A dart embedded itself in Alexei’s neck, snuffing out that little spark of hope real quick.
“Alexei!”
He was unresponsive.
I looked up. The ghul perched on the flatbed. It must have jumped out of the car door and onto the truck from the other side. Damn those nimble assholes. The ghul looked down on us and laughed. His work was done. With the device implanted in Alexei, they’d effectively ghuled my ride.
Alexei slowed down, falling in behind the truck. They were controlling his every move. The sedan moved in, positioning itself to take us aboard.
A whirring sound reached my ears. Aristede. It wasn’t over yet.
I pulled off my belt and anchored Alexei and me to the bike.
Then I pulled out my Glock from the hidden compartment in my bag.
Here goes nothing.
I stepped on Alexei’s foot, shifting gears. “Sorry.” Then my hand closed over his and I accelerated, zooming away from the sedan and toward the looming flatbed. I let loose multiple rounds, springing the truck’s back flap and releasing the ramp, which scraped and sparked against the asphalt.
Traffic was slowing to a crawl where the causeway emptied out onto Fifth Street in Miami Beach. We were quickly running out of road.
The whirring grew louder. The DUST Evac Chopper hovered into view ahead.
My stomach somersaulted.
Speeding up the truck’s ramp, I plowed right into the ghul. His face was a mask of confusion and terror. He flew onto the onramp leading to Alton Road and the path of oncoming cars.
The chopper fired a magnetic winch, hoisting the motorcycle into the air. Below, the sedan smashed into the flatbed, igniting in a fireball.
The helicopter whisked us away into the night sky. I owed Aristede big time. At the moment, DUST was probably dispatching agents to cover up the incident. By the time the spells and chanting were all said and done, any witnesses would be swearing they’d hallucinated the whole thing.
I held an unconscious Alexei close. With the ghuls destroyed, the effects of the Brainwave Inhibitor would be gone when he woke up. Hopefully, he wouldn’t remember a thing about the rescue.
From up here, the city truly seemed like something out of Oz. Sparkling water, neon pastels bathing everything in an enchanted glow. We were just two guys flying through the air, on a moonlit ride. Alexei looked so peaceful with his eyes closed, his lashes long and thick. I reached out and stroked his hair.
His eyes fluttered open. He seemed a little confused. Then he focused on me and smiled. His mouth moved, but I couldn’t hear the words through the wind.
I pulled him closer.
“I really like you, Dagger Beaumont.” He pressed his lips against mine.
Every nerve-ending in my body sizzled. Then his head settled on my shoulder and he was asleep again.
I knew at that moment, dangling hundreds of feet in the night sky with Alexei in my arms, there was nowhere else I’d rather be.
****
I held the glass of water to Alexei’s lips. “Drink up, big guy.”
He took a few gulps before erupting into a coughing bout.
“Easy, Lex.” I set the glass aside, rubbing his broad back until the fit subsided.
“I’m okay, thanks.” He lowered his head onto the pillow. “I don’t know what those guys that were chasing us hit me with, but I think it’s wearing off.”
With the effects of the Brainwave Inhibitor fading, I wondered just how many details he actually remembered. He’d still been out of it when the chopper’d set the Harley down in that alley an hour ago. Between racing us back to Montefuego and sneaking him up to his dorm and into bed, I hadn’t had the chance to question him.
Or maybe I’d just been afraid to.
“Just what exactly do you remember?” I shoved the question out there before I chickened out.
He rubbed his eyes. “The last thing I remember is swerving around a semi, then something stinging my throat. Then some weird sensation like I was flying. That’s it.”
Weird sensation? That weird sensation that was etched on my lips. In my brain? “So you don’t remember anything else?”
He thought about it a moment. “Mmm. Nope.”
“Nothing?”
“Not a thing.”
What the hell was wrong with me? He didn’t remember anything after the chopper. So what? Less explaining to do. I should be happy, right?
Then why did I feel like utter shit?
