Black On Black (Quentin Black Mystery #3)

by JC Andrijeski

“He told us not to wait. To get through the exit right away,” Angel said, holding up her gun. “He said we didn’t need the grenade for that... told me where to shoot the lock.”

  “That piece of shit asshole motherfucker...” I exploded angrily.

  Angel’s eyes widened but she didn’t comment.

  I swiveled my glare to Nick. “He has your gun?”

  Nick nodded. “Both of them. I have Angel’s trank gun.”

  Angel looked at Nick, giving me a bare, apologetic look. “Can you hold her here? I think Black was right.”

  Nick nodded, his mouth grim as he looked back at me. “I’ve got her. She’s not going anywhere.”

  “All right. I’m on the door,” Angel said, hauling herself to her feet.

  “Black was right?” I glared at Nick. “Right about what?”

  Nick was watching me with wary eyes.

  “He said you wouldn’t be...” He hesitated, then his voice turned blunt. “He said you wouldn’t be rational about this, Miriam. He said you wouldn’t be able to help yourself. That you were likely to do something crazy if you thought he was in danger. He said we’d need to restrain you and probably drag you out of here forcibly...”

  “Crazy?” I let out a disbelieving laugh. “I might do something crazy? You mean crazy like taking Ian on alone when I’d just been skewered through the abdomen with a glass rod? That kind of crazy?”

  Nick continued to study my face, his lips set in a frown. He was looking at me like he almost didn’t recognize me. “Black said you’re going through something right now. Something to do with what you and he are. He said it was temporary, but I’ve got to say, Miri... I’m worried about you. You haven’t been yourself for weeks. And right now, you’re acting like––”

  “I haven’t been myself?” The words exploded out of me. “You’re worried about that? Now? That I might be going through a few changes? You just left my goddamned boyfriend alone to be gunned down by a psychopath... and you’re concerned I might not be ‘your Miri’ anymore? Is that it? Am I hearing that right?”

  “Miri, Jesus.” Nick’s fingers gripped my arms tighter. “You need to calm down. Please... try to calm down.” His eyes clicked into sharper focus as his mouth firmed. “Listen. I’m the last one to defend Black, but he’s right this time. He got you into this mess. He’s right to get you out of it. Whatever that takes...”

  “Really?” I cut in. “Black got me into this? Because I thought you were the one who introduced me to Ian, Nick. Or am I remembering that wrong?”

  Nick blinked at me like I’d just punched him in the face. His eyes widened, his jaw growing loose right before it hardened, pushing out the side of his cheek.

  “Miri,” he said. “You know how fucking horrible I feel about that...”

  “Then stop pretending it was Black who got me into this!” I snapped. “Black didn’t do this! And Ian played you just like he played me. Do you honestly think I don’t know that? Hell, even Ian was working for someone else...”

  “Who, Miri?” Nick shook me lightly, his jaw clenched. “This Lucky guy? Is he the one behind all of this? If so, why? Why are these people after you? What do they want?”

  “How the hell would I know that?” I let out another short laugh, fighting tears. “Hell, you might as well blame my parents, for falling in love and having me. These people have been stalking me since I was a kid... or did you really think this all started when Black showed up in the police station that day?”

  Nick’s eyes widened more the longer I spoke.

  Somehow, that only made me angrier.

  “Jesus, Nick... use your brain! My whole family is dead. Did you think that was a coincidence, too?”

  Nick winced, his face still reflecting that shock.

  Even so, I saw him thinking, saw those cop and Special Forces wheels turning in his head as he stared at me. I also saw him realizing something else.

  Or maybe the truth of it just finally sank in.

  “You really are... like them. Aren’t you, Miri?”

  I let out a disbelieving laugh, one that threatened me with tears halfway in. Choking on it, I looked past him where the gunfire had grown more intense again.

