Grave of Angels

by Michael Prescott

  “Glad you could make it, Sister Kate. Bring the valise?”

  “I’ve got it.”

  “Toss it my way.”

  “And then what? You’ll shoot us all?”

  “Jesus, Kate,” Banning said, “do what he says.”

  “Shut up, Carson. I told you not to come looking for Amber.”

  “I had to find her—”

  “Did you have to help Swann with his kidnapping plans, too?”

  “I had my reasons.”

  “Everybody has their reasons,” she said.

  Swann glanced at her for the first time. The sun through the window burned on his bald scalp, reddening his face. He could have been a demon. “You giving up the bag or not?”

  “First, you give me Amber.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  She glanced at Banning, still wondering why he didn’t draw and fire. Swann wasn’t watching him. He had his chance.

  Swann caught her look and smiled. “You hoping this asshole will shoot me?” He shook his head. “I already disarmed him. Came up from behind while he and his kid were enjoying a tender reunion.”

  That was it, then. One hope gone.

  “You didn’t mention she was a movie star’s daughter,” Swann added. “No wonder you were so keen to find her.”

  “You didn’t mention you were working with a movie star, either. So I guess we both left out some details.”

  “Well, we’re all coming clean now. Me and you and the guy you were fucking.”

  Banning had told him about that. She remembered Swann saying, So you weren’t a virgin? You were a fucking whore even way back then?

  She tried again to negotiate. “Why don’t you let the girl go and hold on to her father as a bargaining chip?”

  “Doesn’t seem like he’s worth much to you.” Swann’s gaze glittered, and Kate thought of rodents with their small, bright eyes. “Not worth much to anyone.”

  She didn’t trust her marksmanship enough to take a shot at Swann with Amber in the way.

  “Just give me the girl,” she said, “and I’ll throw you the bag. All the jewelry’s here. Paintings, too. It’s what you wanted.”

  Swann stared at her, a long stare throbbing with hate. “Then why don’t I just shoot you and take it?”

  “You’re not the only one who’s armed.”

  “I like my chances against you.” He smiled, a brief, vicious smile. “But I’d rather not end things between us so impersonally. So here’s the deal. You throw away your gun, then toss me the bag.”

  “Or?”

  “Or I shoot this little bitch.” He prodded Amber with the gun. She whimpered, eyes shut tight.

  “Kate, God damn it”—Banning’s voice was hoarse—“just give him what he fucking wants.”

  “If I do, he’ll shoot her anyway.”

  “He won’t. Tell her, Jack. You won’t shoot anybody.”

  “Of course I will,” Swann said, and he shifted the gun and fired once, into Carson Banning’s chest.

  Amber shrieked. Her father stared down at his shirt, blankly astonished.

  “Why’d you do that?” he asked, the question oddly casual. His mouth twitched into an ingratiating smile, a movie-star smile. “We’re friends.”

  “No one’s my friend,” Swann said.

  He fired again.

  Banning’s head snapped back. He collapsed on the floor in an undignified sprawl.

  Down the hall, there were muffled cries, stamping footfalls. People spooked by the gunfire, running away.

  The noises faded, and then there was only the silence of death in the room.

  Slowly, Kate stepped forward, out of the doorway, into plain view, offering herself as a target if Swann wanted to shoot. She didn’t know why she did it. She only knew she wouldn’t hide from this man.

  “The bag,” Swann said.

  He hadn’t shot her yet, and she realized there was still doubt in his mind, doubt that the valuables were really with her. She could have cleaned out the valise, could be carrying the bag empty, as a ruse.

  “I’ll leave it in the hallway,” she said, “after I get Amber.”

  “You’re fucking trying to negotiate, you stupid bitch? Didn’t you see what I just did?”

  “I saw it. That’s why I’m not going to trust you, Jack.”

  “It’s not about trust. It’s about power. The power I have. I can kill this little shit.” He cupped his hand over Amber’s chin and lifted her head. “I can kill her, and you too. I can do anything. Now hand it over. Hand it over!”

