I’d seen them before. Luna Lobos. Like the ones Luz had, which she may or may not have given to Javier when my back was turned. Jake’s vials held no such Schrodingerian duality—he popped off their caps and poured the contents onto his burger, where they pooled on the cheese. He saw me curl my lip in disgust. “Hey, I’m not just the owner, I’m also a member.” He put the top bun back on and gestured grandly, like he’d done a magic trick, then pulled another full vial out of his pocket and put it on the table in front of me.
“What’s in that? Vitamins and Windex?”
“Vitamins and caffeine probably.” He took a few bites of his burger, smiled, and set it down. “You know, Edie—I really think this stuff is what’s given me a new lease on life.”
“How so?” I held it up and inspected his face, refracted through its blue-tinged contents. There were a few grains of what looked like pepper suspended inside.
“It’s just—things have gotten easier, since I started this…” His voice faded, unsure what word to use, trying, I was sure, to pick one that wouldn’t piss me off. “… multilevel marketing opportunity,” he decided on.
“Uh-huh.”
“I don’t have the cravings I once did. I bought one of these, and as soon as I started taking it, all those other urges were gone.”
I remembered all the money I’d spotted him while he’d been taking “care” of me, post-stabbing. Clearly he’d spent it on more than just lunch.
“Once I found out who to talk to, so I could start selling them myself, and taking a cut—it’s been great, really. I have money now. I don’t want to get high anymore. The only high I’m after is that performance high.” I watched the light of memory go on in his eyes. “God, I haven’t felt this good since I used to run track.”
“You and I both know that was a long time ago. We’re not in high school anymore, Jakey.”
“But it’s the same thing. I want to see how far I can go. How well I can do. Just like running track, back in the day.”
Jake wouldn’t be the first junkie I’d seen kick one habit, only to replace it with another. I’d seen addicts who had burned away the septum between their nostrils become addicted to purchasing expensive shoes once the coke had lost its kick. There always had to be something to fill that aching need.
“Just try one. Really. You’ll like it, I swear.” And here he was, still trying to convince me, all over again. I remember the first time he’d handed over a glass pipe with a full bowl, and how hard he’d laughed at me as I coughed out hot smoke.
“You know, Jake—” I put the vial back on the table. “I’m glad you’re happier now, but it’s really not my thing.”
“This is what’s stopping me from trying to score, Edie. It’s like magic.”
“Yeah. Well.” I looked down at my unadulterated burger, and then picked it up. It wouldn’t do any good to tell him anything, and so I wouldn’t. I shoved the burger in my mouth and took a huge bite. Anything to keep from saying something I’d regret.
Jake sighed at me, shook his head, and then polished off the rest of the fries on his plate. When the waitress came by with a to-go box, he took the check, and he had the gall to flirt with her in front of me. She even flirted back.
I tried to see him as she must have—not as someone participating in a customer service transaction but as a person. He looked clean. Hell, he looked good. He had our dad’s brown eyes, and his shaggy brown hair needed a cut, but looking a little rugged around the edges was almost a rare thing in this town. Holing up for winter after winter made most people soft and doughy. He looked like he’d been outside recently, like he might know how to use a football, or a rake. He put down cash for both our meals and tipped her well, like a true adult.
I had to admit, weird water in little blue vials or not, I was impressed. And really glad I’d kept shoveling in fries.
“Here, Edie, keep this, in case you change your mind,” he said as we stood.
I inhaled to argue, then realized I was tired of fighting him. The thing with Jake was that he always wound up doing what he wanted to anyway. A salesman to the end, there was no way not to lose. I just wished he’d found this calling earlier.
“Sure, fine.” I pocketed the blue vial, and together we walked out to my car.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
We drove to the Armory in silence. I was concentrating on the road—the snowplows hadn’t hit these streets since dawn, and it was getting treacherous. Jake seemed pleased with himself, like he’d won some argument I didn’t know we’d had.
