The Family Cross

by Gabrielle Ash

  “Bad people tend to have bad thoughts more often than good ones.” He finally turned a little to look at me. “In those three seconds, I learned three things.”

  “Which were?”

  “You don’t like my haircut.” He started holding up fingers to count off his list, starting with his thumb. “Your boyfriend has feminine hands.”

  “Feminine? I think the exact word on my mind was silky—”

  “And,” Samson interrupted, “you weren’t lying to me. You really were trying to do something nice, and it bothered you that I didn’t trust your intentions.”

  “None of those things guarantee there’s nothing bad about me.”

  “Bad people tend to have bad thoughts more often than good ones,” he repeated. “And if I’m looking for a reason to hate someone, it makes it easier for me to find something.”

  I pursed my lips. “I don’t understand. Wanting something to be in someone’s mind doesn’t mean it’s actually going to be there.”

  “But if you’ve heard enough of the bad shit sitting in people’s heads long enough, you notice the tells.” Samson looked over at me again before turning onto the highway. My confusion must’ve been clear. “Like terrorists, for example. They’re fanatics, and their brains aren’t like yours. They think differently. They remember things differently. Everything they do and say and think is different from you, and I’ve encountered enough of them to tell the difference pretty quick.”

  I put my elbow on the console and propped my chin in my palm. Terrorists? Was his old employer involved with some sort of military thing? “People are unique though. Aren’t they?”

  He snorted. “People aren’t the special snowflakes they think they are.”

  I fell back into the seat and focused on the cool leather against my skin. I’d had bad thoughts before. I’d lied to people. White lies, but lies. I’d cursed my oldest brother behind his back. I’d resented my father in silence.

  I was a person. A human being with the same tendencies as anyone else. Surely most people weren’t so horrible that my mistakes were negligible?

  Perhaps I’d read too much into it, and it said more about his life than mine.

  The last twenty-four hours had been the most stressful hours of my entire life. I didn’t want to talk anymore. I was done trying to find a glimmer of hope or light in an otherwise hopeless situation. I wanted to go home, lock myself in my room, and cry in my bed.

  But I couldn’t go home. Not tonight. Not with the police there.

  Samson didn’t talk anymore either, but whether he did that out of kindness or exhaustion, I wasn’t sure. He kept his eyes on the road, left hand tucked into a fist pressed to his lips, and right hand lazily steering us down Bruckner Boulevard.

  Nine

  When we finally pulled off the road, we were in East Harlem. It neighbored the Upper East Side, and the comfort the familiarity brought allowed the shake in my hands to lessen somewhat. Reputable businesses. Clean restaurants. Much more my speed than supernatural dives. I’d seen articles and advertisements for new housing and restaurants in several magazines, but none of those areas were where we stopped for the night.

  The building was a few stories taller than my condominium, but the brown block lacked the character and history of my home. The same shade of rust brown covered the building from top to bottom, including the metal of the window units I could see in the streetlights. It looked like someone dropped a rectangular prism in a parking lot and slapped on some windows.

  It was plain and impersonal. Ugly.

  There was a policeman sitting in the parking lot under a light pole. Samson pulled the Mercedes in the closest available spot beside him and put it in park. I never thought I’d reach a point where I felt fear encountering a police officer instead of reassurance. The cop didn’t pay us any attention though. His eyes were closed and mouth open, and his loud snore could be heard through the crack in the window. The jolt of shame as I huddled close to Samson during our stroll through the parking lot wasn’t lost on me. Get a grip, Tilly!

  The warm damp from Hunts Point hadn’t improved despite the new location. The short, thin hairs at the nape of my neck stuck to my skin, and the lack of a breeze made the sweat beading between my shoulder blades obvious and annoying. Whether it was a consequence of the temperature or the constant presence of fear lingering in my subconscious, I didn’t know.