  If she did, Amber would die. And if she didn’t…

  Same outcome.

  There was no way out. She couldn’t talk him down, couldn’t bargain, couldn’t even get off a shot with the girl in the way.

  “Hand it the fuck over,” Swann breathed. “I’m telling you for the last time. Lose the gun. Toss the bag. Do it now.”

  She had no choice. Barney, her mentor, had taught her years ago never to surrender her weapon. But he wasn’t here.

  She threw her gun aside. It clattered on the concrete floor and skidded into a corner.

  Carefully, she unshouldered the bag, then threw it across the room, where it landed at Swann’s feet.

  Still holding the girl, he stooped and opened the valise, looking inside. Something flickered in his face. Relief, elation, vindication.

  “So I got it,” he said, his voice hushed. “I won, after all.”

  “But you didn’t get Chelsea.”

  He looked up, his eyes brighter than before. “I got you, Sister Kate. You’re my consolation prize.” He waved the gun. “Come here. Come on. Don’t be shy.”

  She took a step toward him, and another, until she was close enough to see the blind panic in Amber’s eyes and the tears on her cheeks.

  “Kneel to me, Sister Kate. Kneel and worship. Pray to me.”

  His gun loomed, the muzzle a black hole of death.

  She knelt.

  “Repeat after me.” His voice rang in the concrete vault. “Jack Swann is my shepherd, I shall not want.”

  “Jack Swann is my shepherd, I shall not want.”

  “He leadeth me beside still waters. He maketh me lie down in green pastures. Jack Swann restoreth my soul.”

  She said the words, the stupid, blasphemous words. “Jack Swann restoreth my soul.”

  “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil because Jack Swann is with me. His rod and his staff, they comfort me.”

  “They comfort me.”

  “Now, say, ‘Jack Swann—into your hands I commend my spirit.’”

  It would be her epitaph. She saw it in his eyes.

  “No,” she said.

  “Say it.”

  “No.”

  Swann pressed the gun to Amber’s temple. “I’ll shoot her.”

  “You will, no matter what I do.”

  He let out a shout of laughter. “You’re right about that, Sister Kate. I’m leaving three corpses behind when I get out of here. Now say the words.”

  “Why should I, Jack?”

  “Say what I want, and I’ll make it easy on the girl. I’ll put her lights out with one shot. Deal?”

  “No.”

  “That’s the best offer you’re going to get.”

  “It’s not good enough.”

  “God damn it. Do what I say.”

  “No.”

  “You don’t obey. You never obey!”

  He would shoot her now, she knew he would, and Amber next. And there was nothing she could do. It was over.

  She saw his finger tighten on the trigger.

  And then he froze, his head cocked at an odd angle.

  Listening.

  “Sugarplum?” he whispered. “Is that you?”

  SWANN’S ears still rang like cymbals from the gun’s reports when he’d shot Banning, but over their constant chiming, he heard a new sound.

  It was Chelsea, and she was singing the willow song.
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  He smiled, because it was so perfect, so right.

  The nun had brought the girl, after all. Or the girl had come on her own, to be with him, as she was meant to be.

  “It’s okay,” he said. “You can show yourself. I won’t hurt you, sugarplum. You know I won’t.”

  The song flowed through the room like the flood of morning sun, blinding him.

  The poor soul sat sighing by a sycamore tree,

  Sing all a green willow…

  For a moment, he wondered if he could be imagining it. No, it was real, as real as it had been in the church when she sang for him.

  “Come on out,” he called. “Where are you hiding?”

  He looked around the room, but the only place of concealment was a closet without a door, and there was no one inside.

  She wasn’t in this room, anyway. She was in the hall. That was where the music came from. The hall.

  He started forward, forgetting the girl in his grasp until her deadweight slowed him down.

  “Move!” he ordered, waving the gun at her.

  The girl walked with him, dragging her feet. They brushed past the nun, kneeling on the floor. The nun didn’t matter. Only the song mattered. It drew him forward.

