Freaks in the City (22 page)

“Party would be mine. Knowing Nessa, she’s
hooked up with some guy and she’s out whipping him into a hormonal
frenzy as we speak.”

Jay scooped a very plain black top from the
bed and held it out. “These are hardly Nessa-style party clothes.
She was dressing to impress an employer, not a boy.”

“Ah, but she didn’t wear that, did she?” His
smugly-pleased-to-get-the-upper-hand expression faltered. “S’pose
you can tell me exactly what she
did
wear if I cared to ask,
right?”

“I could.” He was fortunate she wasn’t human
or she’d be hitting
him
with a smug smile right about
now.

“Okay. You win.”

Jay cocked her head, listening. “In
approximately thirty seconds we’ll know for sure.” She tossed the
top back on the bed, and then herded Tyler out the door and
downstairs.

Nessa shut the door behind her and flicked
the deadlock. When she turned and saw them both sitting on the
bottom stair her eyebrows rose to her hairline. “Gee. A welcoming
committee. What’d I do to deserve this?”

“How did the job interview go?” Jay
asked.

Nessa’s eyes rounded. “How did you
know?”

“Lucky guess.”

Nessa hugged the bag she was carrying. A
smile lit her face. “I got the job.”

“Which one? The up market café?”

“Yes!” The word burst from her as though she
was having to remind herself the job offer was true. “I got called
in to meet the staff and go through the ropes. I start tomorrow.
Afternoon shift.”

Jay summoned the kind of grin that was
appropriate in these circumstances. “That’s fantastic, Nessa. I
knew you could do it.”

“I couldn’t have done it without your
help—the clothes and the résumé and everything. I don’t know why
you even helped me after the way I’ve behaved but thank you for
giving me a chance.”

“Everyone deserves a second chance,” Jay
said. Instinct made her cast a sideways glance at Tyler. His
features were not stern, exactly. Brooding was a better
description. She wondered whether he was remembering back to the
time he’d given
her
a second chance.

He’d not wanted anything to do with her
after her shocking revelation that she was, in fact, a cyborg. Or
so she’d thought at the time. In reality he’d gotten over that,
only to be gutted anew by her plans to leave. Even so, he’d agreed
to be her date for the farewell party Caro had insisted Jay throw.
He’d given her a second chance. And when she’d blown it, even
though he’d been hurting and had every reason to be angry with her,
he’d put aside his own hurt to reveal how he really felt about her
through the heart-wrenching song he’d written for her.

She’d never have gotten through the
following months without the memory of that night to cling to. And
the hope she’d done enough to convince Caine she was dead so that
one day soon she might safely reveal herself to Tyler again.

“I get t-shirts, too,” Nessa was saying.
“See?” She held out her arms and did a twirl. “There’re two more in
the bag.”

“Nice,” Tyler said, which so far as Jay was
concerned was only the truth. The black t-shirt with the discreet
logo on the breast pocket did look very smart paired with Nessa’s
tidy denim jeans and the new black and white sneakers she’d chosen
while shopping with Jay. “Now you’ve got a job—” the unspoken words
‘and an income’ hung in the air “—what’re your plans?”

Jay nudged him with her elbow. “Give the
girl a chance to cash her first paycheck.”

“I’ll find a place as soon as I can,” Nessa
said. “I don’t want to keep sponging off you.”

“Don’t worry,” Jay said. “I’m hardly the
type to let you take advantage of me.” She stood and brushed down
the seat of her jeans. “Who’s hungry?”

“I could eat,” Tyler said.

Nessa snickered as she hung her coat on the
coat rack by the door. “Apparently you haven’t changed at all.” Her
stomach chose that moment to rumble. Loudly.

Tyler returned the snicker in spades.
“Sounds like I’m not the only one who’s hungry.”

“I didn’t get a chance to eat before I…
rushed out the door.”

Jay watched Nessa’s face. She was flushed.
That could be excitement over getting the job. But excitement would
not account for the sheen of perspiration on her forehead. Nor the
nervous glances toward the stairwell. What had she been up to?

“It’s time you and Tyler pulled your weight
around here,” Jay said. “Your turn to cook.”

“Nessa doesn’t
do
cooking,” Tyler
said.

