by Sarah Noffke
“I’m sorry, Ren,” Dahlia says, and there’s a raw emotion in her words. “I’m incredibly sorry for how I acted. I was unfair to Adelaide and a complete bitch to you. I shouldn’t have kicked you out or voiced disapproval about you working level five cases. I understand if you don’t want me back, but I will never ever stop trying. Even if this time you relocate to the Institute I will hunt you down. I won’t stop until you take me back, because my life without you in it makes zero sense.” And when she stops I’m instantly regretful that she isn’t still speaking, singing words I’m so incredibly grateful to hear from her.
I lift my eyes to the ceiling, apathy written on my face. “Go away,” I say plainly.
“What!” And it’s Adelaide who voices her disbelief of my response. “Are you out of your bloody mind?”
I look at my daughter, a slight bit of my delight shining through. “Abso-bloody-lutely,” I say.
“Don’t worry, Adelaide,” Dahlia says. “He’ll cave. He’s my soul mate and can’t deny it.”
Adelaide turns and heads for her room. “I’m going to pack.”
“Why? Are you moving out?” I say.
“No,” Dahlia says. “She’s smart and knows she’s moving in with me.”
“Exactly,” Adelaide sings, shutting her door. Giving us privacy.
Dahlia then steps forward. “I want you to move back in with me. And Adelaide as well, because I know that she belongs with you. You two have a lot to learn about each other. You have a lot to teach her. And I suspect she has a lot to teach you. And you, Ren, belong with me.” And then Dahlia is directly in front of me, her eyes staring at me, her hand reaching for mine. None of her thoughts pour into my head from the embrace. I don’t pull away. I can’t even fake a hateful retort. Without Dahlia I was the Sahara, stretched in a maze of lost possibilities. And I know who I am with her. I’m the man I want to be, the one who is proud to be a monster.
“I love you, Ren Lewis. Take me back. I deserve you, and you know it. And you deserve me. Don’t fight me on this,” Dahlia says.
“You kicked me out,” I say, reminding her how hard she pushed me away.
“I know. I’m sorry, but I had to.”
“You put me through hell,” I say.
“Need I remind you that we aren’t even on that. Three months of abandoning you doesn’t even hold a candle to the eighteen years that you abandoned me,” she says.
“Oh, who is counting?” I say, pulling her hand up and placing it around my lower back. I didn’t know I was going to do that until I did, like I didn’t have a choice but to grab her, pull her closer to me.
“I’m really sorry. This has been hell on me too,” she says, sliding her other hand up my chest and around my neck.
I breathe her in. “You realize that you’ll have to be punished for this.”
“I do,” she says, a delicious smile on her mouth. “My body is ready.”
I lean in, knowing that there was never a reality where I didn’t do this, seal this reunion with a kiss. I would always take Dahlia back. Always. There is nothing this woman could do to me that I wouldn’t forgive her for. When she expects me to caress my lips across hers I bite down on her mouth, soft but with a force that still pinches. And then I cover her lips with mine, pulling her to me with a force that speaks of my need for her, my undying, unyielding need.
Chapter Thirty
The bodyguard falls after only ten seconds of staring at the silver pocket watch I swung back and forth. Stupid people take less time and effort to hypnotize. They also look straight at an approaching stranger when he says, “Hey, watch this.” Idiots. The same trick worked on the guards in the outer corridor. Stupid people really make my job too easy. I wished they’d stop breeding, but fat chance that will happen. They’re fucking bunny rabbits.
The handle clinks when I push the door open, causing Congressman Ted to bristle with frustration, but he doesn’t look up.
“I told you no disturbances,” he says, his brow wrinkled and his eyes on his computer screen to the side of his desk. The man has red blotches down his cheek and neck. Probably due to stress. He doesn’t have the knack of aging gracefully like me; his thinning brown hair is laced with wirier grays.
“And I don’t take my orders from you,” I say, taking my position squarely in front of his desk, my feet shoulder width apart, my arms crossed in front of me.
Ted whips his head up and his expression quickly shifts from surprise to disbelief, then to fear.
Perfect.
His eyes dart behind me. “Ren!” he chokes out.
“I see you know who I am,” I say, watching his eyes study the guard on the ground behind me, just on the other side of the door. “How did you…? Was that you? You did that?” he says, pointing, his arm already shaking.
“It’s really not important,” I say, drawing in a slow relaxing breath. “Now we are going to play a game. If you win, you live. Otherwise you can guess what happens if you lose,” I say.
“The Lucidites don’t kill people,” he says, almost stutters. He doesn’t look confident at all anymore, not like he was when he was giving the keynote address at the convention in San Francisco.
“And I see you’re also acquainted with who I work with,” I say.
“I know a great deal and none of it can I tell you. But you’ll find out soon enough. I’m sure of it,” he says.
“I want to know now!” I say, not caring that my voice booms through the hallway at my back. “And you’re right, the Lucidites don’t kill people. But sometimes we fail to intervene, to stop a suicide.”
