Page 7 of The Chosen Son

I tugged on an earlobe, and everything evened out. I just caught the tail end of Phobos’s complaint. “…And she paid me in pickles! Not that I need money or anything, but they weren’t even good pickles.”

“Even a bad pickle is still a good pickle,” I said, stepping out of the stairwell into a carpeted hallway. The elevator would take me the rest of the way down. “Maybe you need to lower your picklestandards.”

He snorted and reached past me to press the button to call the elevator. I glanced at our reflections in the mirrored doors. Even in his ridiculous tights, Phobos was still a good-looking man, and when I met his eyes in the reflection, he was staring back at me with heat.

He moved closer to me, our shoulders brushing. “What I need is an in with the police commissioner. Maybe we should crash that charity gala next weekend. All the city’s top brass will be there. Plus, I have a stunning new tux and need an excuse to wear it.”

“That sounds like…” I paused, my shirt feeling suddenly too tight. “Like an awful idea,” I finished, hooking a finger into the collar and tugging.

With a cheerfulding!the elevator doors opened, and we stepped inside the car, before the doors closed once more and we headed for the ground floor at a stomach-dropping speed.

I cleared my throat, wiping sweat from my forehead. Was it hot in here? “I think your main problem is that the city is too safe. There really isn’t anything the police can’t handle on their own. Well, except for—”

Phobos’s eyes shot to me, hungry for whatever I was about to say. “Except forwhat?” he snapped.

I smirked, loving to make him wait. Finally, I said, “Except for all those mysterious kidnappings. Men, women, children, no apparent connections according to police. Large numbers of people being kidnapped from their homes or work, seemingly at random and with no motive, and then, like a week later, they are returned to their homes, with no memory of what happened and hardly a scratch on them, just a little groggy and dehydrated.”

The elevator arrived at the ground floor, and I stepped out into the lobby. Phobos, however, was no longer behind me. I turned to find him still standing halfway out of the car, blocking the doors fromclosing. “Did you say they had no memory?” he asked, his eyes trained vaguely on the floor.

“Yeah, like a blank slate, with no clue where they’d been all week or who took them. Why? Do you know what that means?”

“Huh?” He seemed to shake himself from his stupor, but when he looked at me, his gaze was focused just off center, like he couldn’t look me in the eye. “No, of course not. Why would I know anything? It’s just curious, that’s all.” Phobos then overcompensated with a mega-watt smile. “Shall we pick up pizza on the way home?”

Phobos was many things, but a good liar was not one of them. He knew something important, and for some reason, he was hiding it from me. That was particularly odd, considering just two minutes ago he’d been begging for some crime to solve.

I decided to play along for now, while doing some research on my own time. My smile was way more genuine than his. “Sure, but no pineapple. That’s just wrong.”

“What was that? I couldn’t quite hear you. Did you sayextrapineapple? That’s weird, I thought you didn’t like it, but okay. Whatever you say.”

I groaned, complaining about the unfairness of it all while Phobos giggled, but the truth was, I loved pineapple on pizza. But I’d learned that if I made him feel like he was winning on this, then he would let the anchovies go. I had this sidekick shit figured out.

As we pushed through the main doors and emerged on the sidewalk, it felt like I’d walked straight into a furnace. The air washed over me with blistering heat, but when I looked down at my hands, the skin was intact, not a single burn in sight. What the fuck? I staggered to a stop, clutching at my chest.

Phobos was still chattering away as he headed for the car, as oblivious as always to the people staring at him as he strode around in histights and cape, but he likewise hadn’t said a word about the world being on fire. In fact, nobody had. I squinted through the haze at a group of women walking down the street, laughing together, on their way out for the evening. One of them turned as she passed, and she frowned, slowing down to ask, “Hey, are you okay?”

I’d broken out in a sweat and gasped for breath as I struggled to answer. There was an impossible pressure on my chest, as if someone were sitting on it.

That got Phobos’s attention. “Cameron? What’s wrong?” He rushed over, reaching for me, and my body flooded with panic. What would happen if his skin made contact when I was like this?

“Don’t touch me!” I yelled, adrenaline helping to clear my mind.

And just like that, the heat evaporated.Poof, gone. Like it had never existed in the first place. If it weren’t for the lingering tingling sensation zinging up and down my arms and across my shoulders, I would think I’d imagined the entire thing.

The girls had been stunned by my outburst, and now turned accusing eyes on Phobos, who just shook his head. “Don’t look at me like that. I didn’t do anything to him.”

“No, he didn’t,” I assured them, my voice shaky. “Thank you for checking on me. I’m fine. Really.”

After a few more threatening glares, the group of women moved on down the block. As soon as they were out of hearing distance, Phobos leaned in and hissed, “Thatis not the kind of reputation I need right now, Cameron. What the hell? Those women think I abuse you!”

“I’m sorry!” I snapped back. “I just felt really sick all of a sudden, and I didn’t want to barf on you.”

That cooled his temper, and he took a big step back, in case I was still about to blow. “Oh. Well… thank you. I just had this suitdrycleaned.” He brushed imaginary dust away from the logo on his chest.

“You’resowelcome,” I said dryly, but the sarcasm was wasted on him.

Phobos headed back to the car and went to open the passenger door for me, but he paused gripping the handle, looking wary. “Do you think you’ll be okay in the car? I really wish we hadn’t carpooled.”

“I’m sure I’ll be fine. Whatever it was, it seems to have passed. Maybe it was just… motion sickness from the elevator.” Was that a thing? I didn’t have a clue, but at least Phobos didn’t either.

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