Mr. Real (Code of Shadows #1) (40 page)

“Awesome,” Paul said, exhibiting a damn sight more confidence in the girl than Sir Kendall felt. He began to give instructions. There was much to do—including tying Hyko up—and little time.

And if Hyko awoke before Alix finished, heaven help them all.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Paul had never been prouder of Alix. He watched her run to Sir Kendall’s car to get the rope as Sir Kendall worked at the lock on one of Paul’s handcuffs—or tried. Sir Kendall’s own hands were bound up pretty well.

“Getting a tad shaky here,” Sir Kendall said. “This may take a bit.”

“You’re losing blood,” Paul said. “You have to stop.”

“I only have to make it to my side alive, that’s all. The doctors on my side can work wonders.” He toiled on, hands shaking. “And you’re in no position to argue.”

It was true; Paul was helpless. Any movement was agony. But the agony of the painful immobilization agent was nothing compared to the agony of not being able to help Sir Kendall.

Sir Kendall looked so pale. His paperclip slipped.

“That’s it,” Paul commanded. “So I stay cuffed to the bars. I’m no use anyway. Let me put pressure on your wound. Scooch under my arm, and I’ll press it down on your belly. Your docs can’t save you if you’ve bled to death!”

“No offense, but you won’t be using your muscles for a while yet.”

“The hell I won’t,” Paul said. “You’ll let me help you.” He raised his arm.

Sir Kendall swayed, there on his knees, seemingly confused—not a good sign.

“Don’t argue,” Paul barked. “You have no choice. Get under my arm.”

He saw the change in his eyes when Sir Kendall’s will collapsed in the face of his pushing. Sir Kendall shimmied under Paul’s arm, positioning his belly wound under the flat of Paul’s forearm. He let out a sigh of relief as he stilled. The man was fading fast.

Paul pressed the back of his arm to Sir Kendall’s belly, stanching the wound. His arm burned as it never had. It ached with searing heat and sometimes the sensation of pins and sometimes bone-scalding iciness. But hell if he’d let up. He kept the perfect pressure on Sir Kendall’s wound, listening to his breathing.

Alix was back with the rope, alarmed to see Sir Kendall stretched out next to Paul, seemingly pinned by the back of Paul’s arm.

“I’m stanching the blood with the back of my arm,” Paul explained, like it was nothing. “Now what, Sir Kendall? What do you need Alix to do next? She’s collected the rope.”

Weakly, Sir Kendall instructed her to put it down and run into the house and find his pen in his room.

As soon as Alix left, Paul allowed himself to twist his face into an expression of agony. His arm killed. But he kept the pressure on. Was it enough to keep Sir Kendall from bleeding out?

Sir Kendall was sweating.

“Hold on, Sir Kendall.”

“She needs to hurry, old man. I’m dying.”

“I won’t let you,” Paul bit out.

“My body will still go back. She’ll write a message on me, but it must be with my pen.” He made Paul memorize a complicated message about a launch that included an email address of somebody named Henry, and coordinates in Kingston, Jamaica. “Somebody will relay the message to my people. The launch can be stopped without me.”

“Let Alix get a doctor for you.”

“My good man, Alix must secure Hyko after she writes on my arm. And above all, she needs to destroy an important paper he’s written on. If she lets him go back with that paper, both our worlds are gone. If I’m not conscious, you have to tell her. Our worlds must be saved before you attend to me.”

“We’re not letting you die.”

“If I’m unconscious,” Sir Kendall said, “you must tell her this—” He related complicated instructions about tying up Hyko using only rope and other items that had arrived with them from their fictional world—he seemed to believe that if Alix tied him up with things from their present world, then those would not blink back with them. “Tell her, Paul. And she has to take the blue paper from him—I believe it’s in his pocket—and cross out everything he’s written on it with my pen. And do thank her for her hospitality. And do give my regards to Karen. People were kind to me here. More than I deserved.”

“Shut up and don’t talk like you’re dying. The good guy always wins, right?”

“Oh, but I’m not a good guy. I’ve done terrible things, Paul. Despicable. You can’t understand—I’m so far from innocent. Like Hyko, I’m a kind of monster. I was never even a child. I have none of that sort of goodness in me.”

“You shut up. You
do
have that goodness. You were always there for me. You helped me, Sir Kendall.”

