John could feel Qhuinn gearing up for a lunge, the heat and the impulse rolling off his friend. To stop the collision from happening, John reached behind and put a hand on his buddy's abs to keep him in place.
If anyone was going after Lash, it was him.
Lash laughed and tightened the belt on his ji. "Don't front like you have game, John-boy. The transition doesn't change you on the inside or fix your physical defects. Right, Qhuinn?" As he turned away, he said under his breath, "Mismatched motherfucker."
Before Qhuinn could jump the guy, John wheeled around and grabbed him around the waist just as Blay locked onto one of the guy's arms. Even with their combined weight, it was like keeping back a bull.
"Chill," Blay grunted. "Just relax."
"I'm going to kill him one of these days," Qhuinn hissed. "I swear to God."
John glanced over as Lash sauntered into the gym.
Taking a vow to himself, he marked the guy for a beating, even if it got him kicked out of the program for good.
He'd always felt that if you fucked with his friends, you were going to get served. End of story.
Thing was, now he had the equipment to deliver the job.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Around midnight Jane found herself in the back of a black Mercedes on her way home. Up front, on the other side of the partition that was in place, the uniformed driver was that butler who was older than God and as cheerful as a terrier. Beside her V was dressed in black leather, as silent and grim as a tombstone.
He hadn't said much. But he wouldn't let go of her hand.
The car's windows were darkened to such a degree she felt like she was in a tunnel, and in an effort to ground herself she hit a button on the door next to her. As her slice of glass went down, a shocking rush of cold pushed inside and replaced the warmth, a bully scattering the good kids at a playground.
She stuck her head out into the breeze and looked at the pool of illumination thrown by the headlights. The landscape was blurry, like a photograph out of focus. By the downward angle of the road she knew they were coming off a mountain. Thing was, she couldn't get any sense of where they were headed or where they had been.
In a weird way the disorientation was appropriate. This was the interlude between the world she'd been in and the one she was returning to, and stretches of neither here nor there should be hazy.
"I can't see where we are," she murmured as she put the window back up.
"It's called mhis," V said. "Think of it as a protective illusion."
"A trick of yours?"
"Yeah. Mind if I light up, as long as I let in some fresh air?"
"That's fine." It wasn't like she was going to be around him for much longer.
Crap.
V gave her hand a squeeze, then put his window down a quarter of an inch, the soft drone of wind flaring up over the quiet hum of the sedan. His leather jacket creaked as he took out a hand rolled and a gold lighter. The flint made a little rasp, and then the faint smell of Turkish tobacco made her nose tingle.
"That smell is so going to-" She stopped.
"What?"
"I was going to say, 'remind me of you.' But it won't, will it?"
"Maybe in a dream."
She put her fingertips on her window. The glass was cold. Just like the center of her chest.
Because she couldn't stand the silence, she said, "These enemies of yours, what exactly are they?"
"They start as humans. Then they're turned into something else."
As he inhaled, she saw his face aglow in orange light. He'd shaved before leaving, using the razor she'd once wanted to turn against him, and his face was impossibly beautifully arrogant, masculine, hard as his will. The tattoos at his temple were still beautifully done, but now she hated them, knowing them for the violation they were.
She cleared her throat. "So tell me more?"
"The Lessening Society, our enemy, chooses its members through a careful screening process. They look for sociopaths, murderers, amoral Jeffrey Dahmer types. Then the Omega steps in-"
"The Omega?"
He looked down at the tip of his hand-rolled. "Guess the Christian equivalent is the devil. Anyway, the Omega gets his hands on them… as well as other things… and presto, changeo, they wake up dead and moving. They are strong, virtually indestructible, and can be killed only by a stab wound to the chest with something steel."
"Why are they your enemies?"
He inhaled, again his brows going down low. "I suspect it might have something to do with my mother."
"Your mother?"
The hard smile that stretched his lips was more a curve than anything else. "I'm the son of what you'd probably consider a god." He lifted his gloved hand. "This is from her. Personally, as baby gifts go, I'd have preferred one of those silver rattles, or maybe some paste to eat. But you don't get to pick what your parents give you."
Jane looked at the black leather that stretched over his palm. "Jesus…"
"Not according to our lexicon or my nature. I'm not the savior type." He put the cigarette between his lips and pulled off the glove. In the dimness of the backseat, his hand glowed with the soft beauty of moonlight reflecting off of fresh snow.
He inhaled one last time, then took the cigarette and pressed the lit tip down right to the center of his palm.
"No," she hissed. "Wait-"
The butt was ashed in a flare of light, and he blew off the residue, a fine powder that dispersed in the air. "I would give anything to get rid of this piece of shit. Although I will say, it's damn handy when I don't have an ashtray."
Jane felt woozy for a whole host of reasons, especially as she thought about his future. "Is your mother forcing you to get married?"
"Yup. I sure as fuck wouldn't volunteer for it." V's eyes shifted to her and for a split second she could have sworn he was going to say that she'd be the exception to that rule. But then he glanced away.
God, the idea of him with someone else, even if she wouldn't remember him, was like being kicked in the gut.
"How many?" Jane asked hoarsely.
"You don't want to know."
"Tell me."
"Don't think about it. I sure as hell try not to." He looked over at her. "They're going to mean nothing to me. I want you to know that. Even though you and I can't… Yeah, well, anyway, they won't mean jack."
It was horrible of her to be glad of that.
He put the glove back on, and they were silent as the sedan ghosted through the night. Eventually they stopped. Started up again. Stopped. Started up again.
"We must be downtown, huh?" she said. "Because this feels like a lot of traffic lights."
"Yeah." He leaned forward, hit a button, and the partition went down so she could see out the windshield.
Yup, downtown Caldie. She was back.
As tears speared into her eyes, she blinked them away and stared down at her hands.
A little later the driver stopped the Mercedes in front of what looked like the service entrance to a brick building: There was a sturdy metal door marked private in white paint, and a concrete ramp that went up to a loading dock. The place was clean in the way well-kept urban places were. Which was to say it was grungy, but without any loose trash around.
V opened his door. "Do not get out yet."
She put her hand on the duffel bag with her clothes in it. Maybe he'd decided to just take her back to the hospital? Except this was no entry she knew of at St. Francis.
Moments later he opened the door and reached in with his bare hand. "Leave your things. Fritz, we'll be back in a while."
"It is my pleasure to wait," the old man said with a smile.
Jane got out of the car and followed V over to a set of concrete stairs next to the ramp. The whole time he was on her like a slipcover, tight against her back, guarding her. Somehow he opened the sturdy metal door without keys; he simply put his hand on the push bar and stared at the thing.