Masks (Out of the Box Book 9)

by Robert J. Crane

  “Yeah,” I said, “I know. I’m a mess.”

  “Well, at least you acknowledge it. But—”

  “No buts,” I said, shrugging. “Crap happens, and if it involves metas, it typically ends up hitting the fan when I’m around. Once again, I attract it like gravity.” I smirked. “Anyway … like I said, I think you’re right about this Frost thing, and I’ll tell my guy at the NYPD so.”

  Jamie looked a little sick. “But you’re not going to mention …” She looked around, a plea in her eyes.

  “Oh, no, no,” I said, shaking my head. “He doesn’t need to know who you are. No one does, not even me, really. Though, take it from someone with experience …” I chucked thumb toward the door behind me. “If you keep taking off out of the backyard, your neighbors are going to realize sooner or later. I assume they’re not blind, and a woman flying out from behind your fence is gonna generate some talk, and eventually, if you make enough enemies, you’ll be followed by someone less capable and less scrupled than myself … so … get ready.”

  Jamie closed her eyes, like she was trying to get to a happy place. “I … I don’t even know what I could do about that.”

  I shrugged. “You could stop heroing.”

  Her eyes snapped open, and she smiled faintly. I knew that feeling. “No, I can’t.”

  “Lots of people with powers don’t,” I said softly. “It’s a really popular choice, actually. It doesn’t mean you have to embrace a life of crime like the a-holes I chase down, but it also doesn’t mean you have to go sprinting and throwing your clothes off every time something goes wrong.”

  She gave me a pitying look. “I don’t see you stopping.”

  “I don’t have a kid,” I said. “Or anyone outside of my job, really. This is what I do. It’s my life, and I get to own all my screw-ups—and under my own name, no less. The fun of being a celebrity without—well, until this new job I got—any of the money to go along with it.”

  “This isn’t a job to me,” she said, and she sounded a little said. “It’s a responsibility. It’s a calling. I can’t just … stand aside while innocent people get hurt if I have the power to help them—”

  “I get it,” I said. “But there are consequences coming that you haven’t seen yet. I’m the voice of experience, just giving you a friendly warning, Jamie.” I smiled tightly. “I hope you maintain your secret identity forever. But …”

  “Thanks for the heads up,” she said, and she sounded like she meant it, though the discomfort I’d brought her was obvious.

  “I’ll, uh, leave you to it,” I said. “Gotta get out of here before you decide to pull out a vacuum or something.”

  She froze and looked over the room. “Oh … oh no … it needs it, doesn’t it? I—”

  “Whoa, cowgirl,” I said. “It was a joke. About your compulsive need to clean. I, uhm …” I shuffled backward toward the door. “I’m just gonna … go file my report and make for the next flight to Minneapolis.”

  She froze and gave me a pitying look. “They really won’t let you fly?”

  “Sadly,” I said. “Which is a real bummer, because the State Fair opens tomorrow, and I bet I won’t land in time to make it for the opening. They have these fried Australian potatoes with ranch dressing and cheese sauce—” I cut myself off mid-babble. “You probably don’t care about that.”

  “I could listen politely,” she said, looking uncomfortable.

  “Best of luck, Jamie Barton,” I said, nodding at her. “New York City is in good hands with you on watch here.” I opened the door and shot out into the night before she could answer me, parkouring my way over the fence, keeping low and running a couple blocks before I launched into flight. She didn’t need me outing her, after all, I reflected as I shot into the air above Staten Island and turned northeast, flying through the cool night and back to Manhattan, where I hoped my comfortable hotel bed would be waiting for me, undestroyed.

  27.

  I woke up way earlier than I wanted to, my phone alarm buzzing loudly, warning me it was time to get up. I thought about ignoring it, but when I saw the time, I hopped out of bed and got dressed.

  My clothes from the previous night were irredeemable. Gravity Gal—Jamie—might have secret ninja Jedi laundry abilities, but I didn’t have much faith in my hotel’s laundry service to fix what ailed my attire, so I’d just tossed them in the garbage and billed the twenty-dollar pair of jeans and five-dollar t-shirt to the NYPD.

