"Aphrodite's_Secret_010" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kenner _Julie_-_[Protector_03]_-_Aphrodite's_Secret_(V1.0)_[lit](multi-file...)

Chapter Six

Zoë was missing something, something important. But a bone-deep exhaustion was pulling her down, and the swill of hormones in her blood had her head in a muddle. She couldn’t think, and her only recourse was to play by the book. Her nephew’s safety was on the line, and she didn’t intend to compromise that—no matter how much the boy’s mother believed in Jason.
Two hours had passed since Lane begged her to uncuff Jason and let him lead them all to his houseboat docked in Marina del Rey. He wanted to tap into the Council’s database to scour it for possible locations where Hieronymous might have taken Davy. And although Lane thought that was a marvelous idea, Zoë had reasonably pointed out that a dozen Protectors were already doing that very thing.
What did Jason expect to find that others couldn’t?
“Unless he already knows where Hieronymous has Davy,” Zoë had said. “And he just wants to poke around for a while to strengthen his story.”
But Lane hadn’t bought that. For better or worse, she believed Jason was trying to help. So at last Zoë had succumbed to her friend’s wishes—but only because she was there to monitor Jason’s activities and Officer Boreas was around as backup.
They were all in the kitchen now, keeping an eye on Jason from the doorway. Zoë frowned, watching him tap at the computer keys. He’d been focusing intently on the task for an hour, and he was still going strong, determined. “I still think this is a mistake,” she said, not really meaning to speak aloud.
Lane shook her head. “He’ll find something the others won’t. And even if he doesn’t, I understand what he’s going through. He needs to do something—anything. ”She shrugged. “I’m going stir crazy myself. I’m absolutely useless ... no help at all to my son.”
Zoë‘s heart twisted, and she gave her stomach a protective pat before walking to Lane and putting her arms around her. “We’ll find him,” she said.
And she meant it. Her hormones be damned, they were going to find Davy and save him.



From the small window over the sink, Lane watched as the sun slid closer to the horizon: a symphony of colors reflected on the calm ocean, deceptively beautiful. Night was falling, and still they hadn’t found any leads. There were monsters in the dark, and her son was with one of them.
Deena walked into the room and Lane tried to conjure a smile for her.
“I just came in to tell you that I called Hoop. I thought it might be helpful if he were here.”
Lane smiled a silent thank-you. She wished Taylor were around, but her foster brother was still at his convention in Switzerland. Zoë had called him, of course, but he wasn’t going to be able to get back until morning. Hoop was Taylor’s best friend, and a private eye as well. She was glad he was on his way over.
Of course, she wasn’t sure how much help Deena’s fiancé would be. She’d take whatever warm bodies she could get helping in the search, though, and maybe Hoop would think of something the dozens of Protectors already looking for Davy had missed. At the very least, he’d give her a hug. At the moment she could really use one of Hoop’s clumsy but sincere hugs.
She paused. In truth, it wasn’t Hoop’s hug she wanted but Jason’s. Earlier, at Sea World, he’d held her tight in the circle of his arms. She’d felt safe. Secure. His embrace had provided a barrier between her and horrible reality, and she’d succumbed to the pleasure, drinking in the optimism engendered by his caress.
Now, the memory of his touch teased her. How her body had heated when she’d seen him. And how right they’d felt together so many years ago—even if his departure had proved they weren’t right at all.
Then again, if what Jason said was true, he would have returned if he could have. Which meant... what? There was still something there? After all this time?
She frowned. No. No way. Not after what he’d done.
The day she’d found out she was pregnant with Davy had been the most emotional of her life. Wonderful, but terrifying. She’d needed him there, wanted him holding her hand and sharing her joy and her fears.
But he’d walked away. Maybe he’d meant to return, and maybe he hadn’t. The bottom line was that he’d put himself before her and her child, and she couldn’t trust that he wouldn’t do the same thing all over again. That was even more true now that she knew he was a Protector. She would never come first. Even—especially—if he was the good guy he claimed; saving the world would always rank just a little bit higher than being with her. Than being with his son.
Honestly, she couldn’t bear that. She’d spent her childhood being shuffled from home to home, never truly being important to anyone. She didn’t want that for Davy. Her son was her priority, and he needed to be the same to whatever man she ended up with.
From what she knew of Jason, he wasn’t that man.
She sighed. She’d work with him to find Davy, but that was all. Once she had her son back, she’d get on with her life.
She stifled a shiver, the truth crashing in on her once again as it had all afternoon: Her son was missing. For brief moments she could remove herself from that reality, could think objectively and know that everything was being done to bring him back. But then she’d return to her own skin, and the horror of it would surround her.
Her skin was clammy and her head throbbed. Her chest ached, and her eyes burned from tears both released and forced back. She was living her worst nightmare, worse than any situation she’d expected or worked so hard to prevent. So much for all her efforts at safety. None of her planning or worrying had protected her boy, and now she had to rely on the help of the one man she’d never expected to see again.
As if reading her droughts, Deena and Zoë reached out for her, each squeezing a hand. She smiled, wishing she had more to cling to than just their friendship.
But she did have more. She had Jason’s promise. And even if she didn’t entirely trust him, she did trust that.
She turned to Deena, squinting. “Zoë thinks I’m nuts for trusting him. What do you think?”
Color rushed to Deena’s cheeks, and Lane almost laughed out loud. Deena was so not the blushing type, and to see her now looking decidedly uncomfortable was funny. Of course, considering her own state of near hysterics, she’d probably laugh at Davy’s favorite Protector joke; How many superheroes does it take to screw in a lightbulb ? None. They just find Electroman and ask him to light up.
She clenched her fists and fought a burst of giggles. Yup. She was definitely hysterical.
After a couple of deep breaths, she felt reasonably in control and repeated her question about Jason. Deena licked her lips, but this time the woman didn’t fudge. She didn’t look at Zoë, either.
“I don’t know what to think. Jason said the kidnapper was a shape shifter.” She turned to Zoë. “Since I’m not entirely sure what you saw...” She trailed off, her words laced with some import Lane didn’t understand.
Zoë did, though. She sucked in a sharp breath, then closed her eyes. “Fire,” she whispered. “That’s what’s been bugging me. He used fire.”
When Lane’s sister-in-law opened her eyes again, she looked straight at Lane and uttered a name. It wasn’t as bad as Hieronymous, but still it was enough to turn Lane’s blood cold:
“Mordichai.”



Davy shoved his glasses into the front pocket of his T-shirt. When his pretend daddy had kidnapped him, those glasses had been in his jeans. Now the arm had broken off, and his mom was going to be really mad. He’d only had the glasses for a month, and she’d made him promise to always wear them and not put them in his pocket, because they cost a whole bunch and she didn’t have the money to replace them every time he sat on them.
This probably meant no Pokemon for at least a week.
The thought of his Game Boy sitting on his desk at home made him start sniffling again. He did so loudly, then ran the back of his hand under his nose and wiped it on his shorts, determined not to be a crybaby. His mom and Aunt Zoë would come soon. Elmer would tell them where to find him, and then he wouldn’t be stuck in this big white room all alone.
When the big Outcast named Clyde had taken him and gotten on that elevator, he’d been really scared—even after Clyde claimed they were just going to a secret hideout. Davy had been so scared, in fact, he’d been happy to be left all alone in this locked room.
He’d scoped it out really good, testing every single part of the walls just like he was playing Super Mario Brothers. But no secret passages opened, which meant that the room made a lousy secret hideout. Of course, by then he knew it wasn’t really a secret hideout. Even though the walls weren’t stone and the floor was carpeted, it was still a dungeon and he was a prisoner, and unless he figured a way out, he was stuck.
Now his tummy was rumbling and he’d looked at every single inch of the room. A twin bed was in the middle, and the walls were all white, with posters of Teletubbies—like he was a baby or something. There was a mirror hanging over the sink, and Davy felt certain there was a camera behind it. The toilet was right next to the bed in the middle of the room, which was kinda gross, so Davy was gonna hold it for as long as he could.
The door locked from the outside, and he couldn’t find a latch. The one window above the bed had bars behind its sheer blue curtains. Davy looked around for a light or a switch but didn’t find one. He also didn’t find any way out—and since he didn’t have any of his tools, he couldn’t make anything to cut away the bars. All he had were his clothes and his Walkman, and that wasn’t much to work with.
It was starting to get late, and it was definitely past his bedtime. The sun had fallen below his window, and the room had already gotten darker. As the sun continued to sink, it would just get worse. And even though he knew there weren’t really any worse things in the dark than there were in the light, he still didn’t want to be all alone in the blackness.
The floor was cold, but the bed squeaked and smelled funny, so Davy plunked down on the floor and took off his sneakers. With his left shoe, his belt buckle, the broken arm of his glasses, and his Walkman, he could probably make some sort of light fixture out of the toilet. It wouldn’t be as cool as his SpongeBob lamp back home, but it would keep him out of the dark. He went to work, happy to have something to do other than sit on the floor watching the shadows move on the wall and wondering if his mom would show up before morning.
A little while later, when the sunlight disappeared completely, it didn’t matter. He’d used the wire from the broken glasses and the metal from his belt buckle and connected them to the back of his red light-up tennis shoe. He’d used the batteries from his Walkman as a power source, along with the water in the toilet bowl, since water was a conductor. He thought it was cool that the toilet now glowed red.
However, he only had one shoe left. He could’ve used both and made the toilet even brighter, but the right shoe had the tracking device he’d invented, and he was pretty sure Elmer would see where he was on they Lite-Brite map and tell someone. He didn’t want to give that up.
His tummy growled some more, and he wondered if anybody was going to come to bring him food— or if there was even anybody around. Curious, he pulled what remained of his glasses from his pocket and balanced them on his nose. With only one arm they tilted sideways, and he had to cock his head so they didn’t fall off.
As soon as he looked through the lenses, the walls started to go all fuzzy, and soon they disappeared altogether. The lenses were the ones his mom had bought, except Davy had added an X-ray coating. He hadn’t told his mom, because he didn’t figure she’d want him to be messing with them—especially since she’d had to use “plastic” to pay for them, and that always made her grumpy. But Davy had wanted to be like his Aunt Zoë. And since he couldn’t see through walls on his own, he’d used the chemistry set at his best friend Eric’s house.
The set belonged to Eric’s brother, but according to Eric’s mother, “Ricky was flunking out of tenth grade because he couldn’t stop listening to that darned, infernal music.” So Davy had figured Ricky wouldn’t care too much if he used his chemistry set.
Now Davy was even more glad that he had. Without these glasses, he wouldn’t be able to see outside this room. Not that there was much to see. Just more rooms like his, but with no one in them. And a long, empty hall with no one in it.
He squinted, turning his head even more sideways to try to get a better view down the hall. A shadow. And it was moving.
Holding his breath, he backed up, half hoping it would go away and half hoping the shadow belonged to someone who was bringing him dinner.
Still... what if the shadow belonged to a monster? Unlike his friends at school, Davy knew that there were real monsters, and they had to live somewhere. He was pretty sure that a dark, scary island dungeon would be the perfect place.
The shadow kept coming, looming bigger and bigger. An orange light flickered on the polished walls, both it and the shadow getting nearer. And then a man appeared, a black cape swirling around him. His face was made of orange fire and dark shadows.
Davy couldn’t help it. He screamed.



