Lost Causes (23 page)

Vivian considered that her cue. She had connected her laptop to Josiah’s surveillance system. With a couple clicks, she brought up an image.

“What are we looking at here?” I asked. So far as I could tell, it was the Truckee River. The water was lethargic, not yet fattened from autumn storms.

Vivian used a red laser pointer to circle a small patch of black. “This was Miriam’s territory. She helps her sister raise her pups here when they’re in otter form. She used to, that is. As we know, the whole area was scorched. There was no sign of arson.”

I checked the time stamp. The photo was taken two days after we escaped the island.

Vivian dropped the laser pointer and turned back to the table. “For argument’s sake, let’s assume this was the council’s work. What would they hope to accomplish by burning such a small piece of land?”

Sera tapped her fingers against the wood. “They’re trying to get to Aidan, and they’re assholes, so they think it’s okay to do it through her friends.”

Luke leaned back in his chair and studied the screen. “That doesn’t sound right. They’ve had months to hurt your friends, so why now? I’m not seeing a good reason to think it’s their work, ’specially without any proof.”

“Unless they are trying to draw you out.” Simon sounded a bit smug, as he often did when he believed he had an answer no one else did. “If they believe you left the island, they will wish to make contact with you again.”

That sounded ominous. “But how the hell would they know that? Damn it, someone get Jet.”

It didn’t take long. She was standing outside with her ear pressed to the door.

“I was curious,” she said, without a hint of apology.

I hit her with questions before she could sit down. “Would they be able to watch the island without you? Did you show them how?”

Jet laughed. “Deborah couldn’t work Google maps without me, let alone a satellite system. She could have hired someone, I suppose.” Her tone suggested it would be a fool’s errand, as she was irreplaceable.

Simon considered the images. “Perhaps they heard about it from one of the escapees or their families.”

It was a possibility. Eila’s ex-pets had sworn to never speak of the place or the creature that lived there, but the promise might have weakened with distance.

If Deborah was behind the fire, she’d just rung the bell to start the next round. “I guess we should be happy they gave us this much time,” I muttered.

Jet perched on the edge of her chair. “What about the forest fire?”

Everyone turned to her.

“Didn’t you hear? There was a huge one started a while back. It took them a week to put it out.”

Vivian considered it for a moment, then shook her head. “I know what you’re talking about, but fires in the Tahoe National Forest are common after a dry summer. Like the one at Miriam’s, there’s no proof. Plus, it’s worth remembering that we’re dealing with waters here—waters who’ve given no indication they want to involve other elements.”

“If you say so.” Jet sounded like she meant the exact opposite.

“Wait, didn’t she threaten you with a forest fire when she showed up at my house?” Luke looked as if he was reconsidering his earlier doubts.

“Deborah had me pull up some footage of the area. She wanted to know what animals lived there,” Jet said.

Mac grew very still. Only his hands shook as he fought the shift. His fingernails began to lengthen. “Show me.”

Jet wheeled her chair over to Vivian and pushed her away from the computer. A moment later, a topographical map of Tahoe was projected against the far wall.

Mac’s face grew black. “A lot of bears use that forest when they need to run. Some permanently live off-grid there.”

His ears rounded. Mac’s father and brothers lived wild in that forest.

I had to control this before Mac went full furry. “Let’s end this. We arrange a meeting, show them that I’m not crazy anymore. We offer them what I’ve learned about a cure, so maybe they can help others, too.”

The table studied me like I had the wit of an especially clever rock.

“They’ll still want you punished for David,” Sera reminded me.

“Plus,” Luke noted, “They won’t believe you. It’s a hard one to prove, and too risky for them to take the chance that you’re lying.”

Damn bunch of negative nellies.

“So what does this mean? I hide out in Europe?” Maybe a few centuries in the south of France wouldn’t be so bad.

Luke watched the thoughts play across my face. “There are worse options.”

I let images of a lifetime frolicking naked in the Mediterranean with Mac fade. “If I keep running, they’ll keep hurting my friends. So we either need to fill that damn school bus with everyone we know and drive it far out of town, or I need to meet with them. That’s the only way this will stop.”

