The Color of Courage (20 page)

“So what changed?” Kirby asked.

I blushed. “Uh, well, I slept with Evan. That didn’t make Adam happy.”

“You
told
him?”

“I had to. We were talking about the possibility of a mole, and I thought all along that Evan was using me to get to Summer or HQ or both.”

“Never.” Summer shook her head so hard her hair hit me in the face. “Evan would never in a million years sleep with a woman for work. Not even to save thousands of people.” She rubbed my back. “If he slept with you, he meant it.”

I sighed. “Thanks, that makes this so much easier.” The truth was, the guys themselves were making it easier. Evan was pursuing me. Adam was backing away and letting him. Sadness washed over me, but I didn’t have time to think about it further. The men came trooping back in, Trace in the lead.

“Cool!” He rubbed his hands together. “Just like old times.”

“Not exactly.” Adam came around Trace and took position next to the desk, his arms folded, his feet braced. I realized his casts were off completely. Everyone circled him, and once again he was in charge. But there was a difference. I barely listened as he explained what he’d been doing with Charles and his vast informational resources while I tried to figure out what was so different now from hundreds of other HQ pow-wows. I studied his face, and it hit me.

He was no longer just a leader of heroes. He was a hero himself.

“We have a target.”

My attention snapped into focus as “where?” chorused around the room.

“Lincoln Memorial.” He shifted toward me a little. “We decoded that part of the message board correctly.”

“When?”

“How?”

Bit by bit, the details came together. Charles had enlisted a cryptologist who worked for one of his companies to review what we had collected off the Internet. Using what we already knew and the little we’d figured out before we were all arrested, he decoded the rest of the communications.

There was going to be an educational ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial in two days, relating to the Atlanta Campaign during the Civil War. Summer camps from all over the region would be attending, which meant lots and lots of kids. CASE’s exact plans weren’t laid out, but we surmised they would make a small disturbance to draw us there, then spring a trap that would either kill us all, or lead to us killing children. Either way, DC’s legion of superheroes would be vanquished.

Adam had talked to the police, who talked the organizers into moving the event. Buses would be redirected to the other end of the Mall. We couldn’t publicly cancel it, just as we couldn’t send in teams of bomb-sniffing dogs and electronics surveillance. It would drive CASE back underground to come up with a different plan, of which we would have no inkling.

“It would be much easier,” I mused, “if we could take out the players before then. I don’t suppose they decoded any of the names?”

Adam shook his head. “They’re posting from public computers with temporary screen names. It would take too long to work backwards to positive identifications.”

“Don’t you have anything on them?” Summer asked her brother. They were sitting shoulder to shoulder, so I assumed she’d forgiven him.

“Unfortunately, no. They’ve got a high-level backer, as far as we can tell. Someone with money and the ability to erase trails. We have traced some connections to disposables, people like Scarengio and Paselteur. But players that low don’t know anything beyond the scope of their particular assignments. They don’t know who recruits them or does the planning or anything of value.”

“And if they did, they’d wind up dead, anyway.” I thought of Gino, a man I’d helped save, but who’d been lost as soon as he agreed to start.

“So we have to concentrate on stopping them at the scene,” Trace concluded.

Adam and Evan both nodded. The computer in front of Kirby beeped. I leaned to see the screen as she woke the monitor. We had mail. A lot of it.

Adam came around the desk and leaned over me, one hand on the back of my chair like nothing had happened between us. He was as casual as he’d ever been, and my heart ached at the thought that he’d given up on me.

He nodded, looking pleased. “Charles came through. Kirby, can you print those out? We don’t have much time.”

She nodded and started clicking away. I grabbed the pages off the printer to sort, foreboding growing as I read snatches of information. We were taking the battle to CASE. They wouldn’t expect us to know what they were going to do. We weren’t simply reacting anymore. But there was one thing that kept reverberating in my head.

No matter what we did to prepare for it, it was still a trap.

We spent the rest of the day and late into the night preparing. Equipment and gear arrived by the hour. New suits came in, and the guys spent as much time
oohing
and
ahhing
over them as the women did. They were black this time, more form-fitting though not tight, and very supple where our old suits had been stiffer. Summer put hers on immediately and moved around the room using her speed. Papers reshuffled, tools flipped in midair, knives flew around our heads with speed and precision I knew exceeded her usual.

She stopped in the center of the room, beaming. “It’s like fighting naked.”

“Not even close!” Trace held up two of the new flexi-shields, which were clear. “All of this is graded to stop armor-piercing ammo. It’s flame repellant, blade resistant, and even a friggin’ mosquito can’t get between the fibers.”

