Shimmer: A Novel (21 page)

Fallon made a noise, then clamped her lower lip between her teeth to stop herself from laughing.

 “What am I missing?” Liana asked with a delicate frown, looking from Logan to Fallon in bewilderment.

“Inside joke,” Logan said.

“We should be going.”

“Right,” Logan said seriously.

“Wait for me,” Fallon said. “I need to grab a few things from my locker.”

“No,” Logan said. “You’re not ready for this.”

“Says who?” Fallon asked a little defensively.

“He’s right, Fallon,” Liana said. “I—we appreciate your concern but you are untrained. You would be placing yourself unnecessarily at risk.”

“But I need—”

Liana interrupted her mid-protest. “Stick with us, Fallon, and your time will come. For now, it’s best we handle this. Agreed?”

Fallon sighed. “Suppose so. But wait—how’s Chelsea?”

“Her father came for her this morning. He’s taking her to the west coast to get her away from… everything. They’ll sell the house, and she’ll stay with him out there permanently.”

“Suppose that’s for the best.” The buzzer sounded. Fallon frowned. “Oh, crap! Late for Dinsmore’s class.”

“See you later,” Logan called back to her, looking back over his shoulder as he and Liana hurried down the deserted hallway.

Fallon mouthed a silent farewell and flashed him a half-hearted wave, but it was the forlorn look in her eyes that made him realize she doubted his calm assertion. He had no idea what her abilities were or might be, but he couldn’t help but think that if conscious prescience were among them, she might have foreseen a near future without him in it.

Chapter 32

Despite her tardiness to government class, Fallon arrived a full two minutes before the habitually late Mr. Dinsmore. She plopped down in her accustomed seat next to Sadie Bennett, heaved a sigh, and shook her head in frustration. Some nagging bit of intuition had urged her to leave school with Logan and Liana, but Liana’s logic had been unassailable. If they ran into something like last night, like whatever attacked Chelsea’s family, Fallon had no clue how to help.
I’d be a clay pigeon,
she thought in disgust.
Sure, I could provide a distraction. Let the demon—or whatever the hell it is—attack me while somebody useful does whatever needs to be done.

“No sign of boy toy.”

“What?” Fallon said, startled out of her self-deprecating reverie by Sadie’s comment.

“Let me guess,” Sadie said. “Slipped your hook.”

“What—? Oh, the fishing metaphor again,” Fallon said, quirking a grin. “He went home sick.”

“Serious?”

“Could be,” Fallon said, suddenly fearing the worst. “Hope not.”

“Wait!” Sadie said with a gasp, eyebrows rising above her sculpted nose. “He’s the one? The guy who upchucked in Claridge’s trashcan?”

“Word travels fast.”

“Oh, wow! That must have been priceless,” Sadie said. “Golden!”

Fallon frowned. “Not exactly a Hallmark moment.”

“You’re kidding, right?” Sadie asked, incredulous. “It’s classic. It’s… all-time! Enshrine that trashcan in the Smithsonian.”

“I’m sure it’s been scrubbed clean by now.”

“No!”

“Settle down, citizens,” came a gruff voice from the front of the classroom. Mr. Dinsmore dropped his weighty briefcase on his desk to signal the official, if belated, start of class.

Within seconds Dinsmore began to fill the chalkboards with his indecipherable scrawl. Fallon dutifully and mechanically copied his sloppy wisdom into her notebook, at least as much as she could interpret, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that by doing the right thing she’d made the wrong choice.

Chapter 33

Logan sat in the passenger seat, his head against the closed window, allowing the silence in the white conversion van to lengthen. Once Liana determined that his bad vibes were as maddeningly unspecific as ever, she stopped pressing him for information. From past experience, she knew that he would tell her as soon as something definite resolved.

After a few moments, he noticed her tapping her fingernails against the steering wheel, that her other hand’s grip was unnaturally tight. He turned his attention to her face and saw the strain there. “What’s wrong?” he asked, sitting up straight in his seat.

She glanced at him before returning her attention to the road. “What do you mean?”

“C’mon, sis,” Logan said. “Your serene veneer is completely gone.”

“Okay, first of all, it’s not a veneer,” Liana said. “It’s inner peace through stress management.”

“Right,” Logan said undeterred. “Whatever. So what’s up?”

Liana sighed. “Ambrose.”

“Up all night with the book research,” Logan said. “Kinda figured. But that’s not what’s gotten under your skin.”

“I thought Barrett should have come with me,” Liana said, “to your school.”

