Hand to Hand, Hand to Mouth
Chapter Eleven
We were back in Huairou before 3:00 AM. I barely remembered the trip. Shuddering into Monica's shoulder, I must have passed out. The next thing I knew, the car was stopping and I was curled against her with my arm around her waist and her hand gently stroking my hair. Oh, hell.
Opening my eyes to see her face with unmasked concern and goddamned pity all over it was a level of embarrassment I didn't think it was possible for me to feel anymore. And, yeah, I overreacted. So, sue me.
"Get away from me," I croaked, my mouth dry and sawdusty. Trying to regain some kind of composure, I pushed her, hard.
For just a moment, she looked like she had been slapped and then her jaw clenched and the openness was gone, replaced by a hard, calculating stare. I opened the car door and scrambled out, just wanting to get away. Far, far away. Unfortunately, my body just wasn't having it. I slumped heavily against the Porsche, squeezing my eyes shut, and willed my legs to stop shaking, my stomach to stop turning and my head to stop spinning.
I was having the worst night I had had in a long, long time. And that, let me tell you, is really saying something.
When the vertigo passed, I opened my eyes to find Logan standing in front of me. He was totally covered in blood. I hadn't noticed before.
"You okay to walk?" His voice sounded strained, though he at least had the decency to not look like he thought I was beyond pathetic.
I nodded too vigorously and another round of the spins hit me. It wasn't quite so bad that time, only lasting a couple of seconds. Still, Logan moved like he was going to pick me up. That would definitely not have helped me regain control of the situation. I held up my hand to stop him.
"Not in front of the help, dude."
He nodded tersely, instantly understanding that we still needed something from Monica. I still had a job to do.
The woman herself had, apparently, wandered out of the renovated structure that housed Aunt Hope's vehicles--the Boxster, four motorcycles and a Range Rover. I found Monica outside looking up at the transport. Her arms crossed over her generous chest, she tapped perfectly manicured nails against her biceps.
"SHIELD." Her voice was cold and businesslike.
"Yeah," I replied. I had forgotten that she knew next to nothing about me. It had either been pretty brave or pretty stupid of her to trust that I wasn't trying to kill her, too. Of course, now she knew where my house was. Maybe I was the stupid one, after all.
"That explains rather a lot," she said. "So, are you taking me back to the mothership?"
I sighed and, without explanation, pried her hand away from where it had been clamped to her own forearm. A flicker of surprise registered on her face before she could clamp down on it.
Logan, to my own surprise, offered me his arm to lean on without any accompanying comment. I took it with total gratitude; my legs still felt rubbery.
I led them both through the mists. This time, Logan's tension when the fog shut him in was almost imperceptible. Monica didn't react at all. Her hand, loose in mine, was cool and dry.
"Fantastic," she said dryly, pulling away from me when we emerged into the courtyard. "I'm in bloody Chinese Brigadoon."
Though it was very late, Mister Hu was still up and waiting for us to arrive. He was already in motion when we walked into the inner hall. I was hardly through the doorway and he was unbuttoning my jacket. Pulling the ruined silk off, he checked me for injuries. My knees were skinned from when I had retched onto the pavement. Hu clucked disapprovingly at the raw, meaty mess.
Logan was getting the same treatment from Zeng. His clothes were soaked with blood, though I'm sure not much of it was his. Zeng peeled away Logan's leather jacket, his flannel shirt and the a-line undershirt he typically wore. To his credit, Logan didn't look at all uncomfortable with the attention, though he wouldn't let Zeng wash the blood off of him. Instead, he took the steaming cloth and quickly scrubbed himself.
A frightened-looking boy darted into the room and picked up the discarded clothing. The new apprentice, I assumed. Some introduction he was getting to me, huh? Though we were nearly the same size, he looked at me warily. When I smiled at him, he flinched and ran from the room. Great. I could add horrifies adolescent boys to my resume.
The mountain night was cooler than the city had been and I was glad to finally be bossily shepherded into a chair near the roaring fire. Mister Hu washed my wounds with a warm wet cloth, applied salve and bandaged them. When he had finished with my knees, he took my head in his hands and, before I could even flinch, simultaneously removed both of my contact lenses with his thumbs. Both the diagnosis and the surgical strike were total testaments to his skills. I hadn't even noticed how badly my eyes had been burning.
