Crazy in the Blood (Latter-Day Olympians) (20 page)

There was complete and utter silence on the other end of the line. Then, “In San Francisco. With you?”

“If you mean with me in the sense of being seconds away from having his head handed to him, then yes.”

“Tori, don’t joke like that.”
 

“Who’s joking? Anyway, yes, he’s in talks with the very group I’m investigating.”

“That’s it, Tori, I’m coming up.”

“Can you?” I asked.

“No,” he sighed. “Probably not.”

“Of course not. I couldn’t get that lucky.”

“Tell you what—you come home and you can get lucky any time you want.”

Home and Armani—Nick—in the same sentence. It was a lovely thought.

Marred only by the knowledge that we wouldn’t be truly alone.

“I’ll be back soon.”

“How soon?”

“Not soon enough.”

We both contemplated that.

“They discovered the identity of the body you drove up there to see,” Nick said after a moment.

“Oh?” That snapped my mind straight away from getting lucky. I wondered nastily if Apollo was getting whiplash at my changing emotions.

“Jeremy Clarkson, a string reporter from the Associated Press. He was undercover investigating… You’ll never guess.”

“Back to Earth,” we both said together.

“Bingo,” Nick finished.

“Thanks, Nick.”

We sat on the phone a second longer with nothing more to say, but wishing it was different.

“I’d better go,” I said finally. “Apollo’s waiting.”

“Tell him I said hi,” Nick told me, knowing how
that
would go over.

“I’ll give him your love.”

“Nope, that’s all for you.” My body ran hot and cold all at once. It was the closest Armani had ever come to a declaration, and I didn’t know what to do with it.

“Okay then,” I answered, going for breezy. “I’ll save it for myself. Good night, Nick.”

“Good night,” he answered, and I wished I could read his mind like Apollo could mine. Had Nick really meant that love part the way it sounded? How did I feel about that? No time to think about it. Apollo waited for me inside, and the anger he inspired was nice and pure and uncomplicated. I held on to it as I made my way inside.

Apollo waited beside the hostess stand of the lovely, elegant restaurant that I had no taste for. The amber-soaked lighting gave the place a warm, intimate glow. Just right for an assignation…or an assassination.
His
, I thought hopefully.

The hostess, who’d been flirting with Apollo, sized me up as I approached and apparently found me wanting. I blamed the ballet flats, but I didn’t regret my choice. If she wanted the god, she could have him. Now would be good.

Apollo studied me intensely as I walked up, and I glared back but didn’t look away.

“Everything all right?” he asked when I arrived.

“What do you think?”

“That you’re still here.”

“We had a deal. You help me, I have dinner with you. I thought about it. I don’t want to end our relationship owing.”

“End?”

“Show us to our table,” I told the hostess. I’d had enough of audiences already.

She smiled professionally at me, more than professionally at Apollo, as if to tell him that if I was stupid enough to pass him up, she’d be glad to pick up my slack, and led the way.

While the front of her little black dress had been demure, the back dipped indecently low, revealing what on a man I’d have called plumber’s butt. I wondered how one wore a bra with a backless dress. Christie would undoubtedly know.

Apollo’s gaze didn’t follow the hostess as she retreated…as if I’d care. Instead, he was disconcertingly still focused on me.

“End?” he repeated.

I looked him in the eyes. I didn’t want him to think that I was in any way unsure about this. “After this case, I don’t want to see you again.” It was dangerous, cutting a god off cold-turkey, but I didn’t see what choice I had. “There’s nothing I can do about the fact that we’ve been thrown together again, and I can’t tell you what to do about Dionysus, but once this is over and I have my uncle back, I don’t want anything more to do with gods or goddesses.”

“What’s this about your uncle?” he asked, ignoring the rest of that rather important sentence.

“He’s missing,” I answered shortly, determined to get back on track. “He’s in trouble and his last known whereabouts involved the Back to Earth movement.
Cult
,” I added. “Dionysus either has him or knows where he is.”

“Why did you not tell me?”

I seriously considered giving up the glare, for all the good it was doing me. If I spent much more time around Apollo, my face might freeze that way. “Did you miss the part where me and mine are
none of your business
?”

His eyes narrowed. “It seems to me you’re my business when it’s convenient. When you need ambrosia or a way into the Back to Earth complex you have no problem calling me up. When my usefulness is over, you dismiss me like a servant. And you call
me
insufferable.”

“If I’m so insufferable, don’t suffer me,” I countered rather than admit he’d made a very palpable hit. My voice must have risen, because several diners looked over at us disapprovingly.

Our waiter appeared and offered to take our drink orders, probably hoping that would mellow us out. I was sticking with water.

The way Apollo had put things, I was a spoiled rotten brat taking advantage of his feelings for me. But he…
what
?
Did what he thought was right only to have it blow up in his face and have you blame him on top of it
? I didn’t know what was right anymore. That was the thing with gods. They’d had eons of practice running circles around us mere mortals.

Still, I hated myself just a little bit.

“Dinner’s on me,” I offered instead of an apology.

“Why?” he asked suspiciously.

“Because you’re right,” I mumbled into my water glass.

“Come again?”

I put the glass down. “You’re right. I’m wrong. But we’re still done. I don’t think we’re good for each other.”

“I think you’re wrong,” Apollo answered.

“Therein lies the problem.”

I ignored him then to study the menu, afraid that if I looked his way again, he or my conscience would get the better of me, and I’d take it back, find some way to make amends that would really be a veiled excuse to remain in his presence. Because no matter how angry he made me, no matter how much I wanted to ignore him, it wasn’t really possible. And now I knew there was no hiding those feelings.