The spy’s breath sounded ragged. “I remember only flashes. People. Feelings…”

“I remember. You’re like a brother to me. You’re the brother of my heart, brave and strong.”

“You see us as brothers?”

“I know we are,” Paul said, sweating from the wrenching pain. “Alix says you don’t remember your parents, your childhood, but let me tell you something—you were a good little boy from a nice home. You had a mother and father who loved you very much. Do you hear me?”

“What’s this?”

“They loved you so much, Sir Kendall. You had a room there that was blue with trains on the wallpaper, and you were amazing at Lincoln Logs.”

“Lincoln Logs?”

“It’s a toy that you build things with. Brown logs that lock together. They’re made of wood, and you can use them to build these huge towers. And then some terrible things happened. New brothers—”

“The threat,” Sir Kendall said. “I remember the threat of them. I have flashes of them. The violence.”

“They hated me.” Pain. Paul shifted. “It was my fault in a lot of ways—”

“No!” Sir Kendall said. “It wasn’t your fault. I remember that now. And the brothers. They were angry.”

“Yes! I got under their skin.”

“No, you were innocent, that’s why they hated you,” Sir Kendall grated out. “You were the only one in that place who was innocent.”

“No—”

“I remember, I should know,” Sir Kendall said weakly. “You were never to blame. You were just a boy.”

Paul could feel the tears streaming down his cheeks.

“Everyone knew you were innocent,” Sir Kendall said. “It’s
why
they hated you, don’t you see? You were a little boy—you deserved nothing but love. But you got hate.”

Innocent
. Paul could barely breathe.

“I feel you shaking, Paul,” Sir Kendall whispered, “you can’t keep up this pressure.”

“I will keep it up, Sir Kendall. You’re the brother of my heart.”

I need him.

Sir Kendall was the part of him that knew he was innocent. And they were together now. He felt washed, as if that stain on him had lifted. It never really was a stain.

“Tell me more, brother,” Sir Kendall whispered. “Were there pictures on the walls? Posters?”

Paul told him about a picture of a monkey riding an elephant. He told him countless little details of life before the horror started. A swing set out back, a neighbor’s puppy, Dad playing catch, a tricycle with streamers, trucks in the sunny sandbox. With every detail, Sir Kendall’s expression softened. The corners of his lips tipped up.

Paul had the sense that he and Sir Kendall were healing together. Reclaiming their losses. Alix had it right all along—Sir Kendall was his people. He didn’t understand how it all worked, but it didn’t matter. They were together.

“And now you’re going back,” he said. “Maybe we should get you out of there. Conjure you again.”

“You mustn’t.”

“But you’re different now.”

“Yes, I’m more. And I have a duty.”

A duty. Sir Kendall was one of the good guys.

When Alix came back out with the pen, Paul instructed her to write the message on Sir Kendall’s arm.

“Yes,” Sir Kendall panted. “Thank you. Tell her the rest, Paul.”

Paul relayed Sir Kendall’s instructions—the way she needed to remove Hyko’s weaponry from his pockets and elsewhere. And she was to tie his hands and tape them. She was to get her computer away from him. And he’d started copying the code on a blue sheet of paper—she was to find that paper he’d written on and scribble it all out with Sir Kendall’s pen.

“Can’t I just rip it up?”

“No, he might be able to piece it together. The writing has to be totally unreadable,” Paul said.

“Hurry,” Sir Kendall said. “The paper is in Hyko’s pocket. He could wake up. But he’ll be groggy.”

“Hold the phone—” Alix straightened. “Hyko might
wake up
?”

“Please, Alix,” Sir Kendall panted.

“No, I can do it,” she said. “Let him wake up. That guy is done fucking with the people I love.” She pointed at Paul. There was something new about her. “I love you, Paul, and I’m going to make this right. I’m going to kick some Hyko ass and save some worlds.” She turned and ran toward the house.

Paul smiled through the blur of pain. She was the most wonderful girl in the world. And she loved him. And he was innocent.

He felt washed clean.

“I need to warn you of something, but now I can’t recall,” Sir Kendall said. “Something having to do with that comic…a pizza…I daresay; I’m feeling woozy.”

“It’s okay. It’s all under control now,” Paul said. “You can relax. Conserve your energy.”

“You think Alix can handle it?” Sir Kendall asked.

