Sacrifice the Wicked (26 page)
“Yes, she’s on our side.”
“What part of
our side
do you mean?” Parker asked mildly, planting her feet and raising her hips to peel the wet denim down her legs.
Simon growled something almost under his breath as he dug through the bag.
“It means that she’s no fan of the Salem situation.”
“Because she’s a Salem witch,” Parker said, tucking her sodden clothes at her feet. “Like Juliet.” The cool air in the car settled over her damp skin, coaxing gooseflesh over her limbs. She shuddered.
Simon pulled out a bundle of clothing, his angular features settled into a hard scowl, but he nodded. “Different batch than me, but stamped all the same.”
“Forgive my candor,” she said as she pooled the slinky pink material through her fingers, “but she’s not dead because of Matilda Lauderdale, right?”
A beat, and she saw Silas and Phin exchange a glance.
She didn’t need confirmation at that point. She’d suspected as much. Pulling the dress over her head took effort, and she rapped her knuckles on the ceiling twice before she managed to pull it over her wet hair and face. “I guess you know about the syringe.”
“We know,” Phin said.
Regret kicked her in the spine, hard enough to hunch her shoulders as she straightened the halter dress. It clung to her like a second skin, an electric bright sheath that barely capped at mid-thigh. “I was . . . I couldn’t keep it—”
Simon closed the distance between them, tucked her so firmly against his side that he might as well have planted a flag in her and named her his. The bare skin of his chest warmed her cold flesh, seared a line down her side. It helped. A little.
His teeth flashed as he snarled, “Too many games. Too much politics. Parker got caught in the middle and Lauderdale has the serum.”
“It’s all right.” Phin almost turned, caught himself. “We’ll figure something out. We always do.”
“Thought it’d happen, anyway,” Silas added grimly. “Let’s focus on getting you through the sec-lines.”
Right. One thing at a time. “Hand me the makeup bag.”
“And a brush,” Simon told her, putting both in her hands. He dropped a kiss on her temple, sweet and exquisitely tender, before bending in the cramped quarters to pull his boots off. The streetlights and district signs they passed gilded his muscled shoulders in ripples of color.
Parker took a deep breath and bent her attention on applying makeup without a mirror. As she did, she listened to the rustle of Simon’s clothing, his muttered swearing as he struggled to change in the small space of the backseat.
She wanted to laugh, but given her precarious position with an eyeliner pencil, she asked instead, “What’s going on up here? The feeds aren’t helpful.” And she was used to a constant stream of information. It bothered her to be so blind.
To her surprise, Silas’s dark rumble answered her. “As far as the media is aware, the bishop is now in control of the Mission. Sector Three is still playing close to the vest, but it’s a sure bet that the real power lies with them.”
Parker shouldn’t be so surprised. The man was a trained missionary, after all. No matter what he fought for now. She nodded—caught herself as the eyeliner pencil came dangerously close to her eyeball and said aloud, “Director Lauderdale has always been the keystone to Sector Three. He’ll have half a dozen strategies in place to secure Bishop Applegate’s loyalties.”
“Which is why we’ve got to move fast,” Phin interjected, “before this has a chance to gel.”
“Any solid plans?” Simon asked. An elbow narrowly missed Parker’s hip as he struggled with his wet jeans.
“First, we get you out of the line of fire.”
“And then?” Parker pressed.
“Then we try to get as much data as we possibly can using Jonas and his new buddies.” Silas glanced over his shoulder as he eased into a lane of light traffic, his gaze briefly touching on Parker as she hunched over the pencil she struggled to apply. His eyes flared, a glint of something warm and reluctantly approving, before he looked quickly back to the windshield. “Fuck me.” It wasn’t an invite.
Parker bit back a smile as Phin chuckled. “I’ll take that as a good sign. You done, Miss Adams?”
“Not yet. Do we know what Lauderdale’s plans are?”
“No,” Phin admitted. “But Jonas is keeping watch. It’s strange that Sector Three hasn’t made any sort of public move.”
“Not that strange,” she said slowly. “They’re used to secrecy. Problem is, they’re good at it, too.”
“We’re almost there,” Silas interjected. “Hurry up.”
It took a lot of concentration, a few starts and stops and a close call with the mascara brush, but she did it. As she brushed out her hair, pulled it up into a tight knot, and yanked the blond wig she’d found in the case over it all, she declared, “Good as it gets.”
Silas’s gaze remained on the road, but she saw Phin’s head tilt. “Can I look?”
She ran both hands through the chin-length strands of fake hair. “Go for it.”
Beside her, Simon struggled into his synth-leather coat, elbows narrowly missing the window and her head. As Phin turned in his seat, his grin split into a fully fledged smile. “Damn, you two.”
