Heroes 'Til Curfew (Talent Chronicles #2) (25 page)

She was silent for a minute and I started to
wonder if I was overdoing it. Had I said too much? Then, “Um…wow.
If I could, like, ditto on all that, and we could just say ‘goes
both ways,’ I’d say that’s a deal. But you also promise never to
jump off a ledge again—unless it’s really, really important. And
then feet first.”

“All right, Marshall. Deal.”

Chapter 12

Marco

“Hey, jailbird, how was your time in the
slammer?” My laugh echoed off the walls of the industrial plant
that housed my new lair. Way better than the last one, I might
add.

My cousin just glared at me, which somehow
made it funnier. I think he was afraid to talk, though. Vivian
probably gave him an earful in the car on the way back from the
lock-up. I know she really let me have it already, and she probably
wasn’t done yet.

She shoved Tony from behind, taking him by
surprise so that he stumbled forward and almost fell into me. Which
wasn’t cool because I was leaning on the railing overlooking the
huge, concrete tank. I figured the tank was probably used to
collect some kind of toxic run-off from whatever they used to make
here, and then they let it drain into the river. Before some
bleeding-heart environmentalist started crying about the poor
widdle fishies and shut them down. Whatever. Their loss, my
gain.

“Do you boys have any idea the trouble
you’ve put me through? And, more importantly, the trouble you’ve
put my bosses through? They are not pleased.”

I thought about slamming her back against
the wall and giving her something to be pleased about. I wondered
what was under that trench coat besides the stripper-special
boots.

“The Syndicate’s not going to tolerate
another screw-up like this. This idiot went and got
caught,
”
she looked at Tony like she wanted to spit on him, “and you did a
lot of damage to a store that was supposed to be under your
protection.”

I shrugged. “He was late with his
payment.”

“So you go in there and take some stuff, do
some minor damage, embarrass him, scare him a little. Something to
remind him to take you seriously. You don’t inhibit his ability to
do business.”

“That was the plan! It was Joss and Dylan
who came in and fucked everything up.”

“The same Dylan that screwed up your bank
job and broke your crew? The same Joss you let get evidence of your
Talent, who fucked up that adorable little blackmail thing you had
going, got in the way of your recent bookstore robbery, and
destroyed your last place of business? How many times are you going
to let them take what’s yours, Marco? How much longer are you going
to let those kids stand between you and what you say you want?
Because let me tell you something: I’m already sick of this little
shit-hole town of yours. That NIAC-affiliated idiot at the high
school has provided me with about all the intel he’s gonna, and I’m
sick of letting him grab my ass just to make sure he stays off
yours.”

Tony reached out and picked up a bright red
curl of hair that was lying on her chest. “Aw, poor Viv. If you
want, I can—”

Tony was becoming a real moron lately, and,
with a nerve strike to his arm and a roundhouse kick, Vivian put
him on the ground.

“The only reason I didn’t put you over the
rail just now, D’Attaviano, is because I just used a lot of
Syndicate money and influence to get your ass out of jail. I don’t
want to have to explain why I did that and then wasted you, when I
could have just had you offed in custody. But I can talk my way out
of a lot, so don’t try my patience again.” She turned back to me.
“And that goes for you, too. My patience is at an end. If those
kids are going to be a problem, get rid of them. Let’s get you in
with the Syndicate and me away from that slobbering Dobbs. And back
to the city where I can get a decent fucking manicure, okay?” She
gave Tony, who was still lying on the concrete, a swift kick in the
ribs with the pointed toe of her boot. “I just broke a nail you
little shit.”

“All right, look. I’ve got a plan for some
serious payback that will crush Joss—trust me, she’s the one
causing the problem—and get both of them out of the picture. But to
do it, I’m gonna need to put the hurt on another paying
customer.”

“You don’t have a whole lot of paying
customers to begin with, Finelli. You keep that in mind. But if
you’re talking about putting that Army-Navy store out of business,
I say go for it. That guy’s not right. He gives me the creeps.”

“That whole family’s full of freaks. And I’m
gonna take them down.”

* * *

Joss

“Okay, that was a good one. Don’t be afraid
to put some power behind that. Really hit me.”

