Cape Storm Page 0,65

was never going to get better, was I? I'm damned if I'm going to walk around with no fucking skin the rest of my life so that I can feel all good about adhering to my strict moral code." I took a deep breath and tasted ozone from the storm's whipping frenzy. "It's just power. Doesn't matter where it comes from, or where it goes."

"And you can quit any time you want."

My tone hardened. I still didn't like being mocked. "Fuck your intervention. I'm the one still standing."

Lewis's fingers tightened around the bottle. The one holding the only thing that might stop me. I'd known from the moment I walked out on the promenade that it was going to come down to this.

I smiled.

And he surprised me. "No. I'm not calling David. Not just for his sake - for yours. If you live through it, I don't want you having that on your conscience."

"I'm not Bad Bob," I said. "I love him."

He coughed blood. "You kind of loved me, too. Look how that turned out." I slapped my hand down hard next to his head. Hard enough to split the wood. Overhead, the storm shrieked harmony to the howling rage inside me. "Call him!"

"No way in hell."

All he had to do was get David out in the open. That was all I wanted. I slapped the deck again, and again, and again. Splinters jabbed deep, and I left primal bloody handprints behind.

It felt so good .

Lewis opened his eyes and locked stares with me at point-blank range. "No," he said, very softly. "This isn't going to happen the way you want." I looked up. There were other people out on the Promenade now - Wardens, arraying themselves against me.

Cherise, standing with them, like an actual person who mattered. They all wore identical tense, focused expressions... the look of soldiers just before the battle.

I looked down at Lewis and smiled a real, warm, sunny smile. "We'll see," I said, and stood up to put my hands on my hips. "We'll see about that." Then I walked away to get some air.

Nobody stopped me as I walked.

In time, I felt the last whispers of power click into place, locking me into the storm. We were one now - a symbiotic dark engine, generating our own power. Our own reality. The storm and I were one.

Easy,I told it. Easy, for now.

And the winds began to slow. It could bide its time.

So could I.

I waited until the winds died a bit, then let go of the bubble of force that Lewis and David had built at such cost.

I ended up on the port side of the ship, in a bar - preciously named Arpeggio's - where some of the non-Warden guests and crew were still gathered. Tables and chairs had been righted. There'd been some minor injuries, but not even a broken bone, remarkably. I supposed we'd gotten off light, unlike the crew of the Abigail .

I bellied up to the serving bar and perched on one of the high chairs. There were three guys behind the bar. One was cleaning up broken glass. The other two were taking orders.

A lot of people were drinking. I didn't blame them at all.

"What'll it be, miss?" the server asked me, and gave me a smile so even and white that he should have been in a commercial. It faded quickly. Even across the other side of a ship the size of a small city, word traveled fast, and it clicked in quickly who - or what - I was.

The room went quiet. He cleared his throat nervously. "Anything to drink?"

"Cyanide?" I was trying to be charming, but I could see from the alarm in his eyes that I was somehow missing the target.

"Fresh out, miss," he said weakly. "Some other poison, perhaps?" I gave up. "How about a vodka tonic?" That was my sorry-for-myself drink, and this seemed an ideal place to throw a ten-minute pity party. He turned away, mixed the drink, and put it on the coaster. I sipped. It was excellent. "I'm surprised the bar is open."

"Anything to keep people calm." There was more than a touch of febrile panic in his eyes now.

"Be sure to save some for yourself." I smiled, with teeth. "You're going to need it." He poured himself a shot of whiskey and downed it without a pause, then fled, leaving me in possession of the entire bar's contents. I sipped my vodka tonic and took a self-assessment as