And there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it. The U in PUPI stood for unaffiliated. That was Stosser’s mantra, his impetus, and it was one we all agreed to, believed in. Repetition made habit. We had to be seen as impartial and unbiased to all sides. Not just client and suspect, but Talent and Null, human and fatae. If we weren’t, if our findings were dismissed as being bought or biased, then everything we did would be completely useless. Worse than useless; they could be used against the people we were trying to help.
Before, I’d been frustrated at that: now I got a real sense for the tightrope we’d been shoved out on. If we did this wrong, if I did this wrong, it would be game over. The fatae, at least, would never trust us.
I couldn’t afford to do it wrong.
There were only a few people around, once I made it across the wide expanse of West Street: an occasional jogger, rapt in their headphones, or a nanny pushing a stroller, trying to give kidlet some fresh air before returning to their high-rise apartment. The site itself was a little more worn than before, but the pile of offerings had been refreshed on both sides. New flowers, new saint’s candles. None of the participants had been religious, according to the dossier, so it wasn’t specific to them: someone else was bringing god into this. It might not mean anything—people called on random deities all the time, even if they didn’t actually believe and would be horrified if someone answered. Religion was rote and empty ritual for a lot of people. Faith, though…
If you believed in something hard enough, a lie can become truth. Yeah.
Holding on to the memory of Mercy’s signature, I sank into fugue-state, and let my mage-sight flicker over the area. I wasn’t looking for anything specific, nor was I trying to glean everything from the site. This was more akin to scanning the ocean’s surface, looking for sign of a humpbacked whale, or dolphin’s leap, out of the whitecaps and swells.
Only, instead of a dolphin or whale, I caught a sea monster. There were things lurking around the edges: new things, gathering and waiting. Some a block away, some within reach if I were to stretch out my hand. Some human, and some not. The eyes I felt on me before, and more. Sharon had only said a few…this was more like dozens. Right now they were passive, merely watching. Was this rubbernecking, Cosa-style? Or did it have something to do with the larger events around us, the antifatae tension Venec was worried about? Everyone had their eyes on us, right now, waiting to see what we did, what we decided—what we reported.
“Need to ask Venec what he thinks,” I said, the sound of my voice startling me, and sending several of the more alien observers skittering farther out of range.
*thinks what?*
I yelped, and fell onto my knees. Off in the distance I was damned sure I heard a snicker from one of my invisible observers, but ignored it, more intent on the sudden intrusion of a voice in my head.
*how did you hear me?* I demanded. That wasn’t supposed to be possible. Screw that, it wasn’t possible! I was tempted to throw up a total block, the kind you’re only supposed to put up in case of emergencies—like blinding and deafening yourself while standing in the middle of traffic, it was more dangerous than it was useful—but my curiosity got the better of my outrage.
*how do you do that?*
There was a pause, as though Venec was as shocked to hear my voice as I had been to hear his, and then:
*was afraid of this*
As answers went, that wasn’t. But Venec’s mental voice lingered in my brain, more solid and specific than any ping I’d ever gotten, the same way it had been earlier that day, and I could feel him poking around, probing at the limits of that connection—not in his brain or in mine, but somewhere overlapping. It was like the current-bubble I’d formed with Pietr that allowed us to share a point of view, magically, only there hadn’t been any spell, no intentional opening-up…
That weird current-spark, earlier in the week. That amazing, near-erotic feel of something transferring between us… No. Impossible. Current didn’t work that way. There was no way to “accidentally” use current—you had to will it to do something, or it would turn back on the user, not go do something on its own, the same way a hammer would come down on your finger, not go attack someone else if you weren’t paying attention to the downward strike.
But the answer felt right, if impossible, and I could feel Venec’s agreement as well, distant and right next to me at the same time. That, and his late-night visit in my head, and this… How, as J used to say over and over in lessons, was subject to If. Once If was met, then How was merely a matter of time and study. If we were connecting on some level neither of us had ever encountered before, then something had happened. If neither of us had intentionally done something, then either someone else had done it to us—and we both thought of and rejected that idea at once; this thing was locked between us, nobody else’s signature anywhere to be found—or we’d somehow done it unintentionally.
I could feel his awareness and uncertainty about all this, tasting it the way a dog would taste the air for rabbit or squirrel.
Impossible or not, when my walls and barriers had been down during training, and his had been down, too, for whatever reason, then our usual current-brushes and attraction had…done what? Done something, damn it.
Suddenly the insights I’d had into Ian earlier made sense, too. They hadn’t been mine, they’d been Ben’s. It wasn’t just his thoughts that had access into my brain, it was his knowledge, too.
My freaking earlier had been nothing compared to how I felt right then.
*get out* I ordered him, and slammed up walls fast and hard enough to dismember any mental fingers left in the way.
Holy shit. The urge to hyperventilate came and went, but my hands were trembling and my pulse was too fast for comfort. Did not like, did not want. No. I might be casual about sex, I didn’t have any of the usual hang-ups about body image or privacy or personal space, but there were certain things that were mine and mine alone and my brain was #1 on that list. Pings were all well and fine but I decided who I talked to, I decided what was in my brain.
