House of Stone

by T. K. Thorne

He means Jason. Am I willing to kill Jason?

  “We’ll face that if and when we come to it,” I say.

  Alice wrings her hands. “But how are you going to find that little girl if you kill the only person who knows where she is?”

  I look at Tracey. He demurred before about trying to get info out of Angola, but I’ve never seen this look in his eyes. They are stone. He knots his hands into fists. “Oh, he will tell us where she is.”

  To say I’m a nervous wreck would be an understatement—heart booming, head light, breath ragged. It’s early Monday morning. None of us have had any sleep. We don’t have time. Tracey and I have called in sick. I’m sure that set the gossip tongues flapping.

  I fumble my keys out of my purse, making sure for the third time that the tracker is there, and open the front door to my house. I haven’t been here since the trip down memory lane. Angola didn’t show up that time, and he might not this time, but he seems to have upped his schedule for offing me. I’m counting on that and on my partners outside, primarily Tracey, who has the back door covered. The house’s rear door opens to a wooded area at the base of Red Mountain.

  The front door is harder to cover but a less likely entry point. Jamal has that. He, Alice, and Becca are in a car backed up into the driveway of a house for-sale-by-owner down the street. It would not have been a good option in daylight, but it’s dusk now, and there are no house lights or working streetlights nearby, a common issue in this neighborhood.

  I lock the front door behind me, flip on the porch light and check the back door and windows. All locked, as I left them. All curtains drawn. There is no basement. Angola will have no option but to try to break in. As soon as he’s spotted, Tracey will call for backup from Jamal, and I’ll unlock the back door where my Glock and I will add our “invitation” for Angola to step inside for a “come to Jesus meeting.”

  “Testing,” I say aloud for the fifth time, making sure my blue-tooth device is secure in my ear.

  “Loud and clear,” Tracey responds.

  We argued about how to communicate. Tracey wanted to use the Vice-Narcotics radio-to-radio channel, which doesn’t bounce off a repeater, but I was afraid somebody from the detail might be nearby and pick up the transmissions, or worse, be using the channel for an operation. I opted for buying some walkie-talkies, but Tracey said those weren’t secure either, as they all worked in a limited range of bandwidth. So we are all on a conference call connection. Simple, but it never occurred to me. It was Becca who came up with the idea. She’d set up conference calls many times in her previous job as a receptionist at an attorney’s office, before she lost her job for hitting her boss with a golf club. He deserved it.

  Jamal echoes Tracey’s confirmation, “I’m in place.”

  Alice and Becca are silent, although they are listening too. They’re to keep the line free for the three of us.

  Once more I check the entire house, including closets and bathtubs, the dryer, and under the beds. There is no way Angola would be here ahead of me unless he can read minds as well as manipulate them. God have mercy if there is a House somewhere that can do that! A nervous burst of laughter at that thought elicits a check from Tracey.

  “You okay?”

  “Ten-four, just a bizarre thought.”

  “Want to share it?”

  He knows what I’m feeling. He’s a Marine, ex-Marine. It’s the waiting part that’s hard.

  “No, just nerves. I’m going to set up my paints and give him some time to show.”

  “Remember we’re right here, and Rose, we have your six.”

  I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have at my back. I take a deep breath. “I’m good.”

  At least half my anxiety comes from fretting about what we have to do when we catch him. I can handle whatever Tracey has in mind. A few bruises or broken bones are worth saving Kaleshia. But after that? Despite my resolve and knowing it’s what we have to do, I don’t know if I can kill an unarmed man. I once shot a man in the back, but that is apples to oranges—he was about to kill my partner. This is different. It’s not what I signed up for. I’m supposed to be the good guy. But what is the good guy now—someone who follows rules and laws laid out for normal people or someone who protects the weak?

  I try to quiet my tumbling thoughts. I’ve been over and over the same worn grooves of thought all day, a substitute for sleep. It only comes out one way—turning Angola over to armed police officers or jailers equals more deaths. He is House. He is our responsibility.

