The Wicked City

by Megan Morgan

  “That’s why I’m a leader. You’ll be helping us,” Sam said to Robbie. “Your skills will be useful. Yours won’t,” he said to Cindy. “You can drive the car.”

  Cindy made a displeased sound.

  “This is a huge risk,” June said. “Not just for me. For you, too.”

  “By next week the Institute will be crumbling,” Sam said. “When Ethan goes to press with his story, all hell will break loose. I’d like to get my knife in before they completely bleed out.”

  “I think we should take Micha with us,” June said, trying not to sound anxious.

  “Why? He’s not going to be useful.”

  “He’s not well. He’s acting even stranger than he was before. We can’t leave him here alone. We can just put him in the car or something.”

  “We might be able to use him actually,” Cindy said. “Let Eric Greerson see him. Make him aware of what’s going on. The more people we have on our side the better, especially if that person happens to be the head of the Institute.”

  Sam was silent a moment, and then he said, “You’re starting to think like me. I like it.”

  Cindy smiled.

  “If he’s ill, though,” Robbie spoke up, “he might encumber us.”

  “You’re a big-time telekinetic,” Sam said. “You can move his carcass.”

  Robbie frowned. His expression darkened, and it reminded June of when he’d went off on the weird rant at his house.

  Muse was still twitching—only one side of her face now. “I’m trying to read Micha and his mind is such a jumble I can’t sort it out.”

  June tensed. “This can’t be my power affecting him. It doesn’t work that way. I told you guys, my power doesn’t make people sick.”

  “Maybe he’s just more pathetic than normals usually are.” Sam turned and walked over to the windows. “I know where we can have this press conference. But before I throw myself on the fire for you one more time, June, I want to ask you a question.”

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “Are you willing to die for your brother?”

  “Of course I am.”

  “Noble,” Sam said, “and easy. So next question.” He fixed her with a glittering gaze. “Are you willing to kill for him?”

  * * * *

  Sam made some phone calls. June went out on the balcony and smoked one cigarette, and then another. She paced in the cold, filled with an anxiety even nicotine couldn’t assuage. Afterward, she checked on Micha and found him still asleep and feverish. Sam quickly received word Eric had accepted his choice of venue. Planning began.

  “Promontory Point,” Sam said. He had pulled a small table in between the sofas, and they all huddled around it. “The field house. Three p.m.” He looked at his watch. “We’ve got roughly three hours.”

  “Promontory Point?” Cindy gaped at Sam. “That’s Paranormal Alliance territory.”

  “No kidding? I was there when the treaty doled it out to us. Why do you think I chose it? They’ll be on my turf. Everyone at the Institute who isn’t an idiot knows that place is mine and they’ll be on their best behavior.”

  June didn’t know what “Promontory Point” denoted, but she didn’t bother asking. Sam started hashing out his plan. Cindy peered over his shoulder; Robbie seemed edgy; Muse sat at Sam’s side, silent and twitching.

  “This is pretty straightforward.” Sam had drawn a picture on a piece of notebook paper, more inexplicable than “straightforward.” In the middle he’d made a square, some squiggly lines on one side, and a big rectangle on the other.

  “When we get to the park, Robbie, you’ll take June down to the revetment, so no one knows she’s there.” Sam tapped the squiggly lines. “And you can take Micha down there with you. I’m not leaving him in the car for someone to see and blow our game. Robbie will act as a lookout and go-between.” He tapped the square in the middle. “I have to be at the press conference in the field house. Ethan will be there too. He’ll signal Robbie when it’s time, and Robbie, you tell June to come up. June, you’ll meet up with Ethan at the field house and go inside.”

  “And then what?” June asked.

  “You walk your ass into the press conference. Step up to the mic, say something witty. For my entertainment, at least. You owe me that much.”

  “And I get Jason out of there?” June asked. “If he’s there.”

