Chapter 24
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
DEUS
I lower my scope.
“Target acquired,” I say as I hop out of the car and scurry off in the direction Ellison just went. Pocket Lint is tucked in my shirt, peeking out and ready to fuck up the first thing that looks at us wrong.
Honestly, I assume the first person who will try to stop me will be one of Beatrice’s irritations, but instead, it’s Ellison’s illusion.
“Well, hello, handsome,” I purr.
The illusion stares at me, already unimpressed. Ellison does like to play hard to get, after all.
“You left without me, so I had to steal some man’s car to follow you. I think he cried a little, but it should be fine as long as I don’t end up in some cross fire on the way back to headquarters.”
“Why would you end up in cross fire?”
“Because you’re so sexy, people be fightin’ over your bod,” I assure him.
He turns around like he’s going to walk away.
“Ellison, My Lord of Suits, where might you be going? Are you upset with something your mother said? I will beat her up for no charge. I’ll actually pay you to let me beat her up,” I offer.
He seems to think about this for a rather long time before shaking his head. “Go home.”
“I’m not leaving you alone,” I say. “And while I love being with your illusion, I don’t want to leave your body unattended. It’s unsafe out here.”
“It’s only unsafe for you,” Ellison says.
I hesitate. “Oh?”
“Go away.”
“No, no, no. I feel like you said something that would be very interesting to hear more about. Please, spill.”
“Go. Away.”
I push past the illusion and begin running in the direction Ellison is in. I’m on a bit of a slope, but there’s enough of a flat spot on top that I can run on.
“Stop it,” he snaps.
“I have no desire to,” I declare as I run.
“I want to be left alone,” he barks after me.
“Sometimes life sucks and we don’t get what we want. I won’t say a word, but I’m not leaving you alone.”
Ellison doesn’t look to be too terribly far away, so I should catch up to him pretty quickly at a run, even while he speedwalks away from me.
Suddenly, his illusion appears in front of me.
I try to avoid slamming into it and twist just enough that I slam into a second illusion and fall in a way to make sure I don’t squish Pocket Lint.
The only issue with that is my left hand and arm take the brunt of the fall as I skid halfway down a slope before coming to a stop.
“I know I told you I fell for you, but this is a bit much, dear,” I say.
Ellison looks startled before going “Shit” and disappearing.
“You alright, Pocket Lint the Third, Esquire?” I ask when I pull her out. She looks fine, but the skin is scraped off my arm and is bleeding, as is the palm of my hand. Ah well.
There’s a stick stuck in my flesh that I pull out and toss before tugging my sleeve down.
“Good as new, eh, Pocket Lint?”
The ferret wants to sniff my hand, but I tuck her back in my shirt and decide to slow down a bit so I don’t slam into any more illusions since Ellison has turned around and started to hurry his way toward me.
I twist my hand away from him so he can’t see it and beam at him as he nears.
“Not a word, as promised,” I say.
“Are you hurt?” he asks, sounding worried.
“I simply fell in love with you all over again.”
“Stop,” he says.
I pause and question whether I’ve possibly pushed my feelings onto him too much. Yes, he caved yesterday, but people have sex all the time with absolutely no feelings involved. Was that what it was? It’s not like he didn’t warn me again and again that there wouldn’t be anything between us.
So I smile at him and take a step back to give him space. He doesn’t seem to know what to do with it as he’s left standing there looking exhausted. Why was he allowed to help me, but I’m not allowed to help him at all? How fair is that?
Or maybe I’m just too much for him. Maybe I’m trying to convince him to have something he really doesn’t wish to have? I suppose I’ve never exactly had a healthy relationship with anyone in my life, so I might be going about it all wrong.
“Let’s go.”
I give him a nod and trail after him at a decent distance while we make our way back to the house. “Wait out here,” he says. “I’m just telling my mother I’m leaving.”
“Okay,” I agree as I lean against the hood of the car I’d stolen and watch him walk away from me. Would he be happier if his mother wasn’t in his life? If I could kill the person stalking him? Or if he found someone who wasn’t a monster?
I dig my fingers into the bleeding palm of my hand.
After a few minutes, Ellison comes out looking even more upset than he had going in.
“I’ll follow you to headquarters so you can return the car and then we’re going home,” he says, voice emotionless.
I give him a nod and get into the car which I drive to headquarters. I park it in the same parking spot I’d stolen it from, toss the keys to a security guard, and get into Ellison’s car. He drives us to his home in complete silence.
