“ARE YOU KIDDING ME?” Scott bellowed.
Kat for her part, just kept staring, trying to feel the look on her face, and knowing that however it looked, it wasn’t composed, it wasn’t produced, it wasn’t stage-managed. It was the horror of knowing that someone out there wanted to kill her, truly and immediately—and that the only person who might be able to stop them was someone who probably never wanted to so much as hear from her ever again.
6.
Sienna
Minneapolis
I breezed back in through the back exit of the restaurant, my hair a FEMA-certified disaster area, smoothing my dress as I went. I was a little fuzzy on how long I’d been gone. I mean, I’d flown straight to Milwaukee at supersonic speed, but I’d had to stop and retrieve my dress the first time it blew off, then I’d had to find the captain, which basically entailed pissing off airport security by overflying their security checkpoints and finding someone dressed like a pilot, then I had to zoom up to find the actual plane—that one was easy, it was the one circling the airport, looking like a drunken monkey was at the helm. Then I had to get on board, yadda yadda yadda, and then I got drunk with that really cool flight attendant.
Now, however many minutes later, I was staggering back into the rear door of one of the classiest seafood places in Minneapolis, walking unsteadily on my flats, which I’d conveniently left just outside the exit (who needs shoes when they’re flying?), and I found Wendy just about where I’d left her at the bar.
“Hey,” I chirruped, a little sing-songy.
“Oh,” Wendy said, eyes widening, “you came back. Wow.”
“Yeah,” I said, motioning to Branch or whatever his name was behind the bar. “I need another.”
“Are you sure?” he asked, looking me over. “You, uh … don’t look, uh …”
“She’ll have another,” Wendy said smoothly, saving the bartender from a drunken punch to the face. “Your date’s, uhm … still here.”
“Really?” I giggled. “I’m so surprised. Why?”
“I don’t know,” she said with a little amusement, “I’ve been kind of … avoiding him. I expect that’ll affect my tip, but I’m finding it really, really hard to care.”
“God, I’m starving,” I said, straightening my dress—probably futilely—for about the ten thousandth time. It flew off again on the way back to Minneapolis, did you know that? And one of the straps was torn, so my bra was showing. The first person who designed a clothing line for unplanned supersonic flight was going to get all my clothing-budget dollars, I can tell you that. I could talk to NASA about it, maybe. “You think Dick will still buy me dinner?”
Wendy turned and I followed her gaze to where Dick-o was still sitting, his back to the bar, an empty glass in front of him. “Only one way to find out.”
“Ugh, that involves going over and talking to him, doesn’t it?” Bartender boy set another glass next to me on the bar. “Bottoms up, ladies.” I raised it to Wendy and then—Blanchard! His name was Blanchard! Yes! I toasted them and drained it to the bottom of the martini glass. “Liquid courage.” I stumbled toward Dick and his table in the middle of the damned restaurant, the showy bastard.
Dick’s eyes widened when he caught sight of me, which was just about when I rounded the last turn and parked my ass in the chair. Wendy had to catch me, scooting it in behind me like the old-fashioned gentleman my date clearly was not. I was just about drunk enough to start calling him Dick-less—and to his face, no less. “I am so hungry,” I pronounced, not lying at all.
“You were in the bathroom for a long time,” Dick-less said, horrorstruck, his eyes fixed on my hair. “And … what happened to your—”
“Listen, your personality is really working against you, here,” I said to him, nodding at Wendy as she withdrew to the side of the table with her pad in hand. “So why don’t you just shut up and order?”
“I don’t have to deal with this,” Dick-less said, warranting the removal of the ‘less’ from my official name for him. “You know I turned down dates with three other women to be here tonight with you.” He stood up. “You look different than your profile picture, you know. It’s like a lie.”
I winked at him. “That’s all right. Your profile didn’t say you were a complete and utter prick, so I feel like we’re even.”
He froze, spine straight, face twisted. “What did you just say to me?”
