An odd silence had fallen over the HQ grounds as Gage, Renee, and I stepped out to begin searching for Ethan. We managed to cover six feet of sidewalk past the Medical Center’s doors before my Vox squealed, startling everyone. I pulled it off my belt.
<Ah, hello?> Dahlia’s voice over the Vox.
“Dahlia, it’s Trance,” I replied. “What is it?”
<We have a tip. A man just called the police switchboard, and they, um, transferred the information to the ATF satellite office and then to Agent Grayson. It’s really neat, though, that the police can—>
“Dahlia, information.”
Renee snorted. Dahlia was young, terrified, and very green, but she was trying to be helpful.
<Oh, right,> she said. <Apartment complex over on Stanley Avenue, the Blue Tower. The landlord called and said he had a tenant who kind of matches the police photos of Specter that we sent out.>
Gage’s head snapped toward me. I met his gaze and saw surprise there. “Kind of matches?” he asked.
<He said the tenant’s name is Marcus Spence. He’s lived there for eleven years. The landlord only spoke to the tenant the day he signed the rental agreement, and hasn’t seen him coming or going in three years.>
“So this Spence guy could be a rotting corpse, and the landlord wouldn’t know it,” I said.
<Gross. Somebody would have smelled him.>
“I was making a point, Dal. What’s this landlord’s name?”
<Andrew Milton.>
“All right, thanks. Trance out.” I put the Vox away and turned toward the Base. “Field trip. And I want Psystorm on this.”
“What about Ethan?” Gage asked.
I flinched. I hated putting Ethan off. He was my friend, he was injured, and he was out there alone. Alone by choice. “Specter’s still our top priority,” I said, meeting everyone’s gaze in turn. They seemed to accept my statement. Foe over friend.
No matter how much it hurt.
The Blue Tower was a few miles away in old West Hollywood, overlooking a strip of sidewalk sporting names of celebrities past. The entire area had once been a glamorous place to live and work. Then too many earthquakes and quite a few Bane attacks had changed the landscape.
Since the War, drinking had become a favorite pastime in many cities, and the most successful chains were, like Whiskey Jack’s, the ones that threw sex legally into the mix. We passed at least a dozen such places on the first four blocks of Hollywood Boulevard. Gage maneuvered the tinted-window Sport down the crowded early-morning streets, past a few crumbling theaters and boarded-up tourist shops.
Six blocks down from the last open bar, we found the Blue Tower, just off Stanley Avenue. A square building painted sky blue, it lived up to half of its name. It resembled a penitentiary more than a housing complex, with scattered windows and no balconies. I couldn’t imagine what it had been before it became low-rent housing for the city’s forgotten.
Gage pulled into an underground parking garage, casting the dim vehicle into darker shadows. I leaned against the dash, watching every corner and cranny, expecting a trap. None sprung. If this was bait, Specter didn’t seem to know we’d taken it.
As we walked, Psystorm’s eyes never stopped moving, as if he expected an attack at any moment. On some level, I understood—he’d been imprisoned for a long time, and now he was back in a world with no walls around it, about to betray a former ally. Not conducive to a sense of personal safety.
We found the landlord’s office—a white door next to the first floor elevator with a manager sign and separate opening at the top. Gage pressed the buzzer, and it screeched angrily on the other side of the wall. Footsteps shuffled.
“If it’s rent,” a voice shouted, “just slip it under the door.”
“Mr. Milton?” I said.
“Who is it?”
“We’re following up on the tip you gave to the police this morning.”
A latch turned. The upper half of the door swung out, almost clipping Renee’s forehead. Andrew Milton stepped into the half frame, a tall and overweight man with the lingering build of a retired linebacker. His bald head and lack of beard did nothing to hide sagging jowls and liver spots.
He stared at Renee first, either shocked by her blue skin or admiring her black leather uniform, and then at me. He dismissed Gage and Psystorm with a flicker of his eyes, and went back to staring at Renee.
“Hey, over here,” I said, snapping my fingers to get his attention. “You have a tenant named Marcus Spence, correct?”
“Yeah, up on the fifth floor,” Milton said. “Why?”
“You tell me, Mr. Milton. When you called the police, you seemed to think Mr. Spence fit a particular profile. Why?”
