“It is. Let’s go,” he said to Ava.
The pair rushed toward the door.
“Thanks again,” Robert said over his shoulder. “Call me if you have any other ideas.”
“I will, but you really need a burner,” Sonya said, referring to the prepaid disposable cell phones popular with criminals. “Landlines are no good for you, or anyone else these days.”
The moment the door closed behind them, Robert saw VaShawna leaning against a wall, glaring at him as she took a drag on her cigarette. Without being too obvious, Robert kept her in his range of vision as he and Ava made their way to his car.
“You should go back and give it to her,” Ava said.
“What to whom?” He kept his eye on the potential enemy, paying only partial attention to Ava.
“Sonya. You should give her your watch number.”
“Funny, Arkangel. You’re hilarious.” He saw VaShawna take a long last drag, throw her cigarette to the ground, and walk back inside the club.
“I was trying to make a serious point,” Ava said as Robert, seeming to forget himself, opened the car’s passenger-side door for her. “Who doesn’t have a cell phone? How is anyone supposed to get in touch with you in an emergency, or a moment of desperation? Anyone who doesn’t have one of those heart-to-mind readers is out of luck.”
Her comment surprised him, but Robert kept his face blank and his mouth closed. He started the car and waited until he’d driven it out of the lot before he asked, “And just what makes you think you know how the watches work?”
“Just a lucky guess.”
Doubtful. Robert himself had little idea how they worked; he just knew they did. The devices had been a joint invention by Zel and Vince. All Watchers had taken a training session on how to use them. Not once during the session were the exact mechanics explained to them; intuition had been emphasized over hard science. No words or sounds were used to create messages, just thought and touch. Psychic Morse code. Robert had always figured the method of message transmission had to do with some kind of connection between electromagnetism and the human nervous system. Even though the watches wrapped around pulse sites, he never once considered the heartbeat—not until now, anyway.
“I don’t give a damn how smart cell phones are today,” he said, “there are plenty of folks out there who are smarter, and up to no good. Whatever you write or say, someone could easily intercept the message, maybe an important one. Transmitting directly from mind to mind is the only truly secure way to communicate. The watches are the best instruments we have for that.”
Ava said nothing for the next several minutes. During that time, Robert dwelled on VaShawna. He’d never seen her before, and yet he had a sense of familiarity when he saw her today, much like he’d had when he saw the word “Charma.” It was possible—even probable—the woman was a previous charity case of Darryl’s, someone who hadn’t been left to stroll on the straight path to peace but instead had been dumped on the muddy, rocky, winding road to nowhere. Such a one couldn’t help but feel wronged, angry, peeved toward others, particularly men, and especially Darryl and his associates. The woman must’ve seen Darryl and Robert together in the club—or together in another club—at some point. She must’ve known they were close.
The only things Robert knew for sure were that he was losing time, he was probably losing his partner, and he was definitely losing his patience.
“Maybe I should sign on formally,” Ava said. “As an IAI agent, I mean. I could use that generous allowance Mister Smith mentioned. I wouldn’t mind buying a cell, or even a burner. And I don’t know if you noticed, but I’ve been wearing the same clothes for a couple of days now.”
“I noticed,” Robert said. “Where’d you snatch them?”
Ava at first seemed confused by the question. It couldn’t have been because Robert had blurted it out without thinking; he suspected instead she hadn’t meant to draw attention to her clothes. Or she thought he’d been too stupid all this time to notice the obvious.
“I didn’t snatch them. I…well…I borrowed them. From the hospital. From some girl’s suitcase before I left.”
“Bullshit.” Another blurt. “And what the hell do you need a cell for, anyway? Who do you need to call?”
“Anyone and everyone,” she said. “My friends in The ID have a great calling plan. I want to get in the network.”
Robert blew a puff of air through his nose, and then he shut up. Clearly that’d been her intent.
“Where are we going, anyway?”
