Cheat the Grave

still had a use for me. Sure, they’d bred chaos the world over, but they were already working to change that-at least if Carlos was to be believed. And while I wasn’t sure I did believe him, I could go along with it for a while, at least until Mackie was subdued. Then I’d get back to my mortal life.

“What about Mackie? True death to the monster, or just a one-way ticket back to Midheaven to get him out of your hair?” I thought about the men in Midheaven, and what Mackie’s absence might mean to them. Each would have a better chance of escaping that twisted world without the knife-wielding piano player there to intercept. That Hunter was over there still had nothing to do with it.

“Oh, no.” Carlos’s dark brows creased low. “Most of the men in Midheaven are rogue agents. Tripp wasn’t able to tell us about them”-because what happened in Midheaven stayed in Midheaven, I thought wryly-“but he could tell us of Mackie’s purpose there once he began interfering with this world’s mysteries.”

He meant once Mackie came after me.

“Okay. Get rid of Mackie,” I said, turning back to Carlos. “And I’ll try to keep an open mind.”

Carlos allowed only a small twitch to his lips. “And may I ask why?”

I thought about my drowning, about being abandoned in a desert wash along with broken bottles and stripped tires, and left with a body too weak to hold its own weight. Yet I spoke of my most recent loss. “Because the bastard killed my cat.”

12

I stood, my chair bumping over the aged floor, wondering if we’d leave via one of the cabs at the neighboring yard or if we’d walk. Or, I thought, amused, maybe one of these grays would pick up their new “amiga,” fling me across their shoulders and vault into the night. Mackie was probably free by now. He’d start tracking my scent as soon as I was on the street. He could be tracking it now. I shuddered…then shuddered again when I saw what Carlos, still sitting, had done.

“You’re joking, right?”

He leaned back, a full smile branding those soft wide lips as he motioned toward the last of the mescal he’d poured into my shot glass…along with the worm. “Gusano rojo. It’s the ingredient which lends the true complexity to the drink.”

I crossed my arms. “I’m more than happy to keep it simple.”

Carlos nodded, but I could see he was enjoying this. “It’s a delicacy.”

“It’s a fucking worm.”

“Larvae, actually.” He laughed at my grimace. “But don’t worry. It’s nonparasitic.”

“I don’t want it.”

Carlos fell still. “This one is…special.”

I studied his smooth face like a map, then picked up the stunted glass for a closer look. The worm looked like a moth with no wings. It was bloated and soft from marinating so long in the alcohol, its destroyer and preservative all at once. I wondered if it’d sunk to the bottom of the bottle thrashing and alive, fighting in inelegant bends and sweeps, or if it had sunk resignedly to its fate. It might have been palatable stewed with some garlic or sweet onion, but sushi style? I didn’t think so.

I followed the length of its velvety sides, which ribbed outward and wide, until my eye caught on an unnatural bulge in the middle. Some sort of device. “Tracking?” I asked, glancing back up at Carlos.

He nodded. “It’s old technology like most of our weaponry, but it works surprisingly well. The sensors inside react to adrenaline and body heat, so even if we’re not near you, we’ll know when you’re in trouble and be able to swiftly pinpoint your location.” He motioned for me to drink again. “Please. I’ve been saving this bottle for a long time.”

I stared at his hands, the liquor I’d already consumed making them appear larger than they were. Yet they tapered nicely, almost elegant in their jointed shape and warm skin. Not at all like the worm.

“Trust me, Joanna,” Carlos said, somehow both composed and imploring, strength and vulnerability living in the same melodious tone. “It will open your eye to things previously hidden.”

I sat the glass back down. “I’d prefer my taste of the forbidden in the form of an apple. Tradition, ya know.”

He pursed his lips, eyes lowered on the small glass containing the large worm. Larvae. I shuddered again.

“Did you know worms have been around for more than 120 million years?”

“This one in particular?”

Ignoring me, he leaned forward to explain. “They evolved along with dinosaurs. They have no brain, eyes, or feet, yet they have burrowed through centuries while those greater, grander, and larger around them have fallen.”

The bigger they are…

Which was the not-so-subtle point he was trying to make about the troops-the Tulpa and his relentless pursuit of power, Warren and his equally determined fight for the same. I sat down again, keeping my eyes averted from the glass. It was an invite to keep talking, but I still wasn’t biting.

“Night crawlers travel underground, hunkered deep and unseen by those who walk the surface. They help with decomposition, eating away the dead, aerating the earth with their movement, enriching the environment through this lowly work. Ask any biologist, and they’ll tell you everything on the surface thrives because of them. They ingest the old so the new can be born.”

I slid lower in my chair and eyed the drink warily. “All right. I get the analogy.” Worms and rogues, both underground, both working beneath the sight of those who ran the world. I’d have still asked if I could skip it, if not for the tracking device. Why couldn’t they have planted it in a chimichanga?

Carlos was gazing at me, dark eyes luminous in the tanned face, beautiful hands still as artwork on the tabletop. I knew he could force it down my throat, but he was waiting for my acquiescence. Not running me down with his desires and demands. “First rule of the cell. Do not underestimate the lowly.”

I see a woman with everything.

Why? I wondered, biting my lower lip. Because I was on my heels, back to the wall, helpless as a being without brains or eyes or feet, but somehow surviving still? The comparison didn’t repulse me as much this time around. Not with Carlos’s gaze on my face and his dark head dipped toward mine. He was a realist, rogues had to be, and my weaknesses were already laid before him like burnt offerings.

It made me feel more seen than at any time since donning Olivia’s flesh. My flaws were my only defenses now that I had none, but I suddenly felt myself lowering my guard willingly. Maybe they weren’t defenses after all, but pretense. Like a child sticking her fingers in her ears and saying she couldn’t hear.

I picked up the glass, eyed the death inside. Would sucking on it draw out the power to burrow to safety as well? If I chewed it into little pieces, could I then ingest the discarded bits of this world, pump life back into them, and create something new?

In the end, I swallowed it whole. Carlos was right about one thing. It was delicate, but for the device buried inside. That stood out like a wire ball of fury. It pierced the worm, took root in my throat, and stuck there like a metal spider until I forced it down. The tears along my esophagus were cold when I breathed. When my eyes had ceased watering, I looked up.

Carlos smiled, holding out a hand. I pushed to my feet again, then lunged for him as the room began to spin. I was in trouble, a teetering dreidel on the inside, but all Carlos did was hold my hand. Remembering the myth about tequila worms having hallucinogenic properties, I slurred, “Is this laced?”

And weren’t drugs supposed to make you feel a high before you hit a low? This one pulled me down to my knees, like a slap from on high. Right before my limbs numbed out, Tripp reached my other side. I imagined I could scent him as I once had in Midheaven, when he’d been sweaty and defiant and smelling of old burnt cedar.

Carlos, so forthcoming about the rogue agents and their desire to help me, about being the one to give me a chance to become “who I was meant to be,” not to mention a detailed history of the worm, simply dropped a silken kiss upon my lips, setting them to buzzing as he braced my arms. “Repeat after me, one word only: Midheaven.”