Out of This World (38 page)

“No, what do
you
think?”

“I'd rather be with you, but it could get awkward and Des is right. We need to stay focused on what we're there to do.”

Lupe reaches across the console and places a reassuring hand on mine for a second. “Members of the Blue Dog Clan are in the crowd,” she says. “We'll make sure he doesn't hurt you.”

“Theo would never raise a hand to me,” I tell her. “What I'm afraid of is him being hurt and upset when he finds out. And I don't want him finding out before I have a chance to talk to him myself.”

“Then go with Des,” Josh says. “Donalita can come with me.”

“I'll be there,” Lupe says, “as soon as I find a place to park.”

Parking turns out to be the least of our problems. A dozen blocks from city hall the streets are so choked that we decide to abandon the car and continue on foot. Lupe pulls over into a back service lane, kills the engine, and everybody gets out except for Des. We all watch in fascination as Des takes the pebble out of his pocket. He taps it on the window and suddenly he's got his arms full of Donalita. She lets herself fall across the rest of the back seat and grins at us.

“Ta-da!” she says.

“Just what we need,” Josh mutters. “Another clown.” But he's smiling as the two of them squeeze out of the back of the car at the same time.

“I'll see you later,” Lupe says. “Good hunting.”

She takes off before I can thank her for the ride.

“Let's go,” Josh says. “Donalita, you're with me.”

“Really?” She shoots Des a pouty glance.

He gives her shoulder a light bump. “It's because of Chaingang,” he says. “Marina wants to wait till this is all over before telling him.” He points two fingers at us. “These two can't hide their goo-goo eyes when they're together.”

She nods, but fixes me with a serious look. “You'd better keep him safe,” she says.

Josh laughs and gives her a little push toward the busy street. “You need to work on your people skills, coati girl,” I hear him tell her as Des and I follow.

“I have
great
people skills,” she says. “Ask anyone. Well, not the javelina boys, but they're always rude first. But anyone else …”

Josh nods. “Uh-huh.”

“It's true. I once charmed a whole pod of killer whales with nothing more than a smile and my good manners.”

“I can see why they'd be disarmed,” Josh says. I can hear the laughter in his voice.

“Is she always like this?” I ask Des.

He grins. “This is her good behaviour.”

“Sounds like you guys make a good match.”

He shakes his head and looks at Donalita's back. “Dude, I don't know what we are,” he says.

“But you like her.”

He nods. “Probably too much for my own good. I don't expect her to stick around. I mean, she's such a free spirit, why would she?”

“I don't know. But if you want her to stay, you'd better make the effort.”

They reach the street before we do. Donalita turns and wiggles her fingers at us, then dances to catch up with Josh, who's already crossing in between the bumper-to-bumper traffic that's now in gridlock.

Des and I stay on this side of the street. “How about you, dude?” he asks. “Are you making the effort?”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

He shrugs. “Don't get me wrong. I'm over the moon that you two are finally together. But I don't want to see either of you hurt.”

I feel the tiniest chill crawl up my spine. “It's a bit scary,” I admit. “But it's also Josh.”

“A new Josh,” Des says. “Not the one we grew up with. This one has a mountain lion living under his skin and some kind of weird-ass GPS in his head. He can navigate between worlds and he can turn into a hawk. Hell, he can put out pheromones and who knows what else. Maybe there's even stuff that hasn't shown up yet.”

“He says he doesn't really turn into a hawk—that's just how we see it.”

“Whatever. The point is, he's Josh, yeah, but he's a lot more now, too, and it seems like every time we turn around, somebody else has plans for him.”

I shrug. “He's been doing a good job of handling them so far.”

Des nods. “But what if it gets to be too much and he decides the only way he can deal is to go away? Are you going with him? Would you be willing to leave your family and everything you know?”

“Do you know something I don't?”

“We both know the same thing,” Des says. “Josh doesn't like to be the center of attention—which, by the way, dude, has always seemed really weird to me for a guy who also wants to play lead guitar in a surf band—but the point is, push comes to shove, I can easily see him pulling a Kerouac and hitting the road.”

“I don't think it will come to that,” I say. “Through all of this, Josh has been trying really hard to get his old life back.”

“I suppose.”

But then I get it.

“You're not really worried about how
I'm
going to deal,” I say.

“I am so!”

“Okay. Except you're also worried about getting left behind, yourself.”

“Maybe I am. Is that so weird? I'm the only one in our little band of superheroes without a superpower. Of course I'm going to get left behind because otherwise, I'll be Jimmy Olsen, the kid that always needs to get rescued.”

“Batman doesn't have superpowers and he seems to keep up just fine.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Just as you have so far. For one thing, Cory would never have found me if it wasn't for you. I was the Jimmy Olsen in that dead city.”

He's about to say more, except then we turn a corner and see city hall, the big stage with its “Humans for Humanity” banner and the flood of people all over the grounds. They're still streaming in.

“Holy crap!” Des says. “I never knew there were that many people in Santa Feliz.”