“The Phantasie played at this lounge in Alexandria on Sunday,” Robert said. “It’s near the Eisenhower Metro stop.”
“We’re going to get on a train?” Ava asked.
“No time. We’re driving. They close at midnight, and I don’t know the secret knock.”
“Then why bother telling me about the train stop?”
“Because once we get there,” Robert said, “we’re going to do some searching. If we get separated, or if anything crazy happens, that’ll be the point of reference.”
When they arrived in the area, Robert parked his car in the lot across the street from the movie theater, next to the Metro station.
“This is our spot,” he said as they got out of the car. “You can remember this, right?”
Ava sneered at him then followed as he walked across the street.
“The club is several blocks that way.” Robert pointed his thumb toward his right. “I don’t know how he got there—by car or foot or piggyback—but from this point on, keep your eyes open for any sign of him passing by, or falling down.”
Both took a quick moment to survey their surroundings before walking on. The sidewalks and parking lots were mostly empty. The few people they saw seemed to be making their way toward the movie theater for a late night showing. The theater’s sign was one of the most prominent sources of light in the area, but it wasn’t bright enough to illuminate the streets and sidewalks. The area was almost pitch dark. Robert and Ava walked slower than they would have during the daytime, four blocks down Eisenhower Avenue, neither seeing anything of even mild interest. When they reached the corner of the street, where the row of buildings ended and a grassy lot lay across the street in front of them, Robert pointed to their left.
“The lounge is two blocks down this street,” he said.
Ava glanced in that direction then looked back at the darkened lot of lavender wildflowers and green-and-brown weeds. She took a longer look at the tall trees across the street on the other side, and then the taller buildings nearby.
“You go ahead,” she said. “I want to get to some higher ground and scan the area. See what I can see.”
It was a good idea, and even though Robert preferred they stay together, he wasn’t in the mood to argue.
“All right,” he said. “When I come out, holler if I don’t see you.”
A brief discussion with some of the lounge’s waitstaff didn’t give Robert much more information than he already had. Yes, The Phantasie had performed on Sunday. Yes, a guy fitting Darryl’s description had been in the audience. Yes, a striking blonde woman had been with him. No, they had no idea where the two went once they’d left the establishment. And “No,” Robert said in response to their question, “I don’t need to know what they ordered.”
He left the lounge and took a little time to peer through the fence at the project that would one day be John Carlyle Square. Seeing no bodies and nothing else of interest, he continued on toward Holland Lane. He crossed the street in front of the park and saw Ava, about two blocks down on his right-hand side, waving at him. He took his time getting there, making sure no step was neglected, no potential clues passed over. It wasn’t until he reached Ava that he saw the first sign of something out of place.
She pointed triumphantly down at the small object lying on the sidewalk.
“It’s all I found,” she said. “But it tells us something.”
It was a lighter, lying several blocks awa
y from the lounge whose name was imprinted on it.
“Yeah,” Robert said, “it tells us that people have no respect for the environment. They litter. I could’ve told you that as soon as you woke up.”
“But look at it,” Ava said. “It hasn’t been here all that long.”
“So?”
“Well, look at it,” she said. “I saw the fingerprints. Look at them and see if they’re Darryl’s.”
“How the heck am I supposed to know what his fingerprints look like?”
“You’re his partner, aren’t you?”
Robert sighed. “Darryl doesn’t smoke. You find anything else?”
“No,” she said. “I even took a quick look over the park. And the cemetery. You find anything?”
“Yeah,” he said, “the last place Darryl was probably seen alive. The lounge. Once they left, Miss Blake must’ve whispered the magic words to make him disappear.”
Ava crossed her arms and began to pace as Robert focused on the lighter, kneeling down to get an even closer look. The same word flashed across his mind as the first time he’d glanced at the object: Charma. There was something about the lighter, or something about this spot. But it was a mystery that would have to be put on the back burner.
“You could be on to something,” he said. “It’s possible someone dropped this on purpose. But it’s telling us nothing, except we’re at a dead end.”
