Fuse

by Angel Payne

  Chapter Four

  Emma

  Why don’t the movies ever go over this part of secret missions?

  Or the fact that it has to be endured with a nonstop loop of French profanities in the background?

  Or the fact that answering nature’s it-won’t-wait call is a hell of a lot harder to finish on a time limit than picking a lock, cracking a safe, or stealing through a garden under full moonlight?

  The fact that we haven’t done any of those things yet, even after sneaking inside a mansion that should have its own zip code, isn’t the point.

  Or maybe it’s exactly the point—because I’m sure that if the Sneaky Spy Shit instruction manual really existed, all that other stuff would obviously be included, complete with pretty chapter headings, detailed line drawings, and even a few step-by-step instructions.

  What they wouldn’t include is what Angie, Wade, and I have figured out minus the manual. Thanks to our friendly neighborhood tech hunk, who hacked the city’s database and downloaded the mansion’s blueprints during the drive down from the ridge, we easily found the laundry room. After that, Angie became the mission’s stud operative. Her ability to size up a person at first glance, as well as her knowledge of the secret dressing room behind the laundry racks, got our camos successfully stowed and our new personas in place: executive housekeepers for Angelique and me and sous chef’s whites for Wade. I even lent some confidence-building tips, courtesy of too many PR courses to count, helping us act like said “official” staffers in walking past two sets of security guards just to find one damn bathroom.

  Relatively speaking.

  If this palace inside a palace is really a bathroom, then I’m the goddess Aphrodite and all this luxury shouldn’t be making my eyes pop out of my head. But I continue to bulge my gaze at the pool-sized tub, multi-head shower, and toilet stall in which two thoroughbred stallions could easily fit—which, of course, makes it impossible to even think once I’ve plunked down for the “business” I’ve insisted on getting in here for.

  Holy shit, shit, shit.

  “Mon dieu. Any chance of hurrying things along, darling? S’il vous plait?”

  I toss a glower at Angelique through the mullioned glass partition. “Make you a deal,” I growl back. “I’ll attempt to get this done tout suite, and you let go of the pee whisperer duties, okay?”

  “Hmmph.” She stops and stamps now. Even through the textured glass, I watch her long blond waves fall back into perfect place. “You would prefer I trade places with Wade? I am sure he would like to get out of pretending he is still on his way to the kitchen.”

  “Are you freaking kidding?”

  She has to be freaking kidding. But when there’s no answer from the other side of the wall, I wonder if she’s gone and utilized her mighty French girl balls to make good on the threat. And that yikes me out even more than having to take care of business in this marble sepulcher of a bathroom.

  But this bathroom, and the concept of Wade’s presence in it, shouldn’t even be making my list of qualms about what we decided to come here to do. Qualms that began the second Wade hacked into the mansion’s security system, rebooted this place’s gazillion super-secret cameras, and showed the feeds to Angie and me. Qualms that were amplified when I saw Faline through those cold lenses. Not because of the doubts about killing her—because there have never been any doubts, nor are there now—but because I don’t have those misgivings. Not a single damn one. A revelation, of course, that does cause me doubts.

  Ugh.

  I never considered killing another person prior to a few hours ago. Is it possible to be so certain that I’m ready to do this…now? Shouldn’t I be on some kind of spirit quest, debating about this? Taking a figurative, if not literal, hike into the woods to talk to the Big Spirit in the Sky about this?

  Remarkably—or again, maybe not—all those quandaries are resolved when I return to a single word.

  Faline.

  Since talking with Angie back at the ridge, I know the enemy better than ever. She’s a years-in-the-making psychopath. A damaged creature, genuinely convinced that she’s been ordained by the universe to mess with the lives—and deaths—of others. Her thinking’s as whacked as images in carnival mirrors, but those mirrors have become her reality. She’s dived fully into the glass, creating her own demented court and kingdom from all the broken shards.

  And dragging her bleeding army through the carnage behind her.

  It’s time for Queen Faline to fall.

  Before she turns my man into her casualty.

