tombstone, eulogy, and life’s history all rolled into one forever.
I sat up and reached immediately for my gloves. After pulling them on, I shoved my hair back and snapped a rubber band around it. “I’ll take the roll and coffee, thanks.”
She aimed gray eyes at the eggs and gave a philosophical sigh. “I’d throw them to the crows, but they won’t touch them, either.” She deposited the tray on the desk and handed me a paper bag fragrant with the smells of butter, icing, and dark roast.
“I didn’t know doctors made house calls anymore, much less with cinnamon rolls.” And a damn fine cinnamon roll it was, too. It was the size of a saucer and dripping with all the things that made life worthwhile-sugar, butter, grease. I had to take my gloves back off to eat it, and it was more than worth the trouble.
“Yes, well, most doctors don’t tend to patients who are being held against their will.” Her lips tightened. “Who are being blackmailed.”
Maybe, like Eden, she was on my side, too. Charlie had nothing to contradict absolute integrity in her. Then again, Charlie had been too good for his own good. And good people are gullible.
“True.” My eyes narrowed as I wiped sticky fingers on a napkin from the bag. “And you think a roll and coffee makes up for that?” She was an amazing woman, and I didn’t need Charlie to tell me so, but that didn’t let her off the hook for all this.
“No,” she responded quietly. “I’m not sure anything would.” Laying warm fingers on my arm, she added, “I am sorry. I know it counts for very little, but I am.”
Behind the words, I saw her. Five years old and standing by the window where the cage hung. Her abuela kept two doves, gray and white with soft pink eyes. They watched the sky through silver bars, and that wasn’t right. No one should be in a cage. Everyone should know freedom. Libertad. Everyone should know the sky. And so she’d opened the window and then the door to the cage, and off they flew, without hesitation. As if they’d been waiting for this moment all their short lives. Meleah had waved in joy until she couldn’t see them anymore. Waved and waved.
I looked blankly at her hand on my arm. “Don’t.”
She removed it instantly, mortified, I could tell by the flush under warm amber skin. “I’m sorry. I forgot. It is inexcusable of me.” Because a good doctor didn’t forget that one patient was a diabetic, and she didn’t forget that another was psychic.
“It’s okay.” I took another bite of the roll. “It’s not an easy thing to remember.” I smiled, ready for a little harmless payback and because, hell, I was curious. “Did your granny bust your ass for letting her birds go?” I raised a hand for a short wave, a simple one-two bend of the fingers. “ Libertad, pequenas palomas.”
Freedom, little doves.
Her mouth opened slightly, and the flush faded. Then, amazingly, she smiled back, her gray eyes warm. “She scolded me quite fiercely, but it was worth it. Of course, the silly birds came back the next day looking for supper.” She gave a gentle shrug. “I did what I could.”
Which is what she was doing now. For Charlie. He was in a cage, the same as I was, the same as the birds, but the door to it was much more difficult to open than when she’d been five. Maybe if we were lucky, both Charlie and I would get our libertad.
Maybe.
I finished up the roll and the coffee just as Hector came through the door. “It’s a party,” I drawled, toasting him with an empty paper cup. “BYOCB, though. Bring your own cinnamon bun.”
Hector was not amused. Tense and on edge behind his usual stone mask, no amusement to be found. “Get dressed, Jackson. We have to get set up at our location.”
“Not the cavern, right?” I demanded with a little tension of my own. I’d had enough of that place-more than enough. Charlie could come through there wearing bells and whistles and dancing a goddamn jig, I didn’t care. I was not going to be there.
“No. I made sure we pulled another site. The last thing I want, Eye, is you gnawing on my shinbone.”
Well, I stood corrected. There was a little humor in Allgood after all. Desperate and dark battlefield humor but humor all the same. “Stringy as hell,” I said, wrinkling my upper lip. “I wouldn’t waste my time.”
Meleah’s smile widened then faded. “Hector? You’ll let me know when something happens, yes? Thackery certainly will not.”
“Of course.” He rested a hand on her shoulder and squeezed lightly. “You’re as much a part of this as anyone, no matter what that bastard says.”
Thackery apparently knew everything about winning friends and influencing people-and had tossed that knowledge into the toilet and flushed repeatedly. I definitely wouldn’t be sorry to see the last of that bastard. If I had to take bets on who might murder Charlie, although I was very carefully not thinking about that, he’d top the list.
Meleah, though, and even blackmailing Hector-they weren’t that bad. Good people in a bad situation, I was forced to admit, as much as I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to be sympathetic to their situation and them, I just wanted out. Wasn’t that right? I told myself. Wasn’t it? As Meleah left, she raised her own coffee cup to me. “ A la libertad, ” she said solemnly. “To liberty.”
Here was hoping it was that easy, I thought as she closed the door behind her.
Hector eyed me, assessing, but said nothing-at least, not about Meleah. “Get dressed,” he repeated. “We don’t have all day.”
“That statement has Mom written all over it.” I tossed my cup into the garbage can. “You want to remind me to use the bathroom before we go? Maybe tell me to wear clean underwear, too, while you’re at it.”
This time, he said nothing at all, the pale eyes narrowed to slits.
“Okay, okay,” I said. “Sheesh. Do I have time for a shower?”
“No.”
“Great,” I mumbled as I stripped and changed into jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt. “If Charlie does show up, he’ll be promptly driven away by my funky stench. There’s a ghostbusting tool Murray and Aykroyd never tried.”
“Actually, you smell like a giant cinnamon bun. Very manly. Now, get your goddamn ass in gear.” There was humor in the words, but his eyes didn’t show it. Why would they? Today was the day he was hoping to take what was left of his brother and end it permanently. It had to be done, but that didn’t mean it hurt any less.
I finished tying my sneakers, put on my gloves, and stood. “Okay. Let’s go save Charlie.”
It wasn’t as cool as, say, let’s go kick some noncorporeal ass, but it was far more true. We might be ending Charlie, but we would be saving him, too, because Hector was right. Charlie would far rather be gone than continue hurting people. The nonexistence of the grave would be vastly preferable. Then again, Charlie believed in life after death
… real life, not the lab-created kind. Funny how someone so brilliant could be so damn naive. And may a heavenly choir of angels sing you to sleep.
Shit.
Our location turned out to be an old mill. Lassie could’ve told us those were never good places to hang out. Trouble was bound to pop up-it was the law.
It was nice, though. Weeping willows bowing over a chuckling creek. The silver wood and stone of the mill was like a pool of moonlight at odds with the bright morning sun. I tossed a rock into the water with my left hand. In my right, I held Charlie’s key chain. When the time came, I’d strip my glove off and try to track Charlie, try to get the jump on him by at least a few seconds, give the team at the chosen location a heads-up.
Our location didn’t have the big guns this time. The equipment had been taken to the place with the highest body count: the cavern. It was considered the most likely place with the highest amount of “fraying.” When I asked Hector why he hadn’t gone there with that team, he hadn’t responded, unless you consider jaw clenching a response. Thackery. The son of a bitch had a lot of power, maybe enough to get Hector thrown off the project. It was the only thing that explained Hector’s presence behind me at the stream and made Thackery seem more suspicious-keeping Charlie’s brother at arm’s length from Charlie was what a murderer would do.
“It’s time,” he said quietly. “Ten minutes until ETE.” I looked over my shoulder and raised my eyebrows questioningly. “Sorry. Estimated time of ether-disruption.”
“Scientists.” I snorted. “Geeks.”
