Lady Superior (16 page)

He squinted at the pieces in his hand. “You can just pull these things off? My parents always told me there’s ink in them.”

“Seriously? Think about that. A retail establishment is going to put doohickeys full of ink on their merchandise? Would you put a self-destruct button your car in case someone stole it?” Kristen shook her head. “Those things are glorified, oversized thumbtacks.”

“Huh. Well, thanks.”

She flashed Todd a
you’re welcome
smile and watched him as he left. Once he was gone, Kristen blew out a nervous breath, dug out her Temple phone, and dialed Jane. While it rang, she walked into the bathroom and closed the door behind her. She didn’t know why, but she always felt the bathroom was the most secure place in a house. Maybe it came from being part of a big family, she supposed. Closing a bedroom door was only a suggestion to keep out. Closing the door to the bathroom meant
I might be pooping in here, stay out or woe unto you
. Kristen sat on the edge of the tub when Jane answered. “Hello?”

“Hey, it’s Kris. Got a sec?”

“Kind of in the middle of something. Is it world-ending?”

“Uh, maybe?”

“Seriously?”

“I said maybe.”

“What is it?”

Kristen laid it all out: Todd, his father, Delphi, the ring, and the promise of a new land.

“Is that everything?” Jane asked.

“That’s it? You don’t think this warrants a little more than
is that everything
?”

“I told you, I’m a little…” Jane cut off; Kristen heard gunfire in the background.

“Jane?” Kristen asked in a panic. “Are you still there?”

“Yeah. Busy. I’ll look into it when I can.”

More gunfire. Kristen gripped her phone more tightly. “Where are you? Do you need help?”

“Nope. I’m fine. Everything’s fine. Try to take a day off, yeah? I’ll call you when I know something.”

“Someone’s shooting at you and you want me to take a day off? Seriously? How are you so calm right now?”

“I said I’m fine, but if you keep distracting me, my chances of getting shot go through the roof.”

“Uh, yeah. Okay. Bye, then?”

“Bye!”

Kristen looked at her phone in equal parts shock and wonder before jamming it back into her pocket. She pushed off of the tub, but her eyes lingered on the trash can beside the toilet.

A pregnancy test. Facedown.

Kristen moved with slow, trembling motions. She wrapped a hand in toilet paper, bent over, and grabbed the plastic stick from the trash. She turned it over in her hand.

Negative.

She threw the stick back into the trash, shook the toilet paper from her hands, and washed them in the sink.

She knew what she’d do with her day off.

Chapter 10

Kristen pushed through Otherworlds’ front door and glanced at front counter. She surprised herself by hoping to see Jack there. Apparently he was a Monday through Friday guy, though, because the store appeared bereft of him on a Saturday afternoon. Another guy, Tom, waved at her from the counter. He’d been working at Otherworlds for almost a year.

“Hey Kris!” he called, far too excited. She knew he had a thing for her, too. In his case, it didn’t bother her, but neither did she reciprocate. He was too young—not yet nineteen—and honestly not at all attractive, as far as she was concerned. Short, round, and with hair in all the wrong places. He’d cleaned up a little in recent months and really was a nice guy, but Kristen couldn’t shake knowing Bernice once needed to have a
take a shower every day or you’re fired
chat with him. He beamed a smile. “What’s up?”

She waved back. “Hey. Bernice is in, right?”

“Yeah, she’s in the office. Did you see the news yesterday? Crazy, right?”

Uh oh
. She forced a curious arch of her eyebrows. “No. What’s crazy about it?”

“You seriously didn’t see it?”

“I’m working the graveyard shift these days. I’ve been out like a light since yesterday morning.”

“Oh, man. That’s brutal. Well, anyway, superchick was on the news again.”

Superchick? Seriously?
Kristen feigned surprise. “Yeah? She take down some terrorists or whatever again?”

“That’s what they’re saying. Apparently they can’t ID the guys, but they say the gear matches what the guys who attacked Temple were wearing. They took a lady and her kids hostage. Everybody’s going wild trying to figure the whole thing out. They won’t show the bodies because she popped one of their heads open, I guess.” Tom pantomimed an explosion with his hands.

“The hostages are okay now, right?”

“Oh, yeah. They’re fine. A reporter talked to the lady and she said she’d be dead if superchick hadn’t shown up.”

