Thin Air

"I know you told me to stay away from Sarah, but I couldn't do it," the driver-Eamon-said. "I won't apologize for that; whatever she and I do is between the two of us. But I do apologize for making that promise to you in the first place."

Okay, so whoever Eamon was-and nice voice, by the way-I hadn't approved. But since I had no idea why I hadn't, and Eamon and Sarah weren't likely to give me an unvarnished explanation, I just nodded. "Water under the bridge," I said. Aphorisms were made for moments like these. Saved me from saying anything that might be proven wrong. "Are you two okay?"

Eamon's eyes focused on me in the rearview for so long that I thought he might drive over a curb. Or another car. He was one of those avoidance drivers, though-either great peripheral vision or awesome luck. Or something else. Maybe he's a Djinn. Except I didn't get any Djinn vibe from him.

"Us?" Eamon said, and raised his eyebrows. "Of course we're all right. Sarah, tell your sister you're fine."

"I'm fine," Sarah said. She didn't look it. She looked tired and puffy and not in the best possible state. Hungover, maybe. Or worse. The way she said it sounded hollow, but not as if she were really scared of him. Just...submissive. Wonderful. I had a wet rag for a sister. "Jo, you need to understand, I love Eamon. I know you didn't want us to stay together, but..."

Oh, God. The last thing I needed was to be the relationship police for a sister I'd barely met and-based on Cherise's memories-hadn't had much in common with to begin with. "I'm over it," I said. "Eamon and Sarah, sitting in a tree. True love. Trust me, I'm more worried about the fact that I was sitting in jail for a murder that I didn't commit." I left it there. I wanted to see what they'd have to say. Which was nothing, apparently. Eamon braked for the light at Fremont Street, and we all stared at the explosion of dancing lights during the pause. "Thanks for bailing me out."

"It seemed the thing to do." Eamon was being just as uninformative as I was. Not helpful. "Did you speak with the good Detective Rodriguez while you were in the precinct house?"

So he knew my friendly-or, at least, not adversarial-cop. "Yeah, I saw him."

"Ah. How is he?"

"Healing up. He had some kind of accident."

Eamon nodded. He kept watching me, and there was a tight frown grooved now between his eyebrows. "Did he say anything about what happened?"

"No." I felt a weird surge of alarm. "Why?" Please don't tell me that I'm responsible for that, too.

Was I crazy, or did he look oddly startled for a second before smiling? "No, nothing, don't worry. Listen, love, are you all right? You don't seem...quite yourself." His voice was low and rich with concern, and man, that was seductive. I wanted somebody to care whether or not I was okay, and obviously that wasn't going to be my sister. Disappointing, but there it was.

Sarah twisted in her seat again to look at me. Her pupils were huge. Bigger than they should have been, even in the dark. I wondered if she was on some kind of pain medication. "Well, she did just get out of jail," she said. "Of course she's not quite herself. She's scared, and there's nothing wrong with that. God, what are you doing in Vegas, Jo? You came looking for me, didn't you? I told you I didn't need your help. I told her, too."

"Her?" I repeated blankly.

Sarah's pointed chin lifted so she could look down her thin, patrician nose at me. "You know who. Imara."

My heart thudded hard against my rib cage, rattling to be free. Oh, that hurt. My sister had seen Imara. Imara had been part of my life. Had tried to help Sarah, evidently, for all the good that did. "When did you last see her?" I asked. Because if Sarah had seen her recently, maybe everybody was wrong about Imara. Wrong about her being...gone. Come on, Joanne, say it. Wrong about her being dead.

What, even David? some part of me mocked, more gently than the question deserved. Surely David would know if his child was alive. I didn't have to know a lot about the Djinn to understand that much.

Sarah avoided my gaze this time, turning back to stare out the windshield as Eamon navigated the car through the neon pinball machine of the Strip. "I haven't seen her since I told her to leave me in Reno," she said. "I know you both meant well, but honestly, Jo, she was getting on my nerves. And besides, she was worried about you. She wanted to get back and check on you, even though I told her you'd be okay. You're always okay."

