Cold

by Robert J. Crane

  65.

  My phone was buzzing continuously by the time I got out of the shower. I’d partaken of the heat, the steam running over my skin, soaking it in until the mirror was completely fogged over. For all I knew, that might happen in New Orleans just by leaving the window open, but I’d probably taken it up a notch by putting the water heat at a setting that would have made Aleksandr Gavrikov take a step back and go, “Wow, that’s hot.”

  Wrapped in a towel, soaked hair turned black by the wetness and slung over my shoulder, I regarded my buzzing phone on the bed with a wary eye. I’d finally gotten my calm back, and the name on the Caller ID said, “Heather Chalke.”

  This was probably not going to help my calm. But it was the job, so I swallowed my reservations about picking up and just did it. “Hello?”

  “What the hell were you thinking?” Chalke set the tone for the entire conversation with that opening salvo, but I cringed and resolved not to answer in kind. Yet.

  “I was thinking, ‘Man I could use another round of good jambalaya,’” I said. “Is that so wrong?”

  “You know damned well what I’m talking about,” Chalke said, the heat fading and her tone turning lashingly cold. “Warrington.”

  “Oh, him? Yeah, about him I was thinking, ‘What a pervy creep and rapist, forcing himself on a thirteen-year-old.’ Unfortunately, I could not keep these thoughts to myself, so…” I shrugged, which she couldn’t see. Hopefully.

  “You’ve really screwed the pooch,” she said, moving more into the domain of cold fury. Which was fine; I was more comfortable there, anyway. “I just got off the phone with Warrington’s chief of staff.”

  “Corcoran?” I asked. “Is it my imagination or is there something really wrong with her? She’s stiff as I imagine Warrington would be after no thirteen-year-olds for a while.”

  “You just can’t let off, can you?” Chalke asked.

  “I had a bad feeling about this guy from the beginning,” I said. “So maybe I jumped on the ‘rapey pedophile’ explanation for that gut feeling too easily, let myself get carried away—”

  “The Louisiana State Police had to draw guns on you. Yes, I’d say you got carried away.”

  “In my defense, it’s not easy to look a guy you believe guilty of that in the eye and do nothing about it, like murder them in the face.” I paused, thought about it a second. “At least it’s not easy for me. Working in Washington, maybe you have a different take on it. Maybe you have to be able to do that or you’d be murdering people in the face all the time—”

  “You cannot do these things,” Chalke said, level and still angry at this point. “You cannot accuse a major political figure like Warrington of this sort of atrocity—”

  “But…we’re good to go on the ‘little people,’ right? Like I can pick any unconnected rando off the street and make those accusations against them and it’s fine, right?”

  Chalke paused. “Of course. What the hell does that have to do with anything?”

  “That’s so wrong,” I said. “You can accuse anybody of anything without evidence as long as they’re not somebody ‘important.’”

  “What the hell do you want?” Chalke asked. “An outlet for your frustrations? What are we talking about here?”

  “Two systems of justice,” I said. “One where a guy like Warrington, who’s powerful and well-connected, can’t be accused of something, but anyone else who’s not those things can. I messed up with Warrington, I’ll admit. Burkitt, our local agent, pointed it out—no matter how much my gut told me Warrington was dirty, he deserves due process. So…my bad. But the fact that he gets that consideration, but I could turn loose that kind of life-destroying accusation on someone else who doesn’t have his sway…yikes.”

  “You want to fight the system, do it on your own time,” Chalke said. “Your job here is just that—a job. You were supposed to protect the governor of Louisiana from someone who’s trying to kill him. You failed.”

  “Uh, no I didn’t. He’s still alive.” I blinked. “Or was, last I checked. Did he—”

  “Oh, no, he’s still alive,” Chalke said, and her voice rose to a haughty height. “But it’s not your job anymore.” She shuffled something paper in the background, and it sounded like a crackle of static in the phone. “You’re removed from the case as of right now. Report back to New York. Immediately.”

