by Lan Chan
My eyes narrowed. “What’s it to you?”
“As you said, I have no alphas at my immediate disposal. The ones worth anything have been snapped up by your Hyper Division and the others belong to my fellow Kings.”
“Maybe if you weren’t such an asshole, people would want to work for you.”
“I could do a lot with an alpha-level Siphon. That kind of strength isn’t easy to come by.”
“What does that have anything to do with me?” If he wanted to recruit Ryan, I couldn’t stop him.
“Somehow I doubt the boy will want to be one of mine if he knows of our little feud.”
“Seriously, why don’t you just kill me then?”
“Why do you continue to do a puzzle that won’t yield its answers? Whatever you have going on in there—” he pointed a finger at my forehead, “—is immensely interesting. What good will you be if you’re dead? Not until I find out what makes Spectra tick.”
“Not if I get to you first.”
His laughter behind the voice modifier was too eerie. “You can try. For now, I have a little time. Callum will take the child’s memories. All of them. Including any ones to do with you. And you cut off your association to her brother. Severed completely. No one else can know the reason why you’ve cut ties to him. Speak of it to anyone and she dies. Those are my terms.”
“He won’t believe anything I say.”
“Make him. Choose.”
Outside, the screech of tyres could be heard. Callum brought his hand up to Abigail’s temple. There was only one choice even if it ripped me in two. “Fine. I agree to your terms.”
Through the fog of Callum’s suppression, Abigail’s lips quivered. The wipe took an instant, Callum being a Reader and all. She passed out when he was done and he laid her down gently on the ground. Tears swam in my eyes as I watched her chest rise and fall. She was alive. That was all that mattered. The rest…I would deal with all of that later.
When I turned around, the room was empty. The Shadowman was long gone. How he managed to evade the incoming troops was beyond me.
Ten seconds later, the doors banged open and Zeke came running in. He skidded to a stop in front of me. The next thing I knew, I was in his arms. A part of me really thought I would hold it together, but when I saw Ryan lifting Abigail, I buried my head in Zeke’s chest and bawled like a baby.
42
There were people everywhere. Zeke carried me outside past Jon Carra, a whole squad of agents, and three ambulances. One of the paramedics tried to get to me, but Bianca made him change his mind. Oz and Adam stood stony-faced aside one of our Hyper critical response vans parked on the edge of the lot. Their telepathy brushed lightly against my mind. I tried to transmit a sense of calm I was hardly feeling but it seemed to appease them slightly. Zeke laid me down on the bed inside the back of the van.
Out the window, I could finally see where I’d been taken. It was one of the Psi-Ops decommissioned bomb shelters an hour away from their hospital.
“This is not good,” Lily said from inside the van when she saw me. Immediately she attached another IV to my arm and started plying me with nutrients.
“You okay?” I asked her. “Last time I saw you, you were playing possum.”
“They shot me with a tranquiliser. It wasn’t very bright. We were able to trace the make of the dart to some pre-Reset weapons the Psi-Ops own. It would have been better if they’d just shot me with a gun.”
For some reason, speaking so clinically about her assault made me feel better. It never occurred to me how quickly I’d become accustomed to their presence and had learned to measure my reactions against theirs. If she was hysterical, I might have had an actual breakdown.
Lily pushed a chocolate bar in my face. My hand touched her gloved one and she shivered slightly but didn’t cry out. Progress.
I’d just taken a bite of chocolatey-peanut goodness when Ryan’s probe tried to search me out.
Zeke, I thought. Abigail has a bottle of Second Sight in her pocket. She’s not going to remember, but she needs to hang on to it. It’s…the nanobots allow her to use her legs for a short period. Don’t let them take it away from her.
He nodded. I’ll see what I can do.
And Zeke…Could you please keep Ryan away from me for now?
That got his attention, though he didn’t need to ask what happened. Everything was there in the vital link in my mind. He disappeared to do as I asked.
“Lil. Can I sleep?”
“Not just yet.” Rich crawled into the small space, and for some reason I automatically lifted my arm. It didn’t even occur to me until he was clutching my hand in both of his that this was strange for us. We’d never had that kind of casual relationship.
“They’re asking questions,” he said. I opened my mouth but he shook his head at me. “The minister is cutting them off. We’re clear to take you back home. But he wants to see you when you’re feeling better.”
“If I ever feel better. Everything really hurts.”
“It should hurt,” Lily said. “You’ve lost a lot of blood.”
“Yeah, thanks for mentioning it.”
“You’re welcome.”
Good Lord.
“Ready to go?” Adam asked as he slid into the driver’s seat.
“Gladly.”
That was the last thing I remembered before Lily turned the dial on my IV and my eyes closed blissfully.
One of the worst parts about having a lightning recovery time was that the period of sympathy lasted about two seconds. A week later, I was getting side-eye from Adam as I sat on the couch in the entertainment room watching reruns of a soap opera Bianca and I were obsessed with.
“Don’t pretend you’re not fully recovered,” Adam said. “I can’t listen to another second of that woman’s voice.”
“That woman happens to be the Don’s wife, and she’s just found out about his mistress. Things are going down.”
