Hidden Darkness

by May, W. J.

  “Would you shut up?” Rae growled between her teeth, focusing all her concentration on the tatù. “Now tell me what’s going on. And don’t you lie to me, Benjamin.” She squeezed his fingers in a warning. “I’ll know.”

  Benjamin gulped. “Little tight there.” When she released the hold a fraction, he nodded. “Okay, okay. The day after you guys left, I got a call from my office that we had a potential investor who wanted to meet with me. Now, let me preface this with the fact that that isn’t unusual, okay? We get generous donors all the time, and, as CEO, it’s my job to schmooze them.”

  Devon rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, we get it. You weren’t incredibly stupid for letting some stranger up into your apartment after we told you someone was coming here to kill you. Go on.”

  Benjamin flushed. “Yeah, well, when you put it like that…”

  “Get to it already, Benjamin,” Molly commanded, little sparks flying from her fingers.

  He shook his head at all of them and sighed. “Well, we went out to dinner, and I told him about my plans for the upcoming quarter. He seemed really,” he glanced around nervously, “well, to be honest, he seemed really nice. He was asking all the right questions, really engaged in what we were talking about. When I mentioned that I had several prototype designs back at my apartment, and he asked if he could see them, I didn’t think it was a big deal. Because I asked him, you know? So why would I have thought that—”

  “Why would you have thought literally inviting a stranger up to your apartment after we told you someone was trying to kill you was an incredibly stupid idea?” Julian rolled his eyes. “Not a clue.”

  “Yes, well, I maintain it could have happened to anyone—”

  A bolt of lightning shattered a nearby vase. “Benjamin!”

  “Sorry, right. Anyway, we headed back here, and I showed him everything I’d been working on. He took a phone call, and then we continued chatting about one of the prototypes. He seemed really interested in investing, so I went to pour us some drinks. That’s when everything…gets a little blurry.”

  The whole time Benjamin had been talking, Rae had been holding onto his hand, letting the unique tatù work its magic as she centered her brain, and concentrated more than she ever had in her life. She didn’t think he was lying. As stupid as this genius might be, she actually thought he was telling the truth.

  “He slipped something into your drink,” Molly summarized, her voice softening for the first time as she looked at Benjamin in pity.

  Benjamin hung his head. “Yeah. He actually seemed really excited about it. Said that I was one of the first to try his new concoction.”

  “New concoction?” Devon asked shrewdly. “What does that mean?”

  Benjamin shrugged. “I don’t know. The doctors at the hospital didn’t know what it was either. They said most date-rape-type drugs make you black out and you lose your memory. This wasn’t anything like that. I was still aware of everything going on around me, I remember it all perfectly, I just…couldn’t move. Couldn’t even think to move.”

  At these words, Julian fell back a step, his bright face suddenly darkening as he looked at Benjamin with something close to dread.

  Rae noticed it as well, but made Benjamin keep talking. “What happened next?” she murmured.

  “He took a blood and hair sample before propping me up with a pillow and going on his way. The whole time he was really nice about it, even apologizing while he had to pin-prick me. He and the girl both were quite nice.”

  “The girl?” Devon asked sharply, taking a step forward. “What girl?”

  “Jennifer?” Rae didn’t need to use Carter’s tatù to know what girl.

  Apparently neither did Julian. His voice dropped down to a low whisper, rough with a million things that would forever go unsaid. “You’re wrong. It’s not Jennifer. It’s Angel.”

  * * *

  “Wait…” Luke struggled to catch up with the others as they hurried after Julian down the street. “I don’t understand. Angel, like Julian’s girlfriend, Angel?”

  “She’s not my girlfriend,” Julian shot back, barely slowing down as he crossed the street. A taxi honked its horn as it screeched to a stop, but he just slapped the hood and kept walking.

  “Jules,” Devon jogged to his side, “slow down for a second. Let’s just think.”

  Julian stopped as quickly as he’d taken off, causing a sea of bewildered pedestrians to part suddenly around him. “What’s there to think about? I think it’s pretty clear what happened.”

