by Chloe Neill
That was close enough to a demand for the stump. The magic filtered into the wood, and the world finally stopped vibrating.
“Thank God,” I said, and hit the ground.
CHAPTER TWENTY
I woke in the truck. I was nestled against the door, the vehicle bumping along the road. The world was quiet and dark, no lights across long lots of former farmland.
I put a hand on the dashboard, tried to sit upright. My head spun like a tornado. “Oh God,” I said, and put my other hand on my head as nausea swelled in my belly.
“Don’t toss your cookies,” Liam said, handing me a bottle of water. “Drink this.”
I uncapped it, drank until I was heaving for breath. “Are the Dupres all right? Tadji?”
“She’s fine. They all are. They’re in the car behind us. How are you?” He put a hand on my head. “Your temperature feels a little better. You were freezing.”
I glanced back to check the headlights, but my stomach rumbled with objection. I turned around again, put a hand on the dashboard, waited for the world to stop spinning. “I think I had all the magic at once. And then I got rid of all the magic at once.”
“Phaedra said you’ll heal, although that tree stump will never be the same. It’s mulch at this point.”
My head felt five or ten pounds too heavy for my neck, and I was only barely keeping it from rolling off onto the very dirty floorboard. I put my head back on the seat, closed my eyes, breathed quietly until I could sit upright without wanting to hurl. “What happened?”
“Since you survived the first war,” Liam said, “it will not surprise you to learn that even guns are often not a match for Paranormals with a point to make. The operatives had been planning on taking the Dupres without any trouble. So when the Paranormals advanced, they retreated pretty fast.”
“Maybe that will make Rutledge think twice before pushing further. Before taking a shot at the Veil.”
“Or he’ll just come with more firepower next time. A man like that doesn’t just abandon his plans. He tweaks them.” He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “We’re taking the Dupres to Gavin’s. He’s a less obvious target than Gunnar. And Gunnar’s house is too big, with too many people. That assumes his father would even let us in anyway.”
“Okay,” I said.
He glanced at me. “But I want you to tell Gunnar what happened here, about everything. He needs to get Tadji and her family under protection, warn the Commandant about Rutledge.”
My heart hiccupped. “But you, Moses, Eleanor—that would put everybody at risk.” And me, I thought.
Liam glanced at me. “There’s no help for it now. Rutledge has seen us, and he’s alive. Our asses are already on the line.”
Once again, being imprisoned in Devil’s Isle became a very real possibility.
I folded my arms, suddenly freezing. “He may not be able to do anything.”
“We have to try.” He winced as the truck hit a pothole, bounced. “We don’t have a better option at this point. I just hope to God he’s worthy of the trust you’ve put in him.”
“He is,” I said without hesitation. I believed it. I just hoped I was right.
“I notice you did not get into the car and drive away. What happened to ‘no heroics’?”
“Recklessly brave?” I offered with a small smile.
Liam chuckled. “Jesus, Claire. You are absolutely terrifying.”
I decided that was a compliment.
• • •
Pain in the ass or not, when we got Tadji, Phaedra, and Zana settled at Gavin’s, Liam drove me back to the Cabildo.
War or not, the Cabildo was still beautiful, if lonely without its neighbors. Two long stories of arches and windows, another row of windows below a mansard roof. And at the very top, a cupola that still gleamed white and silver.
I walked inside to the security desk, waved at the guard. She shopped at the store, knew me, and knew that Gunnar and I were friends.
She probably wouldn’t have appreciated the irony that she’d just waved a Sensitive through the front door of Containment HQ.
I took the staircase to the second story, where the floors were gleaming dark oak and the walls were crisp white. The Commandant’s staff had desks in the long hallway in front of a bank of windows that faced the Square. The desks and chairs were mismatched, pulled from the remains of the Presbytère.
