“Let me take care of it for you.”
I thought of the ass**les in the Teflon crew and could only imagine what Wedderburn would consider proper retaliation, but I sensed I had to be super careful in how I turned him down. Kian had counseled me to say I needed time to think, but if I didn’t nip this in the bud, it would only get tougher to say no later. “While I appreciate the offer, it would rob me of satisfaction not to orchestrate their downfall personally.”
Wedderburn sighed. “I was afraid you would say that, but … I understand. You will, of course, to permit me to be of service in some other fashion. I want to help you reach your true potential, Edie.”
With him wearing that insane smile, I feared I might be the next scary dictator in what Kian called my optimum timeline. “Thank you.”
“Would you like to see a demonstration?” he asked.
Part of me thought it was a bad idea, but I also couldn’t refuse everything. Wedderburn seemed like the easily offended type and I preferred to get out of his office without being flash frozen. So I forced a smile, the same one I gave to the Teflon crew, and said, “That would be amazing.”
“Come a little closer.”
Kian shifted and pulled in a breath, as if in instinctive protest, but I didn’t dare look at him. It required all of my willpower not to shiver uncontrollably and wrap my arms about myself. In addition to the cold, this strange creature also radiated a primordial dread that made my skin creep, trying to crawl all the way off my muscles and bones in horror that no amount of meds or therapy could fix. The whimper in my throat became a silent scream.
“Of course.”
Wedderburn turned toward the head-monitor-thing and swiveled it so I could see the liquid mercury stuff. Before he reached inside the frame, it was opaque, but at his touch, it shimmered and turned translucent, so each time he stirred icy fingertips, a new pattern rippled, first a star, then a pentacle, and then it turned into a cephalopod with tentacles lashing in all directions. He speared one with a fingertip and it flowered into a murky image, similar to a convenience store surveillance camera’s, only cast in liquid.
Vi.
Like the room around me, my blood iced over. Fear wasn’t a deep enough for the feeling that swamped me, tighter and knottier than sickness. Outwardly, I kept a cool front, apart from my breathing, but I couldn’t do anything about it. My stomach swirled as we spied on her. She was at home, head bent over her schoolbooks. Now and then, she smiled at the candid photo of her and Seth taped to her mirror. I took that shot. The scene was ordinary in every possible way, and it was unspeakably wrong for us to be watching her like this.
Beside me, Wedderburn was silent, a faint smile playing at the edge of his lips. “A shadow here … or here … would change everything,” he said conversationally. “Your friend seems to have a bright future.”
Seems. That’s definitely a threat.
He went on, “It would probably crush her if something happened to her new beau. Ah, first love. I’m not sure she’d recover.”
He stirred the surface again, without pulling or changing anything that I could tell, and now we were watching Seth. He didn’t have a picture of Vi on his wall, which might disappoint her, but she was the wallpaper background on his laptop. I didn’t know if that made it better or worse. Idly Wedderburn flicked the liquid and Seth rubbed his head.
“Very impressive,” I managed to say. If I revealed how much I cared, it would go poorly for my friends. I understood that instinctively. The prick of pain on my palms told me I was dangerously close to breaking through the skin with my fingernails. “But surely there are rules about harming mortals who aren’t part of the game.”
Wedderburn straightened, wearing an inscrutable look. “Are there?”
Oh God. If there weren’t … if he could kill anyone he wanted, anyone who wasn’t a catalyst, then I’d put everyone close to me at risk. You didn’t know. But you can fix this. Somehow. It was so hard to keep my teeth from chattering, but I couldn’t show Wedderburn how rattled I felt. I could easily drop down on the floor and cram my head between my knees while I hyperventilated; only the fact that I needed to help my friends prevented me from melting down completely.
“This has been wonderful,” I choked out, “but I have homework. I look forward to our next meeting, sir.”
“As do I, Miss Kramer.” I noted his reversion to formality, now that the lines had been drawn. I suspected Wedderburn knew that I was not—and never would be—his ally.
Kian didn’t speak until we were outside the building. “Are you all right?”
Silently I shook my head and he wrapped me up in his arms. This might be exactly what was supposed to happen, a good cop, bad cop routine, but I leaned on him anyway. I felt like I might never get warm again, even with the late-summer sun shining down on my head. The shivers didn’t abate for a few minutes, despite his hands moving up and down my back. People walked around us with nervous looks, as if my distress might be contagious.
“I don’t understand. He’s supposed to be the good guy, on my side?”
“Good and evil doesn’t apply here,” Kian said softly. “There are only different agendas. I can’t say I’m fighting for right, I’m just trying to survive. And I realize hearing that doesn’t inspire you to trust me more.”
“I doubt you’d tell me that if it wasn’t true. Because it doesn’t cast you in the best light. So at least I know you’re being honest.”
“Text your parents.” He stepped back but left an arm around my shoulder and he guided me to his car.
“And say what?”
“That you’ll be back by dinner.”
Since I was too freaked to head home anyway, I did as he suggested, then hopped in the car. Kian shut the door behind me and I buckled in. “Where are we going?”
“Someplace we can talk.”
Kian drove out of the city; it was early enough for us not to be caught in rush hour traffic. Half an hour later, we ended up driving along the coast, a swath of land remarkable only for the fact that there was nothing particular here, except the rocky shoreline and the pounding of the sea. Kian pulled off to the side and got out of the Mustang. A path led down from the road.
“What’s special about this place?”
“Something in the stone, it’s like … a blind spot. Neither side can spy on us out here.” He tapped his watch with a satisfied look.