Even Villains Have Interns (18 page)

Delilah’s gaze fell on the window of
bullet-proof glass and the empty offices beyond. “So it’s true. The
Company is losing superheroes.”

“Like a sieve,” Katrina confirmed. “It’s the
only reason you’re alive. Twenty years ago we had over three
hundred superheroes in the Midwest alone. Now there’s one.”

“That’s a pretty high rate of retirement.”

With a wintry smile Katrina said, “Superheroes
don’t retire. They die.”

“No more heroes. No more mutant babies. No more
Company?” Delilah guessed. “Maybe you should convince the super
villains to switch sides.”

“We tried,” Katrina said through gritted teeth.
“There’s fewer of them every day too.”

Delilah shrugged. “Have you ever considered the
fact that there are superheroes out there, they just aren’t signing
up to do their patriotic duty? Maybe they don’t like Company
policy.”

“Nonsense.” Katrina either didn’t know what
Delilah’s talent was, or hadn’t taken precautions against it. She
rambled on. “My daughter was born a superhero. I’ve done everything
to keep her safe. Do you see grandchildren anywhere?”

“Maybe you were playing it a little too safe.
Can’t have the grandbabies if she’s using a condom.”

Katrina’s death glare put Lead Feather’s to
shame. “I’m going to bring you some paper. You will write a full
confession. You will detail every skill you possess. I will read
it. If I think for a minute you’ve left anything out, I’ll bring my
mind-raper in. You may not have met one before. The Company doesn’t
keep one on staff, but the Russians loaned us Boris as a show of
goodwill. I’m sure you and he will get along like a house on
fire.”

“There’ll be nothing left?” Delilah smiled.

“Quite.” Katrina stepped out, leaving a manila
file folder with Delilah’s information next to a blank sheet of
paper and a pen. It was good to find a kindred soul who appreciated
dead-tree documentation. Such a shame Katrina was a hubris-riddled
fool.

The minute the door swung shut the handcuffs
dropped to the ground. Delilah scribbled the word GOODBYE on the
paper, took her file folder, and collapsed a bit of tile floor.
Dropping into a supply closet was sheer dumb luck, but Delilah
wasn’t one to question providence. The locked door swung open at
her touch, and she sauntered into the winter sunlight a free
woman.

Delilah,

It’s been a week and I don’t know where you
are. I miss you. There isn’t an hour that goes past that I don’t
want to call you. I don’t know if you’ll ever forgive me, but
please, let me know you’re safe. If you get this email...let me
know.

All my love,

Alan

Alan shoved another pile of paperwork to the
side. If he kept up this pace he might be able to find an end to
the mess before the New Year rolled around.

The door opened and shut. He kept reading,
scribbling his signature over highlighted portions and flipping
pages as if his life depended on it.

The person who’d entered finally cleared their
throat. “Boss?” It was Jesse, the office manager hired to replace
the late Chasten Huntley.

“Yes?” Alan turned away from his computer
reluctantly.

Jesse raised an eyebrow. “You do realize it’s
Christmas Eve, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Are you trying to be Scrooge?”

Alan blinked in confusion. The reference seemed
to have no meaning. A vague recollection of a Muppet movie floated
past. “You want to go home?”

“Everyone wants to go home, boss. Except you,
and you’re wearing the suit you wore yesterday.”

Alan looked down at his shirt. “I changed my
tie.”

Jesse sighed. “Is this about the girl from the
news?”

Delilah.
Thinking about her in handcuffs
made him want to run. To rescue her or to run away, he wasn’t sure
which. The Company had hauled her off while the building was still
smoking and he’d been useless. Absolutely, infuriatingly useless.
“It’s not about her,” he lied. “I just like to work.”

“So it has nothing to do with the flowers that
got returned from her office, or all those phone calls where no one
answered?”

“No.”

Jesse squinted at him. “Yeah. How’d you make it
as a politician? You can’t lie.”

Alan shrugged. “An honest politician in Chicago?
People voted for me because I have novelty value. It’s like being
the only unicorn in the petting zoo. Everyone thinks I’m
pretty.”

