“Some you can’t save,” she told him, and turned on the TV she’d rigged only for sound. Under Amy Avalon’s voice describing how Narc’s serum would freeze her power, she sat down on the chewed up ice cream carton the dog managed to sneak under her butt.
***
Whiskey flowed harsh and bitter down Mac’s throat, the taste doing nothing to smooth the tension in his shoulders. On the sixty-inch flat screen above the shiny bottles of the bar, Amy Avalon pushed a mic at his face.
On TV, he didn’t look like Narc. Not the same arrogant, confident hero, full of idealism and ready to take on the world. These days, he was another scowling asshole with icy eyes and a leftover rasp from a punch in the gut. The Hero of New York, would laugh his ass off.
The bar hadn’t changed. Same shiny brown leather, same badges unwinding after shift change. The framed picture of Narc shaking hands with the mayor had been replaced by a Support Harkor Family sign with a picture of a cop in full dress blues. Mac slipped a C-note into the manila envelope tucked under the frame, when he passed by.
“Tell our viewers more about the serum,” Avalon said. Mac leaned against the counter to feel the cold plastic of the vials. Maybe with enough whiskey down his throat, he’d find the strength to use the serum.
On the screen, the asshole version of him sneered. “You’re the reporter. Dig.”
“Good class tonight.” Wojo slid onto a stool beside him and lifted his hand to signal for a drink. Maybe instead of scouring the streets for Lana, Mac would stay indoors and get miserably drunk.
The vials dug into his armpit. “I didn’t deserve to wear a black belt.”
“My class, son. I decide who wears what belt.” He took a gulp of coffee the bartender slid toward him. “It’s good having you back. Kids need somebody to look up to.”
“I’m no hero.”
“So you say.”
Mac let that slide down his throat along with whiskey. “What happened to Lana when I left?”
“Is that why you’re back? You feeling guilty?”
Silence was as good an answer as any. He pictured her gold gaze, the way she stepped away from him in fear. On the flat screen above, Amy explained to San Mike viewers how the serum paralyzed the “super” enzymes in one’s blood.
Wojo made a cutting motion at the guy behind the bar in a request to lower the sound. Three years off the job and he was still acknowledged by the cops, from nodded greetings to heavy claps on those giant shoulders.
Most didn’t see regret behind the comfortable smile.
“She didn’t take medical well. Supposedly, she tried for a Crime Data cert., but I don’t know where that’s going. She got her black belt though.” The tone went from subdued to proud. “Kicked major ass during the test.”
On the screen above, Doc Williams spoke with quiet intensity about budget cuts and how his team remained professional despite the loss of colleagues.
“Damned budget cuts,” Wojo muttered in tandem with the other badges, and gulped down his coffee.
“How many surgeries has she had?”
“Fifth was the last one. There was talk of an experimental treatment…. She refused.”
“But she kept training.”
“Yeah.” Wojo’s wide face went bright with a fierce smile. “Couldn’t keep her away. God knows she overdid it, training too hard, pushing herself to prove she isn’t an invalid.” His voice turned thoughtful once again. “She blames herself. Not getting there in time to save her brother.”
Whiskey flowed sour in Mac’s belly, doing nothing to warm the ice inside his gut. “You trying to be subtle?”
“Not subtle, son. I’d yell, if it would help. It wasn’t your fault what happened. Not the fire, not Lana. You did your best.”
The next words burned his tongue. “She’s the Night Rook. She has my powers.”
“How is that possible?” No empty words or dismissive claps on his back to tell him the whole thing was his imagination. They sat at Pete’s Grill like they had when he was Mac Gamble, meeting his partner for a drink.
Damned if he hadn’t missed that.
“When I was fifteen, my father took me to Columbia. An easy job gone bad.” Memories welled up and were crushed back, the edges pocking through to cut him. “I hadn’t gotten my powers fully yet. My father sent his shields to me to protect me.”
