Richmond, Virginia, USA
The manor was silent when Tanya, Sandra, and Jiao returned.
It was creepy, reminding Tanya of how it had felt when they had first arrived and taken down the Mendlesons. There was a chill in the rooms, the lights were off, and there was no one home that they could see.
“How could a couple live here by themselves for so long?” Tanya asked the room.
Jiao answered. “Perhaps that was why they had so many children?”
Tanya supposed she was right. “Still, it’s creepy when it’s quiet. At least when the others were here, there was some kind of atmosphere. It felt more like a home with more people.” Her mind turned to Jennie and the others. “I hope they’re okay.” She checked her phone. “Nothing from them at the minute. How long did they say they’d be gone for?”
“A day or two,” Sandra replied, already searching for the Roomba. A moment later, the droning hum appeared from the device and Sandra clapped her hands.
Tanya and Jiao worked their way around the lower floor and found no one. They headed upstairs, taking their time as they examined each room in turn. A mixture of relief and concern came when they heard activity in the laboratory. Two voices were muffled through the door.
Jiao reached for the handle. Tanya stopped her.
“What if they’re dangerous?” Tanya asked.
Jiao shook her head and opened the door, Tanya close behind. She let out a relieved laugh when she clocked Hendrick and Lupe working around the various benches and work surfaces.
Lupe looked at the door, then looked away.
“Hey guys,” Tanya cried cheerily. “Thought everyone here had gone out and left! This house gets quiet when there’s hardly anyone here.”
Lupe busied himself unpacking a cardboard box. Foam peanuts sprinkled over the floor as he carefully lifted glassware and placed them on the side.
“Funny that, isn’t it?” Lupe grumbled. “Imagine being the only two left in the house.”
The penny dropped on Tanya’s face. She moved her hand to her mouth. “Lupe! I’m so sorry, I got carried away and forgot that you would want to come, too! I should’ve checked, but these last few days have been crazy and I—”
“I heard you,” Lupe interjected, his face sullen. “You forgot. It’s fine.”
A beat of silence passed between them. Lupe carried on unpacking while Hendrick organized the cupboards and started setting out a load of equipment to add to the already confusing assortment of objects scattered around the large makeshift lab.
Tanya sensed the annoyance in Lupe and moved closer. “Lupe…I…”
Lupe raised a hand, his brow furrowed. Although he was clearly annoyed, his voice was soft. “Forget it, Tanya. You’ve actually done me a favor. All this time, I’ve been following around the agents and the specters and thinking that I can play an active part in the battle against injustice. I thought I could do it from the frontlines, but I’m not a fighter. I’m… Well, I don’t know what I am exactly. I can’t shoot, I don’t do well in combat, so Hendrick has offered me an alternative. He’s going to teach me his way. I’m going to become his new apprentice and help in a way that doesn’t put my life at risk and gives me more use.”
Tanya’s head tilted to the side. “Are you sure?”
A reassuring smile appeared on Lupe’s face. “Yeah. Yeah, I am. Was I pissed when I found out you abandoned me? Sure. Of course. But it actually might be the biggest favor you’ve done for me. At least here I can have an impact.” His features softened, and he hugged Tanya. Jiao stood silently beside them. Tanya was certain Lupe wiped a tear from the corner of one eye. “But enough about me. What happened out there? Did you find the Paranormanimals?”
Tanya and Jiao exchanged a look.
“Something like that,” Tanya explained. “We may have a slight problem on our hands.”
Lupe’s smile widened. “When don’t we have problems? Please. Tell me. It’s about time we saw some action since the others are away and hogging it all.”
* * *
Jennie fought sleep with a determination that only she could muster. Eventually, as the night sky wheeled above her, someone familiar came to her side.
She could feel his signature, like a bloodhound trained to the scent of a fox. The moment he entered the room, her mind felt foggy, and she could feel him like fingers rooting around inside it.
“Genevieve.” Peter Zhao’s words were smug. He stepped into view and took a seat on the ledge by the glass, just a few feet from Jennie. “Pleasant evening, isn’t it?”
