Super Zero

by Rhonda Stapleton

  She righted herself, lifted her hand and flung something in front of her. A big flash of smoke appeared. As it faded I saw that she was no longer there.

  I slumped against the light pole, trying to ease the pain in my poor stomach. And in my head—how in the hell was I going to get around now with my car rendered useless?

  “Are you okay?” Vigilante said, rushing to my side. “You took a good one square in the gut.”

  I nodded slowly. If I opened my mouth I knew I was going to cry from pain, so it was better to keep quiet.

  Mason thunked me on the back. “Well done. You took that shot like a man.” He looked at me closely, paying attention to me for the first time now that Carrie and her skimpy clothes were gone, and his eyes took in my figure-hugging form. “And who might you be?” he asked me in a husky tone. “I don’t remember seeing you around here before.”

  Oh my God, was Mason coming on to me? I couldn’t prevent my eyes from widening in horror. This was nasty. This was almost like incest, given that I worked for him and he was banging my cousin.

  Vigilante clenched his jaw, stepping closer to my side. “This is my sidekick, The Tangler. She’s new to the scene. And I think you just threw her car.”

  Mason chuckled, then turned his eyes back to me, a lewd undertone in his demeanor. “Well, I guess I have to give her a…ride, then.”

  Double nasty. I felt Vigilante tense beside me. He grabbed my forearm, squeezing tight.

  “Thanks,” I whispered to Mason, too tired to hurl back an insult at him, “but I’ll be fine.”

  Mason dug into his uniform pocket and procured a business card. He handed it to me.

  The Machine—for all your needs

  216-555-6969

  A small shudder of revulsion swept through me. Ew, gross. Although I shouldn’t have been surprised—of course he’d pick that phone number.

  “Call me any time,” he said, practically purring, then dramatically darted off into the darkness between the buildings behind us.

  Vigilante ran a hand through his hair. I think he muttered something like, “Pig,” but I couldn’t be sure.

  I kneeled down by the opened passenger door of my car, grabbing my insurance information and street clothes. My blood boiled. Nice of Mason to leave without offering to fix my car or anything. Ass.

  Good thing I had full coverage. Even though I had a beater car, Mom had taught me to always be fully insured, just in case. And I’d been careful to follow her advice to the T. Thank God.

  Throwing on my street clothes to cover my uniform, I called my insurance claims representative, making up a story that I’d come out of a building working late and found my car completely flipped over in the middle of the road.

  They showed up a half hour later with a tow truck, took my information down and dragged my car away, promising to call me in the morning.

  “Come on,” Vigilante said through a clenched jaw. “I’ll give you a ride home.”

  * * *

  The ride to my apartment was awkward. I clung to Vigilante’s back, my stomach still aching, my body tired from all the running and action of the evening. Okay, there had to be a better, smarter way to do this superhero thing. Getting my ass handed to me on a platter wasn’t exactly the ideal way of fighting.

  Vigilante pulled the motorcycle in front of my apartment building door. I slid off the back carefully, trying to go easy on my stomach.

  He looked at me, his face tight. “Stay in your place, and don’t leave. Carrie knows who you are, so be careful. I’ll call you in the morning. Get some sleep.” Then, he rode off without looking back.

  What was his problem? I’d kind of figured he was going to hang around a bit. Make sure I would be safe by myself, or something. Guess that was out of the question.

  I walked up the stairs slowly, every muscle in my body aching. Was he mad at me for how I’d handled the fight? I’d tried my best, and that’s what counted.

  Or maybe…maybe, he was mad because Mason flirted with me. Oh, please—as grossed out as I was, I knew better than to take Mason seriously. Mason had proven time and again that he was a skirt-chaser.

  Or spandex-chaser, in my case.

  Was Vigilante jealous?

  I keyed the door, thinking about that. He’d started acting weird when Mason arrived, and he’d clenched my arm tightly as Mason flirted with me.