Ouch. That stung, especially delivered in a tone so bitter it could have stripped paint. Apparently having a superhero wizard for a sister wasn't the party-in-a-box that you'd assume. Well, I wasn't finding it all clowns and puppies on this side, either.

"Jo," Eamon said, drawing my attention back to him. "I'm guessing that perhaps in this instance your sister might not have been exactly correct. Right? Things haven't gone as planned?"

"No," I said, and turned to look out the window at passing strangers who didn't notice me, or care. "Not exactly. Where are we going?"

"It's best if we don't tempt fate and stay in the city," he said. "Sarah and I have a small place a couple of hours down the road. If you don't mind?"

I shrugged. I had no money, no transportation, and no real alternatives; seemed like I was stuck with Sarah and Eamon. At least Eamon seemed like a decent kind of guy.

A better person than my sister, anyway.

I wondered if maybe I was internalizing the dislike Cherise had felt for Sarah; probably I was. After all, I didn't have the normal family bonds and memories, nothing that would let me overlook Sarah's flaws and love her anyway. I didn't know her, except on the surface, and the surface wasn't looking very pretty.

Besides, it was fairly clear how she felt about me.

But she bailed you out.

Interesting.

Chapter Eight

EIGHT

Two hours and a boring number of minutes later, we entered a dry, sun-faded little town called Ares, Nevada. Population 318, and no doubt declining. It wasn't a garden spot, unless you liked your garden with lots of thorns and spikes. I remembered-actually, Cherise had remembered-my sister as being impeccably groomed, focused on polish and presentation. I doubted that would get her very far in the social scene of Ares, which probably revolved around the local Dairy Queen we'd passed, and possibly a strip club.

There was one stoplight in town, and Eamon obeyed it at the corner of Main and Robbins, then turned right. Nothing after the next block but some emptied-out stores with soaped windows, and the ruins of a few buildings that hadn't been so lucky or durable. We kept driving. About a mile on, Eamon turned the car off on a bumpy, unpaved side road, and I saw that we were heading for a mobile home community.

As trailer parks went, it tried to rise above the cliches.

There were a few struggling bushes, some attempt at landscaping at the front entrance. Not much clutter. The trailers were mostly in decent shape, although a few showed the ravages of time and weather. There were a couple of retirees walking small, fat dogs along the roadside, and one of them waved. Eamon waved back.

"I hate this place," Sarah said. She sounded like she meant it.

"It's temporary, Sarah. You know that." Eamon must have been tired of explaining it; his tone was more than a little sharp. "Just until the funds come through on the international transfer."

"Meanwhile, we're living in a trailer park. With crack-heads! I used to live in the same zip code with Mel Gibson, for God's sake!" I wondered if the trailer park had its fringe benefits for her, like being a good place to score drugs. Heroin? Meth? Coke? Something that made her pupils so inordinately wide. Eamon seemed sober as a judge, though, so it wasn't likely he was the one supplying her habits. I wasn't sure he even knew, which made me think that he was willfully blind to her problems. Or he knew, and he'd given up trying to fix her.

"It's only temporary," Eamon said again. "I'm sorry, love; I know it's not what you're used to. Things will get better. You'll bear with me, won't you?"

There was a kind of wistful longing in his voice, and Sarah softened. She stretched out a hand toward him, and he took it and held it. He had amazing hands-long, elegant, beautifully cared for. His fingers overlapped hers by inches. "I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't mean it that way. Of course I'll put up with whatever I have to for us to be together." She threw me a look in the rearview mirror. A defiant one. "No matter what other people think."

I'd thought Eamon was bad for her? Wow. I really hadn't had a clue about my sister if I'd thought that a slick English guy who would put up with her bullshit was a bad deal for her. "Other people meaning me?" I asked, and let a little of my frustration out. Sarah glared.

"Of course, meaning you," she snapped. "What other controlling, know-it-all relative do I have in the backseat? Is Mom in your pocket?"

Eamon pulled the car to a stop before I could think of a suitably acid reply to any of that. Probably for the best. The sedan wasn't big enough for a real girl fight, and the bloodstains would never come out of the upholstery.

