by T. K. Thorne
Becca?
Nothing.
Is she there in the darkness? Trapped? How can I find her?
Becca!
Only darkness, a stillness that seems unnatural. Despite my desire to stay calm and detached, despair fills me. She is gone. I’ve failed. I may have even driven her deeper into that place of darkness.
I open my eyes and look in desperation at Alice. “I can’t find her.”
“Try again.” Her response surprises me.
“How do I reach her?”
Alice’s lips purse in thought. “How do you find the living-green or the seams of iron?”
The simple question stuns me. “I don’t know.”
She nods. “Not by conscious thought. You don’t know how to do that any more than you know how to create the series of neurochemical signals sparking the muscle contractions that make you able to pick up a glass of water.”
I stare at her.
“Trust your subconscious.”
Although she has tried to tell me this before, her meaning crystalizes. Alice really doesn’t know “how” to use the living-green to heal. She only knows how to love.
Closing my eyes, I reach back into the darkness. Becca, I whisper, riding the energy of Iron into her mind, come back. I say it with all the love I have for her. You are my best friend. I need you. Come.
Silence.
For a long moment, I’m certain nothing has changed, but something stirs. I don’t know what, but somewhere distant I sense a sound, although it’s more a vibration. I should know what it is, but I can’t quite—
“Rose!”
I open my eyes.
“Look,” Alice says.
I look down. Becca’s head is in my lap, my fingers at her temples. She is crying, her shoulders shaking, her hand at her mouth.
And then I am crying too. I vaguely remember that I don’t cry, but deep sobs wrench up from my chest and my tears fall on her upturned face, mixing with hers.
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Perhaps I wept as a young child, but I don’t remember it. All my life, I’ve clutched everything tightly inside. But when Becca sits up and wraps her arms around me, we both cry convulsively. Tears stream down Alice’s face too. I have shed a tear over Becca once before, but I’ve never known the agony, joy, and release of weeping like this. The strange mixture wrenches giant sobs from me.
Finally, Becca pulls back and looks at me. “You came for me. You found me.”
I cradle her wet face in my hands. “I’m so sorry.”
Her white brows furrow. “Why?”
“I was afraid to come. Afraid I would hurt you more or lose you forever.”
“No. You came. You came. That’s what’s important. That’s all that matters.”
Alice hands us tissues. Becca wipes her eyes, and I blow my nose.
“This is indeed the bee’s knees!” Alice says. “I didn’t think it was possible, but you did it!”
I’m glad she didn’t tell me she didn’t think it was possible beforehand.
“How—?” I ask Becca. “What was it like?” I don’t even know how to ask what I want to know, but she understands.
“It was like being in a dark room. Sometimes I could glimpse things,” she says, “but they didn’t mean anything. I couldn’t touch, see, or hear anything. I wasn’t afraid. I couldn’t feel anything, not even emotions. I just knew I was . . . lost.”
It’s a great relief to me that she wasn’t terrified.
She keeps looking at and touching things—my face, her face, the hand-stitched quilt on the bed, the water glass. “I just want to feed my eyes and skin with everything.”
After a while, Alice moves us all to the kitchen table, and makes us tea, her response to all things, good or bad, while she fixes breakfast, even though it’s 3 a.m.
“I can’t believe you’re really back,” I say, one hand on the handle of my teacup, the fingers of the other on Becca’s arm, wanting to touch her as much as she wants to touch the world, to assure myself she is real. Now that the tears have been unjammed, they keep threatening. “You sat here so many times, but you weren’t here.”
“I don’t remember anything after that horrid tunnel and a cave with an iron throne thingee and a man in a wheelchair.”
“Mr. Black,” I say. “That was Theophalus Blackwell. He touched you right after that.”
“I don’t remember.”
I fill her in on the basics of what has happened since then. By the time I’m up to date, we are eating eggs, ham, toast and juice. Becca eats everything but the ham. I take a plate out to Jamal, who insists on standing guard on the porch. He has kind eyes and a ready smile, though I’m sure there is steel behind both.
“Thanks,” he says, taking the plate.
When I return, Becca says, “I can’t decide what is more awful, you being tortured like that or the idea that I’ve been eating baby food.” She makes a puke-face.
I laugh and wrap my arms around her. “It’s good to have you back.”
“And,” she says, “it sounds like I’m just in time to help you with this kidnapping case.”
Releasing her, I spin around to Alice. “What have you told her?”
Alice shrugs. “She wanted to know what was going on.”
“Becca, there’s nothing you can do.”
“How do you know that?”
“I just—it’s very dangerous. And you need to rest.”
“Rest? I’ve been resting for months!”
I take a deep breath. “Angola will kill you or wipe your mind again in a heartbeat and if he does it, it will be permanent.”
She rolls her lower lip over into her mouth. “We can’t not do something just to keep me safe. We have to help that little girl, Kaleshia.”
“I agree,” Alice says.
“Not you too,” I say, throwing my hands in the air.
My phone buzzes with a text. “It’s Tracey. He’s just pulled up outside.”