  The instant chill of an air conditioner rolled along my arms the second Samson pulled open the glass door to the building. Unfortunately, there was no elevator, so I followed him in silence up a steep staircase with only the sound of my shoes to ground me. The aftermath of my fight with Farrell had finally emerged past the tide of adrenaline, and the higher we climbed, the more my legs wanted to fold in on themselves.

  Without a word, Samson led me to a door at the end of the hall on the eighth floor, apartment 8E, and pulled out a key ring from his pocket. There were at least twenty keys on it. Odd—he didn’t strike me as someone with several homes for weekend getaways.

  The hinges squealed when he pushed the door open, revealing an apartment with less personality than a cardboard box. A variety of browns made up the color palette, from the light tan of the walls to the deep chocolate of the couches. The kitchen was visible from the door, a dinky thing easily less than one hundred square feet. Builder’s grade cabinets and laminate counters, a combination that would’ve looked out of place in my condominium, was at home there.

  While small and plain, it wasn’t off-putting. The only thing that made me uneasy about it was the sterility. Not a single thing decorated the walls. The apartment was as impersonal as a hotel room, and moments later, a terrifying realization made me question every choice I’d made since leaving my condo.

  “I thought you quit.”

  Samson shut the door, and the sound of the deadbolt slipping into the lock was inordinately loud in the small, quiet space. “What?”

  “I thought you quit.” My shoes bounced against the fluffy carpet. “You said former employer, but you don’t live here. I can tell.”

  Even though his telepathic powers wouldn’t help him see my true concern from across the room, I was apparently transparent enough without them.

  “I did,” he said, voice level. “But I still have my keys, and I plan to take advantage of free housing and weapons as long as I can. I haven’t lied to you, and I won’t unless you lie to me…and I’ll know if you do.”

  The muscles in my shoulders tightened. His voice had dropped low, more under his breath than anything. I wasn’t sure if he’d intended to say that last bit or not, but I’d heard it and wasn’t about to pretend otherwise.

  “I won’t.”

  Samson didn’t seem to feel the need to respond and instead walked over to the small kitchen.

  Unsure what to do next, I wrapped my arms around myself and moseyed over to a couch. There were two of them pushed together at the corners, separated by a glass end table, and I took the shorter one. The cushion, plush and almost new, sprang beneath my thighs as I took a seat. How many criminals had sat in this very spot?

  I’d never had thoughts like that before. To be honest, I didn’t pay much attention to the crimes or violence in the news. It was depressing, and I preferred to surround myself with positive things. I knew criminal organizations existed. I wasn’t that naïve. However, they’d always been this distant thing I heard mentioned in passing. Terrorist cells, drug cartels, the mob…all real. Terrible, albeit real, organizations that I’d done everything in my power to keep out of my life. Yet there I was, sitting on a couch in a criminal safe house with a hired gun.

  I closed my eyes and took a long, slow breath. I wasn’t sure what I did to deserve it, but pretending my situation to be anything other than what it was would get me killed. “The organization you left—who are they?”

  “Uh, it’s a mercenary group filled with people and creatures most don’t believe in. Werewolves. Fae and their semihuman spawn…among others.” The s
oft clink-clink of glass pulled my gaze to the kitchen. Samson had brought a beer bottle out of the refrigerator. He positioned a bottle opener on the cap, and his eyes were on me. “Its employees are mostly forced into it. Or coerced. Some things like to eat humans though, and those usually join on purpose.”

  Eat humans.

  “And these people, creatures, what have you—” What was the politically correct term for such a thing? “They’ve just always been around? Right underneath our noses?”

  “Yep.” Samson popped the cap off the bottle, and it clattered to the floor.

  The thought of an entire world of things I always thought to be nothing more than stories existing for the entirety of human history made the room spin. How could any of this be real?

  “How much do you want?” My voice didn’t sound like it usually did. It was tired and heavy, and the emotional crack at the end wasn’t lost on either of us.

  “Same as your hit.” A million dollars.