  “If he’s not, there’s going to be hell to pay anyway.” Sam tapped the square again. “No one’s going to stop you walking out of there, not in front of all those cameras. Robbie, you bring Micha up from the revetment when the conference is over and everyone comes outside.”

  “That could ruin the whole plan,” Robbie said. “If Eric walks out, do you think others won’t be behind him? Micha’s presence will start a riot.”

  “It’ll create a diversion,” Sam said.

  This was the first time June had heard Robbie argue with him.

  “June will have a better chance of getting out of there if everyone is distracted,” Sam said. “If I can’t tell Eric the truth, I can’t. But June and Jason will still escape, so it won’t be for nothing.”

  June clenched her fists in her lap.

  “June,” Sam said. “You and your brother will run like hell for the parking lot where Cindy will be waiting with the car.” Sam turned to Cindy. “Get them out of there. Don’t wait for the rest of us. Take them to the airport. There will be tickets and a flight itinerary in the glove box.”

  “Tickets?” June said. “Back to California?”

  “When you get home,” Sam said, “I want you to tell the police, tell the press, tell everyone you know what happened to you here. That, combined with Ethan printing the story I gave him, will have shit raining down on them from everywhere. At the very least, they’ll be forced to close their doors pending investigation.”

  “It all sounds so easy,” June said.

  “Trust me, it won’t be.”

  Sam sent Muse, Cindy, and Robbie to arrange the details. Before Cindy left, she turned to June and delved into her huge purse.

  “Take this.” Cindy pulled her gun out and held it out to June, butt first.

  June stared at it.

  Cindy jerked it at her. “You might need it. It’s the least I can do.”

  “You’ll be driving the getaway car,” June said. “I think that’s quite a lot.”

  “You might need to shoot someone.”

  June took the gun, delicately. The weapon was lighter than she expected, and she held it out at arm’s length, fearing she would accidentally pull the trigger. Cindy hurried out the door after the other two.

  “Thanks,” June said after her.

  Sam produced a duffel bag full of clothes and toiletries from one of the closets. “I keep stuff in here in case I ever need to make a getaway. I have bags all over the city, actually. I’m going to give you this one in case you can’t get back to California right away.”

  “I haven’t brushed my teeth in over a week,” June said. “I’m not too concerned with hygiene right now. I’m more focused on living.”

  “Still,” Sam said. “It’ll make me feel like a Good Samaritan. Take it.”

  “Thanks.” She placed the gun gingerly on one of the sofas. “We need to get Micha ready too.”

  June went into the bedroom and fished a blue cable-knit sweater out of Micha’s bag and, with Sam’s help, got it on him. She wanted to keep him from freezing to death when they hauled him out in the cold. He barely woke up during the procedure.

  “He’s burning up,” Sam said. “Jesus Christ.”

  “He needs a doctor, I think. He was also talking about Rose earlier.”

  “He remembers?”

  “I don’t know. It was strange. Like, he seemed to remember, but there wasn’t any emotion attached to it.”

  “Something is definitely going on with him. As soon as we get you and your brother out of here, I’ll try to get a docto
r to look at him. I have several private ones.”

  “Thanks.”

  When they returned to the main room, June spied a furry form slipping into the duffel bag on the floor.

  “Dipster,” she said sternly.

  The cat gazed out at her, eyes reflecting the light.

  “I was only kidding about taking you with me. You don’t wanna go where I’m going, trust me.”

  She sat down on the sofa. “I’ve never fired a gun,” she said. “This thing is useless in my hands.”

  Sam sat next to her and picked the gun up. He turned it over in his hands. “It’s a Glock twenty-six,” He pushed something, and a narrow cylinder slid out the bottom. “Fully loaded, you’ve got ten shots.”

  “Is the safety on?” June eyed the gun cautiously.

  “Glocks don’t have safeties.” He pushed the cylinder back in. “The safety is in the trigger. They don’t fire unless you squeeze it. You can shake it.”

  He did, and June winced.

