The phone continued to ring.
He stood and walked over to the coffee table. He had no intention of picking up the phone until he saw the number.
A number he’d dialed many times over the past year. One that had come up on his phone just as many.
The last time, right when he’d been given instructions on where to find Shelly, and watched her burn to death. When Yvette burned her to death.
The phone stopped, and the ghost of the ring echoed in Ben’s ears and raining down an invisible storm of cold.
The text alert dinged, and Ben startled, dropping the phone as if it bit.
Another ding.
Then another.
Ben’s hands shook. Again he picked up the phone. The alert screen offered nothing but an image link. He had no idea if Marcel’s phone was locked. He tapped the screen, waking it up, and the home screen opened.
No, of course, he wouldn’t lock it. Why would he have to? Who else would he text or call but Jacob?
And if he did contact others. If he had secrets. He’d just slit the throat of anyone who threatened them.
The phone dinged again, but Ben was able to keep a hold of it. He opened the messaging app.
The first text read, 1456 East Ramp Street
The second, third, fourth, fifth were all photos. Ben tapped the first one, filling the screen with the face of some teenage boy. An old healing cut marked the place over one eye. A fresh, glowing bruise colored his cheek. Dried blood smeared over his chin.
Ben was sure he’d seen the kid. When?
Those days he’d sat outside Marcel’s house watching him. The boy had walked over a few times and helped with the gardening.
The last text read: You have one hour.
Yvette didn’t have to say what would happen if Marcel didn’t show because Ben knew. He’d seen.
He ran to the Bedroom door and shoved it open.
Jacob knelt on the floor with his shirt off. He jerked around. Marcel stood over him, attention already on the door as if he’d expected it to open.
Ben didn’t want to entertain the idea.
Jacob met Ben’s gaze and shook his head.
“She has that kid next door.” Ben held out the phone. When Marcel didn’t walk over, Ben brought it to him. “She gave an address. She sent photos.”
Jacob stood. “Sam?”
“Yeah, I think that’s his name.” Ben offered the phone to Marcel.
He still didn’t take it.
“She’ll kill him.” Ben’s voice threatened to break.
Marcel dipped his chin. “She will.”
“You have to stop her.”
“There is nothing to be done.” Marcel turned, and Ben cut him off.
“The fuck there isn’t. I watched you slit a man’s throat, and I know you killed more than the one. Don’t tell me you couldn’t do it again.” Because Ben knew better.
“Marcel.” Jacob stepped up beside Ben. “He’s just a kid.”
“Yes. Many die. Children die. It is what it is.” He moved like he was about to walk away.
Again Ben cut him off. “You can’t leave him there.” There was no telling how long that insane woman would torture him before she killed him.
Marcel plucked the cell phone from Ben’s hand and said, “And there is nothing to be done.”
“The fuck there isn’t.” Ben clenched his fists. One hit. One hit was all he wanted, but he knew it would never happen. Marcel, whatever he was, would probably break both arms.
The man twitched his mouth. “The Rules, Ben.”
“Yeah, and from what I remember, you broke those Rules to come after us.” Ben tried to ignore the confused expression on Jacob’s face.
“I acted at the moment, without intention of self-gain, without premeditation, to protect the ones I had gifted my mark. And the Justices agreed. Otherwise, I would not be here now.”
“Wha—” Jacob snapped his mouth closed. His eyes said he knew exactly what Marcel meant.
Something close to distrust flashed over Jacob’s face.
“I forbade Ben to tell you.” Marcel held Jacob’s chin, but he didn’t lean into the man’s touch like Ben was familiar with.
“Why?”
“Because it was not your concern.”
“You’re wrong. It was my concern, at least as much as it was Ben’s.”
Marcel huffed and let Jacob go.
“Now.” Marcel pushed past Ben and sat in the large chair. “Both of you may undress.”
Was he serious?
“I will not ask again.”
“You’re wanting to play games when some kid’s life is on the line,” Ben growled in frustration. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
“Rules, Ben. I cannot break them.”
But he had. Marcel had come after them knowing it may get him killed.
Marcel nodded as if he heard the thought.
“But if it was one of us, you could.” Ben made it a statement.
“If Yvette took you by force, then I would collect what was owed for the indiscretion.”
“You can’t even say it can you? You can’t even call it what it really is. You’d kill her. You’d cut her throat.”
The storm in Marcel’s good eye darkened. “Yes, Ben Corbin, I would kill her.”
And he wouldn’t even enjoy it because he couldn’t feel anything. It was a theory before, but Ben was sure it was true now. What human being with an ounce of empathy would leave some kid to die?
Because of Rules. Stupid, meaningless Rules.
“Fine, I’ll go, and you can come after me. Then you can tell the Justices whatever you need to tell them.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“If you choose to disobey me, and go to Yvette, I cannot act except in response.” Marcel shifted his gaze to Jacob for a moment. “That is why I forbid either of you from going.”
Ben threw out a hand. “How would they—these Justices—know?”
“Because they would ask.”
“And you’d tell them.” Again a statement. Why else would Marcel even say it?
“Yes.”
“And you can’t lie?”
“I cannot.”
He could take a life but not tell a lie to save one.
“Fine, be a coward.” Ben practically spat the words. “You have your Rules, and I have a conscience.” If Marcel wouldn’t stop her, Ben would. He just didn’t know how. But, he had a gun in his hotel room and an address. He headed toward the door.
“Ben.” Jacob stopped him at the threshold. “She’ll kill you.”
“The only reason she did this is because she can’t use me to get to Marcel. I have to try.”
