Grounded (Out of the Box Book 4) (33 page)

But panic was good. Whenever I’d panicked before in a fight, things had happened. Ideas presented themselves. New options opened themselves up.

Necessity was still the mother of invention.

And I was about to show this dude just how nasty of a mother she was.

I reached out and felt the ground beneath his feet, the pebbles that were tarred into the asphalt beneath him. My guess was that he hadn’t heard about this yet. Laverne didn’t seem like the sort who wanted to share the excruciating details of his failures. And it had definitely been Laverne wielding that shotgun, I was sure of it now.

I felt my skull start to buckle under the gravitational pressure and squeezed my hand tight as I grasped for those rocks beneath Edward Cavanagh’s feet. I could feel them, I could touch them with my powers, and all I needed to do was apply enough force to—

Set them loose.

They exploded out of the ground in a much lower arc than the last time I’d used the power. I was in control this time, and I meant to keep Cavanagh alive. He screamed in pain, and I watched his legs buck as his fancy pants legs shredded under the impact and he hit his knees.

The pressure on my back released in a sudden, wonderful sense of lightness. I could breathe again in one explosive, joyful intake of air. I gulped down hungry breath after breath, watching the spots fade from my vision as I tried to force myself up on one elbow, then another.

By the time I looked up, Cavanagh was already to the helicopter. He was hurrying in, the door open. He let it thump closed behind him as he started frantically pushing buttons inside. The engine made a noise as it started up, the rotors slowly beginning to spin, gathering speed as they came around faster and faster.

“I would have gone for the BMW.” Sienna spoke as she landed, extending a hand toward me. “Need help?”

I thought about it for only a second before taking her hand and letting her drag me to my feet. “I wouldn’t turn it down.”

She helped Jamal to his feet as Cavanagh’s chopper blades spun faster and faster and started to rise in the air.

“I’m going to smoke this fool,” Jamal said and raised his hands.

“No!” I said but got drowned out by Sienna, who slapped his hand down. Jamal gave her a look, of course, and she gave it right back.

“He killed Flora,” Jamal said quietly, and the fury in my brother’s voice was unmistakable even under the sounds of the helicopter engine whirring in the night.

“And he’ll pay for it,” Sienna said.

“Damned right,” I said, lifting my hands. “I think the mountain’s about to come to him—maybe settle right on top of his helicopter.”

Sienna sighed, loudly and comically, entirely for effect. “Boys, boys. There are easier ways.” She shook her head at us chidingly and started walking toward the chopper. Her steps were slow and measured, even as the skids rose off the ground and Cavanagh started to get away.

“He’s—!” Jamal said, pointing.

Sienna just waved us off, walking over to the BMW. She ran a hand along its hood, gripped it tight with both hands, and then LIFTED THE WHOLE DAMNED CAR INTO THE AIR. She chucked it right into the helicopter, and I watched the blades slap against the car’s body and frame, shredding it and itself in some glorious destruction that I was hard-pressed to look away from until the shrapnel started flying. Then I ran.

I was expecting an explosion, a bang, and I ended up getting a whimper. Jamal and I stood back as Sienna floated into the wreckage, the engine of the helicopter already spinning down, trashed. The car was in pieces, part of the chassis laying across the bubbled front of the helo like a Tinkertoy someone had left on top of the contraption.

When she came back around, Sienna had Edward Cavanagh in her grasp, his head lolling back and his body limp.

“Is he …?” I asked, pointing. The night was quiet save for the sound of sirens coming from somewhere in the distance.

“He’ll live to stand trial,” she said and dumped him in a pile at our feet. “Won’t he, Jamal?” She looked at my brother, and he turned his head to avoid my gaze.

“Guess we’ll see,” Jamal said, but he couldn’t hide the little bolt of electricity that ran down his arm as he said it. “But I won’t be doing it here.” He locked eyes with me. “Got to go, brother.”

The words, “You don’t have to,” died on my lips. There was pain in his eyes, and I knew he didn’t regret Roscoe or Kennith or Joaquin. “Where are you going to go?” I asked instead.

“I’d like to go anywhere but here,” he said and turned his attention to Sienna. “What about you? You going to stop me?”

She took a long breath and sighed. “You going to kill anyone else?”

