Chimera

Six The Turn

Ethan’s face pinched. He couldn’t hide the fact that at the name Alice Stiles, his mind had just gone right back to our final day in Central Park. We’d been running past several bronze statues when Mayhem started attacking us with heat blasts, melting statues and killing a kid. Ethan had saved us all that day by killing Mayhem. And he was the kind of gentle soul who tore himself into bits about killing, even if it was self-defense.

“What does ‘known to be attached to’ mean?” Thatcher asked.

“They dated,” Marco replied. “They graduated high school a year before the War started. Stiles’s involvement in the War is documented in the later years. However, her exact movements in the first two years are unknown.”

“Was Alice Bethany’s mother?”

“I cannot answer that. However, the timing is correct, and after comparing their photographs, there is a strong resemblance between Bethany Crow and Alice Stiles.”

“Did May—Stiles ever mention having a baby?” I asked Thatcher.

He stared at me like I’d grown a finger out of my forehead. “Do you tell strangers the intimate details of your sex life, Renee? I barely knew Alice, so no, she never mentioned giving up a baby.”

I didn’t back down from his snarly response, even though my Sarcasm Brain wanted to snap right back at him. Besides, I hadn’t had a sex life to speak of for months. “Can you think of anyone in Manhattan she might have confided in? Someone who could help us?”

Thatcher didn’t answer right away, but he was thinking.

“Did he nod or shake his head?” Marco asked over the phone, clearly confused by the silence.

“Neither,” I replied. “Hold on a sec, Fuzz Face.”

Thatcher looked like he’d rather chew glass than admit anything when he finally said, “Mai Lynn Chang. She and Alice were good friends.”

Ethan and I shared a look. Mai Lynn was a cat shifter and current resident of Manhattan. She was also the mother of Simon Hewitt’s son, Caleb. What an incestuous little group we are.

“I will contact Warden Hudson and arrange an interview,” Marco said.

“Thanks, pal,” I said. “See you in a few hours.”

Apparently Hudson was in some kind of meeting all afternoon, possibly getting his ass chewed off by his superiors for allowing Thatcher out on temporary release, so we didn’t have an interview time set up when we got back to HQ. Dinnertime was closing in, and as our little trio made its way to the cafeteria, Aaron snagged Ethan off to the side.

“Are you still able to go to Simon’s?” Aaron asked.

I stopped walking in order to eavesdrop, and my Thatcher-shaped shadow did the same.

Ethan stared at his boyfriend blankly for a beat, then his eyebrows went up. “Shit, I forgot about that.” He looked at me, almost apologetic. “We’d planned to visit Andrew tonight.”

Andrew, his half-brother, lived with the Hewitts, and the pair tried to see each other as often as possible. He was only eight, but Andrew reminded me so much of an adolescent Ethan, with his red hair and green eyes and warm smile.

“So go see him,” I said.

“What if Hudson calls back?”

“We can talk to Mai Lynn tomorrow.”

Ethan shook his head. “No, we should get this figured out as soon as possible. I’ll—”

“Go. See. Him. If we get over there tonight, Thatcher and I can handle it.”

“Are you sure?”

I gave him a gentle shove toward Aaron. “Go to play with your baby brother, Windy. I mean it.”

“Thanks, Stretch.”

He and Aaron headed back in the opposite direction, and I could have sworn I heard Ethan ask how Noah was feeling. The question made me curious for about five seconds, until a sharp pang of envy hit me right in the gut, and it had nothing to do with Noah. Ethan had so many of the things I longed for—a steady relationship with someone who cared about him, living family members who weren’t batshit insane, an open-mindedness about the Manhattan prisoners. I loved him dearly, but sometimes I wished he were easier to hate. Not that Ethan had had it easy—he’d had a horrible time in post-War foster care, and that had left all kinds of emotional scars. And finding the courage to come out to us hadn’t been easy for him, either.

He more than deserved the happiness he had.

The jerk.

Fingers snapped in front of my face. “Anyone home?” Thatcher asked.

I swatted his hand away. “Do you mind?”

“You were staring at the wall.”

“So?”

He opened his mouth, then snapped it shut. He didn’t look annoyed, just amused, and that annoyed me. We were stuck working together, but I was not available for his entertainment. If I wanted to be a sideshow, I’d go back to shaking my ass in Vegas.