  “Wait, hold on,” I said. “The assassin is still out there, and I know who it is. I talked with her—”

  “Yeah, I read the report you gave to Shaw and the troopers,” Chalke said. “You should have shot her.”

  “She was unarmed,” I said. “And retreating.”

  “Metas are never unarmed,” Chalke said. “You know that better than anyone. You could have ended this.” Her voice took on a higher quality, and it was the angriest I’d ever heard her. “You failed. Get home. Now.”

  There was a click, and my chance to argue my case was over.

  I took a deep breath, and looked out the window over the city of New Orleans, waiting below. The Mississippi glinted under a hazy sky, dusty water spots stained the window, clouding my view like dirt smeared over the town. The word “failed” kept echoing in my head, over and over as I sat down on the bed, clutching my towel to me, thinking…

  Yeah. I really had failed. Big time.

  66.

  Olivia

  “It’s a disaster,” Reed said, voice crackling in my ear via cell phone. I tried to tune out the ambulance sirens wailing in the near distance. I was standing on the Strip, just inside the police perimeter tape, as the Vegas authorities sorted out the mess.

  And boy, was there a mess.

  “Yes,” I said, because what else was there to be said? If I’d been face to face with him, no way in hell could I have been looking him in the eye. “Yes, it is.”

  “Just so I have this straight—you arrested the wrong guy?” Reed asked. As though he didn’t know. “Then the real villain decked Veronika, used your power against a civilian, putting her in the hospital, then proceeded to wreck the Venetian?”

  “The EMTs said they think she’ll recover.” Maybe.

  “Good. How much property damage at the Venetian?” Reed asked. The tension was thick in his voice, strain evident.

  “Umm, I don’t know.” I looked at the facade. It seemed…well, mostly fine. The speedster had run through and done a little more chaos creation on their way out. Knocked a few people over, sending them to the hospital. “It’s mostly on the inside.”

  “Chaos indeed,” Reed said, letting a long sigh. “All right, well, why don’t you get back to Minneapolis ASAP. There’s a flight tomorrow morning you can catch. Until then, stay out of this speedster’s way. Let’s not make this worse.”

  “I will,” I said.

  “Good,” Reed said, and he couldn’t even hide his disappointment. “I’m sending Jamal and Augustus to take over. Their powers are a little more suited to dealing with a speedster than yours. When is Veronika getting out of the hospital?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “She was unconscious when they pulled her out, so tomorrow, I guess?”

  “Okay,” he said. “I’ll hold off on booking her travel until we know for sure.”

  “Why not bring me back tonight?” I asked.

  “The morning flight is a lot cheaper,” Reed said, and again, the strain evidenced itself in his tone. Why was he worrying about money now? “Keep your head down, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  “Thanks, I w—” But the soft click told me he was already gone. I let the phone slip down, and looked back at the Venetian. It sat there, symbol of yet another of my failures, the sirens echoing like laughter in my ears.

  67.

  Sienna

  Ever wallow in your screw-ups like a pig in the mud?

  I put on a robe, locked myself in my hotel room and ignored all the knocking from Holloway, the phone calls from Burkitt, and just slipped off into oblivion. I briefly considered going down to the hotel b
ar and getting wasted, but eventually wrote it off as more trouble than it was worth, since I would have to put on clothes.

  To hell with clothes. To hell with people.

  To hell with rules and order and society and all this civilization bullshit.

  What was the point of a justice system if corrupt, rapey piles like Warrington could just skate right through? That idea warred in my mind with another, the one Burkitt had fleshed out—

  How could I be sure that Warrington actually did what Emily Glover—a troubled person, if ever there was one—accused him of doing?

  My gut feeling was that Warrington was dirty. But I was hardly infallible in my gut feelings. I’d been totally blindsided by people on a few occasions, betrayed badly enough to nearly die from it: James Fries, Erich Winter, my damned “dog” Owen Traverton, Rose Steward (that bitch), just to name a few. Hell, even Scott, Reed, and Augustus had betrayed me a while back, though it hadn’t really been their fault.

