Deadly Descendant (31 page)

Jamaal made a dismissive sound. “The little shit will get a kick out of going behind Anderson’s back.”

Was I crazy, or was there a hint of gruff affection beneath Jamaal’s expressed disdain? He made such a habit of snarling it was hard to take it very seriously or personally, but I’d always assumed his animosity toward Jack was real and heartfelt.

“That isn’t exactly what I’d call a rousing endorsement,” I pointed out.

“Come up with a plan that doesn’t require illusion magic, then.”

“You’re not being very helpful,” I grumbled.

Jamaal didn’t bother with a response, which was just as well. He was right, and for the plan we’d come up with, we’d need Jack’s help. I still didn’t like it. I was used to working alone, and it had taken some adjustment to get used to thinking of myself as part of a team. I didn’t like having to trust other people, especially someone as mercurial as Jack.

There was that, and there was also the fact that even if our plan worked out perfectly, Anderson would be furious with us. Then, if Emma threw a little more gasoline on the fire by trotting out her accusations against me, I could find myself in big trouble. There were makeshift prison cells in the basement of the mansion—Anderson’s version of the preschooler’s “time-out”—and I didn’t want to think about what
would happen to Steph if I found myself locked up in one. Emma would have a field day. And that was the best-case scenario! If our plans failed, it would be much, much worse.

If I’d been able to think of another plan, even if I’d just had an inkling of one, I’d have seized it. But I had nothing, and I wanted to stop Kerner before he killed again.

“All right,” I said reluctantly. “Jack’s in. Assuming he agrees to join us, that is.”

“Oh, he’ll join us, all right,” Jamaal said with complete confidence.

I gave him an inquiring raise of the eyebrows.

“Sneaking around? Doing something recklessly dangerous? That is so his cup of tea. He’ll be all for it.”

“Great,” I answered while trying to silence my internal alarm bells. Either my gut was trying to tell me that this plan sucked, or I was suffering an acute bout of paranoia. I wished like hell I knew which one.

After reaching our decision,
Jamaal and I sought out Jack—who was surprised to see us, to say the least—and laid it all out for him.

Jamaal was right, and Jack was more than eager to participate. I would have liked to have gone running out to the cemetery right that moment and get the whole mess over with, but I managed to put a lid on my eagerness.

The phases of the moon seemed to have an effect on my hunting abilities, and though the moon was near full tonight, it was cloudy out. If I had more moonlight, I’d have a better chance of tracking Kerner down, and the clouds were supposed to clear during the day.

I discussed timing with Jack and Jamaal, and we all agreed it would be best to wait until the next night to implement our plan. We needed to stack the odds in our favor as much as possible.

Not surprisingly, I couldn’t sleep that night. Let’s face it, I
was scared. There were so many things that could go wrong with our plan. And even if everything went perfectly, I knew I had to make myself disappear before Emma realized I was reneging on our “deal.” The only reason I was still hanging around was that I needed to stop Kerner first.

In the wee hours of the night, I packed my bag, taking only the essentials, and snuck through the darkened house out to the garage while no one was around to see me. I stashed the bag in the trunk of my car. Tomorrow night, regardless of what happened with Kerner, I would make my escape.

I didn’t think I could bear to say good-bye, but I couldn’t just disappear without a word. I spent the rest of the night composing letters of farewell to those who mattered most to me: Steph, my adoptive parents, Anderson—who needed to hear the truth, even if he refused to believe it—and, yes, Jamaal. I even wrote a short note for Blake, asking him to take good care of Steph.

It was a good thing I composed those letters on my laptop, because if I had been writing by hand, I’d have smudged the ink with my tears. You never appreciate what you have as much as you do when you’ve lost it. I wished I could hug the Glasses one more time before I disappeared from their lives completely—thanks to their cruise, it had been weeks since I’d seen them. More than anything, I wished I could hold on to the fantasy of being part of Anderson’s team, of living with fellow immortals who knew my secrets and
would remain constant as the years, decades, and centuries passed. I had tried to keep myself aloof from them, and I had failed miserably.