Jennie growled but declined to speak. She couldn’t move. The bonds were spectrally imbued, so even slipping into specterdom wouldn’t work on the former Dragon.
Zhao stared out over the city. “Amazing, isn’t it? The first settlers came to this area in 1624. Just under four hundred years later, here we are. A veritable metropolis. A thousand buildings. A million places to hide.”
Jennie stared at the back of his head, imagined puncturing the skull with a sharp object. Peter swiveled and grinned. “I wouldn’t be thinking that way if I were you. You want your freedom, right? Best start behaving.”
Jennie allowed the thoughts to dissipate. “I didn’t have you down as such a sentimental type. Considering how willing you were to blow up a portion of the neighboring islands.”
“Of course,” Zhao replied. “I wouldn’t dare risk damaging the core of my own city, would I? Four hundred years to build, and a minute to destroy it all. It would be easy, but how would that benefit me at all?”
Jennie raised an eyebrow. She connected to Zhao and filtered through his mind, scanning for something which made sense. Suddenly, as if revealing itself from behind a veil, Jennie saw the truth clearly. “There were never any other bombs, were there?”
Zhao grinned. “Of course, not. You’ve been slipping in and out of consciousness for hours, you’d have seen the bombs if they had been set the way I had told you.”
Jennie’s blood boiled. The part of her thoughts she was trying to keep locked away was threatening to spill. She had to control it. Had to regulate her breathing and focus only on what she wanted Zhao to see.
“Your friends are alive and well,” Zhao continued. “In fact, they destroyed some of my people not too long ago. You may be wondering how I know. My followers are loyal—even more so now—and if they haven’t returned my calls, I can only assume that they’re dead. If not now, then they will be soon. Still, an eye for an eye, I think. Your friends damage my people, I’ll damage theirs. Fair trade, don’t you think?”
He advanced on Jennie with a greedy look on his face. His eyes were dark. He grabbed her wrists over the cuffs and stared into her eyes. “I’ve heard that whatever scars you in mortal life will follow you through to specterdom. I wonder how the great Genevieve King would react to having her eyeballs scooped from her face, one by one. Death wouldn’t be salvation from your blindness, would it?”
Jennie’s nostrils flared. She readied herself.
Zhao cocked his head. “Nothing to reply? Ah, well. I gave you a chance to protest.”
He picked up a Stanley knife and brought it to her face. One hand pinned her neck and kept her head still. She patiently waited, eyes fixing on the point where the blade narrowed to its keen edge.
Zhao started laughing, his hand shaking with each movement. The knife was an inch away when Jennie narrowed her eyes, allowed her conscious thought to register what she’d been hiding. Zhao saw it too late, his attention focused on the blade. She latched onto him and pushed forward with her full force, summoning the energy she had been honing since she was a child.
Peter’s hand slipped from her neck. He flew through the glass without resistance and hovered thirty feet outside the building. A severe drop was below him, and although Jennie knew it was likely he wouldn’t permanently fade from existence, the fall would be enough to send a simple message.
Don’t fuck with me.
Jennie locked eyes with Peter. He tri
ed to wriggle and react, but it was useless. Jennie raised the fingers of one hand as much as she could and gave a simple wave.
Then she let him drop.
* * *
The specters were already riled.
Those who were willing and able to help were outside the warehouse. The plan was simple, to divide and search New York. They’d each been assigned districts and territories, and it would be their role to search in any location where they believed the clues might be leading.
Baxter hoped it would be enough. Already they’d wasted enough time and night had fallen. Soon the bombs would start rolling.
Why hadn’t they already?
He raised Jack’s cell to the sky and angled it for a signal.
“You know that does nothing anymore?” Ruby smirked. “We’re in New York, not the ass-end of Pittsburgh. It’s only rural areas you struggle for signal.”
Baxter grimaced. “Then why aren’t they picking up?”
It was then that the phone started vibrating. He tapped the answer button and put it on speakerphone. “Julia? Rhone? That you?”