Thatcher tilted his head to the side, a half smile playing on his lips, and damn it if he didn’t almost look attractive like that. “I know you’re only required to babysit me if I leave the building,” he said with a stupidly charming lilt to his voice, “but would you like to join me for dinner?”

“Not particularly.”

He shrugged one shoulder, not the least put off (that I could tell) by my abrupt shutdown. “At least you’re honest.”

“Most people call it rude.”

“I’m not most people.”

“No kidding.”

“You still blame us, don’t you?”

I blinked. “Us?”

He nodded slowly, something dark burning in his eyes. “Banes. You still blame us for the War, and for everything that happened afterward. Don’t you?”

We were really having this conversation in the middle of the hallway. Granted, no one was around, but I still carried an unpopular opinion around like a festering wound you can’t see beneath all the layers of clothing. I didn’t much feel like arguing my point where others could stumble by and overhear.

“Does it matter?” I asked.

“Yes. We have to work together, for however long it takes to solve this. You know where I stand, so I think it’s only fair that I know where you stand, as well.”

“I’m standing right here.” I folded my arms over my chest and turned to face him full-on. He only had two inches on me, but he did have a good thirty pounds of muscle and solid bulk that I lacked. His posture was as relaxed as mine was defensive, and I couldn’t help wondering if he was doing that on purpose to make me look like an aggressive bitch.

“You’re, what? Twenty-five?”

“Twenty-seven.”

His eyebrows twitched. “I was twenty-two when the War ended, and I was stuck on that island living in misery, eating whatever crap the government dished out or we could scavenge. Today was the first time in fifteen years I set foot off that island, rode in a car, saw a person over the age of sixty. You can hate the Banes and hate Chimera all you want, but Derek Thatcher is a different man than the one who followed Specter. Chimera died a long time ago. Please try to remember that.”

A hot flush crept up my cheeks, straight to my hairline, and it wasn’t from anger—I was embarrassed. Fuck him for schooling me like that. I had a damn good reason for holding on to my narrow view of the past, and I wasn’t about to go explaining myself to Thatcher. Not now, and not ever.

“You have no idea where I stand,” I said coldly. “You can’t even see the fucking ground.”

His eyes narrowed. Before he could retort, my cell rang with Teresa’s personal tone.

“Hello?” I said.

“Good news,” she replied, slightly out of breath. “Mai Lynn is currently at the observation tower getting a checkup for her leg, and I got you guys permission to speak with her before she goes back to Manhattan.”

“Did the warden agree?”

“He didn’t have to. His head guard gave us permission.”

“Fabulous. Thatcher and I will head over now.”

“Where’s Ethan?”

“On his way to see his brother.”

“Oh, right, he mentioned that yesterday. You good with him not being there?”

I glanced at Thatcher, who was watching me intently. “Nothing I can’t handle, T.”

“Good. Keep me posted.”

“Will do.”

After I hung up, Thatcher asked, “We’re going where?”

“Ellis Island.”

He pulled a face, then quickly tried to hide it—interesting. “More flying?”

“Not a fan?”

“Not particularly.”

“Sucks to be you, then.”

Instead of the interrogation room, our guard escorted us to the medical ward on the second floor. Mai Lynn was sitting in what passed for a waiting room: six upholstered chairs around a single, wide, wood coffee table. There was no television, nor any magazines or books to read. The entire space was sterile and plain-colored, and about as interesting as a piece of white bread.

I’d never met Mai Lynn in person and only knew her from her file. As we approached, she used a wooden cane to stand up. Her left leg was in a walking cast. She’d broken it in July’s Central Park helicopter explosion, and seemed to be on the mend. She barely came up to my chin, and I had to look down when I shook her hand and introduced myself.

“Please, sit,” I said.

She settled back in her chair, and I took one opposite her. Thatcher stood a little to the side, observing but not really participating. Good. I could handle it myself.

“Something important must be afoot,” she said. “First you spring Derek, and now you’re speaking with me. Do I get to know why?”

“I wish I could go into the details,” I lied, “but I can’t.” The last three words were true, though. “I was hoping you could help us confirm a suspicion we have about one of your former, ah . . . coworkers.”

Her eyebrows jumped. “Coworkers?”

“From the War,” Thatcher said.

