Tekgrrl (14 page)

“Come on, quit sassing me and get your butt over here!”

I had to smile. “All right. I’m on my way.”

Paul and my possible suspension could wait.

Cozumel’s was packed, as promised by Toby, with women wearing much stranger clothing than my uniform. By the time I passed a woman wearing a silver dress that looked like chain mail and barely covered the essentials, I was no longer the least bit concerned that I would stick out. In fact, I was beginning to wonder how Toby looked in the suit he likely wore.

The club was one of those former warehouses seemingly converted into a hot spot overnight. Tables and couches where glamorous men and women lounged sipping brightly colored drinks were scattered randomly near the bar, leaving a rather large space open as the dance floor where half of the club patrons were packed, sweating and writhing to the music the DJ was playing.

I fought my way to the bar to flag down the bartender, and received my own electric neon drink served in an oversized martini glass. Sipping it, I looked around, trying to find Toby in this madhouse.

I did a double take when I finally picked him out of the crowd. He was slow-dancing with a lean man with close-cropped sandy brown hair, but that wasn’t the shocking part. I would have been more shocked if he hadn’t picked up some young hottie already; no, the shocking part was my normally conservative friend wearing black leather pants and a tight black long-sleeve shirt.

I wove through the crowd. Tapping on Toby’s shoulder, I interrupted with, “Raiding Lainey’s wardrobe?”

Toby turned and saw me. “Hey, you made it!” He eased away from his dance partner to lean down and kiss me on the cheek.

I kissed him back with a wry smile. “Yeah, I made it all the way to the alternate universe where you wear leather.”

He turned red. “Shut up.”

“Are you going through a midlife crisis or something?”

He frowned. “It’s not like my work clothes are any tighter or more ridiculous than this.”

He had a point, but I couldn’t resist teasing him. “Toby, sweetie, I think once you hit forty there’s a law against you wearing leather pants unless you’re a biker or a rock star. And if you start wearing them, Paul might start wearing them, and then I’m going to be psychologically scarred for life.”

“Please. Paul couldn’t pull off this look. And by all means, please keep mentioning my advanced age in front of my boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend?” I looked back at the guy he’d been dancing with, who had been standing by in silence all this time. I did another double take. “Forrest?”

The EHJ’s political liaison smiled at me. “Hello, Mindy.”

Toby gave me a sheepish look. “We’ve been seeing each other since he came down for the big meeting.”

I shook my head. “Wow. Keep a secret much?”

“That’s why I wanted you to meet us here. I thought it was time my best friend knew.”

I looked at Forrest. “As the best friend, I am required by law to remind you that if you hurt him, I’ll hurt you.”

Forrest nodded. “Of course.”

“Always good to get that out of the way.” I smiled. “Well, then, I’m happy for you guys.”

Toby hugged me. “Thanks, Min.”

“Like you needed my blessing anyway.” I hugged him back. “You do realize that I’m mad at you now, right? I am officially the only single person left on this team.”

Toby made a face. “I’m sorry. I think that calls for a drink.”

“I’ll get it,” Forrest interjected. “Mindy?”

“Something nonradioactive,” I said, passing him the bizarre drink I’d initially been served.

“Get me a mineral water, darlin’. I think I’ve had enough tonight,” Toby said.

“Got it. One mineral water and one nonradioactive drink.” Forrest leaned up to give Toby a brief kiss. “Grab us a table.” He headed off to fight his way through the mob.

I sighed. “Ah, young love.”

“Shut up.” Toby gave me a goofy smile. He was definitely smitten.

We fought our way through the crowd to find an empty table. I made a dive just as another guy went for it at the same time. I perched on the chair and gave him a defiant look. He looked like he was going to say something, but then noticed Toby glowering at him and decided against it.

“And once again, your bad-boy looks save the day,” I joked. “Forrest is one lucky politician.”

Toby took the seat opposite me. “I knew you were going to say something about that.”

“I’m just teasing. I never would have thought you’d date anyone in politics.”

“Neither did I, actually. My family has a long history of disliking politics.”

“This’ll be harder to explain than the coming out,” I said. “Your mom’s going to ask why you can’t date some nice Southern businessman.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Paul or Wesley could possibly have a meltdown about you sleeping with the enemy.”

