She smiles and nods, backing away from me. This is what we do. I provide the story and she does the “heavy lifting.”
As the man approaches, his eyes drift between the two of us but he doesn’t pay much attention. When he’s passed Emma, I step into his path. Emma positions herself behind him.
“Hey, mister. Have you seen a black cat running around here? We’ve been trying to—”
The man moves fast—faster than I would have thought—and in the blink of an eye he’s got Emma out beside him, her arm twisted in his grip. A red leather wallet falls from her fingers and bounces on the sidewalk. The man tightens his fingers around her, and Emma falls to the sand with a small cry. She lets out a string of curses in Spanish.
Shit.
I move forward, but he raises a hand to me, and there’s a command about his presence that causes me to stop. I don’t know what to do. He speaks to Emma in Spanish, saying something that makes her eyes go wide. She mutters back to him, and he responds. His voice is low and smooth. There’s some kind of dawning recognition that sweeps over Emma’s face. Clearly she’s puting things together that I don’t understand, and I start to feel like I’m completely in the dark about what’s actually happening in front of me.
All I know is that I have one friend in the world right now, and she’s on the ground in front of a man who she’s obviously afraid of. So when he reaches for her, I can’t help but react.
I send him stumbling backwards with a telekinetic blast.
The attack isn’t much—more of a flinch of my Legacy than anything—but it serves to put some distance between all of us. The man looks surprised for a moment, and then narrows his eyes at me. I puff out my chest and clench my fists.
“Cody, what are you . . .” Emma looks confused. “Listen, I know who this guy is. Sort of.”
The man bends down slowly, hands out in front of him, and picks his wallet up off the ground. He flicks two cards out from it. They land on the sidewalk.
“If you’re ever looking for work, call this number,” he says. Then, as if it’s an afterthought, he tosses a fifty-dollar bill onto the ground as well.
Then he walks right past us. Away. Like he doesn’t have a care in the world. There’s something about him that permeates the air and makes him seem untouchable.
When he’s out of earshot, I turn to Emma.
“Are you okay?” I ask, concerned.
“You have no idea who that is, do you?” Emma asks, her eyes never leaving the man’s back.
“No. Who?”
Emma picks up the two cards and holds one out to me. It’s white, with nothing but a black phone number printed in the center of it.
“His name is Ethan,” she says. “I’ve heard my brother talking about him lately. He’s some big important guy who is shaking things up around the city now. Do you know what this means?” She stares at me, but I just shake my head. She grins. “He’s our ticket to the next level.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
EMMA CALLS.
She doesn’t talk to Ethan, but the person on the line seems to know who both she and I are. It makes me nervous, but it’s only a fake name that they know.
Ethan is apparently in dire need of couriers—people to run packages and documents across the city for him. It’s not exactly what Emma had in mind when she called, but she agrees on behalf of both of us.
“I thought you didn’t want someone telling you what to do,” I say when she’s off the phone.
“I don’t.” She frowns a little bit. “But I’m getting bored lifting off of randos every day. Aren’t you?”
Not really, I think, but I just shrug.
“So, what, you’re going to work your way up to master cat burglar or something?” I ask with a smirk.
She punches me in the arm and laughs.
We call in for our assignments. Usually they include picking up envelopes at specific stores or locations and delivering them to stores on the other side of town. Emma hates it, but I don’t mind. I get to see parts of the city I never knew existed. Voodoo shops in Little Haiti and chandeliers hanging in store windows in the Design District. Sometimes we have to split up to get the work done. Mostly we’re running around the city together.
One day on a solo assignment, I meet Ethan again.
He sits in a big corner booth at the back of a restaurant. I have a package for him. The place is fancy, or at least fancier than the fast food and street vendor food that I usually eat. He grins widely when he sees me, flashing perfect white teeth.
“There’s my best worker,” he says, motioning to the other side of the booth. “Please, have a seat.”
“Thanks, uh . . .” I realize I don’t know what to call him.
“Please, call me Ethan.”
“Ethan.” I nod.
I plop down in the booth, setting my duffel down at my feet. Before I can say anything else, food starts arriving: plates upon plates of seviche and roasted chicken and pasta swimming in sauce. Ethan encourages me to eat as much as I want, and I practically shovel food into my mouth.
Ethan talks while we eat. “I don’t normally get my hands dirty with small-time crooks or gangs in this city,” he says, cutting into a shrimp on his plate. “But reports get back to me. From people on the streets. From cops. When someone of interest pops up, I know about it. And you and your friend are definitely people of interest. You had a solid partnership before you came across me. Tell me, what brought you to pickpocketing? Why do you do it?”
“To survive.”
Ethan smiles. He gestures to me with his fork.
“You’re young. About fourteen I’d say, right?”
I nod. He continues.
“I lived on the streets when I was your age. It made me a damned good thief and forced me to grow up fast. But it’s not an easy life. And it’s dangerous. My brother didn’t make it.” His voice goes quieter. I freeze. It feels inappropriate to keep eating while he’s telling me about his dead brother, so I sit there with a huge chunk of cheese squirreled away in one of my cheeks as he keeps talking. “I had to look for him for days before I finally found him. Another gang had . . . Well, it’s not important. I don’t want to scare you. More importantly, I see a lot of him in you. It’s uncanny, really. I think he would have survived if he had your talents.”
I tense up. As far as Ethan knows, my talents include delivering mail and taking wallets. I think back to when we met on the beach and I stupidly pushed him with my telekinesis. Has he figured out what that was?
No, I tell myself. He probably thinks it was the wind. How could he know?
“Uh, yeah,” I say. “I’m sorry to hear about your brother.”
“It’s all in the past,” Ethan says. “But you—you’re the future.”
Ethan’s lips curl up in a smile.
“Tell me more about yourself,” he says.
And so I start talking. Nothing about Lorien or the island, but about the things I like. Arepas, movies, books, arcades. And Ethan looks fascinated. It turns out he’s a movie buff. He’s waxing on about a long list of films I should have seen when I suddenly start to wonder how I managed to end up in a fancy Miami restaurant talking movies with some high-ranking criminal mastermind.
What would Rey say? I wish he were here. I wish he could see how well I was doing on my own. How important I’m becoming.
Emma is always hungry for more, wanting bigger and better assignments.
Eventually, we get one.
Ethan wants a series of warehouses bugged to keep tabs on competitors or something like that. As usual, we don’t ask questions. Emma and I are supposed to sneak in at night when the buildings are empty and plant a few tiny devices Ethan has supplied us with. It’s an extremely simple task.