Vigilare (26 page)

Emily smirks shrewdly, watching Gina search, attempting to put it all together. “Your arrogance saddens me,” Emily speaks, her tone icy, her hands once again winding around the bars. “Sparkling emerald green eyes, superhuman strength, a regular
Vigilare
. You know nothing of the power you possess.” The bars begin to sound as the pressure exerted on them forces their strict steel frame to bow.

“Emily,” Dr. Ryan warns.

“You’re no better than a punk. An ingrate, undeserving of the gift that encompasses you,” Emily continues, her hands now at rest on the crescented bars that once were straight and parallel. “Vigilare,” Emily huffs. “Good luck with those visions, know-it-all,” she dismisses as she walks away.

Gina scans the two bars, a perfect circle large enough to pass a large ball between. “What the hell was that?”

Dr. Ryan winks, smiling. “She’s a very powerful girl.” She tucks her briefcase under her arm. “Goodnight, Ms. DeLuca. Or do you prefer Vigilare?”

“How does she know about the visions?” Gina’s mind races.

Dr. Ryan shrugs her shoulders. “Either way, goodnight.” She pivots militaristically, exiting the cellblock.

Gina wants to call after her, something her pride will not allow. “What the...?” her words fade into an internal whisper.

SEVERAL HOURS LATER, Gina rests on her bed, her eyes and mind searching for understanding. She hears footsteps echoing down the corridor. Jumping from her supine position, she stands erect, her expression grows disappointed.

Tony stands in front of her cell. “Not who you were expecting?” he quizzes, his feelings hurt. Gina was hoping for Emily Truly’s return. “Should I leave?” he continues.

Gina shakes her head and smiles.

“What the hell happened here?” Tony inspects the bowed bars on her cell door, looking to her concerned. “Did it happen again? Did you turn?”

“No.” She thinks for a moment. “Not to my knowledge.” She grabs her hair, tousling it through her fingers. “Do you know how frustrating it is to not know who you are, or what you are?” Her question utterly rhetorical. Her hands rest on the back of her neck, bearing down firmly. “At least I know I didn’t do that.” She directs to the bent steel.

Tony waits for her explanation.

“I was so fortunate to have a visit from Dr. Ryan.” She rolls her eyes. “Strutted up in here bragging about how she petitioned the judge to send me to a psych facility. So kind of her.”

“I saw her coming out of Judge Carter’s chambers this afternoon, before my meeting. I knew she was up to something. Why would she do that?” Tony’s wheels spin.

Gina shrugs. “Power. Bragging rights. Control. If she has me locked up on the tenth floor, tied down to some electric table, like some Frankenstein project, promise me you’ll come for me,” she teases, a bit of worry in her inflection.

“Dr. Ryan pried those bars apart?” he asks, disbelieving.

“Emily Truly,” she answers.

“What? Dr. Ryan
and
Emily Truly came to see you? What did Emily want?” Tony scratches his head, pacing. “I tell ya Gina, this whole thing is getting weird. Something’s going on. What the hell is going on?” His thoughts jumbled, he continues intermittently, “Emily pried those bars apart? With what? For what?”

“With her hands. Because I made her mad.”

“Gina, come on.” He knocks his knuckles against the bars. “These things are made of iron. You expect me to believe some woman, well other than you, when you’re her...Vigilare, pried these things apart with her bare hands.”

“Believe what you want. I stood right here and watched her do it. And I saw the look in Dr. Ryan’s eyes. She wasn’t the least bit surprised.” Gina circles the concrete floor. “And she knew about my visions, Emily.”

“Visions? You think Emily’s superhuman too? Aw shit, Gina, don’t tell me there’s two of you.” Tony shakes his head, the pieces coming together.

“Yeah, visions. I have them sometimes. Don’t know what they mean though.” Gina talks, her mouth unable to keep up with her mind. “Two of us?
Vigilares?
” she exaggerates the plural. “Ya think?”

“I don’t know what to think.” Tony inspects the hole between the bars, mesmerized. “No five-foot-eight, one-hundred and thirty-five-pound female of human origin did this.”

“She’s a martial artist. They do that stuff all the time. Breaking boards with their hands, concrete with their heads. Probably some trick thing she learned.” Gina attempts to convince herself, while working on convincing Tony.

