Masks (Out of the Box Book 9)

by Robert J. Crane

  “It’s a process,” Reed said. “You don’t just get over someone who was a major part of your life for as long as Scott was, okay?”

  “Yeah,” Augustus said, chiming in, “it’s like … he’s that ex you want to see you out with your new girl, so you can be all like, ‘Yeah, I did better than you’!”

  I blinked. “Crude as he put it,” Reed said dryly, “Augustus has a point. You and Scott have some unresolved … stuff … going on between you.”

  “That was totes obvs in LA,” Kat said. “Major issues between them.” She held off for just a second before starting with the wheedling, “Are you sure you don’t want to be on my show? Because this is exactly the kind of storyline that would—”

  “NO!” Reed and Ariadne chorused together, answering for me before I had a chance to move from disgust to outrage.

  “Just a thought,” Kat said, contrition not in evidence.

  “Sienna?” Ariadne asked, and I looked at my phone again to see her staring up at me. “It’s going to be okay.”

  I could see my face in the corner, and it was a mess. I counted myself lucky I didn’t wear makeup, because if I had, it would have been smeared everywhere. “Thanks, you guys,” I said weakly.

  “If I could just say something,” J.J. said, sounding like he was a little anxious about saying anything but speaking up nonetheless. “Sienna … I know this is tough, but … you’re tougher than the problem you’re looking down. You’ll make it through this, even though I know it—it hurts in the gut, in the heart—you’re—you’re a better person than this Nadine Griffin is, so I know you’ll … keep your cool about her.” He sounded a little nervous.

  Suddenly I felt a little ashamed for wanting to wear her decapitated head like a party hat. “Thank you, J.J.,” and with that, my rage was mostly gone.

  He was right. I was better than Nadine Griffin. Besides, I was going to see her rot in a jail cell. I took a moment and pulled myself together. “Okay,” I said, taking a breath to steady myself and giving only a glance to the wreckage of my hotel room, “I’m on this. I will find evidence for this woman’s crimes and put her ass in the pokey.”

  “Yeah, that’s the spirit,” Augustus said, “whoever told you ‘living well is the best revenge’ was full of shit. Living well while your ex’s new girl is in jail, that’s the best revenge right there. Way better than being the crazy ex-girlfriend who loses her damn mind on you.”

  I blinked. I had been close to being the crazy ex-girlfriend, and the thought took my breath away like a hammer to the kneecap. “Oh … oh … hell,” I said, and felt sick again, for an entirely different reason.

  “It’s going to be okay,” Reed said. “Intervention managed. We’re all good now, back on an even keel and—”

  “Oh, damn,” J.J. said, and my phone buzzed just then. “Oh, man …”

  “Never a good sign when the geek says that,” Kat chimed in.

  “J.J. …?” Reed asked before I could say it.

  “You guys might want to turn on your TVs to the nearest cable news channel,” he said. “This … is not good.”

  I looked over at my TV, shattered to pieces in the ruin of my hotel room. “I … don’t have a TV anymore.”

  “Oh, Sienna,” Reed said, and he bowed his head, eyes closed.

  “Okay, well,” J.J. said, “the FBI has issued an arrest warrant for a suspect in the destruction of the US Attorney's office thanks to an anonymous tip. They say it’s one Jamie Barton, a.k.a.—”

  “Gravity Gal,” I said under my breath, as once more the cold chills ran over my arms and down the back of my neck.

  “Yep,” J.J. said. “They just outed her on national television, got a picture of her without the mask and everything. Looks like they’re going after her with everything they’ve got.”

  70.

  Jamie

  Jacob was back behind his desk now, tapping away at his computer and exchanging shy looks with Jamie every few seconds. He’d meet her eyes, grin, and then look down, blushing.

  It was absolutely adorable.

  “I’m going to print what I’ve got here, because with the screen captures of your credit from yesterday, contrasted with the ones I just pulled …” He whistled. “I don’t think it’s actually possible to lose several hundred points off a FICO score in less than twenty-four hours.”

