I See You (Oracle 2) (26 page)

“I just hate this shit,” Beau said, echoing my unvoiced thoughts. “I hate believing in anything more than you and me. And what I can taste, touch, and feel.”

I didn’t answer. I didn’t have any answer. I wished we were back on the beach, toasting marshmallows in the bonfire that Gary and Beau had built. Or before that. Before Chi Wen had surfaced at the laundromat. Before he’d unlocked the visions and pushed me back on the path of … everything I couldn’t qualify and couldn’t control. Fate? Destiny? The inevitable? The will of some divine providence?

Of course, the far seer didn’t practice what he preached. But then, he was one of the nine most powerful beings in the world.

And I wasn’t.
 

I didn’t know … anything.

Beau turned back to me. His bright green shapeshifter magic danced in his eyes, then faded into his normal dark aquamarine gaze. He smiled sadly.

“We’re here,” I said, knowing he was about to say the same. “We see it through.”

He reached back for me.

I stepped toward him, closing the gap between us until I could thread my fingers through his.

This I knew.
 

This connection was real.

I knew Beau. I knew I’d go anywhere with him. Even if we were heading to witness his sister’s death. Even if nothing we did could change the inevitable.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Ettie was standing at a steel counter that ran the length of a freshly painted cloud-white concrete wall. Sunshine streamed in from a bank of industrial aluminum-clad windows situated over the counter. A laundry-sized sink and a shelving unit sat in one corner. The shelves were laden with the printed boxes of diffusers and e-cigarettes that I’d seen in the vision. Larger unopened cardboard boxes were piled on the polished concrete floor in all of the three remaining corners. The room was laid out strikingly similar to the lab at the university, though there was only a single worktable in the center of the space and no second door through which to escape.

It also happened to be the room in which Ettie was going to die.

Beau’s sister was clothed in the white sundress with the blue forget-me-nots that I’d seen her wearing in the vision. The dress I’d told her to burn. I wondered if I hadn’t said anything whether she would be wearing it. Then, I pushed the thought away as too complex to contemplate in this moment. Her face was covered with a gas mask. It was an odd combination.

Beau and I stood side by side, silently peering through the half-open door. We watched as Ettie slowly and carefully poured some sort of red-tinted liquid from a beaker into a large round-bottomed glass flask suspended over an open flame. The Bunsen burner and flask were hooked up to other tubing and equipment that I had no reference point for. But I got the gist.

Cooking, it was called.

Yeah, Ettie was the chef.

Blackwell was somewhere in the empty rooms behind us, maybe even still on the first floor. Beau had made a beeline through the building and up the stairs the moment we entered. He hadn’t bothered to look around. The sorcerer was more cautious.

Everything carefully piled throughout Ettie’s lab was new. Based on the diagrams and the pictures on the exterior of the boxes, at least six different types of diffusers and dozens of different types of electronic cigarettes occupied the shelving unit on her right. Price tags were still stuck to three folding chairs propped next to the shelf. A fourth chair was opened up next to a large box that someone had been using as a table. It held a gas mask, empty soda cans, and a ragged-paged porn magazine.

I tried to not gag over the idea of Cy paging through porn while watching Ettie cook.

Several dozen carefully labeled baggies holding red crystalline powder were lined up beside a scale on the counter next to the shelving unit. Though the bags were plumper, the powder appeared to be a duplicate of the drugs Beau had found in Ada’s living room. I hadn’t seen those in the vision, or in the sketches. I seriously hoped that meant we were early, that the vision was due to happen tomorrow or the next day.
 

Beau tilted his chin up, opening his mouth to scent the air like a cat would. “That’s my blood,” he said. “And Kandy’s.”

Ettie froze, carefully clamping the neck of the flask she was heating before lifting it away from the flame. Turning just her head, she looked over at us. She didn’t put the flask down.

A wooden test-tube rack occupied the center of the counter space to the right of Ettie’s arm. Six of the rack’s dozen slots were occupied with glass tubes full of what looked like blood. Six other test tubes lay on the counter next to the sink, each tinted with residual streaks of red. Ettie was a tidy cook. She was obviously planning to clean up, maybe even reuse the test tubes.

What if getting Beau’s and Kandy’s blood had been the plan all along? Maybe that was why Byron had used Tasers to kidnap them, not guns.
 

