by Sierra Dean
“Of course.” I didn’t hesitate for a second.
“The cost will be high.”
There was no cost higher than what I’d paid here today. I’d pay with my life if I had to, and I’d do it without thinking twice. She must have seen the determination etched in my features, because she gave me a weak smile.
“You’re special.” She kissed my knuckles. She was so hot it burned my skin. “You can do this.”
I still wasn’t totally sure what she was talking about, but when she reached up to touch my face, I let her.
“Close your eyes.”
I did as I was told, and her hand covered mine. Her skin was fire. It was acid. My whole body burned like I’d been doused in flames. When the pain subsided, I opened my eyes, and my breath caught in my throat.
I was standing across from Imelda at the Starbucks café. The air was clear, and people were milling around in the early-morning sunshine, chattering pleasantly. Imelda was herself, prim and poised, a little annoyed looking.
Her hand was on my wrist, and she said, “I can always make time where it’s needed, Tallulah.”
Chapter Forty-One
I staggered back from the table, recoiling from her touch, and she looked at me with a sad sort of understanding.
“Wh-what is this?” I stammered.
“You were somewhere else just now?” She didn’t seem all that surprised. “With me, I assume?”
I looked down at myself, wearing the same jeans and T-shirt I’d been in the day before. I touched my forehead, and the stitches were gone. I stared at her, and even though I understood logically what had happened, it still seemed too impossible to believe.
“What did you do to me?”
“Chronos is the god of time, my dear.” Imelda gave me an apologetic smile. “Those with his power can manipulate time. Though I must confess it’s only very rare situations that would make one of us send you back. That’s what happened, right?” Her head cocked to the side as she observed me. Her hair was perfect. She was unblemished.
“You don’t remember?” I settled into the seat across from her again, hoping my heart might stop pounding soon.
“No. And you can’t say a word about it either.” She raised a hand like she could tell I was about to start babbling information at any moment. She wasn’t wrong. “You can’t change my path. You can only alter your own reality. Whatever happened in the future that made me send you back to now, I must have believed it was worth it. It’s a rare thing indeed. Upsets the cosmic balance.”
I stared at her. “I can’t tell you anything?”
She shook her head. “I must do everything the exact same.”
So, no talking her into canceling the convention, then. No changing her decisions on any of the stubborn, pigheaded things she was going to do. Of course we couldn’t have made things that easy. At this point in our original conversation she had already drawn a line in the sand telling me the show would go on.
That meant if it was going to end differently, it was all up to me.
“You can’t tell anyone else what the future holds either,” she warned me. “This isn’t a game, Tallulah. If you’re back here, you are the only one who can change things. You bring the future back with you. If the path is going to change, you are the only one who can know how it was. Everything will be different if you do what you were sent here to do.”
I nodded, barely understanding. I could tell Sunny not to come, but she would insist on it, just like she had that morning. Without telling them why I wanted them to stay away, I wouldn’t be able to keep them from the Luxor.
All I could do was find the son of a bitch who did this and stop him before he set the wheels into motion.
I moved to stand up, and said, “Future you…I mean the other you, she told me something. She said the cost would be high?”
Imelda looked up at me.
“You have to give up whatever future you left behind. That path is gone now.”
At first I didn’t understand why that would be so bad.
Then it sank in slowly.
If I stopped this before it truly started, my night with Cade would never happen. He wouldn’t sleep at my side. I wouldn’t tell him I loved him. The only reason we got to that point was because of the car bomb, and I had to stop this before those wheels were set in motion.
I had said I would sacrifice anything.
Turned out I had to give up my only moment of pure happiness.
I thought of Sawyer and Sunny. I thought of everything that hadn’t happened yet, and I nodded tightly. “That’s fine.”
It gutted me. But if sacrificing my happiness would keep Sunny and Sawyer alive, I would resign myself to an entire lifetime of being miserable and alone. I’d cut off my own arms if it meant I didn’t need to relive the tomorrow I had left behind.
Imelda smiled, a sympathetic sadness still in her features. “I wouldn’t have sent you back unless it was for a good reason. I know whatever happens I must have believed you could change it, Tallulah.”
“I will.”
“I’m sorry I can’t help more.”
It was my turn to smile, though the gesture felt odd and stiff. “If I do what I came here to do, you have no reason to be sorry. Believe me.”
“I do.”
I walked into the lobby in a daze, trying to process what I was seeing. The stage was whole and untouched. The chairs were all in neat rows, and a few cameramen were chatting in the press area while reporters typed up stories on their laptops.
Guests were checking into their rooms. Clerics were arriving in time to mingle with friends before all the panels and sessions got underway. Outside, the sun was warm and bright.
It was like nothing had happened.
Because nothing had happened yet, I reminded myself.
“We missed you at breakfast,” a light, cheery voice announced behind me.
I spun around and grabbed her, hauling her into the tightest hug imaginable. Sunny squirmed and giggled, pushing herself free of me, then placed a soft kiss on my forehead. “Gods, Tallulah, you act like you haven’t seen me in a million years.”