  “You can drop it,” he said. “Throw it against a wall, it won’t fire. You have to actually pull the trigger. It’s accurate. Very little recoil, so it won’t jerk your arm out of the socket. The only thing that scares me is Cindy totes it around.”

  “I’m not sure I have the guts to use it.” June hadn’t been able to answer Sam’s question earlier, about killing for her brother.

  Sam motioned for her to stand up. She did, wary, and watched, cringing inwardly, as Sam stood up as well and reached around her side.

  “We’ll tuck it in your pants.” Sam stood so close she could smell him. Apparently he was still making showers a priority, as well as that interesting cologne he wore.

  “You promise it won’t go off?” June said.

  “Not unless you reach down and squeeze the trigger.” He made a space between her jeans and body. “You don’t have to be afraid. You can handle this gun.” He worked the muzzle into her pants.

  “Why are you still helping me?” she asked. “Is this really benefiting you?”

  “I hate the Institute. I’d do anything to make them pay.” He drew back.

  The gun pressed against her hip, heavy and menacing. “It has to be more than that. You sound like you’ve got enough evidence to back them into a corner. You don’t need my plight to help you accomplish anything.”

  “Do you want me to say I care about you? That I’ve taken some kind of liking to you?” He shrugged. “Maybe I have.”

  “You don’t care about me. You don’t know me. You don’t know anything about me.”

  “I know you’re willing to risk your life to save your brother.”

  “I ran when they took my brother.”

  “If you hadn’t, you wouldn’t be able to save him now. Things happen the way they do for a reason. I know what’s inside you.”

  “You don’t.” She tensed, on the defensive. “You see me in this situation, fighting because I have to. I’m not like you, Sam. I’m not proud of this thing I have. I grew up ashamed of what I am, when I saw it ruin lives and break up my parents. I never embraced it, and I never will. I’m an artist. I tattoo people. I hang out with my friends in shitty bars. I like whiskey and wine and I’ve never figured out how to have a boyfriend longer than six months. I’m a mess, but it’s my life. It’s normal, compared to all this. I just want a normal life.”

  “I know what you want.” His eyes were intensely dark. “I know why you act the way you do, why you look the way you do. You draw attention to everything else so no one notices the one thing you want to hide.”

  She took a step back, an instinctive wall going up. “I’m not this thing inside me. I don’t give a damn about the paranormal community, and activists, and science. This world just wants to make me a lab rat. You don’t know me, Sam, because you’ve only seen me trying to escape my inevitable persecution.”

  “June.” He spoke as though addressing a temperamental child.

  “Listen to me.” She held up a hand. “Everything you’ve done for me is phenomenal. I will be indebted to you until the day I die, which hopefully won’t be any time soon. But please, don’t think I have some emotional connection to you or anyone else here, not even Micha. I just want to get my brother and go home, and after that, I never want to see this city again.”

  “I can understand that, trust me.”

  “No you can’t. You love this city, and these people. You love your followers. You’re kinda crazy, but you’re a good person. I can see that. But we don’t want the same things.”

  He snorted. “You think I’m a good person?”

  “I think you’re a great person.”

  “As great as your darling Micha?” He motioned toward the bedroom.

  “I told you, I have no emotional connection to him.”

  “You feel more than you think you do.”

  “We could all die today.” She raised her voice. “The only thing I’m feeling right now is terrified.”

  He reached out, grabbed the back of her head, and jerked her in close; he was surprisingly strong. June widened her eyes.

  “Just shut up and kiss me good-bye,” he whispered, close to her mouth. “I’ll regret it if you don’t.”

  June stared into his eyes, so close. “Who do you think you are?” The words didn’t come out as severe as she wanted them to.

  “I know who I am, but you don’t know me. You mistake me for a selfless person. I’m not, and it’s better that you’re leaving. Now do as I say, like you’ve been doing all along.”

