Heroes 'Til Curfew (Talent Chronicles #2) (26 page)

“Yeah, it
does
. I didn’t want to see
it before, but it is. When I had my head down—the way Dad wanted me
to—it was just me. I didn’t have to see the others, didn’t have to
worry about them. But now they’re in my life and I can’t help it. I
can’t hide under my bed while Marco destroys the town and NIAC
comes to take everyone away. Not if I can help.”

I broke away from him and flopped down on
the cot, drawing my knees up to my chin. “I call into this
voicemail number we have once a day and let them know I’m okay.
Because, yeah, my dad gets freaked out about my safety and it would
be cruel to make him wonder. But I’ve been walking on eggshells
around Dad for years, and lately it seems like he’s a lot stronger
than I gave him credit for. He’s going to have to deal with the
fact that I have responsibilities and obligations that aren’t
always going to match up with what he thinks is best. I totally
understand where he’s coming from, but I can’t keep living like
that.”

Dylan had followed me to the cot while I was
talking. “Okay,” he said softly, pulling me into his arms.
“Okay.”

The way he said it made my heart hurt. I
took a deep breath. Let it out. “And I didn’t run away from home.
I’m just…taking a break from my home life.”

“So how long you think this break’s gonna
last?”

“I’m not sure. He’s gotta be pretty pissed
at me by now. I’ve been out of the house all weekend, haven’t told
them where I’m staying, blew off my shifts at the shop, and then
there was the thing with the car…”

“
That’s
why you suddenly wanted to go
home yesterday. You stole your dad’s car? To take me on a
picnic.”

“I borrowed the family car. I took it right
back.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

I sighed and leaned into him. “I don’t know.
I guess I didn’t know how. Or I wasn’t ready yet. And then we were
in a fight, and—”

“I am so sorry. You were going through this
and I should have been there for you, and instead I was—”

I unclasped my hold on my knees so I could
elbow him. “Shut up. What are you, psychic now?” I turned into him.
It was so easy to turn into him, so natural. Like I thought he was
mine now. I wanted to cry. I wanted to pound on his chest and yell
at him and tell him how much I’d needed him, how alone I’d felt.
But I wouldn’t do that to him.

“I was all caught up in my own crap.” He
pried my hand from his shirt and brought it to his cheek as he said
it, his voice full of regret.

“Don’t.”

“I’m not. I just want you to know that I
would’ve figured out all on my own, that the ache I was carrying
was me missing you. And I would have come crawling back on my knees
asking you to forgive me.”

Jesus, how do you come up with this
stuff, let alone actually
say
it?
I felt liquid, like I
had melted and might slide out of his arms and spill onto the
floor.

He tipped my chin up, brushed a kiss across
my lips as my eyes closed. “You don’t ever have to be alone.”

Something took hold of my throat and my
chest and squeezed. It hurt for him to say that, a reminder of how
much it hurt to feel that way. It was like that was all I knew and
I hadn’t even noticed it was there. It was only when it was gone
that I recognized it as loneliness. As pain.

He understood that. Somehow Dylan, with his
friends and girlfriends, with his charm and careless smiles, knew
what it was to feel that. And that we could make it all go away so
we’d never have to feel it again. How could Dad ask me to give this
up? How could he think that I could?

The kiss spiraled down, deep and frantic as
though we thought that we could blot out the whole world with it.
Because we could. We lowered back onto the cot. Dylan’s body
settled warm and heavy over mine. What else mattered but him, but
us, the way we fit together? Nothing else but his mouth on mine,
his hands on my skin, the solid weight of him.

The buzz of the phone in my pocket startled
us, but didn’t break the kiss. I reached for it but Dylan grabbed
my hand, his fingers twining with mine, raising it over my head.
“Don’t answer it,” he muttered, his voice thick as his lips moved
down my neck.

“It’s gotta be Rob. I was supposed to meet
him,” I breathed.

“Let him wait.”

“How long?”

He took my mouth again in one long, heavy
kiss that he broke off abruptly. “I see your point. All right,
fine. Where’s the phone?”