Evan surveyed the mass of fabric spread over boxes and chairs. “You’ve got extra.”

“No we don’t.” Adam tossed him a shirt. “One’s for you.”

“I’m not—”

“You’re on the team. You don’t have to have superpowers to need a suit.”

Evan studied him, the shirt in his hand. I didn’t tune in, tempted as I was to read him. The relationship between my two men was getting too complicated even for me.

“Thanks.”

Adam nodded. Evan set his suit aside and helped Trace open a box of electronic defusers that we could use to jam radio signals between detonators and explosives.

Around two in the morning, when the bar downstairs had emptied, Evan and Kirby split us up to drive home. We figured the reporters would have moved on, and they had. Evan pulled up at the deserted sidewalk in front of my building and turned off the car.

Trace, who hadn’t had time to move out yet, opened his door and leaned forward to murmur in my ear. “You need a minute?”

I nodded, and he thanked Evan for the ride and headed upstairs. I wrapped my fingers around the door handle, hesitated, and then opened it. I didn’t want to leave him, but I didn’t know what to say to him, either.

“Wait.” He didn’t touch me, but I felt his hand all the same. I released the door and shifted so I faced him. He kept his head tilted down, looking toward my feet.

“What?” I prodded when he didn’t speak. Maybe he didn’t know what to say, either.

“Adam’s a good man.” He finally moved, lifting his head to look at me and resting his hand along the seat back so he could fiddle with my hair.

“Yes, he is.” I waited. “Is that all you have to say?”

He wrapped his fingers in strands of my hair. “I want it to be all. You deserve him. And he loves you.”

I snorted. His hand came closer to my scalp. “You don’t know what I deserve, or how Adam feels. You just got here.”

“Daley—” He shook his head, looking exasperated. “Time has nothing to do with knowing someone. I’m trained to study people, to learn a lot about them in a little bit of time. I’ve done that here. And from the minute you stepped in to protect my sister from me, I’ve wanted you. I should let it go.” His voice softened, and he leaned toward me slightly. “I should let the better man have you.”

“He doesn’t want me,” I said before I thought.

“The hell he doesn’t. He wants you so bad he won’t fight for you. He thinks he’s being noble. But”—he came even closer, reeling me forward with his fist in my hair—“it will just make him”—he pressed a kiss on me, backed away—“the loser.” Then he took my mouth, his tongue plunging in. Given what he’d just said it should have felt like possession. But it didn’t. It only felt like desire. Evan was a man using all his skill to get what he wanted. I knew that. But beyond the intellectual analysis, I also knew his feelings were real, and deeper than I would have believed.

I met him halfway, my tongue tangling with his and my own need panting in my breath as the kiss broke and slammed together again. Evan wrapped his other arm around me and hauled me onto his lap so we could be closer, hip against hip and chest to chest. The hand in my hair held me in place, but the truth was, I wouldn’t have pulled away.

Except for Trace. Apparently, he’d really meant “a minute.” The driver’s door opened and he tapped me on the shoulder.

“Daley.”

Hearing was my one sense not enhanced by Evan’s kiss. I didn’t move until he repeated my name and Evan released me, unwinding his hand to set me free.

“You need a good night’s sleep,” he murmured.

I nodded, grabbed my bag from the floor on the passenger side, and reached for Trace’s hand to balance as I backed out of the car.

“Thanks for the ride home,” I told Evan, and stepped back so he could drive away. I glared at Trace, then stalked across the sidewalk to the front door.

He followed me up the stairs, not talking until we got inside. Even after the door closed and was locked, he waited, probably expecting me to blast him.

“I got worried,” he offered just as I was about to slam the bathroom door behind me. I halted it halfway. He was sitting on the arm of the couch, looking miserable.

“About what? You don’t think Evan’s on our side?”

“I don’t know about what. I just didn’t think you’d be so long.”

I didn’t buy it. “You knew what was happening, and you didn’t want it to. Otherwise, you’d have come back upstairs when you saw us.”

“Daley, Adam’s my best friend.”

I opened the door fully and came out into the living area. “I know, Trace, and he’s one of mine, too. I’m not trying to hurt him.”

“But you are.”

“And it goes both ways!” I threw up my hands. “He says he feels something for me, but then tells me to forget it. But can I get involved with someone else? No! That will enrage him so much he’ll give me the best kiss of my life! I swear, if Summer hadn’t come in . . .” I stopped, shocked at what I was about to confess. To the man who’d take it straight back to Adam, no less.

“You know he’s only holding back to protect you.”

I rolled my eyes and leaned against the wall. “What else is new? He protects all of us.”