  Jamie felt a breath of reassurance as she drew one in and out. “Thank you so much for believing me.”

  He smiled as he looked up, not shy this time, but sure of himself. “I think—”

  The door clicked open a little abruptly, and a woman was standing there, looking pale. “Uh, Mr. Penny,” she said, glancing nervously at Jamie, “could you—Mr. Abbott needs to talk to you for a moment.”

  Jacob frowned. “Can it wait? We,” he pointed at Jamie, “actually need to talk to him in another five min—”

  “I’m afraid it can’t,” she said, glancing once more at Jamie and then suddenly away. “It’s … urgent. He needs to speak with you …” she glanced once more at Jamie, “… alone.”

  Jacob rose to his feet, straightening his shirt where it had started to wrinkle from the way he’d been sitting. “Oookay then.” He smiled apologetically at Jamie. “I’ll be right back.” And he grabbed a page off the printer and headed out the door, shutting it gently behind him.

  “What is it?” he asked quietly. Jamie could hear him through the door.

  “It’s your guest,” the teller hissed. “She’s wanted by the FBI, it’s all over the TV right now. She’s Gravity Gal and she was behind the attacks yesterday—”

  Jamie stood up so abruptly the chair flew back behind her and crashed into the wooden wall separating Mr. Penny’s office from the bank lobby, shattering the window above it. Jamie froze, looking down at the damage she’d just done, and then up at Jacob, who was just outside the office, staring at her, his mouth wide in shock and …

  Fear.

  Jamie swallowed heavily. The teller line was now empty, as though they’d evacuated the bank save for Jacob and the teller they’d sent to fetch him. Jamie stepped through the broken window with a nonchalant lift from a gravity channel, and could see the TV now.

  Her face was plastered across it, side by side, one in her mask and one without. Jamie’s hand fell to her chest and she felt the breath leave her. The caption loudly declared, GRAVITY GAL WANTED BY FBI FOR ROLE IN NYC ATTACKS.

  “I … I didn’t …” Jamie said, staggering away from the television, as though if she got far enough back the screen would change.

  “Jamie—Ms. Barton.” Jacob was looking at her with a horrified expression.

  Jamie stared at him for only a second, registering the look on his face, and then she turned and ran through the double doors, shoving them open and pushing her way out into the summer morning. She found herself out on the sidewalk, and sirens were blaring in the distance, coming closer, she could hear them.

  They were coming for her.

  Coming for her for a crime she hadn’t even committed.

  She thought about standing there, about getting to her knees, crossing her hands behind her head and waiting, like a common criminal. They could work this out, couldn’t they? She could get a lawyer—

  Except she had no money.

  But someone would figure out that she wasn’t guilty of this, surely—

  But without a lawyer, she’d be stuck with a public defender, who probably wouldn’t even give a fig about her or her case. She had no money, which meant no bail, which meant—

  “Kyra,” she whispered. What would happen to Kyra if she got stuck in jail? They’d just announced her identity on television, which meant people would know.

  Criminals would know, if they didn’t already.

  “No,” Jamie whispered, and she took a lurching step on the sidewalk. She tore off her blouse and threw it, watched it whip, caught in the wind, and end up tangled in a bush next to the bank’s entry. She kicked off her shoes and left them in the parking l
ot, then pulled off her pants, just standing there, a security cam looking down at her, people watching from behind the bank’s windows.

  She wore her costume visibly; they could all see her plainly now. She pulled the mask out of her pocket and held it up, staring at it.

  “I am so sick of this,” she said, and tossed it into the wind, watching it flutter as it was carried away.

  And with that, she leapt up into the air, a gravity channel launching her high, high enough to see the flashing lights of police cars coming for her, high enough to see Curtis High School in the distance, and she anchored to its front tower and started to pull herself forward—to Kyra.

  71.

  Sienna

  “This is bullshit,” I said. I was out of my hotel room in seconds, riding the elevator down and talking to my team the whole time. “Gravity Gal was with me during the whole second part of the attack, the one they’re blaming her for. And how do they have evidence? Jamal told me that the security cams were down for the attack on the US Attorney’s office.”

