Slayer(39)

“Oh, hey, Mom.” I pray that she didn’t notice the bulge of stolen books under my shirt.

“What are you all doing here?”

“Hello, Mrs. Jamison-Smythe.” Leo looks like one of those stock photos that comes in the empty frames as he smiles at her. Utterly harmless and handsome. It strikes me that I haven’t seen a genuine expression from him, even in front of his own mother. Everything is carefully posed, deliberate. Fake. Some part of me knows that the last few years weren’t as easy for him and Eve as she’s made it sound, but what made him so closed off?

I remember the painful awkwardness of this morning, his vulnerability in saying how happy he was to see me again. Maybe I caught a glimpse of the real Leo. And then I was curt and dismissive. Ugh, I hate that I feel bad now. I shouldn’t ever have to feel bad about Leo.

“We’re going to look at my DVD collection,” he says. “We thought we’d have a movie night tonight. I think everyone needs to decompress a little.”

To my surprise, my mom looks at me. Really looks at me. One of her hands twitches as though she wants to reach out to me. Then she frowns. “What happened to your forehead?”

I lift my hand to the bruise. “Oh, I—”

“I opened our bedroom door right as she was about to grab the doorknob.” Artemis grimaces apologetically. “I got her hard.”

I think our mom buys it. I’m torn between feeling triumphant—we finally have secrets from her!—and hurt at how easily she buys our lame excuses. She doesn’t want to push deeper. She pulls a few pound notes from her pocket and holds them out. I take them, numbly. Why is she giving me money?

“We don’t have a good television here. It will be nice to get away from this castle. Go see a film in a theater. You can pick up that helpful boyfriend of yours, Rhys. Leo, you have your license?”

Leo nods. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Good. Go be teenagers.” Her smile is as tight as Artemis’s ponytail. “Try it out. You might like it.” She’s clearly trying to get rid of us, even though she and I both know there was a hellhound sniffing around this morning.

But I can’t call her on her shifty behavior without revealing my own secrets—including the demon in Cillian’s shed. So we walk stiffly past her. She doesn’t tell us to invite Jade and Imogen, so apparently only we have this free pass from being Watchers.

We never get outings. My mom is too paranoid, and Artemis and Rhys are too busy. The most we ever have is an occasional afternoon in Shancoom. Which doesn’t have a movie theater, so we’ll have to range out at least an hour if we’re going to follow her instructions. I dart to my room under the excuse of changing my shirt and grabbing a coat. I also hide the stolen books under my mattress.

I meet the others out at the garage. The autumn sun slants toward late afternoon, which surprises me. I lost a lot of time to head trauma.

Leo picks the sleek black Range Rover left over from the days when the Watchers had a whole fleet of vehicles. Back then we also had boats, helicopters, and a private jet. Now we have one golf cart, three cars, a motorcycle, and two ATVs. Plus scooters and tricycles for the Littles.

“Are we really going to a movie?” Artemis sits beside me in the back seat. She sounds dubious but a little excited. She only gets one afternoon a week off, and this isn’t her day, so she’s hit the jackpot. Normally, I’d love to see a movie—with Artemis and Rhys, at least. Not Leo. But today . . .

“Cosmina was still alive in my dream,” I say, “but I don’t know how long that will stay true. Not that I have any idea how to find her, since Mom’s database was a bust. Still, we can’t go sit in a movie theater if there’s a chance she needs our help, right?”

Leo drives carefully out of the garage. “Speaking of your mother . . .”

Sure enough, our mother’s standing at the castle door, watching us leave. I wouldn’t put it past her to have the car tracked too.

She told us to pick up Cillian. And even though we’re ignoring the rest of her plan, it’s a good idea. I need to make sure he understands not to go home. And I want him with us as much as possible so we can keep him safe in case there are more hellhounds. I call him as Leo navigates the bumpy unpaved road. We maintain it enough to be usable, but if you didn’t know it was here, it’d be hard to find.

Cillian answers after the first ring. “Nina? Do you have any more info about—”

I cut him off, unsure if his voice is loud enough for the others to hear. “Hey! I’m in a car with Artemis, Rhys, and Leo, my, uh, new Watcher. We’re coming to get you.”

“You have a Watcher? You are a Watcher. And why are you coming to get me?”

“It’s complicated. All of it. But allegedly we’re going to a movie.”

“Allegedly?”

“We were trying to break into my mom’s computer to get information on a Slayer we think might be in trouble, and while we were leaving, we got caught and shooed out of the castle.” I pause to ask the others. “Where are we going?”

“If there’s a Slayer in danger, we’ll do whatever we have to in order to find her.” Leo speaks so matter-of-factly, it sounds like he’s reading it straight from the Watchers’ guide.

“Wait,” Cillian says. “Who’s the Slayer and why is she in danger?”