Chapter 20

“What are you doing out there?” she mused aloud to herself. Reyna tapped her foot impatiently.

She had been waiting in her bedroom all afternoon for Beckham to leave the apartment. He should have already gone to work or done something. It wasn’t like him to adjust his perfect schedule, but he hadn’t left. She could still hear him moving around and she hadn’t heard the elevator.

After she had walked out of the lounge last night, Beckham had caught up with her and ordered her back to the car. She had waited thirty long minutes for him to finally show up. The drive home was tense and uncomfortable. She hadn’t wanted to talk to him any further about what happened, and he clearly felt the same way. As soon as they had made it back, she had stormed into her room and hadn’t left since.

The last thing she wanted to do was run into him in the living room and make some meaningless small talk. She wasn’t going to be the first to break that was for sure.

Footsteps in the hallway made her stop her pacing and stare at her door. She could hear Beckham stop on the other side. What the hell was he doing out there?

He didn’t knock. He didn’t say anything. He just stood there. They both just stood there. Neither of them willing to make the first move. She didn’t care if that made her stubborn. He had kissed her, treated her poorly, and on top of all that was dating someone else. She had no reason to talk to him.

After a few minutes, she heard him walk away from her room, the telltale ding of the elevator, and then she was alone.

“Finally,” she breathed.

Reyna yanked the tight pink dress over her head and tossed it into a discarded pile on the floor. She walked into her closet, found her stash of normal clothes, and grabbed stuff for her to wear. Once she was clothed in a loose cotton T-shirt, a pair of jeans, and her Converse sneakers, she brushed her hair out and threw the baseball cap on her head, low over her eyes. Her camera went into a plain black bag that she hoisted over her shoulder before leaving the apartment.

She texted Beckham’s driver to let him know she would need a ride. Her bodyguard, Philippé, was always waiting for her in the car whenever he was needed. Beckham must pay a lot of money for these two men to do nothing but wait for one of them to leave the building.

When she got to the front, the car had pulled up for her to get into, but she stopped when she saw Everett. His eyes widened at her clothing.

“Reyna?” he asked.

He hadn’t been on duty the past couple times she had snuck out in regular clothing. She had been glad he didn’t know about her double life. He was clearly so traumatized by what had happened that he could barely look at her. She didn’t want to involve him in anything else that could get him hurt.

“Oh…hey,” she said. “I have to get going…”

She started toward the car, but he followed her. “Hey, are you avoiding me now or what?”

“I…what? No. Of course not.” She looked up at him tentatively. “I thought you were avoiding me.”

“I’ve barely seen you. How could I avoid you?”

“Well, you were all serious that first day back. You called me Miss Carpenter. I thought maybe you…blamed me still. Or agreed with your friends.”

“Sorry about that. My manager was on duty. He’s been around a lot more since my attack. I think he thinks I’m fragile and going to fall apart or something. But…I just got off work if you want to hang. I’d love to find out what you’re doing in those clothes. Are those Beckham approved?”

Reyna made a face. “He’d probably have my head if he knew I was wearing this.”

“I hope not literally.”

She laughed and it felt good. “No. Not literally.”

“So, what are you up to?”

“Just…occupying my time.” She dug into her bag and pulled out the camera. “Trying to see the city from a different perspective.”

“Cool. Can I come with?”

She looked down at his valet outfit—white button-up, black vest, slacks, and dress shoes. “No offense, but you’ll kind of stand out where I’m going.”

“Well, now I’m definitely intrigued. I have a change of clothes in my car, around back.”

Reyna considered it for a second. She knew that Beckham didn’t want anyone to know that her pictures were connected to her, but she didn’t think it hurt anything to take Everett along. Who was he going to tell? He was a valet for her apartment building.

“Sure. Why not?”

Reyna tapped on the glass of the front passenger window. It rolled down slowly. “Yes?”

“I’m going to go around the back with my friend. Will you meet me there in a couple minutes to pick us up?”

“You aren’t going to leave without us, are you?”

Reyna rolled her eyes. “I agreed not to. We’ll be in the completely lit back parking lot.”

“Five minutes,” he said and then rolled the window back up.

“Charming,” she muttered, following Everett around to the back.

“So, what got you interested in photography?” Everett asked.

“The attack actually,” she said softly. She stared hard at the ground. “I already had a bad image of the streets, but that magnified it. Beckham gave me the camera as a hobby, I think to keep me from getting bored, and I decided that I wanted to see the streets through the eyes of the suffering. People like me.”

“People like you were…”

“Just because I live up there right now doesn’t mean I’m any less like you or your friends or anyone else. I don’t belong there, and I want my pictures to show that. Show what no one at Visage or in politics or in the upper class really see with their eyes.”

“That’s…really great,” he admitted.

They reached Everett’s Mustang, and he found his spare clothes. She watched as he took off his vest and button-up, revealing a rather nice bare chest. Her cheeks heated and she quickly turned around.

“Oh, sorry.”

Everett laughed. “It’s fine. Don’t worry about it. I want to hear more about this photography. You know it reminds me a bit of this blog everyone has been talking about lately.”