  A purpose I’m able to reclaim in full as Angie’s heavy sigh fills the bathroom. Oh, thank God. I’ve been granted a pass on the Wade retrieval threat, and taking care of business is finally easy.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I mutter once I’ve smoothed my “borrowed” uniform back into place—only to be hauled back by the woman now grabbing my elbow and spewing a string of disgruntled French. But just when I think she’s about to give me a lecture about letting nerves drive me to chug a whole liter of water between the ridge and here, she jerks up her head. Then swings around a stare with anxiety that visibly matches my pre-mission water-chugging levels. “Angie? What the—”

  But then I hear it too. No. Not “it.” Her. The queen of the crazies herself, heels clunking louder and louder in the long, tiled hallway.

  “Merde!” Angie rasps, instantly whumping the air with the force of her stress. Her energy bears a similar jolt to Reece’s, but instead of flashing lightning, hers is like the whoosh of a comet. Brilliant and blinding, leaving only faint trails behind, until once more flashing the atmosphere.

  The cycle keeps up as she whips out her phone and taps in a two-digit text. Before she hits Send, I know what the message means. It’s the emergencies-only code she’s preestablished with Wade.

  I definitely think this qualifies as an emergency.

  Faline’s bootsteps come with an accompaniment now. She’s rattling off orders to her minions. I can’t make out anything specific, soon realizing it’s because she’s speaking fluid Spanish. Every few seconds, there’s a soft, “Sí, maestra,” in a quiet male tone, interjected between her orders.

  “Holy shit,” I blurt.

  “Holy fuck.” The response nearly overlaps me. But just when I think I’ve really lost it and am hearing voices, Wade’s rough bark becomes tangible on the air—as the man himself breaks into the bathroom. Literally, he’s broken in. Angie and I didn’t notice the door on the other side of the vanity, since there’s no knob on this side and the seam is totally plastered over. But thank God—again—for those blueprints, allowing him to kick through the rubble he’s created, one hand extended, already shouting, “Come on! This hall dumps back out into the other one. We can circle around and take her and her goons by surprise!”

  By the time he’s done, his yell has become a full roar. By necessity.

  Because of the alarms that start wailing throughout the entire building. But not just any peals. These are the we’re-all-going-to-die kind, straight out of duck-and-cover reels from the last century. I honestly suspect we’re going to burst out of the secret passage and find ourselves face-to-face with aliens, terrorists, or biologically restored dinosaurs.

  What awaits us is worse.

  Or better, depending how we choose to perceive it.

  Because technically, finding Faline Garand is exactly why we came here.

  Just maybe not looking so dewy and fabulous, even while jogging up on the heels of the henchmen who have summoned her to our exit point. And especially not being so damn prepared, despite having swapped out her sleek catsuit for a dark-red sheath she probably poured herself into, joined with black suede hip boots that take the term “statement shoe” to a new stratosphere. But at the moment, it’s not her boots I’m fixated on. It’s the gleaming daggers in her hands that catch the light as she twirls them with practiced ease.

  Crap, crap, crap.

  I hold myself back from saying it, no ma
tter how hard the words gurgle and push at the base of my throat. Could have something to do with the moisture causing me problems elsewhere: whopping beads of perspiration, dripping past my eyebrows and collecting on my lashes, start fuzzing out my vision. I compel myself to take the valuable seconds and attempt to shake the fog free, but everything’s still a blur even as I haul my Glock out of my uniform’s other pocket. But my periphery is still fully functional, and it gives me the welcome notification of Wade brandishing a similar pistol, along with a Bowie that makes Faline’s knives look like fast food plasticware. I send up a fast prayer that Angelique has taken precaution to come equally prepared.

  Only to realize, in the next moment, that she would have been wasting the time and effort.

  Two more goons rush onto the scene, obediently bracketing Angie with nothing but a commanding jerk of Faline’s head. Before they’re fully in place, Angie’s eyes pop wide, her predictive psychic hearing going to work…

  Giving her the heads-up that her handlers are going to clamp bright-red glow ropes around her ankles and wrists.

