We were so busted.
A man approached us, dressed in the generic hotel uniform colors of black and green. I gave up all hope of remaining anonymous.
“Such a pleasure to have you here, Ms. Tanis, Mr. Dillon,” he sputtered, rubbing his hands together. “May I escort you to a table? We can have someone bring you a selection of dishes for you to choose from.”
My stomach spasmed with joy at the offer. I beat it down with a wishful dream of trying to be normal. “No, thank you. We’d just like to get in line and eat like everyone else.” I’d had enough of special treatment and of lonely empty rooms with only Mike and me at a table.
I smiled and shuffled forward with the rest of the waiting customers. “But if you could charge it to our room, I’d appreciate it. Seems we left our wallets upstairs, and, well, we sent our chips away with one of the attendants.”
“Oh, certainly. Yes. Definitely.” He backtracked, stopping only to whisper something to the cashier. The line reassembled around us with looks of either relief or envy from the other customers. The cashier waved us through, and we walked into the main dining area.
The spread was incredible, to say the least. Laid out in a horseshoe pattern, the buffet started at one end with various types of hot meats and moved along through the side dishes and salads, finally ending somewhere in the distance with enough desserts to put anyone into a diabetic coma. A football field of food.
I was in culinary heaven. My stomach roared with anticipation as I contemplated my first charge at the counters.
“May I offer you some personal service to help salve your appetite?” Hunter leaned in, whispering. His lips brushed my ear. “I’m all about the personal service.” He picked up a bright orange tray from the stack sitting by the counter.
My cheeks burned. “I’ll keep it under consideration.” I plucked the tray out of Hunter’s hands and headed for the prime rib. My heartbeat skipped up from idle to revving like a street machine about to burst out of the gate.
He dutifully followed exactly two paces behind like a slave boy. I pushed that fantasy into a corner, replacing it with the two-foot-long meat pillar in front of me. One dream at a time.
The chef carved and placed a single inch-thick slab on my plate. I eyed him for a second before he added another slice.
“Thank you.” I moved onto the vegetables, picking up double scoops of mashed potatoes, Yorkshire pudding and enough peas and carrots to sink the Titanic. The tray groaned under the weight as I staggered towards an empty table in the far corner of the eating area.
“You know, most men would be intimidated at having a woman outperform them on the eating stage.” Hunter settled down beside me. His tray held a single slice of prime rib, dangerously rare and bleeding all over the plate, soaking into the loaded baked potato. A bowl held a handful of green beans.
I left the tray there and headed for the beverage counter. A large glass of sweet tea completed what I thought to be a decent-sized meal.
Upon my return I discovered my tray had somehow expanded my food choices to the point of absurdity. I’d gained some fried chicken, French fries and a bowl of coleslaw. Two creampuffs and a slice of chocolate cream pie finished off the obscene scenario. I sat down, both repelled and attracted to the mini-buffet in front of me.
Hunter grinned as he looked down at his own small meal. “I thought you needed some extras. Eat now. Worry later.” He picked up a fork and pointed at the dinosaur-sized slab of medium-rare meat. “You’ll need the energy later, and you can’t live on chocolate bars and energy drinks forever. Besides, it’ll keep David off my back. He’s worse than my mother used to be and trust me, she was always stuffing me like a Thanksgiving turkey.”
The meat was fork-tender, melting in my mouth. I picked up a piece of Yorkshire pudding and mopped up some of the gravy, trying not to drool. My hunger abated for the moment, my mind moved to business.
“I don’t like waiting for Lamarr to contact us. Gives him too much power.”
Hunter shrugged, dissecting his slice with surgeon-like precision into bite-size pieces. “It’s the best option right now. And the only one.”
“But we shouldn’t be partying in Vegas,” I mumbled through a mouthful of potato and gravy. “We should be doing so much more, helping more people.”
“We could. But we can’t.” His knife rose in the air, pointing up. “We can’t be everywhere, Jo. The Agency figured that out right off the bat, creating their Disaster Response Teams.”