“Hopping Hera,” Mordi hissed, aiming the flashlight at the magnetic keypad on Davy’s cell. “You’d think you’d seen a ghost.”
He shifted back to Jason’s form and opened the door. Lane’s kid was huddled in the corner, half a pair of glasses hanging off his face and his eyes wide behind their lenses.
Damn. The kid was really scared.
Well, considering the circumstances, Mordi couldn’t blame him. In fact, he felt a little guilty, adding to what had to already be the worst day in the kid’s short life. “It’s just me, okay? I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“I’m not scared of you,” Davy said. He crawled out of the corner and tucked his broken glasses carefully into a pocket. “But I thought you were a monster.”
“And you are scared of monsters?”
Davy nodded. “Aren’t you?”
Mordi frowned, sure there was some pop-psychology way to answer that question, but nothing brilliant came to him. “Yeah, kid,” he finally said, figuring he might as well go with the truth. “As a matter of fact, I am.”
He’d be especially scared if he was stuck like this kid, in a dark room with—
He broke off the thought with a frown, then glanced down at his flashlight. Sure enough, he’d turned it off, just like he’d thought. So where was that odd red glow coming from?
Squinting into the cell, he noticed an otherworldly looking toilet. “Davy, did you . . . ?”
The boy nodded. “I don’t like the dark,” he said simply.
“You did that?”
Another nod.
Chalk one up for the kid. Hieronymous had said the boy was a genius. Maybe it was true.
“If it’s dark, my mom and Aunt Zoë won’t be able to find me,” Davy added.
Mordi thought of Jason Murphy, out there somewhere and surely pissed. Especially if word had gotten to him about how Mordi was impersonating him. “What about your real dad?”
Davy shrugged, looking a little sad. “I told you, he’s an astronaut. He’d come if he could, but he’s stuck in space.”
Not a bad rationalization for parental failure, Mordi thought. Too bad it wasn’t true of his own father. Hieronymous had been right there during Mordi’s formative years. But despite his physical presence, his father had been absent. The situation had sucked then, and it sucked now. Mordi couldn’t help but hope Jason really did manage to find and rescue his kid. And then stayed with him.
The odds, though, weren’t in his favor.
For one thing, this island was hidden by a cloaking device, making it invisible to both mortal and Protector eyes. For another, Hieronymous had rigged it with all sorts of traps designed to make sure no Protector could get through.
Yes, the island was quite Council-proof. Which was a pity, because Mordi really didn’t want Hieronymous to steal Davy’s brainpower. And at the same time, he wasn’t at all sure that he was up for the job of preventing it. Foiling his father in secret was one thing. It would be quite another to openly oppose him, to see that usual faint glimmer of disappointment change to outright hatred.
All he’d ever wanted was approval from his dad. And if he did anything to help save Davy, he could pretty much toss that possibility right out the window.
He cocked his head, his eyes going back to the jerry-built toilet. “So, you’re a smart kid, huh?”
Davy shrugged. “I guess so. My mom’s making me go to private school next year. If she can figure out how to pay for it.”
“Don’t you want to go to private school? I bet you’d get even smarter.”
“Yeah, but Eric goes to my old school.”
“I see. Is that your friend?” Mordi tapped a finger against his chin, thinking. “So maybe you’d rather not be quite so smart.”
“I dunno,” Davy said. “Maybe.”
“Makes perfect sense to me.” Mordi stepped farther into the room. “Be normal, hang out with your friends.” He nodded, more to convince himself than Davy. “Yes, maybe that wouldn’t be so bad after all.”
“Mister?”
Mordi jerked his head up, realizing he’d lost himself in his thoughts. “No matter,” he said, striding to the child. He carried a bag of food for the kid, and now he plunked it down on the little table, next to the remains of what had once been a Sony Walkman.
“I hope you like peanut butter and jelly,” he said, pulling a sandwich out of the bag.
Davy nodded, then hobbled over, his right foot bare.
Mordi rolled his eyes. “What’s with the shoes?”
“The other one’s in the toilet,” Davy said, as if that made perfect sense.
“And you’re walking around wearing only one because ... ?”
“ ‘Cause Elmer needs it to find me.”
“O-kay,” Mordi agreed. Whatever fantasy made the kid happy. He pointed at the sandwich. “Dig in.”
Davy did, and Mordi leaned against the wall, watching the kid scarf down the boring little meal. He half-snorted, the possibility of rescue by tennis shoe amusing him.
The glow of the toilet caught his attention, and he frowned. Then again ... If the kid could turn a toilet bowl into some sort of art-deco light fixture, then Hera only knew what he could do with a tennis shoe. He was a genius, right?
A small smile played across Mordi’s face, and he hoped the kid was as smart as Hieronymous thought. Maybe Jason or Zoë would find him after all. “Stay on your toes, Davy,” he whispered. “Maybe your daddy will come through for you.”



“Mordichai,” Zoë repeated. Was she right? Was her cousin really the culprit? That seemed to be the only reasonable explanation, what with the fire the kidnapper had used. That was one of Mordi’s skills.
But Mordi? She didn’t want to believe it was true. Despite everything, Zoë had a soft spot for her cousin. And after Mordi’s most recent adventure with Hale and Tracy, Zoë had hoped to Hera he’d turned over a new leaf. If this new hunch was right, though, Mordi had yet to extricate himself from his father’s shadow.
Lane shook her head, a jumble of emotions playing across her face. “What fire? And what does Mordi have to do with this? If he has Davy ...” She trailed off with a shiver.
Zoë couldn’t blame her. Lane’s past encounters with Mordi hadn’t exactly been warm and fuzzy. For that matter, Mordi had put Davy in danger before.
She opened her mouth to explain, but Deena got there first.
“When Zoë launched a bucket of fish at the kidnapper,” Deena said, “fire shot from his fingers. And then, in the water, when he was wrestling with the dolphin, this ball of fire appeared out of nowhere.”
Lane scowled. “In the water?”
“Yup.” Deena nodded. “Sound like anyone we know?”
Lane met Zoë‘s eyes. “Mordi,” she agreed.
Zoë shook her head in annoyance. “I should have realized sooner,” she said, once again realizing she simply wasn’t at her best.
And if this was all true, Jason was innocent and Zoë had wasted valuable time detaining him.
Deena took her hand. “You couldn’t have known. And the Council has been searching for Davy since he disappeared, so it’s not like we could have done anything differently.”
“Why couldn’t Zoë have known?” Lane asked, her gaze darting between them. “I thought all your halfling weirdness had settled down, that all you had to do was take off your glasses to see a shape shifter’s true form. Didn’t you see that it was really Mordi?”
“Well, yeah,” Zoë said, not really sure how to explain. “But right now I’ve—”
“Got a cold,” Deena said. “A nasty cold. Maybe allergies. We’re not sure.”
Lane’s confused expression morphed into one of concern. “And it’s messing with your powers? Like Hale?”
Zoë nodded, grateful both for Deena’s fast thinking and for her brother setting the precedent: He had the unfortunate habit of sneezing himself invisible when his allergies got out of control.
“Do you want a Claritin?” Lane asked, starting to rummage in her purse.
“No, no,” Zoë said. “But we probably ought to head back in and see what Jason’s found out.”
Lane licked her lips, obviously wanting reassurance. “So you trust him now? You think he’s okay?”
“I’m not sure I—” Zoë cut herself off as she noticed a photograph taped to the refrigerator, partially hidden behind a pot holder. Something about the image seemed familiar, and she looked closer. Sure enough, the image permanently recorded in the candid snapshot was Lane and Davy playing at a park. The picture had been taken maybe a week ago. Zoë moved the pot holder. Beneath, previously hidden, was another photograph, this one several years older. There were three, actually—a strip of pictures taken in a carnival photo booth. Lane and Jason were there, happy and very obviously in love.
And yet Jason had left. Why?
“Zoë?” Lane called from the hallway.
“Sorry,” she said. “I’m pretty sure he didn’t kidnap Davy now.”
Whether she trusted him in Lane’s life was another question altogether.



Jason wasn’t thrilled about having Officer Boring attached to his hip, but the baby-sitter had been Zoë and Lane’s compromise. For the most part, Lane had won—after all, Jason was back on his houseboat, doing what he had to—but Zoë had insisted that Boreas be part of the deal. Which meant that, for the foreseeable future, Jason had a shadow.
Oh, joy.
“It would go a lot faster if you closed some of the other programs you have running,” Boring said, his finger snaking over Jason’s shoulder to point at the screen. “And why are you going to the official file on Hieronymous? You don’t really expect him to have taken the kid to one of his registered locations, do you?”
Jason gritted his teeth and breathed slowly, hoping that by the time he finished, Boring would have accidentally stepped out the back door and into the Pacific.
No such luck.
“You want to search?” he said. “Then get your own computer. This is my party.”
In truth, Boreas was right. But Jason’s machine was busy compiling the results of the other searches he was running, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to speed it up.
Rather than feel useless, Jason had resorted to obvious sources of information—and held fast to the hope that he might get lucky. Hours had passed, and so far neither he nor any of the Council had found even a hint as to Davy’s location. Jason was working on adrenaline and coffee alone. And even though he knew he should take a break and get some food while the computer did its thing, somehow he couldn’t seem to drag himself away.
So he sat here, plodding through entries, the vibrant white light of his monitor the only illumination in his small living room.
Behind him, Boring slurped coffee, then dragged over one of Jason’s footstools and kicked his feet up.
“Make yourself at home,” Jason said.
“Thanks.” Boring reached onto the desk and grabbed a pencil and a pad of paper, then gave Jason a smile.
Apparently, the young officer had trouble grasping sarcasm. Jason sighed. But, unlike Zoë, at least Boring seemed willing to believe he was really looking for Davy. Jason knew he should probably cut the guy a break, but it irritated him that Zoë had assigned him this shadow. He was taking it out on Boring, and if that was unfair it was too damn bad. Jason wasn’t exactly having the best of days himself.
Twisting around, he turned his attention back to the computer. He’d already entered his password at www.superherocentral.com and had navigated to the database containing all registered Outcast information. Protector law required Outcasts to file quarterly reports identifying all property held in their name, or by a corporate entity in which the Outcast held a substantial ownership. Jason didn’t necessarily expect Hieronymous had followed the rules, but considering how stiff the penalty was for noncompliance, he was willing to give this a shot. Who knew? Maybe the Outcast played by some of the rules.
It turned out Hieronymous had registered 427 properties around the globe, the most promising of which included a hunting cabin in the Arctic, a mud hut in Borneo, an abandoned winery in the South of France, and a ghost town in Arizona.
Boring leaned forward, his eraser tapping the screen. “Arizona’s close. Maybe he just whipped over a couple of states.”
“Arizona?” Lane’s voice filtered in from behind them and Jason turned, the very sound of her voice warming him more than the T-shirt and sweats he’d thrown on to replace the towel from Sea World. “You think Davy’s in Arizona?”
Jason shook his head, hating to kill the hope he saw in her bloodshot eyes. “I’m sorry, Lane. We still don’t know where he is.”
Her lip trembled, steadying slightly when Zoë put a hand on her shoulder. Lane’s already pale skin seemed translucent, and shadows lined her eyes. Since he’d last seen her she’d pulled her hair back into a ponytail, and now only loose tendrils framed her face. Despite the strength he knew was at her core, Lane looked small and wan, and he immediately got up and took her elbow.
He led her to the small sofa by the window, but there, instead of lying down like he wanted, she sat up, her legs together, her hands folded above her knees, as if keeping herself together was as much a physical act as a mental one.
“I’ve got a team of fifty Protectors checking out each of Hieronymous’s official addresses,” Zoë informed no one in particular. She nodded toward the computer screen where Jason had just been pulling up that information. “In a few hours, we should know something.”
Jason nodded, glad this route had been handled. Then he headed back to the machine and clicked the mouse on the toolbar, pulling up the Council-devised search engine he’d had running in the background. The software filtered through the property records of every city in every state in every country. Considering the massive amount of information to be processed, the program was surprisingly fast.
“Bori—Boreas is probably right. I doubt the kidnapper took Davy to a registered location. I’ve had the computer searching property records. I’m hoping we can locate some likely unregistered properties.”
“That’ll take forever.” This was a new, male voice, and Jason swiveled in his chair to face the door. A somewhat rumpled man appeared whom he recognized from his past months observing Lane.
“Hoop!” Deena squealed, and then ran to embrace her fiancé. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
He kissed her head, then immediately moved to the sofa and put his free arm around Lane. Holding her close, he planted a chaste kiss on her forehead. Jason liked him instantly. “You doing okay, kid?”
She nodded, then immediately shook her head. “No.”
“We’ll find him,” Hoop said. He turned toward Jason. “You’re the dad?”
Jason nodded, grateful the man hadn’t repeated Zoë‘s accusations. “That’s me.”
“So let’s see what you’ve got so far.” Hoop squeezed in between Jason and Boreas, managing to block Boreas’s view in the process. Jason’s affection for the P.I. rose another notch.
He shifted to the left, giving Hoop a better view. “I think you got the gist of it as you came in. I’m letting the computer do its thing to see if any matches come up.” He pointed to a box in the corner of the screen. “So far it’s found ninety-seven properties potentially owned by Hieronymous.”
“That many?” Lane asked from across the room.
“Afraid so,” he admitted. “And it’s only completed fifteen percent of the search.”
She got up and moved toward the computer, and Jason automatically scooted over, making room for her on his chair. She hesitated, her tongue darting out to lick her lips. He patted the cushion, then stood up, letting her have the chair to herself.
“No. You’re working,” she said.
“And you want to watch. You don’t need to be standing.” He squinted at her. “Have you eaten anything?” His gaze shifted to Deena. “She should eat something.”
“I’m not hungry,” Lane argued, but she sat on the edge of his chair. “We can share,” she amended.
Jason nodded, pleased she wanted him close. Before he sat back down, he shot another look in Deena’s direction. She headed off to the kitchen— technically a galley, but the houseboat was so like a fancy apartment that nothing about it really felt nautical.
“Can you see the results so far?” Lane asked, her breath tickling his neck.
“Sure.” Jason clicked his mouse, pulling up each specific file. Behind him, he could hear Boreas squirming, maneuvering for a better view. He scrolled through each entry, but nothing screamed evil Outcast abode.
“Nothing,” Lane said. She closed her eyes, her hands clutching the side of the desk so hard her knuckles turned white. “This is hopeless.”
“Mordichai,” Zoë reminded, her voice little more than a whisper.
Lane’s eyes opened, and she turned to Jason. “Of course,” she cried. “Maybe the property belongs to Mordi!”
“I’m already on it,” he said. And he was. “The computer’s looking for any property that belongs to any derivation of Hieronymous’s name, Mordichai’s, or that Clyde guy who does Hieronymous’s dirty work.” He shrugged. “Of course, it’s probably a waste of resources to plug Mordi’s name in,” he said. “After all, he’s already on probation with the Council, and I can’t imagine he’d risk that by letting his father—”
“Mordi’s a shape shifter,” Zoë said, interrupting. Her voice was flat, but the message wasn’t. Surprised, Jason turned to face her, and she nodded. “Sorry I misjudged you,” she added.
Her expression wasn’t exactly warm and fuzzy, but an apology was an apology, and Jason didn’t intend to look a gift Protector in the mouth. “Under the circumstances, it was a natural mistake,” he said. If he’d expected her expression to soften once she realized he wasn’t holding a grudge, he’d been wrong.
Her lips stayed in a thin line, her posture overly straight and her eyes fixed on the back of Lane’s head.
Ah. Well, he couldn’t fault her for worrying about her friend, either.
“So it wasn’t this guy?” Boreas asked, indicating Jason. “I don’t need to keep an eye on him anymore?”
A shadow crossed Zoë‘s face, and she started to speak, looking none too happy about it. Jason knew what she was going to say and got there first. “You’re stuck with me, kid.” He met Zoë’s surprised gaze. “Council rules.”
“Right,” Boreas said. “Of course. Regulation nine-seven-four, subpart d.” He thwapped his forehead with the heel of his hand. “I can’t believe I forgot.”
Jason rolled his eyes at the neophyte’s enthusiasm for the rulebook, then looked at Lane. “Until another Protector is conclusively involved, I’m still a suspect,” he said, answering the question in her eyes.
Well, for Jason, that was more or less the status quo—at least until he proved himself to the High Elders. A protector like him with Hieronymous for a father would always be a little bit suspect. In that, he supposed, he had a hell of a lot in common with his brother Mordi. Someday, maybe he’d even meet the man.