“I said you’re a dick, Dick.” I glanced at Wendy. “I want a Halibut steak. Those are big, right?” She nodded uncomfortably, clearly not super enthused about being caught in the middle of our little spat. I looked back at Dick. “You gonna order, or am I eating by myself? Not that I’d complain at this point.” His lips moved in outrage, trying to form words but coming up blank. “Try, ‘Well, I never!’” I suggested helpfully.
“Well, I never—” he said, getting some traction finally. “No one has ever spoken to me in such a way—”
“Your mom should have when you were a little Dick, maybe you wouldn’t be such a big Dick now.”
His eyes flared at that and he scooped up his coat, knocking his chair over in the process as he sped toward the exit without looking back.
I glanced at Wendy and shrugged. “Something I said?”
“I’ll get your order in right away if you still want it,” Wendy said, the corner of her mouth twisting up.
“Hell yeah, I still want it,” I said, “I just flew to Milwaukee and back, did you know that?” She nodded, looking a little blank or surprised or something. “It takes a lot out of me.” I gestured at my broken shoulder strap. “You see this shit I have to deal with?” I motioned at Dick’s empty chair. “And that.”
“I’ll get your order in right away,” Wendy said, stopping to pick up the chair. “This one kinda makes you want to just give up on the species, doesn’t it?”
“Best date I’ve had in months,” I said as a buzzing came from somewhere under the table. My phone! I fished for it, apparently lying on the ground where I’d left it. I looked at the lit-up nameplate and my heart sank.
“Wendy,” I said, catching her as she started to walk away, jerking her head back around. “I need another drink. Maybe two.” She nodded, and I slid the screen to answer. “Hey, Scott …” I said, as gently as I could.
But what I was thinking was much along the same lines as Wendy’s thought: Men …
7.
Karl Nash
Karl walked in the darkness, ignoring the quiet sounds, the rumbling in the distance. He passed through walls on his way to his destination as easily as if they were not there. He could see well enough to move along, his footsteps echoing in the quiet. Being alone in the dark didn’t bother him anymore. Once, it had been the worst thing he could imagine, but the trial he’d been through had sorted that out for him quicker than anything else he could have imagined.
He listened for a moment and heard a rattling, shaking noise in the distance. He smiled. It was a more pleasant noise than stark silence, reassuring in its way. He could smell the mustiness of still, uncirculated air, and he pressed on through it, stirring for the first time in probably quite a while.
He recognized his destination by the sight of the spray paint on the concrete wall. It was almost hidden next to long-ago water runoff stains, tingeing the white concrete a darker shade. Karl ran his fingers over the wall, felt the imperfections of the pour, the rough edge of it. He ran fingers through the knotted hair of his red beard and let out a long putrid breath.
“I saw what you did.” The voice of his benefactor came out of the darkness behind him. Karl didn’t whirl to face him; he was used to this by now. His backer liked playing the man of mystery. Karl just kept his hand on the wall, as though he could draw some strength from it. “It was note perfect, just what we discussed.”
“It was … fun,” Karl said, remembering the sight of the bodyguards keeling over after he’d thrust his hand into their chests. It had been an easy thing, slipping in insubstantial and ripping th
eir heart muscles out as he withdrew his fingers in solid form. He’d discovered his ability when he was a teenager, a thin, bullied young boy who couldn’t find a friend with both hands and a flashlight. But once he’d found his power—found it and learned to use it—well, he’d had no shortage of friends.
Including the ones that got him into the trouble he’d had earlier this year.
“Well, I’m glad you had some fun,” his backer said in a smooth voice, staying in the shadows. “No reason not to, after all. It’s revenge; if it wasn’t satisfying, what would be the point?”
“To show the world,” Karl said, voice hard, anger welling up from within him. “To let the world see them for what they are—exploiters, plunderers of human capital.”
“Well, of course they are,” his backer said. “This is LA. That’s what’s done here.”
“They just use people up and leave ’em in wreckage,” Karl said, rubbing his hand against the concrete. “Don’t even care what happens to them after.”
