Firewall (Magic Born) (8 page)

“No kidding?”

“He had her brought to Valley Forge to read tea leaves.”

Tuyet said, “A mamasan at the orphanage in Gehenna taught me to read signs in city elements. Find a sign in neon, another in concrete or maybe steel. Music or crowds. Tech. Then figure out what it all means together.”

“Were you any good at it?”

The strongest divination she’d ever done had been under the influence of nightshade. Still in her teens, trancehacking abilities not yet discovered by a Ranger scout. She’d walked the streets at night. Flashes of blue eyes came to her in a neon sign that spelled out Live Nude Girls. The shelter of a bus stop in pouring rain transformed into the safety of strong arms. Different kinds of music rolling out into the streets from various bars and clubs painted a picture of a dance: first timid, then like a secret too big to keep, followed by anger, followed by things she didn’t have the words for. Random, unfocused trancehacking presented abstract images of black and silver, speed and escape.

“No,” Tuyet lied. “I wasn’t any good at it.”

“I don’t believe you,” he said with a good-natured smile.

She ignored him. “What was in those files that got your interest?”

“Not any one thing, or even anything specific. More like the picture all that history painted. The government really did try to keep a lid on things when hacktivists revealed us. They did a shitty job, but they tried. The problem was that they tried to deny it for too long and public opinion got away from them. The people who feared us, feared magic—they were the ones who controlled the public narrative. And many of them were powerful.”

Tuyet returned to her chair, sitting sideways to face him. “I think I get where you’re going with this—I’m just not sure it would do any good.”

“I don’t know either, but I think it’s worth a try. Facts and statistics don’t matter. The people on the other side, the Brice Jennings of the world, are more than willing to substitute their own version of facts for the truth. All we have to counter that is our stories. The truth of our lives. What we go through every day, being separated from the people we love because of the ordinance. Couples falling apart because of losing a child to the Magic Laws. The reasons behind the anger that leads people to set fires and throw rocks at cops. If we can tell our stories, find a way to get the story of New Corinth out, maybe it’ll make a difference.”

“I’ll see if I can figure something out.” It sounded good in theory, but it also ran up against the wall of her cynicism. The last time she’d opened up that wall was to help a witch escape with his Normal lover—Brice Jennings’s wife. Jennings reacted by pushing for the ordinance that locked up FreakTown.

“Could you also help her get interviews? With people inside the zone?”

She wanted to say no but something stopped her. “Set up a meeting and I’ll talk to her. Can you get me copies of some of the stuff she’s already filmed?”

Jason smiled as he withdrew a thumbnail-sized glass storage drive from his shirt pocket. “Here’s some of her best work.”

Tuyet took the drive. “I can’t guarantee anyone in FreakTown will agree to be interviewed. That’s a huge risk.”

“She’s quite proficient at hiding the identities of the people she interviews.”

“It’s the blowback to all of FreakTown that worries me.”

“I know. Talk to Vadim. See what he thinks.”

She nodded. “Let’s go over how to work the phone I brought you.”

They went through the information quickly, Tuyet working on autopilot. Jason was tilting at windmills with his idea of getting footage from New Corinth out to the wider world in a way that would make a difference. She should have told him no, gently but firmly shut him down. So why didn’t she?

Maybe because she’d tilted at a similar windmill for years, trying to convince Hayes to think for himself instead of following orders.

Maybe because part of her wanted to take one last run at it.

Chapter Nine

2060

Tuyet stared at the spelled bracelet. “I’m not comfortable with this.” Not that she wanted to admit why.

Gibson cocked an eyebrow. “Since when does that matter? The job requires a couple. You and Channing are it.”

“Why not Halif? We work well together.” She knew the answer but thought it wouldn’t hurt to ask anyway.

“We don’t send two Magic Born out on a mission like this. You know that.” Annoyance bristled in the warrant officer’s voice. “Am I going to have a problem with you, Caron?”