His fingers held steady on the piano keys. The piece he’d been practicing was completely forgotten. “What happened to you? You used to be cool.”
“It’s not my fault you’ve got no idea what good entertainment is. If you don’t like it, why don’t you go do something else?”
He snorted. “Believe me, being out on the streets being spat at by drunks is better than having to watch yet another episode of this show. But you’re not allowed to be left alone.” He paused and I felt his mind whir before he spoke again. “It’s interesting that before you were taken, you’d have cut off your own arm before you allowed yourself to be babysat. Yet Rich suggests round-the-clock supervision and you don’t blink an eye.”
I watched him carefully. He was too observant for his own good sometimes. That was what insomnia did to people. It made them see conspiracies where there weren’t any. Or in this case, it made them see too much of what was right in front of them.
“What’s your point?” I asked.
“Nothing. Except that the only person we’ve had to block from coming to see you is Ryan. And strangely enough, it’s always Zeke who’s around when he comes knocking.”
I shrugged, hoping it was more nonchalant than the clamouring in my mind. “Just a coincidence.”
“If you say so.”
I didn’t say anything. Thankfully, the heavy silence was pierced by the sound of the telephone ringing. As much as he liked to bitch, Adam got up to take it. He talked a big game but I was better off under his care than any of the others. Oz was too intense, watching me like a hawk. Zeke tried to wrap me in cotton wool, and because he knew the truth about Ryan, he tip-toed around me like I was a bomb about to explode. Sometimes I was. Today was a slightly better day.
“Will.” Adam came back into the room with the cordless phone. “Rich got a call from Jon Carra’s office. He wants to speak to you tomorrow.”
“Yeah, okay. I don’t suppose I can’t put it off forever.”
True to his word, the minister had kept the Psi-Ops off my scent. Even thou
gh I’d been abducted before he could implement his plan, the outcome had pretty much been the same. Senator Collins was in Psi-Ops custody and Izzy Collins, his other daughter, had been found dead in the bomb shelter. The Shadowman had covered all his bases because she was found with a gunshot wound that had obliterated most of her brain tissue.
Given what had happened, Oz had received permission to read the Senator. The verdict was unpalatable to say the least. After Ballarat, Claudia’s people had caught Jasmine with my blood on her person. While she couldn’t replicate it, Jasmine was a perfect vessel for it. Knowing the senator would do anything for Izzy, Claudia had approached him to help her distribute the drug to take down the other Kings. In return, he would get to flush me out of hiding so that I could be sacrificed to save his daughter’s life. Nice. With leaders like that, it was no wonder the city was in chaos.
At ten in the morning the next day, I stepped into Rich’s office in my full Hyper uniform. The starchiness of the shirt and neatly pressed pants chafed my skin. It was the first time in a week that I’d put on anything besides pyjamas and a robe. The dream had to die some time.
Rich sat behind his desk looking much more comfortable in his dress uniform than I did in mine. The minister sat opposite him. Jon stood when I entered. His brown eyes crinkled around the edges when he saw that I was pretty much recovered. Physically, anyway.
He held out a hand for me to shake. “You’re looking very well.”
“I know. Freaky, isn’t it?”
“That’s putting it mildly.”
He waved at the seat next to him. “Do you mind if we discuss what happened to you in the shelter?” Normally I would appreciate his candour, but talking about any of this made a lump form in my chest.
I cast a quick glance at Rich who nodded at me. The brief thawing in our relationship didn’t last. Whatever delusion I was in that made me reach for him dissipated when I woke up from my long sleep. We were back to dancing cautiously around each other.
“Firstly, I’d like to assure you I’m not here to arrest you or bring you in for R&D. It’s been made abundantly clear to me that if you come to any harm during or after my visit, there will be dire consequences.”
“Oh God,” I said. “Zeke can get a bit overzealous.”
The minister smiled. “If only it was just him. You know, I’ve known Oscar since he was a toddler, and the fact that he can crush my mind with barely a thought has never come up until now.”
I didn’t know what to say.
“They really care about you,” he said.
“I know. I tend to get myself into sticky situations a lot. I think they’re worried I’m going to take half the city with me when it happens.”
“It is a slight concern. Jenny won’t go into specifics with me but this…condition of yours. Have you always had it?”
Unsure where to begin, I turned to Rich for guidance. He shrugged. “It’s your secret. You choose how much you want to tell him.”
“What if I don’t want to tell him anything?”
“Then I’m afraid you’re probably going to need a lawyer,” Jon said.
I turned on him. “I thought you said you weren’t here to take me away.”
“And I’m not. But I have a responsibility to the people of the city. It’s my job to keep them safe and, well, to put it mildly, you’re not safe.”
“Neither is any esper.”
“True. But other espers are containable to an extent. We have alphas and anti-psi technology to put down a rogue esper. We’ve never seen anyone like you before. I don’t know if I really even comprehend what’s happened. There were scorch marks on every surface inside the shelter—”
“That wasn’t me. Okay, some of it was me. But the rest was Izzy Collins.”
“About that. At least tell me what the difference is between you.”