“Which was worth squat,” I grumbled. “Nothing more than a show for the media.”
At first a great idea, the DRT had been hampered from the start by international laws keeping them in check and unable to do much of anything other than pose for publicity shots and visit hospitals that needed supplies more than a celebrity appearance. Every super rotated through the Teams at some point, racking up the Public Relations badge for our sashes. Mike and I had ended up on some desolate island in the Pacific almost destroyed by a tsunami. Three hours in the hospital glad-handing doctors and nurses, posing for pictures with traumatized patients and spending only twenty minutes lifting rubble off the shoreline for a vanished village that’d never be rebuilt.
“Don’t discount the publicity. It got a lot of donations to the major charities that wouldn’t have come in if not for the DRT.” A green bean waved at me before disappearing into his mouth. “You can’t save the world by yourself, Jo. The Agency understood that, you need to.” His lips twisted up into a sad smile. “People die. Good people die. And sometimes there’s nothing you can do to save them.”
His voice broke on the last word. He looked down at his half-empty plate then closed his eyes, shutting out the world around us.
I dropped my fork and took his hand. May had been more than just an assignment to Hunter, she had been a surrogate mother and good friend. In the short time I’d known the psychic, she’d proven herself to have the biggest heart of anyone, super or norm.
Hunter sat there for a few minutes, his face struggling through a series of emotions. He let out a staggered sigh.
My heart ached. May’s last directive had been to transfer ownership of her Guardian to me. It wasn’t Agency procedure, there were no rules for what had happened, but her last request had stuck with both of us. Even if we didn’t have a clue how to make this work.
“It’ll be okay,” I whispered, not caring if anyone saw or heard us. “We’ll be okay.”
His eyes opened, brimming with tears. A faint smile broke through. “Can’t wait for that bikini shot.”
I released his hand with a snort and turned to demolishing the tower of food on my plate. “We’ll negotiate that later.”
“Ne-go-ti-ate,” Hunter repeated with a wide grin like a child loose in a toy shop. “I like the sound of that.”
“Eat.” I pointed at his tray of food.
We finished up our late lunch/early dinner with a fight over the last creampuff. I didn’t want it, Hunter ordered me to eat it.
I raised one eyebrow. “‘Order’?”
“As your Guardian, yes.” He rocked back in the chair and crossed his arms. “I’m not going to have you pass out if we get into a brawl.”
“I don’t do orders.” The fat pastry sat in my hand.
“So, what used to happen, Jo Tanis, when you didn’t take orders?” He leaned forward, a playful twinkle in his eye. “Should I be looking to punish you?”
I smirked.
Exploding the creampuff took almost no effort, the delicate pastry and white insides washing over both our faces.
“Punish this.” My tongue pulled in a mouthful of wafer-thin pastry and super-sweet custard.
“Oh God. Don’t tease me like that,” he mouthed around the cream filling now covering most of his face. “I surrender. Have mercy.”
I tossed him a handful of napkins, keeping some to clean the remainder of the filling off my own face. Even though I couldn’t see them, I knew a dozen cameras were snapping up pictures and
posting them online. It was half-forced, half-legitimate fun on our part.
Hunter finished wiping his face with a chuckle. “So what are you going to say to GroundPounder?”
“His name is Brian Lamarr.” I wadded up the pile of napkins and tossed them on the empty tray. “I don’t like my name. I doubt he cared for his.”
“Understood.” Hunter added his napkin to the mess. “So what are you going to say?”
“Ask him to reconsider his choice. Explore his options. He doesn’t have to be a villain anymore.”
“And if he persists?” A series of flashes came from our right, just beyond the entrance. I belatedly noticed that all the tables around us were empty, suspiciously empty. There was no official announcement, no beefy bouncers standing around. We had been given our own section out of respect.
Or fear.
I picked up my sweet tea and slurped the last few drops through the straw. “If we have to fight, we’ll fight. But I want to try and talk to him first. He deserves that much of a chance after the way we were all treated.”
