Darkest Hour (12 page)

The hall eventually led to an elevator. Based on the numbers above the elevator door, the building they were in had seven floors. Once inside, Mica gestured at Wertz. “Push the seven for me, will ya?”

Wertz spat air, fluttering his lips. “Funny gal.” The button for the seventh floor was well above the gnome’s reach.

Mica smirked as she tapped the button herself.

The rise made Kate’s stomach spin a little. She took a deep breath and tried to prepare herself for whatever came next. Impossible, she knew. In this secret world of gnomes and pixies and vampires and ghosts, you couldn’t prepare, because just about anything could come next. In this world, life seemed to have no rules.

The seventh floor did not disappoint in the surprise department. The doors split and the three of them stepped out into a penthouse apartment that could have fit three of Kate’s old houses inside. A hodgepodge of exotic paintings and statuary made up the bulk of the décor. A half-man, half-dragon carved from marble sat atop a Grand piano, the piano situated in a corner made of glass, a view of endless plains stretching out below, the setting sun turning the tips of the browning grass a glowing amber.

Kate’s breath caught at the view.

More sculptures like the man-dragon sat on shelves or stood as tall as Kate on the floor. Winged creatures, giant snakes, men clad in armor and wielding swords. Paintings on the walls depicted scenes both macabre and inspiring—like the one of the man dancing with a glowing angel, unaware of the twisted demon close behind with bared fangs and a long sword.

Mica and Wertz let Kate gape for a bit before ushering her further inside.

The floor plan was mostly open, but the furnishings and a few select walls provided enough of a maze for them to go through that Kate did not see the man waiting for them on the red leather couch until they turned a corner guarded by a life-sized sculpture of an ogre that doubled as a pillar bracing the ceiling.

For the second time, Kate’s breath caught.

She knew the man on the couch, his arms stretched out along the seatback to either side of him, legs casually spread, dark gaze locked directly onto her. She had seen his face on countless magazine covers, movie trailers, TV interviews and exposes. The even stubbled head. The matching stubble on his face. Both carefully groomed to look perpetually, but handsomely, un-groomed. His most famous feature was his eyes, though. Cool, gray, and always with a hint of the sinister. Those eyes, more than any acting talent, were what made Romeo Kress, according to People Magazine, America’s favorite bad guy.

The closest Kate had ever come to meeting a celebrity in person was when she had lunch one table over from her local weatherman. In any other situation, she would have been plenty blown away with meeting the legendary Romeo Kress. She’d seen his movies, loved several of them. But to meet him under these circumstances? That he had something to do with the likes of Mica and Wertz, that he wanted to find Jessie himself, that he was a part of the supernatural world?

Kate almost fainted.

“Easy, tiger.” Mica put an arm around Kate’s shoulders and held her steady. “A fan, I take?”

Blinking away her lightheadedness, Kate stared at the man on the couch. “Is that really…”

“That really is,” Wertz said.

Romeo Kress smiled. He gestured to a matching chair of candy red that looked like it could fit right in at an old 1950s diner. “Please have a seat.” His voice held that signature rumble that had delivered so many wicked lines.

Kate drifted over to the chair as if walking through a dream. She sat on the edge, folded her hands in her lap, and leaned forward to give her host a long look. She felt the dumb grin pinching at her cheeks and could do nothing about it. “What in the world do you have to do with any of this?”

“What a question,” he said and raised his eyebrows. “All depends on what you mean by ‘this.’”

Kate waved a hand at Mica and Wertz. “Them. The supernatural stuff. My daughter. Craig. Any of it.”

“Well, the supernatural stuff, as you put it, I don’t have much choice with, seeing as I’m a card carrying member.”

“You’re a…?”

“Mortals don’t have a mythical counterpart for me. Much as I’ve searched the globe, I believe I’m the only of my kind to find myself on this mortal plane.”

“You
look
human.”

He hitched a shoulder. “So does Wertz.”

“Yeah, but he’s—”

“Careful,” Wertz warned. “I’m sensitive about my size.”

“Mica looks like an average mortal, too,” Kress said.

“Barring her poor sense of style.” Wertz waggled his eyebrows.

