Page 93 of A Barista's Guide to Love & Larceny
“And we’re just supposed to believe that?” Wyatt sneered.
“Yeah,” Kass said. “Yeah, you are. And even if you don’t, itdoesn’t matter, because you guys were seen by literally a thousand people just a few minutes ago. I don’t think me being here is going to be your biggest problem.”
“He’s right,” Oliver said slowly. “If Dani trusts him, we should at least give him a chance.”
Dani felt a surge of gratitude toward her friend. Wyatt opened his mouth, but Silva held up a hand.
“Stop,” she said. “We’re all under incredible duress right now, and we need to take a beat. I, myself, was unaware of Miss Lionet’s affiliations until tonight. And I assure you, I will take care of it.”
Take care of it?Dani’s stomach squeezed. What did that mean? And where the hell was McKenna?
“But right now,” Silva said, “we have more pressing matters to deal with. The laptop, Mr. Shalhope.”
She held out a hand to him—and as she did, the winds in the gazebo shifted slightly. Wyatt looked down at the slim device tucked under his arm, then back up at Silva. Katya and Oliver each took a step closer to his side, and as their expressions hardened with determination Dani understood what was happening.
Silva, however, did not. “Mr. Shalhope,” she said again, sharper. “Give me the laptop.”
“No,” he said. “Not until you tell us the truth.”
“The truth?” she repeated. “The truth about what?”
A small silence followed, but it was a silence with texture. Dani unwound her hand from Kass’s and stepped forward, moving around Silva to face the woman, whoever she was, with the other four at her back. Silva’s gray-blue eyes found Dani’s, emotions flitting across them like shapes in a spinning zoetrope, until they finally landed on a rigid resolve.
“So you’ve been spreading your baseless accusations, then?” she said.
“I’m not accusing you of anything,” Dani said. “I’m just asking a question. Who are you?”
“My name is Beatrice Silva,” the woman said coolly. “You know that.”
“We know your name, yeah,” Dani said. Anxiety was burbling like a cauldron brew in her stomach. Kass came to stand behind her, positioning himself between her and the rest of the group. “But we didn’t know who you work for. You never told us.”
“Because it wasn’t important,” Silva said, “and still isn’t. I’ve always been honest that I didn’t come here on my own.”
She was fighting hard against Dani’s ability. For the first time, maybe because she’d started testing out her gift more, Dani could see that resistance in her mind’s eye—a black barrier between her and the things Silva didn’t want to tell her. When Dani spoke next, she imagined her words forming a silver sword, which she pierced gently, experimentally, into the barrier.
“But you haven’t been honest about everything, have you?”
The question started to slide through the resistance—but then it struck something rock-hard as her opponent redoubled her efforts. The strain was showing on Silva’s face now, tension tightening the skin around her eyes and mouth.
“I’ve been honest about everything I could be,” she said. “I was sent here by an organization to investigate OneiroLabs with the intention to acquire information that could be used to stop them from hurting people.”
“Stop them from hurting people,” Dani said, “or just stop them?” The sword hadn’t worked, so this time she pictured a torch of brilliant reds, oranges, and golds kindling in her mind, her words licking like flames against Silva’s wall.
“Why can’t both be true?” Silva said, and Dani knew that she’d thinned at least one weak point in her barrier. The woman seemed torecognize it, too, because she set her jaw. “This is a pointless discussion. Mr. Shalhope, give me the laptop,now.”
“Or what?” Wyatt said.
“Or I’ll let the university hoist you on your own petard,” Silva snapped. Her barrier wavered like a force field dangerously close to short-circuiting. The woman closed her eyes, withdrawing again, her resistance restabilizing.
“Were you actually going to develop a cure?” Oliver said, their voice as wobbly as a theremin. “Or was that all an act?”
Silva’s eyes opened, and Dani saw real empathy there. “Of course it wasn’t,” she said. “That was always one of the goals, Mx. Izumi. Exposing OneiroLabs will bring light to your situation and, eventually, an antidote.”
“But that’s not the real reason you came,” Dani said. She felt herself trembling. Gingerbread shifted on her shoulder. “Is it?”
Silva fortified herself as she turned her attention back to Dani, to their battle—the wall hardening against her efforts. Dani let the torch in her imagination grow, the fire running the length of Silva’s barrier. Undeterred by the chill of the evening air, beads of sweat broke out on her forehead. This was a challenge Dani had never faced before: pressing someone who knew about her ability and was throwing every ounce of energy into thwarting it. She didn’t know what would happen, if there was some invisible line she could cross where she might actually hurt Silva; but in that moment, Dani found she was willing to risk it, to trust herself to know when to stop. It should have felt wrong, going against everything she stood for, but it didn’t. As she reached further within herself than she ever had before, plumbing the depths of her power and her conviction, she touched what was at the bedrock of her determination to push Silva to the brink: anger.
Yes, Dani realized, she was angry. She was angry at Silva for not having been up-front with her from the very beginning. She wasangry at the woman for exploiting her, for using her exactly the same way her parents had, but cloaking herself in the guise of righteousness and justice. More than anything, though, Dani was angry at herself—for falling for it, for letting herself be used. She’d wanted to believe she’d become savvy enough to detect a bullshitter when she saw one, especially when her ability was supposed to help her root out the essence of a person. It had failed her this time, and she had failed herself—along with Oliver, whom she’d so wanted to help; McKenna, whom she’d roped into this; and Kass, whom she’d hurt along the way.