  Her hand on her bosom, her head on her knee,

  Sing willow, willow, willow…

  The hall was empty. He moved on, in pursuit of Chelsea’s voice. He passed room after room. She wasn’t in any of them.

  It was impossible to tell where the song originated. It seemed to come from everywhere, the notes reverberating off the bare walls, a storm of echoes.

  The fresh streams ran by her, and murmured her moans;

  Sing willow, willow, willow…

  Then he understood. It was the stairwell. That was where she was. The stairwell acted like a megaphone, amplifying sounds and scattering them throughout the building. She was singing to him from the stairs.

  “Chelsea? Come to me, baby.” He reached the landing. “Chelsea!”

  The girl in his arms pulled free. She simply slipped loose, supple as a ferret, and he was holding empty air.

  He let her go. She didn’t matter.

  He leaned over the railing. Flights of metal stairs dropped into darkness. There were no windows here; the daylight from the corridors barely touched the shaft.

  In the shifting gloom, he saw a pale, thin figure.

  Her salt tears fell from her, and softened the stones;

  Sing willow, willow, willow…

  It was her.

  He descended the stairs, taking them two at a time. Distantly, he was aware of the complaint of his fractured ribs, the electric arcs of pain running up his side.

  The song faded out. Halfway down the first flight of stairs, suspended between two floors, he saw her again, clearly this time. She had gone lower, staying below him. Silent now, she gazed up at him with her shining eyes.

  There was no love in those eyes, and no anger, only contempt. He knew then that she was taunting him, mocking him. She had come back only to show him what he’d lost.

  But he’d lost nothing. She was the one who’d lost.

  He lifted his gun, centered the figure over the sights, and fired twice, the double report raising a clangor of new echoes.

  It made no difference. She was still there. And his gun was empty. But he had Banning’s gun, confiscated, tucked into the waistband of his pants. He threw aside his weapon and pulled out Banning’s 9mm and drew a bead on Chelsea again.

  He fired. He couldn’t miss this time, but somehow he did.

  “You fucking bitch!” he screamed.

  She answered with laughter, light and musical.

  He blasted at the sound. Chips of concrete flew off the walls. Sparks sizzled on the metal banister, the metal treads.

  And still she was laughing. Laughing as he pulled the trigger again and again.

  And then she was gone. Just gone.

  He must’ve taken her out. It was the only explanation. She’d fallen.

  “Got you!” he howled down the shaft. “I got you, you little shit!”

  Flushed with triumph, he lifted his head, and there above him, on the landing, was the nun.

  Resting both elbows on the railing, she trained her gun on him.

  “Drop your weapon, Jack.”

  He stared at her, and in that moment, he came back to himself. He understood that Chelsea Brewer had never been there, that the song had been only in his head, that he’d fired at a shadow or a ghost. He’d given the nun an opportunity to recover her weapon. He’d surrendered his hostage. He’d emptied and discarded one firearm. He’d left himself open to attack from above.

  It had been a temporary madness, and now, too late, he was sane.

  “Drop it,” she said.

  Banning’s gun wasn’t empty yet. He stared up at her, taking her measure.

  “You won’t shoot me,” he said slowly. “You’re a nun.”

  She lifted her gun just a little. Her eyes never left his. “Not anymore.”

  It was her eyes that did it, her eyes and the unnatural calmness of her voice.

  He knew then that he would never have a chance to get off a shot at her. She would gun him down where he stood.

  Slowly, he spread his fingers and let the pistol fall. It hit the stairs and bounced down, clattering like a child’s toy, disappearing into the dark.

  Swann raised his hands in surrender.

  THE police arrived just ahead of the ambulance, summoned by Kate after Swann gave back her cell phone. She saw Swann submit to handcuffs, his face unreadable. The paramedics had loaded Banning onto a stretcher by the time she got back to him. His face was sheeted, and no one was in any hurry to move his remains. Amber sat against a wall, draped in a blanket, protection against shock. Kate knelt by her and told her it would be okay.