“Forrest isn’t the enemy!”

“No, but neither Paul nor Wesley is exactly thrilled by this committee thing. Especially since Simon’s heading it. It might be guilt by association.”

“I’ll just remind them Forrest’s the one looking out for our best interests. We need every friend in Washington we can get.”

“Every friend-with-benefits, you mean.” I winked. “But you know I’m thrilled for you. He’s really cute.”

“I know. I have excellent taste in men.”

I rolled my eyes. “I have to admit I’d much rather watch you two make out and make goo-goo eyes at each other than Luke and Selena.”

Toby made a face. “Luke took off on you to go out with her tonight?”

I nodded. “After we bagged the bad guy.”

“Well…I thought you were over Luke.”

I shrugged. “I’m trying to be.”

Forrest reappeared with new drinks. “A G&T and a mineral water.” He sat them down in front of us.

“Thanks,” I said, taking a sip. Much better.

“Like the table?” Toby said, gesturing. “I had to use my powers of intimidation to get it.”

“Sexy.” Forrest took the chair next to him. “So, what was going on tonight?”

I shrugged. “Had to fight a psychic vampire. I ended up kicking him in the stomach, and Luke had to nerve-pinch him to knock him out.” I conveniently left out the part where I psychically lashed out.

Forrest nudged Toby. “See what you miss when you play hooky?”

This was new. “Paul doesn’t know you took the night off?”

Toby shook his head. “And don’t you dare tell him, either.”

I sat back in my chair and took a sip of my drink. “What’ll you give me?”

Forrest laughed. “You two sound like teenagers sneaking out of the house. Daddy’s waiting!”

“What it feels like sometimes.” If they only knew what I was hiding tonight. My head started pounding again in remembrance.

“It’s got to be hard to hold a team together, especially one as powerful and important as the Elite Hands of Justice,” Forrest was saying. “That’s a lot of responsibility, even when it is divided up between two people.”

Toby patted Forrest’s leg. “He’s used to men in power acting like dictators and treating their underlings like children.”

“You’re not going to go off on the corruption of power again, are you?” Forrest replied.

They were all ready bickering good-naturedly like an old married couple. I had a feeling this was a relationship that was going to last. Good for Toby. Bad for me. I no longer had anyone to commiserate with about my old-maid status. I glanced around the club, checking out the men who didn’t have a woman attached. I hadn’t dated anyone, serious or not, in months. Maybe that’s why those nightmares were coming back. At least with a man in my bed, I had enough distraction to chase the bad dreams away, if only temporarily.

A sharp pain spiked through me so hard I couldn’t see straight. I groaned and grasped my head in both hands, as if that would help.

As if from far away, I heard Toby say, “Whoa, Mindy, are you all right?”

Another spike went through me, drowning out all of the background noise in a weird sort of hum, almost like white noise on a television, a hissing that started out soft and grew to a roar with every surge.

I see you.

It came through so loud and clear, like I had turned all other sound off in the room. I jumped up and actually looked for the speaker.

No one will defend you.

The pain was intensifying as I looked around, searching out the voice. I was dimly aware of Toby trying to grab me but I shook him off. I had to know—

No one will protect you.

—who was talking to me—

You’re all alone.

—and how.

Laughter seemed to boom in my head, blocking out everything else, all of reality, until I wanted to push, hit, and do anything to get it out of my head and away from me.

“Shut up,” I whispered as the laughter continued. “Shut up!”

I lashed out again, mentally, with all of the fear and pain that I had in me. It was like when I fought the psychic vampire: I didn’t realize how I was doing it, only that I was.

Brick, cement and steel erupted from the wall across from me, directly in my line of sight, as a huge dent appeared, as if a large invisible fist had punched it. I was dimly aware of patrons screaming, running past me, mass chaos ensuing. They were panicked, afraid that a terrorist had attacked, that a bomb had gone off, that a villain was going to try to take them hostage. Of course, it was all too much. I couldn’t take any more.

“Mindy, what the hell?” Toby’s voice was the last thing I heard before the world went black.

