He recognized me. I was sure of it. And then he glanced down, sideways—to Grant, Cribari, anything but me.
“She cannot be here,” he said urgently. “She was not approved by our government liaison. If he returns . . .”
“Access to the cathedral is regulated by the Chinese government,” Grant rumbled. “We had to have special permission for tonight. Our chaperone went outside to wait.”
Father Cribari wiped the back of his hand across his brow, his fingers trembling slightly. “You must have jumped the fence to escape his notice. Or found some other . . . unnatural means of entrance.”
The other priest gave him a stern look, but Cribari did not seem to care or notice. He was trying to act like a different man in this place, outwardly confident, less sickly in his appearance. Like a cat with one paw in the cream—and another on the corpse of a warm mouse.
But Grant had been right. I made him nervous. I scared him. Especially now.
Pretend, I told myself. Pretend you don’t know he had anything to do with hurting you.
Grant stepped in and took my hand. His grip was strong, warm. “Come on. I want to show you something.”
The other priest flinched. “No.”
Father Cribari touched his shoulder. “It is allowed, Brother Lawrence.”
He said the words like his tongue was gilded with steel. Father Lawrence gave him a hard look, but kept his mouth shut. Barely. He made a small gurgling sound as Grant led me back down the aisle—but not toward the pulpit. Instead, he walked with me toward the rear of the cathedral and the large wooden doors. His cane and my cowboy boots struck the floor in a quick, easy rhythm.
But as soon as his back was turned from the other two men, his face changed; calm levity draining into a stone-cold mask.
“The murders didn’t happened here,” he whispered to me. “And they won’t let me see Father Ross. They insisted on this tour—a tour at midnight—and won’t talk about anything but Gothic architecture.”
“They’re playing you,” I said softly. “And you’re playing along. Why?”
“Instinct,” he said. “And because they’re both hiding something big. Might be the same thing; could be different. I can see that Father Lawrence is a good man, but it’s also clear he knows what Antony is doing. I don’t understand that connection. Or why he recognized you, too.”
“I’m a popular girl,” I muttered, noticing for the first time how Grant refused to call Father Cribari by his proper title. It was always Antony. A small act of defiance. Refusing to give the man respect.
“You okay?” I asked him.
“Better now,” he told me, but his voice was slightly hoarse, and for a moment all he did was stare at me. I could not look away. It was good to see Grant’s face. So damn good.
“You made it,” he said.
“Of course,” I replied, though I suffered, for one moment, the memories of what had led me here, and what I knew.
Grant’s gaze flickered to the crown of my head. “Maxine.”
“Cribari tried to have me killed,” I breathed. “Twice. I think he’s getting his orders from an Avatar. All of this has been contrived. I just don’t know why. I don’t even understand why they haven’t tried to kidnap you yet. They’ve had all the time in the world.”
Grant froze. I caught him before he could turn around—squeezing his hand so hard he winced. I forced him to keep moving, but he stumbled, and the sounds of his cane hitting the stone floor sounded like gunshots.
“Don’t let on you know,” I told him urgently. “We’ll find your friend—if he’s really here—and then we get the hell out.”
“First job is to get out of this cathedral,” he whispered hoarsely, his fingers tight around mine. “Dear God. I’m going to kick Antony’s rear end.”
We passed through the massive open doorway into a still, cool night. Ahead of us, the iron gateway, and the guardhouse was there. The men were standing outside now, conferring quietly. Men who could make my life very difficult, in ways that had nothing to do with the supernatural.
I hated the intensity of their watchfulness. I hated my sudden sense of helplessness. I was supposed to be one of the most powerful people in the world, but I felt like a charlatan with a tin sword compared to human laws and bureaucracy—and the enormity of everything else I was responsible for. I was meant to save the world. I had been born to save lives. I could barely save myself.
“I miss zombies,” I muttered under my breath. “I miss the goddamn demons. What the hell happened to me?”
