Hannah Jayne - Under Attack

“Fire bomb,” Alex reported, his eyes focused on the second fireman, who wore a water-slicked yellow coat with the name ALLEN sewn on it. “Thrown from the outside when Ms. Lawson was inside.”

Allen nodded and Will raised a suspicious eyebrow. “And Ms. Lawson was inside because?”

Alex cleared his throat. “She was with me. I was escorting her back to her apartment after a second round of questioning when a call came in about a suspected burglar at this address. I asked her to stay in the car. It’s not like anyone was guarding her though.” Will’s eyes flashed as Alex continued. “She must have just slid in behind me.”

I watched the gold flecks in Will’s eyes glitter angrily at the bit of smile that hung on Alex’s lips. Allen looked at the three of us, oblivious to the volumes of subtext going on, and nodded. “Looks like you fellas have got this under control. Just make sure to escort the lady home.”

Will stepped toward me and Alex cut him off, blocking me with his body. He clamped a hand on my upper arm. “I’ve got this under control,” he told Will.

Will went eyebrows up but stepped back. Alex steered me away from the clutch of firemen and flashing lights, and when we were out of earshot, I shrugged him off.

“What was that? You’ve got this under control? Don’t you mean you’ve got me under control? And what was the stare-down for?”

“Really, Lawson? We’re going to do the woman’s lib thing here in the shadow of your father’s raging inferno?”

“I guess not,” I relented. “But that doesn’t mean it’s over!”

“I wouldn’t expect anything less,” Alex said.

I glanced over my shoulder at the smoldering house, at the firefighters working to tame the huge flames that thrust out of windows and licked the tops of nearby trees. I felt an odd sense of loss; I had just found my father—I saw his collection of books, what he kept in the fridge (nothing), the way he decorated a room for his daughter—and now it was gone. Going up in smoke.

I walked up to the neighbors pushing against the wooden barricade. A woman in a velour housecoat was clutching her lapel. Her eyes were so intensely fixed on the fire that I could see flicks of yellow flame reflected in them.

“Did you know the family that lived there well?” I asked her. “What were they like?”

The woman looked down, blinking at me as if I had just materialized out of thin air. “The family that lived there?” she asked. “No, honey, nobody lives in that house—and thank God, now. It’s the model home for the new development going up just over there.” She pointed to a clutch of houses one street over, all glaring with brand-new beige stucco and eco-friendly trim.

“What? But I went inside. It was furnished.”

“Yeah,” the woman said, turning back to watch the flames, “they decorate the house as if someone lives there, but everything inside is fake. Fake plants, fake books, even fake computers and TVs. They just put it up so people feel comfortable, so they can see what their houses will look like once they’re lived in.”

“Oh,” was all I could manage.

I let Alex lead me to the car. He all but clicked me in my seat belt as I gazed dumbly ahead of me.

“It was all made up,” I mumbled.

“What are you talking about?” he asked, plugging his key in the ignition.

“The house. Everything in it. It was fake.”

Poor, poor baby sister ... Ophelia whispered. Losing the childhood home she never even had. No home, no daddy, and now, no best friend. Ophelia giggled in my ear while the fury reawakened in me. I tensed.

“You’re shaking, Lawson. What’s going on?” Alex asked, coasting to a stop at the light.

“Ophelia. Get her out of my head.” I could feel the unattractive flare of my nostrils, feel the ache in my jaw from gritting my teeth. “She’s always going to be one step ahead of us as long as she’s in my mind. If we’re ever going to save Nina, I have to get her out.”

“Okay,” Alex said, staring through the windshield.

I grabbed his shoulder, feeling my fingers digging into his warm skin. “Tell me how, Alex. Tell me how to get rid of her. You have to know a way.”

“Well, there is one way. The mind reading—”

“Mind-hijacking is more like it.”

“Well, it’s not an exact science. Every time she gets in your head, you’re generally on your own, right?”

I frowned. “Or with you.”

Alex ignored me and continued. “The more people who are around—the more distraction—the more difficult it will be for Ophelia to get a handle on your thoughts. She’ll find it difficult to find you and get in your mind.”

“Okay, fine, so we go somewhere with a lot of distraction.”

“Somewhere with a lot of people. Generally, people who won’t notice a stray or weird thought poking into their head. There needs to be something entertaining them.”

I crossed my arms in front of my chest. “Okay, but I don’t think we can make it down to Disneyland before Ophelia lays waste to my entire life.”

Alex remained silent, thinking. Suddenly, he jerked the car toward the highway on-ramp, wheels squealing as he took the corner at full speed. “I know a place.”

I fiddled around with the car stereo and finally found a soccer game being broadcast on the Spanish channel. I turned it up to earsplitting level, hoping the hiss of the crowd would drown out any Ophelia-influenced thoughts. We were inching our way through the Golden Gate Bridge toll plaza when Alex turned the volume down and looked at me.

“Since when do you like soccer?”

“It’s called football,” I murmured.

“Okay. Since when do you like football?”

Since I’ve had a psychopath taking up valuable real estate in my brain. Since Will walked into my life and try as I might, I can’t get the soft English lilt of his voice out of my head, can’t deny the knight-in-shining-armor way he looks in his firefighter uniform. I thought . I was stabbed with a pang of guilt when I glanced at Alex, at the sincere worry in his eye.

He’s not staying around... . This time the voice in my head was my own, and the truth of the words squeezed at my heart.

“I just want to focus on finding Nina,” I said to the windshield.

“Where would Ophelia take Nina?” Alex mumbled.

“Vlad.”

“What?” Alex cut behind a Muni bus, causing the man in the Zipcar behind us to lay on his horn. “Do you think Vlad might have a better lead on Nina? Vampire connection or something?”

I rolled my eyes. “No, Vlad is right there.”

I pointed, and Alex followed my gaze out the driver’s side window to the garish lights of the Roxie Theater. Vlad and his fellow VERMers—all dressed in the standard-issue velvet smoking jackets and ascots—were marching in a neat oval, their wooden-stake signs illuminated by the red and yellow lights of the Roxie. There was a small group of teenagers gathered around them, and when Alex rolled down his window we could hear their faint chant as they thrust pale fists into the air.

“What’s he doing?”

I unhooked my seat belt. “Protesting.” Before Alex could say anything I was bundling myself against the late-afternoon city fog and dodging cars. I crossed the street and made a beeline for Vlad, who, while marching, was clearly being followed by an adoring clutch of teenage breather girls.

“Vlad,” I said when I saw him.

He glanced over his shoulder at me, a kind smile spreading across his lips. “Are you joining us?”

I felt thin fingers clutching at my elbow, and I whirled, only to go face-to-face with a young girl, her cheeks ruddy and shiny, her forehead broken out and partially covered by a failed attempt at Sandra Bullock side-swept bangs.