  I pulled air into my lungs, concentrating on their slow expansion in an effort to steady my pulse. A million dollars. Why on earth would someone like him need a million dollars? He couldn’t even be bothered to lowball a little?

  “What do you need a million dollars for?” I asked, still focusing on slow breaths.

  “That’s none of your business,” he said, sharp tone implying he wouldn’t budge even if I offered double.

  “Fine.” I ran my fingers along the couch cushions and concentrated on the soft brush of the fabric. Corduroy. “A million dollars. I can do that. But there are some things I need to make clear.”

  Samson strolled through the living area and dropped onto the other couch. His feet were a few inches away from mine, and that was too close. I pulled my ankles back, heels against the couch’s wooden leg.

  “All right.” He cleared his throat. “Hit me.”

  “My father absolutely cannot find out about any of this.” I sat up straighter and pulled my shoulders back. “Which means you need to make yourself scarce if he’s around, and on the chance you two interact, don’t you dare mention that I’ve hired you for…this.”

  “Okay.” He pressed the bottle to his lips. Huh. That was easy.

  “And…” I cleared my throat. “To reiterate—don’t lie to me. About anything.”

  “Okay.” Samson shrugged. “Easy enough.”

  “Before you drag me off to any more monster hangouts, I need some warning.” Annoyance zipped down my back when he chuckled.

  “You’re making an awful lot of demands, Fancy Pants.”

  “And lastly,” I said with a pointed glare, “anything that has to do with my contract and the people pursuing us…I expect you to be transparent. About all of them. Regardless of how you left your employer.”

  Samson scowled. “If you’re wanting a long, drawn-out story about my life, you ain’t getting it.”

  “I don’t. I just don’t want you to be hiding things from me if it directly affects my survival.” I tucked my hands into my lap and twisted my fingers together. He could think I was bossy all he wanted. He’d get over it.

  Samson raised his eyebrows, unimpressed.

  “I’ve got money. I’m willing to cut a deal with you. I just want transparency, all right?” Samson’s facial expression didn’t change, and the uncomfortable squirm vibrating under my skin intensified. “I know absolutely nothing about your world, and I’m assuming you know nothing about mine. If we both want to get what we want, we need to be willing to share information.”

  He grabbed the television remote off the coffee table. “I guess.”

  My face got hot. I went off on a tangent, and he had nothing to say beyond I guess?

  “Is there anything you would like to add to our terms?”

  He shrugged, gaze fixed on the television as he clicked through the channels. “Not really. Find who bought your contract. Kill ’em. Get paid. Much simpler than you’re making it out to be.”

  The beginnings of a headache blossomed within my skull.

  “Just have my money when this is over,” he said as he settled on a channel. It was a trivia show. “And I’ll have your buyer. One way or another.”

  The only sound in the room beyond our breathing was the light chatter on the TV. I’d never negotiated with a criminal before, but it felt too…easy. Did he need money so badly that he didn’t have a single amendment beyond not sticking my nose into his personal business?

  “You can have the bedroom.” Samson’s voice was tight, and his gaze remained pinned to the show. The conversation was over.

  The deal had, presumably, been made.

  A shiver crawled along my arms. While my body was tired, I already knew my mind wouldn’t let me sleep. The fear that had seeped into my pores had infected the rest of me, pulsating beneath my skin and in my bones. Despite the fear, I pushed myself to my feet and made to one of two doors on the far right of the entertainment center, unsurprised to find a bedroom waiting on the other side.

  Like the rest of the place, the bedroom was virtually bare. There was a queen-size bed with white sheets and a burgundy comforter sandwiched between a pair of nightstands, and that was all. There were two doors: one for a bathroom and another for a closet.

  The dark pressed against the walls, inching closer and closer as I sat down on the mattress. The shadow of the light pole outside the building waved through the window, swaying in the breeze with every gust and moving like Farrell had in my condo. I pulled off my shoes, swung my legs on the bed, and closed my eyes tight in an effort to ignore the fear creeping in from the new room and the crushing dark.