“I don’t want to hit you,” Maddy whined.

“You’re not going to hurt me.” I was getting
tired of repeating that. It had been a day of assessing Talents and
trying to show them a few basic fighting skills and self-defense.
Mostly I was just trying to get them used to the idea of hitting
and being hit. These kids were so not used to violence in any way.
Some of the girls had burst into tears, and I’d hardly even touched
them.

It was hard. I understood that having to
deal, really deal, with someone hitting you and having to defend
yourself was shocking and upsetting. But damn I was tired. “You
can’t let your brother fight all your battles for you,” I told her
as we circled each other. “You totally jumped that NIAC ape at
Kat’s party. I know you’ve got it in you. Come on.”

“Yeah you did, Maddy. That was awesome,”
Dylan encouraged. We were in one of the tunnel intersections in the
Warren, where there was a little more space for sparring. Dylan and
Matt were lounging against the wall, a safe distance away,
watching.

“Try to find an opening where you could use
your knee or your foot. As a girl you’ve got a lot of power in your
lower body. You can use that, if you can keep your balance.” I’d
already given her several openings, times when I’d even closed her
in near the wall so she’d have that to fall back on. But she wasn’t
seeing it, or she wasn’t following through.

Something shrilled, echoing through the
stillness of the tunnels. I turned to look for the sound, and
that’s
when Maddy found her power and clipped me in the jaw.
No way that was going to put me down or anything, but it did send
me back a step, and Dylan could tell. As Matt answered his phone,
Dylan was all over me in a heartbeat.

“Okay, that’s enough of that. Let me
see.”

“Oh my God, Joss, I’m so sorry! Did I really
hurt you?”

“No, of course not,” I was trying to say to
Maddy, whom I couldn’t even see. I could barely talk the way Dylan
was twisting my neck around trying to get a good look in the lousy
light we had in the tunnel.

“She’s fine,” he told Maddy. “You’re going
to have to really work out before you can hope to put a dent in
this hard head. But let’s cool it for today, okay? I think you’ve
both had enough.”

“Fine by me,” Maddy agreed.

“Sorry about that,” Matt said, putting his
phone away. “That was Mom. She’s held up so she says you’re cooking
dinner.”

“What? No way. It’s so not my turn,” Maddy
told him. I hadn’t brought out the boxing gloves today. I figured
these guys needed to know what bare-handed fighting felt like.
Maddy, of course, had worn the leather cycling gloves she always
wore, one of which she was pulling off with her teeth. She reached
out her bare hand toward her brother, who jumped away like she was
threatening him with electric shock. “Come on, give me your
hand.”

“Cut that out.”

“You won’t let me get your thoughts because
you know you’re lying.”

“Maybe I’ve just been thinking how
incredibly lame and girly you are, how you couldn’t fight your way
out of a paper bag, and don’t want to hurt your feelings.”

“Nice, Matt,” Dylan said. “The bickering
twin thing is really adorable and stuff, but how about you guys
take it on home now.” He was looking at me with that concerned,
thinking about lecturing me look.

“Come on, jerk. Drive me home. Let’s leave
the lovebirds alone for a while.”

Dylan waited until we heard them climbing
back up the ladder before he spoke again. “You are so done for the
day.”

“Rob’s coming next. He should be here in
like,” I checked the time, “Twenty minutes or so.”

“So I’ll call him and tell him to forget
it.”

“No, you can’t do that. I really need to
work with him on this information system phone tree whatever
thing.”

“You’ve got a headache.”

As good as it felt to have him start
massaging my temples, I was thinking that I was going to have to
figure out how he always knew, find that tell and kill it.

“I’m fine.”

“Come on, let’s at least go lie down while
we wait.” He took my hand and started to tug me down the
tunnel.

I didn’t move. As nice as
that
sounded, I really didn’t want to go into that room with Dylan. I
felt bad about holding back, but I just wasn’t sure how to
deal.

“What?”

