Closed Hearts (7 page)

I pretended to take a sip. “This is really great,” I said to her. “Helps with the shakes.”

She threw me a smile over her shoulder, still hovering by the sink. “Julian tried to get Molloy to leave the butterfly behind, you know. I’ve felt what those butterflies are like, and they’re no fun. A jacker should never use one of those on a fellow jacker.” She sounded like she was quoting Julian. I wondered again if they were lovers. Or maybe
she
simply loved
him
. I didn’t have time to waste worrying about it.

I put on a smile, feeling only the slightest twinge of guilt that I was planning on using the tiny butterfly on her. I tried to be casual as I closed the space between us.

“Thanks,” I said. “Molloy’s not exactly the type to listen to anyone else.”

She cast a glance at Raf. He was folding the blanket, masking his thoughts by humming. Which wouldn’t have kept Ava out, but she wasn’t trying to link in.

When I reached her, she leaned close and dropped her voice. “He
is
very cute,” she said. “I can understand why you might want to keep him.”

I mustered another fake smile and hoped she couldn’t hear the pounding of my heart. “Yeah, well he’s kind of shaken up,” I said. “Could you make a cup of tea for him too?”

“Sure.”

As soon as she turned away, I whipped the butterfly out and slammed it against her back, pushing the sharp metallic feet of the device through her long blond hair, her shirt, and probably her skin. She didn’t make a sound as she froze up. I tried to ignore the wide-eyed look of horror on her face and grabbed her arms so that she wouldn’t fall. Raf was off the couch in a flash and caught her before she hit the floor. He swept her up in the blanket and quickly hauled her to the couch.

We have to run.
I grabbed Raf by the hand and towed him toward the outside door, but he quickly outpaced me. I didn’t dare reach back to see if we had been noticed, but there was no way they could miss us sprinting across the factory floor. Raf tried to yank the door open, but of course it was locked. What was I thinking?

Raf searched the door, but instead of a passkey sensor it had a numeric key pad. The sheet-metal door seemed like it had been rusting for the last hundred years, along with the machinery. Raf kicked the door with his strong soccer legs. It rattled and shook, but it didn’t give. The boom echoed off a hundred hard surfaces around the factory. If they hadn’t noticed we’d run before, they certainly would now. I turned my back to him, bracing for their mental reach. They would try to jack Raf first, and I needed to keep them away from his head for us to have any chance of escape.

Raf stopped kicking and rustled behind me. Molloy, Julian, and the other two mages were running toward us, but we were still outside their reach. I plunged into Molloy’s mind and wrestled with him, as well as the other two. Their names automatically popped up but I ignored them, searching for ways to slow them down. I couldn’t stop all three of them, and I didn’t even bother with Julian, afraid the recoil might slow me down.

A loud cracking sound made me jump. Raf had pried open the door! He tossed aside the rusty metallic rod, grabbed my hand, and hauled me through the open doorway. I stumbled after him into the damp summer night’s breeze.

I ran but Raf was faster, and my breath heaved as I tried to keep up with him. The massive building of the mages’ hideout was crammed next to a string of boarded-up businesses. Twilight pushed through the distant skyscrapers of downtown to the nearby low-rise buildings of Jackertown. Plasma lights spotlighted old-style brownstones and tiny merchant shops across the street. People scattered around the sidewalks, pushing through the doors of businesses and standing in groups under the lights. I reached out, skimming minds.

They were all jackers.

Everyone was on high alert, reacting immediately to my soft brush of their mind barriers, and awareness of us swept through their thoughts like a roll of thunder. I quickly pulled back. Protecting Raf in this city of jackers was going to be like shepherding a baby sheep through a gauntlet of wolves. I linked into Raf’s head, ready to shove out anyone that might try to jack him. At the same time, I continuously swept ahead and behind us, trying to keep anyone from even getting close.

Raf veered down an alleyway, and I did my best to keep up with him. I dodged a spill that oozed from a tipped-over barrel and held my breath past the dumpsters overflowing trash onto an abandoned armchair. I reached back to check on our pursuers, careful to brush only Molloy, who I knew wouldn’t be able to detect my mental touch at this distance. He was cursing and scanning the street. At least we were out of their line of sight, around the corner before they spotted us, and now we were out of range too.

