Taken By Storm (20 page)

CHAPTER NINETEEN

We have to jog all the way back downtown in order to get my car, because none of us feel like walking to Tacoma. These days the cloud cover is so heavy that I can't tell if the sun is coming or going. Even looking due west, there's barely a faint glow in the sky to indicate that it even exists. How do people live in this city?

It starts pouring halfway back to the car, soaking us all through. I don't even care. The rain is cold as sin, but even though it'll be hell on my leathers, it feels somehow cleansing. I'm not usually one to feel like water's anything but wet. That said, the icy drops falling on me lift my spirits and rejuvenate me even as they make me shiver.

A tiny spark of hope has germinated in my chest. Maybe, just maybe, this is almost over and I can go back to Mira and the others and help them clean up Hopkinsville like we just did with Seattle.
 

Either way, it's almost over for Gregor.
 

We reach the car at half past five and hop in. I feel like I haven't stopped moving in weeks, probably because I haven't. And the one time I did, my motel room turned into a demon salad.

It's a pretty short drive to Tacoma, and the rain picks up into a full on deluge on the way. I don't think I've ever seen this kind of rain in my life.

We leave the car on the opposite side of a park just across the street from the address the mechanic gave us and
 
hike across the soggy grass. It's a single family home of a modern style, and the inset path lighting blazes against the rain, creating little white gold halos that light the way to the doorstep.
 

There's no way I'm just going to walk up and ring the bell, even though as crafty as Gregor is, there's no way he doesn't have wards around this place. I motion to Udo and Evis to split off to the left, and I go right, circling around the yard. There's one light on upstairs, but that's it.

No one appears to be home. There's no car in the garage, and I meet Evis and Udo at the back of the house.

"It's so quiet," says Evis.
 

He's right, though it doesn't mean Gregor's not there. He could be asleep. Or meditating on how best to murder the next hundred people.

At the front of the house again, I decide to just try the door. It's not unlocked. Evis takes hold of it in his hand and gives it a hard shove. With a sharp crack, it opens.

"So much for a stealthy entrance," I mutter.

No alarm goes off, but it doesn't appear that anyone's home. We make our way through the house, peeking into each room that looks like it came straight out of a design magazine. When we get to the living room, I stop. The mechanic was right about the leather sofas. They're almost identical to…

"Those are mine."

I stop short in the middle of the living room, my mouth hanging open. That's my sofa, with the few nibbles from the left leg where Nana worried at it. And on the shelf, that's my vase. The scent of my own home nearly overwhelms me, its pieces transported almost two thousand miles and plunked here.

On the side table next to the sofa, turned sideways so I almost didn't see it, is a metal disc propped up on a stand. It's glowing like a lamp.

"Run," I gasp to the shades.
 

I grab Evis's hand and sprint toward the nearest exit, the rear window. I throw myself at it sideways, pulling Evis with me. We crash through the glass, and a shard cuts through my scalp, sending a cascade of blood down over my ear.
 

We hit the grass with a wet thud. It's cool and dark and the impact momentarily stuns me, along with the shock of seeing my furniture that is supposed to be stored somewhere safe here. Stolen by the one person I hate more than anything.

"Where's Udo?" There's a bright flash from inside the house, and Evis is pulling me backward. "Udo!"

I hear a scream from inside the house. Evis scoops me up and leaps over the fence behind us just as another flash lights the night, this time not cold white but hot, hot orange.
 

The heat surge evaporates the rain around the house before it can fall, and a moment later the boom shakes us to the ground. Evis gets up, grabs my hand in his, and keeps running, half dragging me.
 

"Udo's dead," I say. I have to say it. The words make me stumble. I pitch forward, almost plowing my nose into Evis's shoulder blade.
 

"Demons." Evis stops and turns to look at me. "When we hit the window, I saw them. They grabbed him."

"We have to get to the car."
 

We take a longer route around the park, and I hope to every god of justice that Gregor didn't think to send someone after my car, that his cockiness proclaimed that the trap would be enough.
 

When we get to my car, I see Evis stumble and throw my arms around him.
 

It's dangerous for us to stand still like this, but I can't help it. My brother's arms are almost limp around me. He just lost a friend. For the past few nights, they've spent whatever precious hours of sleep we had nearly cuddled. Gregor has hurt Evis more than he's hurt me. I swallow, my throat tight against Evis's clavicle.
 

My things. My home. Gregor knew that my home was inviolate. I was never once attacked at home.

Thinking back, Gregor showed hints of what he was. Turning up in my home uninvited, just to show he could. Dumping Carrick in my living room.
 

"The mechanic." I say it into Evis's shoulder and pull back. "He played us."

Evis looks at me wide-eyed, and we both know I'm right.

"Get in the car."

We drive back to the motel in silence. All I can do is think back over the scene in the garage. The hatred in his eyes, which I interpreted as being about Gregor. I assumed Gregor hurt him, and he probably did.
 

But the hells-worshippers are always happy to play the martyr.
 

The directions, the whole just-leave-me act, all of it.

We got played like a gods damned banjo.

When I park in front of our room, we sit in the car, listening to the rain on the roof.
 

A buzzing sound starts in the back seat, and we both jump.