“Damn right she can,” Paul said.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Alix raced across the gravel in her bare feet, heading toward the house with Lindy right behind her. Like hell she’d let anything slow her down. All she had to do was think about Paul and Karen and Sir Kendall, and her parents and sisters, and Lindy, and everyone else who needed her now.

Sir Kendall and Paul believed that if Hyko blinked to the other side a free man, he could destroy Sir Kendall’s world. And if he blinked to the other side with the code, he could destroy both worlds.

She’d get that code away from him.

And she’d told Paul she loved him. Somehow, seeing Paul and Sir Kendall both so injured, banding together, it hit her that the not-deserving-Paul thing was a lot of crap. If she wanted to deserve him, well, she’d start acting like she deserved him, dammit! It wasn’t up to other people to define her; it was up to her. She needed to define herself.

She ran into the mudroom and through the kitchen. She paused at the top of the basement stairs.

All quiet.

Taking a deep breath, Alix headed down, hoping Hyko was still out. She snuck across the cold floor past the boiler and crept into the musty computer room. She hadn’t expected to see the fans in the walls spinning—and the lights of some of the big wrecked computers were on and blinking, too. It was like one of those scary movies with an abandoned funhouse and everything inexplicably lit up. And a pizza box was on the desk—with a pizza still in it, judging by the smell.

And crumpled on the rug in front of the old brown couch, snarled blond hair half covering his face, was Hyko, like the evil clown at the center of the insanity. He lay sideways, with his legs folded under.

She wasn’t prepared for the sight of him—he was so big! Not just physically big. Just
more
, somehow. The way Sir Kendall sometimes seemed more. Except Hyko was scary-more.

Lindy ran up and licked Hyko’s face.

“No!” She yanked her off and pointed at the corner. Lindy whined and backed away, alarmed, Alix guessed, by the tone of her voice. “It’s okay,” she said, glancing at the clock. Just a bit past 7:30. Fifteen minutes. “Everything’s okay.”

With shaking hands, she crept over to Hyko and crouched by his shoulder. Gently, she tried to pry the gun from his fingers. It wouldn’t come. Was he awake and messing with her? She tried straightening his fingers one by one, but they kept curling back around the loops of the bizarrely modified grip.

Eventually she got enough of them straight to yank the thing from him. She set it on the couch, well out of his reach.

She went to work as the guys had instructed, tying his hands together using only the ropes that had come over from their world, and then looping those ropes around his waist and into his belt loops. She bound his ankles together, too. Paul and Sir Kendall had said to get the ropes tight as possible.

He grumbled once, almost giving her a heart attack.

She searched his coat pockets for the blue paper. No go. His jeans, then. She slid her hands in his right front pocket, feeling his hip bone, and the place where his leg started. But no paper. His hair had fallen away, revealing more of his face. He wore a smirk. Was this how he went out? Smirking? She kept feeling like he was faking it! But why let her tie him up?

She tried the other pocket. Nothing. Back pocket then. She heaved him over just enough to check and finally found the blue paper. She stood and shoved it into her shorts pocket with the pen. Now to get the laptop. She spotted it over on the desk.

Movement out the corner of her eye.

She looked down. To her horror, Hyko was twisting his hands, getting the ropes loose.

Shit!

She grabbed his crazy gun. It felt like it weighed ten pounds. “Stop moving or I’ll shoot.”

He wriggled in the ropes, grinning. “Go ahead, shoot.”

She braced herself, aiming for a shoulder. She didn’t want to shoot him. “Stop it! I really will shoot.”

He laughed and kept twisting his wrists.

She pulled the trigger. Nothing. “Fuck!” Was the safety on? She fussed with a small knob. Was that even the safety? The gun had been so weirdly modified. She tried again to shoot. Nothing.

He was moving faster, getting free. She kicked him and still he wriggled. She turned the big, heavy gun so that she held it by the barrel and slammed the butt down onto his head with all her might. It connected with a deep
klonk
that made her feel sick.

Hyko laughed a big, booming laugh.

She whacked him with it again. Then she slammed it against his still-bound hands a few times, hoping to break his fingers.

And he grabbed hold of the thing.

She pulled, trying to wrest it from his grip. He wouldn’t let go. She couldn’t let him have the gun. She checked the clock—ten minutes. Ten minutes until he blinked back, and she still hadn’t crossed out the stuff on the paper!