I needed to get out of here before I made a complete asshole of myself. “It’s getting late. I’d better get out of your way so we can both get ready for the dance.” I started to rise.
He sat up and wrapped his hand around my wrist, pulling me close. A grin spread across his face. “Do you really think I could forget everything?”
He pressed his mouth to mine. My heart went into overdrive. His lips felt soft and firm, igniting new sensations in my body. He let go of my wrist and cupped my face in his warm hands, continuing to kiss me. Then his tongue gently traced my lips and I opened my mouth to taste him.
“I guess you two aren’t going to make the dance.” The voice knifed through my lustful stupor.
Cassie.
I ripped myself away from Alexei, nearly falling off the bed.
Cassie stood glaring at us from the doorway.
And she wasn’t alone.
Marco was beside her, holding a bouquet of roses.
My heart jack-hammered up my throat. “Guys …”
Even from here, I could see Marco shaking. “You said—you told me—” his eyes darted to Alexei and back to me, “—you lied to me.”
Alexei hopped off the bed and took a step toward them. “It’s not Dagger’s fault. It was me.”
“You shut the hell up before I kick your ass,” Cassie hissed.
I took a step closer to Marco. The tears in his eyes were shredding my insides. “Marco …”
His eyes lit up like a brush fire. “The test scores. You only let me think I stood a chance with you because you were afraid I’d expose your goddamn secret. You used my feelings for you to shut me up.”
His words carved into the bone. “That’s not true. I was only trying to keep you safe.” I didn’t care what Cassie and Alexei overheard. I needed to make him understand. To make him believe me. I reached to wrap my arms around him, but he side-stepped me.
“I’m going to tell everybody what I know, you son of a bitch!” He threw the roses at me and ran out of the room.
“Marco!”
I started after him but Cassie blocked the doorway. “Let him go. The last thing he needs is a back stabbing piece of shit like you in his life.”
My eyes flooded over. “Cass, please.”
Alexei stepped between us. “Lay off him. He hasn’t done anything wrong.”
She turned on him. “I told you to shut up.”
“And I’m telling you, you aren’t my girlfriend. You were never my girlfriend. So get over it and stop acting like a delusional psycho.”
Slap.
Alexei rubbed his cheek where Cassie’d struck. “I guess I deserved that. Sorry.”
I pressed my hands together as if in prayer. “Guys, please. Let’s talk this out.”
Cassie sneered. “There’s nothing to talk about.” She focused on me and hiked a thumb at Alexei. “I hope this asshole’s worth it, Papi, because he just cost you two best friends.”
“Cassie, listen to me.”
Her eyes seared my flesh. “You two putas deserve each other.” She whirled out the room, slamming the door behind her.
I buried my face in my hands. I couldn’t breathe. All I kept seeing were the looks of contempt and hatred burning in their eyes. I’d betrayed my two best friends. Alexei wrapped his arms around me and kissed the top of my head. “It’s going to be okay, Dag,” he whispered. “I promise.”
He led me to the bed and sat beside me. I buried my face in his chest as he stroked my hair. I’m not sure how long we sat there without saying a wo
rd.
I finally looked up into his eyes. “Thanks.”
He leaned forward and kissed me. “Thank you.”
Marco’s roses were still scattered on the floor. A fresh wave of pain washed over me.
“I need to call Marco and make sure he’s okay.”
“He’s probably not going to want to talk to you right now.”
“I have to try.” I scooped up my bag from the foot of the bed and rifled through it. Everything was there sans my towel and the cell. Then I remembered. “Shit. I lost my phone during that chase.” I looked up at Alexei. “Is it okay if I borrow yours?”
His smile faded. “I’m not sure what I did with—”
I smiled and kissed him. “I saw you toss it in your backpack.” Rolling over him, I grabbed the strap of his pack.
“No. Dagger, give it here.”
He pulled it away, but it upended, spilling its contents all over the bed.
A single page of weathered parchment caught my eye, encased in a clear sleeve. I snatched it up before he could grab it.
Familiar symbols covered its surface. Symbols I knew only too well.