It had stopped ringing. He batted my hand
away and started digging in my pocket, shifting his body around
like he couldn’t get a good angle and pretending he couldn’t quite
get hold of it. When he finally got it he sat up and threw both
legs over mine. He pinned me there, distracting me by running his
fingers over my bare stomach while he called Rob back. I had little
idea what he said.

I thought about the fact that Dylan was on
my phone and Rob was going to know that we were both down here, why
we didn’t meet him, and why we didn’t pick up the phone. It was
kind of embarrassing, but it was kind of hard to get upset about
it.

“All right,” he said, closing the phone and
tucking it into my pocket. “Let’s go find Rob.” He bounced up off
the cot and pulled me up, slinging an arm around my shoulders. “So
I just found out that my girlfriend is a crazy homeless
person.”

“I’m not crazy.”

“You wanted to answer the phone in the
middle of that? I stand by my analysis.”

A few days ago I would have freaked out
about whether or not he was mad or if I had done something wrong.
But not today. I grabbed his hand where it hung over my shoulder
and tugged it, hugging myself with his arm to squeeze us both
through the doorway. “Yeah, okay, guess I’ll own that.”

“A crazy homeless person who lives in a
boiler room. I don’t like the idea of you here by yourself. What if
there are other crazy homeless people looking for a posh set-up
like this?”

“I doubt that’s a big issue on campus.”

“Drunken frat boys, then.”

“It’s fine, Dylan. My family’s had stuff
stashed here for the last few years and it’s never been touched.
And I’m not exactly helpless.”

“Great. Then when the crazy drunken homeless
frat boys show up, I’ll have you to defend me because I’ll be
staying here until you decide to go home.”

I knew there was little sense arguing about
it, especially when I didn’t want to. “You sure that’s okay?”

“You mean, like, with my parental unit? She
won’t really care if I don’t come home for a few days. And she
won’t really care when I come back.”

I didn’t have anything to say. I leaned my
head against him and tightened my arm around his waist.

“It doesn’t really matter, Marshall.” He
dropped a kiss on the top of my head. “Not anymore.”

* * *

Marco

“It’s too cold,” Maddy whined, turning up
the collar of her jacket. “Why are we doing this?”

“You should have worn a hat like I told
you.”

“You told me to wear a hat because my hair
color’s not stealthy enough for you. Not like there’s enough light
down here for anyone to see it. What happened to all the
streetlights, anyway?”

Matt shrugged. I had to wonder why he’d
worry about his sister’s platinum hair, but not care at all how
much their voices carried right up the storefronts. The
super-powered muscles in my legs took me across a gap between
buildings in a pretty bad-ass jump.

“What was that?” Maddy asked, stopping and
squinting up to where I was standing. I crouched down. There was a
lot of cloud cover tonight, and I was pretty sure she couldn’t see
me.

“Dunno.” Matt sounded worried.

I grinned.

“Let’s go home. This was a dumb idea. Joss
would be pissed if she knew we were doing this.”

“No she wouldn’t. I know she’s been keeping
an eye out down here lately. And she’s been working so hard this
week with the training thing, she’s not in the best shape to deal
with Marco and those assholes if they try anything.”

“And that’s where you come in.”

“Why do you think she’s been spending so
much time training Talents?”

“Um, to protect ourselves from NIAC? Like
she
said
?”

“You didn’t have to come along.”

Matt started walking away, but Maddy kept
after him.

“Like I’m gonna let you prowl around down
here by yourself. Idiot. Come on, Matt. What are you thinking? That
she’s going to be oh-so-impressed that you showed up to patrol with
her? That you’re going to find her in a jam, swoop in and save her,
and then what? She’s with Dylan. Give it a break.”

“Shut up, Matilda.”

“Don’t you see the way they look at each
other? There’s just no way.”

“Hey, did I mention…shut up, Matilda?”

“Lookit, I’m not sayin’ she’s totally out of
your league or anything—”

“You are the most annoying person on the
planet.”

Yeah, really.
I was starting to
wonder why he hadn’t hit her yet.

