Ill Wind

He looked at me seriously from across the teal blue plastic table. Behind him, a neon light sculpture of a parrot climbed a tiled pillar. The brilliant colors made him look drab, a bird in winter colors.

"You're serious?" he asked.

"As a heart attack."

He finally nodded and said, "Okay."

Well, what had I expected? Argument? Heroic measures? Declarations of undying love and loyalty? Hell, he was a road dude, just a guy who'd asked for a ride and gotten in over his head. Cute, but not playing at my power level.

Still. I hadn't expected him to just say okay and walk away. Not really. Not without even another word. It was a little bit ego-bruising.

Well, as a matter of fact, that wasn't what he was doing. He had my plastic tray with the empty disposable plates and tableware. He opened a trash receptacle and dumped stuff, slid the tray into a stacker, and ambled back with his hands stuck in his coat pockets.

"I meant to tell you, you look incredibly good in that," he said. "Purple really likes you."

He was still waiting. I raised my eyebrows. "Anything else?"

"My backpack," he said, perfectly reasonably. "It's in the car."

"Oh." I shoved a shopping bag at him. "Make yourself useful."

He had a truly wicked smile. "I often do."

We hiked a Yellowstone distance to the car, and even though the sky was clear except for some high cirrus wisps, I kept an eye on it. Lightning had been known to form chains hundreds of miles from a storm center—been known to strike people dead from clear skies. In my case, it wouldn't be an accident.

Poor Delilah waited where I'd left her, scorched door and all. I unlocked the back and got out David's backpack. It was surprisingly heavy. He rescued it from me when I almost dropped it.

"What the hell's in there?" I asked. "Did you rob Fort Knox?"

"Yeah, this is my idea of a quick getaway," he said, and shrugged into the thing like he'd been doing it all his life. "Tent, portable stove, cookware, clothes, extra boots, and a few dozen books."

"Books?"

He gave me a pitying look. "You don't read?"

"I don't carry the New York Public Library on my back. Hell, I don't even carry it in the trunk."

"Your loss." Now that he had his belongings, he seemed to still be waiting for something. "You going to be okay?"

"Me? Sure."

"You want to explain what happened back there?" he asked.

"The whole curry thing? Really, I just like Indian food."

"Fu

"That's the general idea," I agreed. "You don't want to know. It's better that you don't. Safer."

He shook his head. Before I could stop him—or figure out if I wanted to stop him—he leaned forward and kissed me lightly on the cheek. I stepped back, raised a hand to touch burning skin, and was surprised by how high my heart rate spiked.

"Take care," he said. "And take care of Delilah."

"Yeah." I wanted to say something profound, but I could barely manage the one word. He turned and walked away, heading back for the mall. Ten steps away, he turned with a dramatic flare of his coat.

"Hey!" he called as he kept walking backwards.

"Yeah?"

"You look like you shopped at Prince's garage sale," he said, and smiled—a real, full, beautiful smile.

"Hot, aren't I?"

"You're a regular fire hazard." He waved and turned again, a perfect balletic turn, and kept walking.

I watched him all the way until he disappeared inside. I had opened the driver's side door, but I didn't really remember doing it. Warm metal under my hand. I got in and smelled a ghost of his aftershave— something ci

"Just the two of us, baby," I said. I didn't like the sound of it nearly as much as I'd thought I would.

When I was ten, I went on vacation with my mom to Disney World, just the two of us. Dad was gone by then, vanished into the sunset like Roy Rogers, only instead of riding Trigger, he was riding his secretary, Eileen Napolitano… not that I knew that when I was ten, I knew only that he was gone and Mom was pissed, and anytime I whined about wanting to paint my toenails orange, she told me she didn't want me to end up a secretary.

Mom and I went to Disney World together—my sister, Sarah, older than me, had opted snobbishly for two weeks of band camp instead. We arrived in Orlando in the middle of a clear and su

The following morning we arrived at the Magic Kingdom with clouds boiling from the east—a big black storm wall riding the tide. My mom was never one to let a little rain get her down. We rode the Mine Train and Space Mountain and Haunted Mansion. We rode every ride I was tall enough for, even the ones that made Mom queasy. We bought souvenirs for Sarah, even though I didn't think she deserved it, after rolling her eyes and being a fourteen-year-old superior little drama queen.

When we were taking pictures with Mickey and Mi

Not me and Mom. We were already soaked stupid, so it didn't really matter much anymore. We whooped and hollered and splashed down Main Street USA, played shark attack in Tomorrowland, and pretended that we'd rented out the whole Disney empire for ourselves, just for one day.

It was the best time we ever had together. And yeah, the rain could have been a coincidence. But when I look back on it now, that was the begi

Even after I knew, even after I accepted it was all true, my mom couldn't. Parents almost never did, apparently; she never really had a chance to come to terms with it. Heart attack at the age of forty-nine. There one minute, gone the next, a shock like a bolt of lightning from a clear blue sky.

It had occurred to me to wonder, much later, if that had been arranged. I tried not to think about it too much, because it made me consider the path that I'd chosen, or had been chosen for me.

I didn't get close to people. Not anymore.

Which perfectly explained why I'd had to leave David behind, the way I'd left every part of normal life behind me when I'd taken the oath and joined the Wardens. I was risking my life every time I reached for power. I didn't have the right to risk anyone else's along with it.

Too bad. He was really, really cute.

Just outside of town, two miles over the state border, Delilah sputtered. It was just a tiny hitch, but I felt it like a spike driven between my ribs. Oh, God. Not now. Nothing menacing on the weather front, but that didn't mean opportunity couldn't knock. Or smash me flat.

Maybe it was nothing, I told myself. Just a ping, just a coincidence, a one-time-only—