Milton shrugged, less interested in the conversation than in the cleft between my breasts. “He looks like the guy, is all. I’ve been here twenty years, you know, I know my tenants. This guy Spence hasn’t left the building in three years.”
“What about rent?” Gage asked.
No acknowledgment, still talking to my cleavage. “Pays in cash every time. I never see him, but someone slips the envelope under the door. Utilities are included in rent. He’s got no phone lines or Web connections up there, so I don’t know who he talks to. None of the neighbors complain, though, so I leave him be as long as he keeps paying on time.”
“Does he ever have visitors?” I asked.
“None I ever saw, but I don’t watch the front door all the time.”
“So he could have left without you knowing.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Did you run a credit check on him?”
Milton snorted. “In this neighborhood? People don’t have credit. He gave me three months’ rent up front, lady, so I was inclined to give him the apartment. Wish all my tenants were so good to me.”
Gage produced a folded photograph from his uniform pocket and held it up. “Are you sure this is the man who’s been renting from you?”
“Yep, that’s him, only older and in a wheelchair.”
My hand jerked. “Wheelchair?”
“Yeah, sucker can’t walk. Said it was a stroke or something. Apartment wasn’t good for handicaps, but he didn’t seem to care. Just wanted someplace quiet, he said.”
He’s telling the truth, Psystorm said in my head. I looked at Gage. He nodded; his senses said the same.
“What room?” I asked.
“Five E,” Milton said. “Fifth floor, end of the hall. Look, you people aren’t going to start up trouble, are you?”
I let the “you people” comment slide. “We’ll do our best to question Mr. Spence quietly.”
“Good, ’cuz I don’t know if my insurance on this place would consider you an act of God. I don’t have insurance for superpower destruction, you know. After the War, everyone dropped that from their premiums.”
“They may want to think about adding the clause again,” Renee said.
Milton blanched.
“Look,” I said, “contrary to recent events, I have no intention of burning your building down, so relax.” Still, it didn’t hurt be prepared. “How many people live here?”
“Eighty or so. Six floors, five apartments on each floor.”
“Are most of them at work?”
“In this neighborhood? A lot of them work out of their homes, if you get my meaning.”
“Loud and clear, but we’re not the police and not here for them. I just want an idea of who might or might not be home right now.”
Milton hung his head and groaned. “You’re going to burn the place down, I know it.”
I rolled my eyes. “Mr. Milton—”
Bells clanged, thundering so loudly I couldn’t concentrate, and the sprinkler system spat tepid water from the ceiling. Gage must have been extending his hearing to get an idea of the number of people in the building, because he cried out and dropped to his knees, palms over his ears. He could control the level at which his senses operated, but getting caught like that had to hurt like hell.
“You see!” Milton shouted. “I knew it, I knew it. Act of God, I tell you, it was an act of God.”
He yanked open the bottom half of the door and stormed past us, his feet squishing on the rapidly soaking carpet. He raced down the hallway, toward the front door, still cursing and complaining about insurance.
“I do not believe this,” I said.
“Could someone have set off the alarm by accident?” Renee asked. Water rolled down her face and plastered her hair to her back and shoulders.
“No,” Psystorm said. “No, he knows we’re here. It’s a distraction.”
Gage dropped his hands and looked up. Pain was etched across his face, but he seemed to have his senses under control. “Do you smell the fire?” I asked as I helped him stand. He stepped away as soon as he was on his feet.
“It’s above us,” he said. “Second floor, I think, and getting bigger by the minute. If the sprinklers don’t stop it, we’re going to have an inferno on our hands.” The sprinkler system slowed from a spray to a trickle, and finally stopped altogether.
“Hell,” I said.
“Give it time,” Psystorm said.
Far away, someone screamed, audible even over the blare of the alarm bell.
“We split up,” I said. “Psystorm and I will head for Spence’s apartment. You two make sure people are getting out of this building, and then call Dahlia. Maybe she can get down here and do something with the fire.”
“She’s still green, T,” Renee said.
“She’s strong and we need her.”
I turned. Someone caught my wrist and pulled me back. Gage’s mouth opened—no words tumbled out. We really needed to talk when this was over. “I’ll be careful,” I said.
After he and Renee disappeared down an adjacent corridor, I turned to Psystorm. He was hard to read, showing no outward signs of fear or concern, just a weary sense of duty.
“Let’s find the stairs,” I said.