  A small chuckle escaped my lips as I locked the door behind me. Vigilante was jealous! Well, served him right. How many times had I watched woman after woman flirt endlessly with him? And not once had he told them to stop or discouraged their advances.

  Well, he could pout then. I showered quickly, set the alarm for eight, and collapsed into bed, falling into a deep, dreamless sleep.

  * * *

  Beep. Beep. Beep. I slid my eyes open at the annoying insistence of my alarm clock, lifting an arm to shut it off. My stiff shoulder cried in protest. I sat up, using my arms to prop myself up. My stomach muscles still hurt.

  I quickly got dressed and walked to work, making a mental list of things I had to do:

  1 – Get a loaner car from my insurance company.

  2 – Be ready to kick ass, should Carrie be at the office. Somehow I suspected she wouldn’t show up since I knew her real identity now, but weirder things have happened.

  3 – Research SummerTech.

  4 – Call Vigilante.

  5 – Continue to protect the crystal, of course.

  I made it to the building and up to our floor, on hyper alert for possible trouble. Mason was seated behind the receptionist desk, a deep scowl etched into his forehead.

  Relief washed over his face when he saw me. “Oh, thank God,” he said. “You’re finally here. You can man the phones. Carrie didn’t show up, and the temp won’t be here until ten.” His brow furrowed. “No call from Carrie, either. I wonder if she’s okay.”

  I shrugged noncommittally, sliding into the seat behind the desk. “I’m sure she’s fine.”

  As Mason trudged off to his office, I quickly called my insurance company to have them send a rental car to me this afternoon and booted up the receptionist computer, digging through the files. Nothing.

  Damnit. I’d figured Carrie was too smart to leave evidence in there, but one never knew.

  I opened a browser and went to Google, typing in SummerTech. About four thousand hits popped up on the list. Great.

  For the next couple of hours I scoured through article after article on the company, learning about their innovative breakthroughs in technology and the robotics industry. Then, I hit paydirt. On page twenty of the list, there was an article buried near the end that interviewed Bradley Summers three months ago. I scanned through quickly, my eyes stopping on an area of interest:

  Bradley Summers, CEO of SummerTech, remained mysterious when asked about the company’s future prototypes.

  “We’ve been toying around with facial recognition hardware, but I think we’ve come up with something special that will blow the competition out of the water. We’ll be able to identify even partially obscured faces due to the intelligent nature of these cameras.”

  This had to be related to the video cameras I saw in SummerTech’s lab. I opened my cell and flipped through the pictures I’d taken last night. Most were blurry, but one of a small camera, no bigger than four inches round, and a strip of metal on a table came out perfectly, backlit in red. The metal was stamped in the bottom corner with our company logo, clear as day. MetalCo Industries.

  These cameras had to be something incredible if Dementrix wanted to gain control of them. What kind of power could she have with facial recognition cameras, and why would she want them?

  A whirlwind of images flew through my head, images of these special cameras secretly planted everywhere across Cleveland. Or maybe even the world.

  A sick thud hit my stomach. I shoved my phone back in my purse. Mason must have sold SummerTech the metal from our company to make their cameras, all under the table, so he could pocket a
ll the profits. No wonder his expenses didn’t add up on the hand-written receipts he’d given me. Just another way for him to milk more money out of MetalCo.

  So, that’s how Dementrix was tied in with Mason. That’s why he had such a huge deposit in his personal bank account. He’d sold out his fellow American for the almighty buck.

  God, I was such an idiot. All this time I’d been working for the bad guy, blindly aiding his endeavors by running his stupid errands, doing his stupid dirty work. He’d used me.

  Even worse, he was willing to let me die so he could get the crystal, meaning he’d have even more power over everyone. Thus I’d take the fall for losing the crystal, and he’d come out looking like a hero.

  My stomach lurched. I was working for a rat.