Mica gave him another nudge with her foot, sending him stumbling into the ogre pillar.

“Many beings from beyond the curtain share mortal features,” Kress continued, clearly used to and unfazed by this duo’s antics. “After all, in the grand scheme, we are all related.”

“What grand scheme?” Kate asked.

He waved a dismissive hand. “Bah, who wants to get philosophical at a time like this? We have more important things to tend to.”

Kate felt a twinge in her chest. “Does that mean you’re finally going to tell me what you guys are all about? And how to find Jessie?”

“Yes and yes. First, some background on us. My wealth from making films has allowed me a great deal of resources. Ever since finding myself on the mortal plane, I’ve wanted to know more about how this dimension fits in with the others. How a being from a parallel world can suddenly find themselves outside of their own realm.” He hung his head and smirked. “Looks like we’re going to get philosophical after all.”

“I don’t understand any of this. Craig tried to tell me some, but he always seemed skeptical of his own explanations. You…people…supernatural people…beings…don’t come from our world?”

Mica and Wertz stood like a pair of guards where they had entered this section of the penthouse. Kate supposed that’s exactly what they were, too, for the moment. As if they expected she might try to run for it. In the meantime, their presence, along with Kress’s, made Kate the only mortal in the room and outnumbered three-to-one. It made her self-conscious about how to address their kind.

No one appeared bothered by her awkward address, though. Kress crossed his legs and rested his arms on the couch-back again—relaxed, unworried. “That’s the trick question everyone wants the answer to. The truth is, our planes have cross-pollinated enough that it doesn’t matter who is from where originally. An easy example is the vampire. Many vampires seen today—”

“If you see ‘em before they see you,” Mica interjected.

“—were born here on the mortal plane. Actually, I’d say most.”

“But why did you come here in the first place? And how?”

“It’s different for every case. Some were summoned by mortals who thought they could control the inhabitants of other worlds. Some of us slipped through natural tears between worlds. Still others came here on a pilgrimage of their own making, each with its own design.”

Interesting information, but Kate couldn’t see how it mattered. It brought her no closer to finding Jessie. And it didn’t cover the original question about who these people were and what they wanted with her daughter.

“Tell me why you brought me here.”

“We are looking for your daughter and Craig Lockman.”

“Why?”

“Because they are key in rebalancing this plane.”

“Rebalancing?”

“Another fancy word,” Mica said, looking like she wanted to spit. “Means there’s too many of us here.”

“Too many supernatural people,” Kate said.

“As I suggested, some cross-over between worlds is natural, unavoidable, and mostly harmless. But in the last decade or so an expanded era of invasion has reigned.”

“That includes you, doesn’t it? I mean, no offense, but aren’t you part of that invasion?”

Kress uncrossed and recrossed his legs. He laced his fingers together across his knee. “That’s right.”

“But if I’m reading you right, you guys want to
stop
that invasion.”

“Not just stop it,” Kress said. “Reverse it.”

“Including yourselves?”

“Eventually, yes.”

“But if you’re part of the problem, why do you care?”

Wertz grunted. “You think we want to be here? You think I like hearing cracks about my size and my gardening skills every damn time I have to deal with a mortal?”

“It’s simple.” Kress shrugged. “We want to go home.”

“How does this tie in with Jess?”

“Your daughter is referred to by several groups of supernaturals as the Chosen One. Not all agree on exactly what she’s been chosen for. But it is my belief,” he looked up at his companions, “
our
belief that she can bring about what some have called The Return.”

Contemplating that made Kate a little dizzy. “Why Jessie?”

“Destiny does not deal in whys.”

“This…Return? How does that work? You all just disappear and end up back home?”

“Wish I knew,” Kress said, “though I doubt it will be that easy.”

Something occurred to Kate. “The ghost. Thom. He said Jess and Craig were about to end the mortal world or something like that.”

For the first time since she sat down with him, Kress hesitated. His gaze shifted to his companions as if looking for backup. Then he looked back to Kate with some of the color leached from his face. “Why did Lockman take your daughter and send you away?”

“I don’t know. He wouldn’t tell me. Said I couldn’t take it.”