She glanced at him, then turned a curious look on me. “Who?”

“Alice Stiles,” I said.

“Alice died fifteen years ago.”

“I know. I’d rather focus on her activities during the first two years of the War.”

Mai Lynn’s expression closed off—bingo. “Why?”

I ignored the question. “Did you and Alice interact frequently during those two years?”

“Somewhat. As Specter began pulling us together, Alice and I were often in the same city at the same time.”

Interesting dance around the fact that they were together murdering Rangers and wreaking havoc in those cities. “To your knowledge, did Alice Stiles give birth to a child during that time period?”

Her eyes went wide with shock, and then her entire expression shifted into something fierce, protective. “What does it matter if she did or did not?”

“It matters because a young woman who may be her biological daughter is running around committing all kinds of crimes. A young woman who has a Meta power very similar to Alice Stiles’s. We’re just trying to confirm that the two are related.”

“Alice was a friend. I don’t know if this young woman is her daughter, but I won’t help you.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

“Won’t.”

“Someone took her,” Thatcher said. He moved closer, his face a dark mask of frustration that he didn’t try to hide. “They faked her death and they took her, and God only knows what they trained her to be. Those bastards did the same thing to Landon.”

Mai Lynn’s face fell. Her hand rose, like she wanted to reach for Thatcher, then dropped back into her lap. She watched him, as though searching for deceit. “Who’s ‘they’?”

“We aren’t certain yet, but I need to find him. Please.”

She looked pained when she turned back to me. “I don’t know if Alice had a child, not for sure. She disappeared completely for about seven months, and the next time I saw her she was . . . different.”

“Different how?” I asked.

“Distant. Colder. She wouldn’t say a word about where she’d gone or why, and I never pressed.”

“Is there anyone you can think of whom she might have confided in?”

She shook her head. “They’re all dead now.” To Thatcher she added, “I’m sorry I can’t be more helpful. I hope you find him.”

“Thank you.”

“You deserve to be with your son, Derek.”

He smiled warmly. “So do you, Mai Lynn.”

“Maybe soon.” Her eyes lit up with the eagerness of a child waiting for Christmas morning to hurry up and get here. “My official parole interview is next week. I could be with Caleb again before the month is over.”

“You’ll get out. I know you will.”

“I wish I had your faith.”

As much as I hated breaking up the official Absentee Parents Club meeting, I cleared my throat loudly. Two heads swiveled to look at me blankly—probably forgot I was even there. This wasn’t a social call. “If there’s nothing else you can tell us, we should be heading back,” I said.

“Of course,” Mai Lynn said.

I stood up, then forced myself to say, “Thank you for your cooperation.”

“You’re welcome.”

On the way to the elevator, Thatcher leaned over and whispered, “You didn’t hurt yourself saying thank you, did you?”

I glared at him, and he just smiled. Really smiled. Is he flirting with me?

Impossible.

We didn’t speak on the elevator, or as we left the observation tower for the warm evening air that reeked of the bay. This area certainly had an unmistakable smell. Halfway to the puddle-jumper, my com squealed with the emergency beacon. I jumped, the noise cutting the silence between us. I fumbled the earpiece twice before I got it in.

“Duvall,” I said.

“It’s me.” Teresa. “Simon just called. He said Aaron and Ethan are twenty minutes late, and neither is answering his phone.”

Shit. Panic turned my insides to icy slush. “What about the tracer on their car?”

“Shows them stopped three blocks from Simon’s house, on Communipaw Avenue. No movement. Marco and Lacey are already in the air.”

“Thatcher and I are outside. We can be there in a few minutes.”

“Keep your com on.”

“Will do.” I didn’t explain to Thatcher, I just grabbed his arm and pulled.

To his credit, Thatcher didn’t start asking questions until I failed to either direct us to Governors Island, or land in the parking area on the mainland. I filled him in while I flew straight toward the streets I only halfway knew, until I was over Communipaw Avenue. Landing the puddle-jumper wasn’t going to be easy—it wasn’t a large machine, but I was used to having a lot more maneuvering space. Thatcher white-knuckled his armrest in a way that would have amused me if I weren’t scared out of my mind for Ethan’s safety. Two grown men with strong damn powers going off the grid meant serious trouble.

