Firewall (Magic Born) (9 page)

“Oh, shut up.”

He laughed as he carried the sandwich and plate around the bar, sidling up next to her in the small space. “It was worth it. Damn, it was worth it.”

Tuyet gathered the robe closed over her front and turned to face him, leaning her hip against the counter. “Did you get in trouble?”

“I’ll have to face a disciplinary hearing when we get back. The major made it clear how the mission goes will impact how the hearing goes. I didn’t work my ass off to get here just to lose it after only six months.” He made a pained sound. “My biggest punishment so far is that I have to keep Channing on the team.”

That was punishment for more than just Hayes. Tuyet put thoughts of Channing away and focused on the immediate issue. “So will I be working with Halif, or did they give you a temporary replacement?”

“Halif will be working support while Gibson coordinates the op.”

“A replacement, then?”

Hayes withdrew a bracelet from his pocket, the match to the one Gibson had given her earlier. “Mrs. Jones, meet Mr. Jones.”

Relief, anger, trepidation and a dozen other emotions warred in her at once. “No.”

“Yes.”

“You might as well just confirm the worst of what everyone thinks of us.” Not to mention treat her like a piece of property, something he’d won in a fight. Because that’s exactly what she was now.

“You can’t let that crap matter to you. Look, this is for the best and you know it. Channing would have blown this op with his behavior toward you. You and I will be able to work together. We can do this. Bring in our target is all we need to do to shut people up.”

For the first time she gave serious thought to his side of things. The youngest team leader in the Rangers, unabashed in his fondness for both of his witch team members, beyond reproach in his treatment of her—he might have favored her at times, but he never expected anything in exchange. Never harassed her like some of the men, did his best to keep Channing and others like him from treating her like a plaything instead of a person. She hated to admit it, but he was right about breaking Channing’s arm. That simple, brutal act would go a long way toward curbing the worst of the harassment.

But it would also make Hayes look like a man being led around by his dick. Successfully executing this mission would mean as much, perhaps more, to his reputation than to hers. They both needed a win.

No matter how much she’d learned—of polite society and political correctness, art and music and literature, how to pass herself off as nearly anyone, how to defend herself expertly—a part of her would always be that scared, powerless little girl she’d been in Gehenna. She didn’t want to feel this tangle of warmth and safety and a strange sort of feminine satisfaction over a man doing violence on her behalf. But there it was, bubbling up from the deepest parts of her, the dark places she preferred to forget existed. A primal desire to curl herself around him, accept his warmth and his violence and the proprietary instinct she suspected he wasn’t even aware of. Accept him because he accepted and desired her.

That wasn’t an option.

“Then we’ll bring in our target.” It was that heated darkness that made her meet his eyes. “Mr. Jones.”

His lips parted and he took half a step closer. He started to speak and swallowed the words instead. Awareness sizzled between them, crackling like magic at her fingertips. She wouldn’t ask, and he wouldn’t admit to it, but she knew he could feel it. The heat and the darkness from deep down, pulling at them both.

Then the spell was broken and he stepped back. “Good night, Mrs. Jones.” He backed out of the apartment as if loath to break eye contact until he had no choice.

The door closed behind him. Tuyet gestured at the wall panel, setting the locks and lowering the lights. Just hours ago she’d worried about having to fight Channing to keep him away from her. Now she was more concerned about keeping herself away from Hayes.

Chapter Ten

2067

Hayes dropped his phone on the bed, twitchy from lingering distaste. It had been easy to lie to Colonel Talbot, much easier than Hayes expected. His conscience was clear too, untouched by even a bit of disloyalty. The distaste came from having to deal with Talbot at all, the smug superiority in the older man, the expectation of blind obedience.

Blind obedience wasn’t something Hayes could do anymore.

He paced the small hotel room, feeling confined by more than its walls. Tuyet had been gone when he woke, but she’d left him a stale energy bar and crumpled bills with a note that read
coffee’s on me
in her careful handwriting. All of her belongings were still in the apartment, which meant she’d elected to trust him at least somewhat. He didn’t take that lightly, but he still had no idea how to keep them both out of trouble. Bring her in and he’d get his dream career back. Let her go again and he’d lose what little he had left. Lousy choices, and the longer he took to make a decision, the harder it would be to carry out, no matter what it was.

Hayes found himself facing a question he’d been avoiding for the past three years: What did he really want?

He still didn’t know the answer to that. Another big question was what did Tuyet want? Three years was a long time. It wasn’t fair to assume she still felt the same way about him. Just because she’d wanted him to run away with her then didn’t mean she still wanted him now. He hadn’t even worked up the nerve to ask if there was someone in her life, though the lack of signs of a male presence in her apartment was a pretty good indicator.

She hadn’t asked him that question either, so maybe she didn’t care.

He checked his phone for messages, finding none. In a password-protected section of the device, he had something that would have gotten him court-martialed if anyone had found it years ago. It was the only picture he had of Tuyet, probably the only one that had survived the virus she used to destroy her records before fleeing the Rangers. They stood together on a beach in Thailand, bodies angled toward each other but not touching. Looking at each other rather than the camera, smiling. Halif had taken the photo after borrowing Hayes’s phone on some trumped-up excuse, leaving it for Hayes to find later.