It was the missing page of Il Evanidus.
The Reich Agents hadn’t been after me, they’d been after Alexei. It was Reinaldo: The Sequel.
I fought the urge to heave.
“I never wanted you to know,” he said.
When I forced myself to look at him, he was aiming a small silver weapon at me.
My nerve-endings burned with a different fire. “Don’t you know you aren’t supposed to bring guns to school?”
Before I could dive for my glock, he fired directly into my heart.
Chapter Eighteen
So this is what dying feels like.
I’d always thought you got your plug pulled, the juices stopped flowing, and you ceased to function. Simple, yet final.
Yet here I was, lingering like an afterthought, wading through a dark stream of conscious thought. Maybe Alexei’d miraculously missed? Impossible. Then again, he hadn’t hit a vital organ, considering my heart had stopped beating the moment I’d found that page. One thing was certain, as long as I still had even one functioning brain cell left, I’d use it up taking the bastard down.
The tricky part was going to be warning DUST. Considering I was currently doing the limbo on a cruise down the River Styx, jogging down to Montefuego’s basement wasn’t an option. But just because I couldn’t reach DUST physically, didn’t mean I couldn’t spiritually, via Astral Projection. Hell, a heightened state of relaxation was key to AP, and, hello, how much more relaxed could you get than brink of death? I could just skip the breathing techniques and move on to the intense concentration of Phase Two. Booyah.
Shoving Marco, Cassie, and Alexei into a mental cubbyhole, I focused on DUST—the faces of Price, Aristede, and Felanie—willing myself to move toward them. The darkness faded. I hovered over my own body, still slumped on the bed. Alexei was gone. A glowing silver umbilical cord dangled from my spirit, tethered to my physical form. As I floated further and further away from my body and out of the dorm, the cord payed out limitlessly.
And then I was rocketing through the corridors, past Limp Dix, Kara Drake, Professor Delacroix, tumbling into the bowels of the school. I zoomed past the Soul Scanners, Tep’s security post, down shiny black aisles, beyond the chanting Mama Mayhem, and into the soulless interrogation room.
Price, flanked by Aristede and Felanie, sat in the small viewing area. On the other side of the reinforced glass dividing the room, my mother stood in the circular Interview Chamber. Phillipe was strapped to a chair beside her, a band of electrodes wrapped around his forehead and connected to the scanning network.
Price’s eyes saucered when she spotted me drifting to ground level. “Dagger. What are you doing here? How did you get past Security Section?”
“Explanations can wait. You have to listen to me. I don’t know how much time I have.”
“My baby’s Astral Projecting,” Felanie squealed. “I’m so proud of you. Let me get my camera.”
“No. Listen to me. The missing page—”
A nearby explosion rocked the room.
Felanie spilled from her chair. Price slammed against Aristede. My mom steadied herself against Phillipe.
And I just kind of hovered.
“What was that?”
Blaring alarms cut me off. A voice rang over the intercom.
Attention DUST personnel. All systems have been corrupted by a Class Ten Hex. Repeat. All systems corrupted by a Class Ten Hex. We are at Cursecon 2. Proceed to Defense Stations.
“It’s the Reich.” Price tapped the mini-keyboard on her wrist unit. “My command controls have been overridden. I no longer have system access.”
Aristede helped Felanie to her feet. “But the Reich couldn’t have introduced a curse into our network. No one has sorce-tech sophisticated enough for a hack of this magnitude.”
“Maybe they’ve got someone on the inside,” Felanie’s voice quavered.
That made sense. “You mean, like a mole? One of us?”
Price dismissed the theory with a wave of her hand. “That’s not possible. The Soulers would have detected the presence of a double agent the moment they were scanned.”
Scanned?
My eyes darted to the Interview Chamber.
To the electrodes attached to Phillipe. The electrodes still plugged into the network.
“It’s a Trojan Horse. They implanted the hex in my brother’s brain, knowing we’d scan him when he turned himself in.”
Snap!