  As much as the public at large might call me Slay Queen, and as much as I might be enjoying a popularity renaissance coming off my actions in Revelen that magnified my virtues and minimized my vices, it wasn’t as though I was infallible. I may have been a metahuman, but “human” was a big part of that, flaws and all. I was no goddess, no all-knowing oracle, no flawless superheroine Slay Queen like some seemed to think I was. Perfect judgment was not among my powers, and I’d messed up enough in my life to realize I misjudged people all the time.

  Ivan Warrington could easily be one of them. Two things could be true: Ivan Warrington was dirty and corrupt in concert with Mitchell Werner and whatever corruption he had going on, and he could be innocent of any wrongdoing with Emily Glover.

  Or he could be innocent of all of it. Or guilty of all of it.

  Without the powers of Gerry Harmon to let me read his mind, or absent a chance to grab his hand and take a deep dive into his memories…who the hell was I to judge?

  A screwup. I was an emotionally unstable screwup, which was why I’d been pushed out of the FBI before. I wondered how much longer Chalke would try and make this work when plainly this was not something I was well-disposed to doing.

  Night fell outside as I sat in my quiet hotel room, the sounds of a second line band wafting up through the glass window. I thought about my friends, who I’d avoided contacting these last few months, at least via conventional means. I wanted Chalke to think I was out of contact with them, that they were on their own, no connection to me.

  When she’d come to me in that room in Washington, I recognized the look in her eyes. Heather Chalke was an operator, a climber, the type of person who would use any leverage she could to get what she wanted. Reading her bio, I knew she’d been doing her thing around the halls of power for quite some time. She knew how the game was played, and the moment she’d stepped into that room with me, I knew she was seeking weaknesses.

  I was determined not to give her any that she could exploit in ways I wouldn’t like.

  So I hadn’t called anybody I knew in the months since I’d come back from Revelen.

  But that didn’t mean I hadn’t talked to them.

  I drifted off after nine, the lights still on, the smooth sounds of that distant band intruding into my dream as I slipped into a familiar space.

  My back pressed against a soft leather couch. A vanilla candle burned in the background, scenting the air. I felt simultaneously taut yet relaxed, like my skin was stretched too tight over my bones. I looked around, my hair rustling against the couch until I heard a familiar voice.

  “Hey.”

  “Hey yourself,” I said, sitting up to look at my guest.

  Reed was in the chair next to my couch, his long hair loose around his shoulders, bags under his eyes. “Didn’t know we were having a talk tonight or I’d have dressed up.” He was in old pajamas, ragged around the sleeves.

  “Sorry to just drop in,” I said. “I needed to talk to someone, and Harry and I got together last night, so…” I shrugged. “Here I am, a couple days early for our check-in. How’s life in the Minne-apple?”

  “Probably not as exciting as life in the big one,” Reed said. His eyelids were low, like he was going to fall asleep again in my dream, if such a thing was possible. He yawned.

  “You okay? You’re looking a little rougher than usual.”

  “Just business stuff,” he said, shaking his head. “Talked to Ariadne recently. She said to give you her best if I spoke to you, so…” He waved a hand in my general direction. “There you have it. Her best, given.”

  “Say hey for me if you see her again,” I said, and now I knew what was eating him. “How are the finance talks going?”

  “Let me worry about it,” he said, and I could tell by his demeanor that it wasn’t good news.

  “I’m sorry I left you holding the agency bag, Reed,” I said, leaning against the arm of the couch. “And I’m sorry I’ve been such a drain the last couple years—”

  “It’s fine, Sienna. We’ll figure it out.” He forced a smile. “We always do. How are you doing?”

  “Well, I don’t know if you’ve heard in the mighty north,” I said, looking at my feet, which were bare. Actually, I was just wearing my hotel bathrobe, because I hadn’t given much thought to clothing before I’d popped in here. “But I got my first real FBI assignment yesterday.”

  “Oh? I hadn’t heard.”

  “I’m in the Big Easy, not the Big Apple, at the moment.”