“So, you’re giving up?” Ava asked.
“On this method, yeah.” Robert picked up the lighter. “But I have another idea.”
FOURTEEN
The ladies helped Darryl through the darkness, up each uneven step of the spiraling staircase.
No lights. No windows. There was nothing to help him see clearly in the cramped area. It took energy to use his parasite-given abilities, and the gauntlet of taunting and whipping he’d just endured had sapped almost every bit of it. He couldn’t even stand without assistance, let alone walk by himself. Even with assistance, Darryl tripped on every third or fourth stair. He knew Victoria and Verdad—the two women who’d draped his arms over their shoulders— were doing their best to ensure he didn’t fall on his face. What he didn’t know was why, especially after everything they’d just put him through.
A black wall was at the top of the staircase. Vonda, the woman in lime-green who was leading them, knocked on it in three different places before rubbing her hand against it at waist level. Something clicked. A long sliver of light appeared, then widened. The wall became a door.
The four entered a bright room; Vonda closed the door behind them. On its other side, the door appeared to be just one of the hexagonal room’s many ten-foot-tall mirrors, all of them seemingly positioned to break up the white walls’ monotony.
The shock and abundance of the light shining from the room’s many bulbs caused Darryl’s eyelids to close, twitch, and scrunch together. But he didn’t have the strength to keep them pressed together for long. So he succumbed, again. He couldn’t withdraw. He’d no choice but to watch whatever new torment awaited him. As he let his fluttering eyelids pull farther and farther apart, his trembling lips mimicked them as they parted and let a shaky voice accompany his vision.
“Where—?”
“You know something funny?” Vonda said. “The Beautiful One used to have a stuttering problem too. Quite awful. In fact, you’re in much the same situation she was in a year ago—battered, bruised, confused by all manners of tricks. Looks like you two were made for each other.”
“What? What’s—?” Darryl stammered while Victoria and Verdad, his two living crutches, moved him across the room and ignored his malformed questions. He stopped trying to speak when his eyes finally adjusted to the bright environment, bringing into knife-sharpened focus the room’s centerpiece: a glass coffin.
It stood upright, hovering a foot above the floor, suspended from the ceiling by four thin wires connected to each of its top four corners. Darryl could tell the coffin was comprised of several different types of glasses and mirrors, but it was mostly transparent—enough for him to see the nude body of the girl inside.
Her body was shapely, and short. She wasn’t much taller than five feet. And not a single inch of her body was touching any part of the glass or mirrors. As the device itself was suspended in the room, the girl’s body was suspended within it.
Rays from the twenty or so light bulbs that ran in a circle around the room bounced off the walls’ many mirrors until they hit and filtered through the coffin’s glass. When the rays of light hit the girl’s skin, Darryl knew the parasites within her skin cells would use the radiation in their recipes of blood and other ingredients; they’d feed on it, process it, regurgitate it, and feed on it again, or work with it, or play with it. However the parasites used the radiation, Darryl knew the indirect results of all this was to cause the parasites’ host to levitate in the air—or, in this case, within the coffin.
It was beyond the spectrum visible to most humans, but even in his condition, Darryl could see the grand web of light threading through the girl’s skin, keeping her afloat within the coffin.
He gazed through the glass, staring at the girl from behind. That stout body. That wild, curly red hair reaching and stopping just a few inches below her bare shoulders. The patches of mud-brown freckles and varicolored rashes, scars, remnants of acne, and other types of bumps and bruises blemishing her pale skin. With only these pieces to form the puzzle, Darryl knew the lost girl had been found. The body in the coffin was Marie-Lydia McGillis, the Virus-infected girl who only a year ago tried to take out an entire high school in rural Virginia and almost succeeded. What had the five other women in the room done to her? What were they planning to do to him?
