Beyond These Walls (22 page)

“How did Agent Umber find Quinn?” I tapped the tip of my finger to my lips and contemplated Ivan and my overgrown best friend. “I mean, if Jake didn’t tell him, who did?”

Nobody shrugged, his eye never leaving the laptop screen in front of him. “Does it matter anymore? Quinn’s either dead or underground.”

Ivan winced, his face, his real face, paling at Nobody’s dire prediction. I smiled an apology to the older man and kicked Nobody in the shin. For a second he just frowned at me.

“I’m sure Quinn’s fine,” I said. Yeah right. I’d put enough C-4 in that bomb to demolish four Resdens. Nobody, including Nobody, could have survived that blast.

Nobody must’ve realized his mistake. “Of course. Quinn’s too smart to die.” He paused. “What I meant to say was, Arthur’s dead, and you’re home. Safe.” His eye returned to the computer and he pressed a few keys. “Forget the past, and focus on,” he stuttered, “the future.”

“Easy for you to say.” The vaccine was still out there. Somewhere. According to HOA reports Nobody hacked, the vaccine had disappeared before Resden exploded. No one knew who’d taken it or why. To me the answer seemed simple enough. Terrifyingly so. But I needed proof and then I needed a nice shiny bullet.

Nobody winced at my comment. The knowledge of my illness hung in the air between us. I felt immediately guilty. That wasn’t what I’d meant. Damn, it seemed like every conversation we had was fraught with deeper meaning. I raised my hand, gaining his attention, however briefly. “Stop it. I refuse to walk on eggshells. Now answer my damn question.” I shoved my hands on my hips. “Who blabbed to Umber?”

Nobody’s eye returned to the computer screen, and for a moment, I didn’t think he would answer. “Maybe I can trace Umber’s phone records, find out where the call originated. It might take some time though…”

Bingo. I leaned down and kissed the top of his head. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.” He paused. “I’m serious. Don’t mention this to anyone.”

“What about London?” I studied his face, searching for a sign of what was rattling around in his over-sized head. Something was simmering between Nobody and London, something he wasn’t telling me. Did he really trust her? Or was he using her? I feared his answer so I didn’t ask.

“No one.” Nobody shook his head. “You either, Ivan. I mean it. No one can know of Indeara’s interest. It’s too dangerous. The less the HOA thinks about Indeara, the safer we all are.”

“Come on, boy.” Ivan rubbed his whiskered chin. “You can trust me, we’re like family.”

His words sparked something inside my head, and I considered the idea of family. What made someone family? It was more than blood.

46 chromosome.

300,000 gene patterns.

Not to mention a trillion or so cells.

Mix together, bake for nine months, and bingo, a green-eyed baby girl was born. I licked my lips, bile burning in my stomach.

“While you’re looking into Umber, do me another favor.” I shot Nobody a grim smile.

Chapter 50

In the darkness outside of a prettily decorated brownstone, in a nice human neighborhood, I waited for a sign. A signal of some sort. It came in the form I’d expected, but at a cost, I hadn’t anticipated.

“Indeara?” London West opened her second story window and called down. “What’s wrong? Did something happen?” The fear in her voice set my teeth on edge. The sweet, innocent beauty queen act only went so far. I wasn’t some dumb guy willing to fall at her petite feet.

I smiled up from the shadows. “Everything’s fine.”

“So why are you here?”

Funny, but I’d asked myself the same question a lot over the past few hours. But something kept poking at my conscious mind, like a rose-igold torn burrowed deep inside my brain. The answer came to me in the dead of night. It woke me from a sound sleep, a cold sweat pooling in my gut. I prayed I was wrong. But I wasn’t. Not this time.

“Can I come up?” I motioned to the locked front door and tried to project the same sweet innocence London had. On me, it came off more like a need to pee. “Please,” I added when she didn’t answer.

For a few seconds, we stared at each other with the same Resden green eyes. Emily’s eyes. A shiver raced up my spine and my grip on the cold steel of my nine-millimeter slipped a bit.

London nodded once and closed her window. A couple of minutes later, the front door opened, and she stood facing me in the moonlight shadowed by the wall. She motioned to the weak glow. “It must be a full moon.”

I nodded, picturing the brightly lit moon hanging high above the mutant world. The moon I’d left when I’d crossed through the gate and into London’s human world.

“I miss watching the moonrise.” The edge of her lips curved into a smile. “It really is a sight to behold.”

