Page 19 of The Shade of Things
5
We couldn’t getanything else out of Ian, and Nav had to wrap up his own mission, so Eli and I headed home to review the case.
The first thing we did when we returned to his black Dodge Charger was call Sadie. We’d been truthful with her about where we were going and why because our therapist had stressed the importance of honesty if our family was to remain strong. It would be far worse for our daughter to learn we’d kept this a secret and have her be scared that we were lying every time we left to get groceries.
Jude had come over to my place to keep her company, and I’d heard the relief in both their voices when we checked in.
Ian remained with Celeste. With her dietary needs, she’d treat him well, and I liked how she’d protected him when he’d grown agitated at our questioning. Much as I was loath to admit it, she really was a step up from the trauma he’d faced running the Human Race.
Speaking of which, what was with that bogus prize? The only way Sapiens could achieve immortality was if they were turned by vamps. Except the winners weren’t, hence Ian willingly becoming a blood donor—caught between hoping he’d live forever and praying he’d die.
Much like how I longed to tell Tatiana what I’d learned and hoped she’d never find out.
Traffic was light on the highway back to town. Dusk had fallen and the streetlamps had snapped on, their light washing over Eli’s somber expression like a succession of crescent moons.
“Why offer a prize that was easy enough to deliver and then not bother to? The players are Sapiens, the only humans that vamps are allowed to turn.” Frowning, I flicked the heat onto its lowest setting. “Why promise it at all given the circumstances? These people weren’t invited and incentivized to play this game. They were abducted and forced to save themselves. Was it just a cruel mind fuck?”
“I don’t know.” Positioning his hands in a perfect 9-3 driving hold, Eli drummed his thumbs against the center of the steering wheel. “We need to get into that game, save whoever is still alive, and find out everything we can about who’s behind this. Shut it down for good provided we can find the portal in. Nav didn’t have a clue about that.”
“I’ll ask Tatiana.” Stretching out my legs, I rotated my ankles, ignoring Eli’s grimaces at the cracking sounds they made. “And I’ll pay Ryann a visit.”
“Esposito told me not to bother his daughter. That this was a VPD matter.”
I glanced over at Eli. “You don’t find that weird?”
“Obviously, but I can’t disobey a direct order.”
“Yeah, well, he never said squat to me. If she knows anything about this, I’ll get her to share.” My ankles now loose, I arched my back to stretch it out best I could while wearing a seat belt. “Assume these game masters always kidnap twelve people…”
Game masters reminded me of raven shifters. Would Poe have any insights into this? They might, but I’d rather cozy up to the Wise Brothers before ever playing another game with Poe. Hiram and Ephraim dealt in facts. Engaging with raven shifters brought things into being that wouldn’t have existed otherwise. Thanks to a previous encounter, before I’d learned of the consequences of tangling with them, there was now some “new player” on the game board of my life. I had yet to find out who—or what—it was.
“You going to finish that thought?” Eli said.
For a moment, I seriously considered telling him, but what good would that do other than burden him with my troubles? Jude knew because she’d told me exactly why raven shifter games were dangerous. Eli didn’t have any useful knowledge about them, and I’d only upset him at a time when he needed to be focused on finding Teresa.
“I got distracted making mental lists of who could help.” A semitruck rumbled past, and I instinctively shifted sideways, like that would save me if the thing tipped over on top of us. “What if there’s some significance to the number of people they abduct?” I pulled out my phone, searching symbolic meanings. “Twelve labors of Hercules. Twelve tribes of Israel. Twelve on a jury.” I turned off the screen. “Twelve has meaning in a ton of cultures, in science, and in numeral systems.”
“We’re either looking for a needle in a haystack of possibility,” Eli said, “or it means nothing at all.”
“My favorite either-or scenario,” I said dryly.
“I can dig into the databases for any missing persons that fit the parameters of the case, but if people are kidnapped from all over the world, it’ll be impossible to assemble a list,” Eli said. “And it’ll take time we don’t have.”
Without the copy of Teresa’s meagre file that the Missing Persons Unit had compiled in front of us, we ran out of steam, so I closed my eyes for the rest of the drive. I managed to push all thoughts of this case aside, but my mind drifted back to the Ascendant.
Tatiana spent three years looking for the magic amplifier and was finally on her way to deliver it to her client when she’d been involved in a horrific car crash that left her paralyzed. The artifact was stolen and Tatiana’s professional reputation was destroyed as thoroughly as her ability to walk. She’d fought to regain both.
My take-no-prisoners employer, of course, had never mentioned any of this to me. I’d put part of it together, with Zev filling in the rest when I discovered that my mom and dad had been the ones to cause the crash. But just because the Ascendant had vanished didn’t mean interest in it had decreased. No, there were still plenty of people who could put the pieces together as I had, and one of them had already tried to contact me and force me to find it. Zev had promised he’d protect me from anyone else, as long as I found the magic amplifier for him first.
Obviously, I couldn’t ask Tatiana to do the same, and honestly? Part of me didn’t trust her to have my back on this.
In the end, it came down to two simple facts: Zev was capable of ruthless violence, and I’d do anything to keep myself and my loved ones safe.
I braced my elbow on the passenger windowsill, my head propped up in my hand. My parents didn’t tell me anything about what they were doing or why. Did they fail to comprehend how dangerous their last job was?
I was left in the dark, and then I was orphaned.
Keeping secrets that touched the lives of people you were in a relationship with, be it romantic, familial, or friendship, was selfish and wrong. It truly was a betrayal, simple as that.