  “Miri,” Nick said. “Miri, wait, I––”

  “Nick. Just stop, okay? Stop.” I shook my head, forcing back that surge of feeling. “I can’t answer your questions. I can’t. The only one who can maybe is Black... and he’s probably going to die, so you and I might both be shit out of luck.”

  My own words hit me in the gut, bringing another nauseating pool of that irrational fear.

  I found myself fighting Nick openly then. He gripped me tighter. When I got one arm loose enough to swing at him, he wrenched me around, grasping me in a bear hug from behind, pinning both of my arms with his good arm as he dragged me to my feet. I knew it must have hurt him, given the hole in his shoulder, but he didn’t budge where he gripped me.

  I struggled to free myself, but in vain. Nick had about a hundred pounds on me, all of it muscle.

  “Let go of me, goddamn it!” I burst out when I couldn’t get free.

  “Not gonna happen.”

  Angel appeared at my other side.

  Without a word from either of them, both restrained me now, half-dragging me towards the other side of the room and the emergency door. I knew Angel got that door open, just like I knew Black didn’t intend to follow us through it, at least not right away. I don’t know how I knew that last part, but I could feel it in every part of me––even over the gunfire being exchanged on the other side of the statue.

  Black! I called him with my mind. Don’t do this, please! Whatever you’re doing... don’t. Please, don’t... please...

  I felt him wince, a coil of pain sliding off him that caught my breath.

  Then my head exploded in pain.

  It felt like someone had punched me right between the eyes.

  I had to withdraw. It forced a groan to my lips, even as Angel and Nick continued to drag me towards the door, which had been propped open by one of Angel’s boots. Something dripped on my face, and I looked down at the drops of blood, realized my nose was bleeding. Even with that pain, even through Black’s silence and the shock of seeing my own blood, I felt things.

  My fear worsened once I made sense of what I’d felt.

  Black’s bluster had been bullshit too.

  He’d been telling Ian the truth... not me. He was willing to die rather than let Ian get to me. And he was pinned where he was.

  He couldn’t move from the wall without Ian killing him.

  His only hope was to throw the grenade as soon as he felt Ian close enough. He wouldn’t be able to run, so he’d have to throw it far enough to avoid being hit by it––which worried him, since the wound in his side would also make it hard to throw. Moreover, he knew Ian would go after Nick and Angel’s minds the second they got out of range of Black’s ability to shield them, so he had to time it right, regardless of how close Ian got. Ian was already chipping away at Black’s defenses, hitting at Black the way he’d just hit at me, only worse.

  For the same reason, Black didn’t answer me.

  I felt his worry. I also felt him waiting... for us to get out the door, for Ian to move closer, for Ian to try and follow us, or make a move on Angel or Nick.

  That fear in me worsened, growing so intense I couldn’t think through it at all. I fought against Nick and Angel with all of my strength. Surprising them with the sudden violence of my attempt, I nearly broke free, but Nick managed to yank me back and grip me even harder. That time, I felt his pain through my back and side, felt every muscle in him tense and he struggled to hold me. Angel ran forward to yank open the door.

  She caught hold of the handle, swinging it wide...

  But that doorway was no longer empty.

  Fourteen

  REMINISCE

  FOUR MEN IN suits stood there, tall, with strangely bright eyes and expressionless faces.

  Nick skidded to a stop,
tightening his hold around my chest.

  Angel froze, too. So did I.

  For a long moment, we all just stood there, staring at one another. Only then did I look down at their hands to see the automatic rifles they held. I stared at those guns, and all I could think was, it was over. Whatever this was, it was finally over.

  I could know that without knowing at all what that ending meant.

  Just then, the lights rose on the room. A voice echoed against the stone walls. It came from above, likely from the museum’s main intercom system.

  “Put down your weapons. Now.”

  The firing immediately stopped.

  Briefly I could see Ian and Black there, panting as they looked up at the voice from the ceiling. I could feel that both of them knew exactly who was speaking. It was more than that, though. I must have been pretty tied into Black still, because I could also see them.

