Book of Night(87)

“Gimme a sec.” Charlie could hear her talking to someone in a conciliatory way, although she couldn’t make out the words. Hopefully explaining to her client that she had to go.

She came back a moment later. “You know I can’t drive.”

“I will be with you the whole way,” Charlie said, keeping her voice calm and low. Radio voice. Hostage negotiator voice. “I promise. I’m coming to pick you up.”

There was a long silence on the other end of the phone.

“Please, Posey.” So much for staying calm. “Hurry.”

“Fine. The backyard?”

“So you’re not visible from the street.” Charlie wanted to get on the highway and race toward home, trying to beat Adam, but she knew it was better to focus on getting her sister out of the house. “Just. You know. Quick.”

As Posey moved through the house, grabbing some things she said she needed and herding Lucipurrr into a cat carrier, Charlie dug her fingernails into the mound of her thumb. She wanted to scream at Posey to move faster. She wanted to do anything but sit there in the parking lot, hurt and powerless.

Some huffing and rustling later, Posey said, “Okay, I’m outside with the cat. I’m heading toward the back.”

“Go over the fence,” Charlie said. “You’re almost gone.”

“You’ve got to explain—”

“I will, I promise. And I’m sorry.”

“What if the neighbors—”

“Just keep going. Don’t look back. Go, go, go.”

“Okay,” Posey said, sounding fragile. “I’m over the fence. You know I hate walking through someone else’s property. What if Elias comes outside and yells at me for cutting through his yard?”

“You’re doing great, all you have to do is keep going. Avoid the main roads, and cut through to…” Charlie tried to think. There were a lot of streets crisscrossing around there. It would be easy to choose the wrong one. She didn’t think Adam knew what Posey looked like, but a woman with a cat carrier was hard to miss.

There was the Williston Library one way, attached to a private high school for rich kids that had perks like riding horses. Posey might be able to talk her way inside, but she’d have to deliver her story with conviction. In the other direction was a Dunkin’, a lunch place that would already be closed, a tattoo studio called Needle Inc., Union Package liquor store, and Glory of India, which mostly did takeout.

“You should have come out on Clark, so cut through the parking lot on School Street. You’re going into Union Package. Browse the wines until I get there.”

“What if they don’t allow pets?” Posey asked.

“Then we’ll figure out something else. There’s a Walgreens that’s not far.”

Charlie waited, listening to the sound of Posey’s breath, until she heard the jangle of the bell on the shop door.

“You’re coming right away?” Posey asked in a hushed voice.

“Right away,” Charlie confirmed, and hung up.

This was why she’d stayed away from gloamists, away from cons and heists of magic. How had she not yet learned the lesson of juggling knives? Even when you kept them all in the air, you still cut yourself on the blades.

She glanced at her shadow one more time, trying to shift her perception toward it. It flickered in response.

“Okay,” she said, and pulled out of the gas station.

Her car sped down the highway, the rattling of the engine barely noticeable. Whatever Vince had done held even as she pressed down on the gas and wove around delivery trucks and commuters. Her swollen eye made it hard to switch lanes to the left, and a pickaxe of a headache cleaved through her thoughts, which were mostly a litany of what-else-could-go-wrong—What if Adam decides he needs a shot of courage before he busts into my house and goes into the nearby liquor store, what if he is following my car right now, what if he has an accomplice, what if Lucipurrr pees in the cage and gets Posey kicked out at just the moment when—

Charlie pulled up to the curb and fought down a wild urge to jump out of the car. Keeping the engine running, she called Posey.

Her sister picked up on the second ring.

“I’m out front,” Charlie said, feeling out of breath despite having done nothing more than drive. Maybe she’d cracked a rib.

A few minutes later, Posey emerged with a bottle wrapped in a paper bag, an overstuffed backpack on her shoulder, and the cat crate swinging from her hand. She climbed into the back. Lucipurrr let out a miserable yowl as her cage was unceremoniously dumped into the seat well. “I got both our laptops and some wine for Mom.”

“Mom?” Charlie echoed.

But Posey had lost interest in that line of conversation. She was gaping at Charlie in the rearview mirror. “What happened to your face? And who are you afraid is coming to our house? Is it Vince? Did he threaten you?”

“Vince?” Charlie gave her sister an exasperated look.

Posey frowned. “I don’t know! Was it the gloamist from Rapture?”

Charlie shook her head, pulling away from the street. She needed to put some distance between them and anywhere close to her house. “That guy’s dead.”

“What?” Posey’s eyes widened. “What do you mean dead?”