Out of Mind

speed moves and this time she was glad, if confused.

“Keep quiet and listen,” he said. “We don’t need to speak aloud.”

“No,” she agreed, still marveling that he was right. “Please let’s get to the conservatory. I’m afraid those bottles will be gone by now. They look like bottles of orchid fertilizer or something. They’ve got colored granules inside. Ben! There’s a little bird in there and it’s evil. It’s guarding the bottles, I think. I saw it the first time I came here, and it seemed harmless enough then.”

“It probably is.” Ben laughed. “I think I can manage a little bird.”

“Are there any police here?” she asked.

“No. They were pulled once it was obvious you weren’t here. I think the house is empty.”

Rapidly, with Willow behind Ben, where he had put her, they slipped from the kitchen into the corridor beyond. Ben’s hand shot back to hold her still. “Do you hear something?”

She listened. “I think so. Raised voices. But they’re muffled. Ben, someone’s coming through the front door.”

He flattened his back to the wall, one arm stretched protectively across her body.

They could see into the gloomy hall, but the front door was indistinct. Willow saw shadows shift. A small light at the top of the stairs cast an anemic yellow swath that touched the foyer and the opening to the corridor leading to the conservatory.

“It’s Rock,” she told Ben, squinting to see.

“Wait. Don’t call out. See where he goes first. We can’t be too careful.”

In his leather pants and muscle shirt, his keys making the faintest sound on the chain tucked into his pocket, Rock crept forward, not looking right or left, but making straight for the conservatory.

“How does he know to go there? Did he tell you why he couldn’t be at the event last night?”

Willow looked up at Ben in the shadows. She could make out the long mane of his hair sweeping forward when he leaned to see what he could.

“What do you mean? You talked to him. I saw you. At the gondola—he sent for you, remember?”

“You saw the man who took his place as boatman in a full mask and costume,” Ben said. “But I think Rock’s a resourceful man and he’s very protective of you. He must have had a good reason to duck out last night.”

At last Rock disappeared. Holding Willow’s hand, Ben started forward again. “I don’t suppose you’d agree to go outside and call Nat, tell him you’re safe?”

“No,” she told him shortly. “I’m not leaving you. And we need to do this alone. This is nothing the police can charge into. Soon we’re going to have to gather all the power we have between the psi families and work together.”

“I’ve contacted Pascal and asked him to find Sykes,” Ben said. “Sykes has his shield up, probably to keep Pascal from interfering, but that means I’m shut out, too. Your brother has only got one thing on his mind. You.”

“We need him,” Willow said.

“He’ll check in and then we’ll have him.”

Raised voices, jumbled together and angry, came from the direction of the conservatory. A crash, then a shriek of rage speeded Ben and Willow in that direction.

“What are you doing here?” Vanity shouted. “You’re that man, Rock, with Willow’s crew. None of her people are here anymore. Get out. Now.”

“You have made a serious mistake, traitor.” It was Rock’s raised voice. “Don’t you know who I really am?”

Silence followed before Vanity made an enraged noise. “You came here in disguise. How dare you trick me.”

“I’m flattered that one look at my real head is all you need to identify me,” Rock said. “That saves time. You underestimated me, Vanity. Worse yet, you underestimated our leader. You think we are all fools and you can control us. I have communicated with the Protector. It was he who told me about you. I am to take you back to Safeplace. He has already decided how to make you wish you hadn’t made your own plans. You should not have followed me to New Orleans. More than that, you should not have tried to take the place I earned. I was the one who fought for the right to come here for the cause, not you.”

“Rock is Embran,” Willow thought. “And so is Vanity.”

Frustrated that she couldn’t see inside the conservatory, Willow dropped to her hands and knees and shifted forward, but Ben’s hand on the back of her neck held her where she was.

Vanity’s strident voice broke in. “The Millets are getting closer to finding the key. We know they have one of them—”

“I also know,” Rock interrupted her. “I saw it in their shop. How did you find out about them?”

“The same way you did. I have my spies who let me know what our Protector discusses. If we don’t stop these humans, they may find all the keys eventually, and then they will be more difficult to stop. We have to capture their secrets first. We must get those keys and find their precious angel.”

Willow started to get up, but Ben stopped her.

“They won’t get to their legend,” Rock said. “Before they can, we will have overcome them all, and the legend will be in our hands. I believe the answers we’re looking for are there. Zibock and I are convinced there is a formula that will restore us. You forget that we have the Millets’ ignorance on our side. Thanks to the woman who was with Jude Millet in Belgium, the Embran know what we’re up against and what we must have. The Millets are still trying to guess about us. They know nothing, not even the significance of the keys.”

“I wish we had those—as many as it will take to reach the angel’s secret.” Vanity took a noisy breath. She sounded as if she could scarcely breathe. “Still, we don’t know how many keys there are. But we are all getting weaker. Who knows how many years we have before we can’t fight anymore. There have been too many mistakes made.”

“Not by me,” Rock said. “Bolivar was too easily distracted. Thirty years he wasted here indulging himself. But I am single-minded. I have done what I was sent to do.”

“How did you know I was working to undermine Willow’s business and get her here in this house?” Vanity asked.

“Have you forgotten what good friends Willow and I are?” Rock laughed. “And how closely we work? I can read, Vanity. And I have my ways around doors. The information is all there, written down.”

“Rock’s been there, right where I work, planning against us all the time,” Willow said. “He opened the tattoo parlor within days of my move-in. Ben, he’s one of them.”

“Did you kill Chloe Brandt to implicate me?”

He laughed again. “How perceptive of you. And it certainly brought a lot of attention you hated. The Brandts were a clever choice for your purposes. Dysfunctional is the word humans use, I think. But I only took moderate pleasure in disposing of the woman. No challenge there. Once I was sure she couldn’t make any noise, there wasn’t a fight. She tried to cover her face and stood there while I cut her. No challenge at all.”

With her hands rolled into fists, Willow looked up at Ben, and he shook his head. “Don’t let anger distract you.”

“So you took Willow Millet to the Protector?” Vanity said. “And now you are golden. Has she given the Protector important information?”

“I can’t tell you about it.”

Willow nudged Ben. “He’s not going to tell her they didn’t get any information from me.”