  Molly, Rae, and Luke caught up with them the next minute.

  “It’s not clear to me…” Luke said.

  Before anyone could say anything, Rae sighed and pushed them all into the little diner they’d inadvertently stopped in front of. She flashed five fingers to the waitress before grabbing a stack of menus for the table and ushering them all to the back. This was going to be a bad talk. One with no good solution. They weren’t going to do it out on a public street. And they weren’t going to do it running on fumes.

  “Rae, what the hell are we doing here?” Devon murmured as she manhandled them all down into the farthest booth.

  “What?” she whispered back. “You want to have this out in front of half of San Francisco?”

  His mouth hardened into a grim line. “That’s a good point.”

  Without further discussion, they settled down in a charged silence as Rae called for five coffees. The waitress set them down and pulled out her pad to take an order, but Molly discreetly shook her head and the woman hurried on her way. Once it was clear that they were alone, Rae cast a quick glance at Julian.

  His face was a hard mask, unlike anything she’d ever seen before. Out of the four of them, Julian was undoubtedly the most soft-spoken; the one who, despite his jaw-dropping looks, was remarkably shy when it came to female attention and the idea of relationships. He’d taken a chance on Angel, that much was clear, and Rae couldn’t imagine a worse way for it to have played out.

  “How…” she almost fell silent at the look on his face, but gritted her teeth and forced herself to keep going, “How did you meet her?”

  He pursed his lips, looking down at the table, his eyes burning a hole through the varnished wood.

  Devon cast him a look of the utmost sympathy, and then gently got the ball rolling. “It was in Italy, right?” Julian kept silent and he gave him a little nudge. “Jules, in Italy?”

  With an almost inaudible sigh, Julian raised his eyes to the opposite wall. There was a strange, lifeless look in them; that same deadening Rae had seen getting started on the plane. “Florence,” he finally answered. “We met in Florence.”

  Rae nodded and resisted the strong urge to give him a hug. “And…who met whom?”

  “She met me.” His lips turned up in a hard smile that didn’t reach his eyes, “but she would have, wouldn’t she?”

  On the other end of the table, Luke cast a hesitant glance around. “I’m sorry, guys, I know I’m a little behind, but I still have no idea what you’re—”

  “Angel was never really my girlfriend,” Julian explained sharply. “Apparently, she was working with Cromfield the whole time.”

  Molly bit her lip, her eyes brimming with little tears. “Oh, Jules… But, are you sure? It could have been any girl Benjamin was talking about. Rae mentioned Jennifer. She’s a die-hard Cromfield fan. Rae, you should have used Carter’s—”

  “I’m sure,” Julian’s voice barely cut above the din of the diner. “The second he started talking about that mystery drug they slipped him. It was how he said it. Not that he couldn’t move, but that he ‘couldn’t think to move.’ That’s how Angel’s ink works. It gets inside your head, so it doesn’t really matter how strong you are. Your own mind holds you hostage.”

  “But hasn’t this been going on for hundreds of years?” Luke asked quietly. “She’s not immortal. She couldn’t have—”

  “Her father had it, and his father, and his father.” Julian
shook his head. “Cromfield’s probably just been collecting them, generation after generation, to help him with his…work.”

  Devon leaned forward and clapped a protective hand on his best friend’s shoulder. “When you called her last night, did she—”

  Julian’s face fell into his hands with a miserable sigh. “I didn’t call her last night. I saw her.”

  Rae shot Devon a quick look. “You saw her?” she repeated. “As in…at the hotel?”

  This girl had been right under their noses? Just two doors down?

  His face tightened and he nodded. “When I called, she said she was in town.” He shook his head with a wry grin. “Of course she was, right? She was here for Benjamin.”

  “Jules,” Molly put her hand over his, “you couldn’t have known.”