Get out, son! He hadn’t been able to move, staring at all those gun barrels. The shove of power was a death jolt to his body, cutting off air, exploding in his lungs until he couldn’t breathe. Endless, mindless seconds, clawing for breath, trying to scream. The sting of bullets bouncing off his skin when he rose up above the guns, his father’s push a dying man’s gift of life.
He’d made his peace with the past. And still Mac took another shot of whiskey.
“Guess that explains why you’re Narc.”
He’d missed the simple way Wojo picked up what hadn’t been said.
Above the shine of bottles, Avalon plugged her mic at people on the street, the ticker tape dutifully transcribing their conversation. How do you feel having Narc back? How do you feel about vigilantes?
“Still doesn’t explain why you think Rook is Lana.”
“I couldn’t get to her in time.” She hadn’t been able to breathe, gasping for air, small fists beating against her chest. He thought the violent reaction had been shock, her breath knocked out when she was hurled to the ground. “I must have given her my powers. Same as my father did to me when he died.”
“I heard it only happens to those like you.” Hard clear gaze, a PC way of saying “no shit.”
“Some are born having powers. Some are born with the carrier gene, capable of holding the infusion. I never saw a case where it lasted long, but….” No need to finish that sentence. The screen version of Mac Gamble sneered at the camera with bloodshot eyes.
“But Nick, her parents….”
“She was adopted.”
“Doesn’t prove a thing.”
“She’s all but admitted it. A cop who can’t see, damnit. Can’t do her job, can’t be out on the street. You said yourself, the Night Rook keeps drugs out of schools, tries to protect kids. What would you do if you had power?”
“When they retired my ass, I thought about it. With or without powers.” Wojo sampled a thoughtful sip of coffee. “How many cops were laid off? A lot of them are still patrolling. No gun, no badge, but they still do the job.”
“Or some use it as an excuse to beat up people.”
Wojo glanced at the screen. “You don’t need powers for that.”
The ticker tape on the screen flashed something about repeated sightings of the Night Rook two blocks from downtown. Mac couldn’t help but note that the sun recently set.
“You really going to shoot her up with poison?”
More guilt, more bile. He was damned tired of apologizing. “If she’s the Night Rook, yes.”
A grimace stretched Wojo’s wide features. “And you’re gonna do it how? If she isn’t the Rook, if it’s some psycho, you’ll get your ass kicked. Or worse, shot.”
His jaw set tight, Mac stood up. “I made a promise.”
“Fine. You keep it.” Wojo slapped down a twenty and hunched over the bar, his huge frame looking weary. “But I bet your old man didn’t save your life for you to waste it shooting up.”
Chapter Five
The taste of rage was that of bitter fire. And the reflection of her power shone out of Mendoza’s eyes while he fought for breath.
His shoes dangled above glistening mud, his throat convulsing under her forefinger and thumb where she held him. Fury gave her enough power to hold herself and Mendoza a good foot above ground.
“I swear, I don’t know nothing!” Terror and spit flew out of his mouth, his voice filling her with slick, nauseated disgust.
She wanted to throw away the helmet, crush his throat, and watch him choke on his own blood. “Nicky Rossini. Narco cop. Remember?” Rage drove her higher, hanging three
feet above ground. No paved roads here in the slums. “You snitched for him. You arranged for the meet up at the harbor.”
It had been buried in a report, a small line she found after digging through mountains of data.
“Nicky Rossini? Jesus, who remembers three years ago….”
“You backed out that night. He was set up, and you knew it.” Her altered voice came out hollow from her helmet. Not bothering with a light shield this time, she used newfound power to propel her up, the one unbroken streetlamp below not hampering her vision. The city didn’t have the budget for maintaining eastside slums.
“I swear I didn’t know. I had something. I called him….”
She let the power have its way, tightening her hold over his throat and almost reveling in his struggle for air.
“He wasn’t the only one I snitched for!” Clawing her arms, Mendoza fought for breath while someone wept in her head, a voice she usually kept buried.
Common sense had the Night Rook loosening her fingers enough to allow Mendoza suck in air.