Lane poked at her plate of scrambled eggs. She’d been doing so for about an hour, ever since Deena had put it in front of her. So far, she hadn’t taken a bite.
At first, Deena had shot her optimistic glances, but she’d finally given up and now dozed in one of Jason’s leather chairs. Jason and Boreas were still hovering in front of the computer, its monitor casting an eerie glow on their faces. Zoë was on the patio, talking on her cell phone to some council big shot, and Hoop was in Jason’s bedroom, calling to see if any of his mortal law-enforcement connections had turned up any information.
Only Lane was useless. Sucking in air, she willed herself to eat. What Deena had said earlier was right: If she wanted to help, she needed to keep up her strength. With a grand effort, she stabbed a tiny clump of egg with her fork and lifted it to her mouth.
Her taste buds had ceased to function, so the bite seemed bland and rubbery. She added a bit of toast, but her mouth was too dry, and she just kept chewing and chewing, unable to swallow. After a moment she gave up and spit the whole mess into a napkin. “I’m sorry,” she said, to no one in particular.
Jason looked up. “How about a milkshake?”
She shook her head. “No, I’m fine. It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay. When was the last time you ate?”
She blinked, trying to grasp the concept of time. Years seemed to have passed since she’d had anything but water, and she frowned with concentration. “Lunch. Today. I mean yesterday. I mean—”
“You mean it’s been a long time,” Jason interrupted. “It’s almost four in the morning.” He stood up and headed into the kitchen. “Something cold and liquid. Strength, energy, and ice cream.” His smile was sympathetic. “Just the ticket for a weary woman.”
She nodded, having to admit it did sound good. But when Jason came back around the corner, his smile had faded. “I’m out of ice cream.” He glanced toward the computer and the Protector sitting there. Boreas had fallen asleep. “We’ll send him.”
She shook her head. “No, that’s okay. I’m fine.” Her stomach rumbled, apparently having come awake at the thought of ice cream. Her hunger triggered a memory, that of a likely hungry ferret trapped in her living room. She stood up, glancing around for her purse. “I, uh, need to go home anyway.”
Jason shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
She crossed her arms on her chest. She’d come close to falling apart today, but she’d managed to hold herself together. The last thing she needed was to be told what to do. She stood up, marched to the table near the front door, and swung her purse over her shoulder. “Yeah, I do. I need to go feed Elmer and I want... I want...” She trailed off, blinking back tears. What she wanted was just to see Davy’s room again, but she felt like an idiot saying that out loud.
Jason moved toward her, his bare feet silent on the polished wood floor. He slipped an arm around her, and Lane leaned against him, wishing she didn’t need his comfort but not about to turn it down from some false pride. Especially since being in his arms felt so very right.
“I only meant that you don’t have a car. You came here under Protector power, remember?” He paused, then added, “If you need to feed Elmer, I’ll take you. And as long as we’re using my place for command central, you should probably pick up a few things.”
She sighed. He was right. Getting Zoë to agree took a bit more effort, but Lane’s sister-in-law finally gave in, even going so far as to not wake Boreas to go with them. Ignoring Regulation 974, subpart d was a big deal; Lane wasn’t certain if Zoë now fully trusted Jason, if she was simply being accommodating, or if she was just too tired to fight. Whatever the reason, Lane didn’t care. She just wanted to go home.
She soon found herself above Santa Monica, with nothing surrounding her but air and Jason’s arm. Below, stop lights blinked red and yellow as traffic moved in a city that thrummed with activity even in the middle of the night. The night air chilled her, and she shivered.
“Scared?” he asked.
She shook her head. “I’ve done this before,” she explained with false bravado. In truth, this particular Protector trick got her every time. Usually, she could focus on something else and keep the fear at bay. This time, though, the something else was even more terrifying. “Maybe a little scared,” she admitted.
His arm tightened around her waist and he shifted her, pulling her below him so that he was essentially lying on her. Her back was pressed against his chest, her rear nestled against his crotch. Their ankles intertwined, keeping their legs together.
The heat from his body poured through her, staving off her chill. But his heat was so much more than just 98.6. No, the friction between their bodies was making things much hotter. It was doing things to her it shouldn’t, making her body remember things it shouldn’t. Making her want things she shouldn’t.
She shifted, twisting against his arm, trying to struggle free. But he held fast. “No,” she whispered. “Put me back the way I was before.”
“Shhh.” His mouth brushed the back of her ear. “We’re almost there. And this is the safest way to fly. I’m tired, too. I don’t want to accidentally drop you.”
She doubted he would, but she appreciated his excuse. She didn’t have the energy to argue. And, truthfully, she craved his touch—wanted it even as she wanted to be free of him.
The journey ended all too soon, and Jason put them down on the lawn in front of her apartment. Lane frowned, wondering how he knew her address, but she didn’t ask. Under the circumstances, it was probably best not to know.
She slid her key into the lock and pushed open her front door. Immediately, Elmer scampered forward and started chittering.
“Hale’s ferret?” Jason asked.
Lane nodded.
“Any idea what he’s saying?”
“Not a clue,” she said. “I’m guessing he’s starving to death. He’s used to hotels with room service. Staying up with me is really lowering his standards.”
Reaching down, she rubbed his little head, thinking that would calm him down. Instead, it only seemed to excite him more. “I guess I better make with the food.” She headed toward the kitchen, gesturing to the interior of the room. “It’s not much, but it’s home. Sit anywhere,” she offered, clicking a button on the remote to turn on the television. “I’ll only be a second.”
Instead of sitting like she’d expected, he headed for the bookshelf. There he pulled down the carved wooden dolphin Davy had received a few months ago from his anonymous benefactor. Lane licked her lips, ignoring the hungry, hopping Elmer as she watched Jason stroke the polished wood. For the first time, she wondered if Aaron was right. Had Jason been sending these presents? But how could that be? He’d been locked up. Imprisoned. He’d told her that himself.
Surely he hadn’t lied to her again?
A commercial ended, and the twenty-four-hour news channel came back on. As Lane pulled open the refrigerator, she heard the broadcast: “A freak storm at the San Diego Sea World on Sunday resulted in an overload on that park’s sewage system. All patrons were evacuated while environmental officials tested the facilities to ensure there was no contamination. ”
Lane twisted, and her eyes met Jason’s, a chill settling over her as the newscaster assured viewers that the park checked out fine and would reopen in the morning. She took a deep breath, and then another. When she felt composed, she popped the tops on two Diet Cokes and turned.
“Tell me about Davy,” Jason said, still holding the carving and standing in the living room. “Tell me about my son.”
Lane opened her mouth, not to comply but to ask her own questions. But when she saw his eyes, she stopped, the sadness there making her want to cry.
The realization that she wasn’t the only one who’d lost Davy washed over her. Jason had missed out on so much. And no matter what he did, there were some things Jason could never have. And despite what had come between them in the past, and no matter what might lie ahead in the future, Lane wanted Jason to know his son.
“He’s wonderful,” she said, not knowing where to start. “He’s the best little boy in the world.”