I spotted one of our Sports, stopped in the middle of the street about three blocks from where Simon’s house should be. The nearest intersection was clear. I hovered the puddle-jumper over it, then pushed down on the controls, dropping us a few feet at a time until the skids hit pavement. I shut off the engine and practically leapt out onto the street.

The Sport’s engine was off, the doors shut. I yanked one open and found the keys still in the ignition. Thatcher opened the passenger-side door and looked around. No blood, no broken glass, no signs of a struggle. I relaxed my shoulders and stretched my neck out so I could see both the backseat and the rear compartment—nothing there, either.

Damn it, Wind Bag, where are you?

When my neck settled back into place, Thatcher was staring at me with open surprise.

“What?” I snapped.

“Nothing.”

“Good.” I hit my com. “Duvall to West. Car’s empty, no sign of a fight.”

“Copy. Lacey and Marco are on the ground, too, nearby.”

“Copy that. Out.”

I repeated it for Thatcher’s sake, then moved out to the middle of the street. Few people lived in this neighborhood, so the chances of finding someone who’d seen what happened was slim to none. Not for the first time, I wished for a more useful power. Something that could help us track down our friends. Gage should be out here with his Super Sniffer, not me with my stupid bendy body that didn’t even work right.

A raven’s cry broke the quiet. I pivoted and ran back toward the puddle-jumper. Raven-Marco darted into the street from that intersection, then hovered there until I caught up. I followed him down another block, past a mix of homes and boarded-up businesses, to a dank alley that reeked of rot and tepid water. Lacey Wilson’s dragonlike wings peeked over a pile of rubble that had once been part of one of the buildings lining the alley. I jumped over the debris with ease and landed in a puddle that splashed something wet and nasty up onto my boots and the legs of my uniform.

Lacey was kneeling next to Aaron, who was hog-tied, blindfolded, and gagged. As she worked at the knots on the ropes, Aaron didn’t struggle, didn’t even move. They wouldn’t have bothered tying him up so well if he was dead, but that didn’t stop a brief flare of dread from clenching my guts tight. I scanned the alley—no Ethan.

“He’s alive,” Lacey said without looking up from her work. “Damn it, these are tight.”

“Let me.” I nudged my way in and squatted down in the grime and muck. Bones and skin stretched as I elongated my fingers into thinner points, giving me an advantage with the knots. Lacey scooted away, and a moment later I heard her on the com, giving someone our exact location.

Thatcher crouched by Aaron’s head and gently removed the gag and blindfold while I worked the final few knots. I got him unwound from the ropes, and we arranged him more comfortably on his back. Lacey said he was alive, but I couldn’t help feeling Aaron’s pulse for myself. It was slow, but steady, and I rubbed his chest with my knuckles like I’d seen doctors do on television.

“Aaron, it’s Renee,” I said. “Wake up for me, pal.”

“I don’t feel any swellings,” Thatcher said, carefully prodding at Aaron’s head. I was silently grateful. Aaron and I weren’t really friendly, but Ethan loved him, so he needed to be okay.

Raven-Marco cried out again from the mouth of the alley, and the familiar rumble of a Sport engine was followed by brakes squealing. Then we were surrounded by activity, and I stepped away so Noah Scott could get at his brother. I stared down at the pair of them, unsure why the sight was so strange, until it hit me that Noah was out in a public street. Dahlia wasn’t in control.

Even more bizarre was the fact that Teresa had come with him, and she wasn’t saying a thing about it.

Gage was there with her, too, and Marco had shifted back.

“I have searched the other nearby alleys,” Marco said. “There is no sign of Ethan.”

“What about their car?” Gage asked.

“I smelled nothing unusual there or here, but your nose is more sensitive than mine.”

Gage closed his eyes. He breathed in deeply through his nose, held it, then exhaled slowly through his mouth. Repeat times four, then he blinked at us. He looked a little green. “The alley stink is overwhelming, but there’s nothing that stands out. No unfamiliar aftershaves or perfumes.”

He moved over to Aaron and did the same thing, trying to get some kind of scent marker off his clothes or the rope. When he looked up at us, he didn’t bother hiding his frustration. “Nothing.”

“Take Marco and Lacey back to the car with you,” Teresa said. “See what you can find there.” Her face was tight, outwardly calm, but I knew her too well. Inside she was falling apart knowing one of ours was missing.