I woke to the sound of raised voices. Groaning, I opened blurry eyes to try to pinpoint who exactly was shouting. It sounded like Paul, but I had never heard him use that much profanity.

“Oh, good, you’re awake,” Lainey said, and I rose up in bed to see that Lainey and Emily had made themselves comfortable in my room and were settled in a chair pulled up next to my bed, watching a cartoon that seemed to revolve around a yellow square wearing a chef’s hat. Regardless of the cartoon and the fact my door was closed, I could still hear the argument, which, now that I was more aware, seemed to be going on between Paul, Toby and Wesley.

“It remains to be seen as to whether or not that’s good,” I said. “What’s going on?”

Lainey turned her attention to her baby, who was drooling and alternately pounding her fists on a plush version of the square on television. With every blow, the toy let out a high-pitched giggle. Socialized sadism at its finest.

“Em, stop. You’re giving Mommy a headache.”

“Mommy’s dodging Aunt Mindy’s question,” I remarked.

Lainey sighed. “Your, um, incident made the news.”

I winced. “Oh, no.”

“There were multiple injuries, both when the building got damaged and in the aftermath. People were trampling each other to get out.”

I felt my stomach flip.
I
had caused people to get hurt. “I didn’t mean to. It was an accident!”

“I know, Min. But Luke told Paul that you had something similar happen earlier, and that he told you to go home and have it checked out.”

That explained the yelling. Paul had to be furious with me.

“It doesn’t help any that Simon held a press conference this morning saying he was going to address ‘problems caused by heroes in matters such as this’ in committee, and that he’d ‘investigate the incident further.’”

Paul was probably going to go nuclear on me. I’d be lucky to keep my job after this.

I felt a tear slide down my cheek. I rarely cried, but the pain and trauma of the last month or so was really starting to kick in. “I really screwed up, Lainey.”

“Oh, Mindy.” My friend reached over to squeeze my hand. Emily frowned, like she couldn’t figure out why there was water running down my face.

“I don’t know why this is happening,” I said, giving in and letting the tears come. If you can’t cry in front of your best girlfriend, who can you cry in front of? “Or why now. How can everything go seemingly normal for sixteen years and then just one day fall apart?”

“Paul and Wes know you can’t control these new powers; you’re just like any teenager. There’s been plenty of collateral damage and even fatalities before because of the newly powered, and there have been plenty of messes to be cleaned up afterward, so it’s not like this is a problem never before seen. The only thing different…”

“Is that it’s me,” I finished for her. “I’m one of the A-list, and nothing like that is supposed to happen with us. The media’s going to drag me and the rest of the team through the mud. And it’s all my fault.” I wiped my eyes.

“It’s not your fault that aliens screwed with your DNA and then tried to make that disappear by blocking you, Mindy. That is not your fault. And Paul and Wes know that too.”

“There’s still going to be fallout. With the press. With Simon.” I shook my head. “You know he’s not going to let this go.”

“He’s not as bad as we all make him out to be,” Lainey said. “He was a greedy, spotlight-grabbing opportunist, but that’s all. He’s not all bad. He did come back to help in our fight with the Dragon, and he saved you.”

“He was in trouble with us and the government,” I pointed out. “How do we know it was out of the goodness of his heart and not a way to generate good publicity for himself?”

Lainey shrugged. “You worked with him for a lot longer than I ever did. You tell me.”

The door was flung open and Paul walked in, eyes burning. “Tell your boyfriend we’ll take it, then,” he was saying to Toby.

“You know, he’s only trying to help,” Toby retorted. “He’s been back in Washington since last night running damage control.”

“I know, Toby, it’s okay,” said Wesley, trying to play peacemaker, which was a bit of a weird change of pace. “Go ahead and call him, tell him we’ll be there.”

“Yes, sir.” Toby turned and walked out of the room, phone at his ear. He never said a word to me.

“Good, she’s awake,” Paul said, finally focusing on me. I wished he wouldn’t, though, from the looks he was giving me. “How can someone as incredibly brilliant as you make such stupid decisions, Mindy?”

I frowned. “I didn’t mean for all of that to happen, Paul. I don’t even know how I’m doing whatever it is I’m doing, let alone how to control it.”