Despite his melancholy, Jason had to grin. Leave it to Lane to state the obvious.
He stroked the driftwood dolphin, the warm wood alive under his fingertips. He wondered if Davy had ever played with the thing, or if it just sat, cold and unloved, on a shelf, some curio given by an unknown benefactor.
Although he’d spent hours watching Davy and Lane, he hadn’t looked into their apartment. He’d seen Davy chasing friends, he’d seen his son and Lane wrestling on the grass, he’d seen Davy and Lane eating hotdogs at the slightly rusty table in the courtyard—but the intimacies of their lives had remained a mystery.
“I was hoping for something a little more specific,” he said.
Putting the dolphin back on the shelf, he headed into the kitchen, joining Lane in the cramped room. She handed him a Diet Coke and took a sip of her own. When she pulled a container out of the refrigerator, he grappled for some question that would provide loads of insight into his son. “What’s his favorite food?” he finally asked. Not exactly insightful, but he was just getting warmed up.
Lane looked up from the glop she’d begun spooning onto a plate for Elmer—the ferret continuing to dance about her feet—the corner of her mouth curving into a smile. “Macaroni and cheese,” she admitted. “Kraft.”
He nodded. “The kid has good taste.”
“I take it that’s still in your cooking repertoire?”
Jason laughed. “That is my repertoire. That and microwave popcorn. You should remember.”
“Slacker,” she said.
“Yeah, well, I haven’t exactly had access to a kitchen to learn anything new.” He nodded down at the plate of glop she held, not wanting to talk about his absence. “Purina ferret chow?”
“Beef bourguignonne.” She nudged the ferret with her toe. “Hale has a service deliver Elmer’s meals. The little guy’s spoiled rotten.”
And, apparently, hyperactive. The ferret was bouncing around on the floor even more frantically, clawing at the hem of Lane’s jeans and running in circles.
“He’s a spaz,” Lane said. “But I can’t blame him for being hungry.” She headed toward the door and squeezed past, her shoulder brushing Jason as she stepped into the tiny hallway. “Come on. I’ll show you Davy’s room.”
In two short steps he was at the door, which, in case anyone might be confused, announced on a miniature license plate that it was “Davy’s Place.”
Jason wasn’t sure what he expected inside, but he was pretty sure it wasn’t the tornado-destroyed disaster area that confronted him. Stuffed animals were strewn all about, their apparent mode of transportation the collection of multicolored plastic trucks scattered across the floor. A variety of wooden blocks and Tinkertoys filled the rest of the space, ensuring that entering would be hazardous to one’s health. He did so, anyway.
At the foot of the bed, the kid had mounted a map of the United States on a plastic board. Dozens of tiny lightbulbs made up its coordinates, creating a colorful display. Davy must not have changed the bulbs recently, though, because at the moment all were burned out except for one light humming in the Pacific.
“Cool, huh?” Lane said, nodding toward the map. “He spent days making it. And he begged me for one of those Lite-Brite kits. I said he could have it on his birthday, but he conned it out of me a few months early.” She half-smiled. “I’m such a sucker.”
Jason grinned. Imagining Davy’s enthusiasm, he understood her weakness.
He and Lane moved around the map to the side of the bed, and her fingers absently stroked the walls. Jason noticed the movie posters that decorated every inch: Star Wars, Monsters, Inc.,—
“He likes Mike,” Lane said, gesturing toward one of the posters. She put Elmer’s plate on the floor in the corner next to a water dish, then plucked a green goblin-looking guy off the bed. The plush one-eyed creature matched the character on the Monsters, Inc. poster, and Lane hugged him close, her lips pressed together so tight they disappeared into a thin line.
“Why don’t you bring Mike back to my houseboat?” Jason suggested. “That way you can give him to Davy when you see him again.”
Lane nodded, her throat moving a bit, but she didn’t say anything. After a moment she gave the monster’s head a little kiss and looked up. “Green’s his favorite color,” she said, her voice hoarse. A tear trickled down her cheek. “And never leave anything electronic near him unless you don’t mind it being taken apart.”
Jason reached for her hand, and she let go of Mike to take it. He squeezed her fingers. “He’s ruined some of your stuff.”
She shook her head. “No. Actually, that’s the funny part. He puts it back together—just not always when I need it. Of course, when I complain, he very seriously tells me: ‘Mommy, sometimes you have to be patient while a genius is working.’ ” She laughed. “How am I supposed to argue with that?”
It sounded like something a son of his would say. “I’m pretty sure you can’t.”
Jason glanced around the room, noting the small gadgets and gizmos tucked away everywhere. And, he noticed, the presents he’d sent were all here, most looking like they’d been well played with. “So, what has his genius created?”
Lane sat on the edge of the bed, Mike secure in her lap. “Oh, let’s see. A transporter beam so that I can go off into space and bring back his daddy.” She met his eyes. “Apparently you’re an astronaut,” she added.
He nodded, trying to keep his face impassive despite his pain. “Good to know.”
“And X-ray glasses. And a magic plate that eats your vegetables for you.” She tapped a finger against her chin. “There’s lots more. Every night he tells me what he invented that day. It’s a game we started playing about a year ago. At first he just took his trucks apart and put them back together. Then he moved on to my clock radio, the toaster, and the VCR. After that, his imagination kicked in—we’ve got boogeyman repellant, tracking devices, animal translators, and mind-reading hats.”
“A new one every day, huh?”
Lane nodded. “Yup. Well, usually. Sometimes he says a project’s in development but needs funding. I don’t know where he picks this stuff up. Other times he says the prototype’s in production.” A genuine smile lit her face, almost bright enough to hide the sadness in her eyes. “I swear, the kid thinks he’s Thomas Edison or something.” She shook her head. “Actually, if his science ever ends up as good as his imagination, he just might show Edison up.”
Jason’s stomach twisted. His son, the inventor. His son, accepting the Nobel Prize in physics. His son, Time’s Man of the Year.
Yeah, that would be cool.
“He’s such a clever, special little boy,” Lane went on. Her voice cracked, and Jason sat beside her on the bed, taking her hand in his. She aimed a weak smile in his direction. “Maybe he can invent himself a way to get free of Hieronymous.”
He squeezed her fingers. “We’ll get him back, sweetheart. I promise.”
His pager hadn’t vibrated, but he checked it anyway. No messages. He keyed in an entry, directing it to the others at his houseboat: Progress report?
No news, came the answer.
Damn.
Lane’s bloodshot eyes darted down to the pager and then back up to him. “Nothing?”
“I’m sorry. But we will fi—”
“No.” She whispered the word, her head shaking. “Don’t keep telling me that.” She got to her feet and then, with an icy calm, hurled Mike across the room. “Damn it all to hell!” Tears spilled from her eyes. “I don’t want any more platitudes. I’ve had enough. I’ve reached my limit. I’m done, Jason. I want this to be over. I want my son. I want Davy back.”
Her anguish came in a flood. Tears streamed down her face, and Lane pressed her hand over her mouth as she stumbled back onto the bed. On the way, she almost tripped over Elmer, who hadn’t eaten and was still practically bouncing off the walls near the foot of the bed. Lane ignored the ferret, throwing herself down on Davy’s mattress and curling up with his bedspread, her knees at her chest.
Jason was immediately at her side, leaning over her, stroking her arm. He had no idea what comfort he could bring, but he had to try. His heart wrenched and he reached out, wanting to make Lane’s tears stop.
Gently he brushed the palm of his hand over her hair, smoothing it back from her forehead. Her shoulders shook with silent sorrow, and he placed a soft kiss on her cheek.
“Lane,” he whispered.
That was all it took. With a guttural sob that almost ripped out his heart, she rolled over and clung to him. Her hands clutched his sleeves and her cheek pressed against his chest. Her sobs were no longer silent, and he held her close, rocking from side to side, wishing he could do more to soothe her, wishing he’d never left, wishing he’d been just another dad at Sea World with his boy so that maybe this would never have happened in the first place.
If wishes were fishes . . .
With one hand, Jason stroked Lane’s back, murmuring soft words, saying nothing but trying to communicate everything: hope, strength, most of all, the certainty that all would end well.
As her sobs slowed, Lane pressed closer against him, her arms tight around his waist. Even in the face of the surrounding horror, the moment felt right. She felt right. And Jason knew without a doubt that he would do anything—anything—to make sure Lane wasn’t hurt again. By him, by Hieronymous, by anyone.
He stroked the small of her back. Her little T-shirt had come untucked from her jeans, and his palm skimmed her soft, warm skin. His own body felt hot, but whether from the warm room or the woman he loved, he wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter. Right now, nothing mattered but letting Lane know Davy would be safe.
“It will be okay,” he whispered.
“How?” The word came out strangled, Lane’s voice so raw it caused him physical pain.
This was all his father’s fault, and Jason clenched his fist, pressing it against the belt loop of Lane’s jeans, fighting the urge to smash his fist through the wall as a substitute for his father’s head.
“Because I’ll make sure it’s okay,” he said.
“But what if—”
He pressed a finger against her lips, unwilling to let her complete the thought. Hell, unable to think it himself. “Failure is not an option,” he said, gratified when she grinned at the cliché. “I’m serious, though,” he added. And he was. Deadly serious.
With the side of his hand he stroked Lane’s cheek. She turned, and his palm slid over her warm, soft lips. The sensation rocked him, sending tremors through his body. He ignored them. This wasn’t about him. Wasn’t even about Lane. Not yet. This was about Davy. “I’ll get him back,” he promised. “Or I’ll die trying.”
When she’d first seen him hours ago, her eyes had been accusing. Now, she looked at him like a hero. A wave of fear rose in his gut—fear that he wasn’t up to the task. His father had bested him before; what was to stop him from doing so again?
He shoved the thought aside. He would win. He had to. For Davy, and because he couldn’t bear the thought of this shadow crossing Lane’s eyes again. Yes, he’d win. And, in the end, he’d make Hieronymous no longer a threat to anyone.
“Thank you,” Lane whispered. “I’m sorry I...” She trailed off with a shrug. “I don’t like breaking down like that.”
“No one does,” he said. “But I’d say you have a pretty good excuse.”
“It’s like he took me, too,” she explained. “Like I’m being held prisoner with Davy. Only I don’t know where, and if only I could see through the darkness we could run free.” She looked up at him. A watery smile graced her lips, in sharp contrast to the sadness in her eyes. “Does that make any sense at all?”
He met her smile. “More than you know. Believe me, I know all about prisons. And I know all about Hieronymous.”
She licked her lips. “Do you want to tell me?”
He shook his head, fighting the memories he’d worked so hard to block out, those years trapped all alone in a suspended crystal fishbowl, that prison within a prison, hidden on some desolate island in the Pacific. “Some other time,” he said. “Right now we should get back to the houseboat.”
She nodded, then scooted to the edge of the bed.
Poor lady. Poor Davy. And no one’s paying attention to the ferret.
Jason frowned, cocking his head as he tried to locate the voice that seemed to come out of nowhere.
He stood and turned in a circle, his eyes scanning the room. Nothing.
Hello? he called.
Lane stared at him. “What are you doing?”
He ignored her, addressing the voice. Is anyone here?
You can hear me? Oh, that’s wonderful! I had no idea. Ask the ferret! You need to ask the ferret where Davy is!
Jason turned to Lane. “Does Davy have a fish?”
Her eyes widened. “Oh, my gosh. I completely forgot to feed Dorothy.” She reached to the headboard and pushed Davy’s pillow aside. There, on the built-in bookshelf, was a simple goldfish bowl housing a tiny plastic castle and one small fish.
Thank Hera he wasn’t losing his mind.
Immediately, Jason climbed back onto the bed and crawled to the headboard, coming nose to bowl with the fish.
“Uh, Jason?”
He ignored Lane, focusing on Dorothy. What do you mean, talk to the ferret?
The goldfish swam back and forth, building up speed with each turn. The ferret’s been rambling like mad. And the boy used to talk to him about a tracking device.
You can understand the boy?
I understand him, but he doesn’t understand me. He can talk to the ferret, though—he invented a translator.
His brilliant son ...
Jason shook his head. Time for that later. Can you ask the ferret?
I don’t speak ferret. Do you?
No, Jason certainly didn’t. Which had never bothered him before, but now it caused him no end of grief. Yet there were other ways to communicate besides words, and he intended to get answers.
With a quick thank-you to Dorothy, Jason dove for Elmer, plucking him off the map and the brightly lit bulb plugged into the South Pacific. He wracked his brain for a way to interact with the beast.
“Jason?” Lane asked, her voice switching from slightly amused to slightly concerned. “What’s going on?”
As Jason opened his mouth to answer, realization struck. He stared at the ferret now dangling from his hands, tiny ferret feet kicking in the air.
Jason swallowed as he glanced from the bulb to the ferret and back.
Surely it wasn’t so simple ...
The ferret twisted to follow Jason’s gaze and then started to spaz out again, his little head bobbing up and down affirmatively.
“Dammit, Jason, tell me what’s going on.” Lane clutched his wrist so tightly he opened his hand, dropping Elmer.
“I know where he is,” he answered, meeting her widening eyes. “I know where Hieronymous took Davy.”