Fuck missing. He was taken.

The trio left the alley. Teresa squatted next to Noah, who was still trying to coax Aaron awake.

“There’s no exterior sign of trauma,” Thatcher said. He’d moved a few feet away, as though afraid to intrude on our private moment of worry. I kind of respected that sensitivity (just don’t tell anyone).

“He must be drugged, then,” Noah said. “Aaron’s hybrid-Changeling ability makes it damn hard to knock him out otherwise. They’d have had to hit him in the head with a bowling ball.”

That mental image made me shudder.

“Let’s get him out of the alley, at least. Lying there won’t do him any good.”

Teresa looked up, right at Thatcher, her eyebrows arched in surprise. Surprise he was being helpful, or surprise that he’d beaten her to the suggestion, I couldn’t begin to guess. “Good idea,” she said.

Noah and Thatcher did the heavy lifting, while Teresa and I went ahead to open the back doors of the Sport. At the moment, Noah didn’t look like he could lift a toddler, let alone half of a grown man—just like Dahlia earlier, he was pale and looked like he had the flu. Something was definitely up with Double Trouble, but now wasn’t the time or place to ask.

Maneuvering Aaron inside the Sport was a sight to see—he was nearly six feet tall and had to weigh in at about one-seventy—but Noah and Thatcher managed. I pulled a blanket out of the rear compartment and tucked it under Aaron’s head. He was filthy and reeked of the alley, and just as Noah knelt on the floor next to him, he let out a pained groan that got our collective attention.

“Aaron? Come on, wake up, bro,” Noah said. “Fight it.”

Score one for Changeling physiology.

It took nearly a full minute of face-scrunching and head-twisting for Aaron to pull loose from the sedative’s hold and get his eyes open. I had a bad angle of his face, but I could clearly see the relief on Noah’s. Aaron mumbled something I couldn’t hear.

Noah looked pained. “We aren’t sure.”

Where’s Ethan?

Aaron tried to sit up, only to fall back against the seat with a grunt.

“Give yourself a minute.” Noah pressed both palms down on Aaron’s chest.

Aaron clasped one of Noah’s wrists and said, “Need to find him.”

“We will. What do you remember?”

“Body in the street. We stopped. Got out. This.”

“Setup,” Teresa said, more to herself than to him.

Aaron made a noise that was probably his version of No shit, really?

“But why only Ethan?” Thatcher asked. “Why not take both of them?”

“One is easier to manage than two,” Teresa replied. “It’s also possible they weren’t sure who or what Aaron is, so they didn’t want to risk trying to handle him. Ethan’s abilities aren’t a secret.”

“Should’ve been more careful,” Aaron said. “Shit.”

“He’ll be fine,” Noah said. He sounded as if he believed the words, but he might have been humoring his brother. He swiped the back of his hand across his forehead—was he sweating? “He always is.”

That sounded more like Dahlia coming through. She and Ethan were practically in each other’s pockets lately, and the dual panic she and Noah must be sharing had to be overwhelming. I couldn’t imagine sharing a body and mind, much less having two sets of emotions to deal with at once. I could barely manage my own emotions most days.

Teresa’s cell rang, and she stepped away to answer it. “Hey, Simon,” she said before she moved out of earshot.

Good grief, Andrew was going to freak out when he realized his big brother was missing. The kid was eight. He’d been through too much already, was too damned young to have seen the shit he’d seen. Sure, kids were resilient during and after a crisis, but we carried that baggage for the rest of our lives. Mine was still firmly strapped to my back with a big old Fucked over and sold out by her own parents written on it in permanent ink.

Thatcher was tracking Teresa with his eyes, and I couldn’t help wondering if he was thinking along the same lines, worrying about Andrew. And Caleb, too. Both boys were attached to Ethan, and both deserved a safer life than the one they had. I’d never disagreed with that part of Teresa’s vision for a united Meta community. Children deserved a chance to grow up happy and safe, no matter who their parents were. Hell, if we were judged by our parents’ actions, the Rangers would have drowned me in the creek like an unwanted puppy and been done with me.

Instead, they saved me and gave me that happy, safe childhood.

For a while.

“Simon has a security camera outside of his house,” Teresa said once her conversation was over. “But we’re too far away for it to have seen anything. Simon’s coming out to read the area, though, see if he can pick up any emotional backwash.”

