by T. S. Bishop
There was a moment of frozen silence between us. I could feel the pulse in my neck, going rabbit fast. Adrian’s face was like a mask of gentle politeness.
“What do you want?” I whispered, sitting down again slowly. There was no point running from this. He would just find me again, I knew.
“Nothing awful…Sophia,” he said, leaning forward. His eyes blazed with excitement. “I—well, we—need your help. You have no idea how long it’s taken us to find you.”
“Are you with the police? You look a little young for that.”
“No, I’m not with the police. And you’re not in any trouble.”
I snorted involuntarily and looked him up and down.
“People like you don’t follow someone like me into a coffee shop and threaten me for nothing,” I said challengingly, “Cut the crap and tell me what you want.”
“Like I said,” he said patiently, “We need your help. We could really use your powers. Frankly, the three of us are helpless without your input.”
“I don’t have any powers,” I hissed, looking around to see if anyone was listening in on us. They weren’t. We probably looked like a mismatched couple in the middle of a regular argument. “You have the wrong girl!”
“I highly doubt it,” he said, leaning forward so his face was inches from mine. I could have counted his eyelashes if I wanted to. “I’ve spent a lot of time searching for you. Believe me, you’re the one I want.”
“If I had even a scrap of witchy powers, don’t you think I would have used them to—I don’t know, blast you away or teleport myself out of this excruciating conversation? I’m telling you, I’m not the girl!”
“It is odd that you wouldn’t try any offensive magic on me,” Adrian said thoughtfully, “Are you sure you’ve never done anything…unexplainable?”
“No,” I said, resolutely not thinking about how I could sense the glow from magical objects, “I’m completely incapable of doing magic.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Adrian said, “You might have some kind of block on your abilities. I can’t know for sure that nobody else got to you in all this time and changed something.”
“Well I can,” I said scathingly, “Unless you think I’m such an idiot that I wouldn’t realize if someone had messed with me—“
“They might have altered your memories,” he returned, unnervingly calm about discussing the possibility of someone getting into my head and picking things out from there. He took advantage of my stunned silence.
“Just come and meet us,” he pleaded, “There are some people who might be able to change your mind, even if I can’t. We have an office in Wicker Park--”
“No,” I said immediately, “I don’t trust you. We either meet in public or not at all.”
“Fine, meet me back here tomorrow,” he said, unfazed. He drew a card out of his pocket, scribbled something on it and handed it to me. I took it gingerly, like I was handling an explosive. It was made of thick, expensive card stock.
“It’s blank,” I said, surprised.
“It’ll activate once you give it to me tomorrow,” he explained, “Just in case someone else gets here instead of me and my friends.”
“Has anyone ever told you that you’re kind of paranoid?”
He smiled, a different smile than the ones from before. This one was thin, grim and soldierly.
“Oh, yes. Better to be careful than dead though.”
“I didn’t realize those were your only options.”
“You’ll soon realize that there are a lot of people eager to get hold of someone like you.” He got up with a crisp movement, folding his coat around his shoulders so quickly that it almost like a magic trick. He nodded at me somberly.
No more carefree smiles and gentle flirting, apparently.
“I’ll see you tomorrow, Sophia. Take care of yourself.”
I watched him leave, a well-dressed boy who was nearly a head taller than everyone else on the street. I still had his card in my hand.
He had left his iced coffee on the table. The glass was sweating, and he hadn’t bothered taking a sip.
I pulled it over to myself defiantly. There was no use wasting good coffee, I decided.
Especially when the world seemed to be going to hell in a handbasket.
Chapter 3
Eli
It was past midnight, and the street was deserted, except for one figure in a hoodie. It was a man, and he was standing oddly still, as though carved from stone. The cold wind had no apparent effect on him, he didn’t move around to feel warm or rub his hands together for circulation.
He was tall, well over six-foot, and well built, although his bulky jacket did a good job of hiding his muscles. It also hid the gun he kept holstered to his abdomen. He was ex-military, and knew his way around guns. He wasn’t a violent man by nature, but violence came easily to him and it paid well.
He was being paid an obscene amount of money by someone whose face he didn’t know, to follow a particular girl. This didn’t bother him. The work never did.
How did he sleep at night? On silk sheets, with a beautiful woman for company.
This was going to be an uneventful night, by his estimation. He hadn’t gotten the go-ahead from his faceless boss to kill the target, so for now he was just performing routine surveillance. His first job had been to track her down.
That was harder than expected, because most of his targets in the past had been criminals on the run, not orphaned kids who ran away to live on the street. She had next to no documentation or paper trail, and the network of homeless people in Chicago were reluctant to give up one of their own, even though she wasn’t technically homeless anymore.
But a few broken limbs got them past the initial resistance, and he got a name of a women’s shelter where she’d spent one night two years ago.
From there, it was easy enough to find a friend from there who saw her sometimes at a shop that sold crap for gullible idiots who believed in magic.