“No.” It was Channing who was the problem, but he knew better than to let that side of himself show around Gibson. Tuyet lifted the bracelet from its box. Made of braided black leather and polished stones and quartz pieces, it sat cold in her palm, humming with untapped energy.

“Good. Briefing’s in ten minutes.” Gibson left the lounge right as Channing entered.

Tuyet shoved the bracelet in her pocket and swallowed her disgust.

“So it’s you and me on this one.” Channing sat in the middle of the sofa, far too close for Tuyet’s comfort. “Mr. and Mrs. Jones. That should be interesting.”

She studied him for a long moment. He was classically handsome with dark hair and a friendly smile. Got along with everyone for the most part, did his job fairly well. Nothing special jumped out about him, but nothing bad did either. It was the eyes that gave him away. She’d known other men with eyes like his, a cold flat darkness that sent the wrong kind of shiver up her spine. She made a point of never being alone with him, and now she had to pretend to be his wife. “It’s just another job,” she said, because she didn’t know what else to say to him.

“It should definitely be more fun than usual.” He ran one finger up and down the outside of her thigh.

The skin beneath her slacks crawled and she had to tamp down a burst of nausea.
Show no fear
had been the rule when dealing with men like him in Gehenna. She gripped his wrist with two fingers and dropped his hand into his lap. “Act like a professional or I will report you.” With calm, deliberate steps, she stood and made her way to the door.

Channing laughed. “You really think Gibson will believe you over me?”

Tuyet knew it was best to ignore him but she didn’t like the dismissive way he said the warrant officer’s name, even though she knew he was also right. Gibson wouldn’t listen to her. “Probably not.” She paused in the doorway and turned to meet that cold, flat gaze. “But Hayes would.” She let that be the last word on the matter and left.

The briefing was even more tense and uncomfortable, but she got through it. For the most part she focused on Hayes, taking notes as he gave the details of the mission. He spoke without his usual flair, as if heavily distracted. Losing his place, forgetting things. Several minutes were lost as he searched files on his tablet for information he would normally have committed to memory. At one point their eyes met and he seemed to forget what he was doing entirely. Tuyet looked away, warmth climbing her cheeks.

At that point he went from distracted to angry. Tuyet kept her eyes on her tablet and waited for the briefing to end.

Tension drained from her body as soon as she crossed the threshold into her quarters. She slumped against the door and rubbed her eyes. The briefing had run over so long she had just enough free time before physical training to change clothes and make it to the gym. She always looked forward to the workouts but this time she needed it more than usual. The desire to hit something,
hard
, made her palms itch and her feet restless. Energy ping-ponged through her body and she had to ground to keep the excess from wreaking havoc with the electronics in the room. She changed quickly, pulling her hair into a ponytail. The bracelet was left on her dresser, still cold. She had no desire to know what Mrs. Jones looked like.

“Hey!” Halif jogged to catch up with her in the long hallway that led to the gym. “What was that all about with Hayes back in the briefing room?”

Tuyet shrugged. “How should I know?”

He gave her a skeptical look. “Come on, it’s me. Don’t play like that.”

“I’m not playing like anything. I don’t know what his problem is.” She boosted into a fast walk and reached the gym door first. “You guys are friends—you ask him.”

“I did,” he said as he followed her into the gym. “He told me to mind my own business.”

“So maybe you should.”

The other three team members were already there. Gibson was running laps around the perimeter with another warrant officer. Channing stood at the far end, talking to Rangers from other teams currently between assignments. Hayes was off by himself, beating the hell out of a heavy bag. Tuyet watched him as casually as possible, glad his back was to her. He put everything he had into those hits, plus a large helping of rage that didn’t suit him.

Halif touched her elbow, pointing at one of the small rings with his other hand. “You up for sparring?”

She nodded. “Just be warned, I’m in the mood to put some hurt on.”

They strode to the ring together. “Maybe you need to be in the ring with Channing. Let him know what’ll happen when he crosses the line.”

“When?” Probably accurate, but it surprised her that Halif would admit it.