There weren’t many agents left at this late hour. But Gunnar sat at his desk in the row, next to the doors that led to the Commandant’s office. He was back in his dark fatigues, head down as he flipped through a binder of notes. At the sound of my footsteps, he glanced up, his eyes widening with concern.
He got one look at me at the end of the hallway, came toward me at a run. “What the hell happened to you?”
“It’s a long story that you don’t want to hear in this particular location.”
He glowered.
“I swear, Gunnar, I’ll tell you as soon as we step foot out of this building.” I caught other agents rising from their desks, watching us with suspicion.
“All right,” he said. “Let’s go.”
We walked downstairs, climbed into the truck, sat there for five minutes while I told Gunnar the truth about everything. About being a Sensitive, the wraiths, Devil’s Isle, the Veil opening, all of it.
By the end of it, he was fuming. “I want to talk to Tadji.”
“We don’t have time for that,” I insisted. “Rutledge could be trying something else right now.”
Gunnar ignored me, looked past me to Liam. “I verify before I report. Gavin’s place.”
• • •
Liam didn’t argue, and Gunnar didn’t talk at all for the rest of the trip.
“Stay here,” he said as soon as Liam had given directions to Gavin’s unit but before Liam had pulled the truck to a complete stop. He climbed out of the truck and slammed the door closed before I could object.
He stayed in the building, a warehouse turned condo building, for fifteen minutes. We waited in silence. Our situation was precarious, so we skipped discussion for staying inconspicuous and keeping an eye on the streets around us.
When Gunnar climbed back into the truck and shut the door, it was a solid minute before he spoke.
“Richard Rutledge is the CEO of ComTac,” he finally said. He must have been familiar with the organization. “It’s privately held, and he’s the principal shareholder. He has a lot of money.”
“So all that talk about protecting humans?”
“Some of it could be true,” Gunnar said. “Right now he doesn’t have an army of his own nearly big enough to fight the Paranormals. At least, not that your tax dollars have funded. But if the Veil opens again, if we have to wage a war again, the feds would probably give him plenty of money to build one.”
“So he wants the cash?” Liam asked.
“And the power,” Gunnar agreed. “I’m going to get guards on Gavin’s apartment, just in case.”
“Gavin won’t like that,” Liam said.
“I’ve already convinced him.” Gunnar’s tone was dry. “Will you take me back to the Cabildo? I need to talk to the Commandant.”
Liam gestured toward me. “And her?”
“She goes back to the store, where she’ll stay until further notice.”
I hated his presumptiveness, but I’d rather be in the store than anywhere else, so I didn’t bother to argue.
He had a right to be miffed at me. Better, I thought, to let him power through it. He ran as hot as Tadji ran cold. I ran somewhere right down the middle. Probably one of the reasons we were such good friends. Or had been until one man’s greed tore us apart.
• • •
By the time we got back to the store, it was past midnight and my body ached all over. I wanted to crawl into bed and hibernate for a month or two, but that wasn’t in the cards.
Liam and I sat at the table in the store’s backroom, waiting for Gunnar to arrive.
He’
d crossed his arms, crossed his ankles on top of it, staring out the front door. I sat in the chair beside him, arms on the table, head on my arms. I closed my eyes, jumped back to consciousness when Gunnar came back in.
I sat up, pushed the hair from my eyes.
“You shouldn’t have let me fall asleep,” I said as Gunnar crossed the room.
“You looked exhausted,” Liam said.
I looked at him. The bruise on his cheekbone was darker, and he looked tired, too. “I think we could both use a nap.”
He half smiled. “Soon as we save the world.”
“What happened?” I asked.
Gunnar pulled out a chair, which squeaked in objection across the floor. “The Commandant approved the Chenal operation. He thought Rutledge was planning to bring in a rogue Paranormal. Rutledge is already back, had already talked to him. He told the Commandant the operation was sabotaged.”
Ice water ran down my spine. “He gave the Commandant our names?”
