Hero Status Page 9

  “What? The TV? It was a crummy old black and white set—and yes, they had invented color TV by then. I’m not that old.”

  She rolled her eyes. “No, I mean super-strength. It seems like it’s just a pain in the as—butt,” she corrected quickly. “I guess being invincible is pretty nice, but—”

  “We’re not invincible. We can still be poisoned, drugged, drowned, mind-controlled—there are all sorts of ways to kill us. People just have to get more creative. Remember that.”

  “Great.”

  “I can’t say whether it’s worth it or not. That all depends on how you use it.” I leaned forward despite the flaring of pain in my back and ribs. “But if someone is ever trying to hurt you, all they have to do is get close enough for you to hit them, and it’s over. Remember that.”

  “Right.”

  I leaned back. Of course, depending on the threat you were facing, that was an easy way to get tried in court for excessive use of force. But it was hard for me to think a person who was trying to hurt my daughter could be hit too hard. If anything ever happened to her…

  She turned and hit the punching bag hard enough to shatter concrete.

  Then again, maybe I was worrying too much.

  • • •

  When I finished putting Elisa through the rounds, I handed her off to Val for telepathy lessons, grabbed a quick bite to eat, and headed out. As I started up the Mustang, I said a mental goodbye to Val, and she wished me luck. If she was still angry, she kept the emotion from leaking into my mind.

  But before I saw Ruby Baxter, I had a stop to make. It wasn’t far. I just pulled out of the driveway and up to the unmarked white van parked at the corner of the road.

  I rolled down my window and rapped my knuckles against the side of the van. A moment later, a DSA agent slid open the door.

  “'Afternoon,” I said.

  “Mr. Del Toro. Can I help you with something?” He inclined his head in greeting, not meeting my eyes. “We’re just doing our jobs here, sir.”

  “I know. I’ve done the same thing, and I remember the long days of fast food and stale coffee.” I passed a large paper bag through the window to him. “Homemade BLTs and fresh café cubano.”

  His eyebrows lifted from behind his sunglasses. “Um, thank you, sir.”

  “You boys have a tough job.” I leaned forward slightly out of the window. “And since it’s my wife and daughter in the house you’re observing, I trust that you’re doing it with the utmost professionalism and respect.”

  His shoulders tensed. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good.” I leaned back into the car. “Nice talking to you.”

  • • •

  When I got out of the neighborhood and onto the Causeway, I realized I’d managed to forget for a moment that today was the festival. One look at traffic was all it took to remind me. Everyone was out. Cars filled the roads, honking and blaring their radios. The sidewalks downtown were packed with people in tank tops and sunglasses, and workers stood on street corners, holding signs to entice drivers to stop at their shops and restaurants. Airplanes pulled advertising banners behind them, showing off for the people on the beach. I wondered if Ruby Baxter would even be in her office, or if she’d be out enjoying the festivities.

  No, publicity was her business. This was probably one of the most important days of the year for her.

  Parking was a nightmare, but I eventually found a garage with a vacancy; the obscenely high price was a given. Then I went out into the streets, smelling car exhaust and the sweat and sunscreen of the crowd. Ruby Baxter’s office was on the tenth floor of a nearby office building, and entering it was a relief from both the heat and pressing throngs.

  When the elevator doors opened in front of her office, I found it empty except for a receptionist. The floor was black tile, the walls black and white striped, and the chairs in the waiting room were lime-green and shaped sort of like teacups. A large picture hung over the front desk, stylish and minimalistic, depicting a woman in a cape standing on top of a building, looking out over the city. Assuming this was the right place, I walked up to the receptionist.

  “Is Ms. Baxter in?” I asked.

  “Yes. Name?”

  “David Del Toro. But I don’t have an appointment.”

  “Oh,” she said with a frown. “I’m afraid we don’t take walk-ins, but if you’d like, I can schedule you for another day?”

  I weighed my options and did something I wasn’t particularly proud of. “It’s important. Could you tell her White Knight wants to talk to her?”

  The woman squinted skeptically at my face. The mask I’d worn as White Knight hadn’t covered much, but people were still used to seeing it. After a moment, her eyes widened in recognition, and she surged to her feet. “Yes, right away. I thought you looked familiar. I’ll—you—please have a seat while you wait.”

  She took a few steps before turning back to me and hesitating, and I did my best to look open and friendly.

  “Um… my nephew was in Washington when Bloodbath attacked and you…” She shuffled and made eye contact for a brief moment. “Well… It’s an honor to meet you, sir.”

  She walked down the hallway, leaving me feeling like a first-class jerk for manipulating her like that. Reminding myself it was for a good cause, I eased down into one of the strange chairs and waited.

  It didn’t take long for her to return, a second woman in tow.

  “Ms. Baxter? David Del Toro.” I stood and shook her hand. “Thank you for taking the time to see me.”

  Ruby Baxter was a short black woman in a plum dress suit. Her nails, heels, and trendy glasses matched the color, and her dangling earrings were covered in shimmering purple gems. She looked me up and down, taking in my plain khakis and white guayabera shirt, and her gaze lingered on my cane before fixing on my face.

