Shades of Memory

by Diana Pharaoh Francis

  The corners of her mouth lifted in a swift, humorless smile. “The usual.”

  Her aquamarine gaze dared me to push. Something shifted inside me, and suddenly I was looking at Arnow through a different lens altogether. She’d come to her icy mask and ruthless determination through Savannah’s machinations. How many girls had Savannah enslaved that way?

  “That’s what you want to take control of,” I said, understanding dawning.

  “I will tear her trafficking trade down to the ground and make sure all the girls end up in good homes and the women get choices in their lives,” Arnow affirmed. “Boys, too.”

  That’s what she’d meant when she said not everybody had choices.

  “Count me in,” Taylor said, her body tight with disgust.

  “Me, too,” I said. Arnow radiated tension, and she clearly didn’t want to talk about it. I could empathize. I skipped back to the original subject. “But you still haven’t explained why Savannah’s lieutenants invited you to their shindig tonight.”

  “She grew to value my abilities. She assigned me certain delicate tasks and gave me access to areas of her business they were not privy to,” Arnow said, and before I could ask for specifics, she continued. “I don’t know exactly what they want from me.”

  “But you have some ideas,” Leo said.

  Arnow shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. The main thing is they’re meeting and you need to attend. It’s going to be your only chance to have them all in one room at one time. You’d better come up with a hell of a good offer to get them on your side. Otherwise, you’re going to be screwed.”

  No shit, Sherlock. “Tell me about them,” I said.

  “You got paper? Pens?” Taylor asked. “We’re going to want to make notes.”

  “Upstairs. I’ll get them.”

  “Meantime, I’ll put on more coffee,” Jamie said.

  “Have you anything to eat?” Arnow asked. “I haven’t had anything since breakfast.”

  “Kitchen’s open. Follow me. I’ll make you an omelet.”

  “I could eat, too,” Taylor and Leo said in a hopeful chorus.

  Jamie gave an exaggerated sigh. “I suppose everybody else is hungry, too.”

  “I wouldn’t say no,” I said, starting up the spiral staircase.

  Patti shrugged, and Dalton just nudged his chin in what might have been a nod.

  “I’m on it,” Jamie said. Arnow followed him into the kitchen.

  Upstairs, I collapsed onto my bed, staring blindly at the opposite wall. I could feel myself shaking and clenched my body to stop it. The quakes continued, growing in strength.

  Did I really think I could possibly convince a bunch of big, bad Tyet thugs to let me order them around? What was I going to do—smile at them pretty and offer them Girl Scout Cookies and old scotch? Sure, that would work. About as well as saying, “pretty please with cherries on top.” I needed some kind of leverage, and I didn’t have any.

  Price would have had some ideas. He wasn’t here. I wrapped my arms around myself and bent over, pressing my forehead against my knees. I had to think. How could I do this?

  I didn’t hear Taylor come up. The bed compressed as she sat beside me and rubbed a hand over my back.

  “Second thoughts?”

  “More like fifty or a hundred,” I said, my voice muffled.

  “You can pull the plug on this right now, no harm, no foul.”

  I sat up, twisting to look at her. “And then what? We run? We live like cockroaches?” I shook my head. “We’ve got to draw a line and this is our best chance of success.” Which, given my lack of ideas on convincing Savannah’s lieutenants to let us waltz in and take control of the operation, really sucked. We couldn’t blow this, or we’d be fighting an uphill battle for the rest of our probably very short lives.

  “So then we do it.”

  I snorted. “Easy to say.”

  “We’ll figure it out.”

  I made a sound that wasn’t exactly agreement and started to get up to find the paper and pens. Taylor held me back.

  “You haven’t said anything about Price. What does he think?”

  “I haven’t exactly told him yet.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  “I was supposed to call him when I got here.”

  “You going to?”

  “I . . . should.”

  “But?”

  “I’m not ready to hear he’s got to stick with Touray, that we can’t be together.”

  “He won’t say that.”

  “Won’t he?”

  Taylor stood, stroking a hand over my hair. “Price loves you. Don’t sell him short. We’ll get through this. All of us together. Call him.”

  With that, she went back down the stairs. I fished my phone out of my pants pocket and thumbed it on. I made a habit out of not using my cell anywhere near my house, in case someone might track it, but inside was safe enough thanks to protection spells. I punched the speed dial for Price’s number before I could chicken out.

  He answered almost before it rang. “About fucking time,” he said, his voice harsh with worry. “It’s been hours.”

  “I slept,” I said. “And then it took a while to get here.”

  “You’re all right?”

  “I’m good. What about your brother?”

  “Cass worked on him. He’s sleeping.” A beat of silence. “What’s going on?”

  Did I tell him? If I did and he passed the information on to Touray, then we’d probably be screwed. If I didn’t. . . . My lack of faith would cut him deep. I couldn’t do that to him, to us.

  “We’re going after Savannah’s territory,” I said. “Before Touray or anybody else can get to it.”

  He didn’t laugh or call me mentally incompetent for even thinking we could do it. He didn’t say anything at all.