I waved to Raf to get him to slow down. We wouldn’t stand out so badly in the darkening Jackertown streets if we weren’t running for our lives. I caught up to him and by the time we exited the alley into yet another street filled with broken businesses and boarded windows, we were walking briskly but not at an unduly suspicious pace.

A couple of boys, no older than fourteen, lingered outside a convenience store. When they saw us, they scurried inside. Unfortunately, we caught the attention of a trio of men standing next to an ancient electric recharge station out front. One smacked his partner on the shoulder and gestured toward us with his chin.

Toward Raf, actually. The reader who had wandered into their wolf den.

The force of their minds slammed into me, then dipped into Raf’s head, but I was able to shove them out. They quickly retreated. Testing me, maybe, but they already knew too much just from that. I grabbed Raf’s jersey sleeve to pull him into the shadowed doorway of a furniture store, clearly abandoned when the jackers took over. Raf tried the door, but it was locked.

Should I knock it down?
he thought.

I don’t think we can hide.
The store was too small to get us out of jacking range. Half the street was staring at us, with the other half busy with their own business, haggling amongst themselves. I kept mindguarding Raf, sweeping for more jackers trying to reach us, but no one was. The trio of jackers was having an animated, silent conversation, probably about us, but brushing their minds to find out exactly what they were thinking would only bring the confrontation quicker. Running wasn’t a great option either. I didn’t even know how big Jackertown was.

We need to find transportation,
I linked to Raf. More urgently, we needed to move out of range of the trio. I edged out of the doorway, with Raf close behind. We crossed the street and walked away from the men as fast as we could without actually running.

Can we hail an autocab?
he asked.

In my panic, I hadn’t even thought of using my phone. I grinned and fished it out of my pocket. I quickly jacked into the mindware interface and pulled up a taxi-paging service. There were no autocabs for miles. I nudged the closest one, but the holographic display flashed red and disappeared: Service Not Available.

I frowned.
Looks like even the autocabs avoid Jackertown.
Regular bus service, and indeed any kind of traffic at all, gave Jackertown a wide berth. It was almost like a little island, hanging on the edge of downtown, which wasn’t the friendliest of places to begin with. Especially at night after all the regular downtown workers fled for the relative sanity of the Chicago New Metro suburbs.

I can call my dad,
Raf thought.
He can come pick us up.

My shoulders hunched up. If Raf’s dad knew I had gotten him dragged to Jackertown, I’d never see Raf again. They would probably move back to Portugal, where Raf’s parents had been born. I put a hand on his arm to keep him from pulling the phone all the way out of his pocket.
Your parents are readers. It’s not a good idea to bring them here. Let me try calling my dad.

We had moved out of range of the trio of men, but now they were stalking toward us, keeping pace. I kept up my sweeps around Raf’s mind and picked up our speed, passing a string of boarded windows that were plastered with dozens of photofilms. “MISSING” was stamped in red across the faces. I guessed Julian was telling the truth about the missing jackers, but that wasn’t my problem.

I flipped through my phone list and nudged my dad’s number, but it went straight to message. My throat closed up. Had Molloy caught up with him as well? I hesitated only a moment before pulling up Mr. Trullite’s number. The one he had given me for emergencies. The one my dad didn’t know I had.

It picked up right away. “Lucy?” There was a rumble of concern. Or possibly annoyance. I seriously hoped I wasn’t about to get my dad fired. “Are you okay, dear?”

“Um, Mr. Trullite, look, I’m really sorry to be calling you like this,” I said. “I wouldn’t, except I can’t get hold of my dad and I… I really need to get hold of my dad. Is he still with you?”

“I’m in the middle of that meeting we discussed earlier.” Definitely annoyance now. “Perhaps you could wait until we are through to speak to Mr. O’Reilly.”

“Mr. Trullite, I’m in Jackertown.”

There was silence on the other end.

“I see.”

“I really need my dad to come get me.” Fear hitched a ride on my voice. “Could you please just tell him to call me?”

“Of course, dear,” he said. “I’ll send a driver right away.”