  Meaning, I could see the other soldiers who had filed silently into the room.

  They entered from the stairs and both ramps on either side of Winged Victory.

  Nearly all of them aimed weapons at Black and Ian. I counted over a dozen. All male. All of them tall and wearing suits and armed with automatic weapons. The rifles they carried looked strangely high-tech––like they’d been modified, parts of them computerized.

  Two of those soldiers walked right up the stairs towards Black, guns aimed at his head.

  I saw four more standing over Ian.

  The rest I saw were scattered throughout the room, with sniper sights on one or both of them. It hit me in the same set of seconds that I couldn’t be getting all of this from Black. Someone else was showing me the layout of the room.

  Whoever held the weapons on Black and Ian was also showing all of us––at least the three of us there with psychic ability––the exact reason we needed to comply.

  There was another weighted pause.

  “...I didn’t say stop firing. I said put them down. This is your last warning.”

  There was a clatter of metal as both Ian and Black dropped the weapons they held.

  I could see Black panting against the low wall, his face pale, hands in the air.

  He was bleeding a lot. Too much. Enough to scare the shit out of me frankly. His blood soaked the long shirt he’d tied around his waist, darkening the leather belt he’d buckled there. A fresh trickle of blood came from his hairline, presumably a nick from one of Ian’s shots, or else he’d reopened his previous head wound getting to that wall.

  Nick released me.

  I turned to find him staring at the four seers standing in the emergency exit doorway.

  Because of course they were seers.

  And of course Nick saw exactly what I did, in terms of their appearance.

  All four were handsome, nearly shockingly so, with faintly Asian features and those strangely perfect mouths. All four had odd-colored eyes, although that was the only thing their eye colors had in common. One had bright silver eyes, like liquid mercury. Another’s shimmered a softer blue-violet, like a night sky before sunset. A third had fire-colored eyes that were nearly opaque. That fourth had eyes that were a darker coal red. That one, I recognized. He wasn’t wearing the blue robe now, either, but I recognized his hawk-like face, even apart from those distinctive eyes. He met my gaze too, a faint smile on his full mouth.

  Each of them stood a few inches over six feet.

  I glanced at Angel, who lifted an eyebrow at me. She obviously saw what Nick had been talking about, when he told her about those seers at the airport.

  Nick, Angel and I all stepped back as they advanced deeper into the room.

  They didn’t advance very far. They also didn’t make any threatening movements in our direction, or even point their guns at us, the way those other seers did with Black and Ian. Rather, they filed out of the opening and flanked either side of the door like sentinels. I was still looking from one expressionless face to the other, when a fifth figure appeared in the doorway.

  I jerked my eyes in his direction––and immediately, felt my chest constrict.

  Never in a million years did I expect to know the person standing there.

  My heart filled with emotion before I could think. I took a step towards him... hesitant... but some of that was emotion too.

  He smiled at me, altering the appearance of his angular face.

  It had been close to twenty years, but with that one smile, he transformed me back through time as effortlessly as walking through a door. It didn’t help that he looked exactly the same as I remembered. He hadn’t aged a day in those twenty years.

  Then he opened his arms and the feeling of déjà vu grew even stronger.

  I flashed to being smaller, barely the height of his waist. I had a crystal-clear memory of him looking at me the exact same way, with the exact same love in his light green eyes, that exact same mischievous grin tugging at his lips. I remembered that exact pose, his long arms held out for a hug in exactly the same way.

  I didn’t think––I just moved.

  I closed the distance between us just like I had back then. In a daze, I wrapped my arms around him just like I would have as a child.

  I didn’t find my voice until he’d crushed me in a returning hug.

  “Uncle... Uncle Charles... ?” I stammered.

  It came out as a question.

  “Miri, my dear, dear Miri... my little fireball Miri...”

