by Jude Watson
The railing was only waist-high. She felt Dan’s hand, tight in hers. She knew he was waiting for her signal.
“C’mon, kiddies, we don’t have all day. Climb over the fence.”
The metal railing was wet and cold. Amy curved her fingers around it. She put her hand over Dan’s. Ears straining, she thought she heard the noise of a car. But it was coming from the direction of the pedestrian walkway.
“Get going!” the man behind her barked. He put his hands on her waist and pushed her roughly up. Amy felt her balance wobble as she hung on to the railing. Panic roared through her as she started to tip over into space.
“Amy!” Dan screamed.
The man tried to tear her hands away from the rail. She didn’t have time to turn and fight, and her balance was off. She couldn’t breathe as he squeezed her around the waist as she kicked, trying to push off the metal railing and send him off balance. It was like trying to unbalance a mountain.
The car engine noise turned from distant to near, and suddenly headlights raked across the bridge. A truck was barreling toward them. A tow truck with a yellow Jeep wheeling crazily behind it.
She had barely registered her shock when she was suddenly flipped over the railing. Amy screamed as the dark river rose up below her. She heard Dan screaming, the squeal of brakes. . . .
And someone had her by the ankle.
Dan’s face, looking down at her, his mouth open, his eyes wild with terror. He had both hands wrapped around her ankle while the goon behind him had his arm wrapped around Dan’s neck. Dan’s face was purple.
Screaming, Amy swung in midair.
The black river so far below. Glints of reflected red on its surface. Her own heartbeat in her ears, roaring. . . .
Dan’s grip loosened. He was losing air, losing her, she was losing, they were losing. . . .
The steel arch of the bridge, if she could just . . . manage . . . to grab that pipe that looped around the railing . . . Dan’s grip loosened again, and she screamed as the river rushed up, but the momentum caused her to swing just a bit.
One . . . more . . . chance . . .
She had taken several classes in trapeze — a birthday gift from Fiske — and her muscle memory told her what to do: use the swing, get that arm extended, fingers straight out, ready to grab —
The noise of screeching metal assaulted her ears, blocking out the sound of her quick, hard breathing and the faint noise of traffic. Her fingers hit the pipe just as Dan let go and she was able to hold tight. The force of her body falling almost jerked her hand off the pipe, but she held on. She was now swinging above the river, holding on with only one hand. Her arm felt as though it was being ripped out of its socket.
Terror shimmered out through her fingers. She brought her other arm up and grabbed the pipe. She would not waste her energy and give in to the scream in her throat. She bit her lip and lifted her weight up, her arm muscles shaking with the effort.
She landed over the pipe on her stomach and was able to take one shuddering breath before sliding, inch by agonizing inch, closer to the bridge. Her hands smacked against the ledge and she allowed herself one sob of relief as she pulled herself up to the top of the railing.
As she yanked herself up, she saw the fishtailing Jeep hit both men. They went flying. Even from here, she heard the crack of skull against pavement.
Dan’s hands were underneath her armpits, dragging her over, and that was a good thing, because now her legs weren’t working. Dan’s body shuddered with sobs. Together they toppled onto the walkway. His tears mixed with the sweat on her face.
“I let you go! I thought you fell!”
“No . . . I made it. I made it.” Amy tasted blood in her mouth and realized she’d bitten through the skin on her lip. Over Dan’s shoulder she saw the tow truck parked at a crazy angle. One of the men was struggling to his knees, shaking his head to clear it. Nellie’s head stuck out.
“GET IN!” she screamed.
Dan pulled Amy to her feet, and they ran. Nellie flung open the door and they jumped into the cab of the truck. She floored it.
“What’s at the end of this bridge?” she shouted.
“I don’t know!” Amy yelled. “But it’s probably the same kind of metal doors as the other side. They have a chain and a padlock!”
“Not tonight they don’t. This baby is built like a tank. Buckle up and hang on!”
They were screaming down the bridge now, the speedometer needle rising higher. The two black metal doors loomed ahead. Amy knew they were firmly locked, and that they were padlocked on the other side with a thick metal chain.
“Hang on!” The truck hit the gate with a crash and Nellie kept her foot on the gas. The jolt sent them all flying forward, straining against their seat belts.
The truck didn’t crash through. Metal screamed as it only slammed the two doors open a few feet apart. They were wedged halfway through, trapped between them. The chain kept the two doors linked.
Nellie stared ahead. “Well. That almost worked.” She glanced behind. “And we’re about to have company.”
Amy twisted and looked back. The two men were racing down the bridge toward them.
“Climb out the windows and over the hood,” Nellie ordered.
Nellie wriggled out her open window, squeezed through the opening between the truck and the metal doors, and yelled, “Tomorrow, I’m going on a diet!” as she scrambled onto the hood. Amy and Dan followed. They slid down the hood and jumped off, now safe on the pavement and facing a dark, hilly park. With a quick glance behind, they saw the men leap onto the back of the tow truck and clamber over the top.
“Run,” Nellie ordered unnecessarily.