As the long, slow hours of the night crept by, I couldn’t help wondering if the best-case scenario wasn’t for the jackals to get me. But I wasn’t Emmitt, to think only of myself and my own needs. If I went on the run tomorrow, it would hurt Steph and our parents—and maybe some of the
Liberi
—pretty badly, but at least they’d know I was alive. And maybe in their own minds, they could imagine a better and brighter future for me than the one I knew was coming.

As consolations go, it wasn’t much.

We met on the front porch at a little after nine the next
night, going out one at a time so that no one would see the three of us leaving together and wonder what we were up to. I was the last to arrive, because I’d waited until the last possible moment to print out my farewell letters, seal them, and leave them on my desk. Seeing those envelopes neatly lined up on my desk had made everything seem much more real. My heart was already aching with loss, and I hoped like hell Steph would one day forgive me for leaving her like this. I was pretty sure she would understand, but understanding isn’t the same as forgiving.

I wondered if this was how my mother had felt when she’d walked out of that church without me. Had she had a good reason? Had she hoped I’d forgive her someday?

I shook the thought off. This wasn’t the same thing. Steph wasn’t a child, and I wasn’t disappearing without a word.
Yeah, like leaving a typewritten note is going to make it all better.

Jeez, I was a maudlin bundle of nerves tonight, but who could blame me under the circumstances? When I stepped out onto the porch and found Jamaal smoking a joint, I was almost tempted to ask him to give me a puff. But somehow I didn’t think adding drugs to my anxiety and sleep deprivation was going to be an improvement.

While my stomach was tight with dread and Jamaal was smoking the joint because he needed it to help him stay calm, Jack seemed more excited than nervous. He watched Jamaal smoking with a hint of amusement in his eyes.

“You gonna share that?” he asked hopefully. Jamaal gave him a withering look, and Jack pouted.

“You’re bad enough sober,” I said, to save Jamaal the trouble of responding. “I don’t want to be around you if you’re stoned.”

Jack grinned at me. Sometimes I swear I thought his face had frozen that way. “But it doesn’t bother you to be around a stoned death goddess descendant?”

“I’m not getting stoned,” Jamaal snapped, playing right into Jack’s game as usual. Amazing how easily Jack was able to provoke him. And that he’d lived to tell about it. “I’m just trying to keep the death magic quiet.”

“Riiiight,” Jack drawled. “And you read
Playboy
for the articles.”

“Guys,” I interrupted before Jamaal could react, “let’s not start this, okay?” I glared at Jack, though I’d never seen any evidence that glares affected him. “If you set Jamaal off before we even get in the car, you’ll have screwed up our plan at step one, because it’ll be noisy, and someone will wonder what the hell we’re up to.”

Jack’s eyes twinkled with mischief, and Jamaal grumbled something under his breath that I was perfectly glad not to have heard. I ignored them both and headed out to the garage, glancing over my shoulder at the lighted windows behind me, hoping no one would see us. But who sits around looking out windows at night?

We made it to the garage without incident and without anyone from the house seeming to notice us. The moment we were inside the garage, Jack started in on the troublemaking again, reminding me of all the reasons why I’d hesitated to include him in the plan.

“I’m driving,” he announced, pulling a rabbit’s-foot key fob out of his jeans pocket.

“No,” Jamaal and I replied in concert.

I’d ridden in a car Jack was driving once, and I had no desire to repeat the experience. Besides, my bag was in the trunk of
my
car, and I intended to drive myself. I knew Jamaal wouldn’t want to get into the Mini, so that meant we’d have to take two cars—which was perfect, because I didn’t want to leave Jamaal and Jack stranded when I made my getaway from the cemetery.

“I’m never getting in a car you’re driving again,” I said. “At least, not without a blindfold and Valium.”