Chapter Six

Zoë was missing something, something important. But a bone-deep exhaustion was pulling her down, and the swill of hormones in her blood had her head in a muddle. She couldn’t think, and her only recourse was to play by the book. Her nephew’s safety was on the line, and she didn’t intend to compromise that—no matter how much the boy’s mother believed in Jason.
Two hours had passed since Lane begged her to uncuff Jason and let him lead them all to his houseboat docked in Marina del Rey. He wanted to tap into the Council’s database to scour it for possible locations where Hieronymous might have taken Davy. And although Lane thought that was a marvelous idea, Zoë had reasonably pointed out that a dozen Protectors were already doing that very thing.
What did Jason expect to find that others couldn’t?
“Unless he already knows where Hieronymous has Davy,” Zoë had said. “And he just wants to poke around for a while to strengthen his story.”
But Lane hadn’t bought that. For better or worse, she believed Jason was trying to help. So at last Zoë had succumbed to her friend’s wishes—but only because she was there to monitor Jason’s activities and Officer Boreas was around as backup.
They were all in the kitchen now, keeping an eye on Jason from the doorway. Zoë frowned, watching him tap at the computer keys. He’d been focusing intently on the task for an hour, and he was still going strong, determined. “I still think this is a mistake,” she said, not really meaning to speak aloud.
Lane shook her head. “He’ll find something the others won’t. And even if he doesn’t, I understand what he’s going through. He needs to do something—anything. ”She shrugged. “I’m going stir crazy myself. I’m absolutely useless ... no help at all to my son.”
Zoë‘s heart twisted, and she gave her stomach a protective pat before walking to Lane and putting her arms around her. “We’ll find him,” she said.
And she meant it. Her hormones be damned, they were going to find Davy and save him.



From the small window over the sink, Lane watched as the sun slid closer to the horizon: a symphony of colors reflected on the calm ocean, deceptively beautiful. Night was falling, and still they hadn’t found any leads. There were monsters in the dark, and her son was with one of them.
Deena walked into the room and Lane tried to conjure a smile for her.
“I just came in to tell you that I called Hoop. I thought it might be helpful if he were here.”
Lane smiled a silent thank-you. She wished Taylor were around, but her foster brother was still at his convention in Switzerland. Zoë had called him, of course, but he wasn’t going to be able to get back until morning. Hoop was Taylor’s best friend, and a private eye as well. She was glad he was on his way over.
Of course, she wasn’t sure how much help Deena’s fiancé would be. She’d take whatever warm bodies she could get helping in the search, though, and maybe Hoop would think of something the dozens of Protectors already looking for Davy had missed. At the very least, he’d give her a hug. At the moment she could really use one of Hoop’s clumsy but sincere hugs.
She paused. In truth, it wasn’t Hoop’s hug she wanted but Jason’s. Earlier, at Sea World, he’d held her tight in the circle of his arms. She’d felt safe. Secure. His embrace had provided a barrier between her and horrible reality, and she’d succumbed to the pleasure, drinking in the optimism engendered by his caress.
Now, the memory of his touch teased her. How her body had heated when she’d seen him. And how right they’d felt together so many years ago—even if his departure had proved they weren’t right at all.
Then again, if what Jason said was true, he would have returned if he could have. Which meant... what? There was still something there? After all this time?
She frowned. No. No way. Not after what he’d done.
The day she’d found out she was pregnant with Davy had been the most emotional of her life. Wonderful, but terrifying. She’d needed him there, wanted him holding her hand and sharing her joy and her fears.
But he’d walked away. Maybe he’d meant to return, and maybe he hadn’t. The bottom line was that he’d put himself before her and her child, and she couldn’t trust that he wouldn’t do the same thing all over again. That was even more true now that she knew he was a Protector. She would never come first. Even—especially—if he was the good guy he claimed; saving the world would always rank just a little bit higher than being with her. Than being with his son.
Honestly, she couldn’t bear that. She’d spent her childhood being shuffled from home to home, never truly being important to anyone. She didn’t want that for Davy. Her son was her priority, and he needed to be the same to whatever man she ended up with.
From what she knew of Jason, he wasn’t that man.
She sighed. She’d work with him to find Davy, but that was all. Once she had her son back, she’d get on with her life.
She stifled a shiver, the truth crashing in on her once again as it had all afternoon: Her son was missing. For brief moments she could remove herself from that reality, could think objectively and know that everything was being done to bring him back. But then she’d return to her own skin, and the horror of it would surround her.
Her skin was clammy and her head throbbed. Her chest ached, and her eyes burned from tears both released and forced back. She was living her worst nightmare, worse than any situation she’d expected or worked so hard to prevent. So much for all her efforts at safety. None of her planning or worrying had protected her boy, and now she had to rely on the help of the one man she’d never expected to see again.
As if reading her droughts, Deena and Zoë reached out for her, each squeezing a hand. She smiled, wishing she had more to cling to than just their friendship.
But she did have more. She had Jason’s promise. And even if she didn’t entirely trust him, she did trust that.
She turned to Deena, squinting. “Zoë thinks I’m nuts for trusting him. What do you think?”
Color rushed to Deena’s cheeks, and Lane almost laughed out loud. Deena was so not the blushing type, and to see her now looking decidedly uncomfortable was funny. Of course, considering her own state of near hysterics, she’d probably laugh at Davy’s favorite Protector joke; How many superheroes does it take to screw in a lightbulb ? None. They just find Electroman and ask him to light up.
She clenched her fists and fought a burst of giggles. Yup. She was definitely hysterical.
After a couple of deep breaths, she felt reasonably in control and repeated her question about Jason. Deena licked her lips, but this time the woman didn’t fudge. She didn’t look at Zoë, either.
“I don’t know what to think. Jason said the kidnapper was a shape shifter.” She turned to Zoë. “Since I’m not entirely sure what you saw...” She trailed off, her words laced with some import Lane didn’t understand.
Zoë did, though. She sucked in a sharp breath, then closed her eyes. “Fire,” she whispered. “That’s what’s been bugging me. He used fire.”
When Lane’s sister-in-law opened her eyes again, she looked straight at Lane and uttered a name. It wasn’t as bad as Hieronymous, but still it was enough to turn Lane’s blood cold:
“Mordichai.”



Davy shoved his glasses into the front pocket of his T-shirt. When his pretend daddy had kidnapped him, those glasses had been in his jeans. Now the arm had broken off, and his mom was going to be really mad. He’d only had the glasses for a month, and she’d made him promise to always wear them and not put them in his pocket, because they cost a whole bunch and she didn’t have the money to replace them every time he sat on them.
This probably meant no Pokemon for at least a week.
The thought of his Game Boy sitting on his desk at home made him start sniffling again. He did so loudly, then ran the back of his hand under his nose and wiped it on his shorts, determined not to be a crybaby. His mom and Aunt Zoë would come soon. Elmer would tell them where to find him, and then he wouldn’t be stuck in this big white room all alone.
When the big Outcast named Clyde had taken him and gotten on that elevator, he’d been really scared—even after Clyde claimed they were just going to a secret hideout. Davy had been so scared, in fact, he’d been happy to be left all alone in this locked room.
He’d scoped it out really good, testing every single part of the walls just like he was playing Super Mario Brothers. But no secret passages opened, which meant that the room made a lousy secret hideout. Of course, by then he knew it wasn’t really a secret hideout. Even though the walls weren’t stone and the floor was carpeted, it was still a dungeon and he was a prisoner, and unless he figured a way out, he was stuck.
Now his tummy was rumbling and he’d looked at every single inch of the room. A twin bed was in the middle, and the walls were all white, with posters of Teletubbies—like he was a baby or something. There was a mirror hanging over the sink, and Davy felt certain there was a camera behind it. The toilet was right next to the bed in the middle of the room, which was kinda gross, so Davy was gonna hold it for as long as he could.
The door locked from the outside, and he couldn’t find a latch. The one window above the bed had bars behind its sheer blue curtains. Davy looked around for a light or a switch but didn’t find one. He also didn’t find any way out—and since he didn’t have any of his tools, he couldn’t make anything to cut away the bars. All he had were his clothes and his Walkman, and that wasn’t much to work with.
It was starting to get late, and it was definitely past his bedtime. The sun had fallen below his window, and the room had already gotten darker. As the sun continued to sink, it would just get worse. And even though he knew there weren’t really any worse things in the dark than there were in the light, he still didn’t want to be all alone in the blackness.
The floor was cold, but the bed squeaked and smelled funny, so Davy plunked down on the floor and took off his sneakers. With his left shoe, his belt buckle, the broken arm of his glasses, and his Walkman, he could probably make some sort of light fixture out of the toilet. It wouldn’t be as cool as his SpongeBob lamp back home, but it would keep him out of the dark. He went to work, happy to have something to do other than sit on the floor watching the shadows move on the wall and wondering if his mom would show up before morning.
A little while later, when the sunlight disappeared completely, it didn’t matter. He’d used the wire from the broken glasses and the metal from his belt buckle and connected them to the back of his red light-up tennis shoe. He’d used the batteries from his Walkman as a power source, along with the water in the toilet bowl, since water was a conductor. He thought it was cool that the toilet now glowed red.
However, he only had one shoe left. He could’ve used both and made the toilet even brighter, but the right shoe had the tracking device he’d invented, and he was pretty sure Elmer would see where he was on they Lite-Brite map and tell someone. He didn’t want to give that up.
His tummy growled some more, and he wondered if anybody was going to come to bring him food— or if there was even anybody around. Curious, he pulled what remained of his glasses from his pocket and balanced them on his nose. With only one arm they tilted sideways, and he had to cock his head so they didn’t fall off.
As soon as he looked through the lenses, the walls started to go all fuzzy, and soon they disappeared altogether. The lenses were the ones his mom had bought, except Davy had added an X-ray coating. He hadn’t told his mom, because he didn’t figure she’d want him to be messing with them—especially since she’d had to use “plastic” to pay for them, and that always made her grumpy. But Davy had wanted to be like his Aunt Zoë. And since he couldn’t see through walls on his own, he’d used the chemistry set at his best friend Eric’s house.
The set belonged to Eric’s brother, but according to Eric’s mother, “Ricky was flunking out of tenth grade because he couldn’t stop listening to that darned, infernal music.” So Davy had figured Ricky wouldn’t care too much if he used his chemistry set.
Now Davy was even more glad that he had. Without these glasses, he wouldn’t be able to see outside this room. Not that there was much to see. Just more rooms like his, but with no one in them. And a long, empty hall with no one in it.
He squinted, turning his head even more sideways to try to get a better view down the hall. A shadow. And it was moving.
Holding his breath, he backed up, half hoping it would go away and half hoping the shadow belonged to someone who was bringing him dinner.
Still... what if the shadow belonged to a monster? Unlike his friends at school, Davy knew that there were real monsters, and they had to live somewhere. He was pretty sure that a dark, scary island dungeon would be the perfect place.
The shadow kept coming, looming bigger and bigger. An orange light flickered on the polished walls, both it and the shadow getting nearer. And then a man appeared, a black cape swirling around him. His face was made of orange fire and dark shadows.
Davy couldn’t help it. He screamed.