I pulled against the curb a block from the shelter, where I could manage to parallel-park without putting anyone else’s life or vehicle on the line. Jake grinned over at me, in the street’s half-light.
“Hey—I’d been meaning to ask, but I forgot. Can you see if someone’s at the hospital for me? You met him on Christmas—Raymond.” He saw the question on my face, and spoke more quickly than I could respond. “He didn’t come home to the shelter last night, and I’m worried he got hurt.”
“Caught in the crossfire of an energy supplement war?” I said sarcastically.
“Or frozen to death, after being beaten by asshole college kids,” Jake replied, just as sarcastic.
“I’ll keep an eye out.”
“All right,” he said, reaching over. We hugged in the front seat of my car, clumsy with coats and no-practice. He refastened all the layers of his sturdy new coat. “You know, Edie—” he began, and looked outside. “It wasn’t so bad living with you.”
I was glad it was dark inside my car, with the engine off—I hoped it hid the emotions running across my face.
“I could pay you this time,” he went on. “I know things are rough for you right now—I don’t know how come, but you can’t hide it from me, they are. I’m not talking put me on the lease or anything, but I could pay for half your rent, and we could share things again—”
I knew the thousand and one ways that having Jake live with me would be a bad idea—above and beyond the fact that a cyborg and a sleeping vampire had temporary residence. When the bottom fell out of whatever he was currently selling, and he wasn’t flush with cash, and he tried to use, or sell other, worse, things, then I’d be the bad sister who kicked him out, all over again …
“It was just a thought, Edie,” Jake said.
Just a thought, but painful nonetheless. “I’m sorry, Jake. I need to get my own life straightened out right now.”
“Yeah. I hear that.” He reached over and knuckled my head like we were kids again, then opened my car door. Winter air rushed in and took my breath away. I was sending him out into the cold. Again. “Bye, Sissy.”
“Bye, Jake.”
I watched him get out of my car and walk down the street while my heart broke in two.
* * *
It wasn’t a long drive back to the freeway, except that I missed the exit because I wasn’t paying full attention. I wished, not for the first time, that I could tell Jake everything. That I could trust him again, like when we were kids. But there was nothing I could do to change the past, and the future was hazy right now. I made three right-hand turns instead of one left and wound up going past the Armory again.
I slowed down to see if I could see Jake inside. The first floor of the structure had bank-window-type glass and was brightly lit. Warm, I hoped, and safe.
“Hey!”
I heard the voice even though both my windows were rolled up. I startled, looking around, even though surely whoever it was wasn’t talking to me.
“Hey!”
I spotted him, racing down the street—a man in a fedora. Viktor, the were from the other night. “Hey!” he yelled again, swinging his arms over his head, as if he was trying to flag me down.
I hit the gas, trying to outrun him, but my Chevy didn’t have much get-up-and-go. It lurched forward, and he ran from the sidewalk out into the street at me. I had to hammer my brakes not to hit him, and I slammed my car into reverse and started rolling backwa
rd, blind down the street.
“I just want to talk to you!” He ran alongside me, pounding on my car hood. Leaving dents.
“Jesus Christ!” I braced my arm on the passenger seat and looked behind me. There was an alley coming up. I wasn’t a stunt driver, but—
“I just want to talk!”
I yanked my steering wheel down and prayed there wasn’t any oncoming traffic. My car spun into the alley, and I put it into drive again, and then this time floored it. I traced my way down the dark street, watching him race behind me, arms still waving like an air traffic controller, until he gave up and the night made him disappear.
I caught the exit onto the freeway this time and drove straight in to work.
* * *
I parked nearby in the visitor lot, trusting the Shadows to keep me safe once I was on hospital grounds. What was Viktor doing skulking downtown? Was that a coincidence, or had he followed me there? Would Jake be safe? I should have asked Anna to protect him, too. The next time I paid attention to my surroundings I was in the elevator, dropping down to Y4.