Hunter studied his half-empty glass. “I’m only advising you as a Guardian now, not as a super. You know in some cases it wasn’t that hard to decide which side someone wanted to play on. You had a choice, but for some people it was clear right from the start.”
I pushed a lone green bean around my plate. “Mike may have alluded to it.”
“Some people are just born bad, Jo. If they hadn’t been supers, they’d be criminals anyway, beating up on little old ladies in back alleys.” He nodded towards the growing crowd of spectators. “That woman who just got your signature? Prime target for someone like Lamarr.” His tone dropped a notch. “Like yesterday.”
I ignored the reference to my abortive alley experience. “People can change. Look at Steve, Harris. They were bad guys, and they’re doing just fine now.”
“True. It’s possible in some cases. I don’t know how much of an asshole Harris Limox was before he came to the Agency, and Steve seems to be a pretty good egg.” He emptied the glass. “But it’s been my experience that by a certain age, people stick to the path they’ve chosen, good or bad.” There was a certain steeliness to his words I hadn’t heard before. A small voice in the back of my mind reminded me I knew nothing about Hunter Dillon before he joined the Agency. Who he was before he became May’s Guardian and our personal four-leaf clover.
The buffet manager trotted over to stand by my side. He held out a cell phone.
“Ms. Surf, there’s a phone call for you.”
Hunter looked at me before answering. “Who is it?”
“He says his name is,” the young man mumbled, “GroundPounder.”
I reached over and took the phone, releasing the manager from his errand. He scurried away into the crowd of spectators.
“Who’s this?” I kept my voice low and level.
“Brian Lamarr, at your service.”
“How did you know where to find us?”
He let out a coarse, rough laugh. “You’re the hottest thing to hit Vegas in the last few hours. How could I not find you?”
Hunter stared at me. I tapped my jaw, where the link was located. He got to his feet and moved away from me, already talking to no one around. Which meant he was calling in Steve and Peter.
“You know me, but I don’t really know you.” I watched as Hunter borrowed a cell phone from a thrilled young woman. “Are we correct in assuming that you caused the earthquake near Erie?”
“You wouldn’t be far from wrong.”
I tucked the phone under my cheek, reached for one of the remaining paper napkins and started tearing it into small pieces. “Well, I could start giving you a whole big speech, but I think we’re both too old for that bullshit.”
Lamarr chuckled. “Ah, Jo, you’re as smart as you are cute. Bet Mike loved banging that cute ass of yours.”
Hunter caught my eye and nodded, pointing at the cell phone.
“Look, why don’t you come on over from wherever you are, and we’ll grab a beer and talk.” I folded one piece into tiny squares. Origami master I am not. “I’m no Guardian, you know that. Let’s pop a cool one and talk things over. Tell me what you want, and we’ll work something out.”
“You’re a weird one, girl.” The juvenile laugh grated on my ears. “Those Agency bastards want me dead, right?”
“We don’t work for the Agency anymore. You know that.”
Peter and Stephen appeared out of the growing crowd, heading towards Hunter.
Hunter glanced at them then at me, mouthing the word Jessie.
“Ah, yes, I’d forgotten. So now we’re all free agents, right?”
Hunter drew a triangle in the air with his index finger. Either he had joined the Illuminati, or he was trying to get Jessie to triangulate Lamarr’s position, using the Agency satellites to pull off another trick.
“I didn’t come here to kill you.” Another tiny napkin square joined the pile on the orange tray.
“Ain’t that nice of you,” he crooned. “Always thought you were a sweet girl.”
“Okay, I’ll come to you. Does that work?” I ignored the slashing motions being made by Hunter. Steve’s face had gone scarlet. Peter just shook his head and stared at the floor. A small crowd gathered nearby, cell phones snapping images while people chattered about who they had seen in Vegas.
“I can do that. Tell you what, get your pretty little ass over to Fremont Street right now. I’ll find you there in about twenty minutes.”
“Done. Fremont Street in twenty.” I hung up and tossed the phone on the table.
Hunter approached me. “Jessie’s working on getting the bastard’s exact location.”
