Even Villains Have Interns (12 page)

Delilah laughed. “I wasn’t intentionally
abandoning you.”

“Uh huh.” Alan cornered her against the desk.
“You turned me down or canceled every date. How long have I been
chasing you? Over a year now?”

“I had perfectly valid reasons.” She tossed her
hair. “I thought you might get hurt.”

“Hurt?” Alan smirked.

Delilah shrugged. “It was a valid concern. If
you weren’t a superhero you’d still be at the hospital nursing the
world’s worst stomach cramp.”

“So, you’re saying I should have led with the
superhero fact?”

“Oh yeah.” She nodded.

“Because you like superheroes?”

She wrinkled her nose. “I like you. Let’s not
push any of the other details.” She scrutinized the board once
more. “Where does Kalydon come into play? He owns the Wacker
building. Is he part of this, or no?”

Alan shrugged. “I don’t know. Up until today I
would have said he’s a businessman, older, semi-retired, and all I
know from his private life is that he likes hunting. He’s a Good
‘ol Boy with a chip on his shoulder.”

“What changed your mind?”

“He came to my office tonight to make demands.
Vague ones. He wants the superheroes out of the city, then said he
knows there are two here. He finished by telling me politicians are
cheap. I don’t know if he meant we were bribable or
replaceable.”

Delilah frowned at her empty take-out container.
“Does he know we’re the supers he wants gone?”

“Probably not. He might not even mean us.” Alan
grimaced. “Which leads to my other piece of bad news for the
evening. The Company is in town on a shopping trip.”

“They go near Travys and I’ll kill them,”
Delilah said without hesitation.

He shook his head. “No, they’re trying to get a
formula of some kind. Katrina thinks she can make new superheroes.
I don’t even know if it’s a real thing though.”

“There’s nothing like that on the market now,
but there’s always been rumors. I’ll have my research team look
into it.”

Alan shot her an amused smile. “Research team?
Who are you, Bruce Wayne?”

“Mmm, more like Batman’s beloved and
well-financed daughter.”

“Lucky girl.” He squared his shoulders. “I’m
supposed to meet The Company operatives at midnight. Want to tag
along?”

Anything The Company could dish out, she could
handle, but it didn’t seem like Alan was trying to set her up for a
take down. “I have other plans tonight.”

“Would I make your life easier if I wrote down
the GPS coordinates for the meeting?”

“It would save me some legwork.”

He smiled. “Then I’ll leave the address
somewhere easy for you to find on the way out the door. But, first,
is there any chance of a kiss good night?”

Dear Mom,

Random question of the day... When you first
met Dad, how did you know he was The One? Was there a flash of
light? Did he take your breath away? How’d you know he was perfect
for you, or was it just a lucky guess?

All my love,

Delilah

Delilah balanced the Teodora on one hip as
something at her other hip beeped.

“Want help with that?” Alan leaned over her
shoulder, arms encircling her as he gently lifted the Teodora out
of her grasp. “Now you can answer your phone.”

“Give it back.” She reached for the gemstone
with one hand as she pulled out her phone. “I have a really good
reason for taking that home with me.”

“Uh huh,” Alan said. “Like you have a
really
good reason for skipping out on our date again? I
thought we were meeting to watch the buy.”

“I was on my way and remembered I needed to pick
something up that I left here after the party.”

“A giant emerald?”

She glanced at her phone. A blue light on her
phone’s map of Chicago showed Travys in the wrong part of town. “I
need to get it out before it hatches and eats everything. They’re
ravenous when they first emerge.”

“Hatch?”

“Yes, hatch. It’ll eat the other stones, and
most of the fossils, and possibly the building. We can leave it at
the zoo if you want, but it’s not safe to leave here.”

“
Hatch
?”

“What? You thought I actually wanted a
twenty-five pound emerald? What would I do with it? Green is not a
flattering color on me.” Delilah grabbed Alan’s wrist and dragged
the Spirit after her. “I’ve got to go get Travys.” He slipped
through her fingers like smoke.

“What’s wrong with Travys?”

She watched the tracking point of his phone.
“He’s gone and done something stupid.”

“You’re tracking your intern’s phone? Isn’t that
illegal?”

