Another set of tracks and another cigar car waited for us. As I lowered myself into my seat and settled my backpack between my feet, I accidentally let myself notice how low the ceiling was. Instant panic. I gripped the bars on the inside of the car and bent my head down. Taylor put us into gear. As I’d predicted, by the time we stopped, I’d sweated through my shirt yet again.
Escape tunnel four let out underneath the Albert Street subway stop in Downtown. A ladder led up to the platform level through a pipe. We climbed up and into our bolt-hole, with me leading the way. I’m pretty sure that was so Taylor could prod me from behind if I froze up. I climbed on autopilot, my cramped fingers hooking over the rails.
At the top, I released the trapdoor and flipped it back. Dim lights glowed inside the cramped space, barely bigger than the size of a bathroom. One wall had shelves with a variety of emergency supplies. Taylor climbed out behind me and lowered the trapdoor back into place. It locked automatically.
I grabbed a bottle of water and drank from it, feeling parched. Panic did that to me.
“Ready?”
I nodded. Taylor opened the door a crack and looked out. A second later she swung it wide and stepped outside. I followed, shutting the door behind me. We stood inside a niche in the subway tunnel. The air was cool and smelled of minerals with a hint oil. From the outside, the door we’d come through looked like solid rock.
We went right, guided by the light from the Albert Street platform. Gravel crunched under our feet. Nobody noticed us emerge from the tunnel. I opened the maintenance door under the platform. We stooped and stepped inside a narrow hallway. The walls and ceiling were thick with conduits. We went down to the end and up the stairs, coming out at a nondescript door leading out onto the platform. We slipped out and joined the small crowd waiting for the next train. They ran every thirteen minutes.
Five minutes later the train arrived, and we boarded, taking seats near the back of the car. Taylor and I hadn’t spoken. I kept my head down, my eyes closed, and concentrated on breathing. When the speaker announced the Porter Creek station, I opened my eyes and stood. Just a few more minutes, and we’d be clear of the underground.
Our stop was only ten blocks from the hangar. The wind was blowing, and the cold slapped my face. I pulled my balaclava over my head and stuck my hands into my pockets. The Kensington Bank said it was five below zero. The windchill dropped the temperature another five or ten degrees. The weatherman had promised a storm sometime in the next couple of days.
The sidewalks had been cleared, but patches of thick ice made the going slower than I liked. Taylor looped her arm through mine so that we could balance each other, and our speed increased.
We’d gone two blocks when a limo slid across the intersection in front of us, blocking our path. Dad rolled down the rear window. “I’d like to speak with you. Let me drive you to the hangar. It will be faster.”
I tossed him a glance but didn’t stop. Neither did Taylor. “No, thanks. We’re more likely to get there walking,” I said.
He winced, and the expression was achingly familiar. So many times he’d made that face. It was self-deprecating and apologetic. And probably fake as hell.
“Whatever you want can wait,” I said. Forever, if it was up to me, but I didn’t think it was.
“Feel free to go to hell in the meantime,” Taylor added.
He frowned, the limo coasting along beside us.
“Very well. I will walk with you.”
He opened the door and climbed out, buttoning his knee-length cashmere coat before setting a fedora on his head. He looked like a 1940s detective. A woman came after, and from the other side of the limo stepped a bald-headed giant. Bodyguards. I guess they were worried we might try to kill Dad. Reasonable enough. If looks were anything to go by, Taylor would have gutted him if she could.
The limo pulled away. Dad’s two minions split up, the giant up front, the woman behind. He fell in beside us. We walked along in silence for a half block before he spoke.
“You two should not be out without an escort,” he said. “It’s dangerous.”
“You mean it’s dangerous for Riley,” Taylor said. I was sandwiched between the two of them. “I’m hardly important enough to notice.” Bitterness sharpened the edges of her words.
“I’m sure it seems that way,” he said.
I could hear Taylor’s teeth gritting at that response. I gripped her tighter, wishing Dad would just go back to whatever rock he’d crawled out from under. Dad. I kept thinking of him that way, but he wasn’t my dad. Not the one I thought I’d known, and every time I said or thought the word, it felt like a lie. “What name are you going by these days?” I asked. “Not Sam Hollis. There’s been no record of him since you vanished.”
He nodded. “It was important that no one connect me to you. Any of you,” he added.
“So what should we call you?”
That seemed to take him aback. “Brussard,” he said at last. “Vernon Brussard.”
“Vernon Brussard,” I echoed. I wondered how he’d arrived at that, if it had any particular meaning. Then I dismissed my curiosity. Didn’t matter. To me it was just a strange name for a stranger. Definitely better than calling him Dad.
“All right, Vernon. What do you want?” My forehead scrunched. “How did you find us, anyhow?” Then I rolled my eyes at my own stupidity. “Never mind. Stupid question.”
Dalton had reported back to him, of course. I couldn’t even pretend to be surprised. Vernon must have been waiting on us, knowing we’d walk past here eventually.
“I have some information that may interest you.”
“What’s in it for you?” Taylor asked.