  Farrell was dead. Farrell was dead. Farrell was dead.

  After ten counts of one to sixty, I hopped up and yanked the burgundy comforter off the bed.

  Samson was asleep on the longer couch already, or he seemed to be. The television was still on, casting its bright light along the walls and illuminating his open mouth. His left arm hung off the side, and his hand lay still against the floor. He still had his jacket on.

  I wasn’t sure if he’d noticed I’d joined him in the living room, but I didn’t much care either. After the night I’d had, I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to sleep alone again. I’d learned that telepaths existed alongside men with monster teeth and shadow walkers. People with strange abilities lived among us. Dangerous ones were trying to kill me. Of course I didn’t want to be alone. The short couch would be my bed tonight.

  The plush cushions sank beneath me as I situated myself on the couch. The comforter, bigger than the couch really needed, covered me up like a tent, and it took everything I had not to cower underneath it like a child after a nightmare.

  With every creak and moan of the building, I jolted. With every snore cracking out of Samson’s throat, I twitched. But I couldn’t stay awake forever, and the warm embrace of the comforter pulled me into a restless sleep.

  Ten

  The news had a segment about Officer Farrell’s apparent suicide the following morning. Officers tearfully mourned him on screen with splotchy faces and red eyes, trying in vain to speak of him without cracking under the weight of their grief. They all claimed they didn’t know Farrell needed help, and the anchors all joined them in honoring his service.

  Ugh. It took everything I had not to scream or bite a hole in my tongue. None of his coworkers had a clue that Farrell was anything other than a police officer, and that left me a little bitter.

  My gaze flickered over to Samson as he sifted through a black backpack. The bedroom closet was filled with them, all stuffed with guns and knives and God knew what else. Nausea swirled in my gut while Samson sorted through boxes of bullets and pushed rounds into magazines. He’d use those things to keep me alive because for whatever reason someone wanted me to die.

  “Let’s go,” Samson said and slung the backpack over a shoulder, completely unaware of my discomfort. I didn’t want to stay in the safe house a second longer though, so I squashed my unease and followed him out the front door.
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  The nausea lingering in the pit of my stomach had marginally abated at the thought of seeing my condominium again. While I’d almost been murdered inside it, it was still mine. The only way I’d get over Farrell crawling out of my floor would be the conscious decision to move on, and I could only do that inside my home.

  Nevertheless, the closer we got to the Upper East Side, the more insidious fear became. What if the police were there waiting for me? What if they knew it Farrell hadn’t committed suicide, and the whole show on the news was nothing more than an elaborate farce to draw us out? We wouldn’t know until it was too late, and then I’d be sitting in a prison somewhere watching my family legacy crumble into tiny pieces on the television behind bars.

  Samson appeared unbothered as we turned on Madison Avenue. He drove much the same way he had the night before: arm braced against the door and fist pressed against his chin. He’d smoked before we got in the Mercedes, and the smell followed him in a cloud.

  “How are you so calm?”

  He shrugged before sitting back in his seat to turn the steering wheel. “What are the first three things you do every morning?”

  “Um…” I hummed and fell back into my seat. “I brush my teeth.”

  Samson didn’t say anything, so I figured it was fine to continue without commentary.

  “I do thirty minutes of yoga.” He snorted, but I continued anyway. “And then I eat breakfast.”

  The silence hung over us until we rolled to a stop in front of a light.

  “I check my phone for contracts…or more recently, warnings. If I have a wound from the day before, I clean it. If I don’t, I move on to clean my gun.” Samson sighed, and the light turned green. The car lurched forward again, my condominium in view. The burn beneath my eyes made me forget about my fear for a moment.

  “And after I clean my gun, I make sure the magazine is full.” He flipped the turn signal and waited to turn into the parking garage. “This is just another day.”