Cassidy Jones and the Luminous (Cassidy Jones Adventures Book 4) (3 page)

“Knock, knock,” I called, pasting on a grin. Joe didn’t like me worrying about him.

His salt-and-pepper dreadlocks poked out of the box, followed by a big smile that lit his dark face and revealed a couple of missing teeth. The smile didn’t reach his sad brown eyes, however. His smiles never did.

“Hey, Green Eyes!” He wiggled out of the box, pulling his thin frame upright. “Mighty glad to see you.”

Since the evening was fairly warm, especially for April, Joe wasn’t wearing the Seahawks jacket that he was typically bundled in. Instead, he wore a gray hoodie like kids my age wear, stained jeans, and tennis shoes, all of which needed to be run through the wash.

What I wouldn’t have given to do that for him, and to get him in a decent home.

As it was, Joe didn’t even know my name, nor had he ever seen my face, other than what was visible through the openings in my ski mask. A couple of times, locks of my dark-red hair had escaped from the mask, but Joe had just stared at them without comment.

“For you!” I produced the gift bag from behind my back.

Joe’s grin widened.

“Me?” He tugged at his coiled beard, looking pleased. I noted how his facial hair had become whiter since I’d met him four months earlier, after he’d caught me scaling the Space Needle. “You’re too good to me.”

“Ditto.” I handed him the bag. He handled it as though it were a precious jewel.

“Thank you.” Joe’s thick tone and gratitude made me blush. My gift was really no big deal.

“Well, come on. Open it.”

He carefully removed the rumpled tissue. “Let’s see what we have here,” he said as he pulled out the box of Turkish Delight.

“Oh, wait!” I grabbed the candy from him before he’d had a chance to get a proper look at it. “This won’t make sense if you don’t see my other gift first.”

“My, oh, my. Two gifts?” His eyes twinkled. He plunged his hand into the bag and pulled out a copy of
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
.

“This is the story your mama read to you and your twin,” he remembered.

“Yep. And she’d give us a piece of Turkish Delight as she read. The White Witch tempts Edmund with it in the story. That’s one of my best childhood memories.”

A distant look came onto Joe’s weary face. He glanced away and tugged at his whiskers. I assumed the void into which he stared held images of days gone by—much better days.

Perhaps of a bedtime story being read to him.

“Thank you kindly.” His grin returned. “What do you say we break into this Turkish Delight?”

“Oh, no, no, no! That’ll ruin it. Save it for the story.”

“Well, I certainly don’t want to spoil the story.” He winked and then gestured to the cement steps. “Take a load off. I’ll just put these away.”

I sat down on the second step, scooting to the corner so Joe had room to climb into the box. A siren wailed past the alley. Another joined it blocks away. I smiled with satisfaction. They were headed in the direction of the thieves.

Good thing you heeded the Seattle Shadow’s warning.

My gaze moved to a neatly folded newspaper that Joe had been reading. I picked it up and frowned at the headlines.

UW Student Reported Missing

Police Baffled by Champion’s Owner’s Disappearance

Search Parties Organized to Look for Missing Seattle Woman

Seattle’s Loch Ness: Is Something Lurking in Lake Washington?

“Has the world gone crazy?” I asked.

“Crazier than a road-runnin’ lizard,” Joe said as he backed out of the box.

I laughed. Joe had the funniest sayings.

He held up two bottled waters and parked himself beside me. He offered me one.

“No, thank you.” Joe needed the water more than I did. It wasn’t like the box had plumbing.

“You sure? This is real good vitamin water,” he tempted. “A bunch was donated to the soup kitchen, so they’re passing them out like hot cakes. I got five more bottles in there.” He jerked his thumb toward his current residence.

“Thanks. But I’m not thirsty.” I smiled and looked down at the newspaper. I wasn’t taking his water.

“Suit yourself.” Joe set one bottle next to me and twisted the top off the other. “It’s mighty refreshing,” he enticed, then took a luxurious drink. After a couple of loud gulps, he smacked his lips and let out a satisfied
ahhhhh
. “Them vitamins are working wonders already. I feel as strong as a bull—or in my case, a mule. You ain’t the only stubborn one here.” He elbowed me and took another swig. “Anyone ever tell you you’re stubborn before?”

