The lid opened.
She sat up, flung herself over the edge of the hamper, and skidded onto the concrete floor, unable to keep her feet.
She’d been brought to a room, pitch-black. She couldn’t see the walls, and only knew it was a room by the way her gasps echoed off walls that were too close. The whole journey, from falling through the sidewalk to ending up here had taken less than a minute. Her superhuman guardians—still in place, after all her complaints—would hardly have time to recognize she’d disappeared, much less be able to find her.
A light, white and muted, came to life. A propane lantern sat on a card table. A man, dressed all in black, his face in shadow, also sat on the table.
“Celia West,” he said in a flat voice. “You really should vary your route. I thought the daughter of Captain Olympus and Spark would know better.”
She clapped her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing hysterically. She waited for the rant to follow—when the villain announced his ominous plan to hold her hostage, to manipulate the Olympiad, to threaten her.
He just watched her.
“You finally got me,” she said. “What now?”
“I wasn’t behind those other kidnapping attempts,” he said. “I’m competent. I succeed on the first try.”
This wasn’t the Strad Brothers, not by a long shot.
“What—what are you going to do with me?”
“Talk. That’s all. Do you know me?”
She stepped a little closer. If he’d lean in, let part of his face show in the aura of the lantern, she might see him. But she didn’t want to get close enough for him to touch her, grope her, strangle her—
He set something on the table beside him. He’d kept it hidden behind his back. As he produced it, he leaned forward, and she saw his face: older but fit, frowning but with the wrinkles of laugh lines around his eyes, as if he waited to see how she’d react to a joke.
Her voice almost failed her. “Damon Parks.”
The West Plaza security guard.
Beside him, on the table, his hand rested on a leather gauntlet with a silhouette stitched in gold onto the back of the hand: a hawk in flight, wings stretched back, ready to strike. The History Museum’s permanent exhibit on vigilante crime fighters had one of those gloves on display.
“Oh my God,” she murmured.
“I knew you were smart,” he said.
“I don’t understand.” Her heart raced, making her dizzy. She had to focus on every breath.
“I have some information for you.”
“What, me? But why—I mean, you’re the Hawk; if you have information, why don’t you do something about it?”
“Because I’m retired.”
“Then you should give it to my parents, the Olympiad—”
He shook his head. “They won’t admit it, but they’re not at the top of their game anymore. It’s time they pass the job to the younger generation, like I did.”
“But I’m not the younger generation. I’m not heir to anything, I don’t have any powers—”
“Neither do I.”
That came like a punch in her gut. A judgment. Proof positive that not having powers wasn’t an excuse for anything. “I can’t take on that mantle.”
“You’ve been looking for a connection between these robberies. Between the gang members who committed them.”
“Not really—”