Kress scratched the side of his neck, the sound of his fingernails against his scruff loud in the interim silence.

“Why?” Kate asked. “Do
you
know?”

Kress shook his head. “The last bit of concrete intel we have on Lockman came when he went up against Otto Dolan in Detroit. We had eyes and ears on Dolan for some time. That’s how we learned about you and Jessie. After Lockman took out Dolan, a little research made the connection between the prophecy of the Chosen One and your daughter. But Lockman took the two of you into hiding and that’s the last we had.”

That didn’t explain the hemming and hawing over Thom’s warning. They were keeping something from her, just like Craig used to do. “What aren’t you telling me?”

“Perhaps it’s better if you don’t know.”

“That’s not going to fly. You want my help, you stay honest with me. Craig kept me in the dark about so many things, that’s how I ended up here.” She looked Kress square in the eyes. “What aren’t you telling me?”

Kress met her gaze and stared long and hard.

Wertz’s small feet shuffled nervously on the polished wooden floor.

The air felt thicker.

“Fine,” Kress said. “Some members of my team are concerned that something may have happened to Jessie.”

Kate’s stomach clenched. “Like what?”

“No one is certain. Much of this was gleaned through supernatural means. Scrying. Tarot. Induced visions. These techniques aren’t always reliable. Your story seems to back up that
something
happened, though. Why else would Lockman take Jessie away from you?”

He was still holding back. Kate could feel it. “You must have some idea. You don’t make a prediction about the world’s end on a whim. If you’re trying to spare my feelings, you’re wasting your time.”

“The specifics do not matter. I’m not going to make you suffer through a bunch of possibilities when that’s all they are. The important thing is that something has changed, and I’m worried that if we don’t find Jessie and put things back on course, we’ll lose our chance at bringing about The Return. And
that
means your mortal plane could become overrun with all manner of dangerous creatures.”

He leaned forward. “Mortals will become the minority.”

Chapter Fifteen

The stream of blood pumped out of Father Caruthers’s stump of a neck in time to his heartbeat. He remained standing for a surreal few seconds before tumbling sideways to the floor. Meanwhile, his head sailed across the room and bounced off the wall like a tossed basketball, leaving a slap of blood on the white paint.

The smell of iron bit at Lockman’s nose and made the hairs on the back of his neck prickle.

Dr. Truman screamed. He spun and ran for the door.

Jessie—
it’s Gabriel now, don’t let yourself forget that
—leapt out of her seat and into a perfect arc that had her landing on Truman’s back. She wrapped her legs around his waist, locked her arms across his chest, and sank her fangs into the side of his neck.

He screamed again, a wet gurgle dulling the pitch this time. With her on him, he lost his balance and fell forward. Jessie—
Gabriel, damn it!
—stayed on his back a few seconds longer. The moist sucking sounds made Lockman’s stomach do flips. As disgusted as he was, his instincts remained lithe.

He drew his weapon and trained it on Jessie, lining up the notch on the barrel with the center of her back.

As if she sensed the move, she tore her mouth loose from Truman’s throat and looked over her shoulder at Lockman. The blood around her grin made her look like a deranged clown with a bad makeup job. “Oh, Daddy, you’re not going to shoot me are you?”

Most frightening in all this, he could see
his
Jessie hidden beneath the horror show. Despite the blood, the gray complexion, the fangs, and her new, Gabriel-twisted voice, he could see his daughter in her eyes. A random memory from before the vamp king had turned her scrolled through his mind. The taste of pumpkin spice coffee. She had made him try some at a coffee house when they were living in Illinois with Kate, during those days he thought he had made them safe. He had insisted he would hate the coffee, but once he had a sip he was hooked. It was one of a handful of good memories with her during that time, when her obsession with mojo hadn’t kept her locked in her room and cutting herself.

Jessie stood and squared off with Lockman. She wiped her mouth with the back of her wrist and only managed to smear the blood across her cheek. “So here we are. My body facing off against my soul. Strange, isn’t it?”

“This isn’t your body. Hasn’t been for a long time.” Lockman’s words sounded hollow to himself. He wished he hadn’t said anything at all. Bantering with Gabriel would get him nowhere.