  Nixing another urge to search the house, I step into the sunroom. Curtains are drawn here too, but I have good light overhead and a standing lamp. My easel is set up in the corner, ready. Two whole walls of windows. It’s a perfect studio, though it gets chilly in the winter.

  I start a new palette, taking my time to dab the colors. Brushes are lined up waiting. The incomplete painting before me is dry, ready for another layer. I eye the water. Too bright. It needs depth. I’ll work on that and the sky, try to lose myself and the sense of time that makes waiting so difficult.

  It works. I’m actually startled at the third ten-minute check-in from Tracey.

  “All quiet,” I say.

  “Here too.”

  “Likewise,” Jamal says.

  That’s when I notice something is wrong.

  I was so focused on making sure there was nobody hiding in the house, I missed it. The last time I was here, when I started this part of the painting, I wanted more afternoon sun, and I angled the easel to catch that from the windows. But now it’s a few inches over, more like it is when I want morning light. My heart lurches and I knock over a brush.

  When I bend to pick it up, glass shatters. I drop to the floor.

  “Rose!” Tracey shouts in my ear. “What’s happening? We got a window broken at the rear of the house, your studio.”

  I look up at the wall opposite the broken window. Level to where I was standing, a hole has appeared in the far wall. I’m wearing a bulletproof vest under my shirt, but that shot had been aimed for my head.

  “Sniper,” I say. “Due south in the woods.”

  “Are you okay?”

  My hand is clenched around the paintbrush I retrieved. The brush that saved my life. It snaps in my fingers.

  Chapter Sixty

  “He set it up,” I say in a voice I thought would be shaky but is flat of emotion. “We failed.”

  “How did he know where you were in the house?” Tracey asks, giving me a ride back to Alice’s. I take a swig of water from the bottle he offers me, happy to have something to hold on to.

  “He’s been inside my house. He saw my studio and moved the easel. Not far, just enough, I guess, to judge exactly where I would be standing relative to the window and line me up in his sights. He marked the window. I didn’t see it because the curtain covered it, but it’s a flimsy curtain. With the lights on in the room, he saw my shadow. If I hadn’t bent over to get a brush on the floor—”

  “But how did he get in? There were no signs of forced entry. The windows were locked. You checked everything twice.”

  “Maybe lock picking is listed on his resume.”

  He leans back. “Maybe.”

  “I feel stupid thinking we were being smart. He’s known every move I’ve made. I kept getting these panic attacks out of thin air. But I think he’s been watching me and maybe, subconsciously, I felt it. He knew when I went home before.” I shudder, imagining him watching me paint. “He would have known at some point I’d come back and finish my painting. All he had to do was get inside, move the easel, and then just watch the tracker and wait for me to go home and turn on the light in that room.”

  Tracey shakes his head. “It’s my fault. I assumed he would come into the house to try and kill you, but I knew he had a rifle and scope. Those shots at Vulcan were too accurate.”

  I set the
cup down without drinking from it. “It’s not anybody’s fault. I’m just lucky, and I guess this answers another question.”

  “Which is?”

  “Would the living-green protect me? When I was checking out that old mine entrance last year, I had a vision, a bullet moving in slow motion right toward my head. Seeing that saved my life. This time my clumsiness and a paint brush saved me.”

  “I don’t have an answer for you.”

  “I don’t think anyone has. Alice said we make the magic.”

  “I don’t want to go too far into conjecture here, but if it’s something that you make happen, how would you know that you need to get a warning?”

  “Over my pay grade, but Alice also said there might be multiple universes and timelines. If somehow I can sense that— I don’t know. I’m stopping there. Jesus, Lohan, it was my idea to set a trap. I could’ve gotten everybody killed.”

  “Angola doesn’t seem to particularly want everyone dead. Just you.”

  I look at him. “And not just because I’m working on this case.”