  J.J. cleared his throat. “I … I don’t know. They say they’ve got some sort of anonymous tip that led them in this direction. They seem pretty confident about it if they’ve issued an arrest warrant and skipped right past trying to question her first.”

  “This sounds bad,” Reed said. “Do you want Augustus and me to hop a plane? We could be there in a few hours to—”

  “No, stay where you are,” I said. “As much fun as it might be to drag you two into this, I’d rather not. If the FBI is going after Jamie, I …” I made a loud, annoyed, growling sound in my throat. “Well, it’s just wrong, that’s all.”

  Ariadne was the first to speak after that. “What are you going to do?”

  “Well, I’m going to try and clear her name,” I said. “And nail Nadine Griffin to the wall for this.” I closed my eyes and threw my head back. “Ohhhhh. Remember why Welch called me in for this?”

  “Yeah,” Reed said, “he wanted you to keep an eye on things because he feared a beef between Captain Frost and Gravity Gal.”

  “Except Frost wasn’t the only one she told off that day,” I said. “She ripped the hell out of Griffin first, remember? Right on television. This is payback.”

  “That’s a tenuous thread, Sienna,” Ariadne said. “You were called to town on a vague suspicion that seems to be blossoming into something else entirely. I don’t see how you link them, unless your friend Welch is a meta of the sort that can predict the future.”

  I frowned as the elevator doors opened and I thundered out into the lobby. “No, I don’t think Welch is a Cassandra-type, or any other type. I think he saw something—in that moment—and got a bad feeling. Normal gut instinct from a guy who’s worked enough cases to have a feeling for when something’s amiss. He got the message; just mistook the messenger, was all. Nadine was sitting there the whole time, probably like a black hole of negativity, secretly scheming her revenge, adding a way to screw Jamie to the plans she already had to clear her name.” I stopped just outside the doors to the hotel. “No, wait. That doesn’t track—”

  “How does Nadine Griffin, the Queen of Wall Street, under FBI surveillance, mastermind a terrorist-style event to destroy all the evidence against her?” Reed asked. “I’m sorry, but that’s … she couldn’t have done that unobserved. Not by herself.”

  “I agree, she had an accomplice,” I said, floating up into the air. “Some sort of broker who knew how to hire mercenaries and hackers and metas and all else. Someone who knew how to put things together for her, package an op and run it while she was far, far away from anything incriminating.”

  “Whoever it is,” Reed said, “they’re good to put something like this together. We’re not talking some moron with a VPN and a path into the darkweb. This is a pro, someone who’s been there, done that, a real Shelob-in-the-web type expert who had connections that they could exploit, presumably for a profit.”

  “I thought this lady had no more money,” Augustus said. “Didn’t the FBI impound her cash?”

  “She’s the Queen of Wall Street,” I said, “she had to have some hidden away for a rainy day, probably overseas.” I felt a tingle as I spoke the words aloud. “How do we find this broker?” My phone buzzed, and I looked at the screen; Welch was calling me. “Hang on, guys.” I flipped over to him.

  “You see this?” Welch asked, and I could hear the agitation in his voice.

  “It’d be hard to miss,” I said. “You know this is BS—”

  “I know, I know,” Welch said. “Or I suspect, at least. But—”

  “No buts,” I said. “The FBI is after an innocent woman. She was there with us—”

  “Listen, you know the brains behind an operation doesn’t have to actually be at the operation,” Welch said, lecturing me patiently. “I realize it’s unlikely, but it’s not out of the realm of possibility.”

  “It is out of the realm of possibility,” I said, so sure I might have been telling him that concrete was hard, Shake Shack was the best, and Hamilton was impossible to get reasonably priced tickets for. “Gravity Gal—Jamie Barton—whatever—is a hero. She was in the thick of this thing trying to save lives, not scheming for no reason to end them and screw this city up. This is bullshit of the highest order of bullshit, right up there with a politician telling you they’re honest.” I paused, letting that sink in. “Now … did you know about this before they announced?”

