Rachel Caine: Devil's Due

She felt a hot flare of irritation. Leads. According to the Cross Society, she and Jazz were Leads, carrying major roles in the chaotic, enormous play of life and death on Planet Earth. "Actors" influenced certain events at crucial moments, but—again, according to the Cross Society's rather esoteric theory—Leads operated at a kind of nexus point. Jazz had told her, in a quiet voice that meant she had come to believe it, that the Cross Society psychic, Max Simms, had summed it up: Everything you do matters.

It was a frightening thought. It didn't get any less frightening the longer it stuck around.

She kept doggedly on the subject. "Have you ever heard of Eidolon contacting anyone in the Cross Society directly?"

He sucked in an angry breath. "No. If you're done—"

"Almost. Who knew where you were taking her?"

"Nobody."

"You didn't make the call from—"

"I booked the reservations at an Internet kiosk using a one-time-only card. Fake name. Believe me, nobody knew we were coming here."

There were ways, nevertheless, if the opposition was strong enough. And if Eidolon Corporation was what Max Simms had claimed, a major technological entity with ties to the federal government, then retasking a satellite and painting Borden's car with a laser tag wouldn't have been very difficult.

If, if, if.

Borden suddenly said, "It's us. Me and Jazz—maybe it has to do with us."

"You think being in love with her is the mistake they're referring to?"

"I never said—" He gave up on the reflexive male denial, to his credit. "No, I don't."

"Then it's entirely possible it might be referring to the events of this morning. To my helping McCarthy get released."

"Then why not just send it to you? Why send it to you and Jazz ?"

"McCarthy's connected to both of us now. I think the better question is, why would Eidolon warn us? Wouldn't they want us to be making mistakes?"

"I have no idea what Eidolon wants," Borden growled. "Look, I barely know what my boss wants half the time. So as far as figuring out motives, good luck. Screw this, I'm waking her up and getting her out of here. Now."

"Yes, you'd better get her back to Manny's." If there was any such thing as a safe place, given what they'd learned about the world and the Cross Society and Eidolon, it would be in Manny's Fortress of Solitude. Wherever it currently resided, since he moved house as often as banks took holidays.

"You're talking like a cop," Borden said. "If Eidolon wants us, they can find us. Well, they can find me, anyway. You and Jazz, it's tougher, since you're Leads. They can only predict you through the effects you have, not your exact location."

"Then how did they just deliver me a note? How did the Cross Society deliver one to Jazz that first night?"

He gave a rattling sigh. "It's too freaking early for philosophy and physics, Lucia. But Leads blip on and off the radar. You're a blur most of the time, but sometimes they can see you clearly. It's like somebody who usually drives really fast having car trouble. But on the more mundane level, have you considered that somebody could have been following you?"

Stewart, again. And if she accepted the idea that the note was legitimately from Eidolon, the Cross Society's adversary in this war of premonitions, then…it changed things. Not for the better. "All right. We'll need to have a strategy meeting later at the office—one o'clock? Bring Jazz through the garage entrance—it's the most defensible. I'll have someone meet you."

"Someone who? You're not giving Manny a gun, are you?"

She laughed. "Not that Manny would need one of mine. But no. I've hired a friend to help us out. His name is Omar. He'll meet you in the garage."

"We'll be there."

There was hope for Borden yet, Lucia thought as she folded the phone and slipped it back in her purse; he had said we without a trace of self-consciousness.

If only they could get Jazz to do the same, a relationship might truly be on the horizon.

"Madam?" The clerk was watching her again, this time with a trace of a frown. "Is everything all right?"

"Fine," she said, and retrieved the blue suit she'd been studying. Much as she hated off-the-rack on men, no doubt McCarthy would resist the idea of tailoring even more than day-spa grooming. She added the ivory shirt and handed the items to the clerk, who blinked at the price tags, then smiled. By the time she'd added the glossy, sleek Magnanni shoes, he was very happy.

She asked him to help her carry her packages to the car, tipped him and slid behind the wheel. As she slammed the door and clicked the lock shut, Ken Stewart rounded the far corner, his hands in his pants pockets, doing his best to look jaunty.

She cruised slowly past him, watching.

He pulled an empty hand from his pocket, pointed it at her windshield and cocked back a thumb. Bang, he mouthed, as he let the imaginary hammer fall. You're dead.

She braked the car, rolled down the driver's side window and leaned over. Her smile must have been disingenuous enough to lure in even a bitter, cynical specimen like Stewart, because he shuffled a few feet toward her.

"One of us would be," she said softly, and let him see that her hand was on the gun in the passenger seat beside her. "And before you ask, yes, I do have a permit to carry it, Detective."

He bared his teeth at her in a crazy grin. A rottweiler raised by wolves. She felt a cold touch at the back of her neck, but allowed only an ironic tilt of her eyebrows as he leveled both hands at her—two imaginary guns, like a kid playing cowboys and Indians—and peppered her with imaginary rounds.

Then he mimed blowing smoke from his fingertips, and those fiercely cold, slightly insane eyes bored into hers. He said, "You be careful, Ms. Garza. It's a dangerous town if you make the wrong enemies."

"Are there ever any right enemies?" she asked, and drove away at a calm and leisurely pace, showing no signs of temper or nerves.

Four blocks later, she stopped at a red light and wiped her damp, shaking hands on her pants.

At five minutes to one, Lucia's desk phone rang in her office. She picked it up and said, "Omar?"

"Yo, girl," he said. Omar had a sly, amused tone, as usual. He found everything a source of humor, from The Simpsons to the evening news. He claimed it had something to do with Buddhism, and seeing the world for the illusion it was. That might have been true. Omar was famous—infamous, really—for having done a seven-year stretch in Folsom as part of one of the most grueling covers in the history of law enforcement. After the takedown of one of the most vicious criminal enterprises on the East Coast, he'd declared himself out of the cop business.

But he did favors from time to time, and Lucia was on his list. Omar was about the most reliable, calm and effective man she'd ever worked with.

He was also one hell of a friend, and once upon a time, he'd been more. Not much more, though. Omar's Zen outlook precluded more serious entanglements.

"Good morning," she said. "Having a fabulous time down there?"

"Unbelievable. Your friends are here. I'm sending them up. Don't shoot 'em."

"Thanks. Keep sharp." Not that she needed to remind him. Omar, for all of his built-in serenity, was rarely caught off guard.

As she hung up, she focused on McCarthy, who was sitting on the sofa at the far end of the room, looking out the tinted windows. The view warped a little; the glass was bullet-resistant, replaced after Jazz's office had been targeted by a sniper. All of their security procedures were considerably upgraded these days. But the offices themselves remained elegantly appointed—not that she and Jazz had put much effort into it. In some ways, the region's economic downturns had favored start-up businesses. They'd inherited this space fully equipped, including desks, lamps, chairs and decor. She'd added touches of her own, but it hadn't taken much.