"Udo's phone," Evis says, his voice mechanical.

I reach back and pick up the phone, flipping it open. My heart feels at once raw and numb.

"Hello?" I say.

"You're not Udo." It's Mavis's voice.

"Ding-ding-ding." I hate myself for saying that as soon as the syllables leave my mouth. "I'm sorry, Mavis. This is Ayala. Udo's dead."

She's quiet for a long minute. "I see. How did it happen?"

"Gregor Gaskin blew up a house in Tacoma with him in it."

"And you weren't in it."

"We'd just jumped out a window. I told him to run. There were demons." I'm suddenly so tired I could pass out here in the car.
 

"I'm sorry."

"He was a good person." It sounds trite and stupid. Nothing I'm saying sounds right.

"I guess I can tell you this. Gregor wasn't there to blow anything up because he was on a flight back to Nashville."

I sit straight up in the driver's seat. "He what?"

"He left four hours ago. One of our people saw him at the gate, but they couldn't stop the plane." Mavis sounds relieved, and though I've never met her in person, I hate her just a little for it.
 

"He was still responsible for blowing up the house."

"If you say so."

"I fucking do." Anger wraps its fingers around my ribs. "Just because Gregor left your city and because I took care of your little alpha shade problem doesn't mean your troubles are over. Tell Tamar she needs to keep her eyes open."

I don't wait for Mavis to answer, just flip the damn phone shut.
 

The finality of ending the call that way gives me the a tiny bit of satisfaction. I look at Evis. "Let's go home."

I can't get Evis on a plane, so we're stuck driving back. I call Alamea as soon as we're in the car ready to head out to tell her what happened and that Gregor's on his way back, but she tells me after a frantic moment that his flight's already landed. It's the first time I've heard her voice in weeks, and she sounds haggard.

"Thanks for telling me, Storme. I'm sorry about Udo."

"Me too." There's not much else to say. "I'll be in Kentucky. If you get eyes on Gregor, let me know."

"Storme," Alamea says. "Mira and the others, are they safe?"

"Safe as houses." Again I feel the heat blast from the bomb, hear Udo's scream. It's all out of order, but it doesn't matter. It all adds up to death.
 

Silence.

"You did good work in Seattle."

"Yeah, and none of the Mediators there even tried to kill me." The lights of Seattle fade in the rearview mirror, and Evis's gaze is glued straight ahead. "Nashville's going to be the new Jackson, isn't it?"

"It might be."

"And all of those people I grew up with —" never mind that they all want me dead right now, "— you're just going to let get sandwiched between the hordes of the hells and death by diarrhea?"

"I don't have a choice."

"You always have a fucking choice." I hang up the phone, hitting the little red circle on the touch screen. It's not nearly as satisfactory as flipping a phone shut.
 

I contemplate throwing it out the window for a moment, but I don't. Instead I text Carrick to get the word out to the Nashville shades that Gregor's on his way back to their turf. They all want him dead as much as I do, and of all the not-me people who could possibly get to him first, they're the ones I wouldn't begrudge the opportunity.

"Remember what we were talking about before that jeeling showed up in our doorway, Evis?" I say. "How I said I'm always afraid?"

He looks at me and nods, but doesn't speak.

"Every second of every day, I'm afraid. I'm afraid the demons are going to take over the world. I'm afraid they're going to kill me, and that it's going to hurt. I'm afraid before they do, I'll have to watch you and everyone I love die like Udo and Rade and Thom and Sez. I'm afraid something will eat my fucking bunny before I can get back to see her. I'm afraid I'll never see Mira or Carrick or Jax or Mason or Ripper or Miles again. I'm afraid Gregor will take down the Summit and watch us all get folded into a hells-hole forever." I'm not crying. There are no tears in my eyes, just the burning sandiness of exhaustion and a weariness that feels coded into my DNA. "But here's the thing, brother. Being brave is never about not being afraid. It's about knowing you always have a choice and doing the thing you know is right, even if it hurts. Even if it's scary. Even if you think you might fall."

We pass under a light on the freeway, and I see a glistening tear track on his cheek.

"You saved my life tonight," I say to him.

We keep driving until sunup, until the still-grey sky lightens with dawn but does not part to show us its golden rays. It's only then that we pull into a rest stop, roll clothes up in the windows, lock the car, and sleep.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Mira almost knocks me over when she sees me, throwing her arms around my neck and hugging me tighter than I think any of the shades could manage. It's just past seven in the morning. The cabin is shrouded in fog, I'm surrounded by monsters, I might be one myself, and even though this has all the trappings of a horror movie, I'm home. I fight back the tears that try to jostle over the edges of my eyelids and breathe in the familiar vanilla scent of Mira's hair.
 

"Fucking missed you," she says.
 

"I missed you." I hold onto her tighter, aware of Carrick and the others exchanging greetings and murmurs around us. "From here on out, we take care of this shit together."

We both know that might not be possible, because she still has a limit on her territory that we don't know how long will last, but for once I take a tiny bit of comfort in that maybe-lie.

Carrick and Jax and Saturn and Miles all crowd around me. Carrick is beaming. Much as I'd like to think he's just grinning like that because he's happy to see me, I think there's more to it than that.