled.
He raised the syringe and stuck me in the upper arm, depressing the plunger. Whatever it was felt like ice in my veins. He lowered the gun and leaned in close, looking into my eyes. His image had gone blurry and dim, and I had trouble focusing on his features. When he stepped back, I tried to move and staggered.
“What...why...?”
He didn’t answer. He turned and left the room.
I slid to the floor, my knees no longer capable of supporting me. The feeling of impotence I’d had earlier was replaced by a complete lack of connection with my shadowmind. I couldn’t even try to use my powers. It was as if they’d never been there.
I was almost gr
ateful for it.
“Miss Weatherfield.”
It was a struggle to lift my head, but I did it. In the doorway stood Annette, wearing her usual long sleeves and gloves. The red light from the lamp made her exposed skin look sunburned.
“How lovely to meet you in my home under honest pretenses.” She walked into the room and perched on the edge of the bed as if it was a throne, crossing her feet at the ankles.
“Thought...thought you were dead.”
“How unflattering. No, I managed to survive despite what you did to me.”
I tried to stand up and fell back to the floor in a heap.
Annette kept talking. “I had to bury myself in the ground for a full blessed day to avoid the sun. That kind of thing makes me extremely vexed.”
Coming from her mouth, the word ground had three syllables. Her voice had its usual honey-soft quality, but I had trouble concentrating on her words. It was as though my mind lagged five seconds behind in comprehending them.
“What do you want?” Each word constituted effort.
“What an excellent question. I do wish I could simply drain you right here and figure out where your boyfriend is, but those drugs in your veins have a very unpleasant effect on me, and it’s clear I can’t let you have use of your powers, so I’ll make this easy for you.” She reached into the pocket of her slacks and extracted a cell phone. “Call Shane and tell him it’s very simple. His life for yours.” She laid the phone on the floor in front of me and nudged it closer.
I tried to reach out and push it back, but I didn’t have the strength. “Go ahead and kill me.”
It would be easier on everyone anyway. By now, I was too dangerous to be around anyone with a life to lose.
Annette turned her head toward the door and pitched her voice to carry. “Greg, go and get her for me, please.”
Footsteps sounded down the hallway. I had to assume she meant Diana—I had to assume she wasn’t above torturing the girl to get me to comply. I closed my eyes to avoid her gaze and forced my hazy brain to work, to think. I had to come up with a way to make sure he didn’t come—some code only he would understand—some lie that would convince him I had a plan for escape—something.
“I’m sorry, Cass.”
I raised my head. The voice I’d heard before, in the park. It seemed impossible now that I hadn’t recognized it.
“Janine.”
“We’ve been circling the city for days, looking for you,” Annette said. “We had to wait until you got into her range. After that, she pinpointed you right away. She’s really quite powerful.”
I stared at her, stunned. “Why?”
“She promised she’d help me get my boy back. She swore.”
Annette smiled. “He might be useful to me. Someone with his skills.”
I met Janine’s eyes. Ryan’s powers were gone, and we both knew it. “How could you do this?”
“He’s all I have left.” Her expression hardened. “I knew you wouldn’t help me.”
“Janine, this isn’t the way—”
“Shut up.” She looked at a spot over my left shoulder. “Just shut up.”
Annette gave Janine a possessive glance, a collector with a new item in her glass case. “So, you see, even if you don’t call him, I’ll be able to find him. It’s only a matter of time. And if you don’t help me, well, I don’t have much incentive to keep you alive, do I? This way, at least you get to go on living.” She leaned in close. “Isn’t that what he’d want for you?”
I made myself laugh. “I won’t call him, and even if I did, he wouldn’t come.”
She smiled, showing her nearly-retracted fangs. If I hadn’t been paying attention, I might have mistaken them for unusually sharp incisors. “You underestimate your influence.”
“You overestimate his stupidity.”
She sighed. “I suppose we’ll have to do this more slowly, then. Janine?”
“I—I—don’t feel him. I think he must be out of my range.”
“I know that, darling.” That voice. Syrup and poison. “We’ll be going on a little trip as soon as the sun sets.”
“Why are you doing this?” I said. “Why him?”
She laughed. “I can’t believe you don’t know. Isn’t it obvious? He’s a potential.”
“A potential what?”
She stood up, shaking her head. “This city didn’t need me to go under. Good Lord. Shane is a potential guardian.”
Time froze. “That’s impossible.”
“Why else would I want him dead? He’s nothing. And he’s going to stay nothing just as soon as he comes to rescue you.”