“—I’m just sayin’ it ain’t happenin’ any
time soon. So this whole fantasy life you got going on that’s
brought on this whole case of civic duty, or chivalry, or whatever
the heck it is—it’s just a big waste of time.” She crossed her arms
over her chest and pouted. “And it’s cold.”

I jumped another gap, made less noise this
time, but scared the crap out of Bella. At least, I was pretty sure
I was looking at Bella. Out of her body, she kind of made the space
she was in look like way hot exhaust makes stuff look. That patch
of distorted air had jumped when I’d landed.

I strolled over, across the roof of the ice
cream place. I thought how, if she were in her body, I’d warm my
hands up under her shirt and she’d totally let me. This girl wanted
me bad.

“It’s the twins down there,” I said in a low
voice. I didn’t look at her, partly just because it creeped me out,
and it was weird talking to the thick air. “They think they’re
‘patrolling,’ but they haven’t even noticed anyone’s in the shop
yet. I’m gonna go in. Come down if you’ve got something to report,
otherwise you can stay up here and keep watch.”

There was no response, of course. Bella
couldn’t talk or even make any kind of signals that made sense
without her body.

I took the fire escape, feeling the twinges
in my knees from all those jumps. I had hoped to find Joss while I
was prowling around. Figured she’d be around here somewhere,
looking for trouble. Wherever she was tonight, she was keeping
pretty well hidden. But Matt and his dumbass crush would bring her
out.

* * *

Dylan

Joss moved in her sleep, pressing her back
closer against me. She wasn’t the only creature that was stirring,
and I hoped the one in my sweats didn’t wake her up. It was going
to be another long, mostly sleepless night.

Still, I couldn’t help feeling like Joss’s
fight with her dad was the best thing that ever happened to me.
And, okay, I felt bad for thinking that, especially knowing it hurt
her, but we were living together. Maybe when I was a little kid,
like before Dad left, maybe I felt like I belonged at home, but I
didn’t remember it. I felt like I belonged here. With her.

And even if we were living in a creepy
basement, eating nasty food out of plastic bags, and sleeping on a
dinky air mattress on the floor—well, there was nothing wrong with
sharing the mattress since we’d gotten rid of the cot, except how
much trouble I had getting to sleep once we stopped fooling
around.

You’re such an idiot
, I thought. But
I was smiling.

Tomorrow was going to be another long day.
School in the morning, and on time. Joss wouldn’t tolerate
attracting attention by skipping school or being late, no matter
how I tried to convince her. After barely managing to stay awake
through school, I was on the schedule for a shift at Casey’s. Since
Joss didn’t have to put in time at her dad’s place, she would be
down here in the Warren all afternoon and into the evening, working
with the Talents. Finding out what they could do, thinking about
how to use it, teaching them self-defense, teaching them how to
think.

I knew I’d get home from work and I’d see
the headache behind her eyes. The little smile she kept for me
would be tired, but it would be there. We’d eat, do homework, and
patrol. But now we were keeping out of sight, with me cloaking us
if we had to walk in the open, and we agreed not to get involved
unless someone was getting hurt. If we saw something, we were just
going to call the police and let them do their job, because
clashing with Marco was doing more harm than good, and attracting
too much attention.

But we hadn’t seen anything since Vinyl
Salvation. I wanted to be relieved, but I couldn’t help thinking he
was just gearing up for something else.

It was cold. I went to pull the blanket up
over my shoulder but it felt like something was wrong.

I was cold because I was alone.

I sat up, realized I must have fallen
asleep, and fumbled for the flashlight. It was lying on top of
Joss’s spiral notebook, opened to a page that read, “Woke up and
couldn’t go back to sleep. Gonna take a walk and make sure all’s
well up top. Back soon. ~Joss.”

I swore a blue streak as I got dressed,
pulling on layers as I raced down the tunnel. The thing Joss didn’t
like about the Warren was the spotty cell signal. I never minded
because it meant we weren’t bothered much. But I minded now.

I turned a corner and skidded to a stop in
the kitchen. My cell phone was gone.

“Dylan, shut the door, you’re letting the
heat out,” my mom said. She was stirring something on the stove.
When we lived here, in our old house, she used to cook a lot.

I shut the back door slowly, dazed and
confused.