I resisted the urge to hug her again. I just wanted to hold on to her and never let her go.
Cade was with her, and he held my gaze when he looked at me over Sunny’s head. His expression was soft, confused. I wasn’t sure what my face was saying, but it was probably too much.
Having her here, seeing her again, was a joy beyond expression. But looking at him I was reminded of the sacrifice I had to make in order to undo the future. I didn’t mind, really I didn’t. Yet knowing what I was setting myself up to lose hurt me all the same.
I smiled at him, but he wasn’t buying it. He knew me too well.
More than anything I wanted to tell them what was coming. I wanted to spill every secret, tell them minute by minute what horrors awaited. Maybe if I could scare them enough, none of them would show up tomorrow. But what then? Then someone else was sitting front row by the stage. Maybe a young initiate. Maybe someone with a baby.
Imelda was right. I couldn’t change their futures unless I changed the future. The only way for me to properly fix this would be cutting off the head of the beast before it struck. And since the car bomb was the thing that would set all the wheels in motion, I had until five p.m. to find the would-be killer and put a stop to his plan.
Sure. No problem. Easy as pie, right?
“What’s your schedule today?” Sunny looped her arm with mine, strolling towards the elevators like she didn’t have a care in the world. Like we weren’t living in the last twenty-four hours of her life.
We weren’t. Not anymore, I reminded myself.
Cade kept shooting me questioning glances, quiet looks of concern meant only for me. I gave my head a soft shake, trying to tell him I was fine. Everything was fine.
He didn’t say anything, but I don’t think he believed me.
“I have a bunch of really boring educational sessions today,�
� I lied. “And a few grievances.” I remembered how I’d spent the previous afternoon arguing with Lettie about wind. I tried to remember what had happened to her during the explosion, but I didn’t know.
The argument hardly seemed to matter anymore.
“I’m actually going to go grab a coffee before my first panel,” I announced. “You guys go ahead, don’t be late on my account. We’ll meet up for dinner later. Okay?”
I didn’t wait for their response, and instead headed straight for the Starbucks. Imelda was gone, the table she’d been at empty. I wondered what it must have been like for her knowing her future self had sent me back. Was she curious at all? Or was this such a normal part of her life she would forget about it by tonight?
I stood in front of the barista, barely registering the coffee options, when Cade sidled up next to me and stood the tiniest bit too close, his arm rubbing against mine.
“What’s wrong with you?” he asked.
“Nothing.” I said it too quickly, too loudly. Maybe I wasn’t such a good liar after all.
“You’re acting like a nutcase.” He ordered himself a coffee, then ordered the same for me when he realized I’d just been standing here the whole time. “Something has your feathers all ruffled. Is it the kid?”
“Sawyer?” My heart pulsed. I wish she was here so I could see her. I knew she was fine, but still, it would have been nice to confirm it with my own eyes, since my last memory of her was her caved-in skull and waxen skin. “No, it’s not Sawyer.”
I accepted my coffee from the barista, and before I could take a sip, Cade took in back from me, giving me a funny stare. He walked over to the service counter and added two sugars and a splash of cream before passing it back to me.
He remembered how I liked it. How I really liked it.
“Like I said. You’re being weird.”
“I’m fine.”
“Did Prescott say something to you?”
I snorted. “Nothing more than he usually does.”
“Was it Leo?”
“Maybe it’s you,” I countered. “Maybe I think you ask too many questions.”
He made a small pish noise. “You love my questions.”
I love you, I thought, the words burning in my chest, eating up my insides. I should just say it. I should say it now, so I still got to keep that moment.
But it wasn’t the same. Him quizzing me over coffee wasn’t our time. Our time might never come again. Maybe that was really how this payment worked. We all got one chance for a perfect moment, and I’d had mine. Life doesn’t go around handing out moments like that.
If I never got another chance, if he never knew, maybe it was enough that I had the memory of it. Even if it never actually happened. Would it become a dream, then?
I sighed and sipped my drink. It was too hot, but at least it tasted right.
“Why don’t you tell me what’s bothering you?” He was standing in my way, keeping me from moving.
“I swear, I’m fine. I didn’t sleep well last night. It’s making me cranky.”
“Cranky isn’t the right word. Cranky would be normal.”
I slapped him on the chest, and he smiled. Balance restored. “Go to your stupid session. I’ll see you at dinner.”
“Fine.”
“Fine,” I shot back.
He made his way past the stage, walking over the place where Prescott had ended Sunny’s life. Where Sawyer’s body had bled out. He didn’t even flinch. They were only tiles on the lobby floor to him.
I wondered then, in a moment of sudden clarity, what Sunny dying meant for my deal with Charon. She had died. I had technically delivered her to him. That Imelda had reversed time wasn’t my fault.
I somehow doubted Charon would see the bargain as being fulfilled, and now was the wrong time to worry about it, but the thought lingered, nevertheless.
“Fuck it,” I grumbled.
I threw my full coffee in the trash and went hunting.