  “I thought it had to be a scam,” she said. “But you’re White Knight, all right. I can tell by the chin.”

  I opened my mouth and realized I had no idea how to respond to that.

  “Oh, don’t worry,” she said. “It’s a strong chin. Very heroic. This way to my office, then.”

  She led the way at a brisk pace, saw I wasn’t keeping up, and slowed back down without a word. The hallway was lined with framed newspapers and photographs, all of the superheroes I assumed Ruby represented. There were some fairly big names there, too: The Gold Guardian, Legend, even Freezefire.

  “You like that one?” Ruby glanced at the article I was looking at: one about Julio’s work with an after-school program to keep kids off the streets. “Julio’s a dream client. I never have to exaggerate his accomplishments. Though he is a bit of a whiner.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “I don’t remember him ever whining when we worked together.”

  “You obviously never tried to put him on a morning radio show.”

  I resisted a smile, feeling a misplaced sense of pride that Julio had never taken to publicity.

  “He was your sidekick,” she went on. “Didn’t you ever teach him about the importance of getting good press? This is the third year in a row he’s tried to get out of Hero-Fest, saying he’s too busy working security. Well, I called his boss and got that sorted out.”

  “What’s he doing?” I asked, almost afraid to know the answer.

  “Clubbing with the Idols tonight.”

  I winced in sympathy. Maybe I could turn evil tonight and try to take over the city, forcing the police to pull him out of the club and send him after me. It would give him a chance to kick my ass, too, which might mend some bridges between us.

  Ruby smirked. “He made the exact same face when I told him. Now I know where he gets it.”

  Poor kid. Things were so different today. Superheroes needed publicists and image consultants, agents and PR departments. In my time, the media would just report when you saved lives. True, even then, the DSA tended to assign the more photogenic of us the public missions whenever possible, and my supervisors had forced me to endure th
e occasional interview or awards ceremony, but it was simpler. We were men and women doing our jobs, and the media attention was just a side effect. Now it seemed like fame was the goal.

  But to be honest, there had always been a certain amount of spectacle to it all. These days, it was easy to forget that people with special abilities were… Well, there hadn’t always been a politically correct term for us like “people with special abilities.” We used to be abominations, locked in the attic by our parents and hunted down by mobs. Governments had always employed us in secret, but to reveal us to the public, they had to dress us in ridiculous costumes and give us names like “Agent Amazing.” A man who could set you on fire just by looking at you was a terrifying thing to think about. Dress that same man up in something out of a parade and call him the Crimson Phoenix, and he was something much less threatening: a celebrity.

  We entered Ruby’s office. The room was white except for a square of aqua carpet beneath her glass-topped desk. Rectangular fish tanks were built into the walls like paintings, and strange blue crystal statues graced the corners, shaped like modern art. “Have a seat,” she said, gesturing at a boxy white chair that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a spaceship. “I’m glad you came to see me, though you certainly waited long enough. This would’ve been much easier if you’d come in yesterday as soon as it started.”

  “I—what?”

  “Don’t worry, I can still help you. I’m very good at what I do.”

  “You mean you had information that could’ve helped, and you didn’t come forward with it?”

  She barked out a short laugh. “Just how do you think this business works?”

  I shouldn’t have been shocked. I’d seen some pretty sorry human beings in my line of work. I’d just been expecting to interview a respectable citizen today, not someone who treated information related to a murder investigation like a commodity and…

  “Wait,” I said. “I don’t think we’re on the same page here. What are you talking about?”

  She frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  “The murder of Harris Holt. You were his publicist. I wanted to ask you a few questions.”

  “Oh. Oh.”

  “What did you think I was here for?”

  “You’re in the middle of some very bad publicity, Mr. Del Toro. I thought you wanted to hire me.”

  It was my turn to say “oh.”

  “Incidentally, are you sure you don’t want to hire me?” she asked. “They’re saying some pretty nasty things about you out there.”

  “Thank you, but I’ll survive. I’m just here to talk about Harris.”

  Ruby gave me a look. “You know I have a billion things I need to be doing right now. I’ve been working twelve-hour days for the past two weeks preparing for today. And I already talked to the DSA.”

  “What did you tell them?”

  “That I never noticed anything suspicious in his behavior and can’t think of anyone in particular who’d want to kill him.”

  “Can you tell me what he’d been doing recently? What were his plans for going public again?”

  She glanced at her watch and sighed. “All right, but I don’t really know what to tell you.” Her manicured nails drummed against her glass desk. “Today was supposed to be his debut. He’d be bantering with the Idols on stage this evening, if…” Her fingers went still. “Well, you know how it goes. He’d race a car, make some jokes about being out of shape, work the crowd. He had a spot lined up as a judge on the next season of Top Sidekick if it all panned out. …And… you don’t look happy.”

  I hadn’t realized I’d been frowning. The Harris I knew couldn’t stand the Idols and cared even less about reality TV. Then again, he wouldn’t have dated Starla Strauss, either. I guess I hadn’t known him as well as I’d thought.

  “Sorry,” I said. “It’s nothing. Go on.”