One terrorized shopkeeper later, and he was standing on the street in a residential neighborhood in a shitty part of Chicago, waiting to send proof to his boss.
The only sign that he was alive was his breathing, which crystallized in the air as he exhaled.
He was looking up unblinkingly into an apartment window. He had been standing there since ten pm, ignoring people walking their dogs and people coming home late from work. He got a few suspicious looks, since it was primarily a residential part of Logan Square, far from the noisy bars and restaurants on Milwaukee Avenue, but no one reported him.
There was something about the man that said he was capable of swift and deadly violence if you made the mistake of crossing him. So they didn’t.
Somewhere in the trees, an owl hooted.
The window that interested the man so greatly showed signs of life.
He immediately took out a cellphone from his jacket pocket in a burst of movement, and waited yet again.
A figure appeared at the window. It was a girl, in her early twenties or late teens at a guess. She had red hair and a face that seemed to say ‘don’t mess with me’. He snapped a few pictures quickly, and sent them to his boss.
He started walking away, having gotten what he came for: proof of life. Seconds later, his phone began to ring.
“Boss,” he said into the phone. He wasn’t the kind of man who bothered with pleasantries.
“Eli,” the boss answered. The boss had the accent of an educated man. He sounded to Eli like the kind of man who had a seven-bedroom house Highland Park, a wife who wore pearls handed down to her by her mother and Chanel suits, and children with white, even teeth and healthy tans. They probably had a golden retriever to complete the picture.
In short, not the kind of man you’d immediately assume would be capable of sending violent men to hunt down an apparently harmless girl.
“Did you get my message?”
“Yes, you’ve found the girl. Well done, I expected nothing less from you.�
�
“I reconned the place too. Buzzer system on the front door, and her lock’s broken. I can make it look like an accident. Gas leak, carbon monoxide poisoning, drug overdose. She’ll be in the papers for a day, but nobody’s going to bother looking into the death of one more teenage girl. This is Chicago.”
“Slow down, my bloodthirsty friend,” said the boss smoothly, “I’m not going to give the kill order till I’m sure she can’t help us. Which means I need to see her in person first.”
“No problem. She’s made plans to meet someone from the Sanctum tomorrow, it shouldn’t be a problem to intercept her before that happens.”
“Are you sure? I don’t know how much experience you have with bringing someone in, er, alive and if I need to get someone else for this job—“
“Piece of cake, boss. I’ll call in my old crew. They owe me a favor.”
“All right, I’ll pay double what I promised. Each.”
The boss, Eli decided, was at heart a reasonable man.
Abducting a young woman who couldn’t possibly pose a threat to anyone wasn’t exactly the job he’d signed up for.
But hey, business was business.
Chapter 4
“Well look who it is, ladies! The great Sophia Landry, most wanted criminal, is gracing my humble establishment!”
There was a round of jeers and drunk shouting and the sound of glasses slamming on wooden tables in approval.
“Warn me next time before you try to be funny,” I told Jade, the grizzled and tattooed bartender who was wiping glasses behind the bar.
“What’re you lookin’ at?” Jade snapped at a couple of biker-looking guys who were sitting at the bar and staring at the two of us—well, mostly at me. They muttered something to each other and looked away.
“I guess I’m not going to be crowned Prom Queen this year,” I joked weakly.
Jade gave me an unimpressed look.
She was in her mid-forties, if I had to guess, although there was a picture of her from the opening of the bar twenty years ago when she looked exactly the same, so maybe she was just one of those people that looked the same until they were seventy. She was tall and was incredibly muscled, which she showed off to advantage in sleeveless shirts. She had tattoos criss-crossing her entire body, and as far as I knew only her face and scalp were spared, although her scalp was hidden by her short hair so I couldn’t know for sure.
She was gruff and taciturn, not exactly the type of person you’d invite to brunch and a pedicure, but her rough exterior hid the heart of a true, loyal friend and the brain of a genius.
Jade was practically the first person I ever met who gave a damn about me when I ran away to Chicago. It was my third day or so on the streets, and she later said that I had the mean, starved look of a dog that had been kicked too often, which was probably accurate.
I had broken into someone’s house the night before and stolen a tea set that glowed with protective magic, and I was looking to fence it for some quick cash for a hot meal. This was before I met Jeremiah, so I didn’t have any solid contacts who would take what I had, no questions asked.
After getting kicked out of various magical pawnbrokers establishments, Jade’s bar was the last on my list.
She took one look at me, with my unwashed hair and bruises under my eyes from lack of sleep and took me to the back room, which had a clean cot and a door that locked.
She had my undying loyalty ever since.
“What’s going on?” I asked, lowering my voice. My eyes flicked towards the two guys who seemed to be absorbed in their beers and over to the nearby table of businessmen who had apparently decided that Jade’s Watering Hole was the kind of dive bar to drown their sorrows this fine Wednesday. “I got your message. Something’s up?”
“Someone’s been looking for you,” she said grimly, lips barely moving, “And he’s bad news from top to toe.”