Jamal’s lips pressed together tight for a minute before he answered. “I don’t know. I don’t aim to.”

“That’s a start,” she said and lowered her head. “Go on. Get out of here. Don’t let me catch you breaking the law again.”

My brother stood there in silence for a moment and gave me one last look before he ran off into the night. I listened to his footsteps disappear into the dark, and I wondered if I’d ever see him again.

Detective Marcus Calderon made my life easier, thankfully. He could have been a real prick about the whole incident, could have doubted every word I said, but instead he listened with guarded skepticism while Augustus, Taneshia and I told the whole story.

“So … Cavanagh kidnapped people through this unauthorized lab and experimented on them to create powers?” Calderon asked, looking about as long suffering as any guy I’d ever seen.

“With the aid of Cordell Weldon and all his organizations,” Augustus said, the red and blue police lights flashing across his face.

Calderon leaned back against the police car he’d been standing next to. “I’m going to need so much antacid to make it through this night. I’m going to need to drink the whole bottle and then chew the little pills like they’re breath mints.” He shook his head.

I was almost afraid to ask the follow-up question. “So … do you believe me?”

He looked at me, once again, like I was an idiot. “It’s an insane story, accusing two of the most powerful men in the area of absolute corruption and greed in the course of attempting a Nazi-like genetics experiment that nobody noticed.” He sighed. “Of course I believe you.”

“Well, okay then,” I said and felt a small sense of relief. “What do we do?”

“How do we contain Cavanagh if he’s got these powers?” Calderon asked. “Seems to me that if the man can affect gravity, we’re not going to be able to put him in a conventional cell.”

“I’ve already called for transport,” I said, “but … this one’s unique. I’ve already got a call in for an injectable version of suppressant, because I’m not sure our standard containment unit will be able to hold him.”

“When does that show up?” Calderon asked, looking at Cavanagh’s limp and unconscious form.

“I don’t know,” I said and felt a nervous rumble in my stomach. “I think my agency is still deciding whether or not to fulfill the request.”

Calderon gave me the eye. “You really did step in it, didn’t you?”

“All the way up to the knee, at least,” I said. “Maybe even to the hip, this time.”

“Mmhmm,” Calderon said, shaking his head. “Cordell Weldon and Edward Cavanagh. You don’t aim small.”

“Heroes don’t punch down,” I said and felt Augustus’s very uncomfortable gaze settle on me. “At least not very hard. Or something. I heard that once. Probably while I was punching someone on the ground.”

Calderon put a hand around my upper arm and gently led me away from Taneshia and Augustus, who were watching every word between us like they were expecting something. I let him because it was kind of cute. “Let me handle the press?” Calderon asked, eyeing me. I wasn’t quite sure how to take that expression.

“They’re all yours,” I said. “How are your superiors going to take this?”

“The governor has directed the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to lend a hand,” Calderon said. “Which of course pissed off the mayor and the council, including Weldon. No one quite predicted that. I hear the feds are going to land on Atlanta’s side, but it’s becoming quite the jurisdictional fight. Until that settles out, though, the governor is in charge and seems to be more on … your side, let’s say.”

“How do we go after Weldon?” I asked, throwing a mental thanks to Senator Robb Foreman for keeping his word to me.

Calderon shook his head. “Won’t be easy. Any chance your boy here would like to confess?” He bumped Cavanagh with the toe of his wingtip, nudging him as if he were testing to see if he was still alive.

Cavanagh stirred, rolling his head back, his hands cuffed eight times behind him. His drowsy eyes found Calderon’s and blinked sleepily. “I’d like to make a full confession. If I’m going down for this … that bastard Weldon is coming with me.”

I stared at Cavanagh for a full five seconds before looking to Calderon, whose jaw was down. “Let me, uh … read you your rights, and then we can get this show on the road, if that’s all right …?” He glanced at me and then ran for his car, waving at every cop he could find in a close radius, trying to get as many witnesses as he could for this.

I just stood back and listened as Edward Cavanagh spun a story I’d already heard in front of about thirty cell phone cameras while I let my eyes drift over the cars parked nearby. I eventually found the one I was looking for, a black sedan with North Carolina tags, but I didn’t approach it or say anything. Why would I? Cavanagh was talking, he wasn’t resisting, and everything was coming up roses.