Kristen nodded along. She recalled Tom’s dad was an officer, and decided to press the angle. “What did the cops say about it? Was there another press conference?”

Tom shrugged. “Yeah, but those conferences are just cop PR. The Chief did his whole thing about superchick being a dangerous vigilante, bringing her to justice, whatever. My dad, though? He says people who put their boots on the ground are thrilled. Whoever she’s taking out, there isn’t a cop in town who wants to deal with it. Can you blame them? Weirdos roll into town with military hardware? The job is dangerous enough. If they can sit back and watch instead of putting their necks on the line—or calling in the National Guard—that’s great.”

“Really? They’re
thrilled
about it? They were shooting at her the other night. And almost got run over by a truck because of her.”

“Sure, but what’d she do? She wasn’t driving the truck. She ran into the line of fire to get them
away
from the truck. If they thought she was a baddie before, they don’t anymore.” Tom paused to flash a smile at a customer walking through the door, then continued. “The only thing they’re worried about is—are there more of her? It’s a Pandora’s Box thing. This woman opened it.”

She had, hadn’t she? Even if she wasn’t the only one, she’d been the first caught on camera. According to Jane, there were
thousands
of people like her. Until her, nobody knew about any of them. Hell, if Jane was right, the changelings had been operating for thousands of years, and nobody knew about them, either. Now that Kristen had gotten in their way, people were seeing them—and asking questions about them.

She wondered if it was her fault Todd had gotten wrapped up with Delphi and the changelings. If she understood correctly, those things hadn’t been in motion very long. Did she somehow inspire Delphi to make a move? Did she reveal something? Provide an opportunity? Open a door—a box?

Tom cocked his head. “Hey, you okay?”

Kristen snapped back to attention. “Uh, yeah. I’m okay. Why?”

“You look spooked all of a sudden.”

She flashed a sheepish smile. “I guess I am. It’s scary stuff, right? It’s all fun and games until it’s real. Then it’s people dying, buildings falling down…anyway, I really need to talk to Bernice. You said she’s in the back?”

“Yup. Catch you on the way out?” he asked, a glimmer of hope in his eyes.

“Yeah, maybe.”

Messenger bag bouncing against her hip, Kristen beelined for the back office. The place was packed, and a casual stroll through the aisles would have been a good way to get roped into small talk.

Though she garnered a few wandering eyes, she pushed through the door to the back room without incident. Bernice, sitting at her desk, glanced up from a stack of paperwork. Her eyes went wide. She leapt from her chair and ran across the room to throw her arms around Kristen in a tight hug. “
Qué chingados
, Kris! Why didn’t you call me?”

Kristen chuckled and shared in the embrace. “I’d tell you why, but you’d think I’m an asshole.”

Bernice pushed her away. “You didn’t call me. You’re already an asshole.”

Kristen set her messenger bag down beside Bernice’s desk. “I didn’t call you because you didn’t wait for me to tell you I had superpowers.”

“Oh, fuck off. You’re mad at me about that? No, Kris. No. It doesn’t work that way.” Bernice jammed a finger at her own chest. “I’m the one that gets to be mad. You tried keeping something from me.”

Kristen pulled her into another hug. “Come on, it’s not like that. I’m not mad you figured it out. I just wanted my storybook moment. You know, show up on your doorstep full of bullets
before
you know what I am—the big reveal. But I didn’t get that, so…I let you hang a little bit.”

Bernice wormed out of the hug. Her eyebrows wrinkled, but Kristen didn’t see any real anger there. “Well, I don’t appreciate it, okay? And did you even think that through? If you showed up at my house
before
I knew you had superpowers, I’d have called an ambulance. And they’d have talked to the cops. And then you’d be in a hospital in handcuffs, and they’d know who you were because
I’d have told them
. That’s what you wanted?”

“If you want my honest answer, I just like it when you yell at me in Spanish.”

Bernice scowled.

Kristen broke into giggles as she knelt down and fished in her bag. “Sorry. But yeah, I’m alright. Calling Jane was the right thing to do. And honestly, leaving you hanging was only half on purpose. I got distracted with that whole
a family was taken hostage
thing. If you’re done being mad at me, I was hoping you’d help me with something.”

