Part 28 (1/2)

By the time he'd rejoined me, I'd found Cal.

Cal was sprawled out on his face between my bed and the window, half covered by a curtain that had been brought down in what must have been a struggle. I could tell by the way his head was bent, and by the way his arms and legs were all uncomfortably akimbo, never mind the pool of blood that spread beneath him.

I could tell he was dead.

I crouched down beside him and moved his face so I could see it, but it told me nothing. There was no revelation waiting in his eyes, or a clue to what had happened clutched in his fist. He was just...gone. That was all.

”Cal?” Adrian asked. It sounded like a guess, and I thought it was a stupid thing to say except that he was still in the doorway, and could only see Cal's feet.

So I said, ”Yeah. It's him.”

”s.h.i.+t,” he said, but I hardly heard it for the sound of men tramping up the stairs, clicking their walkie-talkie b.u.t.tons and organizing a response to whatever danger the building's security had diagnosed. Or maybe they were more Trevors, party to whoever had done this.

Either way, Adrian was right when he took my arm and said, ”We have to get out of here.”

”No,” I said reflexively. ”We have to find Ian.”

”Ian isn't here,” Adrian pointed out, so infuriatingly reasonable. ”So we have to go somewhere else else. This is about to get sticky. Come on,” he urged me again, being gentle, almost. But firm.

”Where would he go?” I asked, and I hated myself for how much it sounded like crying.

”We'll figure it out on the way.”

”Do you think they took him?”

”No,” he said, I a.s.sume in order to humor me.

I settled for it. h.e.l.l, I clung to it. And I clung to Adrian's hand as he shoved open the sliding balcony door and pushed me outside, shutting the thing behind us both and beginning the long, cold crawl down over the edge.

15.

We were halfway down when I caught a whiff...but that's the wrong word. Not a ”whiff” exactly-it was more like a sweeping impression, some sense that I was going the wrong way and that I was required elsewhere. It was the impression of tugging, not as subtle as a psychic whisper, and not quite as hard as a punch in the gut.

I stopped, dangling by my hands perhaps half a dozen floors above the ground. When I stopped, Adrian stopped, too.

”What?” he asked in a quiet hiss.

I looked up and saw nothing but the underside of the balcony. In the distance I heard police cars and fire engines; someone with a walkie-talkie had made it out in one piece.

Someone had found Cal, I a.s.sumed. Someone was looking for us.

My companion was straining to hold himself in position, balancing on the edge of a rail that looked too thin to hold him. ”Raylene?” he asked, more urgently this time.

I told him, ”Up.”

”You can't be f.u.c.king serious!”

I looked down and over to where he was perched-not ten feet away. I said, ”Yeah, I think I am. I think Ian's up there. I think he's on the roof,” I added, even though I had virtually nothing to back up that hunch. Just that warm, strange pull that leaned against me and made me want to climb.

”What is it with your kind and rooftops?” he muttered, not really expecting an answer.

I gave him one anyway. ”Rooftops are a way inside,” I said, pulling myself up now, instead of lowering myself down. ”They're someplace where people tend not to go, and once you're up there, especially at night, it's easy to hide. And sometimes, if you need a way out, it's the last stop and only way to run.”

Up, lift, and over the balcony.

Half a floor down and...I looked up, craning my neck around. We'd started from the fifteenth. We'd descended maybe seven. I thought there were twenty floors in total, so maybe twelve floors to the top from where we were camped out.

Adrian was struggling, and I wasn't so far away from exhaustion myself. I looked back at him, teetering on that rail, trying hard just to make it to the ground. He'd never be able to take himself up another however-many-floors.

I told him, ”Go down without me.”

He said, ”No.”

”Yeah, seriously. You won't make it to the top, and I promise,” I said, turning around and getting a better grip, ”I won't think less of you as a man or anything.” I tried to give it a wink and a grin.

Say one thing for him, say he wasn't crazy. The sweat was s.h.i.+ning on his forehead, dripping down his temples, and his arms were shaking. ”Okay.” He nodded. ”Okay, you're right.”

”Meet me back by Lincoln, in...I don't know. Another hour or two. I'll meet you over there, soon as I can.”

”Got it,” he told me, and he gave me a head-bob that said good-bye good-bye and and I'll see you there I'll see you there, or possibly just whatever whatever. Regardless, he began to descend again, a little more jerkily than before, but I was pretty sure he'd be all right. It'd been a long night for everyone, and he needed a break worse than I did.

But not much worse.

I scrabbled, clawed, and heaved myself up another few floors until I thought I couldn't go even another foot, and all the while that pulse, or that warning, or that summons...whatever it was...it was still drawing me along.

With a sigh and an upturned nose, I reached into my satchel and drew out that G.o.d-awful little pouch of blood.

I gave it a disdainful squish, noting that although it was cold, it didn't appear to be chunky with ice-which believe you me is f.u.c.king disgusting disgusting. And it's not like my body heat would warm it up or keep it nice and gooey. Best I can hope for (unless I want to tote a hot-water bottle around with me) is Not Frozen and Totally Preservative-Laden Dribble of Sustenance.

G.o.d. Half a pint. Barely enough to bother with, and if I hadn't been so busted and worn out by the evening's activities I wouldn't have done it. I would've sucked up my pride, wandered down to skid row, and taken a nibble off a b.u.m like a civilized woman.

But I didn't have such a homeless meat-sack handy, so it was just me and my pouch of goo. I scrunched up my nose and bit down on a corner, puncturing it and spilling a bit down my chin. Ladylike, yes. Also ladylike was the way I guzzled it as if I were dying of thirst in the G.o.dd.a.m.n desert. It was revolting, but it was exactly what I needed, and my body demanded it with such a vicious insistence that I came close to sucking the plastic bag down, too. Then, I guess, I would've starved to death like one of those sea turtles that swallows a baggie, thinking it's a jellyfish. Man. What a way to go.

I wadded up the empty baggie and tossed it off the balcony.

Thus somewhat invigorated, I resumed my climb. It wasn't the shot in the arm I wanted, but it was enough to let me man-haul myself up and over the balconies, one after another, straight up into the sky-well beyond the point at which I would've collapsed and given up if I hadn't had any refreshments.

Finally my fingertips crossed over the very tippy-top of the building's edge. I grunted, heaved, crawled, and hauled until I'd slung one leg up over the side and could flop onto the tar-covered surface.

But even through my exhaustion, I had to look. I had to see.

The sky above was swirling, very faintly but very distinctly-pitching to and fro as if it were being stirred. All the clouds swished like they'd been flushed, doing that lazy, sliding spin. My head was spinning, too. My eyes were closing from the pressure of it...not just the crus.h.i.+ng psychic fog but from pure weariness the likes of which I wasn't sure I'd ever felt before.

I dragged myself to my knees, and then staggered up to my feet. It was dark there, darker than it should've been. I rubbed at my eyes in case that would clear them.

It didn't.