  I yawned as I thudded my bottom into a chair and set my phone in front of me. It was almost ten o’clock, and I was feeling the effects of the late night and the exhausting efforts to save people. My throat was scratchy and dry in spite of Wolfe healing it, a layer of ashy soot probably still coating it in spite of drinking all the pricey Fiji water that was waiting in my room before I went to bed—plus some right out of the shower head as I rinsed last night. It hadn’t helped.

  My phone started buzzing right on time, and I activated the specially tailored videoconference app that J.J. had designed. The phone paused as its processor and internet connection chunked along for a minute, and then the screen split four ways, giving me three filled squares and one that was black as a moonless night.

  “Who’s on?” I yawned, and then shook away my sleepiness as I tried to focus my bleary eyes on the faces in front of me.

  “I’m here,” Reed said, in the bottom left hand corner. Augustus peeked around behind him, nodding, but didn’t say anything. I could see a white hotel wall behind them, an old-timey photo of something that looked like a wagon wheel sticking into frame.

  Ariadne was just above him in the top left corner, looking all put together in her suit with her new white string of pearls around her neck. She was sitting at her desk, all prim and proper as usual, a light smile on her face. “Ariadne Fraser is on the call,” she said, like we couldn’t see her, or like there was another Ariadne that might join in.

  I looked at the top right corner and saw my own face. My hair was a fuzzy mess that I hadn’t styled after my shower, but at least I wasn’t covered in soot anymore. “Where’s Kat?” I asked, looking at the bottom right hand square, the one that was pitch black.

  “I’m here,” Kat said, her voice muffled. “I’m just … it’s so early here.” I heard a thump, and then a click, and light came on in her frame. She looked down at the phone; apparently she had it clutched above her. I wanted to scowl but tried to hold it back. She had on makeup, her hair was perfectly coiffed, and she was wearing silken pajamas. She yawned and sat up in bed, the phone moving with her. It was clear to me that she had risen before the call and prepped herself, then lain down and tried to appear as though she just woke up that way.

  Unless she actually did just wake up that way, but I doubted it, because this was some movie-magic shit. I bet she’d brushed her teeth, too, even though it wasn’t a smell-a-phone.

  Reed rolled his eyes in his little corner of the screen, probably mirroring my own reaction. “Right. Well. Here we are, morning videoconference, day 8,957,362—”

  “We’ve been doing this for like, three weeks,” I said, stifling a yawn. Damn. I was in the earliest time zone of all of them, and I looked the worst. Well, at least I had that whole burning building thing as an excuse.

  “Feels longer,” Reed said.

  “I don’t know,” Augustus said, popping his head into the frame. “I like it. It kinda makes me feel like we’re a team, you know, like we’re working toward something here—”

  “Exactly the point,” I said. “Anyone want to report first?”

  “Well, we’re starting filming today,” Kat said, leaping right in, “so I’ll begin the investigation after some production meetings this morning—”

  “Anyone else?” I asked, talking right over her. Kat knew better than to drag her reality TV BS into my meetings. I only wanted to hear about concrete results, not her dog and pony show.

  “We’ve got something,” Reed said, Augustus weaving back and forth behind him
like he was dancing to something. “Looks like they want us to handle something else while we’re here, some new problem out in San Antonio, so we could get a few more days of business coming our way.”

  I sniffed. “Good. Ariadne? How’s the view from HQ?”

  “Placid,” Ariadne said with a faint smile. “J.J. sends his best—”

  “Where is he today?” I asked, feeling the lines wrinkle along my forehead. He was usually on the call.

  “He’s having a late start this morning,” she said. “He made a rather labored excuse about entertaining a woman last night—”

  “There was a pro gaming tournament last night,” Reed said. “He was probably up late for that.”

  “Let’s make the allowance that he could have been with a girl last night,” I said, and a shocked silence followed. “I mean … there’s somebody for everyone out there, right?” They all frowned at me, suspicious. “Cynics,” I said instead of fully retreating.

  Reed just raised an eyebrow at me. “You’re awfully optimistic all of a sudden. Did you sleep with Captain Frost last night or something?”