On an impulse, I hit the STOP button and looked up. “Hey.” I rapped on the wall with my free hand. “Are you there, Shadows? It’s me, Edie,” I said. I waited in silence, then sighed. “Which is it, you have no sense of humor, or no knowledge of popular literature?”
More silence. I felt sure they were listening in, though. “You’d better protect him from weres, too,” I told the ceiling. And then I let the STOP button go.
I arrived on Y4 an hour early. Charles came into the break room while I was fishing in the back of the fridge for my emergency Diet Coke.
“Hey, Edie! Did they call you in, too?”
“I was down here already, and the weather was bad, so there was no point in driving home,” I lied. “Why? We busy?”
“When aren’t we,” Charles said, and passed by me to take a Hot Pocket out of the freezer, popping it into the microwave as I cracked open my Coke. “So many donors came in last night. What the hell did they need all that blood for?”
After my chat with Anna this A.M., I had a suspicion. I sat down, since technically I wasn’t on yet. “Charles, have the Shadows ever let you down?”
He turned around from the microwave. “Why do you ask?”
“Your scar. The one you showed me. They didn’t protect you then, right? But—whatever they’re trading you, to keep you here, surely they’ve made good on that.”
“Yeah,” he said, and behind him, the microwave counted down backward, seconds ticking away.
“What is it? If I can ask?”
He made a thoughtful face and let out a huge sigh. “My wife needed a heart transplant. She was low on the list.”
“So … the Shadows moved her up?”
“Nope. She just got better.”
“Oh. God.” His wife—that’d mean he could never stop working at Y4. I mean, he could, but if he did … there was a distinct chance she’d die. That was an entire level of horror above the way they’d trapped me into working there. There was always the slim but possible chance that Jake might someday decide to stay clean. There was a ding, and Charles retrieved his Hot Pocket from inside the oven. “Damn.”
“Exactly. How’d they get you?”
“My brother’s a mess. Junkie. Homeless. Clueless as hell.” I wished I could confide in Charles, but I knew I shouldn’t. He had enough on his plate—plus he’d already warned me away from the weres. “There’s just so much stuff going on right now, I get worried about him.”
“Well, I don’t like the Shadows, but I don’t think they’ll abandon ship just yet. This place is prime feeding territory. Where else would they go?” He bit into his Hot Pocket, hissing as it released steam.
“I can’t believe you’re a grown man, and you still eat those.”
“If you ever meet my wife, don’t rat me out. She makes me sandwiches, but I always pick up one of these on the way in.” His phone rang from his pocket. “Speaking of,” he said with a grin, reaching for it.
“She waits up for you every night?”
“She’s a night owl too. We make a good team.”
I smiled at him. It was nice to see that sometimes relationships worked. I took my Coke and ducked out the door.
* * *
If I stayed down in Y4, they’d put me to work. I hopped back into the elevator, made it take me to trauma ICU.
I’d get in trouble if I keyed myself into the computer looking up patient data on Jake’s behalf, but with an exposed badge and a couple of open windows, I could make a thorough snoop. There couldn’t be that many white guys with dreadlocks at the hospital. Javier and Luz were gone; their room held a woman colored Oompa Loompa orange with liver failure instead. I bet she sounded like Gideon. And I bet Javier was at a skilled nursing facility, and Luz was still being strong for him, at least for now. She was tough, but it was young love, so it wouldn’t last—said me, the person who refused to admit she’d ever been in love before.
I quickly walked through all the ICUs. Satisfied that at least I’d tried on Jake’s behalf, I texted him as I waited for another elevator.
Ur friend isn’t here. And then, before I could think things through or regret it, I typed, & still thinking about ur idea.
Faster than I would have been able to type it myself I got, Thanks Sissy. I owe you, back from him in return.
Par for the course. The elevator arrived and I went back to Y4.
* * *
I changed into scrubs after my time skirting the HIPAA privacy line, and was just about on time.
