Deadly Dozen: 12 Mysteries/Thrillers (189 page)

“Nothing, Daddy. I…I just fell down, is all.” She tries to smile but winces in pain. She’s never been a good liar anyway.

“Where’s your momma?”

She points at the closed bedroom door.

George takes the towel, rinses it, wrings it, then gets down on one knee to gently press it against a swollen bump above her eye.

“You so brave, Punkin’. I’m proud of you. Now you can tell me the truth.” Tears stand in his eyes as he struggles to be strong for her. “It was them boys from school, wasn’t it?”

“No, it wasn’t.”

“I said, you can tell me the truth.”

“I am, Daddy. Wasn’t no boys this time. It was Courtney.”

“Big fat Courtney?”

“She and her eighth-grade friends. They see me coming home, minding my own business, then they go and say I’m a freak and ask me, how come no one ain’t never seen your momma—you even got one? And Courtney says I got one all right, she went and married a nigger.” She puts her hand over her mouth. “Sorry, Daddy. I hate that word, but that’s what they say.”

George pulls her tight into his arms.

“Don’t you pay them girls no mind, you hear? They just need some proper education. Don’t pay them no mind, and—”

“I did like you told me! I kept walking. But then Fat Courtney smacks me upside my head. I still didn’t say nothing, just kept walking even though the slap hurt. But then she goes on, hitting at me and saying niggers and white folks ain’t got no business making freaks like me for babies and she won’t shut up and…and...”

Holding her arms, George leans back and looks her straight in the eye. “You didn’t. Did you, Punkin’?”

“I didn’t mean to, I swear.” She sniffles, holding back a sob. “I just tried to give her a little shove ‘cause she was all up in my face, spitting when she talked. But she fell down real hard and started cussing at me. That’s when I knew I done wrong, so I held back how mad I was, like you always tell me to, and I didn’t fight back. I just waited till they finish whupping me, then ran home.”

George scrutinizes his daughter. “You hurting anywhere? Anything feel broken?”

“Nah, Daddy. You know they can’t really hurt me—not that bad, anyway.” Her head slightly bowed, she glances up with a little smile he doesn’t like. “But I can hurt them.”

“No, sweetie. Don’t even think about that.”

“Why, Daddy? I ain’t the only one, they do this to all the black kids in town. And just because I’m mixed, different, they do even worse to me. I
hate
‘em!”

“Now, Punkin’—”

“I do, Daddy. They’re so mean.”

George takes another look at her bruises and cuts. The bleeding has stopped, the swelling has gone down a little. Still on his knees, he hugs his daughter and nods to the sofa.

“Come on, let’s sit.”

A moment later, she’s leaning into him on the comfortable old couch with its plump stained cushions.

“You know, those mean kids? They all the Lord’s children too, Punkin’. And even though they do some pretty rotten things, they all been made in his image.”

“You saying God’s mean?”

George laughs, something he’s done rarely since her mother got so sullen and quiet.

“Oh, no. No, that ain’t what I mean at all. I’m saying everyone’s got some good in them deep down because we all made in His image. The bad stuff? That’s just garbage we picked up—from our parents, from our bad choices. That’s in our nature too.”

“Is it in
my
nature, Daddy?” Her eyes meet his, desperately seeking absolution—for what, George cannot fathom. “Am I just like them—you know, deep down?”

Before he has to answer—which he’d rather not—the bedroom door swings open.

“Enough, George!” Lucretia stands there, flaxen hair flowing past her shoulders like sunlight, lovely features marred by her perpetual scowl. “Are you just going to coddle her like that until she becomes as feeble as you?”

“Honey!”

She covers her mouth, whispers, “Sorry,” and retreats into the bedroom, swinging the door shut behind her.

#

The buzzing hornet in her back pocket causes Lena to check the caller ID. Yuri, her eastern bloc liaison.

“You’re late,” she said.

“Do you know how hard it is to get this stuff out of there and into the States?”

“Not my problem. What’s the current status?”

“Package is en route. One last stop for processing, then they’ll be delivered.”

“They’d better be, Yuri.”

“Have I ever let you down?”

“There’s always a first time—which would, in your unfortunate case, be your last.”

“It’ll be there. Ahead of schedule. I’d stake my life on it.”

Lena smiled. “Your life is always at stake, always has been.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

IN ALL HIS GOING TO AND FROM the earth, relatively few things disturbed Nick to the point of actual worry. He’d never acquired that annoying human habit. But now, as he slowly traversed the distance between La Jolla and his next assignment, his physical form was becoming more of a burden to shed. Which was, well, worrisome. What he hated about flying while fully physical wasn’t so much the cold air or the tailpipe fumes on the freeway below but the queasiness and perspiration. With Lena and his assignments he was back in that state of flux, that neither-here-nor-there place.

With an important issue to resolve.

Am I actually going to push Hope back into despair and suicide?

If there were more asinine rules that said he must do whatever he was told with no adequate explanation, perhaps it was time to see if there were indeed real consequences for not blindly obeying them.

Blasted rules.

How had they worked out for him back in Victoria Station?

No
.

Don’t get distracted.