“Your world got bigger,” Grant murmured, and in a much louder, surprisingly inane voice said, “The Jesuits built this place. Nineteen-ten, I think, but the order’s had a presence here since 1608. The land was given to them by a high-ranking Ming Dynasty official, who converted to Catholicism.”
“Really,” I said stiffly. “Do tell.”
He continued leading me toward the gate as though I belonged there, and that this was part of some grand tour. Every step wrought a deeper transformation; arrogance rolled off him, entitlement, privilege; until a completely different man limped at my side, the kind who fit the stereotype of the filthy rich and handsome: an intolerable bore.
“The cathedral,” he continued unashamedly, when we were almost at the gate, “was used to store grain during the Cultural Revolution. The nuns were kept under house arrest. See that building across the street? That’s where they lived. Now it’s a steak restaurant.”
“Fascinating,” I replied, but I would have said the same if he told me he liked to dress up as a chipmunk and juggle acorns. I hadn’t heard a word he said. Father Cribari and Father Lawrence were behind us, and my focus was split between them and the men standing still by the guardhouse door, dressed conservatively in plain black slacks and short-sleeved dress shirts. Their eyes were cold, assessing. Especially when they looked at me.
I tried to put on my best face. I had never spent much time in front of a mirror, so I didn’t know what that was, but I looked the men straight in the eye and tried not to appear guilty. Just confident. A girl on tour with her guy. Nothing worth spending time on—not at this hour, not at their pay grade.
“This,” said one of the men, in faintly accented English, “was not part of the agreement.”
Surprise and a hint of outrage filled Grant’s face. “Mr. Shu, I know that Father Cribari and Father Lawrence arranged this tour at the last minute, but I was absolutely certain they told you my wife was coming along, as well.”
Father Lawrence made a small choking sound. I got a cheap thrill. Mr. Shu narrowed his eyes and glanced at his companion—who looked me up and down with all the emotion of a rock. I had the distinct impression he was adding up all the parts of me—appearance, manner, the way I clutched Grant’s hand—and coming up with a narrative that did not satisfy him in the slightest.
“I did not see you go in,” said the man, and there was a wary tenseness to his voice that belonged to any man forced to do his job at an ungodly hour: tired, and a bit exasperated. I liked him. I wanted to give him an easy way out.
“I was running late,” I replied, wondering if a person could look young and innocent simply by trying—suspecting I had about as much luck of accomplishing that as a crocodile would have of turning vegetarian.
The other official plucked a toothpick out of his pocket and jammed it in his mouth. “Passport.”
“Ah,” I replied. “I believe I left that at the hotel.”
Or an apartment more than six thousand miles away. Since it was night here, then it was daylight in Seattle. None of the boys would be able to flash home to retrieve my passport. I saw Zee, Raw, and Aaz hunched around the gargoyles decorating the cathedral. Watching us, red eyes glowing softly. The irony of the situation was going to kill me faster than any well-timed bullet.
“I’m sorry,” I added, and meant it. “I didn’t mean to cause trouble. I just wanted to be with him.” I patted Grant’s upper arm when I said that, then replaced my hand
with my cheek. Grant reached back to touch my hair, his fingers light and warm.
Both men stared. Grant put one hand on the gate. “Father Lawrence. Handle this. We’re late for an appointment.”
An appointment at midnight. Father Lawrence seemed ready to melt into the ground. Father Cribari folded his arms over his chest, but that was all. He showed nothing on his face.
Grant pushed me backward, through the open gate. No one stopped us, but I heard some rather sharp tones behind me, a mixture of Chinese and English. Limping fast, Grant led me away, and we walked left along the wall toward a quiet street.
“That wasn’t so bad,” I said, trying not to sound so breathless.
Grant gave me a sideways look. “Those men were members of the secret police. They had the authority to arrest us. Take us in for questioning, at the very least. Religious tolerance is growing, but the government is mindful of people who come here trying to politicize the situation.”
“So you play like some rich boy showing off to his girl, and pretend you’ve done nothing wrong? Nice.”