Simon muttered a curse. “Shove it, Clarke.”
Parker leaned away to study Simon’s new look. Black synth-leather pants hugged his lean hips, outlined the muscles of his legs. The tank top he wore was just this side of
don’t give a damn,
and the way his hair spiked back from his face looked as if he’d spent hours getting it just messy enough to tempt a girl to run her fingers through it. The crowning glory, the long synth-leather coat, made him look like a gunslinger out on the prowl. Or an extremely bored topsider.
He looked dangerous. Delicious. So completely outside the scope of his usual worn denim and flannel that part of her wanted to laugh.
The other part of her—the part barely covered by a strip of pink—wanted something else entirely. Her grip tightened on the tube of lipstick in her hand.
Simon glowered. “The pants are too short.”
“Tuck them into your boots,” Phin instructed and turned his critical eye on her. “Great job on the makeup. Too light for a real night out, but it’ll do. Lose the bra.”
“What?” Her gaze jerked to him. “No way.”
“Lose it, Miss Adams.” His smile turned wry. “No slummer would ruin the sightlines of a dress like that with a bra. Are you wearing a thong?”
“Am I going to have to get out of the car?” she snapped.
“Maybe.”
“Damn it.” Gritting her teeth, she worked her bra off as Phin once more turned away.
Another grunt from Silas, but this time, she swore she heard laughter.
T
he current splashed and frothed beneath the flat-bottom boat, dragging it along the rock wall. The god-awful shriek it made had Parker huddled against Simon’s side, her hands over her ears.
Simon bit back a smile and only held her tightly.
“Sorry!” At the back of the boat, Phin plunged a long oar into the water, wrenching back against the water’s grasp. “Almost there.”
Getting through the sec-lines had been a piece of cake. Prepared for the worst, Simon had kept one hand on his gun as the car idled at the sec-line checkpoint. They’d timed it perfectly. As the guard peered inside—his flashlight had spent an inordinate amount of time on Parker’s breasts—Parker had flashed a smile with enough wattage to fry a lesser man, and Jonas’s promised distraction had gone off.
Whatever it had been, the man’s comm crackled with orders from the security station, and he’d waved them through hurriedly.
Simon hadn’t expected it to go
that
easy. He hadn’t expected the drive to go as smoothly as it had, the shift into a battered orange pickup truck, the route into the ruined carcass of Old Seattle buried under the metropolis, and he sure as hell didn’t think about the Old Sea-Trench as
somewhere safe
.
But then, this is where Matilda protected her people.
This was where she’d died.
Parker’s hair gleamed in the summer sun, a fiery red and copper braid flung over Simon’s arm as she clung to his arm. Molten flame, as cool and silky as it was vibrant. He loved her hair. Thank God the wig was gone. “Where are we?” she demanded. Exhaustion bruised the skin under her eyes, but she didn’t complain.
She wouldn’t. Still the same Parker.
“Near as I can tell,” he said, looking up, “we’re about half a mile out of the city. Maybe more.” He knew exactly where they were—but he hadn’t known about the water entry. The only way he’d found Matilda’s sanctuary had been directly through the ruins.
And even then, he suspected she’d led him there.
“Will Silas be okay?” she asked Phin, shifting on the boat bench. The dress rode up on her hips, but she’d pulled her jeans on underneath once they were safe enough to get away with it.
“He knows the way in,” Phin assured her. “There’s two that we know of.”
“In to where?”
“You’ll see,” Phin chuckled. “Hang on.”
She shuddered. “I never want to go through Old Seattle ever again.”
It amused Simon. After so long in the lower New Seattle streets, he forgot that Parker had never really been off the beaten path. She was a topsider, through and through.
The ruins buried beneath the paved streets of the towering city remained among the most dangerous places Simon had ever been. Liberally littered with pitfalls, rotting structures ready to collapse and worse, he’d only stared at Phin when the man suggested they go there.
“Trust me,” he’d said with a grin.
Not on his life.
But Parker had taken the choice out of his hands, and here they were. Nestled in a boat in the middle of the Old Sea-Trench, watching craggy cliff walls slide by.
The sun had come out an hour ago, a rare day. Although its muted warmth helped take the edge off, anxiety still draped over his shoulders.
It’d been a mere thirty-six hours since the Mission had gone dark, and too quiet.
“Here we go,” Phin warned. “Brace yourselves!”
Simon gripped one edge of the boat, his knee nudging hers. She held onto him with both arms, but she stared out at the formless canyon. Fascinated?
Or cataloging every turn. He had more than a suspicion about how her brain worked.
Phin navigated the boat along the fast-moving current, his mouth pursed in concentration.
Simon frowned. “All I see is—”
“Hey.” Parker pointed, her eyes widening. “There’s a fissure.”