Deep breath in.
Deep breath out.
Deep breath in.
Anyone watching me would have assumed a panic attack and they’d probably have been right. But slowly it came back under control. Whatever had happened, it was Venec. Venec, who had shadowed me before, when I was greener, but had shown respect for my privacy. Venec, who when I told him to leave, left. Venec, who didn’t seem any happier about whatever was going on than I was.
Benjamin Venec, who guarded his privacy so closely that we didn’t even know where in the city he lived, or if he was in a relationship or had a cat or a goldfish or if he’d hatched out of an egg in Stosser’s backyard.
He was dark-eyed and broad-shouldered, with thick curls he tried to slick back but didn’t have the patience to keep groomed, with strong square hands that were the hands of a workman, not an artist. Calloused fingers and strong muscled arms, and my pulse started to speed up again, if for more pleasant reasons, just thinking about those hands.
“Well, you’re back to normal then, aren’t you?” I asked myself ruefully, relieved when there were only my own thoughts in my head in response.
I tried, after that, to slip back into a working fugue-state, but it was no use. I was too aware of every tremor around me, every shimmer of current, every twitch of movement. Going deeper would require me lowering the wall I’d erected, and be damned if I was going to do that right now. I was too off-kilter, too vulnerable. Any faint trace of the original players left here would have to stay hidden for now…and probably forever, after three days of wear and tear on the scene.
I came back to full normal awareness, still holding up my walls, and sighed. I was very much not good at failure, even if there were extenuating circumstances. Especially when there were extenuating circumstances: that felt too much like making excuses, and covering up the fact that we’d failed to gather everything in the first go.
Live and l
earn, J would say. But what if, someday, a screwup like that meant someone didn’t live to learn?
The air felt colder than when I’d arrived, and I looked up to see that the sky—pale blue that morning—had clouded up to a thick gray. I was too tired to do more than sniff in ether, but there didn’t seem to be any storm-hint in the air. Pity; I wasn’t much for sourcing wild, but people—Talent—tended to relax more when the spring thunderstorm season started, and we were definitely, all of us, the pack and the entire damn city, in need of relaxing.
Venec was gone when I made it back to the office. I knew it even as I was climbing the stairs, even through my strengthened internal wall: he wasn’t in the building.
“Coward,” I muttered, letting my wall drop enough that he would hear me. At least, I assumed he could hear me. Odds were he had his own wall up, to keep me out. Reasonable enough. I didn’t think he was enjoying this any more than I was—he’d sounded so annoyed when he realized he’d heard me that it was almost insulting, actually. Irrationally—and I knew it was irrational and I couldn’t help it—that just made me pissier.
“Hey.” Pietr greeted me when I stormed into the office, and picked up on my mood immediately. “Whatever it was, I’m pretty sure it wasn’t my fault.”
I had the instinctive urge to say something wise-ass and cutting, and bit down on it. He was right: it wasn’t any of his fault.
“Venec booked out for the day?”
“Yeah. About ten minutes ago.”
Hah. Just as I was getting out of the subway. “Coward,” I muttered again, for good measure. “Stosser?”
“Disappeared about an hour ago.”
“What are the others doing,” I asked, and then realized that I didn’t give a damn. I loved my job but right now I did not want to be anywhere near anything that had anything to do with Benjamin Venec.
“Gone home, Venec’s orders. Twelve hours of sleep before we’re supposed to come back.” He seemed oblivious to the fact that he was disobeying that order.
Venec was right, damn him. I was wired with the need to do something, but we’d all had a hell of a week, and if I pushed it much further I really would fall over. I needed to get out of here, and ideally get out of my skin, if only for a little while.
I gave Pietr a long considering look that had been known to make some people nervous. He met it square, his gray eyes calm and knowing. Hrm.
“You want to go get dinner?”
Pietr suggested the place, a little red-meat joint down by the seaport that the tourists didn’t know about, and was perfectly willing to not talk about a damn thing that had anything to do with work. And somewhere over the course of a bloody-rare steak and my second vodka tonic, I decided that I was going to break my “no coworkers” rule, and have sex with Pietr. Feel-good, no-promises, tension-easing, playful sex. I was pretty sure he knew what I’d decided and was fine with that.
We finished dinner and paid the tab, and found ourselves standing on the sidewalk in the dusk. It had started to rain while we were eating, the kind of rain that’s like mist against your face.
“My place is closer” was all he said.
Pietr’s place was like him: quiet, almost elegant in its simplicity. He had a one-bedroom on the ground floor of a prewar building, with wooden parquet floors and an upgraded kitchen with very nice stainless appliances I coveted, and a bathroom twice the size of my own, but there were security bars on the windows that would have driven me nuts in a week.
His bedroom was totally what I would have expected from him: Shaker-style maple furniture with clean lines and a definite solidity, the bed in the middle of the room, decent-size, two pillows, a golden-brown comforter and white sheets. Everything was clean and neatly organized, and there were black-and-white photographs on the wall, of scenes I thought I recognized. I walked over to look more closely.
“That’s Budapest.”
“Yeah.”
I turned to look at him. “You took these?”
He shrugged and nodded, as though embarrassed.