When we get there, we head inside before he glances back at me. “I’m taking a nap.”
“Sounds good,” I say as I watch him walk upstairs.
I wish I was better at this. It’s clear he’s caught up in something, but it seems like the more I try to involve myself in his life, the more he tries to cut me out of it.
I pull Pocket Lint out and set her on the floor before sinking down in a kitchen chair and staring up at the second floor, but my mind is in too much turmoil to think. Then I head upstairs, slip through the window, and climb out onto the roof where I call Valerie.
“I would prefer not to speak to you,” she announces.
“Have you gotten any matches?”
“On?”
“Supers who can teleport. Or honestly any kind of invisibility, speed. Things that I can’t see,” I say.
She’s quiet for a moment before responding, “I see.”
“You see what?”
“I’ll let you know if we find something when we do.”
“That’s not enough.”
“It’s going to have to be,” she says.
“Give me their names, and I’ll look into them myself.”
“No.”
I grit my teeth. “Then I will deal with it myself.”
“You stay put and I will tell you when you can deal with it, you hear me?”
Seething, I hang up on her before deciding that I’m accomplishing nothing sitting here.
Swinging back in through my bedroom window, I tug my shirt off and toss it before grabbing a clean one.
I briefly run my arm and hand under the faucet, shake it off, and start to pull my shirt on as Ellison looks into the room.
“What are you doing?” he asks.
“With?”
I don’t have time to pull my sleeve down before he sees my arm.
“Did you do this when you fell?” he demands.
“No, it’s nothing.”
“Don’t lie to me. Were you not even going to clean it up? It’s covered in dirt. You were just going to put on a new shirt and fuck off?”
“I considered it,” I admit.
He hurries out of the bathroom but returns before I’ve gotten too far.
He forces me to sit down on the edge of the tub while he holds my arm over it and tries to rinse off the dirt and debris.
I don’t like the way he looks even more upset about this, which is why I’d been planning on keeping it from him.
“I slid on the roof,” I lie.
“You didn’t.”
“The screen is still out. I just came from there.”
Ellison ignores my lies and cleans my arm gently with water and a cloth as I question if I’ve ever been doted on like this before.
If I’d done this when I was with my family and had shown even a hint of pain, I’d have been ridiculed.
Instead, he carefully uses some gauze to spread cream over it while I watch him work.
Once he seems satisfied, he lays some gauze over the worst spots and tapes it to my arm.
I comment, “This is a lot for a tiny scrape.”
“It’s a large scrape,” he says before he bandages up my hand as well. Really, it’s quite excessive and unneeded.
Finally done, Ellison sighs. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault. I was afraid I’d squish Pocket Lint, so I landed wrong.”
He doesn’t seem to be satisfied by that as he hurriedly gets up. “I’m taking a nap now.”
“Okay,” I say, watching him leave before texting Landon and August.
It doesn’t take them long to arrive.
“Take my Lint,” I say as I pass off the ferret.
Landon does and looks down at the ferret who is wiggling around, displeased she’s not going with me. “Where are you going?”
“It’s time for the monthly sacrifice. Would you like to join?” I ask.
“I’m going to sacrifice the next four hours of my life to this book,” he says as he lifts the novel in his other hand.
“I’m tempted,” August admits. “But I’ll stay here to keep an eye on Ellison since I’m not sure Landon is going to look up.”
“Understandable,” I say, leaving them to it before heading out the door and taking my car to Superheroes United.
I slip through security and move down the hall toward Valerie’s office.
I have no idea where she is, but I make it inside with no issue and sit down before her computer.
Knowing her, her password is something like: “IFeastontheTesticlesofMenandtheOvariesofWomen,” but when I try it, it oddly doesn’t work.
I hesitate before slipping out and hurrying down to the other wing where I let myself into the room.
“Fuck!” Nolan yelps as he looks over at me. “I didn’t even hear you come up. That’s creepy.”
“Thank you,” I say, proud of my ability to make my mind so quiet that even a man who can read minds can’t find me. “I need the password to Valerie’s computer.”
Nolan lowers the book he’d been reading and raises an eyebrow. “And you think I’d help you… why? That woman would probably skin us both if she realized we were on her computer.”
“Just the way I like it.”
“No.”
“Help a man out.”
“Why?”
“Because I need to know more about the people who might be stalking Ellison.”
“She won’t tell you?”
“Of course not. She doesn’t trust me.”
“Does she trust anyone?”
“She trusts August… I should have brought him. I suppose I could kidnap him and bring him back.”