Page 49 of Concluded (The Bureau #13)

“A war,” Dee said to Irina. Again. He’d already said it several times, and each time she’d simply shrugged. Which is what she did this time, without even looking up from the magazine she was reading.

After Spurling had dropped the bomb about what his test would involve, he’d announced that he had a meeting and left the room. Now Irina was arranged comfortably in the armchair, and Dee paced.

“He wants me to start a goddamn war ,” he growled, as if she somehow hadn’t understood that point.

“What difference does it make? There are always wars happening somewhere. That’s what humans are like. Anyway, all of that will end once we’ve achieved our goals.”

“ Our goals. Is this what you want?”

She raised her eyes from the page. They were as cold and hard as metal.

“I told you what I want. As it happens, my interests— your interests, my son—align with theirs right now. Garrick would probably put this in business terms, so I’ll try that.

It’s like… I used to use ride-sharing services often.

No need for that now, of course.” She waved a hand at the room in general, maybe to remind Dee that Spurling was impossibly wealthy.

“But back then, I noticed that the rideshare company had partnered with a streaming music service, so that when you got in a car your playlist would start up.”

It was weird to think of her using Uber, and he couldn’t begin to guess what music she listened to. “Your point?”

“Two companies with different products, differing goals. But by partnering, they could each increase their customer base and revenue.”

He shook his head impatiently. “This isn’t a lift home from a bar or a dank groove, Irina. This is?—”

“This is survival ,” she snapped. “Our people are extinct, Damnation, all but me and you, and the humans did that. I’m going to do everything I need to do in order to ensure that we are not the end of our line.”

A horrifying realization hit him and he sat down hard in the uncomfortable chair. “Are you planning some sort of… breeding program?” He shuddered.

She rolled her eyes and pushed her hair over a shoulder.

“Don’t make it sound so sordid. I’m too old to have more children.

But if Garrick wished to have a baby with me—babies, plural—I think you could make that happen.

And you can certainly father children of your own.

We’ll need to choose the mothers carefully, of course. ”

Dee felt as if he was going to be sick. It was probably perverse that Irina’s plan hit him more viscerally than the ideas of war and genocide, but he couldn’t help that. “I’m not a goddamn stud horse,” he growled.

“Stop with the melodrama. What you are—or could be, if you behave—is the powerful father to an entire race. You could be Adam , my dear, only you’ll never be expelled from paradise.

We will create our own paradise.” She smiled brightly, showing off teeth that were too straight and too white to be natural, and she held out a hand as if bidding him to take it.

But Dee sensed something shallow about her enthusiasm, a thin brittle shell masking something else. If he’d known her better, he might have been able to identify the deeper, truer emotion. All he could do now was bury his face in his hands.

Irina went back to turning the pages of her magazine.

How do I get out of this? How do I get information to people who can do some good with it? And gods, how do I get Achilles to safety?

Dee had no answers to these questions. He’d never had to strategize before. Hell, he’d barely managed his own life and certainly hadn’t taken on responsibility for anything or anyone else.

Maybe his djinn nature was to blame. Irina said he needed a master; Charles had said the same. And Dee had felt the truth of this in his bones, in his soul—if he had one. He was destined to follow, to obey, to passively allow someone else to steer him.

Bullshit. That’s just an excuse for doing nothing.

Face still hidden in his palms, Dee scowled at the voice in his head. Couldn’t he get sympathy from himself, at least?

Sure, buddy. Add self-pity to the mix. That’ll help.

Dee growled. He’d feel sorry for himself if he damned well wanted to. He’d ended up in this situation purely because he’d been born a djinn, and he’d done the best he could, and now?—

For fuck’s sake. Look at your mother, Damnation. She lost her people. Lost her husband. Got stuck in a new country with a useless brat and a son-of-a-bitch husband she only hooked up with because she had to support the brat.