  “Are you there?” I asked after thirty seconds or so of dead silence.

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay.”

  I waited, knowing what was coming next. He was between a rock and a hard place, his loyalties sliced in half. If I had to pick between him and one of my siblings—it would be impossible to choose. Plus, if Touray failed in his deal with Tyrell, who knew what the psycho business magnate would do to him? Not just Tyrell. Vernon wouldn’t like it either. How could Price walk away?

  “I should probably go,” I said miserably. Maybe I could delay the inevitable a little longer. “I’ll call you later.”

  “When?”

  “I’m not sure. There’s something we’ve got to do tonight. It could take a while.” Forever—if Savannah’s lieutenants decided to end me before I could make a pitch.

  I could tell my answer frustrated Price. I could almost hear the crack of the phone as he crushed it in his hand. For both our sakes, I was playing the vague game. It turned my stomach the same as lying. If he asked for specifics, I wouldn’t hold back.

  “What are the chances that you’ll get hurt doing this thing later?”

  “Let’s just say I’m making sure my will is up-to-date,” I said with gallows humor.

  Price did not find it funny. He swore eloquently. “I should be with you,” he said finally when he ran out of colorful descriptions of people and animals sticking things in inappropriate and painful places.

  “I’d like you here,” I confessed. “But you can’t be two places at once and Touray’s your brother. He needs you. You’ve got to back his play.”

  “You need me.”

  Underneath the cold iron in his voice, I heard uncertainty and accusation. I rubbed my forehead with my free hand, a headache starting to pulse behind my eyes.

  “Jesus, Price, of course I do. This isn’t about whether or not I need you or want you. It’s about what you need and
what your brother needs. I’m not going to be a wedge between you.”

  “Has it occurred to you that it’s not up to you?” he asked. “Or did you just decide what was what and to hell with what I might think?”

  Fist to the gut. I gasped to retrieve my breath. He didn’t wait. His words lashed me like a whip.

  “Either we’re partners or we aren’t. Either you’re all in with me or we’re done. You’d better think about just what I am to you. Call me when you decide.”

  The phone went dead.

  I don’t know how long I sat staring down at my cell. My head spun, and I didn’t know what to think. I had a hole in my heart, and pain spilled out of it like a broken dam. On top of that, I was pissed. First, I didn’t like ultimatums, and his last comments sounded like one. I wasn’t wrong about wanting to protect Price. I didn’t want to be the thing that tore him and Touray apart, and I couldn’t imagine how it could go any other way if Price joined my crusade.

  On the other hand, he was right, too. He was entitled to make his own choices. I’d be hot as hell if he tried to decide what I could and couldn’t do.

  I sighed, my fury draining away in a sudden rush. I rubbed my face, weariness grinding against my brain. I couldn’t even manage my love life, and I thought I was going to run a Tyet? I was delusional. Complete nut job.

  I started to call Price. He needed to know how much I loved him.

  “You’d better come down,” Patti said. She’d come halfway up the stairs, and just her head showed above the floor. She looked anything but happy.

  My fingers froze before I could hit the speed dial, ice sliding through my veins. “What’s wrong?”

  “Agent Snowbitch just got a text. Morrell’s lieutenants moved their meeting to my diner. They told her to find you. You’re the guest of honor.”

  Chapter 19

  Gregg

  “TELL ME EVERYTHING.”

  Gregg had woken up with hammers pounding on every square inch of the interior of his skull. He downed two fingers of scotch and poured another. His thinking was fuzzy, and he could hardly remember fetching Cass or what had happened after. It annoyed the fuck out of him.

  “What did that bastard do to me? What did you do to me?”

  The blond woman who sat folded like a jackknife in the chair across from him lowered her coffee cup, resting it on a bony knee.

  “I helped you,” she said acerbically. “Which you asked me to do, so you don’t need to sound like such an ungrateful asshole. Though let’s face it, not being an ungrateful asshole would be stepping out of character for you.”

  Gregg wasn’t in the mood to fence with her. “Tell me what you found and how you fixed it and why I’m having such a hard time remembering anything since I left the diner.”

  “You’ll remember in a day or maybe two. The loss has to do with how your memories were realigned by the dreamer who worked on you, and how I had to untangle them. Whoever did it is damned good, not to mention creative. I haven’t seen or considered making alterations that way.”

  “I’m not interested in your schooling,” Touray said when she paused to sip from her cup again. “Explain.”

  She yawned and sipped her coffee again. “It’s nice to see your brother. He looks like a bear with a herpes breakout, though. You might want to talk to him.”

  “Cass!” Gregg’s fist hit the table. “What did they do in my head?”

  “Your memories got sort of stitched together in a fold. The dreamer essentially took you back in time about a half hour or so, hiding everything that had happened between those points inside the fold. You’d have no way of knowing you lost anything, since he flawlessly seamed it up with a memory marker they established before they started.

  “A memory marker?”

  “Tyrell stabbed you in the thigh with an ice pick so the dreamer would know exactly how far to fold.”

  Gregg frowned, looking down at his legs, half expecting to find the wound.

