Quantum (29 page)

“Anyone else?” Claire tried. There was a shuffling, but otherwise all remained silent. “Thanks, Coach. If you hear from them, please call me,” she said, leaving her card with him.

“What do you make of all this?” she asked Agent Pitt once they were outside again.

He shrugged. “I don’t know. It could have been Raj Sen at the cottage. We don’t know that for sure. Those ladies are fairly old. We can’t go by that identification a hundred percent. Still, it could have. As for Simla and Justin? They’re seventeen. There are a hundred different explanations why we can’t locate them at this moment. I say we stake out the house and head over to the school tomorrow morning.”

Claire nodded. She needed some time to look through the files, anyway. Putting out a search for Simla right now would be an overreaction. It wasn’t like anyone had reported her missing. In fact, for now, they didn’t really
know
anything.

~

Raj watched the FBI agents talking outside the ice rink from his
borrowed
Corolla, which he had acquired when he dumped the Impala. How had the FBI gotten on his case so fast? He did expect Lizzy and Annie to call the police when they discovered their stuff and car missing, so he had dumped their vehicle as soon as he could. He certainly didn’t expect the FBI to get involved so quickly. They obviously knew it was him, why else would they be looking for Simla? And where was she, anyway? Could she still be with Potomal? If so, why had they dumped him here where he was in danger? Why was he being punished? Had Potomal alerted the FBI, like he said he would? What had
Simla
done?

K
ellan looked majorly hot in his Sigma-W protective shell. I was wearing one, too. I bet I looked pretty awesome, as well–I could tell by the appreciative glance from Kellan. All black leather–surprise, surprise–with the Sigma-W logo on the front, red epaulettes, and black biker boots, which I was hoping to get to keep. We were ready to transport out to rescue Simla and Justin.

We, Kellan and I, had not been privy to the planning aspect of this mission–very 007. We’d spent the short time it took the Sigma-W council and my parents to come up with a plan catching up. My biggest surprise? When my boyfriend told me that his mom had been a Sigma-W.

“Get out!”

We had been sitting out in the backyard with Harry and David munching on strawberries while Ella went for a swim with Alexa. Alexa and Ella really hit it off. Or rather, Alexa was an expert at keeping little girls happy. They had been playing with makeup and doing mock fashion shows. Ella was having a blast. She was now reluctant to remove her tiara to go for a swim, nearly opting out of it just so she could keep the tiara on her head, until I offered to take care of it for her until she came out of the pool. I put the tiara on my head and decided to wear it while Ella swam.

“Kellan! Are you serious? Why didn’t you tell me before? Or did I know, but forgot when I
changed
?” I still couldn’t recall much from my Darley life before last October, so there was a possibility I had known this all along about Kellan’s mom, who had passed away when he was about six.

“Shrimp, no. You didn’t know,” he reassured me. “I only found out about it recently, as in after you were taken by Potomal’s group.”

“Wow, your dad kept it from you this long. Why?”

“He didn’t know either,” Kellan explained.

I was flabbergasted. “How could he not know? Being married to a paranormal being… that’s ridiculous!”

“Is it?” Harry asked. “She lived an ordinary life, not one as a Wanderer.”

“I guess, but still….”

Harry hunched forward looking at me intently. “You do realize that Dad has latent Sigma-W abilities, don’t you?”

I nodded. Seeing that both Rupert’s mom and dad were Sigma-Ws, it would be odd if he didn’t. “Can he actually wander?”

“No,” Harry replied. “I guess he
could
, if he wanted to. He would need to release his abilities. He chose not to when he opted to be with Mom.”

“Why couldn’t he do both?” I asked, out of real curiosity.

Harry shrugged. “I don’t know for sure, but from what I’ve been told, the privilege of becoming a Sigma-W comes with responsibilities and duties. I think it would make it difficult for Dad to be a
regular
husband and dad, which I guess is what they wanted.”

“What about you, Harry?”

“I have latent Sigma-W abilities, as well,” he smiled.

So I was sitting in the company of two potential paranormal beings and David. Freaky. And not freaky. They were my brother, my boyfriend, and my–I couldn’t define my relationship with David. The word
friend
didn’t fully describe our closeness. So I was the only regular person here. How boring–for me. “Wow! What does this mean for the both of you?” I asked, looking in turn at Harry and then Kellan.

Kellan shrugged. “Not a lot for now,” he said. “I mean, we have the ability, but that doesn’t mean we have to do anything with it. I haven’t known about this for all my life, so I’m not going to worry about it now. What about you, Harry?”

“I don’t know. I want to spend some time with Gramadea and Granddad learning more about it, but I’m not prepared to buy into this lifestyle–though I don’t know exactly what that entails–right now. It is kinda awesome, though.”