“Why London? Why’d you kill Jake?” I stared at her, watching for any crack in her sweet facade.

Her smile grew. “So you’ve figured it all out, huh? I killed Jake, sold you out, all for what? Resden?” She shook her head. “Quinn was right. It’s all black and white with you. Good or bad.”

“Tell me you didn’t call Umber.” I frowned, annoyed at the sneer in her voice. “That you didn’t tell him the location of the Resistance or where to find Quinn.” My lips compressed. “Try and deny it.”

Her face went slack. “How’d you find out?”

“Nobody.”

She winced. “Why don’t we finish this discussion,” she motioned to the doorway, “inside?”

Why the fuck not?

I lifted my gun from the pocket of my cargo pants, keeping it low and to my side. London’s eyes widened, but she said nothing, and instead stepped inside her quaint brownstone and waited in the hallway for me to follow.

The brownstone was much like I remembered from my last visit when Jake had brought me here after someone had smashed my head in.

Someone named London.

The brownstone suited her, much more than Quinn’s loft had. For the second time I wondered about her life with the real David West. Her husband and the man responsible for administering the plague to my father all those years ago.

David had used the sewer to do it, poisoning Mutant City’s water supply with mutated kool-aid, and stood back to watch the mutants die. But Emily had drunk the kool-aid too.

“Tea?” London motioned to a rose-colored couch in the center of her living room. A dust ruffle protected the antique, like my mutated cells had once protected me.

I shrugged. “Two sugars, no poison.”

Her laugh boomed from her petite body, shocking me at with its richness. “How about some brandy instead?”

She didn’t wait for my answer, but poured two snifters of the amber colored liquor. With a grin, she took a drink from one of the glasses, and then the other, before holding them out to me. I chose the one in her right hand, wiped a smug of her lipstick from the edge, and swallowed the drink in one gulp.

“I’m glad to see you survived,” she said. “I had some doubts that you could pull it off. But I’m glad you did.”

“Are you really?” I raised an eyebrow. “After all I blew the shit out of your inheritance. I figured you’d be a little annoyed.” I paused, letting my words sink in. “But Resden wasn’t what you wanted, was it? You wanted the vaccine.”

“And why would I want that?” She laughed. “The whole idea of turning mutants to humans makes me sick.”

“But destroying us doesn’t.” I poured myself another drink, letting the warmth of the alcohol seep into the coldness inside my soul. “Our grandfather raised you well. In his image one might say.”

The crack of her hand against my face surprised me with its quickness and force. “Don’t say that. Never say that,” she cried, eyes blazing. Eyes so much like my own, inherited from my mother.

Our mother.

I smiled at my half-sister enjoying the sting of her slap in a perverse way. It sure as hell beat the burning in my heart. In one day, I’d gained a sister. A sister I was pretty sure I’d have to kill.

For her own good.

For mine.

Either way, London Resden West, crazed mutant killer, would cease to exist. I owed it to Jake.

Chapter 51

London shook her head, sending locks of blonde hair dancing around her shoulders. In some ways, it was almost funny how much she resembled Emily, much more than I ever had. I shrugged, amazed at the marvels of modern science. My sister was a test-tube replica of Emily, grown for Arthur’s pleasure. Add a pinch of daughter and a speck of random sperm donor, and what do you get? A freakishly beautiful psycho bent on ridding the world of mutants.

It put a new spin on family reunions.

“You’re wrong, you know,” she said. “About all of it.”

I ran a hand across my face, unsure how to handle my new, insane half-sister. Pull the trigger and be done with it, a voice inside my head whispered. But I couldn’t. Not yet. I tossed her my friendliest smile. “Then tell me. Explain why you sent me to Resden.”

London frowned. “Was I that obvious?”

I nodded. Admittedly, at the time, I was too wrapped up in Quinn’s capture, and Jake’s supposed betrayal to figure it out. However yesterday, after some thought, a pint of vodka, and Umber’s phone records, things came together.

My eyes burned as I memorized each call to Umber’s phone. One number kept repeating. The same number listed on my mobile log on the day Jake died. The same number Nobody had called me from. London’s number.

“Why, London?” I swallowed my anger, keeping my voice steady. “You worked for Arthur, for God’s sake. If you didn’t want him to ‘fix’ us you could’ve taken it at anytime. Why use me as a diversion to steal the vaccine?”