“Hopping Hera,” Mordi hissed, aiming the flashlight at the magnetic keypad on Davy’s cell. “You’d think you’d seen a ghost.”
He shifted back to Jason’s form and opened the door. Lane’s kid was huddled in the corner, half a pair of glasses hanging off his face and his eyes wide behind their lenses.
Damn. The kid was really scared.
Well, considering the circumstances, Mordi couldn’t blame him. In fact, he felt a little guilty, adding to what had to already be the worst day in the kid’s short life. “It’s just me, okay? I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“I’m not scared of you,” Davy said. He crawled out of the corner and tucked his broken glasses carefully into a pocket. “But I thought you were a monster.”
“And you are scared of monsters?”
Davy nodded. “Aren’t you?”
Mordi frowned, sure there was some pop-psychology way to answer that question, but nothing brilliant came to him. “Yeah, kid,” he finally said, figuring he might as well go with the truth. “As a matter of fact, I am.”
He’d be especially scared if he was stuck like this kid, in a dark room with—
He broke off the thought with a frown, then glanced down at his flashlight. Sure enough, he’d turned it off, just like he’d thought. So where was that odd red glow coming from?
Squinting into the cell, he noticed an otherworldly looking toilet. “Davy, did you . . . ?”
The boy nodded. “I don’t like the dark,” he said simply.
“You did that?”
Another nod.
Chalk one up for the kid. Hieronymous had said the boy was a genius. Maybe it was true.
“If it’s dark, my mom and Aunt Zoë won’t be able to find me,” Davy added.
Mordi thought of Jason Murphy, out there somewhere and surely pissed. Especially if word had gotten to him about how Mordi was impersonating him. “What about your real dad?”
Davy shrugged, looking a little sad. “I told you, he’s an astronaut. He’d come if he could, but he’s stuck in space.”
Not a bad rationalization for parental failure, Mordi thought. Too bad it wasn’t true of his own father. Hieronymous had been right there during Mordi’s formative years. But despite his physical presence, his father had been absent. The situation had sucked then, and it sucked now. Mordi couldn’t help but hope Jason really did manage to find and rescue his kid. And then stayed with him.
The odds, though, weren’t in his favor.
For one thing, this island was hidden by a cloaking device, making it invisible to both mortal and Protector eyes. For another, Hieronymous had rigged it with all sorts of traps designed to make sure no Protector could get through.
Yes, the island was quite Council-proof. Which was a pity, because Mordi really didn’t want Hieronymous to steal Davy’s brainpower. And at the same time, he wasn’t at all sure that he was up for the job of preventing it. Foiling his father in secret was one thing. It would be quite another to openly oppose him, to see that usual faint glimmer of disappointment change to outright hatred.
All he’d ever wanted was approval from his dad. And if he did anything to help save Davy, he could pretty much toss that possibility right out the window.
He cocked his head, his eyes going back to the jerry-built toilet. “So, you’re a smart kid, huh?”
Davy shrugged. “I guess so. My mom’s making me go to private school next year. If she can figure out how to pay for it.”
“Don’t you want to go to private school? I bet you’d get even smarter.”
“Yeah, but Eric goes to my old school.”
“I see. Is that your friend?” Mordi tapped a finger against his chin, thinking. “So maybe you’d rather not be quite so smart.”
“I dunno,” Davy said. “Maybe.”
“Makes perfect sense to me.” Mordi stepped farther into the room. “Be normal, hang out with your friends.” He nodded, more to convince himself than Davy. “Yes, maybe that wouldn’t be so bad after all.”
“Mister?”
Mordi jerked his head up, realizing he’d lost himself in his thoughts. “No matter,” he said, striding to the child. He carried a bag of food for the kid, and now he plunked it down on the little table, next to the remains of what had once been a Sony Walkman.
“I hope you like peanut butter and jelly,” he said, pulling a sandwich out of the bag.
Davy nodded, then hobbled over, his right foot bare.
Mordi rolled his eyes. “What’s with the shoes?”
“The other one’s in the toilet,” Davy said, as if that made perfect sense.
“And you’re walking around wearing only one because ... ?”
“ ‘Cause Elmer needs it to find me.”
“O-kay,” Mordi agreed. Whatever fantasy made the kid happy. He pointed at the sandwich. “Dig in.”
Davy did, and Mordi leaned against the wall, watching the kid scarf down the boring little meal. He half-snorted, the possibility of rescue by tennis shoe amusing him.
The glow of the toilet caught his attention, and he frowned. Then again ... If the kid could turn a toilet bowl into some sort of art-deco light fixture, then Hera only knew what he could do with a tennis shoe. He was a genius, right?
A small smile played across Mordi’s face, and he hoped the kid was as smart as Hieronymous thought. Maybe Jason or Zoë would find him after all. “Stay on your toes, Davy,” he whispered. “Maybe your daddy will come through for you.”



“Mordichai,” Zoë repeated. Was she right? Was her cousin really the culprit? That seemed to be the only reasonable explanation, what with the fire the kidnapper had used. That was one of Mordi’s skills.
But Mordi? She didn’t want to believe it was true. Despite everything, Zoë had a soft spot for her cousin. And after Mordi’s most recent adventure with Hale and Tracy, Zoë had hoped to Hera he’d turned over a new leaf. If this new hunch was right, though, Mordi had yet to extricate himself from his father’s shadow.
Lane shook her head, a jumble of emotions playing across her face. “What fire? And what does Mordi have to do with this? If he has Davy ...” She trailed off with a shiver.
Zoë couldn’t blame her. Lane’s past encounters with Mordi hadn’t exactly been warm and fuzzy. For that matter, Mordi had put Davy in danger before.
She opened her mouth to explain, but Deena got there first.
“When Zoë launched a bucket of fish at the kidnapper,” Deena said, “fire shot from his fingers. And then, in the water, when he was wrestling with the dolphin, this ball of fire appeared out of nowhere.”
Lane scowled. “In the water?”
“Yup.” Deena nodded. “Sound like anyone we know?”
Lane met Zoë‘s eyes. “Mordi,” she agreed.
Zoë shook her head in annoyance. “I should have realized sooner,” she said, once again realizing she simply wasn’t at her best.
And if this was all true, Jason was innocent and Zoë had wasted valuable time detaining him.
Deena took her hand. “You couldn’t have known. And the Council has been searching for Davy since he disappeared, so it’s not like we could have done anything differently.”
“Why couldn’t Zoë have known?” Lane asked, her gaze darting between them. “I thought all your halfling weirdness had settled down, that all you had to do was take off your glasses to see a shape shifter’s true form. Didn’t you see that it was really Mordi?”
“Well, yeah,” Zoë said, not really sure how to explain. “But right now I’ve—”
“Got a cold,” Deena said. “A nasty cold. Maybe allergies. We’re not sure.”
Lane’s confused expression morphed into one of concern. “And it’s messing with your powers? Like Hale?”
Zoë nodded, grateful both for Deena’s fast thinking and for her brother setting the precedent: He had the unfortunate habit of sneezing himself invisible when his allergies got out of control.
“Do you want a Claritin?” Lane asked, starting to rummage in her purse.
“No, no,” Zoë said. “But we probably ought to head back in and see what Jason’s found out.”
Lane licked her lips, obviously wanting reassurance. “So you trust him now? You think he’s okay?”
“I’m not sure I—” Zoë cut herself off as she noticed a photograph taped to the refrigerator, partially hidden behind a pot holder. Something about the image seemed familiar, and she looked closer. Sure enough, the image permanently recorded in the candid snapshot was Lane and Davy playing at a park. The picture had been taken maybe a week ago. Zoë moved the pot holder. Beneath, previously hidden, was another photograph, this one several years older. There were three, actually—a strip of pictures taken in a carnival photo booth. Lane and Jason were there, happy and very obviously in love.
And yet Jason had left. Why?
“Zoë?” Lane called from the hallway.
“Sorry,” she said. “I’m pretty sure he didn’t kidnap Davy now.”
Whether she trusted him in Lane’s life was another question altogether.



Jason wasn’t thrilled about having Officer Boring attached to his hip, but the baby-sitter had been Zoë and Lane’s compromise. For the most part, Lane had won—after all, Jason was back on his houseboat, doing what he had to—but Zoë had insisted that Boreas be part of the deal. Which meant that, for the foreseeable future, Jason had a shadow.
Oh, joy.
“It would go a lot faster if you closed some of the other programs you have running,” Boring said, his finger snaking over Jason’s shoulder to point at the screen. “And why are you going to the official file on Hieronymous? You don’t really expect him to have taken the kid to one of his registered locations, do you?”
Jason gritted his teeth and breathed slowly, hoping that by the time he finished, Boring would have accidentally stepped out the back door and into the Pacific.
No such luck.
“You want to search?” he said. “Then get your own computer. This is my party.”
In truth, Boreas was right. But Jason’s machine was busy compiling the results of the other searches he was running, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to speed it up.
Rather than feel useless, Jason had resorted to obvious sources of information—and held fast to the hope that he might get lucky. Hours had passed, and so far neither he nor any of the Council had found even a hint as to Davy’s location. Jason was working on adrenaline and coffee alone. And even though he knew he should take a break and get some food while the computer did its thing, somehow he couldn’t seem to drag himself away.
So he sat here, plodding through entries, the vibrant white light of his monitor the only illumination in his small living room.
Behind him, Boring slurped coffee, then dragged over one of Jason’s footstools and kicked his feet up.
“Make yourself at home,” Jason said.
“Thanks.” Boring reached onto the desk and grabbed a pencil and a pad of paper, then gave Jason a smile.
Apparently, the young officer had trouble grasping sarcasm. Jason sighed. But, unlike Zoë, at least Boring seemed willing to believe he was really looking for Davy. Jason knew he should probably cut the guy a break, but it irritated him that Zoë had assigned him this shadow. He was taking it out on Boring, and if that was unfair it was too damn bad. Jason wasn’t exactly having the best of days himself.
Twisting around, he turned his attention back to the computer. He’d already entered his password at www.superherocentral.com and had navigated to the database containing all registered Outcast information. Protector law required Outcasts to file quarterly reports identifying all property held in their name, or by a corporate entity in which the Outcast held a substantial ownership. Jason didn’t necessarily expect Hieronymous had followed the rules, but considering how stiff the penalty was for noncompliance, he was willing to give this a shot. Who knew? Maybe the Outcast played by some of the rules.
It turned out Hieronymous had registered 427 properties around the globe, the most promising of which included a hunting cabin in the Arctic, a mud hut in Borneo, an abandoned winery in the South of France, and a ghost town in Arizona.
Boring leaned forward, his eraser tapping the screen. “Arizona’s close. Maybe he just whipped over a couple of states.”
“Arizona?” Lane’s voice filtered in from behind them and Jason turned, the very sound of her voice warming him more than the T-shirt and sweats he’d thrown on to replace the towel from Sea World. “You think Davy’s in Arizona?”
Jason shook his head, hating to kill the hope he saw in her bloodshot eyes. “I’m sorry, Lane. We still don’t know where he is.”
Her lip trembled, steadying slightly when Zoë put a hand on her shoulder. Lane’s already pale skin seemed translucent, and shadows lined her eyes. Since he’d last seen her she’d pulled her hair back into a ponytail, and now only loose tendrils framed her face. Despite the strength he knew was at her core, Lane looked small and wan, and he immediately got up and took her elbow.
He led her to the small sofa by the window, but there, instead of lying down like he wanted, she sat up, her legs together, her hands folded above her knees, as if keeping herself together was as much a physical act as a mental one.
“I’ve got a team of fifty Protectors checking out each of Hieronymous’s official addresses,” Zoë informed no one in particular. She nodded toward the computer screen where Jason had just been pulling up that information. “In a few hours, we should know something.”
Jason nodded, glad this route had been handled. Then he headed back to the machine and clicked the mouse on the toolbar, pulling up the Council-devised search engine he’d had running in the background. The software filtered through the property records of every city in every state in every country. Considering the massive amount of information to be processed, the program was surprisingly fast.
“Bori—Boreas is probably right. I doubt the kidnapper took Davy to a registered location. I’ve had the computer searching property records. I’m hoping we can locate some likely unregistered properties.”
“That’ll take forever.” This was a new, male voice, and Jason swiveled in his chair to face the door. A somewhat rumpled man appeared whom he recognized from his past months observing Lane.
“Hoop!” Deena squealed, and then ran to embrace her fiancé. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
He kissed her head, then immediately moved to the sofa and put his free arm around Lane. Holding her close, he planted a chaste kiss on her forehead. Jason liked him instantly. “You doing okay, kid?”
She nodded, then immediately shook her head. “No.”
“We’ll find him,” Hoop said. He turned toward Jason. “You’re the dad?”
Jason nodded, grateful the man hadn’t repeated Zoë‘s accusations. “That’s me.”
“So let’s see what you’ve got so far.” Hoop squeezed in between Jason and Boreas, managing to block Boreas’s view in the process. Jason’s affection for the P.I. rose another notch.
He shifted to the left, giving Hoop a better view. “I think you got the gist of it as you came in. I’m letting the computer do its thing to see if any matches come up.” He pointed to a box in the corner of the screen. “So far it’s found ninety-seven properties potentially owned by Hieronymous.”
“That many?” Lane asked from across the room.
“Afraid so,” he admitted. “And it’s only completed fifteen percent of the search.”
She got up and moved toward the computer, and Jason automatically scooted over, making room for her on his chair. She hesitated, her tongue darting out to lick her lips. He patted the cushion, then stood up, letting her have the chair to herself.
“No. You’re working,” she said.
“And you want to watch. You don’t need to be standing.” He squinted at her. “Have you eaten anything?” His gaze shifted to Deena. “She should eat something.”
“I’m not hungry,” Lane argued, but she sat on the edge of his chair. “We can share,” she amended.
Jason nodded, pleased she wanted him close. Before he sat back down, he shot another look in Deena’s direction. She headed off to the kitchen— technically a galley, but the houseboat was so like a fancy apartment that nothing about it really felt nautical.
“Can you see the results so far?” Lane asked, her breath tickling his neck.
“Sure.” Jason clicked his mouse, pulling up each specific file. Behind him, he could hear Boreas squirming, maneuvering for a better view. He scrolled through each entry, but nothing screamed evil Outcast abode.
“Nothing,” Lane said. She closed her eyes, her hands clutching the side of the desk so hard her knuckles turned white. “This is hopeless.”
“Mordichai,” Zoë reminded, her voice little more than a whisper.
Lane’s eyes opened, and she turned to Jason. “Of course,” she cried. “Maybe the property belongs to Mordi!”
“I’m already on it,” he said. And he was. “The computer’s looking for any property that belongs to any derivation of Hieronymous’s name, Mordichai’s, or that Clyde guy who does Hieronymous’s dirty work.” He shrugged. “Of course, it’s probably a waste of resources to plug Mordi’s name in,” he said. “After all, he’s already on probation with the Council, and I can’t imagine he’d risk that by letting his father—”
“Mordi’s a shape shifter,” Zoë said, interrupting. Her voice was flat, but the message wasn’t. Surprised, Jason turned to face her, and she nodded. “Sorry I misjudged you,” she added.
Her expression wasn’t exactly warm and fuzzy, but an apology was an apology, and Jason didn’t intend to look a gift Protector in the mouth. “Under the circumstances, it was a natural mistake,” he said. If he’d expected her expression to soften once she realized he wasn’t holding a grudge, he’d been wrong.
Her lips stayed in a thin line, her posture overly straight and her eyes fixed on the back of Lane’s head.
Ah. Well, he couldn’t fault her for worrying about her friend, either.
“So it wasn’t this guy?” Boreas asked, indicating Jason. “I don’t need to keep an eye on him anymore?”
A shadow crossed Zoë‘s face, and she started to speak, looking none too happy about it. Jason knew what she was going to say and got there first. “You’re stuck with me, kid.” He met Zoë’s surprised gaze. “Council rules.”
“Right,” Boreas said. “Of course. Regulation nine-seven-four, subpart d.” He thwapped his forehead with the heel of his hand. “I can’t believe I forgot.”
Jason rolled his eyes at the neophyte’s enthusiasm for the rulebook, then looked at Lane. “Until another Protector is conclusively involved, I’m still a suspect,” he said, answering the question in her eyes.
Well, for Jason, that was more or less the status quo—at least until he proved himself to the High Elders. A protector like him with Hieronymous for a father would always be a little bit suspect. In that, he supposed, he had a hell of a lot in common with his brother Mordi. Someday, maybe he’d even meet the man.