“Not like this. He’s seen the way your empathy connects you to everyone around you, and instead of closing off, backing away, you embrace it. You try harder to do more. It’s a rare thing, Daley, and the way you take care of him—he needs you. He’s fallen hard for you.”

I bit my lip, a little embarrassed by the praise and the knowledge that Adam had revealed all this to Trace.

“Can’t you give him some time?” he pleaded. “I know you care about him.”

“I love him.” It was that simple, and that complicated. “I’ve loved him for a long time, for everything he’s been for me and everyone else, and for who he is.” His strength, his compassion, and his need. “If Evan hadn’t come along, maybe it wouldn’t have been so hard. Maybe we would have drifted into a relationship. But even before that,” I pointed out, “he wasn’t exactly making a move.”

Trace’s jaw worked, as if he wanted to tell me things Adam wouldn’t want me to know. “Are you going to stay with Evan?”

“Who knows?” I shifted to lean against the back of the couch. It was late, after a bunch of exhausting days. “After this is all over, I don’t know where he’ll be assigned or anything. I don’t know what will happen to HQ.”

“Those are external factors.” He picked up my hand and turned to look at my face. “If you had to choose right now, today, who would it be?”

I could still taste Evan on my lips. His desire was a powerful aphrodisiac for both my body and my heart. But when I didn’t think too hard it was Adam’s face I saw. Adam, who had never wanted to want me.

Choose wrong, and I’d be just as alone as I’d been when this all started.

Chapter 18

“Pool’s clean.”
Click
.

“Nothing at the ’Nam Memorial.”
Click
.

“I’m heading to the World War II Memorial.”
Click
.

I tried to seem touristy as I walked the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and listened to my friends reporting in on the new coms we wore. We’d started at the periphery and worked inward, checking everything from trashcans to bushes and sewer covers. It was daunting. We couldn’t get into every cranny, and every time we cleared a location, I thought of all the hundreds of places we weren’t looking. Not that we even knew what we sought to begin with.

I’d started at the Washington Monument, which was fenced off and closed to tourists. Security was tight all around, and though the officers were aware of the potential incident, we didn’t want to risk getting stopped and questioned or even hauled away. So all of us were incognito, our suits hidden under regular clothes, trying to search while blending into the crowds around us.

I trailed my fingers under the lip of the stone wall surrounding the grassy area next to the Lincoln Memorial, and hesitated when they encountered wire. I stopped and dug a candy bar out of my pocket, unwrapping it, taking a bite while leaning casually against the wall, then bending to pick up the wrapper I’d “accidentally” dropped. In my one quick glance, I saw two wires fastened to the stone.

“Found something.” I described it and moved farther away from the front of the main building, tracing the cord until I was mostly hidden by trees on the side wall. We couldn’t take anything out of its place or risk alerting CASE, and we didn’t think explosives or other devices would be live this far in advance of the event. But that was all hypothesis, and not knowing what something was for, we couldn’t let it lie, either. I let a multi-tool drop from my sleeve to my hand and used the cutting blade to snip the wires by feel, holding my breath as I did so.

Nothing happened. I let my breath out slowly. “It’s cut.”

“Can you see where it leads?” Evan asked over the com.

I continued my circuit, moving faster and studying the wires more closely when I was under cover of the trees, more slowly and carefully when I was out in the open. I pretended to talk on my cell phone once, hoping anyone watching me would think I was waiting for someone who hadn’t shown up. I circled the entire building without finding a connection to anything else. The wires ended at the steps at either side.

“They must be planning to connect something later,” I reported. “They’ll know it’s cut if they test the circuit.” I’d been in the area too long and couldn’t risk taking the time to damage the wires further. If they saw me now, they had plenty of time to fix them before tomorrow.

“Not much we can do about that,” Adam came back. “We know it’s there, and the cuts should delay their plans. We can maybe close in when they’re trying to repair it or hook it up.”

We spent the rest of the day searching and surveilling. After an hour or two, on a rotating basis, we’d go back to the truck to take a break, get a drink, and change clothes. The same people hanging around too long would make security suspicious, especially since we weren’t regulars and had decided not to pretend to be homeless, as that would harm our credibility if it came down to needing help from the security forces.

A couple of times we spotted people we knew. Evan saw a couple of alphabet agents. Adam spoke to an off-duty Secret Service agent, and the cop who’d let us into the building at the jewelry heist helped me remove the lid of my water bottle when it didn’t want to turn. I thanked him and he moved on, whistling and listening to his buddy, who also had cop written all over him.