Vivian reluctantly agreed. “They’re chasing you because they fear you could be a remorseless monster, but they’re also counting on your conscience to draw you out.”

Sera jumped up and began pacing, fingers beating against her thigh so rapidly they blurred. “What if it isn’t only about Aidan? She’s actually not the center of the universe, whatever the last few months have felt like. If the council started that fire, they did it while we were on the island. Aidan might never have learned about it, so it couldn’t have been about getting her attention.”

I picked up the thought. “And the council hates shifters. They pretend they don’t even exist, and that’s harder to do when they dominate one of the largest forests in California. It’s a two-fer. It would draw me out if I survived the island, plus they got to harm shifters.”

“But shifters have always been there,” Vivian argued. “Why now?”

Sera knew. “Josiah’s gone. He lived there part-time since we started at the university. No one would dare cause trouble in his backyard.”

Grams nodded in agreement. “There’s a power vacuum. Elementals have always sought to claim their own spaces. Tahoe isn’t as isolated as most of our homes, but it’s been a beacon to our kind.” She nodded at Mac. “I gather it’s the same for shifters. For the last fifteen years or so, Tahoe has been Josiah’s nearly as much as this compound was, at least according to elementals. Now it is unclaimed.”

Realization didn’t dawn. It slammed into me like a bullet. “They didn’t hit Stephen Grant, or anyone we know from school, or Vivian’s apartment. They never even threatened them. Other than Frank and the Rat Trap, they’ve only gone after shifters.”

The table lifted several inches when Mac gripped its edge. He shoved himself away and stood against the wall, fighting the urge to rampage.

Sera’s pacing increased, her fingers sparking as fast as I’d ever seen. “Damn it. Damn it.”

I looked at each person in the room, the elementals and shifters who’d proven they would lay down their lives for each other.

“Sera’s right. It isn’t all about me. I’m the bonus prize, or maybe Tahoe is. The point is, they want both. They’re going after our home, and they’re sending a message that shifters aren’t welcome in the new Tahoe.”

No one argued.

Sera stopped moving with no warning. She didn’t sit, but she braced her hands on the table and stared at me, black eyes burning. “Tell the truth. Can you handle this? We’re gonna need you, Aidan. The rest of us have a lot of power, but not more than the council. You and Luke are the only ones strong enough.”

“I’m in.” Luke answered the question before anyone could ask.

Once more, I reached for my magic, exploring the threads Eila had merged. I didn’t do it because I doubted myself. I did it because I never tired of feeling the solid bond between fire and water.

Until I reached that tiny bit of loose fire Eila tried to rip free during our last battle. I studied it from every angle, searching for any new frays. I found none. It might not be a perfect cure, but it was the best I’d ever have. It was enough.

“I can handle it,” I told the room.

“Good, cause we’re done running,” Sera said.

“It makes us look like prey.” She said that to me long ago, when life had been much simpler. It didn’t make it less true now.

I stood, and despite everything we’d just learned, I grinned. “We’re going back to Tahoe.”

CHAPTER 24

I
t took us another day to make arrangements. Josiah’s private plane was in Seattle, and it needed to be diverted several times to ensure the council couldn’t track it. They’d find out we were coming soon enough, but we’d rather they didn’t shoot us out of the sky before we arrived.

Vivian and Jet worked together. One redirected the satellites while the other convinced air traffic control that the plane didn’t exist. Basically, they performed Jedi mind tricks with a computer.

“Please don’t get arrested,” I told Vivian.

Jet gave me what could only be called an evil grin. “Impossible. I’m a ghost. If I don’t want them to know I’m there, they won’t.”

Vivian grimaced. Jet had already proven that.

Jet continued. “The only time someone found me, it was cause they didn’t think a fifteen-year-old should have access to the state pension funds. I’ve learned a lot in ten years.”

Vivian tutted. “You got caught? Sloppy. No one noticed when I refinanced my mother’s house when I was twelve. Also, didn’t you say you worked for Deborah because she made some criminal charges go away?”

The other hacker’s eyes narrowed. Jet typed faster.

There was no question about leaving Jet behind. She was helping. Plus, we weren’t willing to let her out of our sight.