  His head jerked up and he pulled away. “But that’s just our running line now, isn’t it? That I ‘couldn’t have known.’ Couldn’t have known about Japan. Couldn’t have known about Angel…” He looked up at Rae without seeming to think about it, his eyes a million miles away as he remembered. “She was so interested in every part of my life,” he said softly. “My school, my job, my friends. It’s how Cromfield got into my head. You can’t do that with someone you don’t know. You can watch them, sure, but you can’t get inside their head like that. But I…I trusted her. I told her whatever she wanted to know. And she used it to offer me up to him. Now everything I do, everything I think…I can’t trust any of it.” He pushed suddenly to his feet. “And you guys shouldn’t either.”

  Without another word, he started heading to the door, leaving his friends in a shocked circle behind him. Unfortunately for him, two of those friends were gifted with super-speed. Before he could make it past the fourth table, Devon and Rae were in front of him, pushing him to a stop.

  “You are not just going to take off on us,” Rae said firmly. “Under no circumstances.”

  Devon’s eyes shone with concern. “Jules, I can’t imagine how you must be feeling right now, but Rae’s right. You going off on your own doesn’t help anybody. In fact, it puts us all at even more risk. You’ve got to stay.”

  Julian stared between them and it looked like it was taking every bit of self-control he had just to keep himself together. “It’s not safe when I’m here. Cromfield hasn’t tried to get back into my head yet, but what about when he does? I can’t stop him; I’m not strong enough. And whatever we’re planning when he does, whatever course of action we’ve decided…he’ll know.”

  “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” Rae said, with a lot more certainty than she actually felt. “We’re not splitting up. No matter what. End of story.”

  “Rae, think,” he pressed quietly. “He’s essentially made me his inside man. I don’t know how to stop that. And I’ll be damned if anyone else gets hurt because of my mistakes—”

  “Julian, they weren’t mistakes,” Devon interrupted heatedly. “You were targeted. Cromfield saw you were one of Rae’s best friends and a member of the Privy Council. Not to mention, you have the same bloody tatù! This had nothing to do with what you may or may not have decided; you were marked from the start.”

  “He’s right,” Rae added fiercely. The look on Julian’s face was breaking her heart; she’d do anything to make it go away. “If you didn’t fall for Angel, they would have sent someone else, then someone else. Maybe even gone after your family. You didn’t have a choice, Julian. It’s not some tagline. It’s the truth.”

  He threw up his hands. “It doesn’t matter! What’s done is done! He’s in my head now; it’s over!”

  Devon continued to argue, but Rae had gone suddenly quiet. There was an advantage here; they’d just been too overwhelmed to see it.

  As the boys went back and forth, a little smile crept up her face as a plan started slowly forming. “It’s not over,” she said softly. “Not by a long-shot.”

  Her sudden change of tone made Devon pause, and he looked down at her curiously. Even Julian turned, wondering what was going on inside her head.

  “You see, Cromfield may have temporarily turned you into his ‘inside man,’ but now we’ve got an inside man of our own.”

  Devon squeezed her hand. “Rae, I love you, but hate it when you’re being damn cryptic.”

  She looked Julian squarely in the eyes and smiled.

  “How would you feel about going out on a little date with a pretty little girl in white; with wings, wears a halo?”

  * * *

  “There is no way in hell this is ever going to work.” Julian was sitting on the bed back in his hotel room, the other four in a line before him, each giving their silent support.

  “Of course it is!” Molly said quickly. “You just saw her last night! Why wouldn’t you call to see her again? It’s the perfect plan.” Her brow furrowed. “By the way, why didn’t you tell us that you saw her last night? And by us, I mean…me.”

  His eyes swept Molly caustically up and down. “Oh, I wonder.”

  “Jules,” Rae said calmly, “it’s going to work. Just tell her that you’re going to be staying in town an extra day or two, and that you’d love to see her again before you head back to England.”

  “And be flexible,” Devon handed him the phone. “Let her pick the time and place.”

  Julian rolled his eyes as he took it. “Asset acquisition 101; I know what I’m doing. I just,” he trailed off nervously and glanced down at the phone, “I don’t know if I can lie like that and be believable. This isn’t just some mark.”