Adam was at the truck the next time I went back. “Are they here for the same reason we are?” I asked, shedding both my sweatshirt and the armor jacket I wore underneath. It was unseasonably cool, thanks to a hurricane off the coast, but the armor didn’t breathe, and I was dying. “Or are they watching us?”

Adam’s face didn’t betray a single thing as he watched me pull a fresh T-shirt over my sports bra. He handed me an apple before chugging his own water.

“Could be either.”

I sat on the tailgate of the truck and reviewed a satellite shot of the mall. My wires had been marked, as had an odd light inside the memorial and four spots where we expected to find explosives come tomorrow. All were marked subtly but definitely, and were premium placements around the front of the memorial.

“So, do we have any better idea of what’s going down tomorrow?”

Adam shook his head. “No, but I feel like we’re not looking at this right. We’re expecting a physical attack, but . . .” He shook his head. “I wish we’d worked harder on your projection.”

I couldn’t see how that would help and didn’t admit I’d done some on my own.

“At least you can help us find them.” He shifted toward me, as if he’d just had a thought. “Have you been checking?”

I hadn’t. I was as closed off as I’d been the day before, and I would have told him it was a normal reaction to being surrounded by hundreds of people and so many awed, raw, painful emotions. But that wouldn’t have been the full truth.

“Adam, I— I have a confession.” I looked down at the apple core I was spinning in my hands. “About the empath thing.”

“What about it?” He drained his bottle and dropped it into a bag hanging from a hook on the side of the hatch.

“I’m . . . having trouble.”

He leaned beside me and waited for me to elaborate. I explained about misreading Summer and Evan, haltingly because of the subject matter, because of the complication of Evan, and because I so hated to admit my fear of failing.

“Your reads have always been off when your own emotions are involved,” he responded, sounding dismissive.

I frowned at him. “No, not like this. I mean, yeah, I can’t read what people feel about
me
, but this was different.”

“Not really. You were protective of Summer and attracted to Evan.” His jaw flexed and he swallowed visibly. “It’s logical that it would throw off your assessment.”

“But—”

“Daley.” He swiveled so that he stood in front of me, and cupped my chin in one hand. “It’s one minor misread buried inside thousands of accurate ones. You’re okay.”

“No, I’m not!” I pushed his hand away and stood. “Don’t patronize me, Adam.”

“I wasn’t.” The tolerant patience he’d worn a minute ago disappeared. I could see it because it had been put on, not true emotion. “I never belittle you or what you can do.”

“You’re not taking my concern seriously, either.” I started to pace, small steps to stay close to the vehicle and not be overheard, though there wasn’t anyone visibly close. “How do we know all those other reads were accurate?”

He caught my arm. “Because we do. Daley, this is no time for a crisis of confidence.” He urged me to sit again. Pacing wasn’t helping, so I let him. “You’ve been doing this for sixteen years. I’ve never seen you go wrong. You have to let this go, because we’re going to need you at full strength tomorrow.”

I knew he was right, but it wasn’t that easy. He studied me, then lifted me to my feet and activated his com.

“Can you guys handle the rest of this?” A chorus of assents came back. “Good. Daley and I will be busy the rest of the day. Meet at HQ by seven tonight so we can do final planning.” He turned off the com and removed it from his ear. “Come on.”

I followed him around the side of the truck. He stowed his com in the case and held his hand out for mine.

“What are you doing?”

“You need to practice.” He grabbed my hand and tugged me behind him as he headed for the nearest Metro station. I followed willingly, but he didn’t let go as we went through the gates, boarded a train, and grabbed bars near the doors. The car wasn’t crowded, but we only had a couple of stops. Adam reached overhead and stood closer to me than necessary as I held a vertical pole. His position could have been intimidating or protective as he loomed over me, rocking against his grip on the bar above us, with the movement of the train. But I found it stimulating instead. My body tingled and loosened. I let the rhythm shift me so my shoulder would brush his chest.

Amazing me that I could be so aware of him, so drawn to him, mere hours after I’d felt similarly toward Evan. But no, I realized, breathing in Adam’s so-different scent. Not similar at all. I liked Evan, but what most attracted me was the obviousness of his feelings for me when no one else’s were, especially Adam’s.

Deep down, I knew that wasn’t enough. Like I’d told Trace, Evan’s job took him all over. I wanted someone in my life who’d be there when I needed him, and for whom I’d be available, as well. Evan was someone who gave all of himself without reservation, and I’d always wonder when he was going to give to someone else instead of me. With Adam, whose nobility and deliberation meant any choice was permanent, I’d always know.

Calm settled over me, and I was at peace for the first time since Ian dumped me.