Monica caught my eye and cocked her head, puppy-like. Sitting languidly in a chair opposite me, she had somehow come through the fight looking as fresh and pretty as she had in the club. Her white cheongsam was hardly even grimy. Only her hair was at all worse-for-wear and even that just looked intentionally windswept. I swear, I'll never understand that. Why is it that some people always come out of a fight looking like they're fresh from a spa weekend? I end up looking like I went ten rounds with Juggernaut and then topped it off by drinking tequila in Tijuana for a week.
Ever the pro, Monica kissed at me and winked.
"Quit it," I snapped at her.
She smiled mercurially.
The boy returned to the hall with a fresh flannel shirt that I could only assume he had retrieved from Logan's bag. He shrugged it on but didn't bother buttoning it. It was such a typical Logan thing to do that I couldn't help chuckling. It was hoarse sound, totally out of place in the serious, quiet room. He looked at me sharply. I shook my head, choking back the inappropriate laughter.
Once we had been seen to, including serving tea that I had no interest in, Mister Hu and the others left the room to us. Monica crossed her legs demurely at the ankle and daintily sipped her tea. Logan lurked quietly near the fireplace, a presence in the room even while in the background. Totally worn out, I breathed deeply and tried to pull myself together.
"Why were you there?" Monica asked abruptly.
I looked at her stupidly. "What?"
"Tonight. Why were you at Rui?" She spoke slowly and clearly as though to someone very slow. Which, honestly, at that moment, I was.
I studied her while trying to decide how I could best play this. Monica's eyes were green and cat-like, so pale they were practically yellow. In the flickering firelight, you might almost think they were warm. I knew better than that, though. I had seen Monica's eyes go cold and cloudy like milky jade while she worked a crowded room, looking for whatever unlucky sucker had the bullseye painted on them. She was a raptor. The fox in every henhouse.
I decided to play it straight.
"I needed information," I answered honestly. "I thought you might be able to help."
She smiled. "So, it was a happy coincidence that, for this one time only, you just happened to bring a babysitter? And not just any old muscle. Oh no. It's the world famous Wolverine. Surely, Xue, you cannot think me that much of a silly bitch."
I should have known there was no way Logan could go unrecognized. Not anymore. Fuck. I was so done in Beijing.
"It really was a coincidence." I tried to soothe her sarcasm. "I swear it was. I'm just trying to get a line on an underground upstart criminal organization. It seemed like it could be the sort of thing that would cross your desk. This was just a right time, right place, right backup sort of thing."
She seemed uninspired by my sincerity. "You're SHIELD. You must forgive me if that doesn't stir a great deal of confidence."
I shrugged. "You never seemed all that hesitant to spill your guts before. What's the big deal now?"
"The big deal," Monica said silkily, "as you so preciously put it, is that I've gone a year thinking that you were Chinese underground and the whole time you were just another one of Nick Fury's thugs."
Logan snorted. Oh, he and Monica were going to be Best Friends Forever with their mutual hatred of the Colonel. The slumber parties were going to be a blast. Monica, however, took his amusement for derision.
"Sodding Americans." She gave him an ugly look.
"Canadian," I corrected automatically.
She turned the glare on me. "What?"
I shrugged. "Canadian. He's Canadian."
"Well, that rather ruins the mystique a bit then, doesn't it?"
Logan was scowling at me. "You wanna give her my home address while you're at it, Jubilation?"
"Jubilation?" Monica asked gleefully. "Is that your name?"
I scowled back at Logan. "Thanks, dude. I'll send her over for a visit when she looks me up in information."
Monica sighed. "Oh, what does it matter now? You'll not be able to work in Beijing like you were, anyway. It's probably all over the city already that vapid little Jing has big guns and even bigger friends."
Shit. She was totally right. I'd probably lost every contact I had in the city. I rubbed my temples, trying to ease the tension headache that was threatening to take over my brain. A whole year of work gone kablooie in a few hours.