  “He had you healed so you wouldn’t know,” Cass said in a “no duh” voice.

  Gregg gritted his teeth, though he deserved the ridicule. Cass had a tendency to grate on his nerves, but she was one of the best in the dreamer business, and she couldn’t be bought by enemies. Once she committed to a job, she didn’t betray her clients. That trustworthiness was gold in his line of work. The fact that she was also willing to cause dire harm to any clients or enemies of clients who came after her—whether to use her or get revenge—that permitted her to remain an independent contractor. Otherwise, she’d have been forced to work for someone like him full time.

  “If you fixed it, why can’t I remember the lost time?”

  “Because the work was brilliant. The fold was designed to dissolve. In a few weeks, I don’t know if I’d have even been able to tell anything happened and those memories would be gone forever. The process was already under way. I stopped it and smoothed the fold back out, but your brain is still trying to catch up. You’ll be able to remember within a few hours or so. Everything since you left the diner will take longer, because I ruffled some things when I dismantled the memory fold. Anyhow, it will take your gray matter a little bit to settle the memories so you can access them.”

  “What can you tell me about that missing half hour?”

  “You were given compulsions.”

  Ice drove down through Gregg’s gut. “Compulsions?” he repeated hoarsely. “To do what?”

  “One was to report in to your new boss at least once a day, whether to ask for resources, information, or to report progress. It was to be your idea.”

  Gregg’s jaw knotted as he clenched his teeth. “What else?”

  “To report to him on Riley. He wants her.”

  “And?” His chest felt like steel bands clamped him in a tightening grip.

  “To soften you up to the bodyguards he’s sending to you. You’re supposed to quickly grow to rely on them and make them your trusted lieutenants.”

  “Anything else?” If Tyrell had been present, Gregg would have ripped the man’s head off. Not that this wasn’t cleverly done and smart. He’d have done the same if their positions were reversed. But how had he gotten the wound that alerted him to the tampering?

  “He told me not to check on whether my brain had been messed with,” he guessed aloud.

  Cass nodded. “That’s the thread that stitched the memory fold closed. A sort of ‘don’t look here, nothing here to see’ suggestion. But there’s one more thing.”

  “Why do you make it sound like it’s worse than all the rest?” Gregg asked, foreboding tightening the bands around his chest.

  “Maybe because it is?”

  “Quit beating around the bush and tell me already,” he snarled.

  “He planted a trigger. Once it cemented in your head—which would take it a few days because of your instinctive resistance—he’d be able to say the trigger word and you’d obey him without question, and you’d be frothing at the mouth to do it. It’s not a one-use trigger, either. He could use it as often as he liked.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Ain’t got nothing to do with this kind of crap,” Cass said. “You should probably be talking to the devil.”

  “Did you get it out? Did you get all that shit out?” He waved his hands at his head.

  She shrugged. “Think so. I’ll want to go back in and have a look in a day or so.” She picked up a paper from the end table beside her. “Here. This is everything I told you. The trigger word is Jettatura.”

  An uncomfortable prickling sensation circled Gregg’s throat, and then faded. He jumped. “What the hell was that?”

  Cass nodded satisfaction. “Good. I unhooked the trigger and dismantled the compulsion, but I was betting you didn’t want Tyrell to know you’d discovered what he’d done. Now, anytime
you hear the word, you’ll get that needle feeling around your neck. You won’t be able to ignore it, which means you’ll be able to properly react.”

  Gregg considered her. “Smart thinking.”

  “It’s not perfect. The only person you’re supposed to react to is Tyrell. If anybody else says it, it shouldn’t matter. I couldn’t be sure I could tie the warning just to him since he’s in the middle of the memory hash. But then, it’s not like a lot of people are going to be shouting it in the streets.”

  “What does that mean? Jettatura? Is it even a real word?”

  “Wikipedia says it is. Says it means ‘bad luck’ or ‘casting the evil eye.’ Appropriate, don’t you think? Anyway, if you don’t want your new boss to know you broke his mind-hack, you should have a good look at that sheet and remember to behave appropriately.”

  She yawned and set her coffee aside. “I need something to eat. And a ride home. Not travelling, thank you very much.”

  “The kitchen will make you anything you want, and after that, I’ll arrange for your transport. And Cass, thanks.” He held up the paper.

  She unfolded from her chair and stood. More than slender, she looked almost emaciated. The toll of using too much magic. But then, he didn’t remember her ever looking particularly healthy, though she ate like a horse. Her short blond hair stuck out in every direction, and the intensity of her penetrating gaze made him want to duck away.

  “Aw gee. Aren’t you sweet. And you didn’t even break your face saying thank you.”

  “You look like shit.”

  Cass cocked an eyebrow at him. “Who’s fault is that? Anyhow, I’m planning a two-week vacation of nothing but food, sleep, hot baths, and trashy books.”

  “When do you want to check up on me again?”

  “Once the fuzziness clears and your mind sharpens again. Should be no more than forty-eight hours. I’ll come back then.”

  “What do you expect to find?” Talking about himself, about his own brain getting tampered with, in such a clinical way, was surreal.