d.a.m.n his smile. I knew what he was doing, what he was suggesting. Any other day, it might not have found its mark. After all, my boyfriend was mature, responsible, secure in his job, and if he went to the bar with his college buddies, he did it on his time off (and usually when I was training.) I'd never felt left behind, not really, because I was too busy doing other things. I pulled my cell phone out of my pocket and lit up the display. Still nothing. "Fine." I looked back up at him. "One drink."

"Attagirl." He shot a look at Kat. "This'll be fun. The three of us, on our first a.s.signment, blowing off steam, hanging out at the bar." He draped a thick arm around Kat and drew her close, giving her a peck on the cheek. "It's kinda like..." He thought about it for a minute.

"Being grown-ups?" I offered it sarcastically, but it only widened his smile.

"Five minutes." He turned and his hand fell to grab Kat's, and they walked toward their door. "We'll head down together."

I nodded and slid the card key into my door and turned the handle. When I walked inside, I flipped the switch and waited for the lights to come on. The carpet was a deep maroon and it was a simple setup * two beds, desk, dresser and TV.

I threw my bag on the dresser and retreated to the bathroom. I looked in the mirror at myself. I looked older, mostly because of the suit, but also because I had my hair back in a ponytail. I held up a gloved hand and heard the leather stretch as I clenched a fist and then relaxed it. Grown-up indeed. I pulled the glove off and started to splash water on my face to help me wake up, but then remembered that it would probably destroy the careful amount of makeup I had applied earlier, before I left the Directorate. I rarely wore the stuff, but in this case it seemed important for the role I was playing.

I looked again at myself in the mirror and wondered what I was thinking. We were on a serious a.s.signment, the first chance we had to prove ourselves, and we were going to a bar at midnight to have some drinks even though we weren't anywhere close to done with our a.s.signment. I sighed and looked at the faceplate on my phone again. The LED indicator that let me know when I had messages or missed calls wasn't blinking. Screw it. Screw him. We'd been working our a.s.ses off for months, Kat was going to stay sober, and Scott and I would just have one or two and call it a night. An energy drink or coffee tomorrow and we'd be ready to keep going.

I tried to remember that reasoning as we walked in the doors to the bar. The light was orange in the room, with flatscreen TVs suspended from the ceiling around the bar itself. Tables were set up to the left and right of the bar area, with a small dance floor in the far corner. Music was playing, a modern pop tune, but not a soul was dancing. I scanned the room as we walked in and the place was only slightly packed, which surprised me given it was Sat.u.r.day night.

We made our way to the bar, Scott leading us, his grin reaching an infectious stage. He bellied up and Kat sat next to him. I took the seat on the other side of him, mostly because he was more likely to talk than Kat. She was always tired and quiet after healing someone.

The bartender made his way over to us, a guy in his forties that had more than a few extra pounds. He had long brown hair in a ponytail and was happy enough after he checked our IDs. "Whaddya want?" he asked in an accent that was as far from midwestern as I could imagine.

Scott looked over to me first and I shrugged, so he turned to Kat. "Just water for me," she said. "Designated driver."

"What's good here?" I picked up the mixed drinks menu that he had proffered and thumbed through it.

"Honestly? I got some strengths; I make a pretty good Whiskey Sour, b.l.o.o.d.y Mary, Rusty Nail, Dirty Martini...my Fuzzy Navel is the stuff of local legend*"

"You don't need to show us that," Scott said.

The bartender smiled and his face split into jowls. "I also make a pretty good Cherry Bomb."

I shrugged, without a clue. "I'll try the Whiskey Sour."

"Straight up or over ice?"

He looked back at me and I felt the fatigue of the day edging in. "Surprise me."

The bartender nodded and Scott ordered a beer, a local brand, and went to the other end of the bar to prep our order. Once he was out of earshot, Scott turned to me. "What do you think so far?"

"He seems like a nice enough guy. Kinda big, though. You think that's glandular?"

"About the case." Scott shook his head.

"I think we should not screw it up." I tried to give him my most serious look. "Right?"

"Right." He looked back at Kat, who was resting her face on her palms. "Right?" She gave a lethargic shake of the head, pulling it off her hands to spread her palms with indifference. "It'll be fine. Just a drink or two, and we're off to bed for the night, and back to work tomorrow." He smiled again at me and I caught the first hint of nervousness. "But come on, admit it * we're out on our own, on the road, we're in charge of this thing, and we're sitting in a bar after a long day of chasing down a meta. Tell me this isn't how you imagined it."

I felt a charge of amus.e.m.e.nt. "First of all, it's been like four hours, not a day, and most of it we've been driving, so I don't know how hard it's been." I saw his nervous happiness start to evaporate and stopped myself. "Yeah, it's kinda how I imagined it. Freedom, right?" The bartender returned and set down a napkin and placed my drink on top of it, complete with a maraschino cherry, put a beer bottle in front of Scott and slid a water gla.s.s onto the bar beside Kat.