“Um, yeah,” I said, breaking free of him and
moving down the tunnel, away from him. “That’s a good idea. I’ll go
lie down, have a few minutes of quiet time. Maybe you could go up
to the surface and look out for Rob. He hasn’t been here before,
and he’s going to need one of us to show him the entrance.”

I had mixed feelings about revealing this
location to more people, but we needed a place to meet and they
couldn’t use the Warren to hide out from NIAC if they didn’t know
about it. Right now I was just glad to have something to ask Dylan
to do for me.

“Well, yeah, okay. I can go meet him up
top.” Dylan started to follow me.

“Probably you should go up now. In case he’s
early.”

“Um…yeah, okay.” He hesitated. “Are you sure
you’re okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Just a headache, like you
said. I’ll go close my eyes for a few minutes and it’ll be a lot
better. Really.”

He did that stroke my cheek thing and gave
me a half smile before setting off down the tunnel. He’d looked
worried, but that was nothing new. It was interesting to realize
that the guy with the easy smile, who always knew what to say, was
as much a worrier as I was.

I let myself into the storage room. In
addition to the end of the world/NIAC siege supplies that were
stashed there, there were now my school books and a bag of my
clothes. The cot that had been bare the last time Dylan had been
here, now had my sleeping bag rolled out on it. I’d cracked open a
case of MREs and a case of water, and there were some empties I
needed to take up to the trash. Not big changes, probably, but
stuff I thought Dylan would notice—the way he watched me like a
hawk—and stuff I didn’t really want to explain.

I felt bad for not wanting to explain it. I
felt like we were together now and I should be telling him stuff.
Maybe part of me even wanted to tell him about it. I’d left home,
which was big, but I’d also left my dad, which was bigger. Dylan
probably wouldn’t get that. He hated Dad now, after what I’d told
him yesterday. So I already felt bad for talking about that and
guilty for how good it felt to tell him and have him care so much.
It was just…

Ugh. Stop thinking!

I stretched out on the cot and closed my
eyes, trying to relax and let the headache pull back. I tried to
shove the stuff about Dad aside. Tried not to think about the day,
about all the kids I’d talked to, how clueless they’d seemed, and
how deferential they’d been toward me, like I was some kind of
expert or authority figure or something. Dylan had been at work
most of the day, so he hadn’t been around to run interference for
me, to say the right things, ask questions the right way.

“Hey, Joss, I—”

I sat bolt upright so fast I almost turned
the cot over.

“Sorry.” Dylan said, “I didn’t mean to freak
you out.”

“It’s fine,” I said, getting up and moving
toward him. Maybe I could herd him out of the room. “Is Rob here
already?”

“No, I…” He stood between me and the door.
“Are we okay?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“I mean, you’re not…afraid to be alone with
me or anything, are you?”

Oh. Oh, damn.
“No, it’s not you. I’m
sorry. It’s just been a really long day. I’m not used to so
much…interaction.”

“Oh.”

Well, this is awkward.
“I think I
feel better, though. Let’s go up and wait for Rob together.”

“Joss, how long have you been here?”

Crap. Truth, lies, or evasion?
“Since, um, Friday?”

“You’re staying here?”

“It’s not a big—”

“What happened? Did he do something to
you?”

Dylan looked ready to explode. I knew
exactly what he was asking and it immediately got my back up. “Of
course not! I wish you’d quit acting like my dad’s some of kind of
monster. Just because he’s had problems in the past—”

“Uh-uh. After what you told me yesterday,
you don’t get to keep acting like I don’t have any reason to worry
about you.”

“Well, I’m so glad I confided in you. That’s
awesome.”

“And I’m immune to the sarcasm, Marshall.
You ran away from home. Tell me what happened.”

“It’s not a big—” He gave me a look, and I
realized I was repeating myself. “I got grounded.”

“Grounded.”

“Yeah. I got grounded when I got home from
spending the night at your house. Which I kinda get, I mean—I snuck
out and stayed out all night. And maybe if that’s what it had been
about, I could have handled it. I can’t deal with him right now. I
don’t have
time
. NIAC’s coming for us, and right now these
kids are lambs to the slaughter. Marco’s out of control—”

He took me by the arms. “That doesn’t have
to be your problem,” he said quietly.