“What about the kids?” I asked.

“His housekeeper is going over to sit with them for a little while.” Just in case hung off the end of her sentence.

I had nothing to contribute to their search, so I hung back while Teresa headed over to the other Sport, where Gage and Marco were still poking around. They were too far away to hear anything, but close enough at half a block to still see clearly. And Gage was very clearly frustrated. He even pulled away when Teresa tried to touch his arm, and that rarely happened. Those two always used to be like peas and carrots, and lately they were more like the same ends of a magnet, pushing each other away.

“If you don’t let me up right the fuck now, I will hit you!” Aaron’s snarled statement bounced out of the Sport’s interior.

“Fine,” Noah snapped back. “If you fall on your face, I’m not picking you up.”

“Fine.”

Thatcher’s lips twitched, and when our eyes met he mouthed, Brothers?

I nodded. I’d forgotten he didn’t know our twisted history with the Scotts and their Changeling halves.

Aaron stumbled out of the Sport and right into Thatcher, who grabbed his arm and kept Aaron from falling face-first to the pavement. “Take it easy, kid,” Thatcher said.

“I’m not a fucking kid.” Aaron pulled away and only managed to fall sideways against the side of the Sport. He was smart enough to stay put, though, and use the Sport for support while he got his bearings.

“Then stop acting like one. Calm down and think.”

Aaron glared. Thatcher had a point. Aaron had known Ethan a few months; Teresa, Gage, Marco, and I had known him for twenty years, and we were keeping our shit together in order to find him. He didn’t get to be more upset than the rest of us.

Déjà vu, honey.

The same thing had happened back in June when Teresa was shot by . . . well, Aaron, technically (but that’s a long damn story), and Dahlia about had a fit. Dahlia, who’d been part of our group for all of six months, who didn’t have our shared history, who’d never trained to be a Ranger. I’d seriously resented her grief and fear, and I was resenting Aaron’s, too.

Unfair? Maybe so, but that’s the way it goes.

“What do you remember about the person in the street?” Thatcher asked.

Aaron’s face scrunched up. He looked ahead of us, toward the other Sport, like it held the answers he needed. “A woman or girl, from the body shape. She was angled away from us, down, so I never saw her face.”

“Tall or short?”

“Short to medium, I guess. Her legs were bent.”

“Hair?”

“Not sure. She was wearing a knit cap, I think.”

“Clothes?”

Aaron rubbed his forehead and left a smear of grime behind. “Jeans, sneakers. A baggy T-shirt, maybe blue. Nothing that stands out.”

“She could have been Bethany Crow,” I said.

“That makes sense,” Thatcher said. “It leaves Landon as lookout, and it’s fairly easy for a telekinetic to drug someone from a distance. He could send in a syringe and depress the plunger without ever being seen.”

“But why take Ethan?”

“It’s possible my son, or the people who took him, are trying to get my attention again. He and Aaron made themselves targets by being out in the city alone.”

“Hey!” Aaron said.

Thatcher gave him a hard look. “You stopped to help a stranger on the street without first reporting it to someone at your HQ. You went out in the open. Perhaps they took advantage of your desire to help others, but regardless, you both made very amateur moves tonight.”

Aaron flushed dark red, and I half expected him to take a swing at Thatcher. Instead, he strode off toward the group at the other end of the block.

Inside the Sport, Noah heaved a sigh. “Aaron already blames himself, you know,” he said from his spot on the floor. “He calls it the big brother prerogative. Makes him a little unreasonable sometimes, especially when someone he loves is in trouble.”

“Understandable,” Thatcher said, “but he needs to be focused, or he’ll only hinder our investigation.”

I gave Thatcher a shrewd look. He spoke with a self-assurance that hadn’t been there before, and he stood a little straighter, more confidently. At some point he’d stopped thinking of this as something he was forced to help with and started thinking of it as our investigation. He’d become part of it, rather than an outsider looking in.

The corner of my brain that had always rebelled against including the Manhattan prisoners in anything we did stayed curiously quiet. Didn’t protest Thatcher’s inclusion or the way he’d handled Aaron just now. He’d been direct and useful. And for the first time since we sprang him, I didn’t mind Thatcher’s presence.

Not that I’d ever tell him so.