Call Out (27 page)

To my surprise, Carmichael reached out and
took my other hand to give it a little squeeze.

“It’s not really about her, darlin’,” he
said. “It’s about him. Remember that.”

I wasn’t sure what he meant, but I nodded
anyway.

For maybe ten minutes, I forced myself to sit
there, aware of the ebb and flow of conversation around me, but not
a part of it. When I couldn’t take it anymore, I went to find
London and Ashe. I found them in the bedroom, London with his back
against the headboard and Ashe leaning against the wall. Their
conversation met an abrupt end as I stepped into the room, but
London, at least, didn’t seem to mind the interruption. He patted
the bed in invitation, and I went to curl up beside him. He wrapped
an arm around me and kissed my hair.

“You okay?” I asked.

He considered a moment before answering. “Not
great, but yeah...I’m okay.”

Ashe watched us for a minute before pushing
away from the wall. “You gonna remember what I told you?”

London nodded, his face solemn, and pulled me
a little closer. “I will,” he said. “And...thanks.”

“Don’t make me regret it, Stretch,” he said,
letting his eyes rove over me in a way that made me want to squirm
and, to my utter mortification, did make me blush.

“I won’t, I promise,” he said. “Now...fuck
off.”

Ashe laughed as he walked out, turning the
lock on the door before he shut it behind him.

“Do I want to know what that was about?” I
asked.

“Probably. Can’t tell you though. Need to
know, and all that.”

“Oh, bullshit,” I said, without any heat.

“How about I make it up to you?” he
suggested, his tone leaving no question as to how he planned to
follow through.

I rolled my eyes. “You’re incorrigible.” I
turned his face toward mine and kissed him. “Lucky for me.”

Chapter Twenty-Six

Frantic knocking woke us hours later.

“Em, open the door!” Dylan shouted.

“Just a minute,” I yelled back, scrambling
into my clothes.

“The shit just hit the fan,” Dylan told me
the second I had the door open.

“Here?” London asked.

Dylan shook her head. “The field team...they
found Julia.”

I darted down the hall toward the library,
Dylan at my side and London right behind us. Once we were all
assembled, Quinn addressed us.

“My field team has a positive ID on Julia,”
he said, as Carmichael and Peterson did something scary and kind of
noisy with what seemed like an army’s worth of weapons. “Ron,
James, and I are going to meet with them to assess the situation –
and hopefully bring this thing to an end.”

Martine took a step toward him, her fists
clenched. “And I’m to stay behind?”

“We need fighters, Martine. You have your
strengths, but we both know combat magic isn’t one of them.”

“I’m better than you,” she spat, her accent
more pronounced than I’d ever heard it. “Better with a gun as
well.”

“I’m the head of the fucking operation!”
Quinn snapped.

“Quinn’s right,” Ashe said, stepping in
between the two of them. “And so’s Martine. No, just shut up a
minute, Robbie. You can do what you want. Like you said, it’s your
operation. But you need to think about what’s really best for the
operation and for your team.”

Quinn deflated like the last balloon left
over from a kid’s birthday party. He closed his eyes for a moment
and when he opened them, he met Ashe’s gaze. “You’re right. With
this whole sending thing...they’ll probably need you, Martine.”

She nodded and started strapping on gear.

“Someone has to stay behind, to keep an eye
on things here,” he added.

“Ashe will be here,” Peterson pointed
out.

“Like hell.”

“You’re a civilian, Ashe,” Peterson said. “I
know you and Quinn already had this argument.”

“I was wrong about that, too,” Quinn said,
surprising everyone. “If anyone can get my people through this mess
in one piece, it’s Ashe. I want you to take Martine and Peterson
and rendezvous with the team.”

“You’re not going?” Martine asked at the same
that Carmichael said, “I’m staying behind?”

Quinn nodded. “I have two priorities here –
neutralizing the threat and keeping the civilians safe. Ashe is
better suited to the former. I’m taking lead on the latter. It
makes the most sense. I hate it, but it makes the most sense.”

“And why’m I staying here?” Carmichael asked.
“They need all the help they can get.”

Quinn rubbed his forehead between his eyes.
“I need someone else here. Just in case.”

