Harper flipped her off. "You know, screw you. You can do it yourself, but you don't, do you?" She tossed the blue bag at Deena and took off toward the door. "This is all fun and games for you, isn't it? You made this bed, but we both get to lie in it, don't we?" She opened the door and started into the hallway.

"You're so dramatic," Deena called after her. She grabbed the bag and followed her sister. She had to take long strides to catch up.

Harper lowered her tone in the hall and Deena knew she was afraid one of the other tenants would hear. "We're living in a G.o.dd.a.m.n high-rise with murderers, thieves and other horrible people, learning to be just like them, and you think I'm being dramatic?"

Harper punched the handle to the stairwell door and knocked it open. She slung her own pack over her shoulder and started down the 576 steps to the main floor. Step after step, she picked up the pace, obviously trying to out-distance her sister and work out some of the anger that was brewing.

The two of them had been living inside each other's personal s.p.a.ce for the last several months. They went to the diner at the same time, they came home at the same time, worked out in the gym together, did laundry, slept and rode the bus together. Deena thought about that as she heard Harper's feet pound on each step, louder and louder. Harper spun at each landing, barely touching it as she continued to the next set of stairs.

Deena had been threatening her sister as subtly as she could. She suggested Harper would be held accountable in some way for what Deena had done to Mike. That she would be implicated in what Deena had done to the stick-up men in the diner, or the killers in the woods. So far, it was enough to get Harper to keep running. There was some inherent guilt in Harper, but the shock of all of the events piling up on each other kept her running. Deena didn't feel good about what she was doing to her sister, but the lure of the criminal life, the thought of working for Marsh, had a hold on Deena that she couldn't break and she would do anything to make it happen.

Still, she wondered where that would leave her sister. What was Harper's breaking point, and what would happen when she reached it?

Deena skipped the last two steps, pa.s.sed Harper on the landing and slammed into the door, shoving it open and kept going to the street. They both turned on the sidewalk and moved down the alley. "What are we doing? Will they take us to Marsh's office?"

"How the f.u.c.k should I know?" Harper asked. Deena knew her sister cussed more when she was nervous. "Let's go to d.a.m.n gym and find out." She pointed down the alley. "All I know is Ramirez'll blow a gasket if we're late."

Deena rubbed her arm and watched her sister disappear around the corner of the building. The gym where they worked out was not a fancy, upscale city gym where women went to do Pilates and ride exercise bikes. There was a woman who did the books and another who came in and cleaned a couple of times of week, but other than that, Deena and Harper were a rarity. Deena didn't mind the smell so much after a while and Harper had finally learned to stop complaining about it, but the smell of sweaty, bleeding fetid men continued to make her nose visibly curl every time they entered the facility.

There were limited options for anyone who wanted to work out. They had heavy bags to pound, speed bags to punch and weights to lift. Some jump ropes and medicine b.a.l.l.s rounded out the facilities.

In the workout area, Deena found the usual a.s.sortment of men who hung around with seemingly nothing to do but lift weights and run laps. Six of them this time, which was about average. The sisters had been using the facility for a while and had never seen the place crowded, but it was also never empty.

Once both sisters were in the room and had placed their bags on the floor, Ramirez entered, his face twisted in its usual scowl. A man they'd never met followed Ramirez.

"Good morning, girls. Nice of you to show up," Ramirez said.

A searing pain erupted on Deena's arm and she saw the line, like a shadow, sweep down her arm. "Hey." She was immediately on guard and wary of the new person.

This is Mr. Danny Englewood," Ramirez said. He pointed to the disheveled man who had moved closer to the main door. "Until approximately twenty-four hours ago, Danny was in prison upstate."

Harper looked at her sister and then back at the wiry Mr. Englewood. "What was he in prison for?"

"Don't ask, because you really don't want to know."

Englewood smiled, revealing a crooked line of yellowed teeth with a number of gaps. His eyes were red and bloodshot. He walked with a confident swagger and Deena a.s.sumed he was high on something. He seemed very pleased with himself.

"Danny's the kind of man you're going to be working with here in the organization. I just thought you'd like to start meeting your coworkers now, rather than later. Just so you know what you're getting into," Ramirez seemed pleased with himself.

Englewood dropped his jacket on a chair and began unb.u.t.toning his thin white shirt to slowly reveal the tattoos that littered his upper chest and torso. Images of eagles and skulls were interspersed with the American flag and a fiery pair of eyes near his neck. There wasn't a s.p.a.ce anywhere from his chin down that wasn't overlaid by the ink work. Deena thought about the little spot of blackness on her arm that had put them in this situation and she worried that Mr. Englewood might be some kind of strange sorcerer like herself. She looked closer to see if any of his artwork moved like hers did.