“I’ve got bad news for you, handsome. Unicorn or
not, no woman is going to give you the time of day when you act
like this. Go home, shower, sleep, order some Chinese food tomorrow
and watch reruns of Christmas specials until you feel like puking.
But don’t come back to the office until the third.”

“The third?” Panic took over. “What am I
supposed to do with that much free time?”

“Sleep?” Jesse suggested. “Go grocery shopping?
Scrub your sink? I don’t know, what do single people do when they
have time off? Maybe you could get a hobby. Take up crochet, or
something.” He crossed the room, snatched Alan’s pen away, and
pointed at the door. “It’s time to call it a night, boss.”

“Are you allowed to order me out of the office?”
Alan asked as Jesse fished his coat out of the small office
closet.

“That’s what you pay me for. It’s right in the
contract, subsection B12:
Make sure the office environment is
healthy, safe, and pleasant for everyone
. That includes
monitoring overtime hours and making sure people don’t kill
themselves for the greater good of the city.”

“I like the city,” Alan protested feebly.

“And the city likes you,” Jesse reassured him in
a calm voice usually reserved for small, frightened children. “But
it’s not worth dying for.”

No, only losing the love of his life for.

He let Jesse usher him out. Everyone else had
gone home, limp garlands from the party he’d missed hung on the
walls, another sad reminder of all he’d given up. Because he was a
superhero. Because he was a freak. Because... He stepped outside
into the snowy street. Chicago at rush hour on a holiday was never
empty, but it felt that way. It was already getting dark and the
snow was piling up. Alan trudged through it, kicking the slush in
front of him.

The lobby was empty. He rode the elevator up
alone. The silence wrapped around him and he walked to his front
door like a man approaching the gallows. For a brief, shining
moment he’d almost had everything he wanted. There had been the
promise of a real holiday in front of him. He let the dream image
of Delilah sitting with him by a Christmas tree surface in his
memory once more. It was so real that for one sparkling second, he
could almost smell her perfume as he fumbled for his keys.

The door fell open.

Delilah stood by the console table wrapped in a
heavy black coat, lit only by the lights from the city outside, her
hair and makeup a flawless shield. “I wondered how late you were
planning on working,” she said without preamble.

His mouth dried out. “How...”

She raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow, her
face an emotionless ivory mask. “They had me in handcuffs, Alan.
How do you think I got away?”

Handcuffs...
“Oh.”

The faintest hint of a smile tugged at the
corners of her mouth. “I’m glad you had the sense not to come
rushing in. For a moment, I worried you’d think I was
helpless.”

“I did. I just didn’t know what to do.”

Delilah shrugged it away. “No matter. The
Company gave me the information I wanted, so it all worked out on
that end. You were the last loose thread I needed to take care of.”
She tapped a white envelope on the console table. “Your Christmas
card. Happy holidays.” She made eye contact, cool and deliberate
and dismissive, and then swept past his reaching hand as if he was
the least of her worries. He probably was.

Alan sat in the dark as the scent of her perfume
faded into the chill air. Christmas alone. Again.

He leaned against the console table and took a
deep, shuddering breath. It hurt. It hurt almost as much as the
time when he was six and thought that one family might actually
adopt him. They’d been so nice, so sweet, and so generous. There’d
been a mountain of toys bought and wrapped—and then on Christmas
Eve the department of child services took him away. His adoption
hadn’t gone through. He’d waited for them to come back, but they
never did. They’d found another adoption agency, another little
boy, and his one chance for happiness was gone without a trace.

His hand clenched around the envelope, and he
felt something hard.

Quickly, Alan flipped on a lamp and ripped the
envelope open. A Christmas card with a horse-drawn sleigh and
carolers slid out. Inside, there was a round-trip ticket to
Vermont, a printout of a car reservation in Vermont for Christmas
morning, an address, and a key. He held his breath as his heart
raced.

She couldn’t have...

She wouldn’t...

The idea was too large to think of in one piece.
Could she have found his family? Delilah, with her quick fingers
and her seemingly endless list of resources. Even if he asked her
not to look, wouldn’t she? Always prying. Always hunting for
answers. That was Delilah...