The train lurched as it approached our stop. Caught off guard, I stumbled toward Adam. He put his free hand on my hip to steady me, and then held me where I was, flush against his body. I closed my eyes and just absorbed him until the train jerked to a stop and forces pulled us apart again. I met his usual patient inscrutability when I looked up. I opened my mouth, wanting to say something, to let him know what I’d just decided, but he turned away, taking my hand again and leading me out of the station. Once we were on flat ground and could walk side by side, he fell back.

“I thought we were going back to HQ,” I said. Adam was guiding me toward Dupont Circle, which buzzed with activity.

“There’s no one at HQ for you to practice on.” He picked a spot between shop fronts and looked around. “Lots of specimens here.”

“They’re not specimens, they’re people!” I subsided when I saw he’d been teasing me. “Anyway,” I grumbled, “I don’t think I should be pushing emotion on people.”

“It’s temporary and it won’t be negative emotion, so don’t worry. You’re not doing anything unethical.” He pointed subtly to a dreadlocked drummer whose instruments were overturned plastic barrels. “Read him.”

I resisted, but Adam didn’t push, just stood quietly next to me. I sighed and tuned in, holding my own taupeness but allowing myself to “see” all the emotions around me. It seeped in, instead of hitting me in a blast. My controls, at least, were solid.

I focused on the drummer. “He’s anxious. Nervous.”

“What kind of nervous?”

“Generalized. Like maybe he’s having financial problems.” Not a brilliant deduction, since he had an upside down porkpie hat on the ground in front of him. We were too far away to see if it had anything in it. “Not like he’s about to commit a crime.”

Adam pushed away from the wall and wandered down the street, pausing at the drummer to drop a few coins in the hat. The musician nodded his thanks. Adam nodded back and returned to my side.

“Not much collected yet.”

“Unless he’s already emptied the hat a few times.” Panhandling was big business, and unless you saw them drive in from the suburbs with their fancy cars, it was difficult to tell who was homeless or penniless and who was simply very good at begging. I was cynical, but not immune. I usually gave to those, like this guy, who were doing something to earn the money.

“What else do you see?”

I didn’t want to dig too deep, but I examined his aura for nuance and saw the joy the creation of music gave him. I described it to Adam, who nodded.

“See if you can push aside the anxiety and let the joy flow.”

“Sure, that sounds easy.”

“Just try it.”

This was different from what I’d done before. Adam wasn’t suggesting I project an external emotion onto him, but help him isolate his own. As I studied him, the colors fluctuated as his joy started to swell, but his anxiety regained dominance. Probably he was thinking too hard. I couldn’t affect that, but maybe I could suppress the anxiety. I imagined reaching out with invisible hands and was startled to see tendrils of green stretching away from my body. I guided them to his aura and swept them over the orange anxiety. It stuck like cobwebs to a broom and actually came away with the green when I pulled it back. The joy started to fill the newly empty space, and his music took on a new rhythm, a new exuberance. Pedestrians paused to listen, bouncing to the beat, and coins poured into the hat. He flashed a grin and drummed harder. Fifteen minutes later, the hat was full, his anxiety was completely gone, and he practically danced as he carried his gear toward the Metro.

The anxiety I’d taken off of him had disappeared on its own. Emotion wasn’t made from matter, despite its manifestation in a way I could see as well as feel. For a few minutes I’d been afraid it would remain with me, but luckily it hadn’t touched me at all.

“Excellent,” Adam murmured in my ear as the drummer disappeared from our view. “Couldn’t get better results than that, right? Now try her.”

I followed his gaze and saw a young woman walking slowly on the other side of the street. Her shoulders were hunched, her head bowed, and depression hung on her like a cloud.

“I don’t know, Adam. That’s pretty deep. Surely a physical cause . . .”

“Just make it a little easier to bear.”

I wanted to. I ached with the need to siphon some of her pain. “But what if it backfires? What if it helps just enough to make it worse when it comes back? I can’t fix the underlying cause. She could try—”
To commit suicide
. I couldn’t say the words, thinking of Gino Scarengio.

“Or she could seek help.” He turned my shoulders toward him. “Daley, psychiatrists face this dilemma every day. What can they do for someone that won’t do more harm than good? What could they have done differently to stop the person’s self-destruction? It doesn’t keep them from trying.”

Dammit, he was right. I turned back toward the woman and did the green-hands thing again. At first there was no effect. I couldn’t wipe the heavy, sticky depression away. But when I imagined a hose siphoning off the cloud, it lightened in color. The woman straightened her shoulders, stood straighter. Her step picked up, and she smiled at a dog that pranced in front of her, trying to get her attention.