"Like what you see little girl?" Englewood caught her staring. "You'll get your chance soon enough." He started toward them with a disturbing confidence. "Ramirez here told me all about you girls. He says you like to party."

The girls looked over at Ramirez. He was smiling wide and had a number of the men in the room gathering behind him near the door. It seemed everyone in the room was smiling except Deena and Harper.

Deena's body tensed and she felt a cramp forming in her stomach to go along with the pain in her arm. Deena didn't answer, but something inside her started a.s.sessing the distance to objects around her that she could use as weapons. There was a scale in her mind that was slowly dipping down toward violence. And she was beginning to look forward to it. Just as the violence in the woods and at the diner had thrilled her, the antic.i.p.ation of it here was overwhelming her brain.

"Oh. I think you'll find out that I like to party, too. I'm a regular party guy," Englewood said. He was slowly circling the girls and getting closer as he did.

Harper held up her hands. "Look, we're not..."

She didn't get to finish as Englewood lunged forward and punched her in the jaw.

Harper stumbled backward and tipped over, falling to floor, only to be caught by Englewood. He grabbed her by the shirt and pulled her so close that Harper had to be able to smell his breath. "Enough G.o.dd.a.m.n talking. I've had nothing but talking for the last ten years. I'm done with talking."

There was a cheer from the men a.s.sembled to watch.

Deena reached for Englewood but was blocked by a young boxer named Dane who grabbed her from behind. He had a tight grip on her waist and dragged her backward while another man quickly grabbed one of her arms.

It was hard for Deena to focus, as blind rage brought the familiar shadow across her body. She could see that the blow had really jarred her sister and she was only standing because Englewood was holding her up. She feebly tried to raise her arms but just couldn't muster the strength.

"OK, we get it. You're in charge here and you don't like us," Deena told Ramirez. "But we've made a deal with Marsh. He wants us to work for him. He made a deal with us."

"Jesus Christ. We don't need to do this," Harper mumbled. "Marsh asked us to be here. He told us that we were here to work." She was on the verge of tears, but was still too shocked to cry.

"Yeah? Marsh asked me to be here, too. Seems he's not convinced you're an a.s.set," Ramirez said. "He put me in charge of you to do whatever I thought was necessary. I decided that you're no good to him if you can't handle yourselves. You'd be pretty worthless to him, wouldn't you say? Your careers as ruthless criminals would be wildly short lived. And that's not a good thing."

"We don't have to do this," Deena's voice pierced the encroaching blackness.

Ramirez's response came like a whisper from the void. "Oh, we do. We most certainly do have to do this."

Englewood grabbed Harper's shirt with both hands and ripped it, revealing the girl's black sports bra underneath. The men cheered again.

"Stop." Deena's voice shook within her chest. She closed her eyes and thought about the spikes that had protruded from her knuckles in the past. She waited a moment as she felt her arm become thick, filling with darkness. Immediately, the man holding her arm screamed a high-pitched cry. They both looked down to see th.o.r.n.y protrusions had emerged from her arms and into his hands, the largest of them came out the other side of his wrist. He tried to pull away, but was stuck fast. Deena took a swing and connected with his nose, causing an audible crack. She released him from the spikes and he fell on the floor.

Deena was still held around the waist by Dane, who squeezed her tighter and lifted her off the ground in an effort to gain control. The other four spectators weren't laughing, and they moved in to help Dane. Ramirez stayed where he was, seemingly confident that the men would handle her, and Englewood stayed with Harper.

It was hard for Deena to get any sort of angle to grab Dane, as he continued to squeeze from behind. She twisted and turned, but his grip was too strong. Her breath was getting short as she struggled to take in more air. The ends of her fingernails became sharp black claws. She plunged them into Dane's arms and dragged them up from the wrist to the elbow. The cuts tore a gouge that flayed the skin and immediately dripped blood. Dane let go.

Free to move again, Deena stepped toward Englewood and Harper, but was blocked by the remaining four, who encircled her. Deena was about to warn them of a dire fate if they didn't let her pa.s.s, but decided not to. She didn't have the capacity for coherent language and they were grown adults. Stupid a.s.s adults.

There wasn't much of a fight. The men had size and strength, but Deena had energy in her body that crept out like murderous shadows. There was no grace to Deena's fighting; she'd never had much call to practice. She attacked like some feral animal cornered and afraid for its life. The men's size worked against them, as they couldn't get out of each other's way fast enough to react to her slashes and kicks. They were all down in a matter of minutes.

"Whoa. OK. We need to dial this back. It got out of hand real quick," Ramirez said. He held up his hands to try to calm Deena. "This wasn't supposed to go quite this far. We were just going to get a little rough and teach you a lesson." He looked over at Englewood, but distanced himself from the man, slowly taking steps away.