Ted’s eyes meet where mine are resting, on a sharp brass letter opener sitting on his desk. It has his initials engraved on the handle. T.S.
“You wouldn’t,” he says, his gaze shifting back and forth between me and the would-be death instrument lying on top of a stack of letters.
“No, like I said, I wouldn’t kill you, but I won’t stop you from relieving the world of your arrogant presence,” I say and then point to the letter opener, which is probably not sharp enough to slit his throat, but stabbed at the right angle into his neck would do the job. “Pick that up,” I say.
His gray eyes widen with disbelief as his hand covered in age spots reaches for the weapon. He’s not intending the movement and yet he can’t stop it. I wait until it’s firmly locked in his hand, which vibrates like a car engine.
“Now let’s play, shall we?” I say in a sing-song voice.
“Ren, I can’t tell you anything. She’ll kill me,” he says.
I could just make him give me the information but that’s an exceedingly boring strategy. Not only that, but doing that will only make Ted feel defeated after I leave. I want him to shake with fear for the rest of his life. I want him to resign from his cushy political position. I want him to retreat to a rusty cabin in Montana in fear that one day I’ll show back up to finish him off. It is this kind of planning that makes me a master of strategy.
“Now, why don’t you start by telling me who she is? Vivian, or as I’m calling her, Medusa,” I say.
“She’s not ready for you to know that. That’s mostly what she’s mentioned anyway,” he says, his voice a rush.
“I think that letter opener would look better closer to your neck. Go ahead and do that now,” I say, putting a force behind the words that can’t be ignored. Or resisted. The whites of his eyes spread as his trembling hand drags through the air until the dagger-like device is clean up to his chicken neck.
“Vivian is a powerful Dream Traveler,” he spits out.
“Details,” I say in a bored voice.
“She has the power to control people with her voice,” he says, hurrying through the words.
“Yes, like a siren. I’ve deduced that much. And she can block psychic energy. Tell me something that will make me spare your life,” I say.
His eyes drop to the instrument held in his own hands against his will. Ted’s stupid Dream Traveler power is that he’s telepathic, wh
ich is what makes him such a successful politician. He knows what people want to hear and says it. However, telepathy can’t get into my head when I’m shielded, which I am.
“She took those Dream Travelers to build an army of assassins,” I state.
He nods, which unfortunately for him makes the blade pinch his neck.
“The CEO and shareholders. Why did she have James go after them?” I ask.
“Because,” he says, through a gurgling cough. “She needed them out of the way.”
“Why?” I say.
“So she can take over the company, Smart Solutions.”
“She’s in line for that, is she?”
Another nod.
“Why didn’t she just tell them to give it to her, use her power?”
“Vivian’s power doesn’t work on them,” he says.
“How?”
“The CEO, Frank Bishop, he’s her father. But estranged. No one knew it. She recently found him,” Ted says.
I sneer. I can relate to poor Frank. “He has…I mean had her power of control through voice commands. Is that right?”
Another nod.
“And therefore, he would be able to resist her control, correct?” I say.
“Yes,” he says in hush.
“So she killed her father. Sounds like a delightful woman,” I say. “Who are the shareholders? Why go after them?”
“They’re her uncles. They own majority shares in Smart Solutions.”
“Again, they share her powers and can resist,” I state rather than ask. “And they have control of the company.”
“Yes,” he says, sweat beading down onto his eyelids. “But they revert to the fourth shareholder if anything happens to them.”
“Vivian,” I say, wondering how convoluted the company is set up that the Lucidites didn’t see this with our recent investigation. None of the connections between these men was realized, nor Vivian’s connection to the company. It must have been shielded somehow. “And why does the witch want control of her father’s company.”
“He wouldn’t sign off on her newest project,” Ted says. He pauses and wheezes.
I sigh. “Which is?”
“Smart Pods.” Again another pause while he tries to breathe past his racing pulse.
“Will you fucking get on with it and tell me what that is? What are Smart Pods?” I say, my short bit of patience having long past run out.
“They are devices that go in homes. They pick up on voice commands,” he says, now talking at an acceptable speed. “They can control everything in a house: lights, temperature, security. They are connected to the internet and store all conversations in a house to provide family history. Furthermore, they play music, games, read books, control all the digital entertainment for a family. And Smart Pods make purchases when directed or offer facts when asked. There’s a voice that members interact with. She’ll answer or do anything a person asks.”
“Vivian’s voice, I’m guessing,” I say.
“Yes,” he says and his arm shakes. It probably feels like lead since he’s been holding it up all this time.
“And she’s going to use this technology to control any households nationwide, is that right?” I say.
“Yeah,” he says with hiss.
“And you helped clear all the bloody red tape so she could get clearance from the government to help,” I say. “That bit about recording conversations for family records, that’s a true invasion of privacy.”