  “Ugh and no,” I said. “He’s an idiot, and I don’t mean just the unsophisticated kind. I’m talking like, full moron. Like, you know how everyone sees Kat as incredibly vapid and self-centered?”

  “Who sees me as like that?” Kat asked, eyes widening, aghast.

  “Relax,” I said. “Really, you’re only mildly vapid and moderately self-centered. Frost … not so much on the mild or moderate.”

  “Oh, well, gee, thanks,” Kat said.

  “Anyway, I think I’m almost wrapped up here,” I said. “I talked with Gravity Gal and Frost, and it looks like he was just being a dumbass, which is totally in his purview. Nothing to see here … well, except for one thing.”

  “Ooh, the suspense,” Augustus chimed in.

  “Probably just her way of announcing squad goals—oops, forgot the hashtag,” Kat said, stifling a yawn.

  “What the hell?” I asked.

  “She’s making a Taylor Swift reference,” Augustus said.

  “It’s a Taylor Swift—DAMMIT,” Reed said, looking back at Augustus behind him.

  “I know that. Now my question is—how do you two know this?” I asked, and there was a lot of hemming and hawing from their quadrant of the screen, suddenly.

  “Gotta keep your eyes out for—” Reed said.

  “Finger on the cultural pulse, you know,” Augustus said.

  “—and she’s clearly popular, and, uh, Isabella—uh, listens to her, yeah—”

  “All right, fine, I got a little crush is maybe all,” Augustus finished, shrugging his shoulders.

  There was a full five seconds of silence, and then Ariadne, Kat, and I all burst out laughing at the same time. Not small chuckles, either, but full-on guffaws.

  “Laugh it up,” Reed said sourly.

  “Taylor Swift is a titan of song-writing power and a mesmerizing stage performer,” Augustus said, nonplussed. “Y’all just jealous of her.”

  Reed blinked, staring straight at the camera. “I doubt that’s going to shut them up.”

  I stopped chortling. “It’s not so much that either of you like Taylor Swift, because I’ll cop to making ‘Shake it Off’ my personal theme song. It’s more that you dudes are probably not her typical demographic. Playing against type there, boys.”

  “I figured you more for a ‘Red’ girl,” Augustus said.

  “I like ‘Style,’” Kat said. “And ‘Blank Space.’”

  “You’ve got a ‘Blank Space’ where you’re supposed to keep your brain,” I shot at her. “Anyway … can we get back to my big revelation, which is …” I took a deep breath. “Scott is the new head of the agency. Err … the FBI task force that replaced the agency. Whatever it is, he’s the head of it.” I waited for reaction.

  “So he took your old job,” Reed said, chewing it over. “Huh.”

  “I thought he was done with government service after the war,” Ariadne said, a frown creasing the corners of her lips.

  “You really pissed him off, didn’t you?” Kat asked, sounding somewhere between amused and sympathetic.

  “What’d you do?” Augustus asked, leaning in over Reed’s shoulder.

  “Little breathing room here, man,” Reed said, looking up at him and motioning with his hand to back off some.

  Augustus ignored him. “Come on, what’d you do?”

  “She stole his memories of their relationship,” Ariadne said after a moment of silence, and Kat held up her hand in front of her mouth like she was surprised.

  “Ohmigosh!” Kat said.

  “I told you that myself, blondie,” I snapped at Kat. “Don’t fake shock.” I turned my attention to Augustus. “Yes … I … I did that.” Then I looked at Ariadne. “How did you know?”

  “A suspicion,” Ariadne said, a little archly, “which you just confirmed. Though it wasn’t difficult to come up with, since every time I talked to him about your breakup he would stare at me blankly.” She looked off the screen. “Speaking as someone who has a few holes in her own memory courtesy of you …”

  I flushed a little. “Yeah … he’s not taking it perhaps as well as you did.”

  Ariadne gave me a faint glare. “I didn’t take it well, but there were graver concerns at the time that required our entire focus.” She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. “Scott isn’t that distracted, I expect, no war to win him back to your side.”

  “It’s beginning to look suspiciously like President Harmon might be gunning for me,” I said. “Does that count?”

