He wrapped his arms around me. “I wanted you to see. You are the desert. You are the whole. Until you believe that, you’re in danger.” He looked out over the city. “You don’t know what Eidolon is capable of. Everyone in this city, in this world, is in danger.” Then he returned to me with a hard gaze. “Our daughter is in danger.”
He was right. If I could do something, anything, to stop Eidolon, I had to try.
He set me at arm’s length but held me tight. Still, for my own peace of mind, I kept my fingers curled in his shirt.
“You can save everyone here. You are the most powerful god in all the dimensions combined.” He shook me. “You just have to believe it to the very depths of your soul.”
I nodded. “I’ll try.”
He relaxed. Pulled me to him. Kissed the top of my head. “That’s just not quite good enough.”
And then I was airborne.
15
If at first you don’t succeed, it’s only “attempted” murder.
—MEME
Few things in life are as surprising as having your husband, the man you gave your heart and soul to, throw you off a 350-foot building. I should know.
The second my feet left the building top, the moment I felt that thrust, I slowed time. And hung, quite literally, in midair. Stunned. Breathless. Slightly irked.
“Reyes Alexander Farrow!” I screamed, because it seemed like the right thing to do.
He stood on the top of the Albuquerque Plaza. Arms crossed. Smirk in place. “You stopped time quickly. That’s a good start.”
He had a plan. Surely he had a plan. “Okay, I get it! I’m a god. I have to know this to the marrow of my bones. But it won’t do me any good if my bones are in a big squishy pile at the bottom of this building.”
“You’re doing great,” he said, completely unmoved.
“Reyes, this isn’t funny anymore. Time is going to bounce back any second—”
“You’re a god. Time doesn’t bounce back unless you allow it to.”
“—and when it does, I will hit that pavement so hard, you will wish you could die before I’m finished with you.”
His white teeth flashed against his dark skin. “Then don’t hit the pavement. Become it.”
“What the fuck does that mean?” I screeched.
He laughed. Laughed! “Absorb it,” he said. “Stop being so human. Just be a part of all that is around you. A part of everything. Like a proper god.”
“You. Are. So. Dea—”
Before I finished my threat, time did indeed bounce back, and I fell faster than I ever imagined possible.
I turned in midair. Not on purpose, because who the hell wants to see that? But I did. I barely had time to focus on the instrument of my death when I was there. Slamming into it. The excruciating pain riveted through my …
Wait. Where was the pain?
Then I felt it, but not my own. I felt it in others around me. Along with joy, annoyance, love … pretty much every emotion imaginable coursed through me like heroin.
And I saw. Everyone. Everything. I saw every blade of grass. I saw every ray of sunshine. I saw every strand of hair on every person who walked through the plaza. That worked in the surrounding buildings.
I saw good as though it were a physical thing. Bad as well, only there was less of it, thankfully. Love overshadowed hate. Altruism overshadowed greed. Confidence overshadowed jealousy. Though in each case, the margins were narrower than I would have liked.
I saw a lizard scurry along a wall two blocks away. A child trip over her ball in her living room on the other side of the mountains. An elderly man offer a homeless kid who’d been making fun of him five dollars to get something to eat in Seattle. A doctor wash the feet of his ailing mother in India.
I absorbed it all. I basked in it all. Like bathing in light.
“Well?” Reyes asked, pressing against my backside, his mouth at my ear.
I leaned in to him as though I’d been standing on the sidewalk the whole time. Astonishment, and a fair amount of shock, had taken hold.
Gazing up at him, I asked, “Have you felt that? Is this what Jehovah feels all the time? No wonder He likes us so much. We are amazing, complex beings.”
“You even more so.”
I shook my head. “That’s where you’re wrong.” Stepping out of his hold, I leveled my best serious stare on him. “If this has taught me anything, Reyes, it’s that humans are incredible. They are each worthy of life. Well, most of them. And each and every one deserves the right to be equal. To be safe. To be fed and sheltered. Part of me understands why He doesn’t step in. Why He doesn’t just make it all right. Their free will is an astonishing gift.”
