Shadow Hunt

He glared at me. “Don’t be perky. It’s weird when you’re perky.” He stepped aside so Shadow and I could come in.

As I walked past, I got a good whiff of him. “Holy crap, Jack! Are you . . . hungover?” I’d never known straight-arrow Jack to have more than one beer. The little sister in me was kind of delighted.

“It’s not my fault,” he groused. “Some buddies from work came over last night to play Magic: the Gathering, and one of them brought this raspberry moonshine . . . it got ahead of me.”

“You’re such a weird nerd.” Jack led me back into the living room, where he leaned against the arm of the couch and ate more cereal. I looked around at a scary amount of empty chip bags and beer bottles. Yep, it definitely looked like things had gotten ahead of him. “Where are Juliet and the kids?”

“In San Jose visiting her parents,” he said, yawning. “Until Monday.”

God bless weekend traveling. “You should probably start cleaning now.”

“Bite me.” He took another spoonful of cereal. “What’s up? I haven’t seen you in . . .” He blinked, his eyes focusing. “Wait, it’s been like two months. Juliet said you’re not returning her calls.”

Right. Whoops. “Can we sit down?” I asked.

He nodded. “You want some cereal?”

I was about to say no, but the baby felt differently. “Actually, yes.”

A few minutes later, we were seated at the kitchen table with our bowls of cereal. I was having flashbacks to being eight. “Jack, listen . . . you know how I work for Dashiell.”

His eyebrows went up. “Yeah.”

“Well . . .” I pushed the cereal around with my spoon. “I don’t just clean houses for him.”

Jack finished chewing a bite, swallowed, and said, “I kind of figured.”

Now it was my turn to look surprised. “What do you think I do?”

“Honestly, I have no idea. But you’re smart and tough, and you make too much money.” He shrugged. “I figured it was something legally questionable but morally sound, like helping illegals get fake IDs. Or fighting crime at night in a cape. Something along those lines.”

“That doesn’t . . . bother you?”

Jack put his spoon down and pushed the bowl away. “Scarbo, when Mom and Dad died, I ditched you. We didn’t have much money, you couldn’t focus on school, and you were just . . . out there in the world. In LA. I’m your big brother, and I let that happen.” He reached across the table and touched my hand. “What right do I have to question the choices you made in order to take care of yourself when I couldn’t?”

Tears pricked at my eyes. Was it possible that I wouldn’t need to blatantly lie to my human brother? “Listen. You’re right. Dashiell does some iffy stuff, but his heart is in the right place. He takes care of people. And that’s made him some enemies.”

Jack’s eyes narrowed. “Go on.”

“I haven’t been calling Juliet back because I was afraid there might be blowback on you guys for what I do to help Dashiell.”

He pulled his hand away and toyed with the spoon, looking unhappy. “I didn’t realize your work was like, dangerous.”

I pushed out a breath. “It usually isn’t. But today, there’s something going on, and . . . well . . . the bad guys know I have a brother.”

Jack leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “How much trouble are you in?”

I faked a smile. “No more than I can handle,” I said lightly, hoping it was true. “But can you go somewhere else for a day or two? I can pay for it,” I added quickly. At this rate, I was going to need to start taking a lot of freelance jobs.

Jack shook his head. “It’s not that . . . I don’t like this, Scarlett. Shouldn’t you just go to the police?”

I almost laughed. “That . . . would not be a good idea at this time, no.”

“So quit,” he said, like it was the easiest solution in the world. “Get another job. We can help you, if it’s about money—”

“It’s not that.” I actually considered the idea for a second, but of course it was hopeless. Nulls were valuable. I needed to be under someone’s protection, and I was never going to get a better offer than I had here. This was my home. “I can’t quit, Jack.”

“Why not?”

“It’s complicated.”

He stood up then, pacing away to look out the window. I waited him out. Finally, he turned around and looked at me. “Do you really think they’d come after me?” Fear hit his face. “Or Juliet? The kids?”

I considered telling him about Noah then. I really did. But that kind of confirmation could be dangerous down the road, especially if Noah recovered and we needed to press him. “It’s not a chance I’m willing to take. Will you go somewhere?”

“Fine. I’ll call in sick for tomorrow, and drive up to San Jose to join Juliet. But . . . I need to think about this whole thing, Scarlett. About”—he hesitated for a moment, obviously upset, then pushed on—“about whether you have a place in the kids’ lives, if you’re gonna keep doing what you’re doing.”

My heart sank, but . . . wasn’t this exactly what’d I’d expected? Jack had a family now. They needed him more than I did. “I understand, Jack. Really, I do.”

I got up, the cereal forgotten, and headed toward the front door. Then a thought surfaced from way in the back of my mind, and I turned around again. “Hey . . . do you remember any of our grandparents?”

Jack looked surprised. “A little. Why?”

“Just something I’ve been thinking about lately. Grandma Rose lived the longest, right?” She had been our mother’s mother.

“Yeah, she died just before Mom and Dad. But she and Mom hadn’t talked for a long time before that.”

I nodded. “I remember how upset Mom was, but do you know why they stopped talking?”

“Uh . . .” He looked at the ceiling, his eyes going distant. “No, I guess I don’t. I remember Mom screaming at her on the phone once, when I was supposed to be in bed. She was mad that Grandma had never told her about something.” He shrugged. “I never got the details.” He spread his hands, not saying it. And now they’re all gone.

“Okay . . . thanks, Jack.”

“Goodbye, Scarbo.”

He sounded oddly formal, and I knew what it meant. Fighting back tears, I added, “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

I left the condo wondering when I’d next see my brother.

Chapter 33

After I left Jack’s house, I checked in with Kirsten, who got a little snappish as she told me that she had calls out everywhere and was working on it, Scarlett. It wasn’t that she couldn’t find information; there were apparently hundreds of different stories about the Wild Hunt, in English alone. The problem was sifting through and figuring out what was real and what was classic Old World misdirection. I asked after Owen, and she paused and said, “Actually, he’s been a lot of help. He seems . . . invested.”

“They killed his grandfather in front of him,” I pointed out.

“Yeah. Hey, what about your contacts?” Kirsten said suddenly. “Aren’t there nulls or someone you can ask about the Wild Hunt?”

Huh. I hadn’t really considered that. I had already left a message for Lex asking her to talk to Maven, but I’d need to wait until after sundown to hear back, and it sounded like whatever was happening would start at nightfall. But I did know a few other people. “I’ll make some calls,” I promised Kirsten.

We agreed to meet in another two hours to pool our findings. As soon as I hung up, I opened an e-mail on my phone.

It’s hard to reach out in the Old World, because it’s so much like Fight Club, and because it’s not organized into governments or anything. There are no embassies, no tourism boards. It’s sort of a feudal-system-meets-the-Wild-West kind of scenario, which makes it hard to communicate in the modern world. You can’t just google “nulls in Japan” and get anywhere.