Equal Parts (10 page)

“No,” I answered truthfully. “It’s who you are. And even if it
did
bother me, I doubt you’d change it.”

“You have a mask of your own,” he pointed out. His fingers waved to my glasses and clothing. “First time I saw you, you were buried under your own emotional baggage. The glasses, the big clothes, the nondescript
everything
. But now…”

“Now what?”

He glanced down at my body. “You’re different. Well, at least I’ve changed the clothes. I’m still working on the glasses.”

“I’m not different,” I said.

“Then why do I see shadows in your eyes that weren’t there yesterday?” He pinched my chin none-too-gently, tilting my face towards the light to examine it more closely. It was disconcerting that he could read me so easily. I would have to work on that. “Come on. Don’t make me go all villainous on you.”

“You’re incapable of being anything
less
than villainous.” Okay, I was projecting, and we both knew it.

“What about me is so villainous?” He seemed genuinely curious. That in itself was a little frightening. “I have no scars, no disfigurements, no eye-patch or wooden leg. No outstanding psychological problems, other than maybe an inflated ego and a love of the theatrical. I’m completely sound, medically-speaking. So what is it that makes me such a horrible
villain
in your mind, hmm?
” God, he was absolutely drunker
than I’d first thought. He was actually talking
to
me, not just
with
me.

“You killed the mayor in cold blood,” I reminded him – and myself.

The fingers holding my chin flinched away as though I’d swatted them. His eyelids shuttered close for half a second, enough to pique my curiosity. Did he not like being reminded of the murder?

I tried a different route. “You are…” If I didn’t know any better, I’d think he was holding his breath. “
Hiding
.”

I think I surprised him, because the frown from the mayor comment lifted. “Hiding?”

“Everyone’s hiding. Everyone has a skeleton in their closet. But people don’t like it when the skeleton is on display – pun intended.” I arched a pointed brow at his mask. “You’re hiding the most important feature in this world – your face, and it freaks the hell out of people. People don’t understand you, and for that, they fear you. Therefore, you’re a villain.”

Silence enveloped the balcony once more, his eyes searing straight through to my soul. “So what was it about tonight that made you brave enough to say that? Did I show a weakness?”

I kept tightlipped. If I lied, he would see through it, clear as day.

“I don’t like secrets, Felicity,” he said in a low voice, walking me straight back into the glass door. His body was suddenly flush against mine, toe-to-toe, his mouth level with my forehead. I glared up at him, but it didn’t perturb him in the least. “Tell me what’s upsetting you.”

“That girl,” I blurted out, mostly because his close proximity was making my head spin, and I didn’t want to draw this issue out for longer than absolutely necessary. “That girl bothered me. I don’t know why – this whole night has just been … weird.”

Twenty-six seconds later, he gave a single nod and stepped back. I resisted the urge to exhale heavily. “Are you coming inside?” he asked, to my surprise.

“I’m not sleeping in your bed, if that’s what you’re asking,” I said testily.

His lips twitched upwards. “I was going to watch a movie, actually. But if you want to stay out here and freeze to death, I guess that’s –”

I had raced inside and all but thrown myself at the sofa before he could shut me out there for good. Giving me yet another inscrutable look, he put on some old Western movie, dimmed the lights, and collapsed beside me, pulling my legs onto his lap. I didn’t resist – it was more comfortable that way, anyway.

Another thing I didn’t wish to overanalyze.

I cocooned further into the sofa, exhaustion slowly catching up to me. Achilles seemed to know the film by heart, judging by the number of lines he quoted, and again I was struck by how absurd this whole scenario was. I was stupid to trust him, even a little. Falling asleep in the presence of a renowned psychopath was a potentially fatal move.

But if he hadn’t killed me yet, what was one more night?

“Go to sleep, darling. You’re in safe hands,” Achilles said, so quietly I could hardly hear him over the dialog of the movie.

I mumbled something incomprehensible even to me, and snuggled deeper into the microfiber cushions.

My last conscious thought was that it definitely wasn’t natural to feel as safe as I did in the hands of Achilles.

Chapter Seven

A Very Lucrative Business

When I awoke, there was a sports bag under my legs where Achilles had been, and two thugs hovering by the doorway. As usual, my captor was nowhere to be seen. The clock on the wall read one o’clock –
in the afternoon
. I must have been more exhausted than I’d first thought.

“What’s going on?” I asked the men, instantly on guard. If Molten was somewhere, sniffing around, I had to be ready to fight.

“Boss wants you to get changed.” One of them pointed to the bag.

Inexplicably nervous, I opened the bag, no idea what to expect to find inside.

Set into three neat piles, arranged by color, were
my clothes – normal clothes, from my apartment. On top of the clothes were my toiletries bag, shoes, and a collection of books plucked from my shelves. I gaped at the thugs.

“How … how did you get this?” This was impossible. He couldn’t have broken into my apartment – how did he know where I lived? Frantically, I whipped out my wallet and scanned the cards to find, yep – he’d taken my license.

“He went and fetched it this morning. We’re leaving in half an hour, so you’d better hurry up,” advised the thug, who resembled a clichéd biker, complete with bandana and denim vest.

I couldn’t believe it. I had my things back! Well, some of them. There was an ulterior motive here, but I didn’t care. Bundling a few random items in my arms, I raced to the bathroom and locked myself inside, something akin to giddiness flooding my veins.

As if Christmas had come early, I hastily showered and donned my beautiful, clean, feminine-smelling clothing. I could finally wear make-up, and clean my teeth with my own utensils, and brush my hair with something other than my fingers!

It wasn’t until I stepped back into the living room, and saw that one of the men was holding a blindfold and earbuds attached to an iPod that I realized why Achilles wanted me scrubbed and dressed appropriately.