I almost didn’t recognize the look on Jade’s face because I was so unused to seeing anything other than an irritated frown, but this time she was worried.
“I know the guy,” I said, “I met him yesterday. He’s annoying but I can take care of it. I’m seeing him again today.”
“But he was only just here looking for you this morning,” Jade said, frowning.
“Huh? You’re talking about Adrian, right? Tall and preppy looking kid?”
“No, I’m talking about the guy who looked like he could tear out your jugular with his teeth,” Jade snapped, putting down the glass she was wiping, “I’m not messing around, Sophia. You need to watch out. He was here sniffing around and asking questions. Know what he wants?”
“No idea,” I said, taken aback, “I don’t think I’ve ever met him before. Did he say what he wanted?”
“’A word,’ apparently,” she said, with evident disbelief, “But I wouldn’t be surprised if that escalated into something more violent. You lay low for a few days, and I’ll tell you if he comes around again being nosy.”
“All right,” I said, mind spinning, “But what if he’s waiting right outside for me to leave. He could see me when I leave.”
“I wasn’t born yesterday,” Jade said, rolling her eyes at me, “I told him you would be at the Randolph Street market looking for trinkets.”
“It isn’t even open on weekdays though,” I objected.
“How was he going to know? I know he’s not a local, he asked me if Wicker Park was more or less than a ten minute walk from here.”
“Jade, you’re a genius,” I said, and hugged her. She immediately squirmed out of my grasp like a large, muscular eel and glared at me.
“You better go and stock up on necessaries before he comes calling,” she warned.
“Cross my heart and hope to die,” I promised.
And I fully intended to follow her advice.
I just had one appointment to keep before that though.
I slid into Heavenly Grounds an hour later, keeping an eye out for Adrian but he hadn’t arrived yet. Well, I was there an hour early.
The barista at the counter recognized me and had my order going in a moment, so I was free to people watch out the front window.
There were the usual young moms with strollers and retirees on their afternoon walks, as well as teenagers who had just gotten done with school and were walking home. There was one conspicuous outlier: a guy in a black trench coat who was standing under the awning of a shop on the opposite side of the street.
He was wearing sunglasses, which was unusual on such a cloudy day. And he was watching the entrance to Heavenly Grounds with an unblinking intensity. I nicknamed him ‘Shifty’ in my head.
Further down the road, another man in similar black clothes was leaning against a lamp post and trying to look casual. But his eyes kept drifting to Heavenly Grounds as well. I was going to call him ‘The Amateur’.
And to the left, I saw a man with a briefcase and fedora sitting on the bench next to the bus stop, reading the paper…which he was holding upside down. He was ‘Incompetent’, all right.
I turned, ready to go, and almost ran into Adrian. My forehead bumped his nose and I gave a little cry of pain, as he cursed.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, rubbing my forehead.
“No harm done,” Adrian said, plastering a smile onto his face, “So are you ready to get going? We’ve a lot to do today.”
“Yeah, but we have a problem,” I said as we left the shop and started walking. I tugged on his sleeve insistently and forced him to stop and turn around which he did with reluctance.
“What is it?” he asked, with forced patience.
“We’re being watched,” I said, expecting to see surprise or shock. Instead, he just shrugged.
“Well, what did you expect?” he asked coolly, “They were bound to find you some time. At least you’re with me and not them.”
“You weren’t so nonchalant yesterday,” I said slowly. “You were also…significantly taller.”
I reached into my pocket, and, q
uick as a cat I flicked the card he’d given me yesterday at his face.
As soon as the card touched his skin, it exploded in a loud bang of sparks and ash, leaving behind some plain scorched paper that drifted to the ground.
More importantly, it seemed to be a spell nullifier, because the man standing in front of me and going purple with rage had none of Adrian’s regular, handsome features. Instead, he looked like an extra on one of those cop shows, where he could have easily played the guy skimming off the top and getting his fingers chopped off by his mafia boss. Low-level cannon fodder, in other words.
“You stupid bitch!” he said, reaching for something in his pocket.
“That’s not very polite,” I said disapprovingly, reaching for my own tazer.
Even here I would have been able to get out alive and in one piece if the guy hadn’t had back up, which was just plain cowardly.
Before I could aim my tazer at the guy, someone came up behind me and with ruthless efficiency stuffed a handkerchief soaked with chloroform into my face.
The last thing I glimpsed was fake-Adrian’s look of triumph as I sank into darkness.
Chapter 5
When I woke up, it was dark. The kind of complete, blanketing darkness that made you feel like you were in a void without light or sound. Luckily, the ground beneath me was soft and damp and reassuringly earthy so it was less disorienting than it could have been.
I couldn’t even see my own hands in front of me, but I could feel that they were tightly bound together with rope, which was quickly cutting off circulation to my fingers. I spat out the foul-smelling gag that had been stuffed into my mouth, spitting with disgust to get rid of the aftertaste.