My heart sinks at the numbers that Householder has managed to pull in, but then I notice that not everybody here is supporting the congressman. I see as many pro-Wildling signs as I do ones for Householder's cause. The crowd is huge and the atmosphere feels charged and ready to blow.

I'm using the maps in my head to get a better sense of my surroundings, but there are so many people crowded around us that I have to dial my awareness way back. But even with the GPS tuned down, I'm getting a ton of information. Too much to sift through easily.

“I've never seen so many people,” Donalita says.

“Me neither. Except on TV. This is crazy.” I turn to look at her. “How are we supposed to find one whack-job in amongst them all?”

She looks as overwhelmed as I'm feeling, but then she shrugs and grins.

“We just start walking around,” she says, “and look.”

My gaze travels over the crowd. I spot Auntie Min's crow soldiers easily enough. They're on every vantage point—palm trees, light posts, rooflines. There are even a few of them on the edges of the big canvas canopy above the stage. I also spy local cops and state troopers, but there's no sign of the FBI, or Chaingang's crew. I could open my maps a little wider and find them, but that's not who we're looking for, anyway.

I offer Donalita my hand and she looks at it as though it's some alien object.

“We don't want to get separated,” I say.

There's still a half hour before the rally officially starts. Up on the stage, techs are running around making last-minute adjustments. I finally pick out Matteson and Solana standing in a cluster of suits just by the wings on stage left. Then one of the suits moves and I see Danny Reed—Elzie's friend from her activist days before we hooked up. The one that turned into a rat for the FBI.

That can't be good.

I suppose the FBI has some kind of vetting process, but what if he's still in contact with Elzie? What if he's in on the plot to kill the congressman? Hell, what if
he's
the assassin?

It seems so obvious that I can't believe nobody else has twigged to it. But then I realize that I haven't talked to either Matteson or Solana since I got back. They don't know what I found out in the otherworld.

I reach in my pocket for my phone, but of course it's not there. I can't remember the last time I saw it.

“Do you have a phone I can borrow?” I ask Donalita.

“Sure.”

I wait a moment, but she doesn't produce it.

“Um, can I borrow it now?”

“It'll have to be later,” she says. “I don't have it with me. I think I left it under Des's bed.”

“What were you doing—never mind.” I grab her hand. “We have to get up to the stage,” I tell her.

She follows in my wake as I wade into the crowd. I must say
“excuse me” a hundred times, but people move out of my way. When I pause for a moment to figure how to get through the next press of bodies, Donalita leans against my back.

“It's so funny,” she says in my ear. “They're all scared of you. They don't know why, but they are.”

I turn to tell her that's ridiculous, and bump into this huge guy standing beside me. If he's not one of the crew who does weightlifting down on the beach, then he should go meet them because they'd get along just fine. He stiffens and starts to react, but before I can apologize, I see something change in his eyes. It's not fear, so much as the look of a person who feels totally out of their depth.

“Sorry, man,” he mumbles and quickly turns away.

I turn back to Donalita.

“You're a predator,” she says, speaking softly, so that her voice doesn't carry. But I hear every word. “They can't explain how they know, but la-la-la—they can't ignore it, either.”

Great. So now I'm putting out a dangerous vibe, making people uncomfortable without even realizing that I'm doing it. Just one more thing to worry about.

But that'll have to wait till later. First I need to warn Matteson about Danny Reed.

I push ahead through the crowd, very aware now of how people are shifting so that they don't touch me as I pass. But I take advantage of it to work my way closer to the stage.

I'm not sure which part of the equation Fat Boy likes the least: backing down from us, getting into it with the state troopers or knowing that if he stays on course, he's got a confrontation with Josh coming up. Which also means having to deal with
los tíos
, and I already know the hawk uncles have some weird hold over the Mexican gangs. When you add in the fact that the Kings are just plain loco, there's no way to tell what he'll do.

Turns out he opts for backing down. His eyes are spitting hate, but he's got a big fake smile on his face.

“We'll see you later,
ese
,” he says. “You have your fun today.”

He and Para move off through the crowd. I see the staties hesitate. Finally one of them trails along behind Fat Boy and his lieutenant, and the other watches us for a minute or so before moving on himself.

“What's the deal with the bangers and these hawk dudes?” J-Dog wants to know.

“Beats me. But I've seen one of them use just a few words to stop a whole roomful of Kings about to blow.”

“You girls finished your pissing match?” Matteson asks through the earpiece.

“They teach you to talk like that in FBI school?” I ask him.

He laughs. “How's it looking out there?” he asks.

“We're shooting blanks,” J-Dog says. “Yo, homies. Talk to me.”

One by one the boys check in, but there's dick to report. Nobody sees anything suspicious or out of the ordinary.

“Unless you count way too many honkies,” Dekker says, “got nothing better to do than whine about something that's never going to be a for-real hassle in their whole lives.”

The crew laughs.

“Word,” Shorty adds. “Strictly First World problems.”

“How about you, Matteson?” I ask. “Anything?”