“They’re wonderful.” They were. I didn’t know much about photography, but these really gave you a feel for the place and the time of day.
“Old camera, not much electronics to fuck up. I used to love playing around in the darkroom. I haven’t been able to do much lately, though. We’re…”
“Changing?”
“Yeah.” His embarrassment shifted to curiosity. “You’ve noticed it, too? Ever since we started really working out, using current more, it’s harder to be around any kind of electronics, even the stuff that used to be safe. You think…”
“I just noticed it myself. I don’t have a theory yet, but yeah, it’s got to be tied into how much we’re using, even when we’re not using it. Is the core a muscle, the more you use it the bigger it gets? Or…” I realized how we sounded, like we were still in the office, and laughed. “Damn it. This is ridiculous.”
“What is?”
“Me, babbling. I don’t babble, ever. I’m scared. I…I haven’t been scared…ever. I mean, yeah, scared about a lot of things, but never this. Never about sex.”
Pietr sat down on the bed. “Are you really scared? Or just not quite so sure of yourself anymore?”
I had to stop and think about that, damn him. There had been so much today, dealing with Mercy, the attack, the deal with Venec…it was no wonder I was feeling wobbly and weirdly off-kilter. I’d known I was using sex to make myself feel better, but was I using it to hide from those wobblies, instead of dealing with them? And if I was, was that wrong, necessarily?
“I am not used to not being totally sure of myself,” I admitted.
“I’d noticed that.”
That made me laugh again, the way I think he’d meant it to, and suddenly I saw again the glint of mischief I’d noted in him, that first day in the office. It had been too subdued lately, buried under training and the weight of what we’d experienced. I was glad to see it back. I was glad to be part of what brought it back.
“I’m okay being a diversion,” he said, his face serious, although the spark remained. “But I don’t want to be an excuse, or a thing you hide behind. Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I sat down on the bed next to him. It gave way under my weight, and I made a mental note not to stay the night. Soft beds gave me backaches.
“It’s not just physical,” I said suddenly. “I mean…the diversion. I…” I really did like him, and the urge to take comfort was matched by a very real appreciation of both his form and his brain.
“It’s all right, Bonita. I understand.”
And just like that, the awkwardness was gone, and I felt like my old self again…well, sort of. There was still this weird space in my head where the wall was up, keeping me from being quite the same Bonnie as usual, and part of me that felt weird, getting down to it with a coworker after all my promises to myself and to J that I wouldn’t mix business with pleasure, wouldn’t screw the job up with my usual casual attitudes. But Pietr stripped down nicely to long lean muscle and just enough flesh to be comfortable, his hands were as strong and as soft as I’d suspected they might be, and he had a streak of wicked inventiveness that challenged my own. And he very definitely was not a virgin.
And he was excessively and pleasingly diverting.
After a while I propped myself up on my elbows, wriggling around the pillows, and grinned down at him. “You were a saxophone player in a previous life, weren’t you?”
“Trombone,” he said, looking up with that glint in his eye, adjusting the spread of his hands across my hips, coaxing me into a better position, even as he shoved one of the pillows off the bed and onto the floor. “High school band. I was horrible. But I practiced really, really…hard.”
Laughing when you’re about to slide into orgasm is possibly one of the best ways in the universe to get rid of any lingering depression. My wall held, but it seemed easier to maintain, somehow, in the sticky aftermath.
Pietr was very guylike in the ability to
pass out right after orgasm—his second, my fourth—and he snored. I had meant to get up and get dressed afterward, leaving a note to ease any awkwardness, but it had been a very long day, and I was very tired. And the bed was surprisingly comfortable, even if it was too soft. I curled up against the warm body next to me, listened to the rain coming down outside, and slept.
eleven
I woke up to a warm but empty bed, and a note on the pillow that Pietr had gone out running. I lay there, staring at the ceiling, and did a quick check on my entire system. Core still low but otherwise…
Settled. Calm. It wasn’t the sex, as such, but the intimate contact that did it for me; the sharing of pleasure. Now, if I could just hold on to that, when things got hinky again…
I collected my clothing from the pile on the floor, got dressed, and considered my next move for about ten seconds. I scrawled a note on his note—gone home to shower, see you later—and let myself out of the apartment.
It wasn’t the same as leaving in the middle of the night, and I’d never had a real problem with the so-called Walk of Shame, dragging myself home after a night out, but I still felt sort of awkward. I’d broken the one rule I had, and while I wasn’t sorry—rules that no longer made sense needed to be updated—leaving like that bothered me. Maybe I should have waited, or showered there, or…
No. We both knew what we’d been doing the night before; no promises had been made or asked for, and he hadn’t told me to wait for him to get back or anything, just that he’d see me later. It was copacetic, right?
The rain had let up a little overnight, but it was still damp and miserable. The site of the attack would be washed clean; any chance we had of collecting any kind of evidence was over. What we had needed to be enough. Please god, it would be enough.
I made it uptown before the morning rush really kicked in, dunked myself under the shower, grabbed a PowerBar for breakfast, got dressed, and was back on the subway in plenty of time to not be late to the office, if the transit gods were kind.
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