  “No,” he said, ignoring my tirade. “They cut us out of the loop. Probably figured we might have an affinity for a local hero.” He lowered his voice. “She saved those firemen the other night, and it’s not the first time she’s helped them and us. She’s a hero, yes, I know it. But—yes there’s a but,” he cut me off before I could interrupt, “the NYPD is helpless in this. We have to aid the FBI if they ask for it, and top brass is not going to stick their necks or anything else out in a pissing contest with the feds.” He took a second to settle. “Now … what are you going to do?”

  “Get into a pissing contest with the feds,” I said.

  “Don’t do that!” he said, lowering his voice to a hissing, urgent whisper. “You remember who you’re working for right now? Don’t screw the department over, please.”

  “I’ll be tasteful,” I said. “I’ll make sure to pick a place where it won’t matter if urine splatters abound, somewhere like—”

  “We have her over Staten Island!” J.J. shouted, the videoconference still active. I hadn’t realized it didn’t automatically mute when I took a voice call.

  “So help me if you make a Staten Island and urine smell joke—” Welch said, voice rising.

  “Wouldn’t dream of it,” I said, hanging up on him and turning south as I accelerated to high speed. I had to get there before things could go horrible, horribly wrong.

  72.

  Jamie

  The attendance clerk at Curtis High couldn’t hide her panic, which bothered Jamie, but not nearly as much as not getting an answer to her question. “Where’s Kyra Barton?” she asked again.

  “I … I … I …” the poor woman said, hands shaking as she punched at the keys. Jamie had heard the school go into lockdown before she’d even gotten five steps into the office. That didn’t matter to her; she had to find Kyra and get her out, get her some place safe, and frankly, a full-school lockdown was about as safe as she could manage without having her daughter in her arms and carrying her off. “… She didn’t show up this morning,” the attendance clerk finished, pointing at the screen and smearing finger oil over it. “See?”

  Jamie stared at the monitor wordlessly. There was her daughter’s name, and full attendance record, in a grid-like chart. For today, sure enough, there was a mark for absence. “This is …” Jamie said, staring at it, willing it to change. “She couldn’t have … couldn’t have …” She turned and stalked out of the office, making it to the door just as she heard the slamming of other doors behind her.

  “Did she skip school today?” Jamie wo
ndered aloud. She’d been gone before Kyra normally woke up, and her door had been closed. She turned toward the direction of their house and launched herself into the air, soaring over the Staten Island neighborhoods.

  If she’d done this last night, she would have been home in minutes, not an hour. She could have found her foreclosure notice without the humiliation of walking into a convenience store and losing both her credit card and ATM card. She could have had her saltine cracker dinner early instead of starving as she walked holes in her shoes getting home.

  None of that mattered now, though. Jamie focused, rolling above the streets with channels walking her over the tops of houses and buildings like great stilted legs. She could see her own home in the distance, flashing lights surrounding it. The FBI would already be there, then. Maybe they’d have Kyra, and then she wouldn’t have to worry—

  “Whoa!” came a voice behind her, and Sienna Nealon came to a stop beside her, breathless, her shirt fluttering in the wind. “I came as soon as I heard.”

  “Did you?” Jamie asked, not ceasing her forward momentum. She had to get to the house, to Kyra. Once Kyra was safe, and she was sure of it, then she could surrender to the authorities, and not a moment before. Kyra would need somewhere to go, somewhere away from Staten Island while this whole mess played out. “Why?” she asked, not really caring what answer Sienna gave.

  “Because you’re innocent, duh,” Sienna said, keeping pace with her easily, hovering along like she was walking beside Jamie.

  “Nobody else seems to think so,” Jamie said tightly, “and it doesn’t matter anyway.”

  “I think it matters at least a little,” Sienna said, nodding at the house ahead. “You know the FBI is waiting there to arrest you, right?”

  “My daughter is there,” Jamie said. “I need to make sure she’s okay before I can turn myself in. She has to be home. She—” Her voice cracked. “She just—she has to be.”

  “I think Nadine Griffin is behind this,” Sienna said. “Because you made her look bad in front of the whole world with the—”