“I had no choice.” She brushed her hair from her face and flopped down on the rose-colored couch. “We had no choice. You see, the vaccine isn’t what you think it is. It’s not an evil mixture bent on crushing mutants.” She shot me an apologetic look. “Or at least it didn’t start out that way.”

“Oh yeah?”

She laughed. “Believe what you want, but the cure is just that, a way to heal mutated genes. Arthur planned to use it to cure mutants, to make them human. I have other plans.”

I had a feeling I wasn’t going to like her ‘plan’. “Do you hate us that much?”

“I used to.” Her eyes turned distant, hazy. “Arthur raised me to hate all mutants. Even you.” She gave a bitter laugh. “Especially you. Growing up he compared us constantly. I usually lost.”

What could I say? “I—”

“He wanted me to be Emily,” she paused, “but I’m not her. I’ll never be her.”

For a brief second, my heart ached for her, for the kid raised by a madman. “I’m nothing like her either,” I said. My mother loved sunrise and flowers. I slept past noon and sneezed whenever in the vicinity of a rose-igold bush. Emily had loved Calvin more than anything, even her own life. I’d never feel that way again. “No one could be.”

London’s eyes flashed to mine, anger radiating off her in waves. I shrugged, so much for family bonding. “It doesn’t matter.” She lifted her slender hand and gave a vague wave. “Not anymore. I stopped trying to please Arthur years ago.” Her lips bubbled with bitter laughter. “Too bad I figured that out after I’d already married David West.”

“I’m sorry.” And I was. My mutant cells had protected me from many things, but the gravest seemed to be Arthur Resden. What kind of man grew a kid in a test-tube and then married her off to a bastard like West? I’d read David West’s personnel file. Nobody had provided it with a few taps of the keyboard. Ten years older than his lovely wife, David West was an up and comer at Resden, until Quinn stole his body.

“Don’t be.” She uncurled from the couch and I gripped my gun tighter. “If not for David, I would’ve never met Quinn.”

Jealousy sprung from deep inside me, threatening my common sense. I wanted to slap the look of pleasure from her much too pretty face. “If Quinn means so damn much to you, why’d you send Umber after him? Why not give him the vaccine?” I tapped my finger against my chin. “It sounds like Quinn wasn’t your lover, but your lapdog.”

London giggled. “Right on one point, but we’ll get to that later. Right now, we need to talk about the future.” With a flick of her wrist a pen-like object sprung from beneath the sleeve of her shirt. “Your future.” She jabbed the device into my stomach. “If you have one.”

Before I could raise my gun, fifty thousand volts of electricity arced through my body. Not again, I thought as blue lights flashed inside my brain.

Then I thought nothing at all.

Chapter 52

Surprisingly I awoke a few minutes later. The surprise part came from the fact I was still alive. London stood over me, her green eyes sparkling like some demented Dr. Frankenstein. An IV tube led into the crook of my elbow, a light blue fluid dripped down the line. I watched in grim fascination as it seeped into my body. I tried to lift my arms, to fight one last good fight, but a thick wad of duct tape across my limbs and chest held me down. My tongue felt too big for my mouth, and I started to gag.

“Shhh,” London whispered, brushing a wayward blonde curl from my eyes. “I know it hurts. It’ll be over soon. Just relax.”

Easy for her to say.

My limbs felt as if a thousand tiny needles slowly punctured my flesh. I wanted to scream, but my mouth refused to comply. Choking, I fought to suck air past the lump in my throat and into my deprived lungs. Fire shot up my nerves. Big, wet tears dripped from my eyes, snot from my nose, and a string of drool gushed from my mouth.

I’d had better moments.

Then, as quickly as the pain began, it stopped. I could breathe and with the exception of my taped limbs, I could move. Really, I felt stronger than I had in months. Was this what it felt like to be human?

“Better now?” London smiled down at me and winced. “Let me get you a Kleenex.” She disappeared through a doorway, giving me a chance to gather my bearings. I was still inside her brownstone, in a bedroom with soft pink sheets, and lace curtains.

On the nightstand sat a framed picture of London with her arms around Arthur. She looked about ten years old, and her smile was infectious. But Arthur didn’t appear to notice. He sat rigid in her embrace. Another photograph leaned against the first. This one wasn’t framed and its edges had yellowed with age. The people locked inside the memory appeared happy, each smiling at the camera. Tears sprang into my eyes. I remembered taking that picture. It was my eleventh birthday. My last birthday with a family.