Mind Games (43 page)

Ever so lightly, I raise a finger to touch his left cheekbone, ragingly red. “Are you okay?”

He knows what I mean. “Yes.”

“But look at you. This will be a terrible bruise.”

He gets a mischievous look. “I know.”

“Hey!” Ling’s ambling up the street with Spruggie the cook, and they both seem shocked. At first I think it’s because Chief Sanchez is there, but then I realize they’re actually looking past us, at the door. I turn. There are recessed panels where the face once was. “What’s with the new door?” Ling runs a hand over it.

“A change,” I say. “And Packard’s taking some time off.”

This surprises her more than the door. “Packard?”

“Can you manage the place, Ling, until he comes back?”

“Of course,” Ling says.

“Packard never takes time off,” Spruggie says, pulling open the new door. They go in.

“Packard’ll never set foot in there again,” Otto says under his breath.

          Thirty-six

I
DON’T KNOW
what I expected from the Mandler-Foley ball, but certainly not a genuine, full-blast ball. To me, a ball is an event from another time and place, most probably a fictional one. As we walk through the two-story door of the majestic Van Horner Place, however, and follow the lobby master up the elegant steps, passing under the arch and into the upper level of the cavernous ballroom, joining a number of stunning guests in the receiving line, it comes to me that this is, in fact, a ball. How can it be, I wonder, that people have been giving and attending balls without the general populace knowing?

I link my arm in Otto’s as we wend toward the front of the line on the grand balcony. I’m wearing the beautiful brown velvet gown I bought for the Silver Widow’s cocktail party, with a silver wrap and silvery jewelry to match the silver sparkles around the neck and waist. But I could have a gown encrusted with diamonds and I wouldn’t outshine Otto.

Injuries usually ruin a man’s appearance. Cuts and bruises around the mouth can make a guy look like he’s frowning, or maybe a messy eater. Poorly placed swelling can evoke defects of various kinds, and many black eyes look downright monstrous as they color and swell.

Otto’s injuries, on the other hand, only heighten his dashing good looks. The redness on his left cheekbone has turned into a midnight-blue bruise that emphasizes the sculpted beauty of his face and the mahogany richness of his eyes and hair. The brilliant red gash above his right eyebrow balances out the bruise; taken together with the white butterfly bandage, it creates a contrapuntal echo to the red satin sash set diagonally over his white shirt. His black suit is cut long, and a golden dress badge gleams upon his breast. He also wears a black beret, of course. I can’t stop looking at him, can’t stop smiling at him. I can’t believe I’m with him.

As we draw closer to the front I get a view over the banister of the cavernous ballroom below, and my heart stops. It’s lit by soft sconces that make the sparklestone walls glint; the white alabaster floor, already filled with beautiful revelers, appears to glow. Colorful banners are draped from the ceiling, many featuring the blue-and-yellow Midcity flag, and a string quartet plays softly in a far, dark corner.

When we get to the front of the line, we’re announced by a jowly man with a booming voice: “Police Chief Otto Sanchez and Ms. Justine Jones.” They way he says it makes my name sound special. Otto squeezes my hand as we move to the side, where reporters question him about his injuries.

“Keeping the citizens safe from evildoers has its occasional hazards,” Otto says as the camera flashes go off.

Somebody touches my arm. “Excuse me—”

I turn, and there he is: large forehead, too-small nose, thinning gray hair. Foley. His suit is plain and brown, like you’d see at an office. But it’s his eyes that shock me. They don’t have that predatory “peering out” quality anymore. They’re warmer, somehow. Engaged.

“I know I could never apologize enough,” Foley says, “but I am deeply sorry. Your father was desperate to
keep you and your brother out of harm’s way, and I took advantage of that. I took advantage of his love for you.”

I just stare at him, bewildered by my impulse to cry.

“Thank you, Foley,” I say, grasping his hand. “I really appreciate your saying that to me.”

Then Foley is drawn by the reporters to pose with Otto and the Mandlers, who don’t recognize me, luckily. Otto speaks on the subject of an enlightened society reforming criminals rather than avenging crimes. Everybody carries on as if Otto and the police had everything to do with Foley’s reform, and Otto allows this. Then Otto deflects a question about his running for mayor. If he were running, of course, this situation couldn’t be more perfect.

Finally we’re released from the interviewers and well-wishers to descend the curved stone staircase. “So was Packard right, Otto? You want to be mayor?”

“My secret status as a highcap makes it complicated and risky. Though it does give me certain advantages.”

“So Packard was right.”

“Sterling Packard is rarely wrong about people. It’s what makes him valuable—and dangerous.”

Not an answer. I take it as a yes. “They all think it was
you
behind Foley’s big turnaround.”

“They need to think it was me,” he says. “And Sterling needs them to think that, too. If people knew about what you and your friends were up to, you wouldn’t be so effective.”

As we near the bottom of the staircase, Otto greets a well-wisher, and I’m thinking about Cubby for some reason. I’d wanted to change and reform for Cubby, but I’m glad I didn’t. Packard changed me against my will, supposedly for my own good as well as his. I still don’t know if I can forgive him for that, but Otto likes me for who I am.

The music switches to a waltz, and the revelers begin to glide around the floor. Just then I look back up at Foley; I can’t get over how different he is. Essentially different. But even though he’s law-abiding and productive and maybe even happy now, something about it seems not quite right. Or am I just thinking too much? For some reason, my thoughts go back to Jordan the Therapist’s riddle:
When is good not good?
Something about it nudges at the edge of my mind. Am I missing something?

