Darkest Hour (19 page)

She wouldn’t let them.

“I don’t know what you want, but you better back off before I make you.”

“I’m only here to make sure you don’t put anymore holes in the walls.”

She tried again to push at him with her mind and got nothing. Her power was gone. Had they somehow taken it? Then why send the ghost. No. She hadn’t lost her power.

She lifted her arm, the one that used to be wounded but now only showed the faintest hint of a scar. While she had slept, someone had removed the tattered bandaged.

No more blood.

“You don’t have to fight us,” Thom said. “As Mica tried to explain, we’re on the same team.”

“A team that kills its own members.”

He made a face as if she had told the world’s worst joke. “Nobody
killed
you. Are you dead right now? Are you even a ghost?” He floated away from her, tilted back, and gently eased down so that he stood, or appeared to stand, on the floor beside her bed. “We took you on a trip to the other side. It was the only way to do it.”

Now that the ghost wasn’t right over her, the cold dissipated some, though she could still feel it emanating from him like winter air through a cracked door. The room smelled like the first hour after a fresh snow. “Do what?”

“Wake up the stuff that you threw at poor Mica.” He crossed his translucent arms. “You know, I’ve never seen Mica scared like that. And, as a ghost, I know fear.”

“Is that your sole purpose?” Kate asked. “To scare?”

He hitched a ghostly shoulder. “If Mr. Kress hadn’t taken me in, probably. He’s given my ‘tween life meaning.”

Despite the cold and the anger still simmering in her, Kate couldn’t deny her curiosity. She propped herself up on her elbows. “What’s a ‘tween life?”

“The closest thing to a name my kind of existence has. It’s not life. Not death. Just somewhere in between. ‘Tween.”

He sounded sad. Kate caught herself feeling sorry for him. Then she remembered where she was and how they’d been treating her. “I want to leave.”

“Okay.”

“That’s it?”

“Can you at least talk to Mr. Kress first? Let him explain some things.”

“Fine. Take me to him.”

Thom frowned. “Can you promise not to break the furniture?”

Kate held her formerly wounded arm up. “All outta blood.”

The ghost cocked his head, brow furled. “You’re full of blood.”

“You think I’ll cut myself just to use...” She couldn’t get herself to say the word
magic
. Even after all she had seen, it still sounded too ridiculous. Especially when talking about herself. Now she had a sense of why Craig and his friends referred to it as mojo.
Magic
just sounded so...fanciful.

“I don’t know what you’ll do. None of us do. You’re kind of a loose cannon at this point.” He held up his hands, palms out. “No offense.”

Kate’s head spun. All of this trouble over her. Did they really have no better way to find Jessie? Did she really have the kind of power they alluded to? “I don’t want to hurt anyone,” she said. “But I’ll be damned if I let you people keep manipulating me.”

“Fair enough.”

“Take me to Kress.”

Thom took her to Kress’s penthouse floor again. He escorted her as far as the door, then drifted back and waved in the door’s direction. “Go on in. He’s expecting you.”

Though Kate wasn’t sure how, since Thom had been with her since leaving her room, and had not communicated with anyone else on the way up. Before she could say anything about it, Thom sank down through the floor and out of sight.

Kate opened the door and stepped inside.

The sound of piano music greeted her. She didn’t recognize the song, something classical, Bach maybe. The whole room filled with it. Kate remembered the piano in the penthouse from her last visit and knew someone was playing it now. The music sounded too full to be coming from any kind of stereo.

She moved through the entryway and around the corner, bringing the piano into view and confirming her hunch. Kress sat on the bench, head bowed, eyes closed, his fingers flickering over the keys. He played for about a minute more, Kate content to let him go on forever. Then he stopped abruptly, dropping an almost painful silence onto the room.

He opened his eyes, lifted his head, and smiled at Kate. “As a child, I wanted nothing more than to become a concert pianist.”

Kate remembered that Kress claimed he wasn’t mortal. She tried to imagine a non-human childhood with such a seemingly human aspiration. “You grew up in our world?”

He nodded. “My parents were brought here at the turn of the century.”

“But you look...”

“Human?” He slid the cover over the piano keys and stood. “Some of us do.”

“What are you?” The question popped out automatically. Kate covered her mouth, cheeks flushing. “Sorry. That was rude.”

He laughed. “I had you killed and brought back to life in order to awaken a power in you you probably aren’t equipped to handle. I think I can forgive a little rudeness.”

Good point. Why did she care at all about insulting him? She had intended to tear into him the moment she saw him. Instead, she was acting like a star struck fangirl. Somehow, Kress projected a disarming charm that was nearly...

Supernatural.

As Jessie would have said,
Duh
.

Kress pushed in the piano bench, came around to her side of the piano, and leaned against it. “Like I said before, there is no known mythological corollary to my kind on your world. I could tell you what I call myself, but your ear would not know how to hear the name. My parents were killed almost immediately after arriving on this plain. So, if you’re at all privy to the tabloids, you know the rest of my history here, as it’s mostly true.”

All the celebrity news shows like to play up Romeo Kress’s life growing up in an orphanage, getting a scholarship to Julliard, being discovered while performing a stage version of
Oliver Twist
, the beautiful irony of a life destined for stardom. But in all his interviews, he claimed never to know his parents.

“Your artistic talent,” Kate said. “Is that a part of who you are?”

He raised his eyebrows and shrugged. “I imagine it is. But I was very young when I arrived here. Without my parents, I had no one to tell me who I am. To this day, I only know that I don’t belong here.”

“That’s what all of this really comes down to. All that talk about The Return, saving the mortal world from over-population. It really comes down to you wanting to go home.”