“I had to. She made me,” he says, and I might spy a bit of guilt in his voice. Just a bit though.
“I’m sure she did, but you’re still going to hell, Teddy. So what does she plan to do once she’s got the evil devices in homes?” I say.
“I don’t know,” he says, shaking his head erratically. “She never told me.”
I’m sure it will involve evil and destruction. “Did she tell you what she wants with me?”
His eyes widen and a look of repulsion covers his face. “Please no. Please not that. You really are better off not knowing everything.”
This man is such a politician. His manner reminds me a bit of Trey. They both seem to think that individuals are better off knowing little, like too many details will keep us up at night. I’m already up at night, wondering what Vivian’s plan could entail and how it relates to me.
“Go ahead and stretch that hand up so that the point of your pretty letter holder is directed at your jugular,” I say with a flick of my wrist, the heavy intention loaded in my words.
He does as I say, his eyes watching his own hand like it’s a diabolical murderer, moving closer.
“Please no, please,” Ted begs.
“It will take little force for you to stab yourself. Or…” I leave the alternative hanging in the air.
Ted’s eyes jerk to me. “She’s obsessed with you,” he says in a rush. “Vivian pretends you’re already with her. Makes me acknowledge you when we meet although you aren’t present. She pretends to consult with you. Has conversations. She knows everything about you. Laughs at jokes you don’t tell. She’s insane. You can’t mess with her. You should go underground. Get as far from her as possible. There’s no getting around her voice control. I’ve tried. Only her father and uncles could resist her.”
Ted’s admission makes me smile inside. Crazy bitch who is obsessed with me. Kind of like the sound of this more and more. “I’m not a coward,” I say to the trembling weakling in front of me. “Don’t you worry about me. But do tell me how she knows so much about me. About the Lucidites.”
Ted hesitates. His eyes fly to the hand holding the knife, which is shaking against his neck now.
“Just a few ounces of your own pressure should do the job,” I say, rocking forward on my heels and then back again. This kind of thing really is too much fun.
“There’s a mole,” he says in a rush.
“Mole?” I say.
He nods. “At the Lucidite Institute. That’s how she knew how to block Roya, that news reporter, and she’s had this person watching you for all these years.”
“Who is it?” I say.
“I don’t know,” he says, and unfortunately he isn’t lying. I can tell. “I only heard her speak to them over the phone a few times. You see, Vivian was trained at the Institute years ago but went on her own. However, even after she left, she kept eyes on you. This person reports on all your activity.”
Thousands of Dream Travelers are brought into the Institute when they come of age. They’re trained, given a set of dream travel rules, and then released back into the world with the hopes they’ll contribute to society, not harm it. This is another of Trey’s long-running agendas. And in promoting it, he’s obviously allowed traitors into the Institute. I may have even trained Vivian. My photographic memory will have to shuffle through the back catalogue to figure that out. And then I’ll have to hunt down this mole and make them kill themselves.
“For how long?” I say, my head fuming with anger. “How long has someone been spying on me?”
“I don’t know. This is mostly just what I’ve learned during her imaginary conversations with you.” His hand shakes violently now, his muscles obviously fatigued from holding up the weapon for so long in one position. “That’s all I know. Will you release me, please?”
“Tell you what, Ted. You stay like that until the sun sets,” I say, gazing out the window. The city landscape to the west spreads out in all directions. It’s about ten minutes until the sun starts its final descent. “When that sun kisses the horizon you can lower your arm and go about your repugnant life. That is, unless your hand fatigues too much before then and you kill yourself.” The mind control I’ve placed in those words will wear off in roughly ten minutes, which means my planning worked out perfectly. As usual.
“Cheers,” I say, teleporting away.
Chapter Thirty-One
One week later
Winter time in Los Angeles is about like any season in this congested city. Most of its residents still
fashion their stupid shorts and have their sunglasses sitting on their tanned faces. People pay a high premium to live in Los Angeles because of the weather. They fail to realize God ripped seasons from the city, which is what creates a balance. Not having winter isn’t a blessing, it’s what’s going to cause the city to fall into the bloody ocean. Sadly, I’ll be part of the collateral damage, but at least I’ll be taking Dahlia with me.
“How does that look?” Adelaide says, standing back and tilting her head to regard the Christmas tree from a different vantage point.
“It’s horrid. Absolutely the worst thing I’ve ever seen,” I say, my eyes on the book in my hands.
“It’s beautiful, dear,” Dahlia says, throwing a hand back and slapping me on the shoulder. She didn’t really look either and I know because her head is partially on my lap. She has her own book sitting in front of her face.
“You know, Dahlia has people she pays to do that,” I say to Adelaide, who is now hanging a crystal angel on a branch.
“Ren, she wanted to do it. And she’s better at it than my people,” Dahlia says, and now lowers her book to look at the tree and its decorations. “It must be your artistic eye.”
“I’m glad you think so. It’s my first time to decorate a Christmas tree,” Adelaide says.