“No one’s running to help you, Pavlic.” She let him wail and drew him higher above ground, lava-fueled power surging through her veins.
The alley, dotted with broken streetlamps, curved under Mendoza’s feet, neglected walls a canvas for graffiti. Thin branches of a struggling tree some Good Samaritan had planted, reached up to scratch her boots.
“All right, all right. Sure, I remember. God, let me breathe.” His fingers clenched over her elbow, right where he’d cut her two days ago. No pain. Another time, she might have been concerned.
“Narco cop, spoke some Russian. Right?”
“You said to meet him at the harbor.” A flash of Nicky’s face made her float closer to the ground. The Night Rook struggled against memories, against the helpless rage of loss. Fury was better. Fury burned away all other emotions lodged inside her throat. “A cop had you back out. Who. Was. It.?” Clenched fingers, fury edged in black.
“No one!”
Mendoza croaked the words with painful rasps of breath. She had to consciously loosen her hand before she passed the line she couldn’t uncross. The burn inside her palms wouldn’t stop, flaying her skin, whipping at her with rage and bloodlust.
For a furious moment, Mac’s face coalesced in rage, his mouth flat with disappointment, his eyes dark, flat. Empty.
“They told me shit was going down. I did like I was told and stayed away.”
“Give me a name.”
“He’ll kill me.”
Above the glistening mud, the Night Rook shook him until his teeth rattled, until those blown-out pupils crossed with fright. “I’ll kill you first.”
No one is innocent.
“Who told you to stay out of the harbor?”
Nothing but wheezing. She had to force herself to keep from shaking him again.
Mendoza clamped down on her arm, his mouth wet with spit and tears.
“Who told you something was going down?”
“Williams! Okay? Doc Williams himself. He called me up, see? The head narco man. You heard of him, right?”
With a shuddering breath, cold waves of grease rammed into Lana’s belly. His own man…. Possible? Proof…. Proof meant nothing.
In a small corner of her mind, Mac’s green gaze clouded with cold reproach.
“He said they got it. They just needed to talk. Then, after, he said to stay quiet, there was plenty of money to be made. News said Rossini opened fire first.” Mendoza twisted in her grip like a caught fish in bitter wind. “You thinking different, you gotta ask the man.”
He wouldn’t die if she opened her hand and let him flail six feet down to the ground.
“You killed him.” The words came out so deep, the modulator barely picked up the sound. “Williams set it up, but you led him to his death.”
“I just told you, I laid low! What’s it to you? Who gives a shit about a cop from three years ago? Look, you and I, we can make a deal here….”
She threw him to the ground, reeling in satisfaction when he sank into the mud. “Ever been in a fire?” She remembered the smoke, screaming Nick’s name and knowing, knowing, he didn’t hear. “It’s like somebody’s choking you. You don’t see anything, and no one’s there. But you can’t breathe.”
Panting, Mendoza crawled, hands and feet digging into the wet ground, his face dripping with sweat and tears. Power, vicious as a cobra’s whip, coiled around his neck, his gasps for air a brutal roar. The Night Rook stood still over that big flailing body and contemplated choking him to death.
She could control the power. The finest tendrils, the hardest waves. She could send heat out to destroy, or wrap the lava around herself in an impenetrable shield. The brilliant darkness bloomed and hummed, the sound overpowering a voice telling her something.
You have to stop.
From a lone, struggling bush, a noise broke through the song of rage. The kid who’d sold her sunglasses stared at her in quiet, horrified wonder while Mendoza gasped three feet away.
“Let him go.” That young scared voice was barely a whisper. She glanced down to see trembling hands clenched into tiny fists. The shiner still lit up his face, the dark misshapen circle enhanced by a glimmer of tears.
“That asshole hit you.”
At her feet, Mendoza wrapped his hands around his knees and rocked back and forth, muttering what sounded like prayers.
“I thought you were a hero.”
The sharp lance of that word drove her to her knees. Power ebbed in her veins, the last remnants leaving her fingers to disappear in the ground.