  Chapter 17

  I printed out the article using Carrie’s desktop printer, then closed out of the browser on the computer, deleting the history so Mason wouldn’t know I’d been researching SummerTech. And him. It was time to figure out what to do to handle this situation, once and for all. Maybe Vigilante could give me some advice on the plan I was formulating when I talked to him.

  My cell chirped from my purse. The caller ID said it was Britney.

  I groaned. What did she want now? She was the last person I wanted to talk to at the moment.

  “Hello?” I said, inserting a small modicum of enthusiasm into my voice.

  “Hey!” Britney said loudly, her tone perky as ever. The background behind her was noisy, and I had a hard time hearing her. “Where are ya?”

  I glanced at my watch. Eleven in the morning on a weekday. Where else would I be? “I’m at work,” I said, trying to maintain a firm grasp on my ever-slipping patience.

  “Oh, good! Can I come see you?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, sure, we can do another visit. When were you planning to come back in town? Maybe in a couple of months or so?”

  “Oh, I mean I’m already here,” she said. “I’m at the airport right now. I took a morning flight in. I need to talk to you.”

  Crap. This didn’t sound good. And the timing was even worse, of course. “Is everything okay? Aunt Betty isn’t sick, is she?”

  “Oh, everything’s great.” Pause. “I’m pregnant!”

  I didn’t think it was possible for the world to crash in on me even more, but it just did. I didn’t know what to say to Britney, but the only thing I could think was, Please don’t let it be Mason’s baby.

  Piggish, ratfink Mason. But because we were talking about my luck here, I knew that’s exactly whose baby it was.

  I covered the mouthpiece and uttered a cuss word, quickly trying to regain my composure. “Okay, wanna meet for lunch? There’s a deli down the street.”

  “Sure. I’ll be at the deli in an hour.” She hung up.

  I put the phone back in my purse, running a hand over my face. Was it too early in the day to have a margarita? It was happy hour somewhere in the world, right?

  * * *

  “So, how did this happen?” I asked Britney, nervously bending the straw in my drink.

  “Well, I was counting backward, and I think it was that night he and I got sushi up at that great Japanese restaurant down the street about a month ago. We had a lot to drink and got really worked up, and he had that hot Justin Timberlake song playing in his car–”

  “No, no, that’s not what I mean.” Ew, she could stop with the details now. TMI. I tried for a more direct, but delicate approach. “I mean, didn’t you use…any protection?”

  “Oh, duh,” she said with a giggle. “We did at first, but then he said things didn’t feel as well with it on. Plus he said he had a low sperm count, so it was okay.”

  Right. What a tool. I unbent my straw and took a drink of the iced tea. “When did you find out?”

  “Well, I noticed my period was late. So, I took the test yesterday, and it came back positive!” Britney giggled again, wiggling the stiff pickle spear in her hand as she talked. The café’s light glinted off her diamond tennis bracelet, out of place with her faded jeans and tight black T-shirt.

  I nodded slowly, unsure of what to say. Britney was obviously thrilled, and I hated to rain on her parade. “Congratulations.”

  “Thanks. I’m, like, so excited. I wanted to tell my mom, but I figured the daddy should know first. You know?” She took a bite of the pickle. “Mmm, this is good. I hope I don’t get really bad morning sickness, like my friend Lily had. During her first three months of pregnancy, I remember she’d puke, like, twelve times a day—”

  “So, you haven’t told The Machine yet, then?” I interrupted.

  I toyed with the romaine lettuce spilling from the outside of my turkey sandwich, my appetite shot. At least she hadn’t told my aunt either. Boy, was that going to be a fun conversation. I didn’t envy her.

  Aunt Betty was, to put it plainly, a frigid old prude. She wasn’t going to take the evidence of Britney’s extramarital curricular activities well at all. I didn’t have to be a psychic to predict a verbal beatdown in Britney’s future, but she didn’t seem worried in the least. Maybe pregnancy hormones made her even more delusional than usual.

  “Nope. I was going to ask you how to surprise him with the news. Should I knit a little baby bootie and attach a card? Or just tell him over dinner?”