Grams would travel with us. Ani, however, wasn’t invited.

“You’re sure? I mean, you just found her.”

Sera was sure. “It’s been decades, Ade. You learn not to miss someone in forty years. I don’t need her.”

I let my doubts show. I had a lot of them.

“I don’t,” Sera insisted. “I needed to know if she was alive. I needed to know that she chose to leave me. I got that.”

“Uh-huh.”

She rolled her eyes. “You’re not giving up until we have some happy Disney moment, are you?”

“I’ll settle for a Hallmark movie,” I told her. “I mean, Josiah was way worse in the grand scheme of things, and you liked him.”

“Because Josiah was there.”

I couldn’t argue. The ones worth keeping are the ones who never leave in the first place.

“You got over it when I ran away,” I reminded her.

“You left because you were scared and in pain and had the emotional maturity of a caterpillar. She left because she was more interested in meeting that thing than in being a mother.”

“No matter what she did, you’re not going to forget about her, so maybe try to talk? Or glare at her, but be in the same room when you do? There’s still space on the plane. And caterpillar my ass. I was a beautiful fucking butterfly.”

Sera snorted and sent a shower of sparks toward me. “Keep telling yourself that. Even if you’re right—which is improbable, statistically speaking—now’s not the time. I don’t need the distraction. Let’s settle things with the council and then I’ll think about it. Will that get you to shut up?”

I took what I could get.

In the end, eight of us stepped onto the plane. A bear, a cat, and two hackers joined a water, a fire, and a couple of duals.

Hawaii to Northern California should have been a six-hour flight. Instead, we stopped in Los Angeles, where it was easier to get lost in the stream of private planes, then headed to Phoenix. After the sacrifices he’d made, it seemed polite to give Luke a day with his second element.

We skipped the small and easily tracked Tahoe airport and landed in Reno after midnight. No one knew we were coming, so no one was there to meet us. We arranged for two town cars to get us to Truckee.

We crossed the California state line an hour later. The streets were empty, just as they’d been when, months before, I arrived in the middle of the night with Sera, hurting and distant and with no idea what my life was about to become.

This time, I was returning home.

I woke early the next day, smiling before I even opened my eyes. I’d dreamt of this moment, but over the past months I’d doubted it would ever happen. But here I was, curled in Mac’s arms with my friends safe in the cabin behind us. I was going to savor every minute. Even knowing I’d need to face the council soon didn’t take away from my happiness.

After a while, my magic grew restless. I slipped out of bed and dressed. The night before, I’d grabbed a clean outfit from my room and, when she wasn’t looking, borrowed a couple items from Sera, as well. She was a lot shorter than I was, but that didn’t matter much with spandex.

I pulled on the sports bra and covered it with a t-shirt. I didn’t have any proper jogging shorts, but it was cool enough that sweatpants would work. My Converse weren’t great running shoes, but so long as I could heal myself, I didn’t need to worry about arch support.

I didn’t run. I flew. I raced down the driveway and across the road, then darted through the thin patches of forest until the lake appeared before me like an old friend. It was seventy miles around all of Lake Tahoe, and I almost wished I had time to make the trip. Instead, I ran several miles north. It was early enough that there weren’t any witnesses when I launched myself into the freezing lake and glided back toward the cabin without once coming up for air.

When I was done, I snuck through the trees. I still wasn’t ready to admit I was exercising after decades of condemning any activity more strenuous than lifting a forkful of pancakes. They’d find out some day, and then I’d need to reassure them of my sanity all over again.

The trailer was empty. I took a quick shower and walked to the cabin. I entered through the rear door and blinked.

“Brook!”

I barely had time to turn toward the booming voice before I was engulfed in an enormous hug.

Miriam squeezed hard enough to draw a squeak before she released me. “I hear we won’t be checking you into the nuthouse, after all.”

I was drawn into another set of arms right away, an embrace both familiar and strange. “We’re glad you’re safe, little water,” said Mac’s uncle.

I tilted my head to gaze up at Will. The man bore such a strong resemblance to Mac that I was predisposed to like him. He had a rougher version of Mac’s features, but they shared the same coloring and immense build. More than that, they were both protective and loyal to a fault. Will was a good man, though he made it a point not to take me seriously.