Lane poked at her plate of scrambled eggs. She’d been doing so for about an hour, ever since Deena had put it in front of her. So far, she hadn’t taken a bite.
At first, Deena had shot her optimistic glances, but she’d finally given up and now dozed in one of Jason’s leather chairs. Jason and Boreas were still hovering in front of the computer, its monitor casting an eerie glow on their faces. Zoë was on the patio, talking on her cell phone to some council big shot, and Hoop was in Jason’s bedroom, calling to see if any of his mortal law-enforcement connections had turned up any information.
Only Lane was useless. Sucking in air, she willed herself to eat. What Deena had said earlier was right: If she wanted to help, she needed to keep up her strength. With a grand effort, she stabbed a tiny clump of egg with her fork and lifted it to her mouth.
Her taste buds had ceased to function, so the bite seemed bland and rubbery. She added a bit of toast, but her mouth was too dry, and she just kept chewing and chewing, unable to swallow. After a moment she gave up and spit the whole mess into a napkin. “I’m sorry,” she said, to no one in particular.
Jason looked up. “How about a milkshake?”
She shook her head. “No, I’m fine. It’s okay.”
“It’s not okay. When was the last time you ate?”
She blinked, trying to grasp the concept of time. Years seemed to have passed since she’d had anything but water, and she frowned with concentration. “Lunch. Today. I mean yesterday. I mean—”
“You mean it’s been a long time,” Jason interrupted. “It’s almost four in the morning.” He stood up and headed into the kitchen. “Something cold and liquid. Strength, energy, and ice cream.” His smile was sympathetic. “Just the ticket for a weary woman.”
She nodded, having to admit it did sound good. But when Jason came back around the corner, his smile had faded. “I’m out of ice cream.” He glanced toward the computer and the Protector sitting there. Boreas had fallen asleep. “We’ll send him.”
She shook her head. “No, that’s okay. I’m fine.” Her stomach rumbled, apparently having come awake at the thought of ice cream. Her hunger triggered a memory, that of a likely hungry ferret trapped in her living room. She stood up, glancing around for her purse. “I, uh, need to go home anyway.”
Jason shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
She crossed her arms on her chest. She’d come close to falling apart today, but she’d managed to hold herself together. The last thing she needed was to be told what to do. She stood up, marched to the table near the front door, and swung her purse over her shoulder. “Yeah, I do. I need to go feed Elmer and I want... I want...” She trailed off, blinking back tears. What she wanted was just to see Davy’s room again, but she felt like an idiot saying that out loud.
Jason moved toward her, his bare feet silent on the polished wood floor. He slipped an arm around her, and Lane leaned against him, wishing she didn’t need his comfort but not about to turn it down from some false pride. Especially since being in his arms felt so very right.
“I only meant that you don’t have a car. You came here under Protector power, remember?” He paused, then added, “If you need to feed Elmer, I’ll take you. And as long as we’re using my place for command central, you should probably pick up a few things.”
She sighed. He was right. Getting Zoë to agree took a bit more effort, but Lane’s sister-in-law finally gave in, even going so far as to not wake Boreas to go with them. Ignoring Regulation 974, subpart d was a big deal; Lane wasn’t certain if Zoë now fully trusted Jason, if she was simply being accommodating, or if she was just too tired to fight. Whatever the reason, Lane didn’t care. She just wanted to go home.
She soon found herself above Santa Monica, with nothing surrounding her but air and Jason’s arm. Below, stop lights blinked red and yellow as traffic moved in a city that thrummed with activity even in the middle of the night. The night air chilled her, and she shivered.
“Scared?” he asked.
She shook her head. “I’ve done this before,” she explained with false bravado. In truth, this particular Protector trick got her every time. Usually, she could focus on something else and keep the fear at bay. This time, though, the something else was even more terrifying. “Maybe a little scared,” she admitted.
His arm tightened around her waist and he shifted her, pulling her below him so that he was essentially lying on her. Her back was pressed against his chest, her rear nestled against his crotch. Their ankles intertwined, keeping their legs together.
The heat from his body poured through her, staving off her chill. But his heat was so much more than just 98.6. No, the friction between their bodies was making things much hotter. It was doing things to her it shouldn’t, making her body remember things it shouldn’t. Making her want things she shouldn’t.
She shifted, twisting against his arm, trying to struggle free. But he held fast. “No,” she whispered. “Put me back the way I was before.”
“Shhh.” His mouth brushed the back of her ear. “We’re almost there. And this is the safest way to fly. I’m tired, too. I don’t want to accidentally drop you.”
She doubted he would, but she appreciated his excuse. She didn’t have the energy to argue. And, truthfully, she craved his touch—wanted it even as she wanted to be free of him.
The journey ended all too soon, and Jason put them down on the lawn in front of her apartment. Lane frowned, wondering how he knew her address, but she didn’t ask. Under the circumstances, it was probably best not to know.
She slid her key into the lock and pushed open her front door. Immediately, Elmer scampered forward and started chittering.
“Hale’s ferret?” Jason asked.
Lane nodded.
“Any idea what he’s saying?”
“Not a clue,” she said. “I’m guessing he’s starving to death. He’s used to hotels with room service. Staying up with me is really lowering his standards.”
Reaching down, she rubbed his little head, thinking that would calm him down. Instead, it only seemed to excite him more. “I guess I better make with the food.” She headed toward the kitchen, gesturing to the interior of the room. “It’s not much, but it’s home. Sit anywhere,” she offered, clicking a button on the remote to turn on the television. “I’ll only be a second.”
Instead of sitting like she’d expected, he headed for the bookshelf. There he pulled down the carved wooden dolphin Davy had received a few months ago from his anonymous benefactor. Lane licked her lips, ignoring the hungry, hopping Elmer as she watched Jason stroke the polished wood. For the first time, she wondered if Aaron was right. Had Jason been sending these presents? But how could that be? He’d been locked up. Imprisoned. He’d told her that himself.
Surely he hadn’t lied to her again?
A commercial ended, and the twenty-four-hour news channel came back on. As Lane pulled open the refrigerator, she heard the broadcast: “A freak storm at the San Diego Sea World on Sunday resulted in an overload on that park’s sewage system. All patrons were evacuated while environmental officials tested the facilities to ensure there was no contamination. ”
Lane twisted, and her eyes met Jason’s, a chill settling over her as the newscaster assured viewers that the park checked out fine and would reopen in the morning. She took a deep breath, and then another. When she felt composed, she popped the tops on two Diet Cokes and turned.
“Tell me about Davy,” Jason said, still holding the carving and standing in the living room. “Tell me about my son.”
Lane opened her mouth, not to comply but to ask her own questions. But when she saw his eyes, she stopped, the sadness there making her want to cry.
The realization that she wasn’t the only one who’d lost Davy washed over her. Jason had missed out on so much. And no matter what he did, there were some things Jason could never have. And despite what had come between them in the past, and no matter what might lie ahead in the future, Lane wanted Jason to know his son.
“He’s wonderful,” she said, not knowing where to start. “He’s the best little boy in the world.”