Yeah, look at her. Sitting there in her fancy clothes with her stupid magazine, hooking up with a monster who made Martell look like an angel by comparison.

But she’s finding a way to control her destiny, isn’t she? It’s a fucked-up way to be sure, but she’s using Spurling at least as much as he’s using her. She’s not passive at all.

Dee groaned, mostly because he had to admit that the obnoxious voice was right.

Irina was in charge of herself, sort of, and was getting what she wanted.

Including, apparently, a private collection of Bureau agents to toy with.

Whereas Dee was just sitting on an uncomfortable chair, spiraling nowhere except possibly into insanity.

And Achilles was still in the black hole.

Dee suddenly realized that a lot of his most immediate problems could be solved if he was in the black hole too. Because if the two of them were reunited, Achilles could make a wish, and then both of them could get the hell out of there.

Okay, then. How could Dee get into the hole?

He knew that this was urgent. Time passed differently in the black hole, so there was no telling how long Achilles had been there already, and what the experience had done to him.

At any point, Irina might decide she felt like doing something even worse than collecting him.

Or Spurling might opt to get rid of someone who he considered a nuisance at best and a potential threat at worst.

On top of that, Spurling clearly didn’t trust Dee. If Dee didn’t gain that trust quickly, Spurling would undoubtedly decide he was far too dangerous to keep alive. A djinn wasn’t the sort of weapon you’d want to risk falling into the enemy’s hands.

Plus, there was the big evil master plan. Dee hadn’t caught the news for the past few days, but he had the impression that things were going very badly in the country and maybe the entire world. How much longer until the damage became irreversible?

Fine. So Dee had to do something , and he had to do it pretty fast. The problem was that, while he was a weapon, he couldn’t wield himself. And he didn’t have a Bureau agent’s training, or much of an education, or any relevant experience.

He must have groaned again, because Irina made an annoyed sound. “If you’re going to have a tantrum, Deedee, do it somewhere else.”

She’d never had any patience for his shows of emotion, even when he was very little, and she’d almost never revealed her feelings to him.

Even Martell, asshole that he was, had occasionally sympathized when Dee was upset and had even, on rare occasions, shared happiness over something like an extra-large paycheck or a TV show he liked.

Emotions were important , even if Irina didn’t seem to understand that.

Even the negative ones, but especially the positive ones.

Charles had put it well during their drive to San Francisco, when he’d talked about the balance between things like hate and greed and things like hope and joy.

It feels so good when the light prevails , he’d said.

Dee saw now that he had a tool after all.

“Irina,” he said quietly.

She looked up, face composed. Waiting.

“My father—my real one, not Martell. Did you love him?”

Her mask slipped momentarily, briefly replaced with a startled expression. “What?”

“It’s a simple question. I know his death caused you a lot of trouble. And it also got in the way of your plan to save our species. I’m guessing, though, that you two were together out of necessity. Only two djinn on the ark, so to speak. But what I want to know is whether you loved him.”

It was possible that her eyes softened infinitesimally. Or it could have been a trick of the light. Her voice remained crisp. “I respected him, greatly. I admired many things about him. I don’t know if I loved him.”

Fair enough. “What about your family? Your parents? Siblings?” She’d never mentioned them at all.

She iced back up again. “My father, like yours, was murdered before I was born. My mother struggled to support me—just as I struggled with you. She died when I was very young. I had no siblings. I spent much of my childhood in institutions.”

Although Dee didn’t want to feel sorry for this woman, he did.

Life had handed her one shitty deal after another, apparently.

No wonder she hadn’t been able to nurture him appropriately—she’d never learned how.

Dee had heard about a series of studies in which infant monkeys were raised in isolation and, when later placed in the company of other monkeys, were basically unable to function.

Barbaric experiments that shed light on human behaviors. And, it seemed, on djinns.

“I’m sorry,” he said, in full honesty. “You should have had better.”

Another slip of that mask, almost too fast to catch. “I survived.”

