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“That was nice of you.” Marita shot the laptop a thumbs-up. “Appreciate it.”
“Hmm.” Nan inclined her head. “Not sure where you are in the timeline.” She sighed. “I’ll keep it short.”
“She knows she’s dead, but she’s talking to us anyway.” Derry shuddered. “Anyone else creeped out?”
“Quiet.” Marita jabbed him. “We’re getting to the good stuff.”
“Luca isn’t a black witch. She’s fae. She’s also Albert Nádasdy’s former lover. He jilted her, she got pissed off, and she’s spent decades on her plan to burn Black Hat—and everyone in it—to the ground. If you haven’t gotten to the poisonings yet, bully for you. They’re coming. And it’s going to get ugly. Luca wants paras out in the open. She’s going to keep killing humans until they figure out they’re not alone in the world.”
We had reached that part, and it was ugly. No argument here.
“The director created Black Hat to protect paras from human discovery, right?” She scoffed.“Wrong.”Her expression darkened. “He created Black Hat to make us believe we were better off flying under the radar. He enforced the narrative we had to hide to be safe. Maybe it’s true, or maybe it’s not. Itdoesn’t matter what I think. It matters what the para community believes. Luca knows that, and she’ll use it.”
“Whoa.” Colby’s eyes rounded. “This is getting good.”
“Black Hat isn’t a savior or a protector or a guardian. It’s a propaganda machine.” Her eyes glinted. “Did it ever strike you as strange how, on Nádasdy’s crusade to thwart humanity, he only recruited the worst of the worst? People with the least moral fiber? Creatures with the most power? Anyone willing to kill and not sob into their pillow about it later?” She chortled to herself. “He’s been recruiting a private army of mercenaries trained to do his bidding, and he’s infiltrated every major city in the country. No one batted an eye because he did it out in the open, and he stuck to his mission statement. He did good work, or so he let them believe as he answered their cries for help, using those cases to pad his numbers.”
An uneasy silence hummed in the air between us and this digital ghost of Nan.
“Luca is going to throw a wrench in the Bureau’s cogs for no other reason than to erase the director’s legacy. She believes when the walls come crumbling down, Black Hat will lose its power along with its purpose. All those psychos? Killers? Maneaters? Those you callagents? They’ll be set free with no one to rein them in.” She clicked a few more buttons. “Don’t get me wrong, I admire her dedication to erasing an ex from existence, but this has gone too far.”
At least we could all agree on that point.
“Listen, I have as many what-ifs as every other para who wonders how different life might be if humans weren’t top of the pyramid, but unlike those dreamers, I can read between the lines of human history to predict how very badly this will go for us.” She cracked her neck. “The director might be toeing the company line,hisline, but that doesn’t mean he’s wrong.”
While I appreciated the opinion piece, we needed hard facts. “Are there any files other than this video?”
“Okay.” Nan rubbed her face onscreen. “You’re tired of me babbling, right?”
“She’s good,” I admitted. “Iamtired of her babbling.”
“Rude,” Marita chided. “This is basically her will.”
“Show some respect,” Derry chided me. “But yeah, I was starting to get bored there at the end.”
“If you want to preserve the status quo,” Nan resumed. “You’ll need to take out Luca.” Her mouth crimped. “Rue Hollis—who you may or may not be—is causing more trouble than Luca anticipated.” She sobered. “She’s going to double down on my NDA, and goddess only knows what will be left of me then. I’m in too deep to get out.” She held a pill up to the camera. “But you can make sure I get mine, even if it’s from beyond the grave.” She clicked another button. “Files are done loading. Thanks for listening.”
“She knew the NDA was coming,” I murmured, “but she stuck it out.”
“If you’re asking why I stuck it out?—”
“She’sreallygood,” Marita interrupted, and I shushed her.
“Luca has my mom. I know, I know. It’s not cool for black witches to be sentimental. But Mom buried the family grimoire in an undisclosed location, and I would really like to get my hands on it before she kicks the bucket. For the magic, and for the numbers and passwords to all her offshore accounts.”
The message ended with a sly wink from Nan before the screen went dark.
“Here goes nothing.” Colby closed that window then opened another. “This is…”
“A bunch of nonsense.” I scrunched up my face. “What is this gobbledygook?”
“Code.” Asa cut his eyes toward me. “These are programs Nan wrote, including her passwords.”
Adrenaline trickled into my veins, pumping me up for the fight to come. “What do they do?”
“I can’t tell yet.” Colby read line by line, furrowing her brow. “One of these must tell us how to find Luca, but I…” Her concentration grew more intense as she clicked another file. “There’s the credit card Nan was using for travel. Boston, Charlotte, Dallas. She was in each city.”
“Does that mean Luca let her handle the distribution?” I mulled it over. “If she was doing the legwork for Luca, then who or what has the director been tracking?” I slumped as defeat sank into me, a punishment for getting my hopes up. “Clay was right here. Part of him anyway. I thought for sure...”
