Rise of the Blood

as if I still had some fragment of Rhea’s all-knowing.

Maybe I did.

I pushed him away and ran for the bathroom, locking myself inside. It wasn’t the most mature response in the world, but we’d blown well past any concern about maturity on the way to post-traumatic stress.

I started the shower, just thinking I didn’t want him listening to me bawl, and then realized that beneath my borrowed top there was still caked blood from the attack that had seeped through the fabric of my discarded clothes. All I could think of was getting clean.

I didn’t even wait for the water to get warm, but stepped into the shower fully clothed. I didn’t adjust the temperature when it turned from frigid to scalding, but stood beneath the onslaught shivering. Burning and yet cold, all at the same time.

I grabbed up the bar of soap and scrubbed everywhere—over my clothes, under. And then I ripped the clothes off entirely and let them lay there on the floor of the bathtub as the water swirled all around, washing me clean.

I’d barely gotten a towel wrapped around me when there was a pounding at the outer door to the room.

I yelled out, “Go away,” but still I heard Nick open the door and let someone in. A second later, I knew who. Small person, big voice.

“Where is she?” Tina demanded.

“Shower,” Nick said.

“Oh my god, what happened to your eye?” Tina asked him, but she was already moving on before Nick had the chance to answer. “Tell her to get her butt out here. I need to see if she’s still fit for duty and to walk her through what she missed at rehearsal.”

“Tell her yourself,” I yelled from behind the bathroom door. “She can hear you.”

Somehow, talking about myself in the third person was easier. Like I could escape. I didn’t even blame Tina for her attitude. After all, we came from circus stock, where you downed the painkillers, put on your flesh-tone bandages, smiled to hide the wince and made sure the show would go on. If there was time later, you could ice it up and call in the medic.

The bathroom doorknob rattled, and I reluctantly reached to unlock it before she could tear it off the hinges. I wouldn’t put it past her.

Tina yanked the door open and we faced each other on either side of the doorway. “You look like crap,” she said, showing off her sensitive side. “What happened to you? They said a walk, but I couldn’t see you scaling the side of the mountain.”

No one could blow your cover like family.

I pulled her into the bathroom with me and shut the door.

“Ooh, secrets,” Tina said, belligerence giving way to elfin mischief. “Tell me all. But be quick about it.”

I rolled my eyes. The normality of Tina’s presence was starting to have a strange calming effect on me. I wasn’t sure I deserved calm, but my brain must have decided it couldn’t sustain a state of perpetual panic.

“Apollo and I had…things to discuss, okay? So we found someplace quiet where no one would be looking for us, and I slipped and hit my head, that was all.”

“Uh huh, someplace to talk. Important enough to make you miss my wedding rehearsal?”

“In my defense, I was unconscious.”

“Sure, sure, some excuse. Of course, if I’d been on a private walk with Mr. Hollywood hottie, I’d have swooned too…if I weren’t a soon-to-be-married woman and all.”

“I did not swoon,” I answered, indignant.

“There, now you look more like yourself.” Her eyes glittered. “You look like you want to take a swing at me. Come on, get dressed.”

“But—” After everything that had happened, the last thing I wanted to do was walk down the aisle at her side like nothing was wrong. I felt like I’d taint the whole ceremony just by being part of it. A wedding was supposed to be something sacred. The show must go on didn’t seem to apply. But there was no way I could explain all that to Tina, even if I was sure she’d see things my way. She’d just see that her wedding party was lopsided and that it was all my fault.

“Okay,” I said finally. “But can we stop for coffee and calories before whatever fresh hell you’re going to put me through?”

“Andre said ‘no caffeine’,” she protested. I guessed Andre was the clipboard guy from yesterday’s production meeting.

“No caffeine, no Tori,” I said, talking about myself in the third person again.

“Fine, fine,” she said. “I’ll just tell the makeup artist to give you the teabag treatment before she goes to work on you. Now get dressed.”

I didn’t get it—teabags were good, coffee was bad? There was no justice in the world.

I hoped the lack of justice would work in my favor for the next twenty-four hours at least. Having the police crash the wedding to arrest me would probably ruin Tina’s big day and Uncle Hector’s production and put me back on the outs with my family…not to mention in prison.

I went to get dressed, avoiding Nick’s arms when he reached for me as I passed him on the way to my suitcase and avoiding his gaze when he tried to catch my eye. I’d just gotten myself together. I was afraid that I’d fall apart again at one hesitant touch.

If I were Christie, I’d probably focus on what I was going to wear, just in case I ended up on the morning news. What went well with handcuffs? Did I go with unobtrusive and demure, completely incapable of cutting down three grown men single-handedly? Since I didn’t exactly own pearls and Peter Pan collars, I went for the first thing I touched, but Tina took it out of my hands and reached for a plain white button-up with just enough darting for shape. Feminine but not girly. “A wardrobe staple,” Christie had called the shirt when she’d made me buy it.

“Button-up is better,” Tina said. “Then you can change later without messing up your hair and makeup.”

Couldn’t have that.

I shrugged and took the shirt, added black skinny jeans and went to the bathroom to change. I didn’t bother with makeup or anything else, since I knew it would all be redone, and I didn’t wear much anyway.

On the way out, Tina dragged me to the hotel’s breakfast buffet, flashed her room key, loaded croissants and fruit into a napkin and looked pointedly from me to the coffee keg. The carafe was keg-sized, anyway, with both ceramic and foam cups sitting beside it. Unfortunately, they only had one size to-go cup, which was not nearly big enough, but I didn’t think the hotel would take kindly to me grabbing the keg like a football and rushing it out of there, so I made myself two cups, doctored them both with cream and sugar, drank one still standing at the coffee bar and refilled the cup before applying lids.

“Okay, let’s go, I said.

She looked like she despaired of my behavior. Since I agreed with her, I didn’t say a word, but followed her out into the extra crisp morning air. It slapped me awake better than the cup of coffee I’d already downed.

The sun was shining, glistening off the dew that sparkled on every leaf. The world seemed newly made, pristine. Perfect. It was the kind of day that made you glad to be alive and death seem far, far away. I felt like crap about it, the kind that stunk and stuck to your shoes, clinging to the treads. The kind that stayed with you…like the memory of cutting down three men without missing a beat.

Okay, enough self-loathing. The only way I was getting through the day was denial. I couldn’t change what was. Couldn’t go back. Couldn’t confess. I’d have to go forward. Somehow.

“Seriously, you all right?” Tina asked, studying me. “You and your boyfriend get into a fight?”

“You could say that.” I took another sip of coffee and avoided looking at her.

“You love him?” she asked.

I glared at her for the question, but she was family. She was entitled to ask. “We may have irreconcilable differences,” I said, avoiding a direct answer.

Like, I’m a killer and he’s a cop.

Part of me knew that wasn’t exactly right. Guns didn’t kill people. People killed people. And all I’d been in Rhea’s hands was a weapon. But that didn’t change the fact that the killing was now