He ignored that. “The FBI is not the only party with an interest in your friend, Clayton Price. Others have watched to see if his talent would reawaken.”
How many people knew about Price’s talent? Apparently he and I were among the few who’d been in the dark.
I shook my head. “I don’t get it. What’s the big deal? Lots of people have destructive talents.”
“That is true, but his may be of particular value.”
“Why?”
“It depends on what his talent actually is.”
“You’re dodging the question.”
“I am,” he agreed. “But for good reason. You haven’t yet encountered his talent. It might be better if you don’t have any preconceived notions about it. What I believe it might be is just an educated guess and that based on limited information.”
“You know the story of his kidnapping,” I said.
He nodded. “I’ve kept abreast of the case. We make a point of tracking powerful talents when they crop up on the radar. He may prove a powerful weapon. Or he may become an enemy.”
“We?” Taylor pounced on the pronoun. “Who is we?”
“Interested parties.”
“How very vague of you,” she said.
“Now isn’t the time,” he replied.
“That’s right. Just like mushrooms. Keep us in the dark and feed us bullshit,” I said.
His mouth thinned. Obviously, he didn’t find my comment amusing. It did, however, hit the nail on the head, and he knew it.
“I have come out of hiding to tell you all you need to know. All that is safe to know,” he amended.
I stopped suddenly and faced my father. My heart thudded against my ribs. God, it hurt to look at him. I had loved him so much. But everything I felt, everything I remembered, might all be fiction. Probably was. I think that hurt the worst. I’d practically hero-worshipped him. I now second-guessed every memory. And even if they were all real and true, I knew now that his kind-father routine hid a much darker man, one capable of killing his daughter rather than letting her reveal her secrets. I couldn’t reconcile that cold, brutal ma
n with the loving father I remembered.
“So get on with it. Say what you want to say and then leave us alone.”
He examined my face, his blue eyes darkening with emotion. It might have been pain, or regret, or maybe he was just hungry. I refused to care.
“Very well. In a nutshell, others are interested in Clayton Price and his talent and they will be coming for him now that the FBI has made a move. They won’t want to risk losing him to insanity. You are watched as well, Riley. Soon, someone will come for you, too.”
Vernon dug in his pocket and pulled out a brass key. He held it out to me. I didn’t take it.
“What’s that for?”
“Use it when you need me. I’ll send help.”
“Or you’ll track me wherever I go.”
“There’s no active magic. You can tell. Look at it.”
He was right. It was harmless. For now. “That doesn’t mean it does what you say it does.”
“True.” He dropped the key into my pocket. “Use it or not, it’s up to you. But I will come to you if you activate it.”
I was tempted to throw it back at him, but I didn’t. I couldn’t even say why. Maybe it was just the residue of how much I’d loved and trusted him. I could always throw it away later.
“Is that all?”
“No. Be careful, Riley. Clayton Price was dangerous before and he’s likely to be more so. His experience with the FBI might leave him unstable, or worse.”
The idea sent razors spinning through my gut. My lips twisted. “Been there, done that. Thanks to you.” I didn’t give him a chance to respond. “If that’s all you’ve got, then you can leave now.”
He gave a faint shake of his head. “Oh no. We’ll never be done. The two of you are my daughters, and whatever you think of me, I will always look after you.” A smile softened the harshness of his expression. “You have both grown into strong, exceptional, talented women.”
“No thanks to you,” Taylor said.
“Of course it’s thanks to me,” he said. “Without me you wouldn’t have the skills, the strength, or the knowledge you do.”
“I guess Mom was nothing more than Kleenex,” Taylor shot back.
His answering smile sent a chill down my spine. “Mel is and always will be brilliant and brave.” Even so, he gave her no credit for raising us.
He turned his head slightly, and it was like a cloud lifted. I suddenly caught a glimpse of the real man. He might look mild-mannered and intellectual, like a college history professor, but beneath that veneer he was terrifying. Worse than Touray, who scared the shit out of me most of the time.
Price’s brother was ruthless and brutal, but at least I understood him. He was driven by the need to protect his own. Underneath everything, Touray really cared. But where he was motivated by passion and the urge to protect, this man—Vernon Brussard, the stranger who was my father—was cold-blooded and calculating. To him, people were nothing more than pieces on a chessboard, even his own family. He’d tried to keep my talent from falling into the ‘wrong’ hands by killing me. In that split second, I saw the merciless savagery hiding behind the smile in his eyes and the jut of his jaw. This man wouldn’t hesitate to use me or Taylor. A leopard didn’t change his spots. He’d do or say anything to manipulate us. The fact that we were his daughters only cemented his belief that he had a right to use us. He’d made us; we belonged to him to do with as he pleased.
Or so he thought. I wasn’t going to let him get away with it. I stepped back. “Stay the hell away from us.”
“I don’t think so. But I will say good-bye for now. Do be careful.” He started to turn away. His limo had pulled up behind him. He looked back over his shoulder.
“While you’re in the compound, you should visit section nine. You might find it interesting. Oh, and Riley, should you help Agent Arnow with her problem, be prepared. The stakes are much higher in that game.” He touched his fingers to his hat in a little salute and then stepped inside the car. His two minions followed, and a moment later they drove away.