“What?” He looked out over her head, but all he saw was more rock. More faceless cliff and stone and craggy edges.
The boat scraped along the cliff side, metal screaming over stone. As Simon braced himself, held Parker as they rocked, he glanced back at their guide. “Are you—”
And then it stopped.
Suddenly, without warning, the boat slipped through a cavity Simon hadn’t seen, pitched forward, and sent him sliding backward off the small bolted seat.
Parker’s laughter ended on a squawk of surprise as his arm tightened around her ribs, pulled her with him to the boat floor.
Her elbow nailed him in the chest. He grunted, but for the first time in what seemed like too long, warmth—genuine laughter—filled him.
“Whoops.” Phin bent, propping the oar on the boat floor, and offered Parker a hand. “Sorry about that.” His brown eyes twinkled. “Welcome to the sanctuary.”
From Simon’s position on his back, all he saw was blue sky muted by a faint trace of clouds. But it was warm—a lot warmer than it had been only seconds ago in the trench.
And it smelled like sulfur. That warm, spicy mix he’d only ever smelled here.
Parker managed to get to her knees with Phin’s steadying hand. When her face lit up, her beautiful eyes shining like the sun, Simon’s heart filled with it. “Simon. Look!”
Gripping the edge of the boat, he pulled himself upright.
The crescent-shaped canyon carved into the trench had stolen his breath the first time he’d ever set foot into it. On one side of the point, Matilda had built a green house—small, cozy enough for one but clearly stretched for more. Tents had been erected on the shore, and a wooden pier jutted into the greenest, stillest water he’d ever seen.
“Oh,” Parker breathed. She grabbed his arm. “It’s so warm.”
“Volcanic hot springs,” Phin told her.
Simon knew.
The boat glided across the bottle-green water. As they approached the pier, the door in the green house with its mismatched windows opened.
Parker went still beside him.
Naomi West stepped out onto the porch—the same porch where Matilda had taken her poison. Where she’d shot him.
And died.
Simon’s hands clenched at his sides.
“This will be fun,” Parker murmured. Her tone slid into the even, cool notes he’d learned meant she was reapplying her armor.
He didn’t blame her.
Naomi was a wild card.
The boat nudged the pier. Quickly, Phin stepped onto the creaking wood, offered a hand. “Ladies first.”
She glanced at Simon.
He nodded.
When she took Phin’s hand, Simon met the man’s forthright scrutiny. Though his lips twitched, Phin said nothing as he helped Parker to the dock.
Simon climbed out on his own.
He’d never met Naomi. Not directly. Reports had suggested she was a knockout, and as Simon and Parker crossed the shore and approached the porch, he couldn’t help but affirm the description.
Her black hair was a spiky, magenta-streaked black mass, short enough at her chin to bring attention to bone structure even Simon recognized as exquisite. Her mixed-Japanese features lent her an exotic beauty the rest of her fulfilled—long legs, trim figure. Lethal as hell, by all accounts. It was no wonder Parker had chosen her to deal with the Clarke problem. She’d fit right in with the beautiful people.
Well, assuming she’d lost the array of facial piercings at the time. A silver hoop nestled into the center of her lip glinted as she braced her folded arms against the porch rail. More rings decorated one eyebrow, a stud and hoop glimmered in her nose, and he’d bet there’d be more under her shredded jeans and loose sweatshirt.
Her eyes, a mix of blue and violet, weren’t kind. “Well, well. Little Miss Parker goes on walkabout.”
Simon’s lips twitched.
“Miss West.” Parker halted several feet from the porch.
Phin strode past them, his mouth set into a crooked slant. “Quit it,” he said lightly as he jumped the porch steps. A boundless font of energy, Simon thought. Phin’s jeans were worn and stained, and his flannel shirt—much like the ones Simon favored—didn’t mark him as anything special, but the way he moved did.
Confidence, assurance. Like Parker, something about him suggested
topsider,
but here he was. As far from topside as a man could get.
And he seemed to be doing all right.
At least, if the way he snagged Naomi’s arm, spun her around, and pulled her into his arms was any indication. “Phin, hey!”
“Hey, yourself.” Phin held her tightly. “I’m glad to see you again, sweetheart.”
“It’s been three hours,” she protested. The compressed edge to her mouth softened. Just a little.
“It’s been too long,” Phin countered, nuzzling her color-streaked hair. “Be nice to our guests.”
Unable to help himself, Simon reached out. Laced his fingers with Parker’s.
Her palm was damp.
Nervous? A chink in the armor, after all.
“Relax,” he whispered.
She shook her head.
“Trust me,” he added dryly. “Of the two of us, you have the least to worry about.”
“I know,” she murmured.
The calm acceptance, the flicker in her eyes, gave him pause.She knew? Knew what?