“There are seven homicide scenes unaccounted for, Gina. We better put a call in to the CSI lab. Throw her name in the hat as a possible suspect.” Tony unlocks the door between them. “Maybe that’s the missing link. Why would they show up here together? Why was Dr. Ryan at the rally at City Hall led by the Truly’s? You thinking what I’m thinking?”

“Not unless, you’re wondering why you came empty handed? No pizza tonight?” she asks.

“You’re impossible, DeLuca.” He grins, shaking his head, taking hold of her hand. “We’re on the brink of a breakthrough here and you’re worried about dinner.” He pulls at her arm.

She pulls back against him. “Did you forget where I am? I can’t just walk out of here, Gronkowski.”

“Oh, yeah. That’s why I’m here,” he recalls amongst all the incoming news and commotion. “I posted your bail. Judge Carter released you into my custody. Just for tonight.” He smiles, pulling her in his direction.

“You can’t be serious,” she inquires, stalling his momentum.

“Come with me and find out,” he coaxes, his smile growing larger. “We’ve got work to do, DeLuca.”

She pulls back against him, one more time, a gleam in her eye. “If I have one night...one night before I spend the rest of my life behind bars, I’m not spending it working, Gronkowski.”

“Hmm,” he growls, clutching at his chest, music to his ears. Quickly, he leads her down the corridor to the exit.

Chapter 19

LATE EVENING. DETECTIVE Gronkowski’s home. After a long, lavish bubble bath, Gina saunters down the hallway, her hair wound on top of her head in a plush white bath towel, a matching robe snuggled around her frame.

“Ah man, it’s the little things,” she says contentedly, joining Tony in the dining room.

He smiles at her, his phone tucked under his ear. “I gotta run. Let me know if you hear anything,” he says into the phone before ending the call.

“Would you relax?” Gina requests.

“Gina, what if the jury comes back tomorrow with their verdict? We don’t have much time to figure out if Dr. Ryan and that Truly lady are involved in this.” He scans his contacts list. “I’m calling in every favor I have.” He starts dialing.

Gina gently places her hand over his phone, taking it from him without protest. She powers it off, laying it on the table. “I see what you’re trying to do, and I appreciate it. Really, I do.” She pulls the towel from her head, letting her hair down, running her fingers through it from root to tip.

Tony’s expression softens with the image. “How can you be so calm about this, Gina?” he asks tentatively.

“I don’t know that I’m calm, necessarily. I’m at peace, with whatever decision the jury makes. If I did what the evidence says I did, Vigilare or not, then I deserve whatever punishment I’m dealt. It’s that simple. We uphold the law every day, or at least, I used to.” Her eyebrows furrow as she processes that statement. “We arrest people when the evidence leads us to believe they’re guilty. Those people are tried before a court of law, and most times receive due justice.” She shrugs. “Now it’s my turn.” She smiles. “Besides, there’s nothing more I can do for myself than you’re already doing for me. Speaking of, just exactly what did you do, or promise Judge Carter for tonight,” she teases.

Tony nods, sucking air through his teeth. “That one’s gonna cost me.”

Gina giggles, ducking her chin to her chest.

“You scared?”

She looks up at him, her smile disappearing. “Yeah.” She circles the table slowly, her hand grazing its surface. “Scared of being locked up for the rest of my life. That could drive a person crazy, I think. Scared of who I am. What if I turn into her, it...that Vigilare thing in prison? If she has an inclination toward evil, can you even begin to imagine the slaughter if I’m surrounded by a bunch of criminals.” She stops, holding her hand up in the air in testimony. “Amongst whom, I am no better.”

“You don’t have to go,” Tony suggests keenly. “We could get you out of here, out of the country, tonight.”

Gina smiles at him, pleased, trailing her hand over his rugged jawline. “And get you fired and thrown in the clink for aiding and abetting. Or worse yet, a lashing with a rather large wet noodle from Judge Carter for breaking her confidence.” She drops her hand from his face, continuing to mindlessly circle the table. “It’ll all come out in the wash, Gronkowski. I think maybe my mother, or someone in my life, I don’t know, it all seems so foggy, told me ‘everything happens for a reason.’ You believe that?” She stops, across the table from him.

He shakes his head, accompanied by a sigh. “I think we all have to believe that. What’s the alternative?” He shrugs. “Shit happens?”

Gina chuckles. “That’s what I like about you. Your delicate way with words and your eloquent delivery.”

Tony laughs, briefly.

“You know what scares me more than going to prison?”

Tony waits for her to answer.

“Going to sleep at night.”