“One that most squander.”
“No. Not most. There is more good in the world than bad. They are still learning.”
“They?”
I questioned him with a tilt of my head.
“You said they.”
“Well, yeah, but I meant—”
He grinned and turned to walk away. “Mission accomplished.”
“No, I meant us. We. I’m still human. And hey!” I caught up to him and tugged on his shirt. “You pushed me off a building.”
“What about it?”
“Well, that was rude.”
* * *
Nothing made a girl hungrier than being thrown off a building. Reyes and I sat at Rustic on the Green, eating an incredible green chile burger, when Cookie called.
“Hey, Cook. How was Amber’s day at school?”
“Oh, great. Thank you so much for having Osh stay with her. It really set my mind at ease.”
“I’m glad. So, what’s up?”
“First, how did your day with Mr. Farrow go?”
“Wonderful. We went to the Sahara. And he threw me off a building. Other than the building thing, it was fab.”
“Well, that’s what matters most. So, I just wanted you to know that I found something on the Fosters. Something … well, pretty hard to believe.”
“Really?” I dipped my head as though it would help us be more secretive. “Hit me.”
“As you know, I ran into a brick wall once I found out the Fosters are not who they say they are.”
“Yes.”
“So I asked Pari for her help.”
“Oh, that’s awesome. Bring her into the fold. What did she find out?”
“Right? Well, she used some kind of facial recognition software and found them. Maybe. About forty years ago, there were two teens suspected of killing a family.”
“Okay. Awful.”
“The kids were arrested and taken to the county jail. Where they escaped. Somehow, a deputy left their cells unlocked. I don’t know. It was all very suspicious. And they were never heard from again.”
“Cook, are you telling me that the Fosters killed a family when they were kids?”
“I’m saying that according to facial recognition software, they were arrested for the crime. But there’s more. These kids were part of some super-religious cult. The members of this cult believed that the children were touched by God to ferret out the unholy and destroy them.”
“Okay, this is all sounding eerily similar to what I’m finding out.”
“So, this cult, if a bunch of nuts living together and marrying children is a good interpretation of the word—”
“I think it is.”
“—believed these kids were the second coming. As soon as they escaped, the sheriff went to the compound to find them. It had disappeared. Overnight. The entire group of thirty-something members vanished. And none of them have been found again, either. Not one single member.”
“Wow. So, you think the whole cult was behind the murders?”
“Either that or they condoned anything these kids did. Charley, they did everything but worship them outright.”
“Stranger things have happened.”
“But there’s more.”
“This is like a soap opera and a gossip show all rolled into one.”
“The children arrested for the crime?”
“Yes.”
“Charley, they were brother and sister.”
Okay, that one surprised me. It surprised Reyes as well. He sat completely motionless, deep in thought.
I glanced over at a nearby table. They were eavesdropping. I could hardly blame them. Shit didn’t get more bat than religious cults. And/or brother-and-sister couples. Because ew.
“Wait. You got this from Pari? Our Pari?”
“The one and only.”
“And how does our Pari have access to a secure FBI database?”
Silence.
“Is she hacking again?”
“She didn’t sound phlegmy.”
“Websites. Databases. She’s gotten into some serious trouble in the past, and she’s on some kind of probation. She’s not even supposed to go onto the Internet. Ever. For any reason.”
“Wow, Charley. I knew she was good with computers. I had no idea she’d gotten into trouble.”
“That’s not on you. I’ll have a talk with her. In the meantime, this is crazy stuff.”
“Should we talk to Robert?”
“Yeah. I’ll call him.”
“Great. Talk soon.”
I hung up the phone and scanned Reyes’s expression. “Are you okay?”
He nodded. “Makes sense.”
“It does. Well, all except the brother-sister thing. I’m hoping that one was a mistake.” I picked up the phone and found Ubie in my contacts.