He took a deep breath.

No, he’d said he didn’t want to know them, and
she would have known that he meant it. So... He turned the key over
in his hand. An airplane ticket, a car, and a house key. Invitation
or threat? Or... challenge. She was going to drag him kicking and
screaming out of Chicago after all. At least for a few days. He
checked the dates on the flight again. There was no way he was
going to sleep tonight, and maybe if he arrived early the airline
could bump him up to an earlier flight. It was worth a shot.

Miss Samson,

I owe you. Come to Toronto if you ever want
to collect.

—
I

The car swerved dangerously on the icy road.
Alan fought the wheel and managed to bring the rental car to a stop
next to a snowdrift. Flat tire. It figured. Heavy snowstorms had
threatened to close O’Hare airport overnight, so he’d flown out
early, not wanting to risk getting snowed in and missing Delilah.
But every step since then had been fraught with trouble. The rental
agency didn’t have cars. When he was finally given a tiny, blue
two-door POS, the onboard GPS couldn’t find the highway he needed.
Then the GPS talked in Swedish for five miles. And now there was a
flat tire.

Movement out of the corner of his eye made Alan
turn. The little red sedan that had followed him since town had
stopped behind him and the single occupant, a blonde woman wearing
a sweater and jeans, was picking her way through the snow to him.
She was thirty, maybe a few years older. Alan rolled down the
window. “I’m fine. You can keep going.”

“And how are you going to get anywhere with a
flat tire?” the woman asked. Fine lines appeared around her eyes
when she smiled and he bumped his estimation of her age up an extra
ten years.

“I’ll be fine. I can call the rental company.
Get a tow truck.” Be late
.
Hopefully Delilah would forgive
him.

“Do you have cell reception?” the woman
asked.

Alan pulled out his phone to check. No
signal.

His face must have given her the answer. “Why
don’t you come with me?” she asked. “Our cabin’s five miles from
here, and we have a land line.”

“I don’t know if I should leave the car,” Alan
said. “My girlfriend—uh, friend...”—
my
something—
”paid for it. I don’t want her to get in
trouble.”

“I hate to break it to you, kiddo, but no one’s
going to steal that car. People in rural Vermont aren’t that
desperate for bad transportation.”

He smiled. “Yeah, I don’t even know why it was
on the rental lot.”

“This girlfriend’s breaking up with you?” the
woman guessed.

“I hope not. They told me they had someone break
into the lot last night. All the fences were broken. This is
probably the rental agent’s car.” And he’d given it a flat tire
driving on the icy, bumpy, rural road.

“Pop the trunk,” the woman said. “I’ll take you
to my place and you can call from there. Come on. I don’t
bite!”

Alan felt the blood rush to his cheeks. “Thanks,
um. Miss?”

“Missus,” she said as he climbed out of the car,
“but I’ll take the compliment. You can call me Tabitha.”

He grabbed his carry-on bag out of the trunk,
locked the little car, and climbed into the tropical warmth of
Tabitha’s car. “So, you’re not a native New Englander?”

She laughed. “Is it that obvious? Actually, I
was born as far away from New England as you can get on the East
Coast. Born and raised in Coral Gables, outside Miami. Beautiful
place. I hate it.”

“Um? That’s a little...”

“Harsh?” Tabitha waved a hand. “It was
miserable. My parents ignored me and even paradise can get lonely.
But that’s old news. I got married just after college, had five
babies who are all grown up, and life is pretty darn perfect
now.”

Alan laughed. “Wow. Um, okay. I don’t know what
to say, sorry. I’m not a family person, I guess.”

“Only child?” Tabitha asked as they wound
through the scenic pine forest.

“Foster child. No one wanted me.” Except
Delilah. Maybe
.
He drummed his fingers on his knee.

Tabitha leaned forward, blue eyes sparkling.
“So, this is me being a nosy future grandma, but are you ever going
to be a family person? Is this girlfriend The One? Are you going to
settle down?” She waited a beat and asked, “Are you going to run
screaming because I’m asking?”