Julia’s voice came through. “Erm. Of course. Didn’t it say so on the phone’s screen?”
Baxter had been in such a hurry to answer that he hadn’t even checked.
“No?” he replied.
Carolyn snatched the phone. “Where are you guys? What’s going on? Have you found anything?”
“The whole thing’s a setup,” Julia replied, her voice breathy. “We encountered some of the Dragon’s—sorry, Zhao’s—goons, and we discovered a bomb, too.”
“That’s great!” Baxter called out. “Did you defuse it?”
Julia paused. “Kind of. It’s bad news, guys. The bombs are fake. They’re leading us down a dead end.”
Julia explained the note they’d found and the useless fake bomb which had been sat in the sewer.
“So, what does that mean?” Jimmy asked, turning to each of the group in turn. “It can’t be fake. Roosevelt exploded.”
Rhone’s voice came on the line. “We don’t know. Something’s fishy, here, and it’s not just the run-off waste from the fish markets in the sewer. Where are you guys? We need to reconvene and work this shit out.”
Baxter gave them an address, and they promised they’d be there as quickly as they could. Rhone hung up.
Jimmy’s face was wrinkled in confusion. “What the hell is going on here, guys? Are there bombs, or not?”
Baxter scratched his chin. “I don’t know. Zhao’s either a super genius, or an idiot, but whatever’s going on, he’s already one step ahead of us. He has Jennie, and he has explosives. Whether he’s choosing to blow up more of New York or not, I don’t know, but what we do know is that he’s dangerous.”
“What motivation has he got to destroy the city?” Ruby asked. “Or us for that matter!”
Jack turned to Baxter. “Didn’t you say that Zhao mentioned a name when you interrogated him in his cell? Something about Ray-Man?”
“Ren-Min-Bi is the next Dragon,” Baxter muttered, deep in thought. “What was that?”
Ruby held up her phone screen. “It’s the Chinese currency. Renminbi is the official currency of China.”
Carolyn balked. “What has that got to do with anything going on here?”
Baxter considered this, then let out a frustrated sigh. “Riddles! What is it with this guy and riddles?”
“Maybe there’s something to do with the stock market?” Jack suggested. “Or the travel bureaus. Maybe there’s some kind of link there?”
None of them had any better ideas.
“We’ll wait for the others to get here then work out our next move,” Baxter instructed. “The good news is that we have numbers to move and utilize. The bad news is we’re down one Rogue, and we have no clue where to go next.”
“There’s more bad news,” Carolyn declared, pointing her finger to the sky where a series of black helicopters was flying toward them. It was only when they landed in the open area outside the warehouse that they saw the SIA logo painted on the externals.
Baxter sighed. “Oh, shit.”
Chapter Thirty
New York City, New York, USA
It couldn’t have looked any more like a cheesy FBI flick on the silver screen. The helicopters landed, one by one, and the door opened on the chopper closest to Jack and Ruby.
The propellers whirled overhead, tousling their hair, and an agent jumped out onto the ground with neat precision. His groomed, blond hair was gelled into perfect spikes, and he wore a pair of over-the-top aviator shades.
“Sup, bitches.” He advanced on Jack with a crooked grin. “What a set of circumstances, huh? Turn our back for five minutes and the city falls to shit. What have you been doing out here?”
Jack looked at the man confusedly. “Lionus? What are you doing here?”
Lionus peeled his glasses off and pocketed them with fanfare. “You’re lucky I like you, Hanson. If you were anyone else, I might have detected a tone of derision, there. Maybe a little disrespect. I wouldn’t advise that you speak that way to a superior.”
Jack scoffed. “You’re my superior? Says who? You’re nothing but a junior who’s just graduated. I’ve got milk in my fridge that’s older than you.”
Lionus maintained his grin. Behind him, two more agents, roughly his age, stood menacingly and crossed their arms in front of them.
“Says Daggro,” Lionus informed them. “The acting Special Agent in Charge needs someone she can trust to operate the outreach since she’s currently office-bound. Guess who she chose to take the reins.”