Meaty saw me coming out of the locker room hallway. “I just made the assignments. You’ll be around the corner tonight. Gina called in sick.”
“I bet she did.”
Meaty’s eyebrows raised with a silent question, and I shook my head. “Never mind.” I couldn’t blame Gina for wanting a shift off after the night she’d had. “Who am I up with?”
“Rachel.”
I made a face after Meaty passed by. Rachel was a four-legs-good, two-legs-bad kind of vet. She worked opposite weekends from Charles and me. On the rare shifts I had had with her, I’d never seen her hang out her co-workers much—so much so that I got the opinion that she hated us. Being in the were-corral corner with only her to talk to for eight hours would be hell.
As if mentioning her had summoned her, Rachel swung open Y4’s double doors. “Edie, I need help. There’s visitors.”
My first reaction was to be surprised she knew my name. After that I paused for a moment, waiting for her complaint to go farther, then realized that was her complaint in its entirety. Visitors. Outside her patient’s door. I nodded. “I’ll be there in a second.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Rachel was standing near Lynn, the P.M. shift outgoing nurse, giving very meaningful looks toward Helen, who also stood nearby. She was dressed in head-to-toe black, the color of mourning, and it didn’t suit her; it made her look too pale.
“Hey there,” I said, giving Helen a smile. “Want to go get coffee?” She was a high-ranking were—I wondered if talking to her would count? There weren’t any other weres around. I wondered how many needed to be listening in to officially kick-start the sanctuary engines of public humiliation and shame. At least where shame was concerned, I didn’t have any.
I watched Helen resurfacing from her distant thoughts, to focus slowly on me. “Hmm? Oh—it’s you. I don’t think I ever got your name.”
“Edie,” I said, putting my hand out.
“Helen,” she said, which I already knew. She shook my hand, hers warm but limp. Behind her, Rachel kept making furtive shoving gestures off to the side. “Do you think I’ll miss anything?”
“I doubt it. And I bet you need a break. Let’s take a walk,” I suggested to Helen, reaching for her arm.
She reached back to me, and clung around me. I was startled by how near she was comfortable being—my personal bubble for strangers was a little farther out, unless I was about to slee
p with them. But I didn’t want to miss my chance to ask her for sanctuary, plus I felt sure that Rachel’s happiness with me would be in direct proportion to how long I managed to keep Helen off the floor.
“Fenris Jr. is in bed, and I didn’t have anywhere else to be,” Helen said once we reached the double doors together, walking arm in arm. I nodded, even though I didn’t think she could see me. “Have you lost someone before?” she went on.
No. I did know what it felt like to watch assorted someones leave, again and again and again. But not death, not yet. “No.”
“It’s awful.” She squeezed me around my waist and arm as if to emphasize that fact, her hot hand on my arm’s skin. I didn’t like it when people touched me at the hospital, especially when I didn’t know the last time they’d used hand sanitizer. I tried to keep that to myself, though. She was going through a lot, watching her father die slowly—just because I was jaded didn’t mean everyone else had to be. I didn’t squeeze her back, but I held her a little more firmly, and she relaxed into me. I assumed we’d hug, and that would be that.
“My husband’s death was tragic, but at least it was quick. My father’s death is a whole new kind of pain.” She didn’t step away.
I felt a little trapped, but I still made a sympathetic sound. She inhaled deeply, sniffing. Oh, God, if she started crying, what would I do? She sighed aloud and settled even closer to me, her head upon my chest, making walking almost impossible.
“Do—you want me to go get coffee and bring it back to you?” Rachel’s desires and requests for sanctuary be damned, I wasn’t going to haul a crying woman across half the hospital to the vending machines and back.
“No. It’s good for me to walk a bit. To get away,” she said from the vicinity of my right breast, and then raised her head, and took a step back. “I don’t mean to frighten you. I apologize.”
“It’s okay.” Frighten wasn’t the precise word I’d have gone with—creepy or overclose, yes—but it’d do.
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