“Justine?”

I break out of my reverie to find Otto in front of me, palm outstretched. “A dance, my dear?”

Gently I place my hand onto his and gaze into his earnest brown eyes. He pulls me out to the floor and we move as one, and suddenly everything seems okay.

          Thirty-seven

T
EN DAYS LATER
, I head into the cracked-mirror-decorated lobby of Rickie’s scary apartment building all by myself. Shelby is ill from Mexico. She’d exhorted me to wait, but I’d managed to find a group of ants, including what I believe to be a queen, at a construction site near my building, and it seemed cruel to keep them in the jar forever. Plus, now that I’ve been there, the place doesn’t seem that scary.

I trudge up the back stairs over the bundles and past a few dazed people and knock on Rickie’s door.

She opens up and her eyes grow big. “What are you doing here?”

“I have your stuff.”

She looks out at the hall behind me. Her lacy tank top is pink today, and her jeans are held up by a pink belt. “I told you to stay away.”

“It’s safe, I promise. And I wanted you to have this.” I put my shopping bag down and push it over the threshold with my foot. Rickie pulls out the jar. The ants scramble around on the leafy twigs in there. She’s already set up the farm, I notice. “The big one’s the queen.”

“I think I know that.”

I don’t say anything about what’s happened. Packard is going around assessing Otto’s prisoners, at least the
ones who aren’t mass murderers, and deciding which ones can be freed right away—released into his custody, so to speak—and which need to be disillusioned first.

“Thanks,” she says.

“It sucks to be trapped.” I watch her put the other stuff on the couch. Batteries. Three bottles of tequila.

“I never thought I’d be so bored that I’d want an ant farm,” she says. “Fuck, it’s all I could think about since you left. Pathetic.” She looks up. “You can come in.”

“Will I regret it?”

“Will I?” Then an expression of astonishment comes over her face.

I spin around and there he is, smiling behind me, holes in his jeans, hair in his eyes, and a blue shirt so faded it’s almost white.

He looks at her for a few moments, assessing her emotional structure. You can always tell when he’s doing that. Or at least I can. I haven’t seen him since he walked away from Mongolian Delites. He’s sunburnt. And he seems taller.

He strolls in. “You ready for that job, Rickie?”

Movement out of the corner of my eye—the giant horse book levitates off the coffee table.

“Shit!” I back up as it flies across the room and embeds itself in the wall like an overfed throwing star.

Packard arches an eyebrow. “You need more than that to be on my crew. Being on my crew means you can’t use your power just because you feel like it. You use it in the line of duty only. Being on my crew means when you feel angry, you settle things with words. It means a vow of total self-control.”

“I can do it. I’m ready!” Rickie says.

“Are you? This is a serious vow that you cannot break. I want you to spend this night deciding whether you can really give your word of honor, because once
you give it, you can’t go back. I can’t have you drawing negative attention to yourself or my crew. Or me.”

Rickie’s nodding vigorously. “You’re alive.”

“You’ll be let out tomorrow,” Packard continues.

She brightens. “You’ll let me out tomorrow? I don’t understand. What about Henji?”

“You don’t have to worry about him. Listen, I’ll send Chief Sanchez over to check on you when the force field lifts.”

An ugly look passes over Rickie’s face.

Packard points at her. “In some ways, this will be your first challenge. Can you be polite to him when he comes to see you?”

Rickie’s mouth hangs open. “Does Chief Sanchez work for you now?”

Packard waits a beat. “I didn’t hear an answer.”

Rickie apparently takes this as confirmation that Otto does, in fact, work for Packard. And that Packard is somehow engineering her freedom. “You’re on,” she says. “Absolute kindness to Mr. Sanchez. Thank you.”

She thinks Packard’s letting her out. I think back on how Otto took credit for Foley’s reform. It’s amusing, the way Packard and Otto both take credit for everything.

Packard places a card on the coffee table. “Call my man Francis when you’re ready to get to work, and he’ll come get you and set you up with a temporary place.”

I pick up the jar of ants. “I guess you don’t need these guys anymore.”

“Hell, no!”

I say good-bye to Rickie and accompany Packard to the elevators. “You know, you shouldn’t ride the elevators here.”

He pushes the button. “It’s a new day.”

“Did you know I was here?”

“Shelby called. She didn’t want you to come alone. And I wanted to get straight with you.”

There’s this silence between us that contains everything.

“I want to get straight with you, too,” I say simply. Then the elevator arrives. We get in and doors snap shut; a caged bulb above casts a dim glow. “Frankly, Packard, I don’t know whether to apologize to you or slap you in the face.”

“Don’t apologize to me, Justine.” The elevator jerks and descends.

“Does that mean you want the slap?”

He gives me a long look. “I might enjoy the slap.”

“Oh, stop,” I say, annoyed, like my face isn’t all red. “Packard, I know I took a chance with you and everyone else, bringing Otto on board and everything. I need you to know, I never wanted you destroyed. I would never want that—”

He smiles.

“What?”

“It so amusing, how little self-understanding you have.”

“What does that mean?”

“How little you see of your own integrity. I knew what I was playing with.” He squints. “I knew if I tricked you, that you could be my strongest ally or my most destructive enemy.”