Had Ettie texted the drug dealer when she’d first seen us in the corridor at Coulter Hall?

No.

That didn’t line up with how scared she was that night, and with how she’d fought back.

Except, there was a diffuser in the vault … placed there to keep Beau and Kandy under control … and Ettie was standing before us, surrounded by diffusers and drugs …

My mind was running wild with terrible scenarios of blame and betrayal. I was squeezing Beau’s hand so hard I was hurting myself. But it was either that or throw myself across the room and gouge Ettie’s eyes out with my tactical pen. Beau probably wouldn’t be a fan of me murdering his sister with a gift he’d given me for self-defense.

Though that would be a hell of a way to thwart the vision.

I eased my grip off Beau’s hand. He hadn’t flinched or taken his gaze off Ettie, who was also still staring at us. And by us, I meant her brother.

Ettie said something, her voice muffled enough by the gas mask that I couldn’t distinguish her words.

Beau snorted.

“What did she say?” I asked. Yes, exactly as if we were watching a movie and I’d missed an important line. This moment, this situation, already blurred the lines of reality all over the place for me. I was missing too much. I didn’t need to miss more because of my lack of supernatural hearing.

“This is sensitive, Beau,” he said, mimicking Ettie’s prim tone perfectly.

Ettie went back to her cooking activities. Apparently, we weren’t much of a threat.

Beau cursed under his breath, pushing the door all the way open as he scanned the room.

“Get back, please,” he said to me, watching as I took two big steps back into the empty room behind us. “Pull your tank top up over your mouth.”

I frowned at him, but I did as he asked.

He reached over to the pile of boxes to the left. He smacked the top one off the stack, exactly like a kitten would bat a stuffed mouse. Except Beau was no house cat.

The box flew across the room, arcing over the table and smashing against the far concrete wall. It exploded in a burst of glass and crushed cardboard.

Ettie screamed, dropping the flask she’d been holding. It hit the steel counter but didn’t break. It did, however, knock over the Bunsen burner. She scrambled madly for the open flame, knocking her other cooking equipment flying off the counter.
 

She managed to right the burner and snuff the flame before it set anything on fire. She ripped off her gas mask and whirled to face Beau. “How dare you muscle in here and try to destroy what I’ve built!”

“You’re in big shit, Ettie.” Beau held out his hands to her, calm and placating.

“Right,” she scoffed, glaring over Beau’s shoulder at me. Her murky brown eyes were clear, not red rimmed like I’d seen them in the vision. “I’m going to die.”

Beau pointed to the counter behind her. “That blood you took —”

“You owe me, Beau.”

“Fine. But the werewolf is an enforcer for the West Coast North American Pack.”

Ettie faltered at that news, then she jutted her chin out defiantly. “An enforcer? Perfect, then. The crimson wolf will be more potent for it. And forget Mom’s measly contribution now that I’ve got your blood.”

“You have no idea what you’re saying.”

The pain in Beau’s voice pinched my heart as I stepped past him into the lab. “Listen, I get we don’t know each other, but we need to leave. Now. Even a change of location might help.”

“Tell you what,” Ettie said, turning back to the counter. “You give me a blood sample. I do my thing with it. I’ll test it myself. If it’s worth anything, I’ll listen.”

“What the fuck is wrong with you!” Beau roared.

I clamped my hands over my ears.

Just like in the lab at the university, several more glass beakers, flasks, and cylinders broke on the counter behind Ettie. Beau’s sister didn’t even flinch. In fact, she crossed her arms and leaned back against the counter.

“Who are you to judge me?” she said coolly. “What have you done that makes you so holy?” She glanced at me with a sneer. “Being her … what? Bodyguard? That makes you saintly?”

“Nothing, Ettie.” Beau’s shoulders sagged. His exhaustion was more emotional than physical now. “There are people coming. Adepts who aren’t going to be happy with this.” He swept his arm to include the entire lab. “The drugs you’re cooking are killing users. Other Adepts.”

Ettie sneered. “Bullshit.”

“Are you partnered with Byron? Or was Cy the one who pushed you into this?”

“No one pushed me, Beau. I’m not as weak as you think I am, not as worthless. Not a dud.”