Despite his melancholy, Jason had to grin. Leave it to Lane to state the obvious.
He stroked the driftwood dolphin, the warm wood alive under his fingertips. He wondered if Davy had ever played with the thing, or if it just sat, cold and unloved, on a shelf, some curio given by an unknown benefactor.
Although he’d spent hours watching Davy and Lane, he hadn’t looked into their apartment. He’d seen Davy chasing friends, he’d seen his son and Lane wrestling on the grass, he’d seen Davy and Lane eating hotdogs at the slightly rusty table in the courtyard—but the intimacies of their lives had remained a mystery.
“I was hoping for something a little more specific,” he said.
Putting the dolphin back on the shelf, he headed into the kitchen, joining Lane in the cramped room. She handed him a Diet Coke and took a sip of her own. When she pulled a container out of the refrigerator, he grappled for some question that would provide loads of insight into his son. “What’s his favorite food?” he finally asked. Not exactly insightful, but he was just getting warmed up.
Lane looked up from the glop she’d begun spooning onto a plate for Elmer—the ferret continuing to dance about her feet—the corner of her mouth curving into a smile. “Macaroni and cheese,” she admitted. “Kraft.”
He nodded. “The kid has good taste.”
“I take it that’s still in your cooking repertoire?”
Jason laughed. “That is my repertoire. That and microwave popcorn. You should remember.”
“Slacker,” she said.
“Yeah, well, I haven’t exactly had access to a kitchen to learn anything new.” He nodded down at the plate of glop she held, not wanting to talk about his absence. “Purina ferret chow?”
“Beef bourguignonne.” She nudged the ferret with her toe. “Hale has a service deliver Elmer’s meals. The little guy’s spoiled rotten.”
And, apparently, hyperactive. The ferret was bouncing around on the floor even more frantically, clawing at the hem of Lane’s jeans and running in circles.
“He’s a spaz,” Lane said. “But I can’t blame him for being hungry.” She headed toward the door and squeezed past, her shoulder brushing Jason as she stepped into the tiny hallway. “Come on. I’ll show you Davy’s room.”
In two short steps he was at the door, which, in case anyone might be confused, announced on a miniature license plate that it was “Davy’s Place.”
Jason wasn’t sure what he expected inside, but he was pretty sure it wasn’t the tornado-destroyed disaster area that confronted him. Stuffed animals were strewn all about, their apparent mode of transportation the collection of multicolored plastic trucks scattered across the floor. A variety of wooden blocks and Tinkertoys filled the rest of the space, ensuring that entering would be hazardous to one’s health. He did so, anyway.
At the foot of the bed, the kid had mounted a map of the United States on a plastic board. Dozens of tiny lightbulbs made up its coordinates, creating a colorful display. Davy must not have changed the bulbs recently, though, because at the moment all were burned out except for one light humming in the Pacific.
“Cool, huh?” Lane said, nodding toward the map. “He spent days making it. And he begged me for one of those Lite-Brite kits. I said he could have it on his birthday, but he conned it out of me a few months early.” She half-smiled. “I’m such a sucker.”
Jason grinned. Imagining Davy’s enthusiasm, he understood her weakness.
He and Lane moved around the map to the side of the bed, and her fingers absently stroked the walls. Jason noticed the movie posters that decorated every inch: Star Wars, Monsters, Inc.,—
“He likes Mike,” Lane said, gesturing toward one of the posters. She put Elmer’s plate on the floor in the corner next to a water dish, then plucked a green goblin-looking guy off the bed. The plush one-eyed creature matched the character on the Monsters, Inc. poster, and Lane hugged him close, her lips pressed together so tight they disappeared into a thin line.
“Why don’t you bring Mike back to my houseboat?” Jason suggested. “That way you can give him to Davy when you see him again.”
Lane nodded, her throat moving a bit, but she didn’t say anything. After a moment she gave the monster’s head a little kiss and looked up. “Green’s his favorite color,” she said, her voice hoarse. A tear trickled down her cheek. “And never leave anything electronic near him unless you don’t mind it being taken apart.”
Jason reached for her hand, and she let go of Mike to take it. He squeezed her fingers. “He’s ruined some of your stuff.”
She shook her head. “No. Actually, that’s the funny part. He puts it back together—just not always when I need it. Of course, when I complain, he very seriously tells me: ‘Mommy, sometimes you have to be patient while a genius is working.’ ” She laughed. “How am I supposed to argue with that?”
It sounded like something a son of his would say. “I’m pretty sure you can’t.”
Jason glanced around the room, noting the small gadgets and gizmos tucked away everywhere. And, he noticed, the presents he’d sent were all here, most looking like they’d been well played with. “So, what has his genius created?”
Lane sat on the edge of the bed, Mike secure in her lap. “Oh, let’s see. A transporter beam so that I can go off into space and bring back his daddy.” She met his eyes. “Apparently you’re an astronaut,” she added.
He nodded, trying to keep his face impassive despite his pain. “Good to know.”
“And X-ray glasses. And a magic plate that eats your vegetables for you.” She tapped a finger against her chin. “There’s lots more. Every night he tells me what he invented that day. It’s a game we started playing about a year ago. At first he just took his trucks apart and put them back together. Then he moved on to my clock radio, the toaster, and the VCR. After that, his imagination kicked in—we’ve got boogeyman repellant, tracking devices, animal translators, and mind-reading hats.”
“A new one every day, huh?”
Lane nodded. “Yup. Well, usually. Sometimes he says a project’s in development but needs funding. I don’t know where he picks this stuff up. Other times he says the prototype’s in production.” A genuine smile lit her face, almost bright enough to hide the sadness in her eyes. “I swear, the kid thinks he’s Thomas Edison or something.” She shook her head. “Actually, if his science ever ends up as good as his imagination, he just might show Edison up.”
Jason’s stomach twisted. His son, the inventor. His son, accepting the Nobel Prize in physics. His son, Time’s Man of the Year.
Yeah, that would be cool.
“He’s such a clever, special little boy,” Lane went on. Her voice cracked, and Jason sat beside her on the bed, taking her hand in his. She aimed a weak smile in his direction. “Maybe he can invent himself a way to get free of Hieronymous.”
He squeezed her fingers. “We’ll get him back, sweetheart. I promise.”
His pager hadn’t vibrated, but he checked it anyway. No messages. He keyed in an entry, directing it to the others at his houseboat: Progress report?
No news, came the answer.
Damn.
Lane’s bloodshot eyes darted down to the pager and then back up to him. “Nothing?”
“I’m sorry. But we will fi—”
“No.” She whispered the word, her head shaking. “Don’t keep telling me that.” She got to her feet and then, with an icy calm, hurled Mike across the room. “Damn it all to hell!” Tears spilled from her eyes. “I don’t want any more platitudes. I’ve had enough. I’ve reached my limit. I’m done, Jason. I want this to be over. I want my son. I want Davy back.”
Her anguish came in a flood. Tears streamed down her face, and Lane pressed her hand over her mouth as she stumbled back onto the bed. On the way, she almost tripped over Elmer, who hadn’t eaten and was still practically bouncing off the walls near the foot of the bed. Lane ignored the ferret, throwing herself down on Davy’s mattress and curling up with his bedspread, her knees at her chest.
Jason was immediately at her side, leaning over her, stroking her arm. He had no idea what comfort he could bring, but he had to try. His heart wrenched and he reached out, wanting to make Lane’s tears stop.
Gently he brushed the palm of his hand over her hair, smoothing it back from her forehead. Her shoulders shook with silent sorrow, and he placed a soft kiss on her cheek.
“Lane,” he whispered.
That was all it took. With a guttural sob that almost ripped out his heart, she rolled over and clung to him. Her hands clutched his sleeves and her cheek pressed against his chest. Her sobs were no longer silent, and he held her close, rocking from side to side, wishing he could do more to soothe her, wishing he’d never left, wishing he’d been just another dad at Sea World with his boy so that maybe this would never have happened in the first place.
If wishes were fishes . . .
With one hand, Jason stroked Lane’s back, murmuring soft words, saying nothing but trying to communicate everything: hope, strength, most of all, the certainty that all would end well.
As her sobs slowed, Lane pressed closer against him, her arms tight around his waist. Even in the face of the surrounding horror, the moment felt right. She felt right. And Jason knew without a doubt that he would do anything—anything—to make sure Lane wasn’t hurt again. By him, by Hieronymous, by anyone.
He stroked the small of her back. Her little T-shirt had come untucked from her jeans, and his palm skimmed her soft, warm skin. His own body felt hot, but whether from the warm room or the woman he loved, he wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter. Right now, nothing mattered but letting Lane know Davy would be safe.
“It will be okay,” he whispered.
“How?” The word came out strangled, Lane’s voice so raw it caused him physical pain.
This was all his father’s fault, and Jason clenched his fist, pressing it against the belt loop of Lane’s jeans, fighting the urge to smash his fist through the wall as a substitute for his father’s head.
“Because I’ll make sure it’s okay,” he said.
“But what if—”
He pressed a finger against her lips, unwilling to let her complete the thought. Hell, unable to think it himself. “Failure is not an option,” he said, gratified when she grinned at the cliché. “I’m serious, though,” he added. And he was. Deadly serious.
With the side of his hand he stroked Lane’s cheek. She turned, and his palm slid over her warm, soft lips. The sensation rocked him, sending tremors through his body. He ignored them. This wasn’t about him. Wasn’t even about Lane. Not yet. This was about Davy. “I’ll get him back,” he promised. “Or I’ll die trying.”
When she’d first seen him hours ago, her eyes had been accusing. Now, she looked at him like a hero. A wave of fear rose in his gut—fear that he wasn’t up to the task. His father had bested him before; what was to stop him from doing so again?
He shoved the thought aside. He would win. He had to. For Davy, and because he couldn’t bear the thought of this shadow crossing Lane’s eyes again. Yes, he’d win. And, in the end, he’d make Hieronymous no longer a threat to anyone.
“Thank you,” Lane whispered. “I’m sorry I...” She trailed off with a shrug. “I don’t like breaking down like that.”
“No one does,” he said. “But I’d say you have a pretty good excuse.”
“It’s like he took me, too,” she explained. “Like I’m being held prisoner with Davy. Only I don’t know where, and if only I could see through the darkness we could run free.” She looked up at him. A watery smile graced her lips, in sharp contrast to the sadness in her eyes. “Does that make any sense at all?”
He met her smile. “More than you know. Believe me, I know all about prisons. And I know all about Hieronymous.”
She licked her lips. “Do you want to tell me?”
He shook his head, fighting the memories he’d worked so hard to block out, those years trapped all alone in a suspended crystal fishbowl, that prison within a prison, hidden on some desolate island in the Pacific. “Some other time,” he said. “Right now we should get back to the houseboat.”
She nodded, then scooted to the edge of the bed.
Poor lady. Poor Davy. And no one’s paying attention to the ferret.
Jason frowned, cocking his head as he tried to locate the voice that seemed to come out of nowhere.
He stood and turned in a circle, his eyes scanning the room. Nothing.
Hello? he called.
Lane stared at him. “What are you doing?”
He ignored her, addressing the voice. Is anyone here?
You can hear me? Oh, that’s wonderful! I had no idea. Ask the ferret! You need to ask the ferret where Davy is!
Jason turned to Lane. “Does Davy have a fish?”
Her eyes widened. “Oh, my gosh. I completely forgot to feed Dorothy.” She reached to the headboard and pushed Davy’s pillow aside. There, on the built-in bookshelf, was a simple goldfish bowl housing a tiny plastic castle and one small fish.
Thank Hera he wasn’t losing his mind.
Immediately, Jason climbed back onto the bed and crawled to the headboard, coming nose to bowl with the fish.
“Uh, Jason?”
He ignored Lane, focusing on Dorothy. What do you mean, talk to the ferret?
The goldfish swam back and forth, building up speed with each turn. The ferret’s been rambling like mad. And the boy used to talk to him about a tracking device.
You can understand the boy?
I understand him, but he doesn’t understand me. He can talk to the ferret, though—he invented a translator.
His brilliant son ...
Jason shook his head. Time for that later. Can you ask the ferret?
I don’t speak ferret. Do you?
No, Jason certainly didn’t. Which had never bothered him before, but now it caused him no end of grief. Yet there were other ways to communicate besides words, and he intended to get answers.
With a quick thank-you to Dorothy, Jason dove for Elmer, plucking him off the map and the brightly lit bulb plugged into the South Pacific. He wracked his brain for a way to interact with the beast.
“Jason?” Lane asked, her voice switching from slightly amused to slightly concerned. “What’s going on?”
As Jason opened his mouth to answer, realization struck. He stared at the ferret now dangling from his hands, tiny ferret feet kicking in the air.
Jason swallowed as he glanced from the bulb to the ferret and back.
Surely it wasn’t so simple ...
The ferret twisted to follow Jason’s gaze and then started to spaz out again, his little head bobbing up and down affirmatively.
“Dammit, Jason, tell me what’s going on.” Lane clutched his wrist so tightly he opened his hand, dropping Elmer.
“I know where he is,” he answered, meeting her widening eyes. “I know where Hieronymous took Davy.”