The path twisted steeply uphill. They pounded up a set of stone stairs. Winded, they paused at the top, and saw below the two men still racing down their path, their legs as powerful and regular as pistons in an engine. They started to run again, streaking through the pathways. If they kept going up, they hoped to reach a road eventually. Amy felt her breath hot and rasping in her chest. Her lungs were giving out. The fight to get back on the bridge had taken most of her strength.
Finally, they spilled out onto a dark, empty street. Amy almost sobbed with disappointment. There was no one around. The stores were closed, the metal gates locked.
A car cruised through a red light and turned down the street. One of the men vaulted the stone wall. Nellie ran into the middle of the street as the car zoomed toward her. She did not move. She closed her eyes.
With a squeal of brakes, it stopped only inches from her.
A head popped out of the window. Amy couldn’t hear the words, but she got the general sense of outrage, alarm, and irritation. She and Dan ran toward the car as Nellie slid onto the hood and crossed her arms.
“Are you crazy, lady?” The African-American man was white-haired and angry. “I’m on my way to work! Don’t give me a hard time now.”
“I just need a ride,” Nellie said. “Me and my friends.”
“Do I look like a bus?”
The two men were now on the sidewalk, watching. Amy knew it wouldn’t take long before they would make a decision. With the same chilling neutrality, they could kill the man in the car, too.
She ran over, already reaching for the cash in her belt. She handed the man a hundred-dollar bill. “Here’s your fare.”
He stared at it. “I think I just started a business. Ernie’s Car Service. Get in.”
They hopped in the backseat and Ernie took off. It took whole minutes for their heartbeats to slow.
“Nice rescue,” Dan said. “How’d you get that truck?”
“They shouldn’t have stopped for coffee,” Nellie said, and winked.
Chapter 12
Ernie was heading to his job at a downtown bakery, and he obligingly dropped them off on the Upper West Side.
&nb
sp; Nellie had contacted Fiske from the car, and to her great relief a black late-model car was waiting at the corner of Broadway and 110th. They stood for a minute, shivering in the suddenly cold wind. A pattering of rain hit the streets.
“Here we go, kiddos,” Nellie said. “After tonight, I think you’ll be safer in Ireland.”
“There’s one thing,” Amy said. “Those goons — do you think there was something crazy about how strong they were?”
“What do you mean?” Nellie asked.
“One of them ripped the chain link from the door with one hand,” Amy said. “And the way they ran . . . how fast they caught up to us.”
“They never broke a sweat,” Dan said. “And you’d just hit them with a car.”
“Do you think . . .” Nellie left the sentence unfinished.
“I don’t know,” Amy said. “Could Pierce have used Sammy’s experiments to give his guards a boost?”
“I think he’s capable of anything,” Nellie said. “We saw that tonight.”
“That means we’re up against a bunch of serum-boosted guys?” Dan asked.
Nellie felt hopelessness suddenly engulf them, as relentless as the rain sweeping up Broadway.
“We’ll beat them,” Amy said. “We’ll beat them because we have to.”
Nellie smiled. Leave it to Amy to sum it up. Simple and clear.
Nellie wanted to burst out crying. She wanted to tell them how proud she was of them.
Instead, she had to let them go on alone.
“The car will take you to Teterboro Airport in New Jersey,” she told them. “There’s a private jet waiting there under the name Swift. When you land in Dublin, someone on that end will meet you.” She hugged them both. “Good luck, kiddos. Remember — minimal contact from now on, but always let me know where you are. Keep a low profile. As soon as Pony gets the system back up, we’ll figure this all out. And we’ll beat them.”
“Because we have to,” the three of them said.
Nellie ran across deserted Broadway against the light. She hadn’t wanted Amy and Dan to know where she was going, because they would have insisted on coming, too. Tonight it had been brutally brought home to her that Pierce would stop at nothing to get at anyone with access to the serum. He was willing to throw two kids off a bridge — her two kids.
They’d survived, but the terror they’d felt tonight would haunt them. Nellie touched her shoulder. The scar from the gunshot wound was still red. She’d been a hostage. She knew about nightmares.
There was one more target. One that had occurred to her in Ernie’s car. The only other person who knew the serum formula.
They never should have left Sammy alone.
Sammy had mentioned that he was going to pull an all-nighter. With any luck, he’d still be there, safe and sound and all nerdy and adorable in his lab. Nellie tried to text and run at the same time as she headed toward the chemistry building.
ARE YOU STILL THERE
SAMMY IT’S NELLIE
No answer.
When she reached the chemistry building, the security guard wouldn’t let her up and wouldn’t confirm if Sammy had left.
“But I was just here!” Nellie protested. “I brought him a pizza.”
A young man was signing out as she was talking. “Are you a friend of Sammy’s? I’m his roommate, Josh.”
“Yes! Is he still here?”
“He left about a half hour ago,” Josh said. “There was some kind of family emergency. They called up for Sammy — his uncle was here.”
Nellie shifted her feet. “His uncle?”
“Yeah. I was worried, so after a minute I came down after him. I saw him standing with a couple of guys by the curb. They were talking to him, and then suddenly he just kind of collapsed. It must have been seriously bad news. They helped him into the car. Jeez, I hope his family is okay. I’ve been texting him, but he hasn’t answered.”