“Ettie —”

“No! You want to know the key to all of this? The reason no one can take it away from me? It’s me. The recipe? My blood is the bonding agent.”

“What do you mean?”

“I figured it out. How it was that you inherited mom’s shapeshifting when your dad was just some shitty spellcaster. Why I didn’t at least get Cy’s abilities. Because my magic is in my blood. I did my thesis on it. How do you think I got the scholarship?”

Beau placed his hands on his head as if to stop himself from hearing the epic hole Ettie was digging for herself. “Jesus, no.”

Ettie waved him off. “I didn’t talk about Adepts or magic. I’m not an idiot. But I did the genetic and chemical research. I’m not just cooking crystal meth for Cy anymore. This is my art. My great creation.”

“You so are an idiot.” Beau turned to look at me, completely aghast.

“Fuck you, loser. And what are you good at? What are you worth? Just the money you can make on your back —”

“That’s enough!” I shouted.

Both Beau and Ettie flinched.

“This isn’t about sibling rivalry,” I said, shoving myself into their conversation. “This is about your dad coming in here, bleeding out of every orifice because he’s so jacked on this crap you’re so proud to be making. This is about him killing you trying to get to Beau.”

“That’s never going to happen. Cy would never hurt me.”

I kept talking, pitching my voice louder than Ettie’s to override her stupidity. “In about a minute, a massively powerful sorcerer is going to come in here, take one look at this … the blood, the crystal drugs … and freak out. Because you’re taking magic and giving it to humans. You are, right? You can’t have enough Adept clientele to make the rent on this place. I know you’re selling to Sara. She told me about it.”

Ettie clamped her mouth shut, refusing to answer me.

“And you’ve made some sort of deal with Byron, right? Who also happens to be human. Or Cy made a deal. That’s why there was a diffuser in the vault. And it’s the only way you’re here cooking with Beau’s and Kandy’s blood.”

Ettie crossed her arms and looked away from me. Beau sighed heavily.

“Finally,” I continued, “like Beau said, Adepts have died. Members of the Gulf Coast North American Pack and others. We haven’t called the pack in, because they’ll kill you.”

“Even if that’s true, who says I can’t use magic to cook drugs?” Ettie sneered. “It’s not like I’m forcing people to use. I’m simply offering a service. A chance to be stronger, faster, calmer … happy. Look at mom. I’ve practically cured her.”

“Shapeshifting isn’t a disease …” Beau said.

“The Adept say you can’t.” I interrupted him, ignoring Ettie’s slanted justification. “The pack, the witches, the sorcerers, the dragons, all of them. You’re lucky it’s us standing here. We can dismantle the lab before —”

“Never. Going. To. Happen.” Ettie ground the words through her teeth. She stepped back to the shelving unit, then inexplicably pulled a diffuser out of a box and plugged it in.

“She doesn’t get it,” Beau murmured. “She’s not going to get it in time.”

“I get it, Beau,” Ettie said. Her tone was casual and easy. “I just don’t see how it has anything to do with me.” She dropped some sort of chalk-like pink cube in the diffuser. “Silver nitrate, in case you were interested. But the rest of the recipe is my secret.”

“One you’ll take to the grave,” I said, pulling out my phone to text Kandy our location. I’d been holding off, but I had no choice now.

“I really don’t like you,” Ettie said as she dropped another cube in another diffuser. She placed the second diffuser on the counter, leaving the first one to begin misting on the shelf.

“That’s okay,” I said mildly. “Few people do. It’s the truth saying. No one likes that.”

“I don’t mind it,” Beau said conversationally as he took another step into the room. “It’s refreshing. No games.”

“Well, no games intentionally,” I said. “My eyes, too. My eyes freak people out.”

“You like that,” Beau said.

“Well, yeah. But only lately.”

“Time to go?”

“Yeah.” I sighed. “Time to go.”

“I’ll just get Ettie, then?”

I nodded.

In two quick steps, Beau was beside Ettie and throwing her over his shoulder.

Unfortunately, she’d grown up with a shapeshifter, so his speed didn’t surprise her as much as I would have hoped.

She cupped her palm over his nose and mouth. He ripped her hand away from his face quickly, but not before he’d breathed in some of whatever crimson drug she’d been secretly holding.