Again and again, her thoughts circled back to that broken helmet on its pedestal, as dangerous as a child’s dress-up toy.
While somewhere within Renegade Headquarters, they had the real thing. Ace Anarchy’s helmet. Intact and waiting.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
NOVA LET THE DOOR SLAM shut behind her. Not because she was angry, but because even after the long walk back to Wallowridge, she was still dazed from the discovery of Ace’s helmet and all it meant. For her. For the Anarchists. For the Renegades, who probably had as much power contained within that one object as all their patrol units put together. They may have opted not to use it for their own purposes so far, but it still remained a possibility that they could at any time. So long as the helmet was in their possession, no one stood a chance to oppose them.
As Nova passed through the front room, Honey appeared in the doorway to the kitchen, digging a spoon into a mason jar full of golden honey. “That isn’t your normal stealthy entrance,” she said, lifting the spoon out. The honey began to drizzle down, before Honey deftly spun the spoon’s handle to catch it. “Did something happen?” She shoved the spoon into her mouth, sucking on it like a lollipop.
Nova stared at her. Did something happen? Did something happen?
“Sort of,” she said, squeezing past Honey and unwinding the communicator band from her wrist. She deposited it on the kitchen counter. It was the first time she’d taken it off since they had decided to leave their home in the subway tunnels, and her wrist felt bare without it. Bare—but also light and unencumbered.
“Uh-oh,” said Honey, lifting a penciled eyebrow at the band. “You must be going somewhere the Renegades wouldn’t approve of.” She leaned saucily against the fridge. “Do tell.”
“Later,” said Nova. “There’s something I need to do first.”
She headed toward the back door and had just grabbed the knob when a small explosion vibrated through the walls. She looked up as a few drifts from the popcorn ceiling tumbled down onto the counters.
“Leroy is making up a new batch of something,” Honey explained, dipping the spoon back into the honey. “Are you leaving already? You just got here.”
Nova ignored her question. “You do realize we’re trying to go unnoticed here, right?”
Honey smirked. “Sweetheart, some people just can’t help being noticed.”
Refraining from rolling her eyes, Nova asked, “Is Phobia here too?”
“No. Hasn’t been all day. I think he spent the night back in the tunnels. He’s better suited to the dankness and shadows, you know. Me? I’m so happy to be back in the sun.” She sighed and cast a sweet smile at the small, dirty window over the kitchen sink.
Nova twisted the doorknob and pushed her way outside. “Don’t get used to it,” she muttered, stepping out onto the slim concrete porch.
She trekked through their small patch of weeds and thorns, where Honey’s bees were busy restoring their hives as fast as they could. The day before, Nova had noticed how their buzzing seemed happier than it ever had down in the tunnels, but now it served as little more than a distraction. She turned into the alleyway behind the house and started in the direction of Blackmire Way. It was nearing dusk, and the shadows from the surrounding row houses filled up the narrow spaces between buildings. She passed boarded-up windows and graffiti-covered fences and yards full of tufted dandelions. A flicker of light caught her eye and she glanced up to the second story of the corner house just as someone was throwing open the window sash. She paused in surprise. She’d gotten so used to thinking of the neighborhood as deserted, she was startled to find that they might have neighbors after all.
Or perhaps it was only the man she had kicked out of her own house before.
She was turning away when the hairs prickled on the back of her neck. Her stomach clenched and her hand fell instinctively on the shock-wave gun at her belt.
It was, she realized a second later, a distinctive scent that had caught her attention. The sweet aroma of coconut body oil mixed with the faintly rotten taint of sulfur and gunpowder.
She forced her shoulders to relax as she turned, letting her hand fall from the weapon.
Ingrid was leaning against the side of the building Nova had just passed, one heel casually pressed against the brick, her arms crossed over her chest. She was dressed in something that might have been intended to be a disguise: skinny black pants and a high-collared jacket that covered both her armbands and her midriff. Even her thick coils of hair had been imprisoned beneath a knit cap.