Nellie swallowed against the ball of fear in her throat. “Did you notice anything about the car?”
“It was a black SUV. I don’t know what the make was. I don’t pay attention to cars.”
“Anything at all . . .”
“First state.”
Nellie shook her head, confused.
“The license plate said ‘the first state.’ I noticed that because I didn’t know there was a first state. Hey, if you track him down, will you tell him to give me a buzz?”
Nellie thanked him and walked a few feet away. She whipped out her phone and activated her search engine. She typed in first state.
Delaware was the first state to ratify the US Constitution. “First state” was on its license plate.
“Delaware,” Nellie muttered. “That really narrows it down.”
Chapter 13
Dublin, Ireland
They arrived in Dublin in a hard rain. All they saw was a curtain of gray. They made it through customs quickly and walked into the lounge. A young man with a dark wool cap pulled down to his eyebrows stood.
“Sarah and Jack Swift?” he asked in a thick Irish brogue. At Amy’s nod, he added, “Guess you landed at last.”
Amy and Dan looked at him, confused. Their plane had been early.
“The birds,” he said. “Swifts. Legend is that they spend their lives in the air and never land. Ach, never mind. Welcome to Ireland. I’m Declan. Follow me.”
They followed him out to a parking lot, where a battered truck waited.
“This is some rain,” Dan said.
“We call it a little mist here.” Declan climbed behind the steering wheel. “You can sit in the back, there’s a blanket there — heating’s not the best in this heap. It’s a long drive. There are sandwiches and a thermos of tea in the basket for your dinner. We won’t be stopping.”
“All right,” Amy said. “What’s the name of the town?”
“Meenalappa. Don’t get excited, there’s not much to it.”
“How many hours is the drive?”
“As many as it takes, I’d guess.”
Declan turned on the engine and drove. Soon they were on a highway, and Amy and Dan lost track of where they were going or why as the numbing monotony of a drive in the rain took over.
Amy had fallen into an exhausted sleep on the plane, and now she was wide awake. She wished she could fall into that dark oblivion again. Because for the first time since she’d stood over an open grave only twenty-four hours ago, she had time to think about the last time she saw Jake.
She and Dan and Fiske had flown to Rome for New Year’s. Somehow, away from Attleboro, away from all those reminders of Evan and what she’d lost, Amy had felt herself come back to life again. She still remembered the New Year’s Eve dinner that Jake had cooked for all of them. Atticus had woven tiny fairy lights all over the dark, somber apartment until it glowed with cheer. She remembered the sudden, surprising snowfall that began as they ate their dessert, and how Jake had grabbed her hand and said, “Let’s walk.” That midnight walk through the snow had given her a glimpse of a new life, a new way of being. An Amy who wasn’t tortured by memory and crushed by guilt.
She stared out at the cold gray rain, wondering how a memory that had once given her hope could hurt her heart so much.
She had sent a text to Jake as she waited on the runway in New Jersey.
HAVE TO GO AWAY FOR A WHILE. NO INTERNET. I WILL BE IN TOUCH.
She had added I LOVE YOU and taken it out. How could she sign off that way, when she could be going away for a long time? How dare she use the word love when she never knew, from one day to the next, what her life would be? She was midair, like a swift, never able to land.
Darkness fell, and the sound of rain drumming on the roof lulled them into a doze. When they woke they were off the highway and driving on a series of small lanes. They could smell the sea. Declan drove faster tha
n Amy would like, since she couldn’t see beyond the headlights. But he seemed to know every twist and curve.
The car climbed a small rise and then made an abrupt turn into what seemed to be a row of bushes. The opening was barely wide enough for the car.
Through the rain they glimpsed a whitewashed cottage, long and low. Declan pulled up and cut the engine. Without a word, he slid out of the front seat and clomped away.
“Are we supposed to follow him?” Dan asked.
“I guess so.”
They headed out into the rain. Declan had swung open the front door, and he turned and handed Amy a key.
“My sister came out earlier and put on the heat and stocked the cupboards. There’s everything you need inside. Bicycles in the garage. It’s about a fifteen-minute ride to the village.”
He headed back toward the car.
“Which way?” Amy called after him.
He gestured, but it was hard through the rain to see if he meant left or right. He hopped back into the car and drove out.
“Ah, it’s that legendary Irish charm I’ve heard so much about,” said Dan.
They walked inside. Declan had switched on the lamps, and the room looked bright and welcoming. There was a small fireplace with two plump sofas in front of it. Amy peeked into the next room, a large kitchen with another fireplace. The back staircase led to the bedrooms, all made up with fresh linens. Laid out on the sinks were new toothbrushes, toothpaste, and soaps.
The rain lashed the dark panes. They didn’t know where they were, or why they were here, or what they would do the next day. They were too exhausted to care. They slipped into sheets that smelled softly of lavender and reminded them of Grace, finally feeling safe enough to sleep.
When Amy awoke, the sky was blue outside her window. She peeked into Dan’s room but the bed was empty. She glanced out the back window. A sloping lawn behind the cottage led to a dock with a motorboat tied to the piling. The inlet snaked out toward a misty blue bay.