“Cheaper to find a new someone to replace them,” his backer agreed. “I think you did a fine job of making the promise, though. It’ll give them some time to think before you come in and finish the job. Everything’s running smooth in that direction, too—”
“Good,” Karl said, pushing off the wall. He liked the sensation so much, he put his hand back on the concrete and pushed off again. The sense of resistance, of the firmness, of solid ground, immovable, was reassuring to him in a way that few things were anymore.
He wanted to take that sense away from Katrina Forrest. He wanted the world to see him do it, wanted to watch her scream and die while the entirety of the globe had their horrified eyes fixed, staring, on it, unable to look away.
Maybe then they’d see what she was—what all of them were.
And then, maybe finally, things would change. And even if they didn’t … they’d certainly never forget him.
8.
Sienna
He couldn’t be serious. That was the overriding thought bouncing around in my drunken mind as I came in for a landing on my back lawn. I could tell I was still slightly hammered because I ended up landing in a stagger-step and almost diving headfirst into the leafless bushes that Ariadne had planted a couple months ago to spruce up the backyard. Admittedly, before that, it had maybe been just a tad, uhm … overgrown.
Hey, I’ve got more important things on my mind than landscaping for a house I wasn’t even living in until two months ago.
I fumbled for my keys, searching my dress for pockets that weren’t there before I broke out into an uncontrollable case of the giggles and remembered I’d left them behind. I knocked on the back door, thumping as lightly as I was capable of. The danger of meta strength was that sometimes you had replace even a steel door.
“Coming!” Ariadne’s muffled voice came from somewhere inside. She unlocked the door and opened it a moment later, greeting me with a smile that told me that my cheeks were probably flushed with what looked like triumph but was actually booze. “How did it go?”
“Oh, yeah,” I said, remembering why I’d originally gone out in the first place. “It went well.”
“Really?” Ariadne wasn’t the sort to get excited enough to clap her hands together, but she nodded, which was like her stoic, Nordic version of that.
“Oh, yeah, it went great,” I said, trying to decide when to drop the boom on her about how the actual date went versus the other parts, where I saved a plane and got hammered in two entirely different cities. “How did your night go?”
The first sign of clouds rolled in on her face. “It didn’t go great, did it?”
“Why, have you been watching the news?”
She frowned. “No. Why? What did you do?”
“Oh, nothing.”
“Sienna …”
“I had to bail in the middle of the date to save a commuter flight. No big deal, okay?”
You could see the air just rush out of her like a balloon losing air. “This was supposed to be your night,” she said, following me as I wandered through the kitchen as I took off my earring. One earring. Must have lost the other somewhere over Wisconsin. Enjoy that $0.37 boon when you find it in a pile of cow shit, dairy farmer.
“It turned out that my date was an asshole, but I partied with a flight attendant and my server at the restaurant, so it’s all good,” I said. “Also,” I paused before dropping a bomb, “Scott called.”
That stopped her in her tracks. Well, that or the counter, which she ran into with her left hip when she turned to look at me with eyes wide enough I could have shoved a saucer in her sockets. But I wouldn’t do that because I don’t have very many good dishes. “What?”
“Yeah, apparently Kat got attacked out in LA today,” I said, suddenly beset by another inexplicable case of the giggles.
“Why would Scott call you about that?” Ariadne asked, rubbing herself where she’d slammed into the counter.
“I guess he was there or something? I dunno.” My head was swaying gently under the effects of alcohol. Oh, Al Cohol, you should have been my only date tonight. I love you, Al. “I lost interest after hearing that Kat wanted me to come to the coast and defend her honor or something—”
“Wait, she wants your help?” Ariadne’s frown became a full-blown dark hurricane on her face.
“I know, right?” I asked with some verve as I curled up in a ball on the couch. It just felt right. “Like … why would she call me after that last crap bomb she splattered me with?”