“I learned from my father,” Grant said. “Same thing you learned from your mother, I suppose. Power is transient. Power can flow from one person to another. The most powerful person in a room isn’t the wealthiest or the one with the most connections. It’s the person who believes the strongest, the one who has the most confidence. And, sometimes, it’s the person who can make everyone else feel like less of themselves.”
“My mother wasn’t big on emotional politics,” I replied, as somewhere behind us the iron gate clanged. “She just had . . . a quality.”
“Like you.”
“I wasn’t bluffing anyone back there.”
“Sure you were. You were a beautiful woman without a clue. That was a better act than mine, any day.”
He was teasing, but his words hit closer to home than I would have liked. Still, I smiled, trying to act like I got the joke—but my face felt like plastic and rubber.
Grant searched my eyes, humor fading—sliding into compassion, concern. His arm slid around my waist. He bent to kiss me, very gently, but I held the sides of his face and pushed closer, hungry for him. Afraid, suddenly, that I would never have another chance to taste him.
I heard voices, dimly. Grant stopped kissing me and pressed his bristled cheek to mine—our breathing ragged, his palm sweaty against the back of my neck. Dek and Mal rolled over his hand, holding him to me.
“Later,” he murmured in my ear, fingers tightening as two sets of purrs got louder in my ears. “We’ll be okay, Maxine. We’re going to be fine.”
And then he turned, just slightly. Father Cribari stood close, watching us—rather like a voyeur, I thought. Which made my stomach turn over.
“You think you are going someplace?” he asked Grant.
Grant smiled coldly. “I believe there was a man who requested my presence. Unless you lied and brought me here for another reason.”
Father Lawrence frowned, bits of him jiggling as he bounced up and down on his toes. He very briefly glanced at me—a strangely significant look, as though he wanted to say something private—but then the odd light in his eyes died, and he became bumbling and soft, murmuring, “Father Ross is not ready. He was—”
“He’s not talking,” interrupted Father Cribari smoothly. “I doubt he can, anymore.”
Something deadly passed through Grant’s eyes. “What did you do to him, Antony?”
“Nothing.”
“You said it was ‘nothing’ ten years ago, when you tried to convince the others to execute me. Or lock me up. What was it you said? There are cellars in the Vatican that run all the way to Hell?”
“You imagine things,” Cribari replied. “They only run halfway.”
Father Lawrence made a small sound of distress. “Please, the two of you, this is unnecessary. Not one of us would ever hurt another—”
“The various offices in the Vatican operate independently of each other,” Grant said, none too gently. “You know this, Father Lawrence. There is bureaucracy, and there is, occasionally, bungling of that bureaucracy, but for the most part there are no conspiracies, and all too few secrets—because no one in a bureaucracy can keep a secret. But there are exceptions. Aren’t there, Antony?”
The priest’s gaze slipped from Grant to me. “If you like.”
Grant edged sideways, so that he partially blocked me from Cribari’s sight. “Take us to Father Ross.”
But the man still held my gaze and would not let go. “I am confirmed in my beliefs of you, Grant Cooperon. Even more so now, with the company you keep.”
“Yes,” I said, smiling dangerously. “That’s something you and I should discuss.”
Father Cribari paled, but he did not back away, or visibly flinch. Grant squeezed my hand. “No games, Antony. You brought me here for a reason. Let’s finish it.”
Father Lawrence gripped his hands even tighter, uneasiness in his eyes—whether from the tension surrounding him or something he knew, I could not tell. But Cribari gestured at the brick building we had been walking toward. “See for yourself.”
Famous last words, I thought, searching the shadows—and not just for the boys. We needed to go, run fast, but I knew Grant too well. This might be a trap, but if there was a possibility that his old friend was somewhere near, he would never rest easy knowing he had abandoned the man. He had to see for himself what was fact or fiction. Dek and Mal, little more than shadows beneath my hair, began humming Bon Jovi’s “Bad Medicine” inside my ears.
