A Memory in the Black (The New Aeneid Cycle) (17 page)

"You've got a gun on me, don't you?" Michael
asked without turning to look.

Smart
, Diomedes thought. "Yes. Now answer the question."

Michael
pitched an irritated sigh. "Let's see, why shouldn't you kill us? First of all, we're not here to kill
you
. I wasn't lying about that. Not that I'd guess that'd stop you, would it?"

The kid's companion'
s hands gripped tighter on the wheel. "Uh, Michael?"

"Who's he?" Diomedes asked.

"Um—" began the driver.

"I asked
him.
"

"This is Marc," Michael told him.
"You met him before, if you remember. He helped us find Gideon?"

Gideon!
"What do you know about Gideon?"

"What?
Nothing!" Michael sounded confused at the question. It was impossible to tell if it was genuine.

A lie.
He knows something.

Michael's never lied to you.
You've known him too long to kill him like this. You're in control now. You can afford to hear him out.

"Nothing?" Diomedes pressed.

"No more than when you—" Michael stopped to face him. "Well, no more than when you shot him, really." Again Michael seemed in earnest. He'd always been naïve. "Why?"

"Because I asked.
Who told you where to find me?"

"Are you going to hold the gun on me for the whole conversation?"

"You want me to put it on Marc instead?" he shifted his aim.

The kid shook his head.
"No, you can leave it on me if it makes you feel better. But we won't try anything, I'm telling you."

"Ah, I'd really feel better if you just put that away completely," Marc said.

"Just shut up and keep driving." He turned the gun back on Michael. "Gun's back on you. Now how'd you find me? Who tipped you?"

"Okay.
Fine. Either you'll shoot me or you won't. You're faster than me either way."

"Brave of you," Diomedes grunted.
"Stupid, too." The kid should know better than to pass up a chance to get a gun off of him. Yet Michael wasn't intimidated either. Even as that frustrated him, Diomedes had to admire it. He wouldn't have gotten intimidated either.

"Yeah, well, I'm glad you approv
e," Michael grumbled. Sarcasm.

"Whatever.
Who
tipped you?"

"You tipped us.
A long time ago. You took me here. You were using it for storage, you told me Silas used to live there."

Diomedes remembered.
He had shown him.
You shouldn't have trusted Michael then. Came back to bite you again, didn't it?

Maybe, maybe not.

"You remember Silas, then," Diomedes said.

The kid took his time speaking next.
"It took me a while to think of that place. We got lucky finding it. But yeah. You were always talking about him. Back on the farm, the stories you'd tell. Do you remember that?"

The farm.

Is there anyone left that you've known as long as Michael? Have you forgotten?

He'd told the kid about Silas.
Back when there were stories he wanted to tell. "But you never met him," Diomedes said. It wasn't a question. Michael had found him again in Northgate after. . . everything else.

"Nope," the kid answered,
and then turned to face forward. "But you did tell me he'd lived there."

"Shouldn't have.
You led those two to me."

"I didn't mean to."

"Meant to or not, you screwed up!"

Michael spun around so fast that Diomedes nearly fired.
"Look, I didn't put the damned bounty on your head, so don't get—" He stopped suddenly, just watching.

Diomedes stared back at him for a time before going on.
"You find out about the bounty before or after you came looking?"
Dumb question. That's why they're here, don't fool yourself.

"Before," Michael admitted.
See?
"But we're not here to collect, I told you."

"Then you're looking to sell me out."

"I'm not telling anyone where you are," Michael insisted. "I don't know just how much you saw back there, but if we'd wanted to sell you out we threw a great opportunity!"

"Maybe."
He didn't bother to disguise his skepticism. "Maybe it's a set-up. You turned on me. Didn't want anything to do with me after all I'd taught you, given you. Then there's a price on my head and you just turn up. So why
are
you here? Tell me. Something that doesn't make you a liar."

Michael swallowed and glanced to the driver.
If he doesn't say anything, you'll know he's playing you.
Outside, buildings were getting fewer and fewer. Davis Avenue became Highway 17 as it left Northgate. More isolated, fewer witnesses. Plenty of spots to dump a body or two.

You're running out of bridges to burn.

"Because we think the same people who hired you are after us," Michael said finally.

Marc shot a look to Michael
and tried badly to cover it. The kid had let something slip. Diomedes stared Michael down. It had always made the kid talk a little more. This time he just turned away. Again, brave.

"Then why come to me?"
Diomedes asked. "Same people as hired me are after you, maybe I'd just kill you for them. You're being stupid, coming here."

Michael continued to watch the road.
"You're in hiding. You're alone. If they cared about you at this point, I'd guess they wouldn't have hung you out to dry, right?"

"Oh, you just think you know it all."

"Am I wrong?"

"My gun, my questions. Who's after you?"

Michael shook his head. "Well, if we knew that we wouldn't have tried to find you. Who hired you?"

"That's crap.
You don't know who they are but they're the same as who hired me? That's crap, kid." An exit was on the road ahead, leading into the dark. "Take that turn." Marc had the sense to do as he was told.