"Home sweet home," he said with just the right touch of irony. "Sorry, I've given the staff the day off. Do forgive the mess."

It was a trailer. Not a very big one-not one of the kingly double-wides, like the one across the road. And it was dented, faded, and run-down. There were some cheerful window boxes, but they were full of dead plants; what a shock. I couldn't see Sarah as the getting-her-hands-dirty gardener. Apart from the bold landscaping choice of a chain-link fence around some struggling, sun-blasted grass, there wasn't much to recommend the place.

"Nice," I said noncommittally, and got out to follow Eamon toward the aluminum Taj Mahal.

It wasn't any better on the inside, although it was darker. The smell was a little strange-a combination of unwashed towels and old fried fish, with a little stale cat litter thrown in-and as I blinked to adjust my eyes I saw that the place must have been bought fully furnished. Matted, ancient gold shag carpet. Heavy, dark furniture that had gone out of style twenty years ago, at least. Clunky, vegetable-colored appliances in the small kitchen. There were dips in the carpet that I suspected meant rotting floors.

Still, they'd made an attempt. The place was mostly clean, and it was also mostly impersonal, with only a few personal items-Sarah's-in view. A trashy candy-colored book on the coffee table, facedown. A wineglass with some sticky residue in the bottom next to it. A fleece robe flung over one end of the couch, and I hoped it didn't belong to Eamon, because pale pink wasn't really his color.

Eamon swept the place with a look, tossed his keys on the counter, and turned to face me. It was my first good look at him, and I wasn't disappointed. My sister did have good taste in exteriors, at least. He wasn't gorgeous, but he was nice-looking, with a clever face and a sweet smile. The only thing that bothered me about him were the dark, steady eyes that didn't quite match the rest of his expression.

"Jo," he said, and opened his arms. I took the cue and hugged him. He had a strong, flat body, vividly warm, and he didn't hang on an inappropriately long time, though he gave good value for his five seconds. When we parted again, his eyes were bright, almost feverish. "I'll tell you the honest truth: It's good to see you again," he said. "I know I speak for Sarah when I say that we were worried when you dropped out of sight. Where have you been?"

I had no idea what span of time that covered, of course, not that I was going to tell him that. "Around," I said, and smiled back. "I'm parched. Can I get something to drink?"

"Of course. Sarah." He said it as if she were his servant, and I saw her frown work its way deeper into her forehead. Couldn't blame her on that one. I wouldn't have appreciated it, either. Still, she wandered into the kitchen and started rooting through cabinets, assembling me a drink. She didn't ask what I liked. I guessed either she already knew or didn't care. "Please, sit down. Tell me what happened to get you into this problem."

"Mistaken identity," I said, but I obeyed the graceful wave of his hand toward the couch. Eamon took a chair next to it. "Nothing to tell, really. They think I killed a cop."

"Ah. Which cop would this be?"

"Detective Quinn."

"I see. And did you?" he asked, not looking at me. He needed a haircut; his brown, silky shag was starting to take on a retro-seventies look that made him look a little dangerous.

"I can't believe you asked me that," I said, which was a nice nonanswer. "What do you think?"

"I think that they're talking about Orry, aren't they?"

"Thomas Quinn," I said. "They didn't mention anyone named Orry."

He shot me a quick, unreadable glance. "Oh," he said. "I see. Not the same person, then."

I covered with a noncommittal shrug. Eamon smiled slightly, and then moved back in his chair as Sarah came toward us with drinks. Eamon's was clearly alcohol-something amber, on the rocks-and mine was just as clearly not. It bubbled with carbonation. I sipped carefully, but it was just Coca-Cola. No rum, no whiskey. It was even diet.

And yes, it was delicious. My body went into spasms of ecstasy over the faux-sugar rush, and it was all I could do not to chug the entire thing in one long gulp.

Sarah perched on the arm of Eamon's chair, her own glass clutched in one long-fingernailed hand. She needed a manicure, and she didn't need to be drinking whatever was in that glass, which wasn't likely to be as innocuous as my Diet Coke. "What were you talking about?" she asked. Eamon raised his eyebrows at me.