“It’s a family phone.” Locks on the cases around
them cracked open. Delilah rubbed her forehead, trying to contain
her emotions. “Angela is going to kill me.”

“Family? What, you’re in the mob now?”

Delilah froze halfway down the staircase, where
the winter moon threw odd shadows across the darkened museum. “What
are you going on about?”

Alan came down the last few steps so he stood on
eye-level with her. “You don’t look like you belong to a crime
family, but...”

“Family; as in Mom, Dad, Brother, Sister. Travys
is sort of my adopted baby brother. Sort of. It’s weird.” She waved
his next question away. “Do you know how amoebas roll over and
absorb everything they touch? My family is like that. They steam
roll and assimilate everything in their path. Travys got caught in
it one day, but he’s a good kid and he didn’t have anyone else, so
we dragged him into the clan.”

“Why?”

“My sister used to be his math teacher.”

Her boots echoed on the tile floor of the atrium
and Delilah realized Alan had stopped. “Hello? You have my egg. You
need to keep walking.”

“You know, I never had a family of my own, but
when the other kids in foster care talked about loving home
environments they never used terminology better suited for a
biology class.”

“They probably didn’t have a family like mine,”
Delilah said. “Even by our own lax definitions we’re a little
weird. Every family is, I imagine.”

“I wouldn’t know. I never had one.”

She pivoted, walking backward so she could watch
him. “Did you ever try to look them up?”

He shrugged. “There never seemed to be a reason
to.”

The lights flickered around her as the secondary
generator cut back in. A siren screamed as she sighed. With a touch
of her finger she turned the coms unit on. “Freddie? Meet me at the
side entrance. And open the pixie cage.”

Alan’s footsteps echoed on the floor behind
her.

Delilah pulled out her whistle as a voice yelled
from the third floor for them to stop. Brightly colored lights
flitted past and she barely had enough time to grab Alan’s hand as
he reached. “Don’t touch. They bite.”

“What are they?”

“Pixies. Don’t ask.” She held the door open and
shooed him toward the car. “How’d the buy go? Did you see the
seller?”

“It was a preliminary meet up with a voice
recording on a tape recorder. The thing had to have been forty
years old.”

Delilah whistled again to call the pixies back
before climbing into the vehicle. “And the voice on it was
warped?”

“Noticeably.” Alan frowned as he pulled his seat
belt on. “But I recognized it anyway. Remember Kalydon?”

“The man who said politicians were cheap? Yeah,
he sticks out. Freddie?” She tapped the minion on his shoulder as
he merged into traffic. “Slow down, or the pixies will never catch
up and they’ll freeze to death.”

The car picked up speed.

“Freddie!” The car slowed and Delilah stripped
off her gloves. “Did Kalydon say what he was selling?”

“Whatever it is, he wants one million in
unmarked bills and a donor from anyone interested.” He shifted the
Teodora. “I... just stole this for you, didn’t I?”

“Yup.”

He closed his eyes. “You are so bad for my moral
integrity.”

“But a vast improvement to your street cred.”
She smiled.

Alan didn’t smile back.

“It’s an egg! Look.” She pulled a flashlight
from her bag on the cab floor and shone it into the egg. The deep
green ribbons rippled, rolled, and two riparian eyes blinked at
them. “My father forgot this one when we were on vacation one year.
It wasn’t incubated at the right temperature and it’s only dumb
luck the poor little thing didn’t die. If it had hatched in the
museum there would be all sorts of problems.”

Alan dropped the Teodora on the seat between
them. “Your father tinkers with a lot of genes, does he?”

“Not officially. He’s a professor in ethics.
Now.” She squirmed. “He was a little bit wild as a kid.”

“How wild?”

“America’s Most Wanted Super Villain wild?”

Alan seemed to consider this. “I thought the
Most Wanted villain in the world was Strike, and last I checked,
she was a woman.”

“Is a woman. Yes. My father was a super villain,
then he retired. Gave up the life of crime almost completely when
he married Mom.”

“I feel like I’m missing a story here.”

Delilah shook her head. “You have no idea how
true that is. Freddie, turn left up here.” She turned back to Alan.
“Are you coming with me to pick up Travys, or am I dropping you at
home? I know you have a city to run in the morning.”