  “Hiring your ex into your old job doesn’t necessarily count as gunning for you,” Reed said, though he was frowning. “But it’s not exactly a great sign, is it?”

  “Umm, a few hundred metas left in the world and he picks the only one I used to sleep with, one who has a major axe to grind,” I said. “Yeah, seems suspicious to me.”

  “Lots of people have an axe to grind with you,” Augustus said.

  “None that are still above ground,” I said.

  Augustus did not let that one pass. “There’s the ones in the Cube—”

  “Which is below the ground,” I said patiently, and he got an Ohhhh expression on his face. “Anyway … suspicious timing. I ran across him last night when I was trying to save people from a burning building. He did not seem pleased to see me.”

  “Wait, there was a burning building?” Ariadne asked.

  “That explains why you look freshly showered,” Kat said, nodding as if the world suddenly made sense. “You did it before you went to bed. I was wondering, you seemed way too clean, lacking your skin’s usual morning shine—”

  “What the ass?” I asked, looking daggers at her. “Are you seriously competing with me for who has the better morning look?”

  “Oh, yeah, just casually drop that reference to a burning building and don’t elaborate on what happened,” Reed said. “Classic Sienna.”

  “What?” I asked, trying to turn my ire away from Kat. “There was a fire, I went to it, I saved some people, maybe a dog—”

  “Awww,” Kat said, her face turning all mushy.

  “Awwwwwww,” Augustus said, outdoing her.

  “Ughhhhhh,” Reed said, rolling his eyes.

  “—and then I encountered Scott and Guy Friday at the scene,” I said. “And he … maybe saved me with his water jets. That’s it. Nothing more to tell.” I paused. “Except that Captain Frost and Gravity Gal were both there, and—”

  A series of groans ran through my phone’s beleaguered speakers as my entire audience voiced their disdain at once.

  “—listening to status reports when we could be talking about this—”

  “—some quality hero work and probably an interesting story and we just go skipping right over it—”

  “—worry about you, Sienna. You should really—”

  “—but the dog’s okay, right?”

  “The dog and the people are all fine,”
I said. “And also not the point of the story, which was really more a chance for me to mention my ex working for the government and possibly trying to bring me down, if my suspicions are correct.”

  “Which they usually are,” Ariadne said. “You might not be much of an investigator, but when you do finally get a hunch, it often ends up being right.”

  “Yikes,” Kat said, shifting around and looking concerned all the while. “What are you going to do? Blow them up? Fight them? Shoot them?”

  “This is the government,” I said. “Fighting and blowing them up are not options.”

  “So … you’re going to shoot them, then?” Kat asked.

  “I don’t have my gun with me, so I figured it would go without saying I wasn’t going to shoot them,” I said. “Apparently it did not go without saying, since I had to fricking say it for you. I don’t want to cross these guys if I can avoid it. Even Scott.” Especially Scott, I didn’t say.

  “Why?” Kat asked, particularly dense this morning. “Scott’s a Poseidon type and Friday is a … what is he again? A Hercules? You could mop the floor with both their faces and not break a sweat.”

  “I could,” I said. “And then I could have the entire government make it their mission in life to ensure I don’t get to have a life. Maybe I could beat them all, down to the last FBI agent and National Guardsman … but I don’t get to live like a person while I’m going to war with the US government, and that’s assuming they don’t tranq me or shoot me or whatever just to get it over with. I’m not invincible, and I can’t live my life in society unless I live like a normal person, which includes following the law as best I can.”

  “As best you can?” Ariadne cocked an eyebrow at me.

  “I may push the speed limits a li’l bit when I drive,” I said. “Like the rest of you don’t.”

  “Yeah, you’re one of the people all right,” Augustus deadpanned. “Except for that goddess complex you’re carrying around with you.”

  “Point is, I’m not looking to start a blood feud with the US government,” I said. “So … like I said, I think I have things pretty much wrapped up here. I’m gonna make my report to Lieutenant Welch, tell him he’s worried over Captain Frost’s brain—which is to say, nothing—and then I’ll bail.” I leaned back in my chair and ran my hands over the smooth top of the hotel desk. “I might even make it back to Minnesota in time to get some fried cheese curds at the State Fair.”