“You know I’m an all-powerful dual magic, right?”

He bopped my nose with his index finger and let me go.

A large banner hung across the far wall. It was decorated with storks and baby bottles and read “Congratulations, mom!” in large curving letters—except “mom” had been crossed out and rewritten in black Sharpie. The banner now read “Congratulations, sane person!”

The trellis dining table held a small feast, and the smell of maple syrup told me pancakes were hidden beneath one of the metal lids. There were more bagels and muffins for the carb-addicted elementals, but also some sausage, a plate of lox, and a bowl of apples and blackberries for the various shifters.

The cabin was full of them. Simon and Mac, Miriam and Will, even Carmen mingled with the elementals. The shifters might be used to me, Sera, and Vivian by now, but Luke and Grams were new.

Several months ago, they would have been on opposite sides of the room, preparing to reenact
West Side Story
. Now elementals and shifters milled about, chatting and sitting side by side on the floor pillows scattered throughout the living room—along with a couple of FBI agents and one human hacker.

Carmen greeted me with a smile that barely touched her eyes. While the rest of us hadn’t bothered to do anything more strenuous than brush our hair and change into clean clothes, she wore full makeup, tastefully applied, and designer jeans. The mountain lion’s coloring wasn’t far off a desert’s—amber eyes and sandy hair. She and Luke almost looked like they could be siblings—except a grin was never far from Luke’s face, while a scowl was never far from Carmen’s. We weren’t so much friends as allies, but it had been a while since I thought she wanted to disembowel me. I considered that progress.

Vivian and Jet sat cross-legged on the floor, their laptops between them like they were playing a high-tech game of Battleship. For the first time since we started running, Vivian wore her own clothes. Her t-shirt read “Have you tried turning it off and on again?”

“Everything okay?” I asked.

Vivian flashed me a small smile, then returned her attention to her screen. “No new disasters, but they’ll know we’re here soon if they don’t already. Even without tech, it’s easy to monitor cars coming in and out of the cabin, and there were a bunch of those this morning.”

“What are you working on now?” I peered over Jet’s shoulder like the scrolling numbers meant a single damn thing.

“Math,” they said in unison.

“Uh huh.” It was the only possible response an English major could make.

Sera sat next to Carmichael, who looked a lot better after a shave and a few square meals. She rose when I appeared.

“What is this?”

“It’s a welcome back to sanity party. We got you a cake.” She pointed to a white sheet cake with red piping that read “We’ll miss you.”

I raised my eyebrows, and Sera shrugged. “You expect more from the Safeway bakery at four a.m.? And, though I protested quite loudly, your favorite music.” I tilted my head toward the speakers, picking out Patsy Cline over the others’ voices. The song, of course, was “Crazy.”

“You know, based on this evidence, I might think you like me.”

“Family obligation. That’s all.”

“Don’t think I don’t appreciate it, but—”

Sera didn’t let me finish. “But we need a plan? We need to figure out how to get the council out of Tahoe before they burn something else? We need to put Deborah on a one-way rocket to Mars?”

It sounded like a good start.

She piled five pancakes on a plate and smothered them in maple syrup before thrusting the meal at me. “We’ll get to it, but we’ve earned this. We need a few hours when no one is hunting us or doing their best to destroy everything we love. It’s not asking for much. Besides, after the island, you’re skinnier than usual. Eat these before your ass actually becomes concave.”

She was right, and we did get a few hours before we were interrupted.

A tinny ring struggled to be heard above the music. Out of habit, we checked our pockets, but most of us didn’t have phones. We’d left them behind during our flight across the desert and hadn’t bothered to replace them yet.

The shifters held up blank screens. The ringing continued.

I followed the sound until I found an old flip phone tucked inside a planter. No one spoke as I held it up, but their apprehensive expressions told me they’d never seen the device before. I didn’t recognize the number on the screen.

The room was silent, waiting. I opened the phone and held it to my ear. I didn’t speak.

The caller didn’t need me to. She only wanted me to listen. “Have you visited Frank at the Rat Trap yet?”

Threat delivered, Deborah hung up.