Another figure stepped out from the lush foliage to the right of the pretty green house with its roof of purple flowers, and Simon’s shoulder squared.
Showtime.
The woman who approached from the hidden cove on the other side of the crescent point had short black hair, a rounder figure, and a face Parker recognized immediately.
She stiffened.
Simon’s grip tightened around hers in silent warning.
Juliet Carpenter transferred a small basket to her hip, her green eyes shuttered as she approached the porch. She didn’t smile.
But she didn’t run, either.
Simon met her accusing gaze. “Hello, Eve.”
T
he basket Juliet carried hit the black-sand ground just as Naomi vaulted over the porch railing, a curse on her lips.
Beside Parker, Simon braced himself. Secrets and unspoken accusations filled the too-tense air.
No.
None of this. No more.
Parker stepped in front of Simon, arms outstretched to the side, squaring her shoulders as Naomi closed the distance in a smooth, leashed surge of fatal intent. “Stop it!”
Phin jumped down the porch steps. “Naomi, don’t.”
“That’s not her name,” the ex-missionary snarled.
She filled Parker’s space, a bullet ready to tear through anything in her way.
Enough was enough.
As Simon grabbed her shoulder, Parker stepped into Naomi’s approach—grabbed her by the sweatshirt, one arm curved around the woman’s waist.
She might not fight, but Parker knew how to get in the way.
And angry missionaries didn’t scare her.
“That’s
enough,
” she yelled.
Her voice pierced through the canyon, echoed back eerily.
Naomi stopped. With one hand twisted in Simon’s collar, she’d managed to brace her forearm against Parker’s throat—one flex of lean muscle away from crushing her larynx, or worse.
Slowly, her eyebrows climbed, fine black arches pierced with rings on one side. “Holy shit,” she drawled. “Look who’s suddenly got a spine.”
“I always
have,
” Parker said evenly despite Naomi’s arm at her neck. “You never bothered to look.”
“Let them go, sweetheart.” Phin’s arm tightened around Juliet’s shoulders. She hadn’t moved. White-faced, she stared at Simon behind Parker.
Pretty girl. A witch named Eve.
Matilda’s chosen.
Simon wasn’t a complete blank slate. Parker didn’t need anything else to fit the pieces into this particular puzzle. Slowly, she loosened her hold on Naomi’s waist.
The woman drew back, but her eyes glittered dangerously as they flicked to Simon. “One wrong word—”
“We’re all on the same side here,” Phin said tersely. He squeezed Juliet’s shoulders. “No one’s going to hurt anyone. Juliet’s safe, Nai, I promise.”
Simon’s hands settled over Parker’s shoulders in like reassurance. She stumbled as they pulled her back, well out of Naomi’s reach, fingers tense. “The hell are you thinking?” he demanded.
She shook her head, shrugged off Simon’s grip. “Juliet. I’m Parker Adams. This is—”
“I know who you are.” As greetings went, it wasn’t promising. The girl patted Phin’s hand on her shoulder but pulled it off with a lift to her slightly square chin. “He was there in that facility.”
Simon stepped into Parker’s peripheral. “I’m sorry.”
Juliet’s eyes widened.
“Look,” he added, pitching his voice to carry. It firmed. “My name is Simon. I wasn’t born with it.” He reached up, dragged down the collar of his thermal shirt. The tattoos inked on his tanned skin stood out in stark relief. One seal of St. Andrew.
One bar code.
Parker watched Juliet’s face. Every sign seemed to point to her as the key to this reunion. The cue the others would react to.
Someone they all wanted to protect. A good girl.
A girl with the secret to Simon’s survival.
Juliet’s eyes flicked to the stamp. She swallowed hard.
“Like you,” he continued, tone gentling as he let his collar go, “Matilda made me.”
“Why?”
Parker stepped aside as the question slipped from the witch’s lips.
This wasn’t her conversation.
But as she backed away, folding her arms over her chest, she watched Simon just as closely.
His jaw was set, features ridged with strain. Tension. Only part of it was the effort he was making to remain steady. She knew the signs by now. But did they?
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “It’s one of the many things I don’t know. Who I am or what she wanted from me.”
Juliet’s arms folded beneath her breasts, twined into the pale blue T-shirt she wore. Too big for her. Maybe Phin’s. “Go on.”
Naomi shook her head. “What’s it matter?” she demanded.
“Christ, Naomi,” Phin murmured and folded his hand over her mouth. He dragged her against his chest, her back to his front, and grunted as her elbow collided with his side.
A pang hit Parker’s heart.
“I don’t have anything left to go on with.” Simon spread his hands. “All I know is that Matilda made me from her own genes. She wanted me to do something, but before I could ask, she—”