“We’re taking that stupid field trip of his, aren’t we?” I asked the biker dude.

“Please don’t make this more difficult than it has to be. I like my hands attached, thanks.”

Crap, I’d completely forgotten about his promise of two nights ago. Why did he want me to accompany him, anyway? I didn’t particularly care to see Achilles in his natural habitat – which probably involved being covered in blood and guts.

“Can I at least know if I should bring a cardigan?”

They exchanged a glance, then the other man, short and round, answered, “Go on, then.”

I darted to the bag, my back to them, and quickly pocketed a metal
nail file
as I fetched my oversized cardigan. No point in being weaponless, especially if Molten was tagging along for the ride.

I followed the pair out of the living area, downstairs to some kind of rubble-filled foyer. The blindfold was tied around my head and the earbuds shoved in, blasting some kind of bluegrass song through my head.

I didn’t bother asking why the music was necessary – I wouldn’t hear the answer anyway.

Hands pushed and pulled me around for a while, until I hit a seat – the backseat of a car, I had to assume – and we were soon moving. My hands immediately shot to my eyes, whipping the blindfold off.

The biker thug sat beside me, saying something to the driver. I went to pull the earphones out, but his hands stopped me.

“Keep them in,” he mouthed to me. I rolled my eyes, but complied. Best to save my energy for when I truly needed it.

Of course, that didn’t mean I couldn’t press ‘pause’ on the iPod in the seat between us when he wasn’t looking.

“…she’s coming along for, anyway. Is he finally gonna kill her?” I heard the driver ask. His words were a little muffled through the earbuds.

“Doubt it,” snorted Biker Dude. I kept my eyes out the window. “She’s got some power he wants.”

“Fuckin’ superhumans, man. Can’t trust one of ‘em.”

You can have my power
, I thought at him.
God knows I don’t want it.

“She doesn’t seem too bad. Maybe she’ll soften him up,” pointed out Biker Dude, glancing at me. I fought the urge to give him a grateful smile.

“Or make him worse. You saw what happened to Josh.”

We turned a sharp corner, and when the iPod skidded towards me, I hastily pressed ‘play’ once more before Biker Dude snatched it back up.

Why the hell did people keep thinking
I
had any influence over Achilles? The guy was a homicidal maniac – I doubted he let himself be affected by anyone, ever. Well, aside from girls like the one he brought home last night. The very thought made my skin crawl.
Ick
.

It had to be what Molten had said: Achilles saw me as a shiny new toy, and therefore treated me better than his usual playthings. My power made me more valuable, more worthy of security.

Yeah. That had to be it.

The car pulled up outside a Chinese restaurant on the outskirts of town, an area I’d never been to before. Biker Dude yanked the buds from my ears and said, in a growl, “We don’t wanna kill you, girly. Don’t give us a reason to.”

Translation:
don’t put up a fight, don’t draw attention, don’t try to escape
.

“Loud and clear,” I mumbled, following him out of the car. Like I would bother – this restaurant was the only building around for a good three blocks. They’d shoot me down before I got ten yards.

The driver led us inside, where an elderly Chinese man just pointed to a door in the back without sparing us a glance. There was no one else in sight, not even in the main area of the restaurant.

I got the distinct feeling I should have been nervous. The two thugs seemed edgier than before, their hands at the guns at their sides as we entered the back room.

“Finally,” called out a voice from behind a wall of cardboard boxes. The room seemed to be some kind of storeroom-meets-private-dining-area. “Don’t tell me – you got all girly about your stuff and took a whole hour to do your hair.”

Urgh
. Even without seeing him, I wanted to strangle him.

When it became obvious the two thugs were to remain by the door, I wandered around to the other side of the boxes, where a four-seater table was tucked into a corner, its setting a whole lot more lavish than the ones in the main restaurant.

“Is this seriously where you do your criminal businessman stuff?” I asked wryly, pointedly looking around the room. “A little cliché, don’t you think?”

“It’s cliché for a reason, darling.” He patted the seat beside him. I tentatively sat, my arm brushing his. His eyes weren’t on me, but I was learning to read Achilles by his body language, instead of his facial expressions and eyes. The way his shoulders tensed, his hands fisted slightly; he was …
uncomfortable.
With the situation? Or my close proximity?

“What are we doing here?”

“Meeting with a prospective investor.”

“
Investor
? People invest in you?”

He looked as though it was an obvious fact. “The rate you underestimate me, honestly. I have valuable skills, Flick.” He wiggled his fingers in front of my face. “The whole killing people thing is a very lucrative business. Plus, I’m a real whiz at computers, especially bank accounts.”

I frowned. “Is that why you do this? For money?”

He took a prawn cracker from the center basket and chewed it thoughtfully. “I guess you’ll find out for yourself in…” He glanced at his watch. “Thirty seconds or so.”

I didn’t have to wait that long. A knock came at the door as soon as he said it, and again, I noted how his body reacted to the sound: straightening the tablecloth before him, dusting off his jacket collar, head tilting slightly to the left. Anxiety? Eagerness?

“Should I leave?” I wasn’t quite sure why I asked – I just felt … out-of-place.

“No, no,” he assured me, propping his elbows on the table. “I’m sure your being here will distract him enough to slip up on the terms and conditions.”

I didn’t quite like the sound of that, but the door scraped open and I realized I didn’t have a choice.

“Achilles!” boomed a voice. A figure rounded the corner, arms outstretched for a hug. “There’s my man!”

Holy macaroni. This guy was terrifying. Not in a hulking, wrestler way, either. He was quite skinny, actually, with arms that were far too muscular for the rest of him, but he seemed to carry a sense of importance with him that inflated his  physical presence. Thick unibrow, pox-scarred cheeks, oily brown curls, and eyes shielded by expensive-looking sunglasses.