I looked at Taylor. She looked spitting mad. White dents framed her nostrils, and her mouth was a thin white line.
“We should go,” I said. The hangar was only another couple of blocks. I started walking, my chest tight. Taylor caught up with me in a few steps.
“Of all the gall,” she said. “He thinks he’s going to get daddy privileges now that he’s decided to return from the dead?”
“It’s worse than that.”
She frowned at me, clearly expecting a different response. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that he has plans for us.”
“What do you mean? What kinds of plans?”
“I don’t know, but everything he’s done—he’s like a farmer planting seeds and waiting for harvest. I think we’re getting ripe for his needs.”
“That’s—” Taylor couldn’t find the words. “What needs?”
“Nothing that ends well for us.”
She digested that. “It’s you he wants.”
“Maybe it was a long time ago, but I think he’s got his eye on you now, too. And Leo and Jamie and maybe Mel, too. All of you have talents and skills. I’m sure he’s got uses for you.”
She didn’t answer as she considered what I’d said. Finally, as we turned into the driveway and approached the door of the hangar, she glanced at me. “What are you going to do with the key?”
“Keep it.”
“Why?”
“Do you remember that fable about the frog and the scorpion? Where the scorpion needs to cross the river and the frog refuses because the scorpion will kill him, and the scorpion argues that that is stupid because if he kills the frog, he’ll die too. So the frog gives him a ride and then in the middle of the river, the scorpion stings the frog and they both drown.”
“What’s that got to do with Dad and the key?”
“As he’s dying, the frog asks why he did it. The scorpion says, ‘it’s in my nature. I can’t help it.’ Vernon is a scorpion. He’s going to use us. It’s his nature. We can count on it. It’s as predictable as the sun rising in the east. The key will protect his property. Keep us from falling into the wrong hands. So we can trust that when we need him, he’ll show up because he doesn’t want anybody else to have us.”
“I can see that. But you know, just because we want help, it doesn’t mean he’ll do it in a way that we like. He might rescue us from a burning building, but he’d leave everybody else we care about to cook.”
“We won’t let that happen,” I said.
“How are we going to stop it?”
“We’re going to play his game better than he does. And we’re going to win.”
If only it would be that easy.
Chapter 11
WE MADE THE FLIGHT up to Honigstock Peak without any hitches. It was on the southeast side of Diamond City. Getting there was weirdly silent, with no engine or rotor sounds whatsoever. All I heard was the whistle of the wind around us and the clicks and adjustments as Taylor took care of business. Usually we used headsets just to be able to hear ourselves think.
We had waited until darkness fell, then lifted off. We rose into the sky and shot west across the caldera. On the other side, we’d bank and come around on course. Taylor flew the Eurocraft with a deft touch. She wore a set of goggles that I assumed gave her night vision. I sat in the front seat beside her, watching the lights of Diamond City grow smaller. Heat blasted into the cabin space, fighting the exterior cold as snow began to swirl thick through the air. It was like flying inside of a snow globe.
“I can’t believe it’s so quiet,” I said as we rose higher into the night.
“It’s magic tech I commissioned awhile back. I can charge more for the flight tours and I’ve had movie people wanting to use my
service. Got it installed a month or so ago, but I haven’t really had a chance to use it. The nice thing is that it doesn’t take a lot of power. The spells loop into one another and I only need a recharge every few weeks or so. It cost just about as much as the helicopter did, but it’s totally worth it.”
“Handy for tonight, anyway.”
Taylor grinned. “Ain’t it?”
She’d also shut off the helicopter’s transponder and slapped a fake registration number over the real number. Even if we were seen, nobody would connect it to Taylor or me or Price.
As we climbed over the western rim of the caldera, the wind buffeted us, and we shimmied and bounced despite Taylor’s expert handling of the stick.
As the snow turned blinding, I wondered how we were going to land. I figured GPS would get us to the right coordinates, but that wasn’t going to get us safely down to the ground. Steep mountain ground with trees and snow. My foot pressed down on my invisible brakes. I made myself relax. Taylor had flown in wars, and she often flew rescues in the mountains in far worse conditions than this. She knew what she was doing.
I wasn’t ready for when we abruptly started to descend after about a half-hour flight. I gasped as we seemed to rocket downward at a steep angle. The silence of the whole thing made it worse.
“Nervous?” Taylor flashed a grin at me. “Don’t worry. I’ve got this.” She was in her element.
She leveled off, and we slowed so that we were almost hovering. I could see patches of dark and light below that had to be trees and snow on the mountain. They spread outward and up and down on the left side of the helicopter.
“Bugs Bunny, this is Roadrunner,” Taylor said into headset. “Go for coyote action.”
Taylor watched the ground below out her window, the helicopter bouncing and swinging on the wind. All of a sudden we started dropping. My stomach rose into my throat, and my hands clenched on the sides of the seat.
Whisper of Shadows (The Diamond City Magic Novels) Page 14
