Hellbent (26 page)

“True, true. Say, are you carrying
that
?”

“Yes, and hush up about it. I don’t have anything smaller and perkier or more appropriate that will hold everything I need to bring tonight. Some things just won’t fit in a tiny satin clamshell, okay?”

“I know, but—”

“No buts. I need stuff. This holds stuff. And it’s black velvet. It’s not like I’m waltzing in with a backpack made of olive drab.”

“It’s your fashion funeral.”

“You don’t really care about that. You don’t want to be seen with me, that’s all.”

“I don’t want to be seen with that bag,” he clarified. “You, I’m happy to have on an arm.”

He held out an elbow, and I took it. It felt weird, considering this was the same guy who just gave me bigger, brighter eyes with his travel stash of cosmetics, but oh well.

Downstairs, the doorman hailed us a cab and before long, we were pulling up to the Johnson Space Center, which was lit up like a Kennedy. Though it was closed to tourists or other assorted space buffs, the whole compound glowed with a thousand and one electric lights, including a few spotlights and some banners and
flags that were artfully illuminated on the main building’s exterior. At first I thought it was overkill for an honorary ceremony, but then we emerged from the taxi into near silence, and I realized that this was just what the place looked like at night.

“Cool,” I said.

“Yeah,” he said also, and he paid the cabbie out of the leftovers of whatever cash he’d lifted from me earlier in the day. “You ever been here before?” he asked as the cab pulled away, leaving us there to our own devices.

“No. I’ve been to Cape Canaveral, but that was a long time ago. Have you?”

“No. So I have no idea where we’re supposed to go to get inside this thing.”

“I do,” I told him. I triumphantly held up my somewhat-too-big-bag and pulled out our printed invitation confirmations, and also a small wad of other printings … mostly the kind that gave me a good layout of the space center and its surrounding buildings. “I didn’t have time to memorize everything, so I brought everything that looked important.”

“All of it?”

“There are over a hundred structures here! I had to leave some of it back home, but everything pertinent to the building where we’ll be dining—and the half dozen buildings nearest to it—can be found in this-here wad of shit I printed out before leaving Seattle.”

“I don’t know exactly what’s wrong with you, but I bet it’s hard to pronounce when you’re drunk.”

“What’s wrong with me is that I’m an old hand at this, and I’m totally smarter than you, and that’s why I get paid the big bucks.”

“Because you’re crazy,” he concluded.

“Crazy like a fox. And that’s where we’re headed.” I indicated a big place to the right of where we’d been deposited by cab.

We began walking toward what was known only as “Building 3,” or the first employee cafeteria and store. According to the invitations, it’d been freshly remodeled—top to bottom—and this banquet was one way not just of honoring the hilariously named Buck Penny, but also of showing off the new digs.

Building 110 was the one that housed all the security, where nice young men and women in uniform checked badges and invitations, but that building wasn’t convenient to where we were headed, so the security guards had come to us. They lined up on either side of a red carpet that looked like it was made of bloody Astroturf and, with cute little flashlights in hand, they noted identification and scanned the bar codes on the announcements with weird tricorder-looking devices.

I experienced a momentary pang of nervousness, or really, I experienced a pang of mistrust wherein I strongly considered the wisdom of taking anything Horace told me as factual, complete, accurate, and capable of withstanding outside scrutiny.

The moment passed as soon as a mustachioed fellow in a beige jumpsuit covered in patches scanned my invitation and the machine spit out an approving
beep
. Adrian was similarly accepted, based on his equally valid (or valid enough) invitation and a fake ID I’d helped him arrange shortly after he’d shown up in Seattle. Everyone needs a good fake ID. Especially people who hang around
me
.

As we approached the “cafeteria” (a spurious place for a black-tie event if ever there was one), more people joined us and we began to feel less alone, visible, and conspicuous. Not many of the banqueteers were arriving via cab; most of them worked in the area or had friends who did, I assume, for most of the attendees
were walking from a parking lot around the side of the building.

We got a few sidelong glances, and when I poked around with my none-too-impressive psychic senses, I mostly got the impression that people were trying to figure out what department we worked in. Fair enough. We didn’t look familiar, and for very good reason.