  Amber shook her head, refusing comfort. “So my dad was mixed up in this shit? He was, like, that crazy guy’s accomplice or something?”

  “We can talk about that later.”

  Kate expected a protest, but the girl seemed too exhausted to argue. “Who are you, anyway?”

  “My name’s Kate. I’ve been looking for you.”

  “Why?”

  “To help.”

  Cynicism darkened her gaze. “Right. Saving lost girls—that’s just what you do, right?”

  Kate squeezed her arm. “It is, tonight.”

  ——

  Kate spent two hours with the police. She told them everything, withholding only Victoria’s relationship with Banning. It wasn’t her place to tell that part of the story.

  At the end, she asked if she was under arrest. She wasn’t.

  At Good Samaritan Hospital, she found Victoria sitting with Skip and Alan in a room in the ICU. Chelsea lay in bed, unconscious, amid a tangle of tubes and wires. Blood tests showed she had overdosed on GHB. The overdose had brought on respiratory depression and bradycardia. She had been intubated and given atropine and activated charcoal, as well as a continuous saline drip to combat hypotension. No one was using the word coma.

  “For now,” Victoria said, “all we can do is wait.”

  And pray, Kate thought, remembering Mrs. Farris and her shrine to Mila. But Victoria didn’t ask for a prayer, and Kate didn’t offer one.

  “You were right,” Victoria spoke up abruptly, more than an hour after Kate’s arrival. She was looking directly at Kate. “When you said I could replace any material thing, but I could never replace…You were right.”

  True to his word, Barry Larrison broke the story at seven a.m. on Good Morning America. Hospital security kept the media out. From the window, Kate could see a line of TV vans with satellite uplinks, reporters doing live stand-ups outside the ER. Carrion feeders gathering to gnash their beaks and caw. She hated them.

  “Goddamn vultures,” Skip said, following her gaze.

  She looked at him, surprised to hear her thoughts echoed by Skip, of all people. He glanced away, but not before she caught the guilty
, self-conscious flicker in his eyes.

  An hour later, Victoria spoke again, this time without looking at anyone. “They found Sam.”

  Kate glanced at Alan. “Did they?”

  Alan nodded. “Forgot to mention it, chief. We got the call on the way over.”

  “He was left by the side of the road,” Victoria said. “He’d been…mutilated. He’s dead, of course,” she added as an afterthought.

  “I’m sorry,” Kate said, though the news was no surprise.

  “Are you?” Victoria’s mouth puckered. “I’m not.”

  At noon, Kate took a walk through the ICU. She couldn’t stand the bedside vigil any longer. She had to move, walk, think, or she would go crazy.

  She wondered if Swann was somewhere in the ICU. More likely, he was in surgery. He had been wounded in his encounter with Grange and Di Milo. Shot three times, she’d heard. Her men had drawn blood, at least.

  She looked down at the street, where the TV people seemed to be hastily setting up for new live reports. By now the coverage would be wall-to-wall, every channel, a whole nation fascinated by the death of Carson Banning and speculating about Chelsea’s fate.

  But as for Grange, Di Milo—no one cared about them. No one cared about the driver of the Hyundai shot to death in the street, a man whose name Kate didn’t even know. No one cared about Mila Farris, dead of an overdose, her story hushed up. No one cared about the children of the Monroe Towers or the vagrant named Lazarus by the railroad tracks.

  The sisters used to comfort themselves by saying God cared. God watched out for all the forgotten ones. But where was God tonight? Was he there for Chelsea? For Amber? For anyone?

  God was nowhere. There was nothing but pain, nothing but grief. Children dying in graffiti-streaked corridors or in the sterile confines of the ICU.

  She walked back to Chelsea’s room, feeling empty. It took her a moment to realize that Victoria was seated on the bed, holding her daughter’s hand, and Chelsea’s eyes were open.

  Kate caught Alan’s eye. “How long ago?” she asked softly.

  “Couple minutes. She just opened her eyes and smiled, like nothing had happened.”

  No wonder the reporters had been preparing to go back on the air. They’d heard the news even before Kate had.