Carmichael growled and turned away.

Peterson laid a hand on Carmichael’s arm.
“You go. I’ll stay.”

Carmichael stared at him.

“I just have a feeling I need to be
here.”

“Shit,” Carmichael said, rubbing his hands up
and down his arms. “I hate when you ‘just have a feeling’.”

“Me, too,” Peterson admitted.

Ashe, Martine, and Carmichael suited up,
armed up, and headed out to meet up with the away team. The rest of
us stayed put, not even venturing away from the library. We all
wanted to be together, and we all wanted to be close to Quinn so
we’d be in the loop, so we all hung out in the library...and we
waited.

Waiting is one of the most difficult things
that a human being can endure. Anyone who has ever taken a major
exam, sat in a hospital chapel while a loved one underwent surgery,
or applied for a job can attest to that. There have even been songs
written about that particular grueling experience. Waiting is never
easy, but sitting around wondering when – or if – we would hear
from Ashe and the field team was sheer hell.

Peterson parked himself in front of the
monitors, gun in hand, to wait. Brian sprawled in one of the big
leather chairs not far from him, and Adrian curled up in its
opposite number near the bookcases behind me. Dylan, true to her
nature, started looking for a book to pass the time with. London,
Quinn, and I paced.

I had only made two circuits of the library
when Peterson sat bolt upright in his chair.

“The perimeter lights just went out,” he
said.

Seconds later, the entire house went
dark.

“Everyone move to the master bedroom,” Quinn
said. I felt his hand on my shoulder, turning me toward the door,
and then the world exploded.

Everything happened at once. Glass shattered,
the loud bark of precise gunfire rang out, and I felt something
warm and wet splatter against my arm even before I heard Quinn’s
pained cry. In the next second, the wall behind me imploded in an
avalanche of books, chunks of wood, pieces of drywall, and bits of
brick. Something hit me in the back, and I went down, more stunned
than hurt.

Moonlight streamed in through the gaping hole
where the wall used to be, and I peered around as best I could
without moving. Adrian and Dylan, who had been near the wall when
it blew, lay sprawled on the ground, half buried in debris. Neither
of them moved, and I sent up a silent prayer for them, that they -
that we all - would make it through this night alive. From my
position, I couldn’t see any of the others, and I couldn’t see the
enemy.

But I could hear her, I realized. She was
talking to London, who was pleading with her to leave Brian
alone.

Taking a chance on my own safety, I turned my
head toward the sound of their voices. Julia was kneeling over
Brian, her hands on his face. From the way he was jerking and
twitching, I had a feeling she was using her metaphysical cattle
prod on him. I knew how much pain he had to be in, and I was scared
for him.

London knelt nearby, yelling and pleading
with Julia – and banging his hands against thin air. It took a
moment for my brain to make sense of what I was seeing, but
eventually it clicked. The psycho bitch had to have some sort of
damned barrier up around her.

I lay my head against the cool, polished wood
of the floor and tried to think. It was really damned hard to
gather my thoughts when they kept bouncing from point to point:
worrying about Brian, worrying about Adrian and Dylan, worrying
about Quinn, wondering what was going on with Ashe and the others,
wondering where Peterson had disappeared to, and most of all
wondering how the hell we were going to take down the bitch while
she was in her metaphysical panic room.

I didn’t have a single clue how to go about
taking out Julia or her shield wall, so I chose to concentrate on
something I did know how to do. With slow, almost silent movements,
I crawled across the two feet of space between Quinn and me,
skimmed off my t-shirt, folded it, and pressed it against the wound
in his shoulder that he’d been trying in vain to keep pressure on.
I leaned on it hard, ignoring Quinn’s stifled grunts and groans. It
was while I was playing nurse that I spotted his gun.

He had to have dropped the Glock when he’d
been shot. It appeared to have hit the floor and then skidded,
placing it just out of my reach. Using Quinn’s body to hide my
movements, I crawled backward, sliding across the floor toward the
gun. I had just closed my hand around its grip, wondering if I
would ever get a chance to fire it, when I heard London speak five
words that froze my heart: “I’ll do whatever you want.”