  Glow ropes?

  Only…they’re not.

  These shackles are worse. A terrifying whole bunch of worse.

  At once, as Wade and I watch with widening gapes, Angelique’s energy changes. While it’s still clear her vital organs and mental functions are intact, those glaring shackles have immobilized every muscle up and down her arms and legs.

  “Holy. Shit,” Wade grits out—a shock I share but feel as paralyzed as Angie about expressing. If I repeat those words, I have to face the reality that’s brought them. That just like that, Faline has used our own damn tactic against us and hijacked the surprise party we were bringing for her.

  My pulse triples, beating what is left of my nerves to a pulp. I whip a glance Wade’s way, taking in his pumping chest, flexing fists, and throbbing veins in the sides of his neck. Ohhhh, shit. The bitch has flipped the tables on us, but my friend looks ready to take a try at flipping them back.

  Damn it, Wade. Don’t do anything crazy. Don’t do anything crazy!

  And I’ve given myself permission to say that…why? Because I hadn’t made one of the craziest calls of my life when I decided to break in here and do this? Because I’m not standing here in front of Reece’s hugest nemesis, still telling myself not to feel like a geek in a maid’s costume while she’s approaching with the serenity of a practiced geisha? Because I’m not still struggling in vain against the invisible strands around my arms and legs, frantically thinking—violently praying—the bonds will somehow give way just because we’re the good guys?

  That’s the movies, you dumb shit.

  The good guys only get to win in the movies.

  But they get to move in the movies too.

  “You bitch!” Wade seethes.

  “Salope.” Angie’s version, while rasped like a title of a poem, carries ten times the insulting intent. But if the witch notices or cares about either version, she doesn’t show it by one iota.

  “Well, well, well. Angelique, my old friend.” Faline pivots to slide the back of a finger down the side of Angie’s face, though her steady scrutiny doesn’t falter from Wade and me. “You certainly took your time, darling. I expected you hours ago, amiga. And you really did not have to bring apology gifts…though I am most grateful for the kind gesture.”

  Shit.

  By gifts, the woman isn’t referring to a couple of potted plants or some scented candles. Though at the moment, I wish I felt more like a pillar candle than a fern in a pot, the roots of my balance hopelessly knotted while just a breeze would knock me over.

  In contrast to my stupefied silence, Angie breaks into hissing French profanity. But Faline is much more interested in Wade and me, appraising us from head to toe. My heart thunders faster, wondering what will happen once she’s done.

  And dreading the unnatural stillness she takes on when she is.

  And flinching when she finally does move, flicking just the tip of one twiggy finger.

  And watching, unable to hide my incredulity, as that tiny move rips the golden waves off Angelique’s head and sends them flying down the corridor. With another finger tick, Angie is driven to her knees, the lattice of electricity across her skull transforming into furious purple pulses. She drops her head. Hunches her shoulders. Curls her fingers in, scrabbling so hard at the floor that her nails audibly screech. Everything about her form screams in humiliation and mortification.

  “Ahhh, well, look at that,” the bitch purrs. “You are not the only ‘special’ one in the room anymore, amiga.” Then rocks back on one heel, hands hitching to her hips. “But what was it that Sister Anais always said to us? Ah, yes. Everyone is special in God’s eyes.”

  Wade bares his teeth. Raises his gun. “Yeah? Well, guess what? The dude down in hell also saves special places for people. I think yours is already engraved and waiting, baby.”

  Faline lifts a smooth smile. She still looks like she’s tolerating a fly, only now it’s as if the insect has done a backflip and awaits her approval. “And you are going to be the one to show me the way?” she drawls. “Is that it?”

  As she’s getting coy with Wade, a tormented whimper falls out of Angelique—spurring me to stomp forward and align the Glock with the center of the woman’s smirking face. “If he doesn’t, I will.”

  But why are we even standing here talking about this? The time for action was practically a minute ago, when this bony harpy and her threadbare soul first appeared in front of us. I came here to rid this world—and the mind and will of the man I love—from her. And here she is, right before me, in all her elegant insolence, wearing the color of all the blood she’s spilled and ruined for so many—and I’ve become an indecisive mess.