Ruby burst out laughing, then wilted once Lionus fixed her with an intense glare. “You can’t be serious?”
Baxter tried to place where he knew the man from. He was young and traditionally handsome, but his arrogance sharpened his features. There was a bruise slightly above his eye, and Baxter wondered if he could just be…
Yes. The dude who came onto Jennie. How the hell did he get put in charge, here?
Clearly, Jack had the same thoughts. “I could spend the day listing agents better-qualified than you are to take that role. Why you?”
Lionus shrugged. “It’s not my place to question the decisions of the higher management, just to perform the duties as required. Think of it this way. You’re all my bitches, and this is my operation to handle. With that in mind, give me the skinny on what’s been going down. They said something about additional bombs?”
Jack remained silent, unsure whether to answer him or not. Lionus waited expectantly, and after a moment Jack relented, filling him in on what they knew so far.
“Sounds like a real shitshow.” Lionus drew his SI glasses from a separate pocket and placed them once again on his face. He immediately flinched when he noticed the number of specters currently surrounding them. “What the hell? You didn’t warn me we were surrounded by them.”
“Them?” Baxter snorted. “You might want to be careful how you phrase that, pal. Isn’t the SIA meant to be an organization that brings mortals and specters together?”
Lionus’ mouth twisted into a snarl. He tried to remain cool. “Yes. Just took me by surprise, is all.” He half-heartedly waved at everyone. “Henson, Ruby, follow me onto the chopper. We’ve got some business to attend to.”
Before Baxter and the other specters could complain at this clear division between specters and mortals, another cab pulled up curbside. The cabbie stared open-mouthed at the helicopters in the clearing, as Rhone, Julia, and the conduits stepped out of the car.
Rhone shook his head and sighed. “When did the shit-brigade get here?”
Lionus snarled. “Agent Rhone, I’d suggest you be careful with how you attend to a senior-ranked member of the SIA.”
Rhone strode over to Lionus while Ula tossed a couple of notes into the cabbie’s hand. As the car slowly drifted away, he stormed up to Lionus and stopped just a foot in front of him. He was taller than the lad, wearing his age and experience on his featur
es like a mask.
Lionus held his ground, but even Baxter could see that there was a hesitation in his demeanor.
“In case you haven’t been given the memo,” Rhone started, “I no longer work for the SIA and therefore have no part to play in any dutiful lines or loyalty to the organization.”
Lionus’ snarl morphed into a sick grin. “That’s right. Disgraced and fired from the SIA. Must be a lonely boat to be floating in.”
Rhone returned the grin. “Actually, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. I’ve found a new employer. Someone who actually gives a shit about her employees and has the faculties to do something about the situations we keep finding ourselves in.”
Lionus held Rhone’s eyes. “Yeah? And where is she now?”
Rhone’s confident facade flickered. He closed the gap between himself and Lionus and grabbed the punk by his collar, his face a hair’s width from the kid. “Listen, you little shit. I’ve encountered fuckboys like you before. I know how your mind works and what you’re trying to achieve here. Seniority doesn’t give you experience, kid. Jennie has single-handedly pulled together every operation over the last few months that has had a significant impact on the SIA. Any operation you’ve been involved in has been walking the dogs compared to the dragons we’ve fought along the way—pun intended. If you think you can stand there and try to give me or these specters any orders because Daggro has finally lost it and assigned you to the big leagues, you’ve got another think coming. This is our operation. The SIA will play nicely, or they will not play at all. Got it?”
Baxter and Carolyn nodded, impressed. There came an uncertain round of applause from the specters gathered around. Lionus’ cool didn’t slip as he brought his hand up to Rhone’s wrist and eased it away. He brushed down the front of his shirt and walked toward the helicopter, shouting, “Henson. Kepnes. Follow me, please.”
Jack and Ruby gave the others a longing look and followed Lionus and his two agents onto the chopper.
“Sorry, guys,” Jack whined. “They’re still paying our checks.”
Agents, Agreements and Aggravations: In Her Paranormal Majesty’s Secret Service™ Book Three Page 23