Gunnar shook his head. “No. According to the Commandant, Rutledge didn’t give any names. He stuck to his ‘rogue Paranormal’ story.”
Liam frowned. “Why not give us up? He had to know we’d go to Containment.”
“Why would he?” Gunnar asked. “He doesn’t know that Claire has a connection to the Commandant through me, or that I knew about Tadji’s family, the missing Sensitives, the entire deal. And I didn’t at the time. He’d have thought it would be too risky.”
Liam held up a hand. “So if he didn’t tell the Commandant about us, who’d he blame for the operation going bad?”
“He said there was a conspiracy against Containment that originated in Devil’s Isle—and a Para with a lot of computer equipment.”
His words were soft, full of regret. But they echoed through me like a gunshot.
My heart sank like a stone. “Moses,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. “He got to Moses.”
We hit the street running.
• • •
Liam got us through the gate, and we ran without stopping toward Moses’s store in clothes still streaked with dirt and sweat from the last battle.
A fire truck was parked in the middle of the street, firefighters still pouring water onto the smoldering ruins of what had once been “Moses Mech.”
The store was gone. There was nothing left but a heap of bricks and twisted bits of metal and wire in a pile. Shards of electronics were everywhere, plastic snapping underfoot or melted into big globs and piles. Water ran in little rivers through the debris, collected in the gutter and poured down the street.
“Oh, Liam.” It was all I could think so say. Nothing else seemed appropriate. And even that didn’t come close to being enough.
I didn’t know what had happened, what had turned Moses’s store into rubble, but he couldn’t have survived this. Not if he was inside.
I knelt down, picked up an “M” key from an old gray keyboard, rubbed my thumb over the faded letter, and put it in my pocket. It would be my memory of him, this man I hadn’t known very long, but who’d been nicer to me than a human deserved.
“They did this because of us,” I said, rising again. “Because he helped us.”
“They didn’t do anything,” Liam said. “Rutledge did this. Rutledge arranged this. That piece of shit must have found out Moses accessed their file, decided he was the easiest person to hit. He’s in Devil’s Isle, after all. Less than human.” He swallowed hard. “I will see that asshole in the ground if it’s the last thing I do.”
“Containment wouldn’t have blown up the building, would they?” I asked quietly. “Not when it would have endangered the neighborhood, the grid, whatever.”
“Containment didn’t.”
We turned back. Hawkins stood behind us, hands stuffed into his pockets.
He seemed shorter than I remembered, probably because he wasn’t standing in his security station.
“They didn’t?” Liam asked.
“Agents came for him—but it was ones who work for ComTac.”
Liam frowned. “Did they take him out of the building?”
“Don’t think so. I mean, I didn’t see anything.”
I looked at Liam. There was a strange look on his face. “Thanks, Hawkins. I’m gonna get her home.”
I was completely confused but let Liam take my arm, guide me away from the rubble. “All right,” I whispered. “I know you know something, but I don’t get it. You’re going to need to fill me in.”
“Moses didn’t want anyone else to get his toys, so he rigged it to blow.”
“Fuck yeah, I did.”
We stopped, glanced around, but saw nothing but darkness.
“Mos?” Liam whispered. “Where are you?”
“I’m in heaven, genius. Where do you think I am?” A thick hand poked out of a narrow gap between the two buildings. Not big enough to be a full alley. Just big enough for him to squeeze into. He moved forward into the light, still hidden from view from the rest of the street. “I’m right here. Bastards got to my shop, so I blew it.”
Liam looked utterly relieved. “You scared the shit out of us.”
“You’re not the only one. I didn’t survive war to get taken out by some assholes with a death wish.”
“It was ComTac?” I asked.
He nodded. “Decided to use me as a scapegoat, I hear. Fortunately, I got a couple friends in Containment yet. They got the word out.”
“I’m sorry you had to blow your store. Do you have a place to stay?”
He snickered. “I’ve got the tunnels, Red.”