“No. He would’ve known.” But I wondered—would he? No one had yet fully explained to me how guardians were chosen, or called, or whatever. If New Orleans really had been without one for generations, it wasn’t such a stretch to think potentials might have lived and died never knowing what they were capable of.
And it fit. Shane loved the city. He’d never had a desire to leave. And his sense of justice, of what was right—it was stronger in him than in anyone I knew. Even Lionel.
“Go ahead and kill me now,” I said, “because I will never help you.”
The doorbell rang. Annette’s head whipped up like a dog hearing a whistle. She inhaled through her nose.
“Watch her,” she said to Greg-the-guard, and she left the room, Janine trailing behind her.
Greg set his mouth in a firm line and looked at a spot just above my head. Annette’s voice—the musical cadence of it, her low laugh—carried up the stairs. I heard the front door shut, and then more footsteps.
When she came back into the room, she wasn’t alone.
A pizza delivery guy trailed behind her. He was wearing a bright red polo shirt embroidered with the logo for Big Al’s Family Pizzeria, and he carried a large cardboard pizza box. The smell of melted cheese and tomato sauce filled the room.
“Here’s your dinner.” Annette took the box and set it on the dresser. “And mine.” She shoved the guy down onto the bed.
His eyes rolled in panic, but he didn’t move. Sweat soaked his underarms.
“No,” I said.
Annette ignored me. She stood in front of him and tipped his head back. His pulse pounded so hard I could see the way it jumped in his neck. He didn’t struggle. She’d done something to him to prevent it, used her mind control.
I tried to get up, but Greg held me down with one hand on my shoulder. I reached for my power but it wouldn’t break through, the wall still strong between my shadowmind and my will.
Annette licked her lips. Her fangs extended. The pizza guy’s breath came faster.
“I’ll do it! I’ll call—please—don’t.” I couldn’t watch her kill this guy. I couldn’t. I would figure out something, anything, but I couldn’t watch her kill a man who was barely out of his teens.
Annette turned her gaze on me. “I’m sorry.” She stroked the guy’s neck with a long, manicured finger. “His life is not part of our negotiation.” She struck.
I screamed, I struggled against Greg’s grip. The pizza guy jerked as Annette drank, blood running down his shirt, soaking it, dripping to the floor. His eyes registered shock, then panic, but he didn’t fight her off. Couldn’t. I sobbed and tried to pull away, tried to stop it even though it was too late. Greg’s face was blank.
Annette dropped the man’s body. He lay utterly still. Gone. I stopped struggling. She turned to face me.
“You have a choice to make.” Her mouth dripped blood. “You can die just like he did, or you can live. Shane dies either way.”
I met her gaze. “Go to hell.”
“Charming, but I’m immortal. Greg, lock the room and guard the door. We’ll simply have to wait.” She walked out. She left the body where it was.
“Greg.” I looked up at him. “You can’t want this to happen—you can’t want her to keep killing like this—you have to help me.”
He didn’t respond. I tried another tack.
“I can pay you. I have money.” Or I used to, anyway. Hopefully the rental with its trunk full of cash was still where I’d left it. “Whatever she’s paying you, I’ll give you more. Just let me go.”
He got up to leave.
I grabbed on to his arm. “Please, please—”
He shook me off. “Look.” He glanced over his shoulder and leaned in close. “There’s not enough money in the world, got it? Two more years, and she’ll turn me. I get to live forever—you got nothing on that. And if I let you go, she kills me, and she won’t do it quick. So you can just keep your stupid mouth shut.”
He shoved me away and left, dragging the dead body of the pizza guy with him.
* * *
I called after him for a few minutes, but I knew it was a lost cause. I guessed he was probably standing right outside the door, but he didn’t respond, and eventually I gave up. I paced back and forth in front of the bed, trying to think, trying to avoid looking at the swath of blood on the carpet. The pizza grew cold. I didn’t eat it
Shane would expect me back by nightfall. I wished he wouldn’t be foolish enough to come after me without the safety of daylight, but I knew better. When the sun went down, he would head for the city as fast as he could.
I still didn’t know if it was day or night. I twitched the curtains aside, but the window had been boarded up. I should’ve known. There was no way to tell how much time I’d spent unconscious, or how much time I had left. It could be hours. It could be dark outside already.
I searched the drawers in the dresser. Nothing but cheap quilts and generic white T-shirts and drawstring pants. If I could pry the boards off the window, I could probably wrap the fabric around my hands and break the glass, but there was no doubt the noise would alert Greg.