“What kind of something?” Bernice looked down at her from the corner of her eye. “Superhero stuff? Can’t say I have any experience with that.”

“Neither do I.” Kristen popped up and thrust a sheaf of papers at Bernice. “But no, nothing like that. I was looking at apartments online this morning. What do you think of these?”

Bernice fell back into her desk chair and flipped through the pages. “You could’ve saved the paper and emailed me.”

“Then I wouldn’t have had an excuse to swing by.”

“Why are you looking to move?”

Kristen hopped up and sat on the corner of Bernice’s desk. “I want a bigger place to Emma can move in. Her boyfriend’s a dick.”

“She still with Chad?”

“Yep.”

“You can’t trust a dude named Chad.”

“That’s what I said!”

Bernice passed the pages back. “I don’t think you should go with any of those.”

Kristen tilted her head. “Why not? They seem nice. Plenty of space, decent neighborhoods…”

“That’s the thing,” Bernice interrupted. “The bigger the apartment, the less it makes sense to live in one. A small apartment is cheaper than a small house. But if you can afford the rent on a big apartment like the ones you’re looking at, you can afford the mortgage on a decent house. In this part of town, anyway. The rules might be different in LA, but we’re not in LA. If you want to move up, there’s only three reasons someone might not want to buy a house. Number one: you can’t make the down payment. Number two: you fucked up your credit so bad nobody will give you a mortgage. Number three: you don’t think your job is going to last very long, and in that case, you don’t move into a bigger place to begin with because that’s just not smart. If number three is your problem, Emma’s gonna have to settle for sleeping next to your stinky gym clothes.”

Kristen chewed the inside of her cheek. She hadn’t thought about any of that; that was why she’d wanted Bernice’s help in the first place. Kristen shook her head. “I don’t know. Seems like a boneheaded move these days. Shit happens.”

Bernice leaned back in her chair and swiveled to face Kristen directly. “Temple Financial gave you a job. I don’t think you’re the kind of person they can decide to replace one day. There’s a nice-ass house for sale on my block for one hundred and eighty-five thousand. On a thirty-year mortgage, you’ll pay a little over a grand every month. If you’re making as much as you told me, that’s one paycheck per month. Those apartments you’re showing me aren’t much cheaper than that.”

Kristen held up fingers as she spoke, counting off items. “But then I’d pay my own water bill, my own energy bill, my own repairs, property taxes…”

Bernice looked at the ceiling as she performed the math in her head. “About an extra six hundred per month. I didn’t count the repairs, but if you’re buying a nice place and take good care of it, there won’t be as much of that as you think.”

“In other words, the actual cost is almost twice as much as the most expensive apartment I showed you.”

“Let’s put it this way: before taxes, you’re making about four thousand per month with Temple. High estimate, a house and all of its bills would cost you half of your monthly income. You put half of the remaining half—a thousand dollars—into savings every single month. That leaves you another thousand to use for groceries and whatever else you want. It’s just you, or maybe you and Emma. Do you need a thousand dollars of groceries every month? If not, buy a house.”

“What if I want a new car?”

“What’s that sedan you’ve been driving around?”

“Jane let me borrow it. It isn’t mine.”

“It’s her car?”

“It’s a company car, I guess.”

“Then you don’t need a car. You tell Temple you need to keep that one to do your job. And then you tell Temple to give you the best rate they can offer on a mortgage and waive the down payment.”

Kristen scrunched her face. “I can’t just go making demands.”

“Like hell you can’t.” Bernice’s hands animated as she spoke. “You’re not just hard to replace, Kris. You’re
irreplaceable
. Nobody else can do what you do. They’re one of the largest financial institutions on the planet. Temple giving you a car is like a normal person giving somebody a piece of gum. And it’s not like these things wouldn’t help you do your job. You need a car to get around. Your own house would give you privacy—privacy that I’d call essential to having a secret identity.”

Kristen was silent as she thought about it. Bernice had a point.

Bernice held up a finger again. “Hold on. Privacy. You want Emma to move in with you. Does she know?”

Kristen shook her head. “No. And I’m not going to tell her.”

Bernice looked Kristen in the eyes. “If you’re going to live together, you aren’t going to have a choice. You can’t wear that wig all day, every day. It has to come off sometime.”