  Rae’s face softened. “You don’t want to hurt her.”

  “No,” he said quickly, “I do, I mean, I want to stop her, it’s just… She’s going to hear it in my voice. I’m no good at this sort of thing.”

  “It’s a relationship,” Devon said simply. “She lied to you, you lie to her. It’s as simple as that.”

  Rae cast him a disconcerted look. “Yeah, I’m filing that one away for later.”

  He rolled his eyes. “I meant it’s a work relationship, the kind of tactics and espionage we’ve been trained for. She was playing you. Now you get to return the favor. Try not to think of her as your…” He stopped short at the look on Julian’s face. “I just mean, try to think of her as an agent of Cromfield’s. Nothing more.”

  Luke stepped forward. “If it helps, I could call and pretend to be you.” He put on a ridiculous deep, brooding voice. “Meet me at the hotel…don’t try to kill me… Pretty good, right?”

  Even Julian had to smile at that one, and the mood was temporarily lightened. He dialed the first few numbers before turning, glancing up with one final concern. “She’s good, guys. She’s really good.”

  Molly rolled her eyes. “Honestly, Julian, enough. I like to be a busy body about your love life, but it’s not like I want to know the details—”

  “Her ink, Molls.”

  “Oh.”

  He spoke primarily to Rae, but addressed everyone. “If she gets her hands on you, even for a second, that’s it! You’re done. There’s no fighting it.”

  Luke nudged Rae playfully. “Yeah, but we have Miss Super Hero over here. What’s the worst that can happen?”

  Rae beamed with pride, but Julian shook his head slowly. “Actually, I think our best bet is with Molly. Or with one of the abilities that Rae doesn’t use very often.”

  Rae looked up curiously. “What do you mean? Which ones?”

  Julian explained calmly, “Think of fighting her like fighting Kraigan. Except the second she touches you, she doesn’t take just one of your abilities; she takes out all of them in one fell swoop.”

  For the first time all morning, nervous butterflies started battering against the walls of Rae’s stomach. She remembered very well what it was like to fight Kraigan. He was a nightmare. And even though she’d managed to beat him last time in the parking lot, he’d still managed to get some of her powers along the way. From the sound of it, that wouldn’t cut it with Angel.

  “You can’t hit her,
you can’t knock her down,” Julian continued. “She might go flying, but she’ll get back up and that’ll be it for you. Devon, Luke, and I are basically out unless we try to take her down with something that won’t bring us skin to skin. So that leaves you and Molly. Powers that can disarm without bringing you into direct contact. Electricity is great. You can also use wind, water…anything like that. Things that project.”

  “And all that’s if she decides to go out on another date,” Molly mumbled, looking a bit discouraged for the first time.

  But the more he talked it out, the stronger Julian seemed to become. His eyes gleamed at the chance to right some of the wrongs that had been forced upon him, and he actually dialed the phone with a bit of a smile.

  “You leave that part to me.”

  Chapter 12

  It could not have been more awkward. Rae, Devon, Luke, and Molly stood in an uncomfortable circle while Julian sat on the edge of the bed, trying to ask his fake girlfriend to come over for sex.

  Julian’s fingers drummed nervously on the edge of the phone, and, when the line opened, Rae could have sworn he stopped breathing.

  “Hello?”

  The second he heard the seductive voice, his eyes snapped shut, but, when he spoke, he was collected and calm. “Hey, it’s me.”

  “Julian? I thought you were heading back to England.”

  Rae gritted her teeth as she listened in with Devon’s tatù. The little liar probably gave that exact report to Cromfield when she crept out the window this morning.

  “Plans changed; I’m going to be here another day. Are you still in town? I’d love to see you again before the flight.”

  She giggled lightly. “I bet you’d love to see me again. I’d love to see you again, too. That was pretty intense last night. You’ve got a particular set of skills. Very impressive.”

  Julian bit his lip and glanced self-consciously at the ceiling, while the rest of them discreetly looked every other direction in an almost comical ‘we’re not here,’ kind of way.