I looked into his dark brown eyes and wanted to believe he wouldn’t betray me. If for nothing else than the fact Aunt Jenny seemed to really like him. But if I opened my big mouth today, I’d never be able to hide again. Any time something happened, they would come after me with their suspicions. Call me selfish or stubborn but I wasn’t ready for that yet. Heck, I enjoyed not being in trouble for once. So I fudged the truth a little. Just enough so that it would make things clearer for him but not enough so that he would freak out more than he already had.
I left out the parts about the Shadowman completely. My bargain was clear and I wouldn’t go into that with anyone for anything. When I first woke up after the incident, my first order of business was to try and sever the vital link between Abigail and me.
Unfortunately, there were no take backs. Callum had done a good job of erasing me from Abigail’s memory, but the link confused her. So I had to block her access to it and to my mind by erecting a shield between us. I would never be able to cut her out completely, but I made it so the link was always in her mental blind spot. It was easier this way. And as long as the link was there, I hoped she’d be able to take the Second Sight when she needed it so that she could walk again.
When I was done, Jon blinked at me. “It’s a fantastic story. Why do I get the feeling there are pieces you’re leaving out?”
“Because there are pieces I’m leaving out. Everyone is safer that way.”
“You’re sure you can control your telepathy?”
“I’ve never had a problem before.”
“What if you lose your temper?”
Rich smirked. “She loses her temper all the time and we haven’t had a critical situation yet.”
“We could help you if only you’d allow us.” The minister stroked his moustache. Not in a creepy supervillain way. More in a stressed, contemplative way. Like he really wanted to issue me an order but he couldn’t, so he was trying his darndest to figure out another route. He was a politician, after all.
“I think the Psi-Ops have helped me enough. You’re sure there aren’t any records involving me?”
“They’ve been erased. You are persona non grata as far as the Unit is concerned. It’s just – ”
“I’m getting the help that I need right here. I’d rather Lily poke around inside me than anyone else.”
“But she’s a child.”
“I trust her motivations. I’m not sure I could say that about anyone else.”
He sighed. “It’s asking a lot to request that I turn a blind eye. It’s highly irresponsible to allow an individual such as yourself to roam free in the city.”
I couldn’t help but laugh at his statement. “I think you and I have very different definitions of free. I get to go to school, work, and on patrol. The rest of the time I’m stuck here. My only day off is on Sundays and let me tell you those haven’t exactly been a picnic either.”
“I’m aware of your schedule. My concern is what happens if you decide that you’re tired of being cooped up.”
“I decided that about two weeks into the good behaviour bond. If I were going to go postal, I would have done it by now.”
“That’s all very well, but we don’t know what will push you over the edge.”
I wanted to tell him this conversation was what might push me over the edge, but Rich cleared his throat.
“I understand your concern, Jon,” Rich said. Jon, eh? Was everybody on a first-name basis with the minister? “But if there was a possibility Willow might disregard the terms of her probation, I believe we’re best equipped to contain her.”
“And what does containment look like? As far as I’m aware, her abilities haven’t yet been completely detailed.”
Rich nodded his agreement on that front. “When she met you at the Purple Plume and you learned she was Spectra, wouldn’t the smartest thing have been to silence you?”
I didn’t know where this was going but trying to keep me out of prison by detailing all the things I could have done to murder people didn’t seem like the best plan.
“Agreed,” the minister said.
“And yet she allowed you to
walk away. Why?”
“Because she didn’t think I was a threat.”
“You and I both know you’re the biggest threat to her safety she’ll come across besides the Shadowman. You’re sitting here talking to us because making you disappear would upset Jennifer Atherton. Isn’t that right, Willow?”
I threw daggers at him with my eyes. Alright, yes. There may have been some consideration of silencing the minister. But I’d decided against it eventually. My mum would be rolling in her grave knowing I’d allowed so many people to retain my secret and they were still breathing.
“You see,” Rich continued despite my scowl, “as much as she’s been repeatedly told discretion is the only way she’s going to survive, Willow insists on making friends. Maybe we’ll always be surprised by the way her powers manifest. Maybe there’s no one who can contain her. But as long as she cares about her friends, I don’t think she’s a danger to anybody.”
The minister lapsed into silence. Conversely, I wanted to reach out and strangle Rich. All this time I’d thought the physical grounds at Hyper were my prison. Turns out it was the people inside it. And dammit, I couldn’t even be angry because they were the only thing keeping me going when I wanted to give up. Well played, Officer Nichols.
Finally, the minister scrubbed at his face with the palm of his hand. “I suppose I can only ask that you keep me updated if there are any changes to the situation.”
“I will.”
“May I have a look at the bullet wounds?”
The request caught me off guard. It shouldn’t have been a surprise. That was the first thing Adam and Bianca did when they were allowed to see me after I’d woken up. I guess it just never occurred to me there would eventually be others I might consider safe too.
Again, my first thought was to gauge Rich’s reaction. The slight frown on his face was reassuring. He caught me looking and evened out his expression.
“I don’t know. It’s still a bit sore.”
The minister nodded. “I understand.”
The fact that he didn’t push was a point in his favour. Maybe one day we’d get to a stage where I’d be able to trust him with this. It just wasn’t going to be today.