Harper was pinned beneath Englewood, who had barely noticed what was going on around him. He was tearing at Harper's sweatpants and nuzzling his face into her neck, nearly salivating as he went about his work. Harper's shirt lay in tatters and her black sports bra shined in the harsh gym lighting.

Ramirez tried to get Englewood's attention, but stayed away from him. "Christ, Englewood. Stop." Deena ended his plea by swinging her arm in his direction. She didn't look at him, only thought of a meat cleaver as her arm made an arc across his body.

Ramirez's scream finally got Englewood's attention. He turned to see that he was the only one unscathed in the room. He staggered to his feet and took a moment to quickly b.u.t.ton his pants back up. "What's this? What the h.e.l.l is this?" His eyes were gla.s.sy as he tried to focus on Deena.

"What is this? What is it?" Deena growled. She took steady strides toward Englewood. "You started it. You tell me."

A switchblade appeared in Englewood's hand, produced slickly from his back pocket. "I don't know what you..." Deena punched him in the jaw before he could finish. He staggered back, swinging the blade in front of him to prevent Deena from a quick follow up blow. "Look b.i.t.c.h. I am here to teach you a lesson." The knife settled between the two of them. "That's what's goin' on here." His words were wet with the blood that was dripping from his lips."

"Get the f.u.c.k away from my sister," Deena said. She saw what she thought was a shadow pa.s.s over her whole body and it spurred her on. She thought of a handcuff and a line of the blackness shot out of her and wrapped itself around Englewood's wrist, immobilizing the knife he was holding. He struggled as Deena pulled him closer with the dark restraint. Realizing he couldn't use the knife, Englewood swung at Deena with his free hand.

"I think today's lesson is about over. Don't you?" Deena asked. She thought about the knife drawer at home and immediately, her fingers elongated with Shadow Energy and flattened into the likenesses of the sharp and serrated things that she kept in her kitchen: steak knives, a paring knife, bread knives and other sharp cutlery.

As soon as he was close enough, Deena sliced Englewood. She'd considered letting his wrist free, just to give him a chance, but didn't. He hadn't given Harper such a chance. Deena brought her razor-sharp fingers across his chest, cutting through the fabric and leaving rows of deep gashes.

She suddenly felt nauseous. It wasn't a reaction to the blood or what she was doing to Englewood, it was something internal. Her grip on him weakened and the tendril that had wrapped itself around his wrist was beginning to loosen. As she struggled to maintain her grip on him, her body rebelled with spasms of sharp needle-p.r.i.c.ks of pain. She felt light-headed and stumbled. Englewood saw an opportunity and tugged his arm free. He swung at Deena with the knife and managed to cut her across the arm. The pain gave Deena enough of a jolt to keep herself in the fight. She pulled her arm back, and shoved all of the blades that had grown from her hand into Englewood's chest and then pushed as hard as she could. She stumbled forward and knocked Englewood to the floor, falling on top of him and shoving the blades in with all her weight.

The last thing Deena heard before pa.s.sing out was Englewood's piercing scream.

She awoke the next day in the c.r.a.ppy apartment she shared with her sister. Harper had dragged her there after the fight and nursed her to health as best she could. Deena had no scars, no bruises, not a single scratch. But Harper made a point to hand her sister a mirror. What Deena saw there was a sight that made her sit up and look again. In the mirror, she saw herself three years ago. It was subtle, sure. But the definition, the shape was different in her cheeks and chin. "It's a good thing, right?" Deena said to her sister. "I can use this power and stay young forever. That's the best power, ever."

Harper stared at her with pale, vacant eyes.

"What?"

"You've been asleep since yesterday. I've been sitting here waiting on Marsh's men to burst through the door and kill us," Harper said. She nodded over to the coffee table. There were two automatic pistols resting there with a scattering of bullets next to them. "I took them from the gym. I thought I was going to have to use them."

Deena rubbed her eyes as she stared back at the mirror. "Why would they come for us? They gave us a test and we pa.s.sed. Why would they have a problem?"

"You killed most of them. You killed Marsh's men. Why wouldn't they?"

The thought of what happened yesterday was hiding somewhere in her mind, but wouldn't fully reveal itself to Deena. "Back in school, they didn't penalize you for pa.s.sing a particularly hard math test, did they? That wouldn't be fair." Deena pushed her hair back, to look at her neck and ears. The changes in her body were so subtle.

50.

Morgan took a deep breath as he saw the figures through the picture window. They were moving towards the door.

"Here they come. You're going to kill them all, right?" Brandt's words felt hot on Morgan's neck. "G.o.dd.a.m.nit, if you don't do it this time, I'll lose my s.h.i.t."