“I may be a guy but I’m still a witch. Let’s just say he doesn’t feel the need to be on his best behavior in front of me like he does Hayes and Gibson.”

Tuyet didn’t ask for details. She began her usual stretching routine, a combination of yoga and tai chi, and tried to empty her head of thoughts about the next mission. Halif was right. With Channing, it was a question of when, not if. The two of them alone on an isolated mission, posing as a married couple—to him it would practically be a gold-plated invitation to cross the line. She would just have to shove him back across it and hope it didn’t land her in a cell. It was pretty much a given that he would lie if she had to hurt him.

“Mrs. Jones.”

The sound of his voice scraped against her nerves. She looked up from the floor to see that Halif had drifted off to talk to others. Channing stood over her. “What do you want?”

“Going a few rounds with you sounds like fun.”

The innuendo in his tone made her stomach heave. It was tempting to spar with him because she knew she could beat him. But she’d have to touch him to do it and right now she couldn’t handle that. Not with him looking at her like a toy. Something to be played with, used and discarded. She’d had enough of all of that in Gehenna. Being a Ranger didn’t allow her total freedom but she didn’t have to take that kind of treatment anymore. She just had to figure out the best way to scare him off, a way that would allow him to save face so she wouldn’t have to deal with any blowback.

But then he had to go and fuck that up by putting his hands on her. As she stood he grabbed her ponytail and dragged her to him, slamming her body against his. “I plan on enjoying this mission. You can too, if you stop pretending you’re better than me.”

“I am better than you.” She wrapped one hand around the top of her ponytail and pulled, losing a few hairs in the process. He clamped an arm around her waist, forcing her even closer. She slammed an elbow into his gut, grabbed his arm and twisted. Kept twisting until he was on the ground, forehead on the floor, feet scrambling, knees sliding.

“Bitch, let me go!”

A crowd was beginning to gather. Tuyet ignored them. It would get her in a hell of a lot of trouble if she was caught, but she drew energy from the ground to help keep Channing under control. Just like drawing on concrete and steel back in the zone. Magic ran through her blood like a rock fall, wild and fast and very nearly out of control. She soaked up the strength it gave her.

“You’re gonna break my fucking arm. Let me go, you crazy bitch!”

“Caron!”

She took her eyes off Channing long enough to see who’d called her name. Hayes stood ten feet away, a warning look on his face and something she couldn’t name in his eyes. “Let him go,” he said.

Tuyet released the man’s arm and sent him sprawling to the floor with a mild kick to the ass. “Keep your hands to yourself. Here, and on the mission.”

Laughter sprinkled through the group, all but Hayes. He watched her intently as she walked away.

With her back to him, she didn’t know Channing had made it back to his feet until he shoved her. She hit the gym’s wood floor hard, the impact knocking out her breath. She pushed to her side, wanting up and out of a vulnerable position as fast as possible. It wasn’t fast enough. Channing brought his fist down before she could move any farther. Pain ripped open her head like a bomb, a double shot of it, first from his punch on one side, then as her head bounced off the floor. She curled into a ball, gasping for breath, spots in her vision obscuring everything. For a long time, or maybe just a few seconds, voices were nothing but white noise.

A gentle hand on her back brought her out of it. Halif. “Can you move?”

Yelling, cursing. The sound of a fight. A sickening crack followed by a piercing scream that added another layer of pain to her head.

“Oh, shit, that’s no good.” Halif eased her into a sitting position, his gaze on the commotion.

“That’s enough,” Gibson stood over Channing, who was slumped on the floor. She had one hand thrown up at Hayes in a warning gesture.

The spots began to clear. Details sank in quickly once her vision went back to normal. Channing held his arm at an unnatural angle, his face contorted. Two men from the crowd helped him up and guided him out of the gym as he cursed and complained.

“Take her to a healer,” Gibson ordered Halif, not sparing a glance at Tuyet. The warrant officer hurried over to Hayes. “What the hell was that?”