  “I don’t think you should do either,” I mumbled.

  Mason as a dad—horrifying. I remembered his flirtation with me last night when he didn’t know who I was. Something told me he wouldn’t be too eager to help Britney out with raising the baby. It might cramp his "player" style.

  “Yeah,” she said, picking up her sandwich and digging in, “maybe those aren’t good ideas. What do you think?”

  “Honestly, I don’t think you should tell him at all,” I said. Another thought hit me. Rowena. If she found out, she’d feed Britney and her unborn baby to the sharks. Not that I could fully blame her for being upset, as her husband was a cad.

  Rowena’s devastated face when she’d realized Mason cheated on her still haunted me. I couldn’t fathom how awful this news would be for her.

  “So how will he find out?” Britney asked, scratching her head. “Shouldn’t he know he’s going to be a father? I need to tell him.”

  A sudden swell of irritation surged in my gut. I couldn’t believe how selfish, how self-focused Britney was. Didn’t she realize what damage this would cause?

  “What, so you can add more complication to everyone’s lives?” I said in a tight voice. “How do you think his wife is going to feel when she finds out you’re pregnant?”

  Britney swallowed, staring at her sandwich. I saw two small tears forming in the inside corners of her eyes. “He said he was going to leave her for me and get a divorce. He loves me. I know he wants to be with me.”

  I patted her hand, my anger fading away as quickly as it had come. How naïve could she be? This was bad. “Honey, he doesn’t love you. He’s not going to leave her. I’m sorry, but I’m telling the truth. He’s already working on reconciling with her.”

  She looked up at me, sparks of anger flaring in her eyes. “What do you know? You don’t know him like I do.”

  I raised an eyebrow. How could she be so blind to his true nature? “I’ve worked for the man a full year now. How well can you possibly know him after a month-long affair?”

  Britney stood, her cheeks blood-red, and slapped a ten-dollar bill on the table. “Here’s my portion of lunch. I can’t believe how unsupportive you are.” She sneered down at me. “When The Machine finds out I’m having his baby, you’ll see how wrong you are. Then you’ll feel bad for being such a judgmental bitch.” She stalked off, slamming her hands onto the deli door to open it.

  I stared at her, my jaw dropped. I’d never seen Britney so furious before. And not once in our whole time together had she ever called me any names, much less “bitch.”

  Or judgmental, for that matter.

  I should have just minded my own damn business.

  *
* *

  Vigilante’s lips were pinched shut as he read the SummerTech article that night. The only sound was the rain pounding against the window outside my apartment window. Boy, was I glad I was inside.

  I wondered where Britney was right now. She hadn’t responded to the apology message I’d left on her cell earlier. Hopefully she was okay—not that she wanted any of my concern. I tried to push her out of my mind and figure out a solution.

  He shook his head, thunking the paper down on my coffee table. “This confirms it. And I agree we need to go to the League of Heroes about it.”

  I swallowed. “My only concern is that Mason heads up the League. Won’t that be…awkward to confront him in front of everyone?”

  “Of course it will,” Vigilante said, his eyes flashing. “But that doesn’t mean it’s not the right thing to do. He needs to be revealed for the scammer he is.”

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right. I’m just not looking forward to it.” I toyed with the handle of my coffee mug, sipping slowly. I normally didn’t drink coffee this late in the evening, but I needed a jolt to keep me awake.

  Oh, man. Once I ratted Mason out for his illegal activities, I was going to lose my job. Things just kept getting worse and worse.

  I slumped back on the couch and looked around my apartment, which would be a goner in no time, too. Without a salary, no way could I afford to live here. I was going to end up homeless, jobless, and an all-around pathetic girl who could turn electricity on and off. There didn’t seem to be a huge job market for someone with my skills. How was I any better than a stupid power switch?

  Vigilante must have guessed my thoughts. He grabbed my hand, his fingers stroking gently. “Don’t worry. We’ll figure something out for you.”