"I'll drink to that," Scott said, raising his beer up and angling it toward me. He waited for me to pick up my gla.s.s, which was a lot shorter than his; kind of a midget gla.s.s, I thought, like they didn't want me to have a grown-up's cup. I clinked it against his bottle as he said, "To us! To freedom!" and then reached around him to click my gla.s.s against Kat's. Even she was wearing a smile, as wan as it was.

"Pretty sure it's bad luck to toast with a water gla.s.s," I said to Kat as I took the first sip of my drink. Whatever she said in reply, I didn't hear. I felt my face contract as the full flavor of the whiskey hit my mouth. It was only mildly sour. What caused me to make a face like I'd swallowed battery acid was what I could only a.s.sume was the result of the alcohol. It was pungent, powerful, and I immediately wanted to spit it out and throw the cup far, far away from me. They had given me poison, I was sure of it.

"Are you all right?" Scott was looking at me with his brow furrowed. He took a swig and set his beer back down on the bar.

I swallowed the vile mixture and wondered where the barman had gone. I a.s.sumed he'd wanted to be as far away from me as possible when I discovered that his idea of a good drink was far removed from what I had thought it would be. "Is it...supposed to taste like I took a swig of household cleaners?"

Scott laughed and looked back at Kat, who feigned a smile of amus.e.m.e.nt as she rested her face on her hands. "A little strong, huh?"

"It's a little strong in the same way that compared to normal humans, we are a little strong."

He picked up my drink and took a sip. "Not bad. It'll probably take a little bit for you to get used to the flavor, that's all."

I wanted to tell him that the only way I could ever get used to the flavor would be to take a blowtorch to every taste bud in my head first, but I refrained. I stared down at the drink, looking at it like it was an adversary I was facing off with. "Acquired taste, huh?" I picked up my little kid's gla.s.s, suddenly thinking it was a lot bigger now. I didn't want to waste a lot of time on this, and it certainly didn't bear sipping, prolonging my disgust for an hour or more, a little shot of revolting nastiness at a time.

I threw it back like I'd seen on TV, trying to ignore the strong, nearly gag-worthy reflex it caused as it pa.s.sed my tongue and drained down my throat. I felt the ice on my lips, and that was good, the last lingering aftertaste of the liquor still remaining on the cubes. I set the gla.s.s down on the bar and shook my head, as though I could rid myself of the tang that was still on my tongue.

The bartender made his way over, and just as I was about to ask him to make my next round a water, he set another Whiskey Sour in front of me. I looked up at him, frozen, like I had gotten caught flashing him a fake ID, except this was much worse. "The gentleman down there sent you this." I looked at the barman, and he lifted a pudgy finger to point to a man down the bar.

He had brown hair, spiked a little in front, with a thin face and intense eyes that caught my attention even from twenty feet away. He raised his gla.s.s to me and I could almost feel the ice cubes melt in mine as I picked it up and raised it in a silent toast across the distance between us. He took a drink of his and I took a deep sip of mine, taking care not to make the face that was struggling to get out, that mixture of putrid desire to spit and horror that drinking so vile a liquid was socially acceptable.

"Picked up an admirer, huh?" I turned back to Scott to find him with a second beer in front of him, and his words were drifting a bit as he talked, slurring. I looked past him at Kat, who was shaking her head as if to keep awake, not paying much attention to us.

"I guess." I looked back to the man to find he had turned back to the bar, nursing his drink, attention focused on a soccer game on the screen in front of him. "Or maybe he just figured I was the only unattached woman in the bar." I swiveled on my stool to look around and confirmed my suspicion; most of the people in the bar were plainly coupled up.

I looked to Scott and frowned. "Why didn't he a.s.sume I was your girlfriend and send a drink to Kat?" Scott got a blank look, then hemmed and hawed. "Never mind, it doesn't matter," I said. He took a breath and lifted his second beer, draining it.

"Take it easy." Kat leaned over, crossing Scott's body to weigh in over the blaring music that filled the bar, now a cla.s.sic 80s rock tune that had more metal than an orthodontic patient's mouth. "You're not going for a third, are you?"

"I've been drinking beer and wine with my family since I was like...thirteen," Scott said, his words curling as he answered, his tongue sounding like it was getting heavy. "I can handle it."

"Uh huh." Kat looked from him to me, her eyes narrowed slightly. "How much does your family usually let you have?"

"One." He swayed on the stool. "We're social drinkers, not alcoholics." He laughed, as though it were the funniest thing in the world.

She rolled her eyes and then whispered something in his ear. He straightened on his stool and turned to me. "I think we're gonna turn in for the night." He pulled a wad of cash from his pocket and laid some on the bar. "You coming?"