“Are you going to need rescuing?”

“That’s always a possibility.”

***

Alan fastened his seat belt and smiled brightly
at Locke—she was Locke right now, from her shiny metal curls to the
top hat to the thigh-high boots that kept dragging his attention
down to where it was not supposed to be. “I’m not leaving.”

She rolled her eyes. “Fabulous. Freddie, head
after Travys. We don’t have time to waste.”

“Travys works security with Subrosa. He’s
probably at a party. You realize that, right?”

Her glare made the wind chill feel warm. “The
Company is in town and while Travys isn’t going to be a superhero
any time soon, he’s got enough precognitive powers that he might
draw unwanted attention. While there’s a threat, he’s supposed to
stick to routes I have surveillance on. Right now he’s out of
sight, and I’m worried.”

Alan frowned. “I didn’t realize he was anything
out of the ordinary.”

“Most people won’t, but that doesn’t mean The
Company doesn’t have someone who can pick him out.” Locke shrugged,
her copper ringlets tinkling as she moved. “Angela had to protect
him. It’s really not complicated. If you stay around us long
enough, you’re either one of us or you’re dead. I don’t think we
know any other way to live. Travys needs people to take care of
him, to make sure he’s eating right, to...” Her voice trailed off.
“Are you all right?”

Belatedly he realized his tightening shoulders
had rounded until he was hunched up and folded in the corner like
he was three again. “I’m fine.”

One eyebrow went up in question. “I can make you
tell the truth,” Locke threatened.

“I’m fine. It was a stupid reaction.” He sighed,
forcing himself to relax, and looked out the window at the
Christmas lights. “When I was little, that’s all I ever wanted: a
big family and the postcard-perfect holiday. Candy canes, hot
cocoa, sledding down the hill and then running inside to spend time
with a huge throng of people who all loved me.”

“You never had that.” Delilah’s voice was
flat.

He shrugged. “I was abandoned at the hospital
when I was a few hours old. It’s not the start of a story that ends
with happily ever after.”

“You never know,” she said as she took off her
top hat and wig, once again transforming into Delilah. “Maybe if
you’re very good, Santa will bring you a family for Christmas.”

Smirking, Alan turned back to her. “Right. And
what is Santa bringing you?”

Delilah shrugged dismissively. “A pony? I don’t
know. I don’t want things. Anyone can buy things, or, well...
Anyone born into a wealthy family like I was can buy things. What I
can’t buy is safety for my family, or an end to my mother’s
nightmares. If there was a way to buy that, I would.”

Alan leaned forward, interest piqued. “What
happened to your mom?”

“She was kidnapped when I was five. The Rainbow
Dane had this mad idea that he’d kill all the children of super
villains and he was going to get my mom to help because she can
move at super-speeds and fly. She wasn’t going to, but he used a
lotus serum to strip her freewill away. It was rape, but not the
physical kind. Everyone thinks she’s fine, but people can’t lie to
me. That’s my talent—utterly useless as it is; I can make people
tell the truth. So when I caught her crying one day, huddled in the
back of her closet during the middle of the day when I was home
sick and everyone else was gone, I made her tell me the truth. And
she did.” Tears sparkled in Delilah’s eyes. “She hates herself. She
hates everything about herself, because that’s what put us at risk.
And I can’t do a damn thing about it.”

“Did you tell anyone?”

“Daddy knows. I think he knew all along. Mom
tries to act like it’s not a big deal, because the fact that she is
getting better is the only thing keeping Daddy in check. But it’s
going to break down one day. She’ll fall apart, because you can’t
live like that forever, and then Daddy will retaliate and this
little cold war we currently have will turn into something that
makes World War Two look like a picnic.” She pressed her lips
together in thought, and then said, “My dad’s a little scary when
he’s angry.”

“Good to know.” Alan reached for her hand, their
fingers entwined. “I’m sorry I brought that all up.”

She shrugged. “Someone needs to know, in case I
ever go crazy. Keeping secrets... Sometimes it feels like
everything is on my shoulders. I know too much to be happy. I know
what’s wrong with everyone and what they want and why they want it,
but I don’t know how to fix it.”