I also picked up a few appreciative glances. Mostly for Adrian.

I didn’t take it personally. A majority of the guys in attendance looked like the same breed you find in your average basement comic book shop, with the exception of a few astronauts. They stood out from the crowd like rock stars at … at … well, let’s not say a comic book shop. For the sake of variety, let’s say a science fiction convention. Even if they hadn’t clearly been born of superior genetic stock, the astronauts were easy to pick out.

They were the only ones with tans.

I
obviously didn’t come from finely engineered astronaut stock, but Adrian looked like he might have. Even in a penguin suit, any idiot could see that he had a body like a Greek statue, and from the neck up he displayed the bone structure of an Armani model. At least one gawker (the wife of a pasty man in thick glasses) wondered if my date was perhaps the sibling of an astronaut … a good cover, and something I wished I’d thought of sooner.

That’s always the rub. When I have nothing but time to prepare, my outings run smooth as butter on silk. But when I have to do things on the fly, I miss opportunities. It would’ve been easy as hell to find a few astronauts with siblings of approximately the right age—and then cross-reference that list with people who were comfortably far away, and unlikely to crash the banquet. Anyone floating around the stratosphere in a space station, for example.

Ah, well. I filed it away as something that someday might prove useful (or not) and strolled along the walkway into the reception area—just beyond which waited the banquet hall.

Security guards came and went, chattering into headsets and tiny microphones in code that any idiot could translate, but almost no idiots paid them a lick of attention. I did, naturally, but mostly I smiled coyly (no teeth showing) and pretended to flirt with my date.

“Any sign of her?” he asked me quietly.

“Not yet.” I felt around with my mind—and since that was really what he was asking anyway, he didn’t bug me about closing my eyes and taking a deep breath. I didn’t know what I was “looking” for, exactly, but I opened myself to the possibility of menace, rage, and vengeance. Surely that was something like what she was feeling, if she intended to come to this place and tackle this guy.

Otherwise, why bother?

But no. Nothing. All I got was the swirling mass of hungry people, bored people, nervous people, proud people, curious people, and people who were freaking out a little about the prospect of public speaking. No crazy people—or more to the point, since I knew what to look for better than anyone in the world, I didn’t feel anyone’s focused, driven, laser-like concentration. So I knew she wasn’t here yet. Because when she arrived, that’s what it’d be—that’s what I’d feel. It wouldn’t be wild and mindless, or outrageous and nonsensical.

It’d be precision hatred in motion.

Yeah. I’d know it when I saw it. Felt it. Whatever.

Adrian and I were ushered to a set of seats at a round table with about a dozen other people, none of whom we knew and all of whom we actively sought to avoid from a conversational standpoint. We kept our heads close and acted like newlyweds, talking
softly to each other and generally ignoring everyone else—as if no one could
possibly
be as fascinating as our own company.

It was rude, absolutely, but couples in a new relationship are rude beyond belief, and nobody ever throws them out of a banquet for it. Or that was
my
rationale.

The waiters came around asking what wine we wanted, and what our selection from the very narrow menu might be. Adrian put in a request for the prime rib with braised asparagus, and I echoed the request because it wasn’t like I gave a damn what food they put in front of me.

I did put in for a glass of their house red, though. It sounded nice. I didn’t intend to down a whole serving, given how slowly I process the stuff, but that wouldn’t stop me from giving it a taste.

The room was huge, and split into two halves with an aisle in the middle. I got the distinct impression that this was not the usual layout, but it was to be expected when a special event was on deck. Whatever usual folding or otherwise cheap tables were in use, they’d all been put away for the evening and replaced with fancier versions, covered in posh white tablecloths with expensive floral centerpieces and candles that could’ve brought the whole joint down in under an hour.

Up front there were two long tables separated by a podium—or a “lectern” as Adrian was so gauche as to correct me when I whispered something about it into his ear.

“You have to stand
on
a podium. A lectern is what you stand
behind.
”

“You’re a douche-canoe.”

“Where did you pick
that
one up? It’s hilarious.”