“Are you reading me right now?” I asked, tense.

“No,” he answered. “It doesn’t happen all the time. When it does, it’s a single, clear, strong feeling striking me like a bolt to the heart. Right now all I feel is churning.”

“So it’s really my emotions you read, not my mind?”

“I don’t read, I receive.”

“Whatever.”

“Yes.”

It made surprisingly little difference to my feelings on the matter.
Churning
was a good description of my emotions and my gut. If there was anything rising to the top it was wanting not to want him. As clear as mud and pure as the L.A. air.

It was a relief to get back to the room and prepare to head into danger. It was clear cut with no messy ambiguity. I wondered whether Apollo was feeling
that
and what he’d make of it. It pissed me off that I bothered to wonder, but I put the anger to good use. It kept the fear at bay. Because as tough as I liked to pretend I was, the thought of sneaking into a cult compound by the dark of night after seeing what had been done to that reporter was enough to shiver me timbers.

But first, I had to face down Christie.

“Oh no, you don’t,” she said. “I’m putting my foot down.”

I looked at her foot. I was unimpressed.

“Christie, this is what I
do
. If you weren’t here, you wouldn’t even know I was in danger.”

“But I am here.”

“Same deal then, I’ll check in by text or phone every hour, or you can call in the cavalry.”

“You mean the cavalry almost an entire state away?” she protested. “Unless…maybe Apollo can go with you.” I knew she was seriously worried if she suggested throwing the two of us together again.

“No,” I said sharply. Then, at the hurt on her face, “Sorry, it’s just…
no
. Things are complicated with us.”

“Then take me.”

“You don’t think that two of us sneaking in are
more
likely to get caught than one?”

“I can drive getaway.”

“I thought you had to get up early tomorrow for some sort of greet-the-dawn, cleansing ritual with Martin.”

“I do.”

“Well then, you stay. I promise, I’ll be all right.”

“I’m going to hold you to it.”

“Deal. I’ll be back in plenty of time to take you out for a huge breakfast of bacon and eggs after your cleansing.”

“Make it egg whites and turkey bacon, and I’m your girl.”

“Turkey bacon—really? Isn’t that an oxymoron?”

“Don’t knock it until you try it.”

I scrunched up my face. “Pass.”

“Child.”

I finished checking the gear in my fanny pack and adding in a few things, like camo face paint and lock-picking tools. If I was caught there’d be no way to claim innocence, but I figured that was the least of my worries.

Part of me wanted to get an hour or two of sleep in before setting out, but I knew I was too hopped up on adrenaline for that. Anyway, I didn’t want to risk waking up groggy. I was going to need all my wits about me.

Christie hugged me like she was saying good-bye. I shook off the thought, sure it was just that and not premonition.

“I’ll check in,” I said again in reassurance.

She nodded and pushed me toward the door. I took a glance back and caught her still looking after me, concern written all over her face.

I called my new friend Alonzo on the way and asked him to meet me at an Internet café I’d spotted on an earlier drive. I needed copious amounts of caffeine, since I might be up all night; I needed to research the dead journalist, and I wanted to hear more about Alonzo’s sister. I could kill three birds with one stone. Typically, it was two birds, but I was an overachiever.

He was available but on duty, so I told him I’d pay him as if he’d taken me for a ride, and he wouldn’t even have to use up the gas. Plus, I’d tip generously. He had no problem at all with my terms.

I spotted a white SUV following me. Either OJ was taking another leisurely run from responsibility or Hades was on my ass. I didn’t like either thought.

But I was almost at the café. I pulled off the road and watched the SUV roll right past me. Maybe I was paranoid.
 

I’d just retrieved my triple espresso from the counter and slid my credit card through a slot at one of the computer terminals, holding my breath about whether or not I’d hit my spending limit, when Alonzo walked in. He gave me a nod and took the insulated cup he’d brought with him for a fill at the counter before joining me.

I used the time to look up Jeremy Clarkson. He’d been the one to write the article I’d previously found calling Back to Earth a cult. More recently, he’d done a piece on a recent string of disappearances in the San Fran/Napa area. He hadn’t drawn any conclusions, but speculated that there might be something sinister at work.

Living in L.A., a city that seemed to have more than its share of serial killers, most recently Michael Hughes, Louis Craine, Chester DeWayner Turner and others, my mind might have gone that way, but together with his cult interest, I thought Jeremy’s suspicions lay elsewhere. His last article had been four months ago. Before he’d decided to go deep?

Alonzo joined me a second later, taking the lid off his mug to let some of the heat escape. Steam rose from the brew like the warning signs of an active volcano…or maybe the pits of Hell.

“How’s your sister?” I asked.

“Not good.” He took a sip of his coffee, hissing as it hit his tongue. Then, “She has no energy, no focus, stomach aches and pains, the shakes so badly she can’t drink a half full glass of water without half of it ending all over her. She’s right now in the hospital for dehydration and malnutrition.”

It all sounded familiar from when I’d gone cold turkey off the ambrosia. It had felt like an amped up case of food poisoning. Not good.

“Malnutrition?”

“She hasn’t been eating.”

“You said you traced the beginning of her illness to Back to Earth?”

“She works at a nearby winery. She started on this raw foods and probiotic kick, getting her lunches and everything from the Back to Earth stand—fruits, nuts, the whole bit. Within a week she was jaundiced, sick. Her kidneys were shutting down. There was nothing she’d eaten that should have done that. Their stand was the only thing different in her world. So either those culty people were lying about being all organic and were using some serious chemicals on their crops that made her sick or…something else. I don’t know, I’m no scientist, but growth hormone or something. I’ve been doing some reading.”