“I’m no hero, kid.” A cold space squeezed her heart.
“I thought you were like Narc.” The thin voice shook with his hands, a gleaming knife clutched between dirty fingers.
With soft whimpers, Mendoza crawled farther away.
“Put your blade away.” Power, dark and delicious, became too large, too bright. Satisfaction surged and ebbed. Disgust lashing her blood, the Night Rook ran through the shadows, along the curves of the dirt road with shame burning her stinging eyesight. She sprinted until she couldn’t run anymore, helpless against the burn of tears. Doubling over, she fought with the straps of her helmet, fighting against the urge to gag. She would have retched had there been anything in her heaving belly.
Regret was nothing. Shame didn’t mean a single thing. I thought you were like Narc.
She didn’t move when his shadow cut across her.
“I won’t fight you.” He’d a needle in her vein to freeze this thing inside her. A small part of her was glad to cool the burn.
“You hurt someone.”
“Yes.” It didn’t bring back Nicky. “Don’t come closer. Not yet.”
He moved in front of her, his tall form outlined by distant lights, his body huge in the cold darkness. Behind the helmet, she could make out his features, the taut clench of his chin, the hard lips that held little mercy. Nothing in that cold narrowed gaze.
“Don’t. Don’t come any closer. I can’t control it.” Power rose up in hungry coils of a snake. “I can’t stand if it hurts you.”
His hands loose at his sides, Mac took another step and Lana had no control over the sudden flare of her shields.
“Please, just stay back.” She held up a gloved hand and prayed she wouldn’t hurt him.
“It doesn’t control you, Lana.”
Mist dragged its clammy nails over her flaming face. “Inject me. I won’t fight.” With shaking hands, she grabbed hold of her zipper, drawing the metal tab down to expose her neck. Cool air caressed her fevered skin, the gentle touch of the grim reaper. “Do it.”
“You know I can’t. Not like this.” His voice lashed over her in a mocking caress.
“Then take it back.” The wind wept at the words. “I don’t want it. I don’t want what it makes me. Take it back.”
His shadow grew, his heat and essence coming closer. “You know I can’t.”
“Just take it back.” Lava blazed
through her hands and filled the space between them. White sparks seared her vision when Mac staggered and gasped.
He fought for air and found only heat. Heat and white pressure, scalding lava fighting for space inside his lungs, a sucker punch of pure unfiltered power. Agony blazed through his veins and he fell to his knees, hands pressed against his chest as if to pry open his ribs and break the heart inside. Over the roar of his own pulse, Lana screamed out his name.
Mist slapped his cheeks, the swell of pressure twisting him from the inside. Gloved hands supported his head when he toppled, unable to move, or breathe. Her lips closed over his, sweet strawberries pushing air past the bitter knot of pain, into lungs being crushed by an invisible, familiar fist.
Kneeling, curls sparkling with mist, she pumped his chest in sharp and rhythmic motions. “Mac? Please, God. Please. Come on.”
He would’ve smiled if he had the strength. He would’ve told her he was fine, except he had no air to speak with. Power pushed through in jagged waves, so sharp, so hot he didn’t know how he could ever ice his veins again. He would’ve closed his eyes and drowned if not for her soft mouth pumping air into his starving chest.
“Come on, come on.” He muttered those same words although he couldn’t remember where. Strong hands pushed down on his ribs, one pump, two, three, until the world rushed back in a vicious onslaught of color.
“God. Mac?”
A nod was all that he could manage. He didn’t trust himself to speak, not when heat flowed through his veins, forbidden, potent. Bright.
“I’m okay.” What had been normal seemed dull and lifeless. The night pulsed with strength, and he hated this heat as much as he had missed it.
Lana knelt over him, a wayward curl trailing over his cheek. “Thank God. What happened?” Soft words, her hands touching his chest, awareness of her ten times intensified with the power inside him.
Sun-colored curls bright in the night. Tiny flecks of black in her eyes, deep within the amber. Soft, pink lips, and though they had touched his a second ago, he was starved for a taste.
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