“I thought we had that already,” Steve growled. He sat down across from me. “Fremont Street.”
I got up from the table, leaving the napkin mess behind. “You stay in touch with Jessie and give me updates over the link. If we can keep tracking that phone, it’ll be an advantage in the future if he keeps it with him. I’ve got to fly.” I rose off the ground, my bare hands grabbing at the waves.
Hunter’s hand landed on my arm, trying to press me down into my seat. “You’re not going to meet him alone,” he said in a low, warning tone. “You’re not.”
I locked eyes with him. “I am. I said I’d be there, and I’m not a liar.”
We stared at each other. The skin on the back of my neck started to prickle, right around the plug. This was where we drew the line between Guardian and super, leader and follower. I didn’t care who was on top in bed, but I’d be damned if I gave up my freedom right after earning it.
After a few seconds Hunter’s lips twitched upwards into a half-smile, signaling his retreat. “You play rough.”
“You have no idea,” I said. “I’ve got to go.”
Peter broke in. “It’s dangerous, Jo. You don’t know what he’s going to do.”
“True. But I can’t turn my back on him, not yet. Not without talking to him.” I looked at each of the team members in turn. “How can I, in good conscience, try to kill him without trying to reason with him first? That’d make me no better than the Agency, popping heads ’cause we wouldn’t fight for them.”
Hunter crossed his arms in front of him and stared at the ground. “Doesn’t mean it won’t be dangerous.” There was a catch in his throat.
“I’ve got to go. We can’t risk him tearing up the Strip to get my attention if I don’t show.” I nodded at Peter as I hovered in the air. “Send some animal friends to watch me, but don’t interfere. Please. I’ll return as soon as I can. Listen in on the link and if I need help, I’ll call for it.”
“What’s the first rule?” Hunter demanded.
“This is different,” I protested. “I know you’ve got my back.” I cleared my throat. “Thanks for lunch.”
I didn’t wait for the response but moved off, passing over the heads of the spectators with ease. A thousand cell phone cameras flashed around me.
God ble
ss them, the doormen had the presence of mind to open the double doors before I got there and either slammed into the glass like a wayward mosquito or hovered there like a butterfly. Not that I wasn’t slow enough, maneuvering around the garish slot machine displays and almost impaling myself on the handlebars of one motorcycle hanging from the ceiling that I could WIN RIGHT NOW if I dropped a few dollars in the machines below. But I really didn’t want to land and risk being tied down with a crowd pawing at me for autographs, photographs and asking questions.
The second I cleared the front doors I shot up sixty feet into the air, stopping traffic for a few minutes while the cameras snapped away. Seconds later the cars started moving again as if a super flying along the Strip was an everyday occurrence.
Fremont lay in a straight run up the Strip, and as long as I didn’t clip any treasure ships or get caught in any spouting fountains or burnt by any volcanoes erupting I’d make it in plenty of time. It was hot, damned hot even with the sun setting and with nary a breeze in the air, making it a pain to pull on my black gloves. I was grateful for Hunter’s extra helping of food.
Fremont Street is a bit of retro Vegas. A lot of the old casinos are there, smelling of tobacco that’s soaked into the carpets and walls so deep that all the air deodorizers in the world can’t take it out. Low ceilings, cheap slot machines and a sense of history fill the buildings on each side of the street. Of course then they went and glitzed it up for the tourists by slapping a large half-moon screen overhead that ran small movie spectacles starting at dusk. The neon signs in front of the casinos dim, the cigar-smoking cowboy flickering once before going out for the show, and we’d all peer up and provide great targets for the pickpockets while being entertained by artificial dancing showgirls kicking high over our heads. Last time I’d seen the show Mike and I perched ourselves on the top of Binion’s, lying down on the roof and giggling like children.
One show was just starting as I landed in an alley leading off the street, taking advantage of the diversion to avoid drawing attention to myself. A trio of jets roared overhead on the curved screen, the light bulbs flashing and racing through the programmed routine to make the illusion work.
Heroes Without, Monsters Within Page 9