  “So many sleazy jokes I’m holding back right now, little sis.”

  “Don’t hold them back on my account; I’m not exactly innocent, even outside the legal definition.” I sighed. “I’ve already gotten kicked off the case.”

  Reed blinked a few times. “That’s fast work, even for you. Who’d you piss off this time?”

  “I kinda accused the Governor of Louisiana of child rape,” I said.

  Reed’s eyebrows shot skyward. “Oh. Yeah. That’d do it.” He adjusted in his seat, suddenly a lot more awake. “Do you think he really…?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, letting out a sigh. “In my gut, yeah, but my gut’s not exactly reliable. And it’s certainly not a viable method of conviction for any court of law I’ve ever been involved with.”

  He snorted. “I dunno; I think that Magistrate in the Meta court who tried you used a similar method of determining guilt.”

  “Yeah, which kind of makes me the villain in this, doesn’t it?” I leaned my head against the soft back of the couch. “I mean, how pissed was I when they pulled that crap on me? Convicting me of things I didn’t even do in the course of the sham-wowiest of sham trials.” I shook my head. “But put me in a position where I sniff out a hint of heinous guilt on a guy, and I do the exact same damned thing I railed against.”

  “Well, you are human, and human beings are judgy creatures,” Reed said. “I mean, really, that’s all we do, take in oxygen and spew out judgment. And breed.”

  “These are some of my favorite things,” I said. “Not actually breeding. Practicing it, though—”

  “You’re crossing a line here,” Reed said, eyes narrowing again. “Walk it back. Don’t scar me.”

  I smiled. “Point is, half of the reason I’m doing this FBI thing is to try and get it right, this time. To buy into this idea you plugged into my head that the law is supposed to be a shield for people. To protect us from those who do wrong, regardless of whether they’re criminal or in the seat of power. But…I think I suck at it, Reed.”

  “Well, yeah,” he said, “because you’re used to arrogating the power of judge, jury and even executioner unto yourself. To do anything else is to surrender some control.” Here he smiled again, though it was more ghostly. “And I think we all know how much Sienna Nealon likes to surrender control.”

  “Hey, I have no problem surrendering control—over something I don’t give a damn about.” I slumped against the arm of the couch, felt it pushing against my ribs. “Like the rules of tennis, or whether C
her hires a necromancer to get her through her fifteenth retirement tour. I have no problem having zero control over these things.” I squeezed my hand together. “But when it comes to the idea of a really bad person getting away with something…or terrible things happening to good people…” I shook my head. “I have a hard time letting it lie.”

  “That’s the problem, isn’t it?” Reed wasn’t smiling now. “That’s a hero complex, in a nutshell. And the real issue there is that you could be doing something in that vein all the time. Hell, we did, after the war, remember? You and I ran ourselves ragged trying to right every meta wrong we could. Saving people is a full-time job, a life commitment if you wanted it to be. I know you’re doing some small-scale stuff in that regard in New York, and—hey, I applaud—”

  “Don’t say that unless you’re actually clapping for me.”

  He brought his hands together and it was loud. “I applaud your efforts at trying to bring some order to an otherwise chaotic world; to stop some wrongdoers from doing wrong, to keep innocent people from getting hurt. But you’re always fighting a battle against people with free will doing potentially terrible things to others. That’s a tough beat, because if you do everything within your sizable power to prevent crime and harm, you’re kind of a fascist. And if you let everything skate, you’re a monster.” He shrugged. “And if you can figure out the line between those two, you’re a hell of a lot wiser than I am, because I’ll be the first to admit I struggle with everything related to this job. Like where to send our people. ‘If no one has died yet, is this a serious thing, worthy of our time? If this person looks like they’re about to hit a spiral into violence, should I send my people in to stop them before they really cross the line?’” He shrugged even deeper. “Hell if I know.”

  “There’s a lady trying to kill this governor,” I said. “That’s how I got the case. She’s trying to assassinate him. Sniper rifle with ice bullets, can you believe it?”