"Diomedes," Michael said, "we've got suspicions.
That's all."

Diomedes glared
. Suspicions? "Fine. Who do you
suspect
is after you?"

Even in the fading light he could see the kid was sweating.
"You're the one who always tried to teach me not to give away what I know for free. I
was
paying attention to you then, you know."

"
Should've taught you not to pull a gun on me in the middle of a stand-off!"
Damn right!
"Or have you changed your mind about that?"

Michael didn't
answer.

"You don't trust me," Diomedes told him.
That was it, then.

He
doesn't
trust you. You can't even think of trusting
him!
He doesn't really want your help. It has to be a trick, you know it is.

We're almost there
.

They were almost there.
Soon the road would turn along a high embankment covered in scrub brush. It would be over then. Yet even as he thought it, he could feel the tug of the little whisper preparing to delay him.

Michael needs your help.
You need his. He doesn't have to trust you to ask for help. You've worked with people you didn't like before; you didn't trust Felix Hiatt but you asked for his help finding Fagles.

Which got y
ou nowhere! Hiatt wouldn't help you, you found Fagles yourself! You don't need help from anyone!

The vo
ices went off to argue, and he was on his own again.

The road slipped on beneath them until Michael broke the silence.
"I used to trust you, you know." He turned back around. "On the farm, you were the one who looked out for me. When I came here, you protected me, helped me adjust to the city."

"You wouldn't
shut up about it until I did. You talked me into it."

"Maybe you let yourself be talked into it."

"Maybe that was a mistake!"

Yes, sentiment. You thought someone from your past would shield you from more change?
Look where it got you!

Michael turned away again
—pouting, Diomedes thought, like a weakling. "Well, maybe it was, then," Michael said. "But maybe you just had some loyalty to the past. Yeah, I used to trust you. Because you used to seem to give a crap."

Diomedes was no longer looking at him, watching instead the yellow lines on the road.
"Whatever."

"Yeah, maybe you never cared," Michael said.
"I don't know why you helped me. Maybe everything I saw in you really was a lie."

"I don't care what you think," Diomedes muttered. Even as he did so, he couldn't help but recall the words she'd said that echoed Michael's, and the memory of another night
, years past, forced its way into his mind.

He watches her tear the wrapping paper, enjoying the sight of her delicate hands breaking through ribbon and tape to get at the box inside. "Happy birthday, Janette," he tells her.

She stops long enough to smile at him with a delight
that no one has ever quite shined on him before her. "Thank you, Malcolm."

He returns her smile, feeling foolish for it and yet not caring.
There's no one there to see it but her. "You don't even know what it is yet."

"I told you, sweetie, it doesn't matter what it is.
You remembered, and I'm thrilled."

"Hard not to remember." He grins. "You
gave hints for a month."

"Well, we've only been together nine months, it's not fai
r not to give you hints. Nudges. Brilliant neon signs." She giggles with a wink.

"Open it anyway.
You'll like it."

She smiles again in that way that makes him surprised that she's his, and opens the box.
"Oh, my god."

He smiles as she lifts the necklace.
"Those are real diamonds."

"Oh, my god," she repeats.
"It's beautiful! But how did you. . .?"

"
. . . afford it on a security guard's salary? Saved. Shopped. Came into some money."

"That wasn't what I
—" She takes her blue eyes off of the necklace as worry begins to fill them. "Came into some money?"

"Uh huh."

"Malcolm, came into some money how?"

"Does it matter?"

"Yes, it matters. How?"

"Janette, just try it on."

Her smile is gone completely, her face hardened. "Did you get this from your brother? Did you
steal
this with your brother?"

He stands and snatches up the box but manages not to throw it across the room
. "I told you it doesn't matter! Would you just put it on?"

"I don't want to put it on! Malcolm, you told me you were done with that!"

"
Two
times, Janette! Just two times, and you go all frantic!"

"I don't care
! You said you were going to stop!"

"Come on, it was just a little—"

"I won't be with a thief!"

"And how the h
ell else am I supposed to do it?" he yells. "You're dropping hints all over! What am I supposed to do?"

"Not for this!" she shakes the necklace at him through starting tears.
"Not for something stolen! A rose, a card, just something from
you
! I grew up with money, I don't need that from you!"

He reels on her.
"Because I can't afford it, right? Because you know I can't possibly be worth that much!"

"That's not what I mean!" She drops the necklace to the floor.

"You pick that up!" he roars, doing it for her.

She glares through tear
s as she takes a step back from him. "I never cared about how much you made, Malcolm—or how much you could give me. I loved you! Because you were good to me, because you were different! And because you cared more about living life than making money! But it was just an illusion, wasn't it? You're turning into your brother." She swallows. "Everything I saw in you was a lie."

"Janette," he starts,
one fist clenched around the necklace. "I did this for you."

She turns away. "You won't stop stealing
, and you lied about it again! I can't trust you, can I?"

"Dam
n it, don't turn your back on me!" He wrenches her around before he can think about it.