Stop overthinking this and complete the assignment.

For no reason other than sheer instinct, Nick looked over his shoulder expecting to find that dark vapor looming about.

Not there. Perhaps he’d be okay.

As he got closer to his third subject, Carlito Guzman, his smartphone buzzed and chimed. The proximity sensor showed him which car on the surface road below was Guzman’s. The text flashed his assignment:

PROTECT CARLITO GUZMAN

There, stopped at a red light on Mission Valley Road with no other cars in the lanes next to him, Guzman’s car stood awaiting the signal change. But coming from behind without slowing down was another car—a black Cadillac that changed lanes to bring itself right next to Guzman’s window. And from the Cadi’s passenger window a gun protruded, its muzzle aimed right at his head. Guzman had no clue what was about to happen—he appeared to be singing.

Nick made himself invisible, flew down to the street, and stood directly in the path of the bullets.

The popping sound of semi-automatic weapon fire rang out.

Nick altered his molecular density so the few rounds that hit him went blunt at the point, then fell to the asphalt clinking like steel bolts. Cars on both sides of the road blazed out of the danger zone.

The gunman kept firing at Guzman. Nick kept shielding him from the onslaught. Then he tried that trick he’d learned from Lena outside Grand Central Station. Focusing on the oncoming bullets, he absorbed them into the spiritual layers, then sent them out into the sky.

It worked. The Cadillac raced off and took the on-ramp to the freeway. Nick saw Guzman look all over his body, all around the inside of his car, astonished he hadn’t been hit.

Nick passed into the car, where the cartel leader now sat perfectly still, his head resting against the steering wheel. He sat down in the passenger seat, which sank just a bit—apparently he’d brought weight and density with him even while invisible.

But then Guzman lifted his head and turned in Nick’s direction.

“Holy—!”

Nick instantly re-established invisibility.

With sudden jerky movements Guzman swiped his hand over and around the passenger seat, then spun around looking in back for Nick. He finally gave up, shut his eyes, folded his hands, and began to pray.

“
Gracias a dios…gracias señor…”

It was, of course, the first time Nick had heard his voice. He could usually discern sincerity in a human’s tone, especially one who thought he was alone. Guzman, he sensed, was genuinely grateful that his life had been spared.

So what if, for a split second, the subject had seen him? So far as this part of his assignment was concerned, Nick had succeeded. He’d protected the drug lord from death. And according to Lena, Carlito Guzman would go on to do great things if given the chance.

Imagine, feeling happy for a drug lord! But saving a life rather than watching it end? That was refreshing. And judging by the look on this young man’s face, Nick sensed that something wonderful was happening within him.

This felt good.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

HOPE MATHESON WOULD BE AWAKE by now. Having muddied the waters, Nick wasn’t exactly sure what he ought to do about her. For now, better teleport back to the Broadmore. But as soon as he focused on the hotel, a dull throb started in his head.

Worse, the pain intensified every time he tried to teleport.

Most annoying.

Never mind, I’ll fly.

A murder of crows blackened the sky as they flew overhead heading northwest towards La Jolla. He’d have to fly in the same direction to get to his suicidal subject. Judging by the sun’s height over the eastern horizon, he’d better hurry.

#

By human standards, traveling from Mission Valley to La Jolla in ninety seconds would be extremely fast. But compared to teleportation, the trip had seemed interminable. Now, holding two shopping bags full of women’s clothing, size 8, he stood in the Broadmore’s lobby shrouded from physical sight and paused to think. Wouldn’t it be more enjoyable for Hope if the clothes appeared magically before her eyes?

Yet when he recalled the one time he’d tried something like that, how it worked, where it ultimately ended, he heard sounds from London at the turn of the 20th century.
The squeal of metal, the screaming train whistle—

No. He’d vowed never to allow himself to go down that path again. And he had an assignment to complete.

With the snap of his fingers, Nick sent the shopping bags into what he called the oblivion locker, within which he could store physical items in an inter-dimensional state of limbo, to be retrieved at any moment.

He went to the elevator. He’d have to do something drastic to push Hope over the edge. But it just didn’t seem right.

Something about her...

Stop it! Were those feelings not the very ones that set him on the path to that fateful day in Victoria Station?

When he reached the third floor, he stepped out of the elevator and started the long walk down the hallway toward room 310. Sunlight flooded the end of the corridor, so brilliant that Nick had to cover his eyes for a moment. Yet another odd physical sensation he couldn’t remember dealing with before.

When he opened them he thought he saw something floating around the door to Hope’s room. It resembled a shadow that could not possibly co-exist with all that bright sunlight. But every time Nick blinked, it disappeared—only to reappear a few moments later.

The dark vapor.

It made him uneasy, though for several millennia it had never done anything other than hang about, as though watching to see what he would do in a situation where his choices were unclear.

But at this point Nick was fairly certain what he would do.

He’d waited all this time for a promotion and wasn’t about to let the weakness of human-based emotions cloud his judgment again. At least, that’s what he kept telling himself. A part of him felt differently. And that part seemed to be telling him not to do this. It was sort of like that doctors’ oath—
First do no harm.