Ariadne’s face darkened even further. I’d honestly expected a slightly more forgiving track from her; she’d always gotten on well with Kat, even though I hadn’t. I think that last thing, though, where Kat had called me after the prison break incident and recorded our forty-minute phone call in which I talked about my feelings (I was exhausted, okay?) and got it shaved down to a two-minute exchange for her reality TV show that made me look like a psychopath, had probably been the straw that cracked even Ariadne’s strong back. “Well, in fairness, she had Scott call you on her behalf, so …”
“Yeah, that was pretty chickenshit,” I said, resting my chin on my bare knees. I tried to pull my dress up to cover them, but it was trapped under my butt. “Such a Kat thing to do.”
“I wouldn’t say Kat is chicken, exactly,” Ariadne said, picking her way around the coffee table in the middle of the room to sit down in the chair to my left. “She’s been in battle with you on more than a few occasions, and she never showed a sign of cowardice.”
“Umm, except for that time she betrayed us,” I said.
“There were other factors at work there. Janus and—”
“Ughhhhhh,” I said, feeling nauseous and wondering if it was the drink or the thought of Kat and Janus that did it.
“So what are you going to do?” Ariadne asked.
“Probably puke my guts out if this nausea isn’t a temporary effect of thinking about Janus and Kat—”
“About Kat, I mean,” Ariadne said.
“Ummm …” Was this a trick question? “Watch her dangle helplessly, hoisted on her own justly deserved petard?”
“That’s malignantly gleeful,” Ariadne said, and I could tell she was judging me. Some from the tone, some from the look she was giving me. “I thought you were trying not to be like that anymore.”
“I’m trying not to kill people as much,” I said, squeezing my eyes closed as if I could shut this whole uncomfortable situation out and make it go away. “I make no promises about letting people who have screwed me over come to their own unfortunate, mostly natural ends.”
“What if she dies?” Ariadne asked.
What if she dies? Aleksandr Gavrikov asked in my head, totes raining on my damned parade.
“That’d be a real shame, and I’ll send a lovely bouquet of flowers to the funeral—”
“Sienna,” Ariadne said, her head slumping back, her patience clearly at an end.
“A fruit basket would be more appropriate, you
think?”
“Sienna!”
“Ariadne, she’s not exactly the wind beneath my wings—more like the knife between my ribs,” I said. “She made me look like shit in front of the whole world. I mean, it wasn’t enough that Ma Clary and her merry band of assholes were trying to destroy me and then kill me—they got aided and abetted by someone who pretended to be a friend.” This was all true. In fact, my reputation out in the world at large was such that I got spit on in public sometimes. True story.
At least, it happened once. I think word might have gotten out about what happened to that guy, though; he was still being fed through a tube according to the last court papers I got served with. I maintain that it was a real shame that he resisted arrest after that, but hey, what are you going to do? Spitting on officers of the law is a bad idea in addition to being illegal. Spitting on an officer of the law who can hit like a freight train feels like bad judgment on the level of trying to have a boxing match with a nuclear missile. The destruction is assured, but not mutual.
Wait. I guess that would be mutual, since the missile would blow up … shit. Whatever, I’m drunk, and my metaphors are like gifts from Bacchus, okay? Shove your literal-minded disapproval.
“What if she dies?” Ariadne asked again, and this time I had no defense. “What if Scott dies, since he’s there with her—”
Ugh. That was a valid point. I mean, Scott Byerly was a guy who had come to my aid thrice recently in spite of officially cutting ties with our agency years ago. He’d been the one who asked for my help, not Kat—
Oh, Klementina, Gavrikov whispered in my mind.
“Oh, shut up about your stupid sister, Gavrikov,” I said, letting it spill out of my head. “I’ll save her, all right?”
“Really?” Ariadne asked. She was used to me talking to the voices in my head by now, and brushed it off like a champ, though I’m sure it looked weird to people outside my head.
“Why not?” I asked, shrugging my shoulders. “Reed and Augustus are still off in—what, Texas or something?”
Out of the Box 7 - Sea Change Page 4