I pretended to think it over. “Nope,” I said, shaking my head. “Can’t say anyone has.”

Joe chuckled. “Bet Mendel would beg to differ,” he said, referring to my best friend, Emery Phillips. Joe only knew the boy genius by his middle name, Mendel. In fact, he knew everyone in my life by a pseudonym, except for Jared Wells, my kind-of boyfriend whom I had kind-of introduced to Joe once.

“Ha! Compared to Mendel, I’m as stubborn as a . . . a . . . cotton-tailed rabbit!” That was the most docile critter I could come up with.

“He still got everybody fooled at your school?”

I squirmed. Me and my big mouth. Why had I ever told Joe anything about anyone from my
normal
life?

Before answering, I took a moment to categorize what Joe knew and what he didn’t know, in order to avoid revealing too much once again.

He knows that exposure to an undisclosed substance in the laboratory of Emery’s mother Serena had mutated me last October, resulting in ultra-enhanced senses, super strength and speed, and skin that can turn rock-hard. He also knows that I have the ability to learn fight moves just by watching them, and to heal from almost any injury, which might make me immortal.

I grimaced. I tried to avoid thinking about immortality.

But he doesn’t know that Serena’s experimental gene therapy, Formula 10X, created the strange retrovirus I’m infected with
.

Formula 10X was a concoction of animal DNA with an Assassin kicker. Assassin had been a top-secret biological weapon that Serena and her former employer, criminal mastermind Arthur King Sr., had been developing for the military fifteen years earlier, until Serena had pulled the plug on the project.

Then there’s the Phillipses moving into the house across the street from mine, where Serena searches for my cure, while Emery, a fifteen-year-old college graduate, poses as a ninth-grader and attends school with me, obviously.

But he doesn’t know Emery’s dad Gavin is a secret agent for the CIA.

On second thought, I couldn’t remember ever mentioning Gavin to Joe. That was the problem with sharing pieces about my life with someone I shouldn’t. I was having trouble remembering which pieces I’d shared.

So Joe knows squat about Gavin, but he does know my family finally learned the truth about me
.

How could I not have told him that? Keeping my family in the dark had been very hard for me.

And he doesn’t know there are others like me.

Well, sort of like me. The mutants who Arthur King Sr. had created fell more into a monster category. One of his experiments, Raul Diaz, and I had practically ripped one another to shreds before King had escaped and crawled back into whatever hole he’d been hiding in. He was most likely still there, creating more abominations.

“Yes, he does,” I answered at last. “No one knows Mendel is a genius, and
I
don’t know how he can stand it. He has to be bored out of his mind, especially in our science class. He could teach it, after all! He does have a degree in microbiology—”

I stopped talking and pressed my lips together for safe measure. At least keeping them closed would prevent more foolishness from escaping. Why couldn’t I just shut up?

“Green Eyes, you ain’t got nothing to worry about,” Joe assured. “Your secrets are safe with me. Besides, who’s going to listen to an old ex-con like me, anyway?” His eyes dropped to the newspaper in my hand. “There’s more than just them,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“There’s street folk missing, too. Been disappearing for a long while now.” His troubled gaze moved to the water bottle he held. “I know folks move on, but not these. Mason, Doc, now Lady Jane—they was regular fixtures out here.”

“Lady Jane? The woman with the cat?” I asked, picturing the young woman with matted hair and haunted eyes. I’d crossed paths with Jane on my midnight jaunts every so often. Hidden in the shadows, I’d watched her dote on her smoky-gray cat, Cleo. Cleo had looked well fed. No doubt Lady Jane would sooner feed her cat than herself.

Joe nodded, watching the water he swirled in the bottle.

“She really loves her cat,” I said.

“Never lets Cleo out of her sight. But the other night, Cleo was wandering through Occidental Park, yowling for Lady Jane.”

“Did you tell the police?”

“Na.” Joe watched the water spin around and around. “When you got nothing and no one, you’re invisible.”

At a loss for words, I watched the liquid swirl in the bottle, too. The water splashed against the brand name etched in the plastic in bright lavender with beams shooting out from each letter, like an explosion of light:

Luminous
.