“What blog?” She turned back around to face him. He had on a plain gray T-shirt and a pair of jeans perfect for what they were doing.

“I’ll have to find it on my phone.”

Beckham’s car drove toward them as Everett fiddled with his phone looking for the blog. They hopped into the backseat, and Reyna told them where to go. She had been taking pictures at a homeless shelter a lot lately. The pictures made her eyes blur with tears when she looked through them, and that was how she knew they held truth.

“Aha. Here,” Everett said. He passed the phone to her. “Perspective.”

Reyna nearly dropped the phone. There were her beautiful pictures. Beckham had been the one to name the website Perspective when he had set it up for her. She hadn’t even realized that other people could see them. She had just been uploading her images to it and organizing them for herself.

“You said people are looking at these?”

“Yeah,” he said, eyeing her questioningly. “They’re anonymous though. Everyone has been trying to figure out who the photographer is. They think the person must be an Elle sympathizer.”

“A what?” she asked. People were associating her pictures with a person she had never even heard of?

“You really know nothing about politics, do you?”

“No,” she admitted. “Who is Elle?”

He glanced up uneasily at the driver and her bodyguard. “Someone…and something a lot of people disagree with.” Then he leaned over and started adjusting the baseball cap on her head. “I’ll tell you when we stop.”

She took the hint and changed subjects until they made it to the homeless shelter. Once they were safely inside, she slung her camera strap around her neck and walked the halls with Everett.

“So, tell me.”

He peeked behind them, but her bodyguard was a respectable distance away, pretending to be invisible.

“Elle is the code name for the rebellion against the vampires and Visage. Back when Visage was just forming, there was a series of protests against vampire-owned businesses and the mission statement that was coming out of some of these corporations, of which Visage is now the most prominent. They called this Elle’s Rebellion for the woman who led the protests, who was subsequently killed in an otherwise peaceful protest. Everyone thought that would be the end of it, but since then, there have been whispers that the Elle sympathizers have gotten together under the Elle Rebellion name and formed a more formal underground rebellion. Hence Elle or sometimes the graffiti on the streets is just a cursive L in a circle.”

“Wow,” Reyna breathed. “That’s…crazy. I’ve seen that logo before.”

“Yeah. It’s everywhere. Elle rebels believe that Visage wants to be more than just the biggest company in the world. They want to rule. A lot of them claim that Visage was responsible for the economic collapse so that they could force humans to work for them. Make everyone desperate for change so they place too much power in the hands of one company.”

Reyna’s mind spun. There were people out there fighting Visage? Even though she worked for them now, it lifted her spirits to know that there were other people out there who disagreed with what was going on.

“And they think that the person taking those pictures is an Elle sympathizer? Why?” she asked.

He pulled his phone back out and showed her the latest entry. Her latest entry. Everett had walked them over to the exact spot the picture had been taken in this very homeless shelter.

“Because no one photographs humanity like you,” he said softly.

“I didn’t…” she started, but she could see he had already figured it out. Her shoulders slumped. So much for being anonymous.

“So…are you?”

Reyna bit her lip. “Well, I didn’t know about Elle or the underground rebels until you just told me, but it’s not like I entirely disagree with the sentiment. People are dying out here and no one cares. Visage has all the money and power, and they’re doing nothing to help anyone. They’re lining their own pockets and feeding their own. I believe in balance, but I’m not part of any…movement.” She sighed and looked around at the room, which was full of examples of the very problem she had just detailed. “I just want to help my family survive this. That’s all I care about.”

He nodded understanding. “Don’t we all.”

“Maybe we should try somewhere else,” she suggested, suddenly not wanting to be in the same place as she had been before in case someone was trying to figure out who the supposed Elle sympathizer was. The way Everett talked about it, she was sure that it wasn’t going to look good to Visage or Beckham if they thought she was one.

“I have an idea if you’re interested,” he said with a mischievous smile.

Her eyes lit up. “I like ideas.”

He laughed. “Your bodyguard might not like this one.”

“He’ll deal with it. Let’s go,” she said excitedly.

Once they were back in the car, Everett gave them an address almost clear across town. Much farther out than she had ever been. She waited for her bodyguard to recognize that it might be dangerous and refuse them, but he said nothing. She kept waiting for the other shoe to fall. But they drove all the way across the city without one word.

They hopped out of the car with her camera safe in her bag again, and Everett directed the driver where he could park. Her bodyguard followed behind them as they walked three blocks away from their drop site.

“Why didn’t you drop us off in front of the place?” she asked when they came upon a large warehouse. It reminded her of home.

“Driving up to this place in a Town Car is a good way to get knifed,” he whispered.

Reyna shivered against that assessment and followed close to Everett. They reached the front of the building and walked through a slate gray door.

An enormous man with bulging muscles stopped them before they could walk through a second door. “No guns. No fangs. No trouble. Ferrier House rules.”

The guy quickly checked them over, rifled through her bag, and then let them inside.