  June did, though she wasn’t sure if the kiss was of her own volition. Sam’s lips felt the way they had at the pier, soft and smooth but much more yielding this time. She liked it, found herself willing and sinking into it. When he broke the kiss and drew back, her cheeks were burning. Sam turned away.

  “Don’t get yourself confused with someone else.” He snatched his mug from the table. “You’ll realize who you are, who you really are, before this is over.”

  June patted her hip and the gun under her waistband, awkward and searching for something intelligent to say in return. She didn’t know how to react, if she even should react, if she needed to. She licked her lips and tasted Sam’s mouth, the taste of coffee and something dark and dangerous and thrilling. Her stomach sank. His words foretold the end of her life as she knew it. She couldn’t turn back now.

  “You’re awful pushy.” She tried to sound belligerent. She didn’t so much.

  “Someone has to be.”

  Chapter 12

  The others returned with two cars, and they left for Promontory Point a half hour before the press conference. Sam, June, and Muse rode in one car, while Robbie, Cindy, and Micha followed in the other.

  June sat in the passenger seat, Sam driving, entombed in tense silence. They took a freeway, speeding over pavement washed white by the winter’s punishments. The lake loomed to their left, choppy and dark under a low bleak sky. They seemed to be driving to the end of the world, and June figured they probably were. Sam's earlier, prophetic words still rang in her ears. His knuckles were white on the steering wheel, his skin pale in the stark light. He glanced at her.

  “What did you mean?” she asked, voice low. “Not to get myself confused with someone else?” She didn’t care if Muse heard, but speaking too loudly seemed wrong.

  “Most people like to think they’re someone they’re not.” He flexed his fingers on the wheel. “It’s a symptom of being alive in this world, in this day and age. It’s worse for us, for people like us.”

  She gazed past Sam, at the water. “What if I don’t like the person I might actually be?”

  “Of course you don’t like the person you actually are. That’s why you don’t try to be her.”

  “What will happen to you after today?”

  “What will happen to any of us? Let’s throw the dice and find out.”

  When they exited the freeway, the clock on the dashboard said 2:56. They entered
a parking lot situated below an overpass, the lot packed with cars and news vans. They parked at the back of the lot, and Cindy pulled in beside them. A tunnel opened beneath the overpass, gaping like a mouth, complete with an arch of granite teeth waiting to chew them up.

  “Looks like the whole damn circus is here,” Sam said.

  June wanted to get out, and at the same time, she wanted to stay in. Her brother might be close, but untold dangers stood between them. She slid her hand over her left hip, over the bump under her jacket.

  Everyone started getting out. June opened her door.

  Cindy's face was scrunched up as she got out of the other car, her cell phone in hand. Robbie got out of the backseat and pulled Micha out after him. Micha was sagging, limbs flopping. Even though Robbie was slightly shorter, he didn’t seem to exert any great physical effort in maneuvering Micha upright.

  “This is perfect,” Sam said. “Everyone’s here by now. I can make an entrance.”

  “Sam,” Cindy said, “I just got a call from Kevin.”

  “How unfortunate.” Sam grabbed the duffel bag out of the back of the car and held it out to June. “Put that in the other car.”

  June took the bag with a mumbled “thank you.” She opened the back door of Cindy’s car and set the bag on the floor of the backseat. When she turned around, Muse was watching her, one eye twitching rhythmically. Muse had her fluffy furry white coat wrapped around her, like the day June met her. She still looked like a snowball with legs.

  “Kevin said the police came by to dig the bullet out of the bar,” Cindy said. “Except…they didn’t find one.”

  Sam went still. Cindy withered under his gaze.

  “What?” Sam asked.

  “He said there wasn’t a bullet in the bar when they went to take it out.”

  Sam was unmoving except his hair being tugged by the wind. Muse, standing beside him, was also completely still, her face blank and no longer twitching.

  “How could there be no bullet in the bar?” June asked. “We saw the hole.”

  “I knew it.” Sam glanced sideways at Muse.

  “What the hell is going on?” June asked.