He tilts his head as if to say,
Huh?

She begins circling the table again. “Those visions. The ones Emily Truly knows about,” she adds, skeptically. “They keep coming. Stronger. Over and over. I don’t know what the hell they mean, but I feel like I should.” Her hands flail in time with her words. “I don’t ever get the whole story. Just pieces, parts, clips. Like a freaking movie trailer. And Dr. Godfrey said my
condition
may be due to dissociation and traumatic experiences, and yada yada yada.” She stops, eyeing Tony intently. “You think those visions, was that me? My life? My past traumatic experience? If so, why can’t I recall? Why does it seem so foreign? Is my life, my past, really not what I think it is or know it to be at all?” She slaps her hand down on the table. “And this Vigilare thing. Why can’t I remember any of that? I hear people talking about it. You, and Aubrey. The things you saw, the things you say I did...as Vigilare. I feel like a freaking video game character. Like Ms. Pac-Man. Like someone takes over with a joystick, and apparently I go through the motions. It’s ludicrous, Tony. The whole damn thing. It’s crazy!” Unexpected tears form in her eyes, a combination of frustration, anger and hurt.

Tony, experiencing his own frustration, wanting so desperately to help her, make it all better, taps his hand on the table, the wheels of his mind in motion. Apprehensively, he pulls his utility tool from its casing attached to his belt. Opening it up, he searches for the thinnest, shiny piece of steel in the set—a razor blade. “You trust me?” he asks aloud, the words surfacing in his own conscience.

Gina looks at him, subconsciously biting the inside of her lip and shaking her head. “I don’t like where you’re going with this.”

“You trust me?” he insists.

“Yes,” she replies, frustrated. “I trust you. You’re not the problem.”

“You are?”

Nodding, she elaborates, “I don’t trust me, and if you do, you’re crazier than I thought. We’re not doing this.” She wraps her hands around the cinch on the waist of her housecoat, jerking at both ends, squeezing adamantly against her middle. “Absolutely not. No freaking way, Jose.”

“Dr.Godfrey said you can learn to control this thing. I’ve already seen it, Gina.”

“Dr. Godfrey also said it’s not just about bleeding. It’s about the environment. I have to be amped up somehow, or something like that. I’m too relaxed right now. It won’t work,” she dismisses. “It?” she sputters as an afterthought. “Did you refer to me as
it?
”

“You,” Tony quickly corrects. “You...as it...ah, shit...you as Vigilare,” he continues fumbling over his words. “You know what I mean. I’ve already seen you, like that. What’s it...you,” he interjects, wincing uncomfortably. “What are
you
going to do? Scare me? Shit, Gina, if you didn’t give me a heart attack that night at Randall’s, I’m sure I’ll be fine tonight. At least I’ll be expecting it.” He runs his hands through his hair, his eyes wild with excitement.

“You must be a masochist,” Gina scoffs, miming his body language, running her fingers through her own hair.

“Maybe.” He winks, followed up with a grin.

Gina shakes her head, waving her finger, a nervous giggle escaping her vocal chords. “I know what you’re doing here, Gronkowski, and it’s not working. Save that signature bullshit for someone who’s buying.” She plants her hands firmly on the table across from him, leaning her weight onto her arms, leveling her eyes with his. “Just because you smile and wink doesn’t make everything light and carefree. It’s not cute.” She smiles, briefly. “Okay, well maybe just a little bit. You’re a little cute.” She slaps her hand down on the table, snapping herself out of it. “But it’s not cute. Not in this context. Save the charm. You’re not getting your way. Not with this.” She turns, walking away from him.

He grabs her by the arm, pulling her into him. Their bodies pressed together, their mouths inches apart, her eyes frantically search his. “Trust me?” he asks, his breath warm and intoxicating.

“Yes,” she whispers, unable to refuse him.

He lifts her hand, inspecting its palm.

She pulls her hand from him, using it to push the robe down over her right shoulder, exposing a small scar from the gunshot wound. “No need for a new scar, is there?” she asks timidly, her skin instantly cool with the thought, sends a shiver through her.

Tony traces the scar with the tips of his fingers before laying his hand out flat, stroking it across her skin. Gina moans faintly with his touch, warm and soothing, causing her eyes to close and her lips to part.

“Still can’t believe how small this scar is,” Tony admits, his voice low and sensual, somewhere between fear and desire. Her mouth, the fullness of it and the moisture collecting on her bottom lip, almost unbearable.