Chapter Forty-Two
None of the Luxor staff knew who I was talking about when I described the vaguely chubby blond man I had seen. I knew his face. It was scarred into my memory. I’d never forget it as long as I lived.
Yet no one could remember seeing him.
He was boring and forgettable, precisely the kind of man who could disappear in plain sight because no one would think to look twice at him.
After I’d scoured the main floor, speaking to every bellhop, concierge, and maid I could find, I decided I would start from the ground up, searching every single room and corridor until I found some trace of him.
It was already one in the afternoon, and time was winding down. I was starting to lose patience and energy, exhausted from everything I’d been through. I was running on almost pure adrenaline. But this asshole was here somewhere, and I was going to find him.
My first clue was in the employee locker rooms on one of the subbasement levels beneath the hotel. I waited for a brief lull between staff members coming and going, then ducked into the men’s locker room. I started going through the open lockers one by one, but aside from some baseball equipment, there was nothing really noteworthy.
Then, in a broken, dented locker with no lock, I found a slightly rumpled uniform and a rolled-up sleeping bag. When I knocked the bag out of the locker, a spindle of electrical wire tumbled out.
“Fuck me,” I breathed.
This was it. This was his fucking stuff.
It would explain, in part, how he managed to sneak by all the guards and search requirements outside. He slept in here. He never left the hotel, so he never had to worry about getting back in.
I crouched and unzipped the sleeping bag. In addition to the wire, there was an old Casio wristwatch, a roll of duct tape, and the gun.
The same gun he would use to blow his brains out the next day.
I popped the clip out of the magazine and slid each bullet out until only one remained in the chamber. Probably the one with his name on it. I was tempted to leave it in there, to let it fulfill its destiny, but I slid it out as well, slipping it, along with the others, into my pocket.
I replaced the gun, the wires, and everything else into the locker, and then I ducked into a nearby shower stall with an Out of Order sign on the door, and waited.
Shift change happened around three. Blessedly no one tried to wash up. They just shucked off their clothes, and either changed into or out of their uniforms, then went home or to work.
He showed up fifteen minutes later, his head ducked low to avoid attention. I saw his hair first, and my hands tightened into fists. Since it was after three now, that meant he was on his way to get what he needed to wire up the car. Or the car was already wired and he was setting himself up to watch it from a good vantage point.
He changed out of his street clothes—a pair of ill-fitting slacks and a plain green polo shirt—and put on the Luxor uniform. The material was so dark it was hard to see how wrinkled it was. He’d blend right in, even though he had probably stolen the thing out of the laundry.
I wanted to jump out and tackle him then and there.
I wanted to climb on his back and rip out his hair, smash his face repeatedly into the floor until there was nothing left but a mash of bone and teeth and ruined meat.
This man had—or would—take everything from me. He had killed twelve children, all because he felt ignored.
I wanted to destroy him.
But if the car bomb was already set up, I had to know. I needed to figure out which car it was, where it was. I cursed myself for not looking up the make and model the day before. It would have saved me so much effort.
I waited until he was dressed and had re-stashed his goods in the locker, then eased open the shower stall door. I stopped at the locker where I’d found the baseball equipment and was relieved to see it was still there. I had come totally unarmed, and in spite of my plethora of abilities, I was only human. I couldn’t exactly punch a lightning bolt into him from five floors underg
round. I eased the wooden bat out of the locker and followed his footsteps into the hall.
Now that I had him in my sights, his death was all but inevitable. He wouldn’t get away this time, and I wouldn’t let him hurt another living soul.
He took the stairs up, and I stole in after him before the door clicked closed. He jogged noisily to the next floor, and I was like a ghost trailing behind him, purposeful and quiet. The door on opened, and I caught it just before it shut.
We emerged in an underground parking lot, and my skin started to crawl as if fire ants were climbing all over me, nipping little trails wherever they went. The lights down here weren’t great, making it easy to stick to the shadows at the front end of the cars while he marched through the rows, obviously intent on a certain destination.
He paused in front of a Crown Vic, looked around, then popped open the hood.
This is it.
I had no way to know that. I hadn’t been outside when the car blew up. I hadn’t read the police reports or seen any footage of the explosion. It wasn’t like a Crown Vic grille had gone sailing past me in the lobby, telling me what I was looking for.
Yet his actions told me everything I needed to know. Up until that moment he’d been whistling off tune, but the second he opened up the car he fell silent. The sound of metal on metal told me he was tinkering with something in the engine.
A detective I was not, but I had enough common sense to draw a straight line between two points. In about two hours, this man would set off a car bomb in front of the Luxor. Right now, he was in the Luxor basement, messing around under the hood of a car.
That was math so basic a toddler could make the connection.
I tested the weight of the bat in my hands. I wanted to sneak up behind him and knock him out cold. Though to be honest if I started beating him, I’d never stop. Maybe I should have taken his gun, but I hadn’t wanted him to notice it was missing.
I took a step closer, my jeans brushing against the side of a nearby car with a soft scratch. I froze, holding my breath as tight as I was holding the bat.
He paused, looked around, then went back to work.