“Us? Gah! Please tell me you’re not part of them! You can’t be part of them! Do you know they hate me?”

“No we don’t. WeCare doesn’t hate anyone. We’re all about rebuilding and helping. Whatever gave you that idea?”

“We.” She’s slaying me. Is Mac part of them, too? “Dude, like, maybe the way they copied my paper, took over my posts, and printed all kinds of lies about me.”

“I happen to know for a fact that top individuals at WeCare are eager to meet you. They think as much of you as Mac does.”

Gee, great, so they want me dead, too. Top individuals. Lovely. They can get in line behind Christian. Who’s behind the Unseelie princes.

“They think you could be a tremendous asset. I think so, too.”

I give her a look. “You might want to recheck your facts. I think you’re missing a few. Folks in charge of organizations don’t consider me an asset. Never have, never will.” I hate organizations. Folks got to be free, able to breathe, and make up their own minds about stuff, not be fed a party line. Ritual numbs the brain. Repetition is grass for sheep.

“Mrs. Lane, so nice to see you again,” Ryodan says, and I almost fall over. Not only didn’t I hear him approach us, he’s being polite. Ryodan is never polite.

I squinch up my face, studying him. “Dude, you feeling okay?”

“Never better.”

“Why are you, like, pretending to be nice?”

“Mr. Ryodan is always nice. He was a lovely host while we stayed at Chester’s.”

“You didn’t stay at Chester’s, you were hostages.” What is wrong with everyone that they can’t see things for what they are?

“He and his men were keeping us safe, Dani. The Sinsar Dubh was targeting people Mac loved.”

“Was the door to your room locked? Dude, that makes you a hostage,” I say.

“Our door was never locked.”

Huh? “Yeah, but did you even know how to get out? He’s got those tricky panels.”

“Mr. Ryodan showed Jack and me both how to operate the doors.”

Huh? “Yeah, but there were guards outside. Keeping you in.”

“For our protection. We were free to come and go. We chose to stay. The city was dangerous when the Book was loose. Jack and I are very grateful for Mr. Ryodan’s help during those difficult times.”

I scowl at Ryodan, who’s wearing a smug-ass smile. He probably worked some kind of spell on them, like the kind of thing he did to me in the Hummer when he forced me to take the candy bar from him by muttering strange words. He makes people puppets. Empty-headed slaves. Not me.

“Do you know he’s forcing me to work for him by holding Jo hostage?” I tell Rainey. She needs to wake up and smell the coffee.

“You mean that lovely young waitress? I’ve seen the way she looks at him. She’s crazy about him,” Rainey says.

And that pisses me off even more. Mac’s mom can tell Jo’s stupid crazy about this psychopath just by looking at her? Gah! Just gah! On top of it all, said psychopath has Rainey so fooled there’s no point in even talking to her anymore! Not that lack of a point would shut me up. “Do you know he has private clubs under Chester’s where—”

“I just spoke with Barrons,” Ryodan cuts me off. “Mac’s on her way to meet you, Mrs. Lane. She should be here any second now.”

I give him a suspicious look. He’s probably lying. And he knows perfectly well I won’t risk finding out.

Rainey gives me a warm smile. “Dani, she’ll be so glad to see you! She’s been looking for you for weeks.”

I’m sure she has.

I lock down my mental grid to freeze-frame, make like folks on Gunsmoke and get the feck out of Dodge.

TWENTY-FIVE

“I don’t know who he is behind that mask”

“What are you doing.”

“Why do you care?” I got belligerence stuck in my craw and I don’t even know why. Sometimes just standing next to Ryodan makes me feel that way.

“Because if there’s no point in what you’re doing, you’re wasting my time.”

“Dude, got eyes? I’m collecting evidence.” Finally! I been trying to get out for a second look at the exploded scenes for just about fecking ever but things keep coming up, like me almost getting killed. Oh, and me almost getting killed again. There’s never a dull moment in the Mega-verse. The Ice Monster would freak me out a lot more if my world hadn’t been jam-packed with monsters of all kinds since pretty much my birth: big, small, human, not.