“Backup driver?”

Liana scowled at him. “Don’t be obtuse, Logan. If this thing is as bad as you made it sound in your phone call, the three of us should be together.”

“I realize that, with my passive talents, I inspire little in the way of confidence, but the least—”

“Oh, don’t get defensive on me,” Liana said impatiently. “I’m not disparaging your manhood. It’s simple. We’re a team, right?”

Logan shrugged. “Sure.”

“And if we ever needed our best players on the field,” Liana continued, “all our best players, now is the time.”

“Agreed,” Logan said. “And thanks, by the way.”

“Don’t mention it,” Liana said. “Anyway, Ambrose specifically sent me for you without Barrett.”

“Still not sure what you mean.”

“He told Barrett to wait at the house.”

“Why?”

“Wouldn’t say,” Liana said. “Either he wants us to face it alone or…”

“Or he decided to send Barrett out after you’d gone.”

She nodded, frowning.

“Doesn’t make sense,” Logan said. “I’m the douser. Where would he send Barrett?”

She shrugged. “Maybe he’s holding Barrett in reserve.”

Logan patted her forearm. “Don’t worry, sis,” he said. “I’ll never let you down. You can count on me.”

“Same here,” Liana said and fell silent again.

Since the ill-fated rift crossing fractured Thalia’s mind, it had come down to the two of them, Liana and Logan against the world. Or rather,
for
the world. They’d lost their parents one after the other, followed by a sibling—because Thalia had changed. She was no longer the whole person who had stepped through that rift. That left the two of them. Ambrose seemed to exist outside their familial bond. He was their universal constant. Logan had the feeling Ambrose would be there long after Liana and he checked out. Sometimes only Liana and he seemed real, a last fragile connection to life and humanity. Because of their shared tragedies, their sibling bond had become stronger. At the same time, the rest of the world had become ephemeral and untrustworthy, offering only the illusion of safety and belonging.

Liana reached over and squeezed Logan’s left hand where it rested on his knee. “You really tossed your cookies in your teacher’s trashcan?”

“We don’t need to tell anyone else. Okay?”

She smiled. “You’re no fun.” As she turned onto their street, Logan leaned forward, like a hunting dog on point. Liana noticed the sudden tension in his body and she unconsciously eased up on the accelerator. She waited a moment or two before speaking. “Logan?”

“Something’s different.”

“What is it?”

“Don’t know.”

“Something good… or bad?”

Logan shrugged. “Different.”

As soon as she turned up the long driveway to their home, Logan hopped out of the moving white conversion van. He slammed the door as Liana protested his recklessness, then raced between the trees scattered across their wide lawn. Sun-fractured shadows lined his path, like harbingers of a deeper darkness to come, but he shook off the presentiment of doom and stayed focused on the change he sensed from inside the house. It seemed as if gravity had shifted, not stronger or weaker, but somehow askew.

“Logan, wait!” Liana called from behind him.

A quick glance revealed that she’d parked the van well short of the three-car garage and was chasing after him, no doubt fearing an imminent or ongoing attack within the house. “It’s okay,” he yelled over his shoulder. After a moment, he whispered, “I think it’s good.”

Logan rushed into the house, but stopped in the foyer and looked around expectantly. Ambrose and Barrett, the latter wearing sweat-damp workout clothes and an inquisitive frown, were walking toward the closed door of Ambrose’s office.

“Remarkable timing, Logan,” Ambrose said with a pleased grin.

Liana entered the foyer a few seconds after Logan and said, “What’s going on?”

“Good news,” Ambrose told them, his arms spread wide. “We have a visitor. No, that’s not quite right. A new addition. That’s better. Not that he’s new, you understand, but—”

“The rest of us don’t expect to live quite as long as you, Ambrose,” Barrett said impatiently. “Could we skip the preliminaries?”

“Certainly,” Ambrose said. “Right this way?”

When Ambrose opened his office door, Logan noticed that he still hadn’t decided where to hang his disturbing collection of artwork. The paintings continued to lean against the walls and bookshelves. But a moment later, Logan saw the tall, muscular man sitting in one of the leather wingchairs. Though quick details of the man’s attire registered—blue chambray shirt, jeans and scuffed work boots—Logan’s attention shifted to the black patch over the man’s left eye and the ruin of that side of his face. Deep furrowed scars traced an uneven path from his forehead to his neck. Despite the damage to the man’s visage, the family resemblance was unmistakable. His hair was a darker brown than Barrett’s and his remaining eye a paler blue, but otherwise there was no doubt.