“You thrived, by the looks of things. In some ways, at any rate. But are you happy?”

She looked away instead of answering.

Then he asked another question. The hardest one. “Did you love me?” He took a steadying breath. “You clearly made sacrifices to support me. But was that because you cared about me, or because you needed your Adam to survive?”

It hurt when she didn’t respond. And he was going to drop this whole attempt, but then another memory surfaced. “Happy Meal,” he whispered.

“What?” she asked, seemingly bewildered.

“The day before you walked away from me, you granted me a wish for a dog. It was the only wish you ever gave me. Why did you do that?”

“You were whining for one. I wanted you to shut up.”

“No. I wasn’t much of a whiner, I don’t think.

” He’d learned very young that there was no point in it.

“I remember that day. We were just sitting outside peacefully. It was hot out. I mentioned a puppy just once and then you… poof . You could have refused or ignored me. You didn’t gain anything from me getting a dog.

So why did you do that for me?” This question had never occurred to him before.

It skewed things a little, but that might not be a bad thing.

Irina still didn’t say anything. But there might have been a tiny movement of the corner of her lips, and she didn’t look away.

Dee smiled warmly at her. “I think you did love me. Which is sort of amazing, really, considering your background. It explains why I’m capable of love too, because Mom, I am .

And I have to tell you that love is hard.

It hurts. There’s a good chance that it doesn’t end in a happily ever after.

But gods, there is nothing like it.” He held a fist over his heart.

“It can make you feel stronger, happier, better. It can fill holes inside you. It can help you be so much better than you’d ever dreamed of. ”

He had to stop in order to swallow a few times and blink back hot tears. He might have given up on speaking altogether if not for the recollection of the way Achilles had looked at him. The way Achilles—his beautiful hero—had treated Dee like someone who mattered.

Dee got out of the chair and walked over to kneel in front of Irina.

Not like a supplicant, but like a caring family member.

“I don’t know how you feel about me now,” he said.

“But if I were to go along with Spurling’s plans, I’d be broken.

Ruined forever. I didn’t used to think I had a set of morals, but it turns out that I do.

Love helped me find those. And I’ll die before becoming responsible for killing countless innocent people. ” Yes, those words were true.

“None of those innocent people would lift a hand to help you.” She might have intended to sound harsh, but there was a hollowness behind her words. As if they were a mask too.

“That doesn’t matter.”

“You’ve been consuming nonsense. Love is just a word people throw around in order to manipulate others.”

Dee kept eye contact with her. “I’m sorry you’ve experienced it that way. It’s been different for me.”

“I doubt that.” Her mouth pursed as if she’d tasted something bitter, and she tapped her fingers on the magazine. “If you’re worried about being alone, don’t be. You can father offspring… remotely. And you can pick out any man you want for yourself, and simply wish for him to love you, and?—”

“You know that doesn’t work. True emotions aren’t magic tricks.

They’re… they’re a part of you. Forcing them on someone is like using AI to write poetry.

You get words, and they rhyme and everything, but there’s nothing behind them.

They have no heartbeat.” He wished he was handier with words himself so that he could do a better job explaining this.

But he was fairly certain that Irina knew all of this already.

She didn’t admit this, but she did stop trying to argue.

He wondered how many people had bothered to sit down and discuss things with her, rather than ordering her around or keeping her in the background as an ornament.

Until the Bureau dropped into Dee’s life, few people had held true discussions with him.

Irina was tense, though, and he was afraid she was going to jump up and stalk away. He chuckled softly at his own foolishness and then threw everything he had into the pot. If he lost this bet, he lost… everything. But he hoped he’d win.

“Mom, there’s a way for me to possibly save myself and the man I love. Maybe I’ll save some other people too. But I need your help. And if you ever loved me—even a tiny bit—I’m asking you to help me. Please.”

Then, heart beating fast, he got to his feet and walked out of the room.