Kress pushed away from the piano, a wolfish grin on his face. “You seek the Chosen One. If you find her, you could help save your world from destruction. But that would be a happy side effect. All you really want is your daughter back.”

“I’ve never pretended to want anything more.”

“But you’ve been given something more. A role in the fate of this world. What good is having your daughter back, only to have the world end? Yes, I want to go home. I want to know what I am, why the rules of this world work differently for me than everybody else. But I have come to accept my motives are only a means to the larger end.”

Again Kate felt like a player in one of Kress’s movies. She wished she could have read the script ahead of time. She shook her head, bewildered. “You know, before Craig Lockman came crashing back into my life, I was just a suburban mother trying to raise a difficult teen. I’m not a secret agent or superhero. If you think I can help find Jessie, fine. But that’s as far as I go. I can’t save the world. That just isn’t...me.”

His brow creased. “But you saw what you did to Mica? There are very few who can subdue one of her kind so easily. That wasn’t a parlor trick. That was true power.”

“Power I don’t have any idea how to use. Power I didn’t even have before you bled me to death and then shocked me back to life.”

“If you’re worried about control, we can help you.”

“I didn’t ask for this.” She started to tremble. All at once, his magical charm had worn off and her anger came boiling back. “You had no right to...change me. I didn’t want to become a part of this world. I wanted to rescue my daughter and get the hell
away
from it.”

Kress stepped toward her. “I’m sorry you feel that way. But if you truly believe you could have stolen Jessie away and lived a so-called normal life somewhere, you’re more naive than I thought. Your power was dormant. Left alone, it never would have surfaced. But Jessie’s power...” He slowly shook his head. “There is no containing what she is. You will never be able to hide her.”

A hint of incense cloyed its way into the room and made it hard for Kate to breath. She waved a hand in front of her face to no effect. “She’s hidden pretty good from you.”

He closed his eyes with a long sigh. “Those that wish her harm are far more powerful than me. They may already have found her.” He opened his eyes and glared into Kate’s. “It may already be too late.”

A bitter flavor filled Kate’s mouth. “Is that a threat?”

“Stop being so stubborn. I understand your fear, but it’s time you stopped fighting me and directed your battle to those who’ve earned it.”

She started to say she was pissed off, yes. But she wasn’t afraid. She stopped, looked inward, and could easily see her anger only a coat of paint over the fear. Not of Kress or his menagerie of paranormal oddballs. What scared Kate most was this expectation that she could find Jessie and rescue her from some dark fate. What if she couldn’t, though? What if, even after they had given her magical powers, she didn’t have it in her to save her daughter? What if she failed her?

Kress had the wisdom to let Kate work things out on her own. He stood quietly, his gaze on her focused but soft. He must have turned on whatever magic he possessed, because that inexplicable desire to please him came over her again, not in any crude way. She felt like a favored student desperate to make her teacher proud. If she focused, she could dampen the feeling. She couldn’t banish it completely, though.

“I want to help,” she said.

“But?”

“Are you sure about my...power?” God, how stupid did that sound?

“I’m not the one who has to be sure.”

“But it’s real, right?”

“You know it is.”

“Is it enough?”

He moved close to her. His cologne smelled natural, like a collection of fresh spices. He rested a hand on Kate’s shoulder. “They only way to know is to use it.” He squeezed her shoulder. “Help us find Jessie, Kate. Then help us save your world.”

“Turn it off. Whatever you’re doing, turn it off. I can’t know if I’m making the choice on my own if you’re going to try to manipulate me with your tricks.”

“It’s not meant as a trick. I’m able to project my emotions. The only thing you’re feeling is my sincere desire to help you.” He removed his hand. “But I’ll back away.” He skirted the piano and crossed over to the sofa where he sat when Kate first met him. He sat and folded his hands in his lap.

Kate sensed his influence fade, though it left her feeling chilled, as if someone had stripped her of a warm blanket.

She had her wish. Time to decide what came next. With this new power now in her, she might be able to find Jessie on her own. She didn’t need Kress and his team for that. But what then? She knew deep down what he had said about Jessie’s own power was true. She had seen for herself her daughter unleash that power. She had even used it to save Kate from insanity.

And what of the things she had seen during that insanity?

Visions of Jessie bringing about terrible darkness.

Kate had tucked those images away as mere scraps of an addled mind. If they had been glimpses of a possible future, though, how could Kate stand by and not try to redirect that fate? Hiding Jessie away would not work. These dark forces would find her again and again, just as they had in Illinois from that terrible artifact. Just as they had to somehow make Craig take Jessie away from her.

Now, Kate had power of her own to fight back with. And a powerful group of potential allies to back her up. Craig had had his chance at protecting Jessie. From the sounds of things, he had failed. It was time she took over.

“Okay,” she said. “Here’s the deal. We find Jessie. We kick the crap out of everything that’s trying to get at her. We help her do her thing to trigger The Return. We save the world. I get my daughter back. You get to go home. Sound about right?”

Kress grinned, clapped his hands together once. “Sounds perfect.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

Waiting was the worst part. But mobilizing an army, even a small one like theirs, took time. Mobilizing equipment took time. Gathering resources, arranging travel, and staging a military assault on a city in the middle of the frozen nowhere took time.

Time.

Meanwhile, the vampires continued to feed on and turn the small city’s entire population.

Lockman slammed his fist on the table. He sat alone at the long conference table in the middle of the War Room. Maps, photographs, and schematics littered the surface like some creative tablecloth. Among the mess, Lockman had enough room for a laptop and a thermos full of coffee the gnomes in the mess hall dutifully replaced with a fresh one every hour. He used the laptop to surf the Net, keeping tabs on public knowledge of the situation in the north.