“That can be arranged,” Jack answered, undaunted. “Jamaal’s stoned, and you’re going to need all your concentration for the hunt.”

“I am
not
stoned,” Jamaal gritted out. “Stop being such an asshole.”

“I’m driving,” I declared. I unlocked the Mini and reached for the door. “If you have a problem with that,” I said over my shoulder to Jamaal, “then you can drive your own car, and we can do rock, paper, scissors to figure out who gets stuck with Jack.”

To my surprise, Jamaal opened the passenger door like he was fine with the idea of riding with me. It meant I was going to have to strand them at the cemetery after all, but I wasn’t going to renege now that I’d already offered.

Jamaal started folding the seat forward to let Jack into the backseat, then paused with a thoughtful look on his face.

“We shouldn’t take the chance that Kerner might see Jack riding around in the backseat while we’re looking for a place to park. We should have our cover all ready to go by the time we get there.” He turned and looked at Jack, his expression almost gleeful. “You should ride in the trunk and be in your Konstantin disguise by the time we open it to get you out.”

Crap. This was not a contingency I’d planned for. I didn’t want the guys to know I was planning to bolt. Maybe they wouldn’t try to stop me—I doubted Jack cared one way or another, and with the dangerous
undercurrents that ran between us, Jamaal might be just as happy to see me go. But even if they didn’t try to stop me, I knew they wouldn’t let me go quietly and without fuss.

“You won’t give me a hit,
and
you’re going to make me ride in the trunk?” Jack said. “Man, you two are cold.”

Jamaal surprised me by holding the joint out to Jack, which made Jack laugh.

“No, thanks,” he said. “Never touch the stuff.”

Jamaal took one last drag, then stubbed out the half-smoked joint and put it away. He blew his smoke directly into Jack’s face. Jack laughed again but not until after he stopped coughing.

“My trunk is too small for Jack to ride in,” I said, trying to sound casual. “Maybe you guys should take the Saab, and I can meet you there.”

Jack’s form shimmered, and seconds later, there was a fluffy white miniature poodle, complete with a pink bow and painted toenails, sitting where he had been. The poodle made an impossibly long leap and landed on the passenger seat, then put its paws on the dashboard and panted eagerly, tail wagging furiously, looking for all the world like a real dog excited for a car ride.

Jamaal rolled his eyes. “Size isn’t an issue,” he informed me unnecessarily as he grabbed the poodle by the scruff of its neck and lifted it off the seat. He held the poodle up to his face and glared at it. “This is not a laughing matter, so quit with the hilarity.”

The poodle nodded solemnly, then flicked out its
long, almost froglike pink tongue and licked Jamaal’s face. Jamaal made a choking sound and tossed the poodle away from him hard enough to make me wince in sympathy. Jack resumed his human form before he slammed into the wall of the garage. He let out a soft “oof” and slid to the floor on his butt, but it didn’t seem to put a damper on his sense of humor.

“You should have seen your face!” he said, laughing at Jamaal as he picked himself up off the floor. “Priceless! If only I’d had a camera.”

“Whose idea was it to bring Jack?” Jamaal asked me with a look of chagrin. He wiped at his face where Jack had licked him but showed no sign that he might be losing control of his temper. Which was pretty impressive, considering
I
might have lost my temper in his shoes.

“Yours,” I reminded him, then smiled, realizing he’d just made something approximating a joke.

He scowled but with less ferocity than usual. “Pop the trunk.”

And here I’d been hoping Jack’s prank might miraculously make Jamaal forget about his brilliant idea for deception. I tried to think of a good excuse not to put Jack in the trunk, but I came up empty. Either I had to let the guys see that I was ready to bolt, or I would have to change my mind about taking my own car. The latter meant I’d have to come back to the mansion later, and I didn’t think that was a good idea.

While I was still hemming and hawing, looking for a third option, my trunk popped open of its own
volition. I leapt out of the car with a startled gasp and saw Jack peering curiously into the trunk.