The metal binders pinning Phillipe’s hands and feet to the chair sprang open. In one swift move, he leaped to his feet, grabbed my mother’s sidearm, and aimed it at the glass panel.
“Get down!” I yelled.
Aristede shoved Price and Felanie to the floor, covering them with his body.
The panel exploded in a hail storm of glass under the onslaught of Phillipe’s fire. Some of the shards passed right through my spiritual penis, and I winced and covered my groin out of reflex.
Phillipe scrambled through the opening.
I took a step forward.
He whirled, aiming the gun at me.
Our eyes connected.
Then he lowered the weapon and bounded out of the room. The door wooshed shut behind him.
Click.
Attention DUST personnel. Security has been breached. Enemy agents are within the perimeter. We are at CURSECON 1. Prepare to take evasive—
The intercom crackled and fizzled out.
“Daguerre!” Mom rushed into the viewing area, arms outstretched.
I took a step back before she could reach me, sparing us both the embarrassment of having her arms pass right through me. “Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”
“No.” Her gaze dropped. “Not physically, anyway.”
I knew exactly how she felt. I turned to the others. “Is everyone else all right?”
Price, Felanie, and Aristede were picking themselves off the floor, brushing the shards from their clothes.
“Just peachy,” Felanie replied, shaking glass from her golden locks like a wet dog.
Price walked past me, a trickle of blood oozing from her left cheek. “I’m fine, Dagger.” She studied the panel beside the door. The distant sounds of screams and gunfire filtered through. “It’s sealed.”
“Cool. At least we’re safe.”
“From the outside,” she finished.
Talk about major suckage. “Does anyone have any weapons on them? Maybe something we can blast through this door with?”
Price and Mom shook their heads. Aristede held up empty hands. The very security measures meant to keep everyone in the interrogation room safe were now working against us.
Felanie rummaged through her bag, lifting out items one at a time. “Let’s see. I’ve got nail polish, some dental floss, a vibra—uh, mating wand, this ceremonial necklace—”
I pointed at the pile.
“What can you do with that?”
She blushed. “Well, depending on what speed setting I have it on.”
“Not the vi—mating wand, the necklace.”
“Oh yeah, that,” she twittered. She stood and placed the necklace around her, pointing her hands at the doors. “By the powers of the serpent’s tongue, I command you to release us. Ackbay, Toombay, Razanbay …”
Yeah, right. Ebay. Flambée. Oi Vey. Felanie definitely had magical abilities, but this Pig Latin chanting crap was a little too much.
She did manage to make her nails glow and conjure up a breeze that gusted through her hair like a supernatural blow dryer. The doors, however, didn’t budge.
“He’s going for the vault,” Mom said. “Il Evanidus. The elixir. That’s what he wants.”
“The moment he opens that vault, we’re all doomed,” Price announced coolly. “It will trigger a failsafe countdown. This entire complex will be wiped off the map.”
I looked up, my mind racing with images of Marco and Cassie, all the other kids at the dance. “What about Montefuego?”
“Collateral damage.”
My eyes bounced to each of them. “There must be a way to stop the countdown.”
“The only way to override the failsafe would be to get the new access codes from the Control Center server and enter them into the biometric keypad attached to my wrist.”
“All right, okay. There’s a plan in there somewhere.”
“I don’t mean to pee on anybody’s firecracker,” Felanie interrupted, “but how are we going to fight our way to the Control Center when we’re trapped like rats on the R.M.S. Titanic?”
I broke out into a broad grin. “Correction. You guys are trapped. Not me.”
They all looked at me, as if I’d lost it.
“I’m not really here, remember?” I drifted up to the ceiling, sticking my arm right through one of the ventilation ducts.
“Be careful, honey,” Mom said.
Something inside me thawed. “I promise. Even though I can move through the walls, I’ll stick to the shaft so they won’t even see me coming.”
Then I was through the vent, wondering if I’d ever see any of them alive again.
****
I paused in mid-crawl, feeling a little woozy. The shaft ahead blurred into two.