  She shrugged. “What else do you want to know?”

  What else did I want to know? I just didn’t have the knack for asking questions that brought out relevant information. I was no detective.

  “When was the last time you talked to him?”

  “We touched base over the phone two days ago. The… day he died, I guess.” She had been looking off into space, but at that, she focused back on me. “I’m not a suspect, am I? I was home all evening. You can ask my husband.”

  I opened my mouth to tell her not to worry, but then my brain caught up and I asked, “How long were you home?”

  “I went home at five and didn’t leave until seven the next day. Why?”

  I sat up straighter, no longer relaxed. “I thought you said you’ve been working twelve-hour days.”

  “I have been.”

  “Then how did you get home at five? I assume you didn’t come into the office at three in the morning.”

  She touched her mouth. Had I caught her in a lie? Or had she just not remembered the time? That happened. Not having a perfect memory of something from two days prior didn’t make her a murderer.

  “No, I don’t get here until after seven. And I’ve been stuck here until eight or nine everyday for the past two weeks.”

  “But you went home at five two days ago.”

  “Yes. How many times do you want me to say it?”

  “But that’s not—”

  I stopped. I’d been about to accuse her of being a ridiculously poor liar, but she was looking at me like she didn’t understand why I kept questioning her. She didn’t see the problem with having worked until nine every day for the past two weeks and going home at five two days ago. Missing something like that was a sign of sloppy telepathic coercion. Someone had forced her to remember going home at five the night Harris was killed, but they hadn’t expanded that coercion into what else she remembered, like the fact she had to work late every night up to the festival.

  I could point this out to her, but people have gotten brain damage from trying to undo stuff like this without the help of a trained telepath. The best thing I could do for her was contact the DSA.

  I took my cane and pushed myself up. “Never mind. Thank you for your time. I’ll—”

  “Wait.” She held up her hand, wrinkles forming on her forehead as her eyes lost their focus. “I know I went home at five that night…”

  “Don’t worry about it,” I said quickly.

  “No, I—” She winced and put a hand to her head.

  “Listen—”

  “I know I can remember.”

  “Stop.”

  She was hunched over in pain now. She could tell something was wrong, and she was fighting it. She looked up at me, eyes wide in growing panic.

  “You need to stop thinking about it,” I said.

  She lurched to her feet, knocking over her chair. “What’s going on? What is this?”

  “Someone altered your memories of two days ago,” I said in what I hoped was a calm tone. “Don’t force it. You could hurt yourself. I’m going to call the DSA and—”

  “What? No.” She shook her head. “No, no, no. This is—”

  Her expression went slack, and she toppled to the floor.

  Chapter 7

  I swore and rushed around the desk to her. When I dropped to my knees beside her, the pain that shot through my body was enough to make me see white for a second. I swore again, shaking as I bent over Ruby. I checked for a pulse and found one, but I wasn’t afraid she’d died. I was afraid she’d spend the rest of her life staring at the ceiling and getting fed through a tube, all because some bastard had messed around in her mind and screwed it up.

  “Ruby?” I said. “Ruby?”

  She didn’t respond. I pulled out my cell phone. Regular hospitals weren’t equipped to deal with this. I’d go straight to Moreen. She’d get Ruby help fast.

  Ruby jerked and opened her eyes with a strangled cry. She sat up and looked around like she didn’t know where she was. Then she saw me and seemed to calm down.

  “Are you all right?” I asked.

&nbs
p; “Yeah, I… Those little shits!” She clenched her fists and tried to stand. “They psy-assaulted me!”

  I grabbed her arm to steady her. “Ruby. I think what you need to do right now is stay calm and relaxed. Frankly, I’m surprised you can form sentences. We should probably call an ambulance.”

  “You should call the police! Those punks. I’m going to press every charge in the book.”

  “You can remember what happened now?”

  “Yeah, I—” My amazement must have shown on my face, because she frowned. “Why?”

  “You just thought your way out of a psychic block. Most people can’t do that.”

  “Were you expecting me to just sit here and cry about it?”

  “I was expecting serious brain damage.”

  Her expression sobered. “Maybe you should call that ambulance,” she said after a moment. “Just to be safe.”

  I did so. Then I called Moreen, but she didn’t answer. She probably knew I wouldn’t be calling unless I had more trouble to cause. It meant she wouldn’t throw me in jail for a little while longer, so I’d take it as a blessing in disguise.

  “They’re on their way,” I said, hanging up. “Stay here. I’ll get your receptionist, maybe find you a glass of water.”

  “There’s a bottle of brandy in the bottom drawer by your elbow. You can get me that instead.”

  I found it and passed it to her. She took a long swig and offered it to me. I took a short one. For a while, we sat there on the floor in silence.

  “Shouldn’t you be grilling me about what I remember?” Ruby asked.

  After almost causing her brain trauma? Pretty sure that would make me a jerk.

  “That can wait until I’m sure you’re okay,” I said.

  “I’ll be okay if I know White Knight is after the assholes who attacked me.”

  I surveyed her. She was leaned against her upturned chair, looking shaken but otherwise fine. “If you’re sure you’re up to it,” I said.