I felt a flush of red as I imagined what Kat had said that got him to change direction so quickly. I didn't want to be in the room next to them, certainly not for the next half-hour. "I think I'll stay a little longer."

He grinned, a goofy one. "Heh. Well, you might wanna stop after that one." He pointed to my drink. "After all, if this is your first time drinking, you need to build up a tolerance."

I felt a sway of my own in my head. "I'll work on that." I shot him a dazzling smile. "Have fun."

Kat rolled her eyes at me but smiled, a weary look that I knew contained at least a grain of indulgence; her making an accommodation she normally might not have made when she was this tired, only for the purpose of getting him out of the bar before he became too trashed to walk.

As if to ill.u.s.trate my point, Scott started to stand and his legs buckled. Kat caught him with an arm around his back and I could see her help him regain his balance, her meta strength enabling her to keep him upright. They walked to the door, her steering, him along for the ride. I chuckled under my breath and was dimly aware that the room had a gentle bob to it that could have been my head rocking back and forth. I knew that my best bet was to avoid drinking even one more drop of the suddenly much tastier drink in front of me.

When I turned back to the bar, I started because there was someone in the vacant seat to my left. He caught my eye, those intense blue eyes locked on mine, and he gave me a disarming smile that somehow got me to giggle, which came as a great shock to me. "Sorry," he said. "Didn't mean to startle you."

"I didn't mean to be startled." I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, shaking my head that I'd said that. "Sorry, I just didn't expect*"

"Do you mind some company?" He caught my gaze and held it, and his smile went beyond the realm of disarming and into charming. He was wearing a b.u.t.ton-up shirt that was unb.u.t.toned at the top, giving me a glimpse of the beginning of some well-defined chest muscles.

I caught my breath and it held for a minute before I could squeeze out my answer. "I don't mind."

"My name's James. James Fries." He held up his drink, a tall, clear gla.s.s with some sort of garnish being the only hint it wasn't water, and took a leisurely sip, not breaking eye contact the whole time he was drinking. "And you are?"

"Sienna." I thought about it for a second, remembering that my identification had a drastically different name on it than the one I'd grown up with. "Sienna Clarke."

"What brings you to the mighty town of Owatonna, Sienna Clarke?" He leaned against the bar, the angle of his body making him look very cool, his laid back att.i.tude drawing my interest.

I took another breath and caught a whiff of a musk, something that left me wanting to take another breath so I could smell it again. "I'm here for work." I blinked a couple times and the room swayed pleasantly. "You?"

"The same." He took a sip and I admired his lips as they caressed the gla.s.s. "What do you do for work?"

"I'm..." It took me a second to remember my cover story. After all, I wouldn't have wanted him to think I was some sort of person with super strength and powers that defied reasonable explanation. "I'm with the FBI. I'm doing some...investigating."

"Investigating. How mysterious."

My hand found its way to my gla.s.s, which found its way to my lips for another sip. "I do like to keep a certain mystique about me." This time it didn't taste too bad. In fact, it was almost good. "Do you live around here, James?"

"No." I watched the sweat drip from his gla.s.s, leaving little blotches, like inkblots on the napkin as the dark wood of the bar bled through. His hand swirled his gla.s.s, slow. "I live in Minneapolis. I'm here for work."

"I see. What do you do for work?"

He smiled. "Recruiting."

I laughed, light, and I had no idea why. "That was vague."

There was a glimmer in his eyes. "I have a mystique to keep up, too, you know."

"Fair enough." I put my empty whiskey down and watched as the bartender slid by and snaked it, replacing it with another. I started to protest but he had a wide grin on his fat face and nodded at James as he headed back to the other end of the bar where someone waited with a hand raised in the air. I looked at the new drink and felt a certain pressure in my chest at the realization that this could not end well. "I can't drink this," I said to James and watched him half-smile.

"Why not?"

"I'm a lightweight." I said it with the air of someone making a confession. "And I have to work tomorrow morning, which means I kind of need to call it quits for tonight if I'm going to be at all able to think or drive tomorrow."

"Acetaminophen and ibuprofen are your friends," he said. "And lots of water."

"I think moderation might also be a swell idea."

"Much less fun." His hand moved, very casually, across the bar and came to rest on my own. I could feel the gentle weight of it through the glove, the very slight warmth, and it caused me to redden, a heat rising in my cheeks that might not have been noticeable had I not been drinking. He watched my reaction. "Is that too much, too fast?"

"What?" I had been in a little bit of a daze, staring at his hand on mine. "No. Not really."

"No?" He picked up my hand and cradled it in his, rubbing it. "Not this either?"

It felt strangely good, even through the glove. "No. That's fine." His eyes were on mine, staring, with a warmth that I found compelling, drawn to, and I couldn't quite explain it. I found myself leaning closer to him.