“There’s plenty of food,” Alice says. “Tell him to come in and eat.”
I get up and meet him at the door.
“Sorry for intruding at a crazy hour. Hey, something smells good,” he says.
“Breakfast. I have a surprise.”
He gives me an appraising look. “Something better than being shot at in a swimming pool, I hope?”
“Much.”
I grab his hand and pull him into the kitchen. “I want you to meet my best friend, Becca. Becca, this is Tracey Lohan, my partner.”
“I remember him,” Becca says. “He came to the hospital after you got hit by that car, but I forgot he was such a hunk.”
“Becca!” My earlobes burn in embarrassment.
“Sorry. I’m just sayin’.” She smiles up at the stunned Tracey. “You wouldn’t happen to have a brother, would you?”
It takes him a few moments to respond. “This is wonderful. You’re so—”
“Normal?” she finishes brightly.
He turns to me. “What happened?”
Though he addressed me, Becca answers. “She rescued me, of course. That’s what she does.”
“How—?”
“I’m not sure,” I say. “I used magic and just called her.” My hand flies to my mouth.
Tracey looks at Becca and then Alice and then me, his brows raised in a question.
“Becca knows about the Houses,” I say. “And Alice knows about you.”
He shakes his head, apparently nonplussed that I revealed who he is to Alice. “You just called her? That’s amazing.”
“Damned straight,” Becca says. “But what about Kaleshia?”
“Yes,” Alice says, “is there any news about the little girl?”
Tracey shakes his head again. “Nothing. We haven’t heard again from Angola
. Segal is working on the database, but he says he’s almost finished. Got someone watching the mansion driveway with orders to stay back and just report any movement, and someone watching the tunnel entrance, but there could be other tunnels and ways in and out.”
“He’s keeping her somewhere,” I say. “We have to find out where.”
Tracey pulls a chair up to the table and helps himself to a plate. “I think that encounter with you at the pool might have shaken Angola. Don’t think that one is accustomed to having his ass kicked.”
I smile. “That’s hardly the way I would describe the encounter. I barely got out alive.”
“Have I met this person?” Becca asks.
“Angola? Yes, but not that you would remember. He’s House of Iron and a killer.”
Tracey’s phone buzzes and he glances at a text message. “That’s Hobart, reporting in. He’s got another . . . person taking over with Segal.”
“I’m glad someone is getting a little sleep,” I say.
Alice puts on a pair of oven mitts and reaches into the oven for what my nose announces is biscuits.
“With a little honey, they will be breakfast dessert,” Alice says.
“Who’s Hobart?” Becca asks. “Is that like the City Councilman Hobart?”
“Yes,” I say, my gaze cutting to Tracey.
Tracey clears his throat. “I’m House of Stone, and Hobart is my father.”
Her eyes widen. “Really? You’re a warlock? That’s so sexy!”
A twitch of amusement tugs one corner of his mouth.
“I am. A warlock, anyway.”
“What magic can you do? I don’t think anyone ever said.”
He shrugs. “I just have a little extra muscle.”
Becca, elbow on the table, chin cupped in her hand, stares dreamily at Tracey. “I noticed.”
“Becca—” I start and give up.
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Iturn to Tracey. “Since everyone here knows who everyone is now, there is something I want to talk about. But first I need to speak to Deon Segal.”
I call Deon’s cell. “Segal, where are you?”
“In the same place I’ve been for the last three days,” he says. His voice is ragged. It’s 6 a.m. now. I doubt he’s had more than catnaps over those three days. If I feel run over by a truck, he must feel far worse.
“I’m finished with the database,” he says. “What do I do now?”
“Hold on.”
I put him on mute and address Tracey. “Segal’s finished doctoring the database. How do we get something into the news so Angola knows it’s done?”
“I got that covered,” Tracey says. “Story is written. UAB will post it as soon as I pull the trigger.”
Becca’s eyes widen.
“Figuratively speaking,” he adds at her expression.
“We’ll handle that when we have to,” I say into the phone to Segal. “Until you hear from him, we aren’t doing anything.”
“Right.”
“Get some rest.” I click off.
“I’ve been really stupid,” I say.
This gets everyone’s attention.
“Angola seems to know where I go too easily.”
“I’ve been thinking the same thing,” Tracey says. “I can usually make a tail, and I was paying attention when we left the scene at Laurie Stokes’s apartment, but Angola—at least I assume it was him or someone on Team Kill Rose—followed us and took pot shots at us at Vulcan.”
“And he showed up at the Y pool once before when I was swimming,” I say.
“Really? I don’t think you mentioned that to me.”
“Jason wanted to talk to me.”
Tracey’s mouth tightens.
“It was personal. Angola said Jason had information on how to help Becca.”
“You could have been walking into a trap.” Disapproval stains Tracey’s voice.
“I took the chance,” I say. “That’s on me, but without that information Becca would not be here, and you’re all sidestepping the point.”
Tracey leans back in his chair, which creaks under the strain, and crosses his thick arms over his chest. “Which is?”