Three of the women—Vonda, Victoria, and Verdad—had participated in the beating he’d received in the dark room. He’d heard them named by the now-absent Veronica and Vanessa. The other two women—one in red, the other in blue—were new to him. All five were nearly seven feet tall. Darryl knew enough to know he was being used in some sort of elaborate ritual that was probably sacrificial. He just didn’t know why. It all seemed so senseless.
“You see,” Vonda said as she walked toward the room’s fireplace, “it all went wrong for your zero-hero Vastion when his baby died—”
“Where’s Veronica?” Darryl asked. “She led me to this…this execution. She should have the guts to face me.”
“I’ve got your answer right here.”
Darryl turned to look at the woman in the crimson gown as she picked something off of the fireplace’s mantle and held it up by her face. It was a book.
“A full, complete copy of Death’s Heart,” the woman said.
“Let me go,” Darryl said to no one in particular.
“Yes, do,” Vonda said. “Victoria, Verdad—please give the dirty boy a bath.”
The women in tangerine and lemon led him toward a clawfoot bathtub standing less than twenty feet in front of the glass coffin. The tub was filled with a gleaming ivory-colored liquid, a substance concealing golden-brown globules that sometimes rose to the surface and bobbed before sinking back out of sight.
Victoria and Verdad kicked Darryl’s legs out from under him, hitting just the right spots to make them go numb, and forced him to lie backward in the tub, submerging his body in the creamy substance. The two were careful to position him so that his head stayed clear while the rest of his body remained immersed. It seemed they didn’t want him to drown, at least.
Darryl couldn’t put up a struggle, but he refused to give in. He opened his mouth to shout in protest, to shout insults, to shout threats—but nothing came out. He remained silent when he saw the golden globules beginning to elongate and wriggle, struggling and swimming like snakes in the milky substance surrounding him. Whatever the globs were made of, it was a substance that didn’t dissolve in the creamy liquid. Darryl soon regarded the caramel gels less as snakes and more like eels as he became aware that something in the milky substance was actually soothin
g his body, giving a skin-tingling comfort to his many sores and wounds, calming his aching muscles…But his sense of dread remained. He wouldn’t be soothed or calmed while he was facing the front of the suspended coffin, the front of Marie-Lydia McGillis.
Even though the texture of the skin and the condition of the body didn’t look any different from the front, from his new perspective Darryl was able to do two things: confirm the girl really was whom he thought, and see the expression on her face. There was just a hint of it, at the corners of her mouth, but it was unmistakable to Darryl. It was the expression of someone sleeping sweetly, pleasantly. He wondered about it as the vapors from his bath wafted toward his nose to be inhaled, to be absorbed into his system.
“As I had been saying,” Vonda said, “it all went wrong for Vastion’s plan, his mission, when his baby blew itself out before its own birthday. His love child died—born stillborn—all because Vast settled for an unfair woman, a capricious tramp, an imperfect match. But all of that, all of this, it’s really just a fiction.”
The woman in red tossed the book into the fireplace.
Darryl should have shouted or screamed at the sight—his bible was burning—but the bath’s vapors had already begun to affect him. While the liquid was doing something to his body, its odor was doing something to his mind…synesthesia. He began to taste the liquid through his wounds. He could taste the cinnamonspiced honeymilk, with its hints of peppermint. It was delicious… intoxicating. Layers of his consciousness were being peeled back as he savored the flavors of the layered concoction, and Darryl didn’t mind it at all.
He watched silently as Verdad, Victoria, and the woman in periwinkle-blue walked to stand against the white spaces of the room’s walls. He then rolled his head and looked at the woman in red, the one Vonda called “Vesuvius.” She was using the iron poker to jab at something in the fireplace. When she’d finished, Vonda thrust a shovel into the same spot. She pulled the shovel out of the fire and looked at the mound of smoldering black-white ashes with a satisfied smile. Darryl stared as Vonda gracefully approached him, not spilling a single ash, looking at him with a grin the entire time, until she was close enough to dump the shovel’s heap into the tub.
Broken Angels Page 22