Halif helped her stand. The pain was receding quickly now, thanks to her drawing extra energy just moments before she was hit. That was not something the warrant officer needed to know or even suspect, so Tuyet let Halif lead her out of the gym. Behind them, Gibson and Hayes argued in low voices.

Hayes might have just blown the mission. No other team could be ready for it in time. A Shanghai antique dealer using sorcery to smuggle weapons—and worse, using sorcery to upgrade those weapons—was a high-value target and damned near impossible to get near. The cover of Mr. and Mrs. Jones, a husband-and-wife team of experts on Egyptian artifacts, had a chance of getting close to the dealer. But first they’d have to pass muster at an exclusive auction in Hong Kong and hope for an invitation to an even more exclusive event. The intelligence arm of the Rangers had been working to get that initial invitation for months, and now Hayes had blown it before the team even left the country.

It was nearly midnight when a knock at her door roused her from a heavy doze that had been threatening to turn into sleep. She snapped fully awake immediately and hurried to the door. “Who is it?”

“It’s Hayes. I need to get you up to speed on the mission changes.”

Tuyet opened the door. “How much trouble are you in for breaking Channing’s arm?”

Hayes winked. “Can I come in?”

She stepped aside to allow him to enter. “Did they call off the mission?”

He wore his dress uniform, which gave her an idea of the kind of evening he’d had. “Made some changes, that’s all. Do you have anything to eat?” He flashed the boyish grin she’d noticed the first time they met. “I was busy getting yelled at during dinner.”

Modesty was something they stripped away during training. You never knew if you might have to change clothes in a hurry, if an injury might necessitate cutting away clothing. Normally Tuyet would not have thought twice about her snug tank top and shorts, the lack of a bra. Normally she wasn’t alone in a room at night with Dale Hayes. She picked up her robe from the floor and slipped into it then waved her hand at the control panel on the wall by the door. Light filled the room. Blinking against it, she said, “I’ll see what I’ve got.”

The studio apartment had an open floor plan that left only the bathroom private. Hayes looked around as he followed her to the small kitchenette. “You like abstract art?” He indicated two of several prints on the walls.

“Getting high isn’t an option anymore so I had to find something else to help me get out of my own head once in a while.”

He stopped on the other side of the bar from her, tapping his fingers on the top of a stool. “You’re mad at me.”

Looking at him was not a good idea. Slapping a sandwich into submission seemed like a better one. “You shouldn’t have done it. People will talk.”

“About you and me?” He eased onto the stool, elbows on the bar. “People already talk.”

Tuyet slammed a jar of mayo onto the counter. “But there’s nothing to talk about!”

“Now there is.” A laugh to match his grin slipped out.

“Sir, it’s not funny. I don’t think you understand.”

“Don’t ‘sir’ me in this conversation, and I understand more than you think.”

Tuyet pushed a plate at him and glared. “It doesn’t matter if there’s no truth to what people say. It doesn’t matter if you never touch me. All I am to most people is the slut witch you like to look at. The slut witch you favor over the rest of your team.”

“I can’t control what people think or what they say.”

“You shouldn’t be here at this hour. Especially not alone.”

“Channing will never touch you again. Neither will anyone else. Not after what I did today. I didn’t just break his arm, Tuyet, I snapped it like a twig and made him look like a punk bitch in front of a gym full of people.” He took a bite of the sandwich and spoke around a mouthful of it. “Fuck people that like to talk. Let ’em say whatever they want.” He held up the sandwich with one hand and wiped at his mouth with the other. “This is really gross. You drowned it in mayo.”

She waved at the ingredients still arrayed on the counter. “Make your own God damn sandwich then.”

Hayes was a handsome man who could stop a woman in her tracks just walking by. He had a certain smile he only deployed on occasion, a smile like dirty sunshine, blatantly sexy, part invitation, part promise. He used that smile on her now and she hated what it did to her. “It was really sweet of you to worry about me getting in trouble.”