“I really don’t,” Nessa said. “Grilled
cheese and instant noodles is about my limit.”

“Then it’s time you learned. There’s fresh
pasta in the fridge. And Tyler can do a pretty mean pasta sauce
with canned tomatoes, olive oil and fresh herbs.”

Tyler stood and stretched. “C’mon. I’ll show
you how it’s done.” He wandered toward the kitchen.

“What are you going to do, Jay?” Nessa
asked. “Aren’t you hungry?”

“Not particularly,” Jay said, carefully
watching her face. “I’m gonna go unpack. I’ll be down shortly and
you can tell me all about the job.”

“Oh. Okay.”

If her tone was anything to go by it was so
not
okay. Jay headed up the stairs, aware of Nessa’s gaze
fixed on her back. Whatever Nessa had done, it shouldn’t be too
hard to figure out. And there was a high probability it centered
around Jay’s bedroom.

She took a couple of steps into the hallway
and paused, listening for Nessa’s footsteps heading for the
kitchen. When Tyler began relaying instructions for where to find
this and that, Jay knew it was safe to proceed without risk of
being interrupted.

She opened the door to her bedroom and
paused, taking in the room, cataloging the contents, comparing the
placement of everything as it was now to the photo-like memory she
extracted from her memory banks.

She found herself reluctantly impressed.
Tyler would never have noticed anything untoward. Nessa had done an
excellent job of searching the room and putting everything back the
way it was. But she hadn’t reckoned on a cyborg’s ability to note
even minute changes. Nor a cyborg’s acute sense of smell, that
could detect, for example, even the faintest whiff of the
antiperspirant body spray Nessa used. She’d been here. In this
room. Searching through Jay’s personal belongings.

Jay walked into the en suite bathroom.
Tyler’s few toiletries. Toothpaste and brushes. Jay’s hairbrush,
Tyler’s comb. All were still evident. She checked the medicine
cabinet. Tylenol and arnica cream she’d bought for Tyler. Ditto the
throat lozenges. Nothing untoward. Unless Nessa had taken samples
of hair from the brush and comb for DNA purposes, which might prove
problematic.