I looked between him and Liam. “The tunnels?”
“That’s a story for another time,” Liam said, looking at Moses again. “You need anything?”
“Not right now. Let me get settled first.”
“Tunnels?” I asked quietly again as we walked back toward the gate.
“Tête dure.”
“I’m not hardheaded.”
“And that’s exactly what a hardheaded person would say.”
I didn’t have an argument for that.
• • •
We found Gunnar at the table, elbows on the tabletop, head in his hands. The store was dark, the candles lit. The power must have been out again.
“Hey,” I said, putting the pilfered “M” key onto the tabletop. “I didn’t expect to see you here. I figured you’d have gone back to the Cabildo.”
“I’m on leave.”
I pulled out the chair beside his, sat down. “Wait. What?”
He lifted his head, linked his fingers together. “I’m too close to what’s happened, the Commandant needs to evaluate the information regarding the various parties and determine if I’ve been derelict in my duty.”
“Were you?”
“Of course not.”
“Well, there you go. The Commandant will figure out what actually happened and get you back in your position.”
He nodded. “What did you find in Devil’s Isle?”
I glanced at Liam. I wasn’t sure how he’d want to handle that part of the truth.
He pulled out a chair, took a seat at the table. “Let’s just say Rutledge didn’t accomplish what he set out to accomplish. Body count is lower than believed.”
Since the body count had been one, that meant there were no casualties. Without him coming out and saying it, of course.
Hope blossomed in Gunnar’s face. “You’re serious. You aren’t just playing with me?”
Liam’s smile went bland. “I rarely play.”
I was pretty sure that was meant for me.
Gunnar blew out a breath, sat back, ran his fingers through his hair. “Oh thank God.”
“None of this was because of you, Gunnar—just like Liam told your father. This is about Rutledge. And it sucks.”
“It’s a miracle,” Liam said. “She is capable of listening.”
“You’re hilarious as always.” I looked at Gunnar. “And I’m sorry to you, too. I waited to tell you beca
use I didn’t want to put you in a horrible position—”
“And you weren’t sure about my loyalties.”
“And I wasn’t sure about your loyalties,” I confessed. “But we’ve already been through all that. Can we agree we both did what we thought was right in the moment? What we thought would hurt the fewest number of people?”
Gunnar dropped his hands, put his palms on the table. “Agreed.”
I nodded. “Good. Good.” Because I didn’t need to be fighting with everyone I knew right now.
“Listen, would you mind staying the night? There’s a bed in the back room, and I’d feel better if someone else was here.” That was absolutely the truth, but it would also keep Gunnar nearby. He was very much defined by his job, and he wasn’t done talking this through.
“I think that’s a good idea,” Liam said. “I don’t think Claire should be alone. Not until your boss pulls his head out of his ass and shuts Rutledge down.”
“I was always the smartest man in the office,” Gunnar said.
“And, like Mr. Quinn, ever so humble.”
“Mr. Quinn should get going,” Liam said, rising. “I want to go see my grandmother.” He clapped Gunnar on the back. “You did the right thing. Hopefully, Containment will recognize that. If not, they’re idiots.”
Gunnar nodded. “Appreciate it.”
Liam gestured toward the door, motioned for me to follow. The night was still, humid, quiet. The memorial songs had all been sung.
“I want to check on Eleanor,” he said. “Just in case. I have some favors I can call in for extra security, and I think it’s time to do that. I want to make sure she’s protected.”
“Favors?”
He blew out a breath. “I’ll have to ask Solomon.”
I winced. “There’s no other way?”
“Not after tonight. And his price will be high. But there’s no avoiding it.” He glanced back at Gunnar. “He’ll be all right?”
I nodded. “I think so. He’ll adjust, or the Commandant will come to his senses when Rutledge causes more trouble. That seems pretty inevitable.” And that reminded me. “Be careful in Devil’s Isle. He could still have friends.”