“Oh! No, wait, don’t do that—”

The phone went dead.

I stared at it.

What did he say?
Raf was nervously checking behind us. The trio of jackers had formed a triangle, with the older ones slightly behind, guarding their rear flank.

He hung up on me. I’m not sure. I think he might be sending a car.
I urged Raf to cross the street again, but half a dozen girls were camped on that side, and their stares weren’t any friendlier. I tugged Raf into the middle of the empty street. It seemed like a hundred eyes and minds were tracking us from behind the boarded-up storefronts. I kept up my vigilant scanning, mindguarding Raf. I felt a surge or two against my head and struggled to swat them away from Raf, but it was only a fraction of the people watching us. If any of them got serious about jacking Raf, I doubted I could hold them off for long. I tried not to let all of my fear show by breaking into a flat run.

My phone vibrated my hand, startling me. I flicked it with my mind to turn it on.

“Kira?” It was my dad’s voice.

“Dad!” I held the phone close, whispering. “I need you to come get us! We’re in Jackertown, at…” I squinted at the street sign, faintly glowing with biopaint. “The corner of 23rd and Laramie.”

“Us?”

“Me and Raf—”

My dad’s curse cut me off. “You and
Raf
?” he said. “I thought you weren’t seeing him any more—”

“Dad!” I said. “I’ll explain later, okay? Molloy found us and—”

“What?” My dad’s voice turned rough. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” I decided now was not the time to mention the bruise. Or the butterfly. “But we need to get out of here before Molloy and the others find us.” I glanced back at the men, who had paused, probably listening to my conversation. I dropped my voice to a whisper again. “We’re heading east—”

“Jackertown isn’t safe for you, Kira,” my dad cut in. “You don’t need me to tell you why. And Raf—”

“I know!”

“Mr. Trullite gave me a car to come get you.” His voice sounded strained, and the hydro engine hummed in the background. He must be hauling through the suburban streets if the car was making noise I could hear over the phone. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

Raf pointed behind us. The men leered, drawing closer. “I gotta go, Dad. Just call me when you get close.”

I hung up the phone and abandoned any pretense, grabbing Raf’s hand and turning to sprint down the street, only to find another two jackers standing dead in the middle, blocking our way. One was a woman, tall and bony, the other a man with a face that had taken a few punches. He could probably arm wrestle Molloy and win. Raf and I stumbled to a stop, trapped between the men behind us and these two in front. I glanced back. The men were holding their position.

I realized too late that they had been herding us.

The woman’s mind slammed into mine with enough force that I swayed back, then she dived deep into Raf’s head. It took me a half second to recover and I was able to shove her out of Raf’s head, but I wasn’t strong enough to wrestle her back into her own mind.

She suddenly pulled back. “Now there’s something I haven’t seen before, Henry,” the woman said.

“What’s that?” Her partner’s sneer made his face even uglier.

“A keeper running trade in Jackertown,” she said. “With your pretty face and that closed head of yours, I’d imagine you could fetch a fine rate all by yourself.”

I had no idea what she meant.

She kept talking. “So why would a keeper be running trade in Jackertown, Henry?”

Henry looked me up and down, taking in my waitress apron with the Dutch Apple logo. “Don’t know, boss. Maybe she’s bringing us some pie.”

“Bet they don’t suspect you at all in that Dorothy from
The Wizard of Oz
getup.” They both smiled wide, and I had a feeling they were mentally laughing at my expense, but jacking into their heads to listen in seemed like a very bad idea.

“So.” She flicked a look to Raf. “How much for your trade?”

I didn’t know what she meant by trade, but the way she was eyeing Raf, I didn’t think it was because he was cute. More like how much she thought she could get for him on the open market.

Tell her you’re just here for business,
Raf thought.

What?
I resisted turning toward him. “I’m, um, here for business,” I said to the woman.
How do you know anything about this?
I linked to Raf.

I have a world-famous mindjacker for a girlfriend,
he thought.
A guy’s got to be prepared.

I was working full time to keep the shock off my face, but the woman looked surprised enough for both of us. She took a closer look at Raf. He gave her a cool stare in return. My heart was giving my ribcage a beating.