The Russian SVN-98 sniper rifle felt right in Morgan's hands. It was fast becoming one of Morgan's all-time favorites, even though the experimental model was still new to the market. He'd adjusted for the light breeze, calmed himself and controlled the rising and falling of his chest. As they moved away from the window, he zoomed in closer to the door, antic.i.p.ated it opening and waited for the first of them to walk out.

"Do you need a breath mint?" Brandt asked.

Morgan's mom spoke up in her soothing tone. "Juice box?"

"Are you comfy?" Mr. Hector sounded sincerely concerned. "We just want to make sure you handle this right. Your whole future's riding on it."

"After all, if you miss, everyone will think you're a d.i.c.k," Nadine said.

"No pressure," Brandt added.

With his breathing still in check, Morgan waited a few more moments for something to actually happen in the house. The door swung open slowly and his scope was suddenly filled with targets. The blonde agent came into view first, followed by Deena and finally, the black agent bringing up the rear.

"Cookies, maybe? I can make you a nice batch of oatmeal raisin. You used to love those." Morgan's mother stepped close enough that her feet were visible next to him as he looked into the scope.

"No. Knock it off, I don't need anything."

"Just shoot all of them," Brandt said.

Nadine leaned close, her breath, stinking of beer and cigarettes, was wet in his ear. "Get this over with, so they don't come back to haunt you later."

"Yeah. Hate to see them come back to mess you up." Morgan could hear Wallace's voice outside the treehouse, somewhere below them.

"You really shouldn't have killed Wallace. He was such a nice man." Mr. Hector suddenly seemed very sympathetic to a man that everyone agreed would probably have killed Morgan, given half a chance. It was pretty much par for the course. The teddy bear could turn on a dime.

"Shut up, he deserved what he got," Morgan said. "There's no room in Marsh's office for both of us. I did what I had to. Ask Brandt, he knows. I was just securing my future."

Mr. Hector started to laugh and Nadine joined in almost immediately. "Aren't you supposed to be quiet when you're sneaking up on someone?" Mr. Hector asked.

Morgan realized that he'd taken his eye from the scope in order to admonish a teddy bear that wasn't even there. He'd never let his demons distract him from doing his job in all the years they'd been coming to him. They'd faded into the background the moment he'd locked on his targets and he'd successfully completed each job despite their interference.

He leaned back down and put his eye to the scope.

51.

The warm sunlight felt good on Deena's face as they stepped through the doorway. The fresh air was a welcome change from the musty house. She'd miss the place. The city was great for a murderous thug, but that wasn't her life anymore, she hoped. No. She wouldn't go back to that. But with every contract killer and murderer suddenly knowing her address, she didn't see any chance of moving back into the old house. Maybe a nice little cottage in the woods, or something. That would be nice. Something by a stream. Good Lord, she was losing it. How was that childish fairytale ending ever going to happen? She was handcuffed and being led to a car that would deliver her to prison, where she'd live in a cell no bigger than her old treehouse. It wouldn't be so bad actually living in her treehouse, but to have to be behind bars would ruin it. It certainly wouldn't have as good of a view.

Deena looked up to see if her former hideout was still on its perch and in good condition. The sides had mostly fallen off, but the floor itself seemed to be hanging in there. Imperceptibly, she saw movement on the platform; the outline of a man was clearly visible laying down and turning.

"Get down," Deena lunged, knocking Pel forward. As she did, the report of a rifle rang through the woods and an area of the doorframe splintered from the impact of a bullet. She saw Agent Garrett drop to the ground, the bullet landing just a few inches to the right of him.

Strength rose within Deena's body and her arms felt like granite. She struggled to pull them from the cuffs, but saw that Agent Pel was still exposed to the gunman. Without much thought, Deena stepped in front of the agent to shield her from the sniper's next shot. "Get inside," Deena said.

The young agent didn't need prompting, and was already scrambling back toward the door. When her foot hit the porch, another shot exploded from the hidden a.s.sa.s.sin.

The white-hot pain that ripped through Deena's shoulder threw her backward. She'd managed to maneuver herself between the gun and Pel, blocking a bullet that most likely would have found the agent had Deena not been there. Deena stumbled back and fell to her knees. Behind her, the agents had pulled out their sidearms and were firing back. The bark of the firing handguns hurt Deena's ears, with the weapons so close to her head.

Pel grabbed Deena around her uninjured arm and pulled her inside out of danger. Another shot from their a.s.sailant tore a chunk off the doorframe.

"Are you all right?" Pel asked. She examined the wound, pulling Deena's shirt away, to get a better look. Pel's hand immediately went over the wound to try to stop the blood.

It hurt like h.e.l.l. It was a burning sensation that was unlike the last time, when she got shot on the train. She wondered if the bullet had broken a bone, or severed something important in the shoulder or collarbone.

"Jesus. Garrett. Look," Pel said.

They all turned to see the blood seeping over Agent Pel's hand had turned black.