He leaned in and kissed me. It was sudden, and caught me by surprise. My eyes widened when he did it, but it felt so good, the pressure, the warmth of his hand as it touched my cheek, and rested there, his lips on mine. I kissed him back, the haze in my mind so agreeable, and I felt his tongue part my lips and swirl. I let him hold my face in his hands and he kept them there, pressing his lips on mine so firmly*

I opened my eyes in shock and with the realization that I couldn't, wasn't able to*

I pulled away, broke from him with sudden violence, standing so abruptly I knocked over both my stool and my drink, trying to get backward, away from him, him who didn't know what I was*

He looked at me with vague amus.e.m.e.nt. "So that was the line, huh?"

"What?" I looked around to see everyone in the bar staring at me, and turned back to him, still sitting on his stool, the same little smile crooking his lips. "No, it's fine, I just...can't..." I let out a breath in frustration. "Are you okay?"

His eyebrows arched upward. "I'm fine. Are you?"

"Yes. I'm fine. I'm sorry." I c.o.c.ked my head and tried to give him my most regretful expression. "Thank you for the drinks, James. You're a really nice guy * and a fantastic kisser, by the way * but I have to go."

He stood and tossed some bills on the bar. "Why don't I walk you out?"

He took a step toward me but I held a gloved hand out and rested it on his chest. I let it linger there; d.a.m.n, it was firm. "I don't think that's a good idea, for a lot of reasons."

He seemed to be suppressing his grin, but nodded. "Fair enough." He reached into the pocket of his pants and came back with a business card. "If you're ever in Minneapolis, give me a call."

I straightened my blazer and nodded, feeling the holster against my ribs. "I'll keep that in mind." I nodded toward his stool. "You might want to sit down for a few minutes." He gave me a quizzical look. "Just a suggestion. Nice to meet you, James."

I walked from the bar and tried really, really hard not to look at him as I pushed my way out the door. It didn't work, and he gave me a sizzling smile that made me want to go back to him, and kiss him until his eyes rolled back in his head and his face melted off. I shook my head in disgust at that thought and walked out into the parking lot. It felt like I was being weak when I thought it, weak and casual and flippant, endangering James's life so I could feel...something. I was lucky that the eternity that it felt like he kissed me was less than I thought it was, or he would have made a h.e.l.l of a scene pitching over in the bar.

The parking lot lurched as I was about halfway across it. I stopped, regained my balance, and kept going. Once I reached the elevator after pa.s.sing through the hotel lobby, I leaned against the wall and felt my head spin. Those Whiskey Sours weren't so bad.

When the elevator door dinged I opened my eyes to find the doors still closed. I heard another ding and stared, waiting for them to open. On the third ring I realized it wasn't the elevator: it was my phone, and I scrambled to grab it out of my pocket. I thrust it up to my ear after hitting the talk b.u.t.ton, not even looking at the caller ID. "h.e.l.lo?"

The elevator dinged, the door opened, and I heard Kat's voice on the other end of the line as well as in person. She stood in the hall and turned her head in surprise when she saw me stagger out of the elevator. "Get packed." She pulled her phone away from her ear and I got a good look at her face, which was still drawn, but now more serious, her blond locks twisted and mussed around her. "Ariadne called. There was another robbery."

I dropped the cell phone back in my pocket and my hand went out to the wall automatically to support me. "Where?"

"Red Wing, Minnesota." She started to hold out a hand to help me but I waved her off. "It's north of here, a little over an hour, on the Wisconsin state line. We need to move now." A little hint of a smile peeked at me, understated, on her tanned and pretty face. "If we hurry, we might be able to catch up with them."

Chapter 8.

A few minutes later our SUV was back on the highway, doing about a hundred miles an hour, barreling north on the interstate with the siren blazing. Kat was at the wheel and I was in the pa.s.senger seat. Scott was pa.s.sed out in the back seat, his head against the window. We hit a b.u.mp and he didn't stir. I rolled my window down and let the warm night air blow in my face.

"How are you holding up?" Kat didn't take her eyes off the road. I could tell she was tense, white-knuckling the wheel. I would have been too. Scott had learned to drive years ago. Kat and I had learned in the last six months, with Parks as our instructor, in an intensive driving course that the Directorate gave us to teach us how to drive both offensively and defensively. Now I could run a car off the road at eighty miles an hour easier than I could parallel park.

"My world is in motion," I said, as I swallowed heavily. I didn't quite feel sick, but I certainly felt the first strains of it. "I could do with a little less of that."

A tight smile made its way onto her face and a few of her teeth peeked out from between her lips. "At least I didn't take the back roads route the GPS suggested. All those twists and turns..."

"Bleh." I shook my head. "Drinking is bad for you. Also, I think I came close to kissing a guy to death in the bar."