Perfect Gravity (Wanted and Wired #2)(48)

Heron was going on, moving his mouth in subvocal words, obviously doing his damndest to soothe. Kellen didn’t need to know what his friend was saying, but whatever it was, it seemed to be working. Still, Mari stayed coiled tight, like a flat-pressed spring. At any second, Kellen expected her to burst out of Heron’s arms, guns drawn, ready to blow something up. It was her way. Impulsive. Emotional. Loyal.

After a moment or two or a million, some of the tension eased from her spine. She made a small sound, accepting. Waiting.

Heron drew in a breath and found Kellen again. He raised his eyebrows.

“Yoink’s on her way,” Kellen said. “But already, we’re getting some data in from critters on the ground.”

“Can you put their data feeds up on the walls?”

This was easier when Yoink was around, but Kellen fiddled with the com and relayed data to the smartsurface walls. It wasn’t pretty, just charts and numbers, results of quick air-composition analysis and structural tension readings for the remaining building supports, though honestly, there wasn’t much left. Subsidence crater more than a mile wide. Damn. That thing had gone into the ground before it blew.

Heron swore, which was unusual enough a thing that Kellen instinctively asked, “What?”

“The munitions used in these attacks are identical to the bomb that hit Angela Neko’s hotel in Guadalajara.”

Coincidences again.

Kellen blew a breath out between tight lips. “If he found out she wasn’t dead, he might be looking to finish the job.”

“Maybe,” Heron said. “It’s hard to theorize motive when we don’t clearly know whom we’re dealing with.”

Mari shifted, still from her perch on Heron’s lap but getting her tough-girl armor on, figuratively speaking. “Oh, I got myself a guess.”

“What do you mean?” Kellen asked.

“I’ve been running searches on that particular kind of bomb for days now. It’s an old model, not in wide usage anymore, probably unstable as all get-out. UNAN sold most of their reserves ten, fifteen years back. Guess who not only bought those turkeys but made a big chunk of them to begin with?”

“Texas?”

Her eyes narrowed and shot daggers at the wall display. “Yeehaw.”

“So,” said Kellen, forcing himself to remain calm. “Vallejo’s on a tear, maybe trying to kill Angela. Again. Fine. We’ll just pay him a little visit. He was at Enchanted Rock not too long ago. Could still be there. Central Texas is his stomping grounds.”

Heron nodded, his gaze darting unnaturally fast between the displays. “I can’t send Chloe,” he said, “not while she’s dispersed, and it might not be a bad idea to organize a soft evacuation here at the Pentarc, just in case. I could use your help with that, but I understand if you prefer to do the other.”

“I’ll go with,” Mari said, already uncurling herself and rising to her feet. Cool calm fell over her like a shell. She had to be burning up with emotion inside, but she sure could get herself into a zone.

Heron reached out one long arm and brushed her hip. She stopped. Looked down at him.

“Please don’t,” he said. “I can’t endure sending you into his sphere of control again.”

Heron blinked like he was resetting something internally, then turned to face Kellen. “The last time she and her father faced off, he put a bullet in her. That won’t be happening again. So if you want to stop Vallejo, you’ll have to go get him yourself.”

Alone. Not Kellen’s favorite thing, but he’d do it. “I got no problem with that. Don’t you worry, Miss Mari.”

“Are you certain?” Heron asked slowly. “Running in headfirst and guns blazing isn’t your usual style.”

“Well, that don’t mean I can’t—”

Yoink blurred into the room, a comet of wild fur, screeching. She hooked her claws on Kellen’s jeans leg and literally climbed him. Hurt like the dickens, but he was way too startled to move. Also thought he probably shouldn’t. When she got her little face up in his, she stared him down hard. His com crackled. “Bad robot attacked my human. To the goats!”

In the space of one hot second, Heron smoothed the data from Minneapolis to the side and splashed visuals up for Northy and the skywalk. It took them maybe four heartbeats more to find Angela. She’d run clean out of her pillow shoes, and though it looked like she’d gotten some kind of head start, the mech-clone was faster.

Immediate questions like What the hell could have set it off? shifted to God, what will it do to her if it catches her?

“She’s headed for the barn,” Kellen said, interpreting Yoink-speak for the rest of them.

Good girl, going someplace you know. Just hang on, sweetheart.

Mari was already ahead of him through the door. “Then we’d best get there first.”

? ? ?

It had been nine plus years since Angela had been forced to run a twice-weekly “smile mile” in the desert. She’d kept up with her health in a general sort of way, but she so wasn’t conditioned for a run like this.

Like this. Nothing ever had been like this.

A death run over uneven flooring, stairs that cut out halfway, freezing winter wind gusts, and unexpected plunges into vast, bright nothing. Nightmares reached for her. She wished she’d learned the layout of this place, wished she’d spent time hardening and honing herself.