A shame Nessa’s cooking lesson was going to
be trumped by an interrogation.

~~~

Nessa scraped the last of the pasta sauce
from her plate. Jay decided now was the perfect time to pounce—when
the girl was relaxed, and sleepy-eyed, lulled into a false sense of
security by a plateful of carbs and Jay’s non-reaction to having
her personal space violated.

“So, did you find what you were looking
for?”

“Huh?” Nessa blinked and screwed up her
face, displaying classic symptoms of confusion. Oh, she was
good.

“In my bedroom.”

Ah. There. Gotcha. Swallowing convulsively,
inability to meet the accuser’s gaze, fidgeting with whatever
happened to be at hand—in this case, cutlery. Classic symptoms of
guilt.

Tyler halted his forkful of pasta halfway to
his mouth. Jay cautioned him to silence with a finger to her
lips.

Nessa opened her mouth, paused, and shut it
again. When she did speak it was barely a whisper. “I need a pen
and paper.”

Jay caught a WTF? glance from Tyler.

“Have you two finished eating?” she asked.
“Good. Come with me.” She beckoned Tyler to follow and herded Nessa
into the room off the lounge she’d outfitted as an office cum
library with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. She powered up her
laptop, clicked on a playlist and selected a song.

“What do you think of this one, Tyler? I
love this group.” She amped up the volume and then opened up a
blank text document.
You think someone might be watching?
she typed, and pushed back her chair to give Nessa access to the
keyboard.

Nessa knelt on the ground in front of the
laptop.
yes,
she typed.

Jay heard Tyler’s sharply indrawn breath. He
positioned himself against her back, hands gripping the back of the
chair, protecting her.
Who?
she typed.

name is sixer,
Nessa typed
. phone
rang picked it up in yr bedroom. he knew where I was. told me 2
search yr room.

Why?

don’t know.

Tyler reached overtop Nessa to punch out,
BULLSHIT
.

Jay removed his hands from the keyboard and
typed,
Not helping!
Tyler backed off. When Jay glanced over
her shoulder at him he had his arms folded across his chest and he
was scowling mightily. For Nessa’s benefit Jay typed,
Sheesh,
Tyler. Still not helping.

Nessa hiccupped a watery-sounding laugh.
so sorry
, she typed.
met him in snapperton. gave me money
2 spy on u. told me what he’d do 2 me if I told u bout him
.
HE SCARES ME!!!

Jay felt a pang of compassion that she
quickly shoved aside. She couldn’t afford to be compassionate until
she knew who and what she was dealing with.

What did he want you to do after you’d
searched my room?

tell him if anything strange or out of
place.
Nessa’s hands shook as she typed.

Anything else?

Nessa squeezed her eyelids shut, screwing up
her face as she tried to recall. She nodded and opened her eyes and
started typing furiously.
said he wanted 2 c u thru my eyes.
said he was more interested in what I didnt find than what I did
whatever that means.

Tyler pointed to the laptop and waggled his
eyebrows. Jay gave him a thumbs up. She’d left the laptop at home.
If this mysterious Sixer was after information about her, a laptop
was an excellent place to start. Surely he’d have asked Nessa about
it, and upon learning it was downstairs in Jay’s study, insist she
steal it and bring it to him.

Nessa had already anticipated her next
question.
asked him bout laptop. he said u wouldnt store
important stuff on it.

Interesting.
What did you tell him?
She moved aside again to give Nessa access to the keyboard.

u like reading, music, cooking. u r in
love with Tyler. u r clueless about fashion and girl-stuff.
She
darted a sideways gaze at Jay as if to gauge her reaction.

All very true. Anything else?

u don’t have any condoms.

Jay’s eyebrows rose to her hairline. Behind
her, Tyler inhaled with a hiss.

he asked bout personal stuff. told him no
tampons or sanitary pads either
.
sorry
.

“Jeezus,” Tyler muttered beneath his breath.
“What kind of a sicko whack-job is this guy?”

1 more thing
, Nessa typed.
told
him bout u having nightmare & nearly strangling me. & he
already knew u r Jay Smith & Jaime Smythson.

“This is not good,” Tyler said quietly.

r u into drugs? is he after u coz of
drugs?

No. This has nothing to do with
drugs.
Jay decided a similar explanation to the one she’d once
given Tyler and Caro was her best option.
My father was a
research scientist. He worked on a top-secret project before he
died. I helped him with his research notes. Now some people want to
find out what I know.

Nessa bit her lip, her gaze switching back
and forth from the monitor to Jay.
not good 4 them to get that
info?

No.

sorry bout the drug thing

I don’t blame you. It’s a logical
assumption.

hated not telling u
, Nessa typed.
glad u know now
.
but afraid he’ll hurt me
. She sank
back until her butt hit her heels. Her sniff indicated she was
trying her best to hold back tears.

How did you keep in contact with him?
Jay typed.

gave me cell phone

A phone rang and Nessa jerked her hands back
from the keyboard. Jay muted the song blaring from the laptop. The
ringing wasn’t coming from the phone on the desk.

Nessa stared at Jay. Her pupils dilated,
going huge with shock. She reached into her back pocket for a cell
phone and stared at it like it’d suddenly morphed into a viper.
“It’s him,” she said. “He’s watching us. He knows I’ve told you. Oh
God. What am I gonna do?”

“Answer it,” Jay said. And when Nessa seemed
paralyzed, prompted her again. “Answer the phone, Nessa. It’ll be
okay. I promise I’ll keep you safe.”

Nessa nodded slowly. With her gaze still
fixed on Jay’s face she answered the call. “H-hello?”

Jay could easily hear the male voice on the
other end of the line saying, “Put her on.”

She held out her hand for the cell phone and
ended up having to pluck it from Nessa’s grasp. The poor girl was
shaking so hard her teeth were chattering. This man had truly
frightened her. “Hello, Sixer.”

“Hello Jay. Or should I call you Jaime?”

“Jay will do. What do you want?”

“Straight to the point. I approve.”

Jay remained silent.

“A female of few words. Again, I
approve.”

“I don’t have the slightest interest in
garnering your approval. What do you want?”

“I simply wanted to speak with you.”

“I find that very difficult to believe. Why
have you threatened Nessa?”

His attempt at a laugh was more of a wheeze,
as though he hadn’t had much practice at laughing. And his voice….
Interesting.