Page 29 of Strange Lights

“I didn’t think your best was this, Zara. Still working for a monster. Why haven’t you left?”

Her composure slips as she sputters a slew of incoherent words, half-formed insults, and accusations. There. I finally recognize her. A deep-dwelling satisfaction sweeps over me at successfully goading her.

“Don’t you dare assume you know anything about me or what I’ve been up to. You have no idea how hard it’s been⁠—”

A noise comes from somewhere close, high pitched and unnatural. We both glance toward the desert night around us, and I think Zara might notice the dark shape of Doug or Dave darting back into shadow, but her face tells me nothing. Long gone are the years I could read her like a book. Hers, one of the only faces I ever fully knew. Above us, more of those persistent strange lights wheel about the sky.

“What do you think it is?” Zara asks. She’s the old Zara again. Full of questions, sure I know the answers.

“I don’t know, Zara.”

Zara stares up at the sky for a long moment before she turns back to me, speaks low and urgent, like she’s afraid of running out of time. “She’s up to her usual tricks. She keeps saying she’s running out of time, and it’s too much for me, Reggie. I still don’t really understand what she’s up to.”

“Then leave, Zara.”

“As if it were that simple.”

A flash of movement in the darkness distracts me. Eldi’s eyes catching the moonlight from where she lurks in the brush behind the Airstream.

Zara reads the alarm on my face before I can hide it and whirls around. Eldi darts back into cover. Instinct propels me forward, and I yank on Zara’s arm. She’s seen Eldi. If Eldi wasn’t already on Agency 51’s radar, she certainly is now.

“A Chupacabra? You think it’s a good idea to taunt her, keeping one of those creatures around?” Zara says. Eldi’s presence doesn’t yield a flicker of surprise from her.

“She won’t know anything if you keep your mouth shut⁠—”

I’m interrupted as Winnie’s door swings open and Calvin rushes out, still barefoot, but he at least found pants and a shirt.

“Let go of me,” Zara grits out, pulling from my grasp as her eyes fall on Calvin.

“Who are you?” Calvin says, his voice deadly. “What are you doing here in the middle of the night?”

“Calvin,” I say, trying to communicate to him to keep his cool. If he transforms, we’re screwed. He’s shaking. I can sense rather than see the air vibrating around him.

Zara looks from me to Calvin. Looking him up and down, baldly assessing. She lets out a sharp laugh at the shirt he’s wearing. It’s from my closet, an old Gorillaz band tee. My heart feels like it’s held in the jaws of some dangerous beast, moments away from being torn to pieces. Zara’s eyes narrow when she sees the scars on his face.

“Someone from Agency 51,” I say. “I told her we don’t have any information for her. She’s going now.”

Calvin looks between the two of us. He raises a hand to push back his hair, and Zara’s gaze falls on the undeniable ring of bite marks on his arm.

A flash of genuine surprise crosses her face, trailed by smug glee. She straightens, smooths her jacket. A mask of cocky satisfaction snapping back into place. She’s leaving with an extra secret of mine.

“You saw nothing here,” I say to her.

“Unbelievable,” she says. “You’re so predictable, taking in every stray that comes across your path. At least until you’re tired of them. What fun leverage this is.”

Calvin growls, which only makes her grin widen.

He takes a step forward, his canines elongating as he speaks. “I don’t know who you think you are to threaten us⁠—”

“No,” Zara says lightly, “you really don’t know who you’re talking to.”

“That’s enough,” I say.

“Better keep your pets on a tighter leash, Regina,” Zara warns.

“Consider us sufficiently threatened,” I say, pushing Calvin back toward the Winnebago. “There’s nothing that concerns the agency here. You should leave now, Agent.”

“Nice to meet you, Calvin St. James. I’ll be very interested to hear what you have to say in your next episode. You’ll be covering lycanthropy soon, I expect,” Zara says pointedly, with a nod to Calvin, who stiffens as he realizes she knows exactly who and what he is.