“Don’t you undercut my insult,” I joked in a soft breath, this time up against his cheek. “And I don’t know. I just heard it somewhere. I like it, don’t you? I think I’ll bust it out more often.”

“It’s rich. Alliterative. Disgusting. It’s very
you.
”

“Thanks,” I said, and would’ve said more but I stopped myself short and froze, with my head hung low and close to his.

He noted the change and asked, all business, “What is it?”

At the very distant edge of what I could perceive and what I couldn’t, I noticed her. Not as a spark, or a flash. Not as a swelling of emotion or maniacal havoc-wreaking, but a presence sharp and true.

“Her,” I whispered. “She’s here.”

“Where?”

“Outside.” I looked up.

“Oh for Christ’s sake,” Adrian swore. “Not another rooftop battle.”

“At least it isn’t raining. And no, she’s not on the roof. She’s outside, that way.” I cocked my head in the general direction of the stage—but I meant behind it, on the other side of the wall and another dozen yards into the night.

“What if she didn’t bring the bones?”

“You can bet she’s brought
one.
”

“What if she left the rest at home?”

I’d been wondering along similar lines, but now wasn’t the time to start backtracking and overthinking things. “I don’t plan to kill her,” I murmured. “If I have to, I’ll drag the location out of her.”

“Using your …” His eyebrows wiggled, like he was trying to use his face to gesture at his own hair.

I knew what he meant. “Yeah, using those.” My psychic powers, that is.

It was mostly untrue. My powers aren’t worth a shit, in the grand scheme of useful powers. I’d get a lot more mileage out of telekinesis, or levitation. But
no
. I get coach-class brain waves, and that’s it. Better than nothing, but not much.

Not without divine intervention could I have wrested any information
out of anybody’s head except maybe Adrian’s—and only him because he’d taken a swig out of Lake Me. Someday, we were really going to have to test the limits of that communicative ability.

But today was not that day. And I didn’t want him thinking maybe I’d smack around a woman nearing sixty, bullying her like an old-fashioned pimp. I’m not saying I’ve never roughed up a fool in the name of information-gathering, because that’d be a bald-faced lie. But I knew before it even became hypothetically in the cards that I wouldn’t do it to Creed … and not simply because I didn’t think it’d work. Don’t ask me why. Just a feeling I had. Maybe I’m psychic or something.

“Ray?”

“I have to get outside.”

“I’m coming with you,” he said.

I grabbed his hand. “No, I need to take care of this alone. I want to talk to her, crazy-bitch-to-crazy-bitch.”

“Are you serious?”

“Yes,” I vowed. “Please, I don’t want to spook her, and I don’t want to hurt her if I don’t have to.”

“You’re being weird about this.”

I frowned at him, hard. “Which sets this occasion apart from all others exactly … how?”

“You’ve got me there.”

“Thank you. And now, I hope, I’ve got you
here
. You have your cell?”

“In my pocket.” He tapped it with his free hand. I heard the plastic case slide around in his pants, and knock against the seat.

“Good. Put it on vibrate. I’ll ping you if I need anything.”

“You’re just … leaving me here? With all these … people?”

Some of those people were now looking at us, as the conversation
had gotten barely loud enough to overhear in snippets. And up front, over by the
lectern
, thank you very much Adrian, the show was starting to get under way—thus the sudden lack of background noise that revealed us to be obnoxious chatterers.

A spotlight was aimed at the still-vacant position of honor, but the “important” guests—or the guests who had seats up front with the honoree—were shuffling into position at their labeled place settings. The dull roar of a room full of whisperers dropped precipitously as a tall, thin man stepped up to the microphone and gave it a tap.

A squeal of feedback cut through the remainder of the noise, and only served to underscore the similar peal of energy that was raring itself up outside. Elizabeth Creed was getting closer.

“Adrian, I’m going. If you want to leave too, hit the men’s room or something. Just leave this one to me, please?”

“Men’s room it is,” he grumbled and rose with me. He made some excuses disguised as pleasantries to meet the curious questions in the eyes of our tablemates, then hustled off behind me.