  “This guy has been more than one step ahead of us and that’s on me.”

  “Stop beating yourself up. We tried. The question is, what do we do now?”

  “It’s Angola’s play now since you threw that tracker into the woods.”

  “Maybe I shouldn’t have done that.”

  “I should never have let you be bait.”

  “You didn’t ‘let me.’ It was my idea.”

  “We have to get you out of here, Rose. Someplace far away where Iron won’t find you.” He reaches over to lay his fingers lightly on mine.

  “Like where?”

  “I don’t know. New Zealand or something.”

  “That’s ridiculous.”

  “Why? Why is it any more ridiculous than your aunt faking her death to save her life?”

  “Stop it. I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I have a job to do. Because there’s a little girl’s life at stake.”

  He stares at me. I give him the rest of the truth.

  “Because I belong here. This is my city. It’s why I came back. I don’t understand it. Maybe it’s about the magic. I don’t know, but I’m not bailing out.”

  “That’s nuts.”

  “Maybe.” I feel my mouth thinning into what Becca calls its stubborn set.

  “You are exasperating,” Tracey says.

  “I’ve been told that before.”

  “I’m not letting my House fail again. I’m calling in our people. Even if they’re not trained, Iron can’t manipulate them, and they can help protect you.”

  “For how long? Muscles don’t stop bullets, Lohan. You can’t protect me.”

  The set of his jaw says he will die trying, and that’s exactly what I’m afraid of.

  Chapter Sixty-One

  We regroup at Alice’s and try to grab a few hours rest. Even as deprived as I am, sleep is an erratic thing. I keep bouncing in and out of nightmares.

  My phone dings and I answer.

  “I heard from him,” Segal says hoarsely.

  I snap awake. “When? What did he say?”

  “He sent an email with a photo of Kaleshia. It’s got a time stamp. It’s current, about ten minutes ago. She’s alive!”

  “Where is she?”

  “I don’t know.” Segal’s voice rises in desperation. “I can’t tell. She’s just standing on something in front of a window. I can’t see anything but the top of a bush. How am I supposed to know where she is? He says time is up. He wants to know I’ve finished with the database and then he wants you and me to come to him. Just us. No weapons. In three hours. Any violation, and he will kill Kaleshia.” His voice breaks.

  “Where?”

  “He didn’t say, he just said if I wanted to see Kaleshia alive we need to come.”

  “What number did he call from?” I grab a pen and scratch pad.

  “I wrote it down,” Segal says. He reads out the number, and I scribble it on the paper.

  “Segal, don’t panic. Message me the photo, and I’ll call you back in a few minutes.”

  “Okay. Okay, but we gotta find her!”

  “We will. We will find her. I promise.” I hang up. Damn you, Angola Simone. I will find you.

  I call Tracey, who is sleeping upstairs in Nora’s old room. He sounds like his mouth is full of cotton.

  “Logan,” he mutters. “I mean, hello.”

  “I’m coming upstairs.”

  “What’s happened?”

  “Angola sent Segal a photo of Kaleshia with an ultimatum. He forwarded it to me, and I’m sending it to you along with the number he called from. I think we’re out of time. We need to publish the results with UAB, or I’m afraid things will get nasty.”

  “I’m on it.”

  I examine the photo Segal forwarded of Kaleshia. She looks okay, if bald and too thin and needing to be in the hospital having her treatment is “okay.” She’s standing on something, a chair, I presume, since a windowsill in the background is at the level of her hips. A normal window would have been higher on her. Only a small patch of the curtain is visible. It looks familiar. I zoom in. The wooden windowsill has long grooves in it, like a cat used it for a scratching post.

  I throw on my clothes, gargle to wash the nasty taste from my mouth, splash water on my face and go upstairs. Tracey joins me in the living room. Alice and Becca, hearing us, do as well.