We entered a quiet building that was a maze of narrow halls: long, plain, and poorly lit. The ceilings were so low I felt the urge to stoop. Even Grant hunched over, leaning harder on his cane. Worse, I saw no one else. I heard no one else. Even the sounds of our passage were muted, swallowed, each click and scuff dulled into death. A claustrophobic atmosphere, oppressive; like a cage of white straitjackets. Made my skin crawl.
We rode an elevator to the sixth floor. Each of us took a corner. I stood across from Cribari. He watched me, his gaze hooded and dark, and Grant watched him. Father Lawrence stared at the floor, his shoulders round and hunched. I considered the benefits of breathing.
The little priest led us to the end of the hall and removed a single key from his pocket. He hesitated, looking to Cribari for confirmation, then unlocked the door.
Grant started to enter. I was faster, and slipped in first. The room was small and lit by only one lamp that gave off a weak yellow light. I saw a narrow window draped in a thin pale curtain. The ceiling felt very low, and the air was cold and smelled like plaster.
There was the bed, and a man who lay in it. Father Ross.
I wasn’t sure what I had been expecting. A zombie would have made sense, or no man at all—just guns pointed at us, or tranquilizers, or whatever Cribari had in mind, eventually, to subdue our sorry asses. But there was a man, and all it took was one look at Grant’s face to see that it was the right man.
Father Ross had red hair. Freckles dashed across his nose. He might have looked like a nice, wholesome individual, once upon a time—but his cheeks were gaunt, and his body was so bony he seemed little better than a corpse. Bones jutted through the sheet that had been pulled up to his neck, and atop the sheet, black leather straps pressed down, restraining his hollow frame from shoulder to ankle.
His eyes were closed. He looked asleep. Grant stood very still, staring at him.
“Luke,” he murmured.
“He disappeared for several days, and when he returned . . . when he returned, he was quite different,” Father Lawrence said, hovering by the door. “He is very sick. He must have been, of course, to do . . . what he did. But there have been . . . other changes in him.”
“What did you do with the bodies of the nuns?” I asked, feeling rather uneasy about the priest’s careful choice of words. Remembering Franco and the changes that had been done to him.
“We made arrangements,” Father Cribari answered, and Father Lawr
ence, standing just behind him, shot the priest a look so full of venom I wondered if it was my imagination.
I raised my brow. “Making arrangements for the dead, especially when you don’t want anyone to know about the dead, is quite a feat. Not entirely a legal one, I imagine.”
“You judge us?” Cribari said softly. “You, of all people? What would you sacrifice in order to preserve what you consider dear? What wouldn’t you give?”
I would sacrifice everything, I told him silently. But that was between me and myself, and me and the people I loved.
Grant said, “Father Ross’s brain has been damaged. And his body.”
Father Lawrence frowned. “He was hit during the initial struggle, but not on the head.”
Grant looked at Cribari. “You know what I can do.”
“You don’t deny it?”
“I never did.” He reached for his flute. “Both of you, out.”
“I think not,” said Cribari.
“I won’t work in your presence.”
The priest bared his teeth in a terrible smile. “You seem to be under the impression that you have a choice.”
“And he would be right,” I muttered. “But first things first.”
I grabbed his arm, and shoved him hard against the wall. He was strong. He resisted. But I was tougher than most men. I had to be, in order to bear the weight of the boys on my body—my boys who weighed the same, whether tattoo or flesh. Like Superman, surpassing earth’s weak gravity. Fly, man, fly.
Father Lawrence was already in the hall, staring. Not in astonishment; but something else in his eyes that made me uneasy. I slammed the door in his face and added a kick for good measure. No lock, but I waited a moment, and the small priest did not try to come back in.
“You,” I said to Cribari softly, “have been a very bad man.”
“Take your hands off me,” he whispered.
“I don’t think so.” I leaned in, close enough to kiss, and he shied away from me like my breath was going to burn his face off. “You were surprised to see me. You thought I was going to be dead. Poor little Franco.”
Darkness Calls Page 11