Sheesh. I was starting to feel a bit jealous. “So, is wandering the only thing the Sigma-Ws can do, or do they have other abilities as well?”

“
Only
?” David laughed.

“Oh, you know what I mean!” I smiled. “Can the Sigma-W make themselves invisible? Walk though stuff? Breathe fire? Superhuman speed–that would be cool for hockey….”

Harry chuckled “No! Well, I don’t think so. It would be cool if there were other things we could do. I guess we’ll have to ask Gramadea.”

“Right at this second, you’re both as useless as I am in the wandering department, right? It’s only David who can wander.”

“That’s right,” Harry replied. “It would be
useful for us to be able to wander, especially to help out with the rescue mission. As it is, we’re going to have to be babysat.”

“Is there a way they can temporarily switch on your abilities, just for this mission?” I asked.

“I wish,” Harry sighed. “I did ask. There’s no possible way of doing that.”

“Too bad. Kellan, are you all right with all this? Were you upset to learn about your mother?”

He shook his head. “No, not the least bit, once I knew that they hadn’t even told Dad. He’s a bit upset and it’s no wonder. Knowing Dad, I’m sure he’s reassessing his whole time with Mom now, wondering if there were any signs. I need to get back to talk to him soon. I’ll bet he’s freaking out about me. We didn’t have any time to talk things through before I left with David. I guess, in a way, I feel a bit more unsure about myself. I’d stay on here, with Harry, to learn more, but I’m concerned about Dad. Besides, I’m not letting you head off on your own,” he said, coming up and kissing my forehead.

“Cut it out,” Harry muttered. “We get it, you like each other.”

We stopped chatting as Ella came bounding out to retrieve her tiara. She was still wet, wrapped in a huge pink towel.

“Why are you
wearing
it?” she sulked.

“Sorry, safest place,” I grinned, as I took it off and handed it to her.

“Kids, can you all come in now?” Gramadea asked, coming up behind Ella. “Ella, go and get changed. Alexa asked if you wanted to play Guitar Hero with her.”

“Awesome! See ya later, alligator,” she said, and took off.

“Right!” Gramadea said, beckoning us.

After a short briefing where we were basically assigned babysitters–Gramadea was mine and someone I never met before was going with Kellan–we changed into our protective gear. I thought we looked like cool superheroes; I had to stifle a giggle. Harry was going to stay behind. He wasn’t the least bit pleased, but… tough cookies. He was of no use without any abilities and, unlike Kellan and me, he had never seen any of Potomal’s lot, so he couldn’t even help in that aspect.

So, there we were, Kellan and I dressed up in our Sigma-W gear. I felt good. A team of sixteen Sigma-Ws, including Gramadea, met us in the conference room. There were no signs of
Granddad
, I guess he was too important to go on rescue missions. I didn’t recognize any of the faces. These weren’t the same people we had been introduced to when we first got here. This must be their
SWAT
team, or whatever. Mom and Rupert came to see us off.

“Arizona, now remember… do exactly what Gramadea says.
Do not
go off on your own. Right?”

“I won’t, I promise,” I reassured them, waving them off after a group hug.

Gramadea stood behind me and put her hand on my shoulder and we transported off. The journey was short and we landed right outside the building where I had been held. It was pitch dark. I guess we had moved in time, as well. There were no people around, so I guessed it must have been very late into the night, maybe early morning.

It was surreal, like being in a sci-fi movie. The
SWAT
team took their places in front of us. The four of us–Kellan, his minder, Gramadea and I–stayed at the back. We went to the main entrance of the building, armed with the building code so we could get in–thank goodness for Intelligence. Turns out that we didn’t need it. The front door was unlocked, the lobby empty. The security guard was not at his station and the lights were off–weird.

“Top floor?” Gramadea whispered to me. I nodded and we made our way to the stairwell. It was decided that this would be the safer option. Safer maybe, but I was pooped by the time we got to the top. The door was gently pried open by one of the Sigma-Ws in front of us. He went first and then beckoned us through. The hallway was as I remembered, except deathly quiet and dark apart from the beams from our flashlights. Had Potomal’s group transported off? We searched the floor, systematically, room by room. We finally came to the room I had been held in.

Light escaped from under the door, but we couldn’t hear any sounds. The room itself was big; I knew that from my stay there. It could hold a small army of people, certainty more than there were of us. It was possible that on the other side of this door a team of Potomal’s group were waiting to take us out.

Gramadea ushered Kellan and me back along the corridor to an empty alcove, where we remained out of sight. We could hear a lot of commotion, angry voices and running around. One of the Sigma-Ws finally appeared at the alcove to update us.