  “UAB was on standby to publish the trial results,” Tracy says, “and it’s being pushed out now. The phone number Angola used belongs to a convenience store. I’ve got the Tech Unit checking the email address, but it looks like a dead-end one to me.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” I say.

  “Why not?”

  “I know where Kaleshia is.”

  I find myself the center of everyone’s attention.

  “She’s standing on a chair in my kitchen.”

  A moment of silence greets this. No one misses the irony. We were just there a few hours ago.

  “She wasn’t there when I was,” I say. “I know that house, and I searched every inch, twice. Wherever he had her hidden, he’s moved her.”

  “You can’t go there,” Tracey says.

  “I have to.”

  “You’ll be walking right into his hands.”

  “He’ll kill you,” Alice says, tying the sash on her bathrobe. “Think of what you’re risking. It’s not just you. It’s the future of our entire House, of all the Houses.”

  “I can’t let him kill Kaleshia or wipe her mind. Segal will insist on going too.”

  Becca, the only one of us who looks as if she’s not allergic to morning, plops down in a chair. “I guess calling in a SWAT team is not an option.”

  “They’re called a TACT team in Birmingham,” Tracey says. “And no, that’s not an option, even though it’s a hostage situation. Getting law enforcement engaged with House of Iron elevates the risks of a bloodbath. This is our responsibility.”

  “Well then,” she says. “We have to outthink him.”

  Tracey turns to her. “You got any ideas?”

  “Not yet,” she says, “but we have to stop thinking like there’re no other solutions than to just walk in and surrender to him.”

  “Becca’s right,” I say. “Thinking only along the lines that Angola has given is just a path to death. There has to be something else we can throw into the pot. But while we’re trying to figure out what the heck that might be—Tracey, can we get someone to run Segal here?”

  “Sure.”

  “We need everybody’s thoughts,” I say, as soon as Tracey disconnects with Hobart. “What advantages do we have?”

  “Witches,” Becca says immediately.

  “Place and t
ime are his choices,” Tracey says. “I don’t like anything about this.”

  “But I know the place.” I don’t mention that it didn’t stop him from turning the trap I thought I was setting against me.

  “If something goes wrong,” Tracey asks, “and Angola wipes minds, could you ‘fix’ Kaleshia or Segal like you did Becca?”

  I shake my head. “From what Jason has told me, I’m pretty sure Angola doesn’t have the expertise to make it reversible. Even if he could do something as complex as a tabula rasa, why would he? He has everything to lose if Segal confesses to manipulating that database. Not to mention, if we deliver ourselves into his hands, Segal would be a witness that Angola murdered me. I’m pretty sure he would permanently burn out their personality and memories.”

  “I think his ultimate plan is to kill them,” Tracey says, “at least Kaleshia.”

  My gut twists.

  Alice puts both hands to her cheeks in horror. “Why would he murder a child?”

  “My guess,” Tracey says, “is once he’s killed Rose and maybe Kaleshia, he will wipe Segal’s mind and set up evidence that lays both murders on Segal. Then the man with the ponytail will vanish. Very convenient. Only survivor left will be a man who can’t testify about anything. It’s pretty brilliant, actually. The photo we have from the hospital is too grainy for an ID, and investigators looking at real evidence Segal killed his sister might assume he sent someone to the hospital to retrieve her. It’s known we interviewed Segal on a murder case, which gives him a motive to kill Rose.”

  “We can’t let him do that!” Becca says.

  Tracey scowls. “I don’t see we have any choices here. If we don’t play according to his plan—if Segal doesn’t show or Angola sees anyone else—”

  I finish the sentence. “He can wipe Kaleshia’s mind. He would still have her life to bargain with and no one could pin anything to him.”

  “We can’t let that happen either,” Becca says. “We have to keep him happy. Keep him thinking he holds all the cards.”

  Which he does. . . Except maybe one— “We can’t forget Segal in the equation,” I say.

  “He’s a liability.” Tracey frowns. “Soon as Angola puts a finger on him, he’s a slave.”