Monica wasn't sympathetic. "Don't look so tragic, darling. You're not the only one. I've been burned, too. Dreadful shame, really. I've had a lovely time here."
"Yeah, it's been bitchin'."
"Not to mention," she continued, "you're not the one with the fuck-all walking dead after you."
The walking dead. Zombies. Men who were dead and then just...weren't. And their eyes...fuck. I squeezed my temples harder.
"Do you know why they were following you?" I was surprised by how steady my voice sounded.
"I'm rather inclined to think it may have had something to do with my last project."
"Monica's a swallow," I said, filling in the blank for Logan.
He shrugged. "Makes sense."
Monica smiled, pleased. "Figured that out already, did you? Very good. Most people just see a gold-digging slut. Yes, I shag for secrets." She leaned toward him, practically purring. "And I'm really good at it."
"Stop flirting," I snapped at her. "You're not on the job."
She smiled. "I know I'm not. This is extra-curricular flirting."
"You ain't SHIELD, though," Logan said, ignoring the exchange.
Monica snorted. "What am I, some scaffy ex-pat? Give a girl a bit of respect, would you?"
"She's MI-6." I wiggled my jaw, trying to loosen the growing pressure in my head.
Monica toasted us with her tea. "For Queen and country, darling."
"Why do you think it has something to do your last, um, project? Did something go wrong?" I steered the conversation back to the night's earlier events.
"You could say that. He was a raven." Monica laughed like tinkling crystal.
"Seriously?" I asked. "You were seducing each other?"
She shook her head. "No, no. He was honey-trapping a closeted diplomat."
"So, you were working him while he was working someone else?" I was always impressed by the bizarro coincidences that this work seemed to throw at everyone involved.
"Yes, we had a jolly good laugh about it right before I terminated him."
Cold. No matter what you said about Monica--and I had some totally choice things I could say--she really was good at her job. She never seemed to feel guilty. Never got attached. Never fell in love. Never even really liked anyone, as far as I could tell. She was a totally expertly-trained sociopath. She was, at that moment, smiling over her latest accomplishment.
"You are way too into that."
"What?" Monica asked petulantly. "One is much more effective when one actually enjoys one's profession. Don't you think, Xue?"
"Whatever," I paused. "And stop calling me that!"
"If the shoe fits, darling."
Logan snorted. Jerk.
"It means snow," I snarled at him. "She's calling me frigid."
He, probably wisely, chose not to reply.
"Oh, fuck off, both of you." The headache was blooming into my forehead.
Monica looked pleased with herself. "Now, back to the matter at hand. I didn't get much out of him. But what I did get was that the diplomat he had been sent to seduce was somehow involved with an underground upstart criminal organization." Monica smiled as Logan and I traded looks. "Yes, I thought you might be interested in that little tidbit."
I swallowed hard. Could it be that whatever was after Monica that night was involved in my assignment? My head was throbbing. Goddamn stress headaches. I stood unsteadily and went to the tea table. Maybe tea would help. My head swam and my hand shook as I tried to pick up the teapot.
"Let me help you with that, darling," Monica whispered in my ear.
I jumped. I hadn't noticed her come up behind me. Her hand rested on the small of my back and I hadn't noticed. The pressure in my head was too distracting. She poured tea into a cup, hovering more closely to me than I was comfortable with.
Mr. Zeng appeared in the doorway. He bowed slightly to me.
I turned to face Monica. "Your room is ready."
"My room? My room all by myself?" She stroked the bare line of my collarbone with a delicate touch. I regretted wearing a strapless dress. Next time, I'd find a nice burqa.
"Yes, Monica," I snapped. "Your room all by yourself."
"All by myself?" she asked again, this time of Logan. "But I'll be so terribly lonely."
"You'll survive." Logan grimaced at her.
"Oh, you're no fun at all," Monica pouted. She turned to me incriminatingly. "You've got this one wrapped around your little finger, Xue. How do you do it, I wonder."
It felt like my head was pulsating with the drum-like throbbing. She caught my chin between her thumb and forefinger and turned my face up to her as though she was going to kiss me.