I turned to look at him, fear turning my
blood to ice.

“I’ll do whatever you want,” he said again.
“Please just let him go.”

Julia sat back, pulling her hands away from
Brian’s face, and studied London for a moment. “I don’t think I
believe you. I think you’re hoping I’ll drop my defenses so you can
come swooping in and save him.”

London tried to speak, but couldn’t seem to
find words. Julia laughed.

“I thought so. So stubborn.” She gave him a
slow, lazy smile. “I’ve always known that about you. So I have a
backup plan.”

For a moment they just looked at each other,
and then London sat back and wrapped his arms around his raised
knees in a gesture I knew all too well.

“Come with me, and I’ll take you to her.
Continue to fight me, and you won’t like the consequences.”

I didn’t know who the ‘her’ in question might
be, but I had no doubt that Julia was telling the truth about his
not liking the consequences of continued resistance. London
obviously had no doubts either. He staggered to his feet, looking
broken, and held his hand out in front of him, his fingertips
grazing the unseen barrier.

“Take me to her,” he said, his voice low and
hoarse.

Julia stood and extended her arm, moving
forward until her fingertips touched the wall that separated her
from London. And then she slid her hand forward, her fingers
meeting London’s.

I didn’t know for sure that she’d dropped the
wall. For all I knew, she could have just made a hole for herself.
But it was the only chance I was likely to get. I rose into a
kneeling shooter’s pose, braced my right wrist in my left hand, and
fired. Then I fired again.

The surprised look on Julia’s face as she
crumpled to the floor is something I will never forget. It will
haunt me for the rest of my life.

London stared at her in shock for a moment
before moving to kneel at Brian’s side, his fingers feeling for a
pulse. A few seconds later, he doubled over, his forehead resting
against Brian’s chest, and my heart did a backflip. I couldn’t make
myself move, though. I just knelt there, holding the gun, as if
waiting for Julia to rise up and make a target of herself
again.

Sometime later – it could have been seconds
or minutes or years – someone took the gun from my hand and made it
disappear. Then London was in front of me, taking my face in his
hands. I could see his lips moving, but I couldn’t make sense of
whatever he was saying.

He stood and pulled me to my feet, turning me
toward the door. I watched Carmichael help Dylan stand and then
escort her to where Brian lay, unmoving. A young man and woman I
didn’t recognize knelt beside him, and I realize they had moved him
onto a stretcher. I tried to ask what I desperately needed to know
– if he was alive – but the answer came in a form I never would
have imagined. Violent spasms wracked Brian’s body, and I heard
someone say the word ‘seizure’. Funny how that one word made it
through the fog around my brain.

“Will he be okay?” I heard myself ask.

“Amy says he’ll live,” London told me. “Too
soon to tell how much damage was done.”

“Alive is good,” I said. And then the world
went kind of gray around the edges.

I felt strong arms lifting me, and I snuggled
in close. I felt weak as a kitten, like I couldn’t lift my arms or
my head. Sound seemed far away and what words I heard were back to
making no sense at all. I gave in to the feeling instead of
fighting it, greeting darkness like an old friend.

Not much time could have passed between my
passing out and my coming around again. I woke lying on the rug in
the master bath with Ashe and London sitting beside me. Ashe smiled
down at me as I looked up at him.

“There you are,” he said. “Knew you couldn’t
stay away.”

I struggled to sit up, and the two of them
helped me. London stood and pulled me to my feet – again – and I
realized with a start that we were both covered in blood.

“Don’t freak out on me,” London said, pulling
me into his arms.

I felt the warm emotional trickle of
projected calm flowing over me and realized that I was no longer
wearing my amulet. Pulling back, I reached up to feel for the
chain, just to be sure.

“It’s in the bedroom,” Ashe said. “You needed
help. You still do, but I’m going to let London take over from
here.” He patted London on the shoulder as he moved past him toward
the bathroom door. “You okay, Stretch?”

London nodded, and Ashe left, pulling the
door shut behind him. Without letting go of me, London turned on
the shower and fiddled with it until he got the temperature right.
Then he stripped us both out of our clothes and pulled me into the
shower.