Hayes stared at the image now. Tuyet was made of gold in the unearthly sunlight. Caught in a carefree moment, she looked happy too. Hayes had to laugh at himself; he looked worshipful. Halif had captured them perfectly. Tuyet was a goddess and Hayes her adoring supplicant.

Feeling useless and stupid, he left the hotel and made his way to Rockenbach. The streets were much calmer this afternoon. Crowds of people went about their business relatively free of tension. Few cops were in evidence, a fact that probably contributed to the lighter mood. Hayes wasn’t far from his destination when something caught his eye. He paused in the middle of the sidewalk, peering through the glare of the bright sunlight at an arcade across the street.

Tuyet had entered the place several times during his surveillance. It had no apparent name. The only signage that caught his eye advertised a game called Silver Wheels. Hayes hadn’t heard of it, which meant nothing as he hadn’t gamed much in years. What got his attention was the game’s logo: a black V10 Panther Ultrabike with a black-clad rider wearing a mirrorball helmet.

Just like the spelled image that had careened through Rockenbach shortly before the protest march began, and then later drawn police away from Tuyet’s location.

Also just like the bike that had been his pride and joy, and the helmet worn by the only other person he’d trusted to ride it—Halif Osman.

Hayes jogged across the street. There was no line to get in, so he purchased a ticket for an open console and entered, squinting at the abrupt darkness. Deeper inside, neon and LED lights gave the space a flashy glow. Sounds from different games competed, underscored by the insistent rhythm of trance music. He found a console as far away from a speaker as he could and tapped the touch screen to select the game.

He was out of practice with this kind of thing, and he’d never been great at it to start with. Halif and Tuyet used to play all the time. They’d never admitted it, but he’d suspected they took their game play into cyberspace by trancehacking.

To start with, he did some simple missions designed for learning the game and its world. It was easy to see why it had been co-opted by protesters. The game was set in a futuristic dystopia. Silver Wheels was the anonymous champion of hacktivists and free-information advocates. There was no magic in this world, but Hayes could see the metaphors clearly. If the game ever achieved more than cult status or if New Corinth authorities figured out where the character used in the protests came from, it would likely be banned or forced out of circulation through corporate maneuvering.

He crashed three times before giving up. Other than symbolism, he could see no immediate connection to the protests. Even so, it bothered him. He didn’t believe in coincidence, but there was no other explanation for that particular bike and helmet combination. Not unless Tuyet had taken up game design and was spending the money on something other than a nice place to live.

The heavy smell of old cooking grease coated the air in front of her building thanks to a food cart out front. Hayes stepped around a group of kids loitering on the step, briefly wondering when he’d started thinking of people in their late teens and early twenties as kids. One of the bigger boys eyed him in challenge. Hayes ignored him and opened the door. If she wasn’t home, he would sit in the hall and wait.

Every stair on the way up creaked. Sounds from televisions leaked easily through the walls, as did conversations, fights. He’d grown up in a small outpost rather than a big city, but he knew more than he wanted to know about close-quarters living, the sounds and smells of poverty, the hopelessness that lurked under the bravado of those kids on the front step. He might have been one of those kids, except for whatever it was inside that pushed him past the boundaries his birth should have forced him to accept. He’d always wanted more and he’d damned sure gotten it.

That old, familiar itch was tormenting him again. He missed the life he’d left home for, the action, the danger, the spice. His world had expanded when he ran away, then even more when he joined the military. But the best, most exciting time of his life had been the four years he’d spent as a Magic Ranger team leader. He could pretend all he wanted that Tuyet’s part in that had been just a coincidence of fate, both of them being assigned to the same team by faceless bureaucrats. That was far from the truth though.

Soft music emanated from her apartment. He listened for a moment before knocking. “It’s me, Snow.”

The door flew open faster than he expected. Tuyet glared up at him. “Why do you insist on calling me that?”

A pleasant warmth that had nothing to do with the late-summer heat wave spread through him. “Why do you insist on pretending you don’t like it?”

She had no snappy answer to that. “What do you want?”

If he only knew. “That’s a loaded question. Come on, don’t make me stand in the hall.”

A flush darkened her cheeks to a rosy gold. “Fine, whatever.” She backed away to let him walk through the door then closed it behind him.

The sound dock now sat on a small low table in the center of the room. It was flanked by two carved figures and a single lit candle. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were, uh, doing your church thing.”

“You know it’s not church,” Tuyet said kindly. “It’s okay, I was pretty much done.” She sat on the floor and blew out the candle, then packed away the figures in a small wooden box that went under the table.

Hayes sat opposite her, against the wall. “Do you still talk to the same spirit guides? The Enchantress of Numbers and the Madman of the Wires. I always liked those names.”

“Me too. I always thought it was strange that people outside Gehenna used the same names, the same guides. I guess even before trancehacking started to become more common, Magic Born were communicating somehow.”