“Wait, buddy,” he said, stopping her bodyguard, “didn’t you hear me? No fangs.”

Her bodyguard gave him a terrifying look and then produced a card out of his wallet. The bouncer read it over once and then nodded his head.

“Fine, but if you make any trouble, we have authority to stop you at any cost,” he said menacingly.

“Noted.”

When they walked inside, Reyna had to keep her mouth from dropping open. Everett had said this place was going to be a little different than what she had been shooting, but this was…beyond anything she could have imagined. Much of the warehouse was open space, but at its center there was a giant fighting ring. Two people faced off in the ring, wearing nothing but tight-fitting shorts. All the while an enormous crowd cheered for their champion. A makeshift scoreboard hung from one wall, and there was a box for betting on the matches.

“What is this?” she asked. She was already itching to take her camera out.

“Ferrier House. It’s owned by some Irish mobster. But everyone just calls it Hell,” he said. “Because that’s where so many people who fight here end up.”

“Stick nearby,” her guard growled. “I don’t want things to get out of hand and have no exit strategy.”

“Okay,” she agreed, rolling her eyes. As if it wasn’t bad enough having a bodyguard in this kind of place, he wanted her to stay as close as possible. He could just keep up with her.

“Come on,” Everett said. He grabbed her arm and drew her through the thick crowd.

The people they passed were a mixed bag. Some looked like the homeless and destitute she had been photographing on the streets. Others were dressed up in suits, not quite as nice as Beckham’s but not horrible either, and they were cheering on the people in the pen just as hard as the others. Still there was another group of people who reminded her so much of her brothers. Not hopeless but not prospering. She could see in their eyes that this was the way to escape the captivity of their daily lives. She had seen it countless times in her brothers’ eyes, but with her waiting for them at home, they had never participated in anything like this. She hoped they stayed on the straight and narrow with her gone.

An ache crept into her heart, and she had to force it down. It was good to think of them. She never wanted to forget them, but it was difficult. She knew the money had to be helping, but she was terrified that their faces were fading from her mind.

She couldn’t think about that right now. It wasn’t any help.

Everett reached a spot in the middle of a group of people and a man approached him, asking for a bet. Everett handed over a five and bet on the man losing.

“As you wish,” he said. “For the lady?”

She shook her head. She didn’t have cash and a black card would surely draw attention. “No, thank you.”

When he was gone, she leaned over to Everett. “Why did you bet on the scrawny guy?”

“Watch.”

So, she did. She knew nothing about fighting, but watching the movements of the two men was like a choreographed dance. The bigger of the two had the upper hand in height, weight, and strength. He was all bulk and threw it around with a prowess that clearly had been established over many matches. The smaller guy was quick on his feet though. He dodged and blocked, striking out at the bigger guy when he least expected it. Despite this, it was pretty clear that the bigger guy was going to win any minute.

Reyna slowly extracted her camera from her bag and stared at the pair through the zoomed-in lens of her camera. She snapped picture after continuous picture of the fight, trying to see what Everett saw.

Then it happened in a flash.

The smaller guy smirked. That was all Reyna needed. She took that picture and knew it was going to be a brilliant one for her collection. The guy was toying with his opponent. He wanted to make it look like he was going to lose, keep the odds against him, so when he was victorious it was even more exceptional.

“He’s playing cat and mouse,” she whispered.

“Yes,” Everett agreed. “You can tell in his footwork.”

“No. In his eyes and in his smile.”

She zoomed back out and took a picture of the crowd, the venue, the sense of desperation in the room. She was focused in on one woman’s angry cries when everyone roared their disapproval. Her eyes flew to the stage and the bigger guy was laid out flat on his stomach, blood pouring from his face. The other guy hadn’t stopped. He just kept pummeling until they hauled him off.

The crowd surged forward, and Reyna almost lost grip of her camera. She stuffed it back into her bag as Everett clamped his hand down on her elbow.

“What’s going on?” she cried.

“People lost a lot of money. We have to get you out of here.”

Her eyes searched for her bodyguard, but he was too far away. She made up her mind to get to safety with Everett and let him drag her through the mob. She lost sight of the guard, lost sight of everything, just held on to Everett for dear life. Fights broke out all around them. People angry that they had lost more of their precious little income to a gambling debt. The noise grew unbearable and suddenly guards rushed down with batons, Tasers, and guns to keep the crowd in line.

She and Everett burst through an unguarded door that she had assumed went outside, but it led to a flight of stairs. Everett didn’t hesitate as he took the stairs two at a time. She had no choice but to follow him. She was breathing hard when they finally got to a landing with a long hallway.

“Where are we?”

“I think this is just office space,” Everett said. “Let’s find a room to wait this out.”

“My guard is going to be freaking out,” she said.

Everett shrugged. “Isn’t it a little freeing?” He smiled back at her, and she couldn’t stop from laughing. She had been afraid running through the crowd and now she released all her nerves.

“Yeah. It kind of is.” She pushed open the first door. “How about this one?”

She stepped in the first room and fumbled for the light. Her mouth dropped open.

“What the hell?”