Hero Worship(6)
Author: Amelia Wilde

 

Now it’s time that I’m separated from Daisy by the distance of cruising altitude and hundreds of miles.

 

I’d like to stay separated from her. That would be ideal. She doesn’t want me to be in her house any more than I want to be in her house, but she won’t die under my protection. I’ve accepted the mission. The next step is to carry it out.

 

Not because I have feelings for her. The only thing I feel about Daisy is frustration.

 

My plane touches down at a private airstrip west of LA as the sky is turning gray, gearing up for dawn. There’s a car waiting by the hangar, a driver standing at the door.

 

The driver gives me the code phrase for the mission. Midnight blooms. He’s brisk about shutting the SUV’s door behind me and driving off. No doubt he’s been given explicit instructions from Zeus. The man isn’t wasting a second, even from all the way across the country.

 

Hercules: Landed. In the car en route to her house

 

 

 

 

 

Zeus: No trouble on the flight?

 

 

 

 

 

Hercules: Tell me you didn’t stay up all night tracking the damn thing

 

 

 

 

 

Zeus: I would, but I’d be lying

 

 

 

 

 

Hercules: Go the fuck to sleep

 

 

 

 

 

Zeus doesn’t answer, and I know that’s not because he trotted off to bed. All three of those overprotective pricks are probably still sitting on his kitchen floor in a huddle, waiting for confirmation that Daisy’s fine. As if she doesn’t have security already.

 

Somehow, the thought isn’t comforting. Her security wasn’t enough to keep someone from shooting at her at an art gallery. That’s why I’m here.

 

It’s a short drive from the airstrip to Daisy’s house, which is immediately recognizable as a property her father bought for her.

 

It’s beachside property, for one thing. Her yard is grass on one side and a sandy beach on the other. Waves roll on the shore under the lightening sky. The houses on either side are a good distance away, giving her privacy, and every window in view has a subtle tint to it that says it’s the ultra-expensive filtering glass that her father and both her uncles have in their giant-ass houses.

 

Daisy’s is neat and elegant. One story. White siding. Black frames around the windows. The driver enters a code at the gated driveway, and we go through.

 

A lantern hangs above the front door, its glow fainter by the second as the sun begins to rise. I sling my bag over my shoulder, put my phone in my pocket, and go.

 

Daisy’s front door opens before I can touch it. A man in a suit sans jacket stands inside. “Code.”

 

“Midnight blooms.”

 

He gives a terse wave to the driver, takes my shirt in his fist, and hauls me over the threshold. Doesn’t seem to care at all how loud the door slams. He locks it and turns his back on me, heading into the house.

 

What the fuck?

 

“You’re Shane, right?”

 

He pauses, halfway around a corner. “Yes.”

 

“The hell is going on?”

 

Shane doesn’t answer, and it doesn’t matter that I hardly slept on the plane. I’m wide awake, because this is off. Hades would’ve had a hand in hiring this guy. There’s no way he’s this shaken by a near miss.

 

I follow him into the house. Through a neat living area with a picture window overlooking the ocean. Through the kitchen. A short hallway leads past a walk-in closet and into the main bedroom.

 

Dawn is beginning to filter through the windows. The glass makes it more shadow than light. The brightest spot in the room is Shane’s phone. It washes all the color from his face and makes it hard to see anything else. He sits on a chair next to the bed, watching the screen.

 

Daisy comes into view as my eyes adjust.

 

She’s on top of the covers in a black cocktail dress, and she’s dead.

 

Fuck, no, she’s not dead. I’ve taken a few involuntary steps closer, and I can see her chest rising and falling. Her eyes are open and staring, no reaction at all to the light of Shane’s phone.

 

It would be impossible to tell if she was reacting, anyway, because her pupils are about the size of her irises. According to family lore, they were like that when she was born. If she hadn’t inherited her father’s sensitivity to light, she’d have blue eyes.

 

But this stillness, this staring—this is not fucking normal.

 

It’s not rage that floods my body. It’s bloodlust. I want to find the person to blame for this and fucking kill him.

 

First, I have to deal with the liar in the room.

 

“Shane.”

 

He doesn’t look up from his phone. “It’s my understanding that you’re—”

 

I don’t know I’ve gone for him until his shirt is in my fist. Until his feet are about to lift off the ground. We’re the same height, but I could do it. “Tell me what the fuck is going on. Tell me why she’s like that if the bullet didn’t touch her.”

 

Shane shoves his phone into my chest. “That.”

 

I put his feet firmly on the ground, let my bag slide off my shoulder, and look at the screen. It’s a graph. Some kind of medical printout. A blue wave is spiky and high and thrashing, like a storm, and it’s way above a thick red line in the middle. “What am I looking at?”

 

“A seizure.”

 

“Are you fucking with me? Why didn’t you take her to the hospital?”

 

“Hercules—”

 

“I know you have orders for this, motherfucker. If you’re more concerned with your job than with her safety, then get the fuck off this property before I tear you limb from—”

 

“They’re her orders,” he snaps. “I’m following her orders. She hired me, she pays me, they’re her orders.”

 

He’s shaking. This close, there’s no denying that the man looks like shit. Dark circles under his eyes. A wild look about him.

 

I let go of his shirt but keep my hand on his chest in case he loses his mind. “Has she been like this since the shooting?”