I leapt through the window of my second-story bedroom around two a.m. I could have walked through the front door, since my nighttime activities were no longer a secret. But I preferred coming and going through my window. Bad habits are hard to break.

On my way to bed, I pulled off my mask, sweatshirt, and shoes, discarding them on the floor. I crawled underneath the covers and fell into a deep, dreamless sleep. The back of a hand slapped me awake in what felt like only moments later.

“Chazz,” I groaned, pushing his hand away. It sprang back like a bungee cord, nailing my nose. It’s like the kid was made of rubber.

“Why do you keep crawling into my bed?” I complained to my sleepy, six-year-old brother.

I knew why. He felt safe with me. Whether or not he wanted to admit it, Chazz was afraid that someone would discover my secret and would hurt our family in order to get me. I hated that he had this fear, but, as Gavin put it, fear keeps us on our toes.

Chazz whistled a snore.

Groaning, I pulled a pillow over my head.

~~~

“Who’d you save last night, Cassy?”

I pried my eyelids apart. Chazz’s cute, round face hung over mine, red hair poking out every which way. His big green eyes were eager.

“No one.”

His face fell in disappointment.

“But I did stop a robbery.”

His mouth turned up into a huge smile, revealing a new gap where a bottom front tooth had been. He was too cute for words.

“Did the Tooth Fairy come?”

Chazz rolled his eyes, shaking his head. The song “Who Let the Dogs Out” suddenly blared from my alarm.

“There is
no
Tooth Fairy,” he stated, offended by the mere suggestion there was. He hopped out of bed. “I’m going to tell Daddy what you did. He’ll be so proud!”

“That’s debatable.” I yawned as he darted into the hall. “And there is a Tooth Fairy!” I called after him.

Adding a “woof, woof,”
with the song, I slammed down the snooze button.

My parents weren’t exactly thrilled with my crime-fighting shenanigans. In fact, it took some convincing from Serena and Emery just to get them to give me permission to work off excess energy in the dead of night. My parents still couldn’t wrap their heads around the fact that a girl who could give Jackie Chan a run for his money and leap a car in a single bound wasn’t all that vulnerable.

~~~

I got ready for school, then went down to the kitchen.

“Mornin’,” I greeted my family and Dad’s cameraman, Ben Johnson. With his mocha skin, wild corkscrew hair, and happy amber eyes, twenty-four-year-old Ben was one of my favorite people in the world.

“Hey, Cassy Girl.” He gave me his infectious grin.

“Good morning, sweetheart.” Dad gave me a disapproving look.

My twin, Nate, gave me the
shame, shame
gesture, rubbing one forefinger over the other.

I gave
him
a glare.

I glanced over my shoulder at my mom, Elizabeth, who was standing behind our white-marble-topped kitchen island, meticulously spreading cream cheese on a bagel as though it were the most interesting task on Earth.
Uh-oh
. Chazz had obviously brought them up to speed on my heroic deed before Ben had arrived. Thank goodness he’d come over early this morning. Otherwise, I’d be getting an earful.

“Bagel?” she offered with a side of forced smile.

“Thanks, Mom.” I took the bagel and sat down at the table with the males, wondering if I was the only one who could feel the tension collecting in the air like dust particles. It was almost palpable. It isn’t like my parents were
uninvolved bystander
types. They were good people. They just worried about me.

Ben didn’t appear to sense anything amiss, and he continued to relay the latest Lake Washington Monster sighting. At least that’s what believers in the outlandish, such as Ben, had dubbed the recent events at the lake, despite the conflicting details.

A few weeks earlier, a couple had claimed a serpent-like creature had slithered under their speedboat, and another woman had described seeing a mermaid the week prior. The latest sighting had been made by another boater, who’d allegedly seen a silvery creature with a stark white mane, before it had submerged into the depths.

“A
mane
?” Nate repeated, raising his eyebrows. “You mean like on a
horse
?”

“What else, Nate?” Chazz answered for Ben, flipping up his palms in exasperation. His fingertips and teeth were coated with cream cheese.

Ben chucked a wadded-up napkin at Nate. “Don’t be so closed-minded.”

“
Moi
?” Nate aimed forefingers at his chest. “I’m, like, the opposite of closed-minded, or else I wouldn’t believe in the Seattle Shadow.”