  But why? How?

  Just shoot her.

  Just. Shoot. Her.

  I resecure the gun in my grip and focus on all its steely might and potent power in my palm…but am helpless to move beyond that. My hands are sweaty and slick. My arms start trembling. My aim wavers. If the Glock’s barrel were a paintbrush, I’d be creating a shallow infinity symbol on the air with the thing.

  What the hell is wrong with me?

  Wait.

  Maybe that’s not the right question.

  What the hell is she doing to me?

  Oh, God. Is that it?

  Why are my heart and spirit—and yes, now even my head—a crashing chaos of remembrance stuffed full of all the hideous acts I can recount the woman being directly or indirectly responsible over the last year but am unable to squeeze just one finger to claim payback for them? Why can’t I exact the vengeance the whole team has dreamed of getting for Mitch and Kane, for Tyce, and yes, even for Dario? Most crucially, the requital for Reece. For the body she ravaged for six months and the soul she scarred forever.

  For the mind she’s ruthlessly fighting to control.

  For the will she will not be allowed to steal.

  I vow it.

  But somehow, I’m not able to act on it.

  And with a skittish glance, I realize Wade is waging the same struggle with his weapons. He’s held back by the same bizarre, invisible bondage that I am.

  Damn it.

  He’s wobbling his pistol barrel worse than me. His Bowie topples from his grip, clattering to the floor. One of Faline’s goons sweeps a foot over, kicking the knife hard enough so that it only stops when jabbing into the baseboard.

  What is going on?

  I stare at my arms, still stiff and flexed in front of me. But they’re not a part of me. My system’s been cleaved in two. My body has rebelled against the demands of my heart.

  No. That’s not right, either. My body is ready and able to cooperate here—but it’s not being allowed to. My bones and muscles and synapses have been denied access to their free will.

  “Holy. Fuck.” Wade’s hoarse cry brings a flood of comfort but a jolt of anxiety. The good news is, I’m not going totally crazy. The bad news is, I’m not going tota
lly crazy. There is a metaphysical spider web across the entire room, and the three of us are stuck in it, gawking at the treacherous arachnid who created it.

  “You sick bitch.” Wade’s seethe brings more of my psychic conflict. On one hand, every note of his fury mirrors my own—but the second he spits it, I yearn to give him a good head smack. Whatever’s going on with Faline—however the hell she’s making all this happen, whether it’s Consortium technological trickery or her own DNA upgrade—now is not the time to be goading the unstable witch. And yet Wade torques his lips, fires up his glare, and stabs on. “You think we’re going to dissolve and slink into submission just because you can Jedi-fuck the air?”

  But Wade’s the one answering his own charge—with a strange sound from deep in his windpipe. All right, not a sound. A gurgle. Because he’s choking. Because with just one lift of her hand, Faline’s shutting him up by strangling him.

  “Hmmm. Now look at that,” the bitch drawls as my friend gasps and gags for air. “And I thought you were the go-to boy of Team Bolt.”

  I’ve never been more thrilled to welcome a surge of rage to my blood before. I let the floodgates slam wide, every drop rushing and blasting, the inferno consuming me faster than a smoldering log tossed into a drought-ravaged ravine. Growing me. Empowering me. Incinerating every last speck of fear in me—until I clench the Glock harder than I can imagine. I point it steady and true now, tracking the barrel with the back of the bitch’s head as she leans over Angelique, her ink-thick waterfall of hair brushing over Angie’s mottled dome and downturned cheek.

  “Stop it!” My snarl lays on top of Angie’s taut sobs and Wade’s heartbreaking chokes. Sounding and feeling just as useless as both. “Let them go, damn it, or I’ll…”

  “What?” Faline croons it while tracing one of Angelique’s electric trails with a shiny red fingernail. “Tell me, little rabbit.” She deliberately taunts out that last word, slanting a preening glance over her shoulder. “I really do want to know.”