AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Did you check Yesenia’s room?” Jem asked.
Overhead, Nat King Cole died a staticky death, and John Lennon picked up—voice distorted and sounding like one of Yoko Ono’s side projects.
“That’s where we should start, right?” Jem nodded in answer to himself. “Instead of thinking she ran away or disappeared. Simplest explanation first: she’s sick, like Rod said, or she fell, or something.”
“Ok, yes,” Tean said, “that’s a good idea, but—”
“Be right back.”
A few minutes later, Jem and a chipmunk-cheeked white woman in a red Santaland uniform left the front desk. The woman was carrying a keycard, saying, “—if it’s a wellness check, of course.” Jem waved for Tean, and Tean shot Kristin and Heather a look.
“One of us should stay here in case somebody comes looking for Yesenia again,” Kristin said, giving a meaningful look at Heather.
“I’m not staying,” Heather said. Her wattle swung from side to side as she shook her head, and she started off toward Jem. “I’m being summoned by the spirits.”
Tean tried not to sigh.
Kristin, however, made no effort not to roll her eyes.
Hurrying across the lobby, Tean had almost caught up with Heather when a group of men entered the Santaland lobby. They came in through the automatic doors that connected to the parking lot, and they didn’t look like vets or biologists or even Santaland elves—not unless elves had taken to wearing a lot more leather and living rough. There were four of them, and they moved like a pack.
Heather spotted them too, squeaked, and abruptly changed course. She cut away from Jem and hurried—practically ran—toward the closest hallway.
“What—” Tean began.
“The ether!” Heather said without looking back, waving one hand for him to go on without her.
When Tean reached Jem, he said, “I don’t know what that was about—”
“You know what?” Jem asked, hand on Tean’s nape, steering him toward the elevators. His gaze flicked over the men near the door before settling on Tean. Blue eyes. The color of a summer squall. He grinned, but it only touched his mouth. “Let’s keep moving.”
“Do you know those guys?” Tean asked, twisting for another look.
Jem’s hand forced him—gently but firmly—forward again. “I do not. But I don’t like the look of them.”
The Santaland woman gave them a glance and sniffed. “Two of those are the Rangel boys.”
“A little faster, please,” Jem murmured, and with his free hand, he took her arm and hustled the three of them out of the lobby.
The elevator came when the woman—her name tag said Daisy—pressed the button, and Jem practically threw them inside the car. Santaland only had three floors, and Daisy pressed the button marked with a two. The doors slid shut, and then the elevator began to inch upward.
After what felt like five minutes, Jem said, “Are you kidding me?”
“It’s for our older guests,” Daisy said. “Some of them don’t like it moving too fast.”
“I could have Spider-manned my way up the building faster than this.”
“Jem,” Tean said, “what—”
“Nothing. It’s fine. Everything’s fine.”
But some emotion Tean couldn’t name tightened Jem’s expression. After a moment, he reached up and removed Jem’s hand from his nape, and then he laced their fingers together.
Jem gave him a compressed smile, barely more than a line, but he squeezed Tean’s hand once.
An eternity later, they reached the second floor. When they stepped out into the hall, Daisy turned left, and they followed her past several rooms. Then she stopped and knocked on the next door. Silence answered them.
“Ms. Alvarez,” Daisy called, “are you in there? This is Daisy with Santaland. We’re just making sure you’re ok.”