He drew up his legs and rested his arms on his knees. “Ada Lovelace, the Enchantress of Numbers. The first computer programmer and daughter of Lord Byron. Do you still have that book of his poetry I gave you?” Tuyet’s quiet spirituality fascinated him. For some reason he liked it that she’d held on to it after all this time. Another thing he liked was the friendly ease with which she spoke to him now. It was unexpected, and reminded him of late nights spent talking with her about everything and nothing. He’d missed that, and the realization pierced him with a sudden lancing pain.

But he did kind of regret asking about that book. Now it was his turn to blush, feeling like a love-starved teenager.

Tuyet indicated the duffel next to the twin bed. “I keep it in my getaway bag.”

Well.
Well
. Hayes cleared his throat. Nervous laughter escaped. He ruffled his hair just to have something to do with his hands. “So. What do you say we skip the part where I hit on you and you pretend you don’t like it, and just—” The words dried up in his throat. Three years he’d waited for this moment. No, seven.

“Just what?” The husky quality of her voice sent shivers to all the right places.

“I’m open to suggestions.” He gave her his best smile, the one that earned him attention from beautiful women on a regular basis. He’d wielded that smile on her countless times and it had never worked.

Tuyet watched him for a long moment. The weight of her eyes raking over his body had him fighting the urge to squirm. Those eyes were lit up with amber sparks. Heat. Unmistakable desire. But she stayed where she was, because she would never act on it. Not after he’d turned her down on the stupidest night of his life. In all the time they’d worked together, he’d respected the secrets she’d shared with him, her need for distance, her pathological reluctance to admit her feelings. Then the one time she’d let her guard down, he’d blown it.

He didn’t want to blow it again. The clarity of that undeniable truth hit him square in the middle of all his confusion. It shone a light on things he’d kept in the dark for far too long.

“Snow.”

“Yes?”

He tapped his index finger on the floor at his side. “Come here.”

It was a risky gamble, skirting that close to an order. He’d tasted the bad side of her temper plenty of times, and his own blood when she took it out on him in training sessions. His face still bore tender spots from her punching him in greeting upon their reunion. Plus there was what she could do to him with magic. He was hoping that thoughts of all the sweet, delicious things he could do to her would sway her decision.

In a sinuous motion that made his pulse pound, Tuyet moved to all fours. Slowly, painfully slowly, she crawled to his side. Never breaking eye contact. She raised her left leg over his knees and settled on his lap, resting her arms on his shoulders and linking her hands behind his head. There was no hiding his arousal, especially when she pressed herself against it, all welcoming heat and softness.

She dipped her head close to his ear and whispered. “I guess I didn’t quite do what I was told, did I?”

Enough of his brain was still working that he recognized the warning in her tone. He shut his eyes and tried to think of something, anything, that would quell his raging hard-on. “I like it when you think out of the box.”

Tuyet gripped his hair and yanked his head back. He stifled a groan, and damn if his hard-on didn’t get worse. She said, “Don’t play with me, Dale.”

Grinning, he rested his hands lightly on her hips. “I think you’re the one that’s playing right now.”

“You’re right.” She nipped his Adam’s apple with her teeth, the brief, sharp taste of pain sending darts of electricity straight to his cock and eliciting a ragged sound he didn’t bother trying to suppress this time. “Sadly for you, I don’t have time for more.”

In a flash she was out of his lap and across the room, shrugging into a lightweight jacket. Both his brain and other, lower parts of his anatomy had whiplash. “You did that on purpose, you heartless tease.” But there was no anger in his voice, just frustrated laughter.

She curved her lips into a smile just as torturous as her earlier actions. “You walked right into it.” Snapping her fingers, she strode to the door. “I have a meeting, so you’re going to have to come back later.”

Hayes stayed right where he was. “We can’t leave things the way they are. We have to figure out what to do.”

“You’re not taking me in. We both know that, so let’s stop pretending.”

“Talbot’s getting impatient. We need to find a way out of this for both of us.”

“Tell him you can’t find me. Tell him I left the city. The country, even.”

That was a decent possibility, if he could make it believable. “He’ll want proof.”

“How about a postcard?”

“I’m serious. Look, you want to keep your freedom. I want...” He paused, not sure what he wanted or how to articulate it. “I want out from behind a desk. There’s got to be a way we can both get what we want.”

She narrowed her eyes. “He said he’d get you off a desk if you brought me in.”

“We can figure this out if we work together. We were always good at that, working together. We made a good team.”

Tuyet checked the time on her phone. “I don’t want to be late. We’ll finish this later.”

He shot to his feet and waved his index finger. “Nope. Not happening. You don’t get to blow me off, Tuyet. This is serious business.”

“Keep trying to give me orders and see what it gets you.”

“Damn it, this isn’t about giving orders. It’s not safe for you here.”

“I’m a Magic Born living under a fake Normal ID. It’s not safe for me anywhere. Can we please talk about this later?”

“How long’s it going to take?”

She crossed her arms across her chest and refused to answer.

So that was how she wanted to play it, doling out her trust in small bites. Okay then. He shoved his hands in his pockets and shrugged. “Fine. You feel like telling me something, just give me a call. I’ll be at my hotel, watching TV and drinking the minibar dry.”