"It's those eyes, I think," she murmured, the velvet of her voice undercut by vicious acid. "Blue like lapis. One could swim in them. Where ever did a little Chink like you get eyes like that?"
I closed them. "Shut the fuck up and go away, xiaojie."
"You're so cute when you call me a whore," she whispered, her breath warm and sweet on my face.
My stomach turned. I opened my eyes and saw only red. Throbbing red pain. Red fire. Red rage. Red, red eyes. I trembled with the force of it.
"Get out of my face, Monica, before I fucking break yours." My own voice sounded detached, like it wasn't coming out of my mouth.
Her smile was bright, fake and bitter. She let go of my chin roughly and went with Zeng.
"Did you notice their eyes?" Monica asked, turning back to us. "Those men, when they got up again, their eyes were red. Just red."
Red eyes. I couldn't answer her. My mouth was too dry.
"Yeah," Logan answered her. "I noticed."
"Red eyes," she said as she left the room. "Creepy."
They had red eyes.
"She's a real piece of work," Logan said when she was gone.
I nodded wordlessly. It was all I could manage.
My hand trembled when I tried to pick up my tea cup. The steaming liquid spilled over my finger. As hot as it was, it must have burned my fingers; but I couldn't feel it. I tried to move and my legs shook. My chest felt tight. My head pounded. It hurt. And there was something else. A familiar feeling that I couldn't quite place. It felt like my head was in a vice. Like there was a cement block resting on top of it. Like...
Like someone was trying to get in. The realization hit me harder than the pain did. Someone was breaking through my metal shields. I tried to clamp down and push them back out.
But it was too late.
Because they had red eyes. They were dead and then they weren't and they had red eyes. They had red eyes. They had red eyes and I couldn't breathe, couldn't breathe, couldn't breathe. The room spun and I couldn't breathe. I couldn't feel my legs and I couldn't breathe. I heard Logan calling my name but I couldn't answer. He was so far away and I couldn't breathe.
I was in Malaysia.
I was screaming.
There was a figure in front of me, hazy and black like it was made out of moving coal smoke. I smelled the acrid fire of it as it flowed around me. There were hot hands on my face, on my chest. They trapped me in their foggy, flaming grasp. They felt tighter and tighter until the form in front of me solidified. Into someone I recognized. The impossibly long, snaking black hair. The bottomless black eyes. The cold, vicious smile.
God, help me. It was Jia Li.
"There you are," she said to me, though not in any language I had ever heard. "I thought I would never get you."
Her neck burst open where I had cut her. The blood soaked down her robes until she looked like she had the last time I saw her. She smiled at me. There was blood in her teeth. It spilled out of her mouth. She shook her head as though I had done something adorably naughty.
"Did you really think it would be that easy? That you could rip me open and that would be the end of it?" She pulled me closer to her and hugged me like a child. "You cannot kill Death."
The blood flowed out of her mouth. Out of her nose. Her eyes. I poured out of her face and into mine, choking me. Gagging me. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't struggle.
"Find me," I heard her whispering voice in my head. "Come and find me. I am so desiring to see you again."
She let me go.
Far more quickly than it had disappeared, the house in Huairou was yanked back to me. There were cold hands on my face and the bitter taste of huang gin on my tongue. I felt strong, familiar arms cradling me.
"Breathe, darlin'," I heard someone say. "C'mon and breathe. Breathe for me, darlin'. C'mon."
I was wheezing and choking. The healing hands left my face and traveled down my neck, leaving a cool trail in their wake. They came to rest over my lungs, over my heart. My pulse slowed and my lungs opened. I could breathe again. With the rush of air, my eyes cleared. It was Mr. Hu's hands over my heart. Logan, kneeling on the floor, held me close to his chest. Still gasping, I desperately clutched at his shirt as though he could ground me here.
"Shan gao Huangdi yuan," Mister Hu said softly to me. His voice vibrated through me and with the proverb came a calming peace. The mountain was high and the emperor was far away. I was safe. There was no danger. There were no red eyes. No witch. No death. There was just Hu's voice and Logan's warm, safe arms and then blessed nothingness.