“Gideon…?” Barrett said incredulously. “Gideon! Damn!”

“Barrett,” Gideon said with a nod and a tentative smile as he stood in greeting.

Barrett stepped forward, gripped and shook Gideon’s offered hand, then pulled his older brother into a quick, fierce hug, slapping him on the back several times before releasing him. “You should have called!”

“I did,” Gideon said with a slight frown as he glanced at Ambrose.

“Ambrose?” Barrett said. “Why didn’t you tell me—us?”

“Not his fault,” Gideon said. “I wanted to be sure…”

“Sure? About what?”

“I didn’t change my mind,” Gideon said with a wry grin. “Wouldn’t want to disappoint everyone, again.”

“No harm, right?” Barrett said as he turned to the side, indicating Liana and Logan as he made introductions.

“Glad to meet you,” Logan said. “Barrett talks about you a lot.”

“Don’t believe a word,” Gideon said, chuckling.

“Well, if only half of what he says about you is true,” Liana said, “we’re very glad to have you with us.”

“You are staying, right?” Barrett asked.

“Apparently, I don’t have a choice,” Gideon said, again exchanging a secretive look with Ambrose. “But yes, I’m staying.”

Barrett turned quickly to Ambrose and demanded an explanation. “No choice? What’s he talking about?”

“I called once,” Ambrose said. “Suggested he should join us. The decision was his.”

“No arm twisting?” Barrett asked. “Or guilt trips?

“I assure you my meager abilities in no way allow me to twist limbs through telephone lines from thousands of miles away,” Ambrose said. “And guilt is a subjective burden and an unreliable motivator.”

“Then I don’t get it,” Barrett said, glancing back and forth between the two men. “What am I missing?”

“Not much, apparently,” Ambrose said. “Gideon’s hand was forced, in his opinion, at least. You see, he encountered a grim. Or rather, the grim stalked him.”

“Worse than that,” Gideon said. “I believe this grim was killing children to lure me out of seclusion. His way of throwing down a gauntlet. A sick challenge.”

“But why? Why you?” Barrett asked. “You stopped hunting Outsiders so why… Oh.”

“What?”

“Nothing,” Barrett said quickly, dismissively.

“Say it.”

“I was thinking maybe he sought you out because you lost your… I mean, he might have assumed you lost your nerve.”

“Is that what you think, Barrett?” Gideon asked defensively. “That I lost my nerve?”

Barrett cleared his throat. “No, of course not, I…”

“The truth.”

“All right, damn it, yes,” Barrett said. “But only because of what happened to you. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t blame you. It was my fault, I should have—”

“You’re wrong.”

“Fine.”

“That’s not why I left.”

Barrett shook his head, wanting to avoid this confrontation if no others lately. “I said fine. Let’s leave it at that.”

“But it’s not fine,” Gideon said. “Not by a long shot.”

“Look, Gideon, no harm, right? Let’s drop it. I’m glad you’re back. That’s the important thing.”

“And why’s that?” Gideon asked. The right side of his face taut and flushed red with anger while the scar tissue along the left side remained pale. “What good am I to you—to any of you—if I’ve lost my nerve?”

“Let’s not argue, Gideon.”

“If you can’t trust me at your back,” Gideon shot back, “what the hell good am I?”

“You’re family.”

“Not good enough.”

“Please,” Liana said. “Is there a point to this bickering?”

“We’re not bickering,” Gideon said with a forced grin. “We’re clearing the air. Barrett thinks I’m a coward.”

“I never said that!”

“Let’s get one thing straight, little brother,” Gideon said as he pressed his index finger against Barrett’s chest. “I never lost my nerve.”

With that, he left the office and strode toward the kitchen.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Barrett yelled after him. “Are you calling me a coward?”

When Gideon refused to reply, Barrett started after him, but Ambrose caught his arm and shook his head. “Let him cool off, Barrett.”

“I didn’t mean…” Barrett protested. “I never said…”

“We know,” Ambrose said. “This is something Gideon needs to figure out.”

Logan saw Liana frown at them briefly before she followed Gideon into the kitchen. If any of them had the ability to calm Gideon, Liana was the best candidate for the job. Logan decided not to tag along and, instead, sat down in the abandoned wingchair and sighed. In all the excitement since arriving home, he’d almost forgotten about his intense nausea at school. The worst of it had passed, for the moment at least, but what remained was an itchy feeling of dread, as if imminent doom awaited his next moment of inattentiveness.