Okay, so not exactly veiled.
I glanced around at the squeaky tanned leather seats, polished decanter and glasses, mahogany armrests, and flat screen, currently off. A slim line of green neon slid around the carpeting, casting a soft glow over everything but the shadows layering his face. I sighed. “Well. It is a nice car.”
Those glowing eyes remained unblinking and unamused. I guess I got my sense of humor from my mother as well.
“All right,” I said, tucking the vial into a pocket I’d lined with foam. “Since we’re telling stories, I have one for you as well.” I looked up and waited until I saw a slight nod-he’d indulge me-before continuing. “Once upon a time there was a being who got off on injuring and influencing mortal lives, spreading disease and destruction in hopes that it would snowball. He wanted humans to feel chaos, to spew out soured emotions so he could feed off that negative energy, making it easier to sow evil thoughts, habits, and deeds among them. But that alone was never enough for him. He was always wanting more. And that, ultimately, would be his downfall.”
“It’s true,” the Tulpa said, to my surprise. “Joaquin was stymied by his own aspirations. He died in that maze because he reached too far.”
And because I hadn’t been talking about Joaquin, I paused, leaned back in my seat, and stared.
And saw something far more revealing than any aura. I saw the puppets. And I saw the strings.
“How about that,” I said, wonder spreading through me. “Joaquin was trapped in a maze before he ever stepped foot in that warehouse.” I shook my head, a humorless laugh escaping me. How could I not have seen it before?
The weight of those red orbs on me told me I had his full attention now.
“You laid out a labyrinth so large and intricate, it spanned this entire city. The virus was just a diversion, sleight of hand. You weren’t targeting the agents of Light as much as you were cleaning house on the Shadow side. And you used me to do it.”
There was a deep breath-he was composing himself, but it was too late-and his eyes burned out, slipped back into the obsidian slate that so perfectly matched mine. “I handed you your greatest enemy on a silver platter. Where’s the gratitude?”
I shook my head, scoffing at that. “I handed him to you. Of the two of us, you considered him the greater threat. But it was a win/win situation for you, wasn’t it? You knew I’d go after him and you’d either score some power from me or stop him from looking for the original manual.”
“Or both,” he said baldly, no longer denying it. I suppose he thought he was safe, that it was all said and done. That this story, the legend, was already written. He smiled, teeth flashing, and seemed to read my mind. “That is, if it were true. Right now it’s just a cute story.”
“And one that should be told,” I said coldly, knowing it already was. Somewhere in this city, Zane was getting a buzz on. It’d be interesting to see which manual this conversation showed up in, the Shadow line, or the Light. I thought of Regan, and how she, like Joaquin, was keeping my identity to herself. It seemed the Tulpa hadn’t yanked the threat to himself out at the roots. He’d merely snapped the top off a rapidly growing weed. I grinned widely, and let him see that secret in my smile. “Who knows? Someone might take up an interest in collecting.”
Maybe it was the smile that got to him. His fingers twitched on his knees. “An unhealthy interest.”
“Why?” I asked, tilting my head. “I mean, if the original no longer exists?”
When I realized he wasn’t going to answer, I shrugged and climbed out of the car. But then I just stood there. I had a feeling he couldn’t let me leave with the last word, and I was right. Seconds later, the window rolled down soundlessly. “You don’t honestly believe that you can beat me, do you?”
I lifted my gaze to the clear night sky and thought about how he’d almost killed me once, how I thought I was dead again after chasing Regan and Liam back into Valhalla. And how Hunter and I had approached it with not much more going for us than a whole lot of chutzpah the night before. I hadn’t really believed I could beat him then. Not any of those times. But somehow I’d survived him.
And somehow I’d do it again.
“You, of all people, should know the potency of a strong imagination.”
Another plane roared overhead, and he waited until it faded in the heated night before speaking again. “Last chance, Joanna. Return that vial to the agents of Light, if you must. Fulfill the second sign of the Zodiac and put an end to the plague killing off this valley. But return to me voluntarily before the splitting of the next dawn, fulfill the third sign of the Zodiac, and I’ll forget we were ever enemies.”
“And if I don’t? War?”
He leaned forward, and we stared at each other across the short distance, black eyes fastened on black eyes, matching resolve roiling at the surface, and the uncanny family resemblance had us both searching each other’s face.
“Apocalypse,” he answered, his voice a smoky whisper.
I left him then, backing away from the heat searing the air between us, the late-summer night balmy in comparison. I turned away from the offer to find refuge in the shadows, and shrugged off the feeling of blackened eyes following my heavy steps as I strode across Sunset. The taste of sulfur burned across the night, and I didn’t doubt him in the least.
34
Hunter and I were allowed back in the sanctuary the next day. Tekla had cleared the way, explaining about our break-in at Valhalla, my deal with the Tulpa, how I’d saved Ian from the maze when it’d meant sacrificing myself…and how she had foreseen it all. We learned of all this secondhand from Gregor as he ferried us in the cab, through the boneyard wall at dusk…as it should be. Tekla, he’d explained, hadn’t been seen since her return, and refused to come out of her room, even for meals. I knew why, of course. There was a difference between merely killing an enemy agent and torturing him up until his dying breath. I could only imagine her self-struggle as she tried to reconcile what she believed-what she taught-with what she’d done.
Meanwhile, I’d set up an appointment with Ian to get my conduit back…and find out who knew what about the contents of my missing computer. Fortunately, Ian saw our meeting as a date, a second chance to get together with Olivia Archer, and was gushing about mazes and conduits. I humored him long enough to ascertain that Joaquin hadn’t shared the information about Ashlyn with Regan or the Tulpa, and that Ian-in a spurt of heroic behavior-had destroyed the hard drive as the contents revealed themselves. Then I got him drunk on Mai-Tais, ferried him out to the car under the relieved eye of the bartender, where Micah drove him away to mess with his memory. He woke the next morning thinking the past week’s events had all been a bad, blurry dream. My letters to Ben were gone for good, but I snuck back to my old house, hoping for an answer to the note I’d so hastily scribbled on the kitchen counter days before. Given the little he knew of me, my life, and my reasoning-and how much I knew it must have hurt him to wake alone again-I shouldn’t have been surprised to find only two words waiting for me in the mailbox: Fuck you. No wonder he’d turned to Regan.
But the antivirus was safely in Micah’s capable hands, and we were planning a fireworks display of our own, though Hunter and I would probably be fast asleep before then. And while Warren made a point to specifically take me aside and apologize in private, we still weren’t entirely comfortable with each other. But we were both willing to start over again, and with the Tulpa out there, gunning for blood, we’d need each other more than ever.
“I’m sorry you couldn’t get your sister’s computer back,” Hunter said, once we’d been debriefed and dismissed. We strode the familiar corridors of the sanctuary side by side, hands in our pockets, smiling at those we met along the way, but not stopping. “I know there was a lot of…her on that thing.”