Fifteen minutes later, we were ready to arrest Cordell Weldon.

You ever have a hero? Someone you watched from a distance do incredible things, things that made you admire them? Maybe it was taking a principled stand under pressure. Maybe it was stepping in front of a punch meant for the little guy. Maybe it was just calling someone powerful out on a wrong they’d done.

I thought I’d seen Cordell Weldon do those things. But what’d I’d really seen was Cordell Weldon doing what he thought people wanted to see.

I’d gone by his office building before, just to see it from the outside. Nice three-story brick building not far from home, with Atlanta’s skyline as a backdrop. The whole city was lit up when we came to Cordell Weldon’s office, because it was the middle of the night.

And Weldon’s lights were on.

This was only our first stop, though. Detective Calderon had already pulled up Weldon’s home address, because we figured he wasn’t going to be at work at this hour.

His home address wasn’t anywhere near my home address, that was for certain. Dude lived in the burbs, far from the neighborhood. I had no idea. No one I knew had ever mentioned that.

At that point, I wondered if I’d ever known anything about Cordell Weldon at all, really.

Taneshia and I went in through the front door while Sienna took the back stairs, cops with us every step of the way. They took us along because while Cavanagh claimed Weldon hadn’t ever taken any of the meta serum that would give him powers, none of us fully believed him. And I sensed that once they’d heard the story, most of the cops were all too happy to drag Cordell Weldon out into the street with a particular glee. He hadn’t always been the kindest to them, after all.

Weldon’s assistant wasn’t at her desk, and when I busted open his doors we found her under his. Heard a thump under the desk, that’s how we knew. When the cops shouted, “Police!” she came scrambling out with her hands up. Sienna and her crew of cops came in through the side door, filing in through the shattered frame.

We had actually caught Cordell Weldon with his pants down in every sense of the phrase, and I wasn’t too proud to be amused by it, though Taneshia looked a little embarrassed. Sienna just looked tickled pink. No, really, her cheeks were pink, and there was laughter in her eyes. Rare thing for her, I think.

Weldon looked at us, pure fury embodied in that wiry frame. His eyes, always all business, now were calculating where to direct the lash. “What is the meaning of this?” he asked, keeping one hand below his desk as a couple detectives pulled his secretary out of the room.

I felt a little bad for him, then I saw the picture of him with his wife and five kids, and I didn’t feel that bad anymore. “Cordell Weldon,” Detective Calderon said, “you’re under arrest.”

“For what?” Weldon said, standing up as he zipped his pants.

“Conspiracy to commit murder is a good start,” Calderon said. “I’ll let one of these officers read you your rights, though I’m sure you’re familiar with them by now.”

“What I’m familiar with,” Weldon said, seething, “is a police department that’s so petty that they’ll take the word of a proven liar like Ms. Nealon here—”

“We have a full confession from Edward Cavanagh,” Calderon said.

Weldon paused, appropriately stunned. I gave him about five seconds before he came up with a reply to that.

It only took four. I counted. “If you think I’m going to just stand idly by while that man—”

“A.k.a one of your biggest donors and a close personal friend,” Sienna interjected.

“—smears my reputation in the community,” Weldon said, “you’re fooling yourselves. This is not going to end well for you. You’re making enemies here. Powerful enemies.”

“I’ve had some of those,” Sienna said loudly. “Of course, mine were the sort that could actually throw fire at you, whereas yours were the sort that could maybe toss a political favor your way, but … hey, we come from different worlds.”

The lines around Weldon’s eyes grew taut. “You haven’t heard the last of me, Ms. Nealon, and you’re a fool if you think any of this will stick.”

“I dunno,” she said and sort of gestured at his pants, “you look like you might be sticky.” I blanched and looked away. “Take him away,” she said, and I heard a few laughs as they did so, along with an officer reading Weldon’s rights to him as the cuffs clicked on. “Hey, Weldon,” she said, and he turned in the grasp of the cops. “Remember how you said it doesn’t matter what you do, it matters what you’re seen doing?” She clucked at him. “You might want to rethink that philosophy, because nowadays … someone’s always watching.”