“That he knew exactly where I was again.”
Tracey looks thoughtful. “And unless he was staking out the YMCA, Angola knew when you went there today—or, I guess, that’s yesterday now.”
“Yes, and that was just an hour or two after you and I confronted him at the mansion.”
“He decided to take you out.” Tracey says.
“That has always been on his agenda,” I say, “but the point is, how did he know exactly where I went?”
“Maybe he put a tracker on your car,” Tracey says, “like we did his.”
“I thought about that,” I say, “and we can look, but we were in your car when we went to Vulcan. Remember? You had me drop mine off here.”
He nods.
“What about your purse?” Becca asks. “If I were looking to know where a girl went, that’s where I would put something. And, unless this tracker thing is clunky or heavy, God knows, with all the stuff in there, I wouldn’t notice something in mine unless it interfered with finding my lip gloss.”
In the house, I now wear my gun in a holster, but my purse is in the living room.
I retrieve it, placing it on the cleared table, and start removing items—a set of plastic handcuffs; a slender wallet with a zipper compartment for money; a wide-toothed comb; a compact; under-eye cream; a business card holder; my badge case; a small notebook; two pens; an empty holster that fits in the hidden section where I carry my gun; and a couple of gem clips.
“That’s it?” Becca asks.
I shrug. “That’s plenty. It’s heavy enough as it is.”
I upend the purse and shake. A penny falls out.
“I want to double check your car,” Tracey says, “and mine. You’re right. He knows our moves.”
Alice picks up my empty purse. I look over the items on the table, pluck up the compact and open it. Nothing but powder. I empty the wallet, spreading out twenty-four dollars and thirty-six cents on the table.
“Did he or Jason ever have access to your purse?” Becca asks.
“Maybe at the pool the first time when I was underwater.”
“Or on Jason’s yacht,” Tracey says. “We were both in the water for a while.”
“Or even before that,” I add, somewhat guiltily. “I felt that drink Angola brought pretty hard, and I think I left my purse on Jason’s bed when I went below to whiz.”
“Whiz?” Alice asks with a puzzled look.
“Pee,” Becca says.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if he spiked your drink,” Tracey says grimly, “or just doubled up on the alcohol.”
“I think I’ve found something,” Alice says. She has the purse’s cloth liner pulled out, exposing the seam at the bottom.
“Someone has sewn this bit here,” she says. The thread is different. Setting the purse on the counter, she pulls out a kitchen drawer and digs around, producing a seam ripper. I flinch when she rips the liner open, but after a moment she produces a small rectangular object from the bottom of my purse and lays it on the table.
“I can have the Tech Unit take a look,” Tracey says, picking it up, “but I’m willing to bet it’s a GPS transmitter.”
I pick it up and march it off to the bathroom, setting it on the back of the toilet just in case it’s a mic transmitter as well. Let him hear a toilet flushing. Then I return to the kitchen.
“That means it probably happened on the boat, and he was prepared to do it quickly.”
After a few moments of silence, Becca says, “Now what?”
“Now,” I say, “we stop waiting for that son-of-a-bitch.”
Chapter Fifty-Nine
> Becca sits up. “A trap. Nice.”
“This doesn’t involve you,” Tracey says.
She lifts her chin. “I was her partner before you were, and just because you have a lot of muscles, and I’ve been in a . . . coma doesn’t mean you get to boss me around.”
If I had any doubts that Becca’s back, they have melted.
“Lohan,” I say, “I don’t want anyone to get hurt, but we need everyone on board, or at least their thoughts. You know we can’t involve the PD. They’re vulnerable to Iron’s touch, and they would never agree to this.”
“What exactly is ‘this’?” Tracey asks. “I’m not sure I’m agreeing to it.”
“The trap,” Becca says, hands on her hips.
Tracey narrows his eyes at me. “A trap has bait, and I suppose you are the bait?”
“What else do we have? What else does Angola want?”
“He wants Segal to mess up the database.”
“And Segal is doing that, but Angola has Kaleshia. He has all the cards, except me, and he wants that too. I have to be the bait.”
“No,” Tracey says.
“Why?”
“It’s too dangerous.”
“I’m in constant danger not doing anything. Angola is just waiting for an opportunity. I can’t live my whole life in fear, afraid to go to the store, afraid to go to the swimming pool. I won’t let him do that to me.”
Tracey is silent. At least he is thinking. I hit him with the rest of it.
“And doing it now gives us a shot at saving Kaleshia. Even if Segal does everything Angola wants, we don’t know that Angola will release her. He knows we’re involved now, and he can’t just kill Segal and make it all go away.”
“What if we’re successful?” Tracey says slowly. “What if we arrest him?”
I know what he is saying. No jail is going to be able to hold him.
We search each other’s eyes, looking for the resolve to do what we have to do, even though it goes against everything we are and believe we are as police officers. No one will be safe from him. This is now House business.
“And what if he’s acting under someone else’s orders?” Tracey asks softly.