  He squeezed me harder, kissing my face, stroking my hair, which had fallen out of the ponytail completely by then. So much warmth poured off him it brought tears to my eyes before I could wrap my head around the specific emotion. He loosened his hold without letting me go, meeting my gaze with tears in his eyes, too. Heat filled my chest. It brought a tightness to my throat, causing me to cling to him in return.

  “I cannot tell you how happy I am to see you, my dearest, dearest heart... how very, very happy I am to finally see you again in the flesh...” He kissed my cheek again, then pressed his face to mine, nuzzling my cheek before he kissed me on the forehead, grasping my hands. “You are so very, very loved, little Miri. My little fireball of heat and light...”

  Memories bombarded me as I stood there, speechless.

  I fought to incorporate the old with the new, the images I had of him as a kid to what stood in front of me now. I fought with the affection I suddenly remembered from when I was a child. Not just from my parents. From this man. From Uncle Phil. From my mother’s family.

  From so many people.

  I’d forgotten the sheer constancy of that affection. I’d shoved the memory of that out of my mind, too––along with so many other things.

  I made myself forget so many, many things.

  Maybe it started when no one showed up for my parents’ funeral.

  Maybe it was when I found out later that my favorite uncle––the man standing in front of me now––left the country before my parents’ death without so much as a goodbye. Maybe it was when Uncle Phil left, mere days after they died.

  Maybe it was when I’d been older, scanning the crowd in a smaller, dingier church after Zoe died, waiting and praying for someone I loved to walk through those doors.

  But he wasn’t there. None of them were there.

  That shocked me. More than their absence from my parents’ service, it shocked the hell out of me when no one showed up to say goodbye to Zoe.

  When I joined the military, I never let myself think about him again. I already knew if I died over there, he wouldn’t come to my funeral either. And years pass and not-caring becomes a kind of habit. You forget you ever did care. You forget what that even felt like.

  But I could feel it all now.

  I’d adored him as a kid. I would have done anything he’d asked of me back in those years, without a second thought.

  Wiping my eyes, I stepped out of his embrace, fighting to breathe.

  “Miri,” he said, softer. “Miri, my dearest, dearest child...”

  I shook my head. I di
dn’t speak. I also didn’t move away. He caressed the hair out of my face and I just stood there, stunned into silence. Some part of me wanted to push his hands away, to walk away from his affection even now, play the wronged teenager, but I couldn’t make myself do that either. The memories grew more intense, bombarding me.

  Things I’d blocked out, somehow deliberately made myself forget.

  He’d known about me. About the psychic thing.

  He’d been the only other person, apart from Zoe––the only adult who ever talked with us about it openly, since I had to assume our father knew.

  Somehow I’d managed to forget that too.

  As I thought it, heat came off him in a thick pulse, a cloud of warmth and affection. I remembered that now too. But it was more than that. It was like a black and white world, the world I’d shuttered on my past, burst up around me in surround-sound and technicolor. I remembered me and Zoe running in a field with horses, Uncle Charles telling us we could talk to them if we whispered softly enough, teasing me by calling me fireball because of my temper.

  How had I forgotten so much? Had someone helped me to forget?

  He’d whispered secrets about things we could do with our minds. Cautioned us about how we could never tell our mother, how even our father didn’t want us learning those things until later, when we were older...

  I remembered how different everything was then.

  How different I was then.

  That intensity of feeling returned, nearly making me feel sick... nearly drunk... even more than I had for the past however-many months I’d been struggling with whatever was going on with me and Black. I fought with the up and down rollercoaster I’d been living since Bangkok, that feeling of being off-center, of not being sure who I was anymore.

  I fought not to cling to him... to shake him maybe, but not really in anger. That excess of feeling spilled over into my body, making my fists clench, bringing tears to my eyes. I wanted to shout at him, to ask him where he’d been, why he’d left us.

  “Ah, child,” he said, softer, caressing my hair. “That’s a longer story than I can tell today. Just know I have thought of you often... so very very often. I’ve waited impatiently for the day I could see you again, when I would have you standing next to me...”