“If you leave, Ben,” Marcel said. “My mark will not stop her from destroying you and still killing Sam Waters.”
Yes, destroy was a much better word. Because Ben wouldn’t just die, she’d break him. The ways she might do that tried to strangle Ben’s courage.
Then Ben thought of that kid. That innocent kid who had nothing to do with this, who would die in Ben’s place.
Yvette might destroy Ben but it would be better than living with the knowledge he didn’t even try.
Ben turned.
Jacob grabbed his shirt off the floor.
“What are you doing?” Ben said.
“I’m coming with you.”
“Please, don’t.” If he stayed here, Marcel would protect him.
“Trust me.”
“I do trust you. I just don’t want you to get…” Hurt. Ben would never be able to live with himself. Just the thought of losing Jacob clawed his soul.
“He’ll come for us.” And Jacob sounded so sure.
“I don’t think so.”
“Yes, he will.” Jacob looked at Marcel.
The man was nothing more than a damaged statue occupying an upholstered throne.
“He will because life is a gift. A gift to give or take.”
“Jacob.”
Marcel would come for them.
There was no doubt in Jacob’s mind the man would. He’d already disobeyed Marcel once, and he’d spared Jacob.
Twice?
Yes, he’d come to collect what was his and eliminate any obstacle to achieve that.
“Can you call a cab, I need to get to the motel first?” Ben ran down the steps, ahead of Jacob, and headed toward the sidewalk.
“Why?”
“My gun.”
Jacob took the lead. “The back way on foot will be faster.” They reached the subdivision exit, cut across the road, and followed a concrete gully between apartment complexes and strip malls.
At a run, they were at the motel within fifteen minutes.
“Wait here.” Ben disappeared into his room.
Jacob checked his watch. They had thirty minutes at the most, and no telling how long it would take a cab to get to the motel.
Waiting was too big a risk.
Jacob went into Ben’s room, almost knocking him back with the door.
“Where are you going?”
“We need a car.” Jacob opened the closet. Like his room, Ben’s had been supplied with a half dozen courtesy hangers. The cheap wire kind Jacob had replaced within a week of moving in. He grabbed one and went back out.
Ben followed him.
“What’s that for?”
There was no shortage of old cars with manual doors. Jacob picked one that looked the least likely to fall apart. It was tucked into the shadows away from the front of the building.
“Jacob.”
“No time, Ben.” He unwound the hanger and forced it between the glass and rubber seal along the driver’s door. Lucky for Jacob, breaking into a car was a lot like riding a bike. The stem of the lock popped up. He opened the door.
Jacob unlocked the other door from the inside. “Get in.”
Ben stared.
“Get in, Ben, now.” Jacob felt under the steering wheel column until he found the nest of wires.
“Are you hotwiring a car?”
Jacob rolled his eyes. “No, I’m giving it a tune-up.” He pulled loose the wires he needed and put them together. Sparks lit up the wheel-well, and the engine sputtered. Jacob did it again, and the car rumbled to life. He straightened up and shut his door.
“Where the hell did you learn to hotwire a car?”
Jacob couldn’t decide if Ben sounded more in awe or perturbed. “When I was a teenager. I didn’t exactly run with a good crowd.”
Jacob pulled out of the parking lot and hit the road. “East Ramp Street?”
“Yeah.”
“You sure?”
“Kind of hard to forget an address that may be a death sentence for a kid.”
Yeah, Jacob supposed it was.
“Do you know where it is?”
“Yeah, that’s a new parking deck for the high-dollar storage complex being built behind it.”
“Are you sure?”
“They knocked down my favorite fresh food market to build it.” And Jacob still resented the city for that.
He turned down a side road to avoid the traffic on the main strip.
“I suppose we need a plan, huh?” Ben took the gun out from under his shirt.
“Not sure that will help.”
Ben glanced at him. Orange halogen lights cast copper highlights in his blond hair and streaked the gun in his hand in shades close to red. “Why?”
“Because we’re going in blind. We don’t even know where they’re keeping him.”
“It’s a parking deck, there can’t be too many choices.”
“A parking deck connected to a building with storage units still under construction.”
Ben’s expression crumpled. “We’re not going to be able to save him, are we?”
“We’re going to try, that’s all we can do.” Jacob sent a silent prayer to the universe for a miracle, even if that miracle was a knife-wielding man with no soul.
There were only a few streetlamps near the parking deck. Construction equipment blocked the main entrance. A sheet of plastic shielded scaffolding covering the first two levels from the outside. Jacob kept driving.
“Aren’t you going to stop?”
“I want to look around first.” Not that he knew what to look for.
Yeah, the more Jacob thought about going in there, the worse it became. At least he’d die his own person.
Funny how life worked out like that.
“I want to tell you, thank you.” Jacob turned the corner at the nonworking stoplight and entered the single-lane separated by chain link fencing and caution signs.
“What? Why?”
“For giving me this.”
“I don’t think getting you killed is grounds for thanks.”
Jacob pulled in between two dump trucks filled with rubble. He put the car in park. “Not this, everything else.”
“I don’t understand.”
Jacob pulled the wires apart, cutting the engine. “I know. And if we get through this, I’ll explain.” He pulled Ben over by the front of his shirt and pressed his mouth to his. Ben didn’t hesitate, and Jacob savored the flavor of his tongue one last time.
When Jacob pulled away, he got out, taking care to close the door without much force. He had a feeling it wouldn’t matter. This Yvette would know. Maybe not in the same way Marcel did, but the result would end with someone dying.
They walked across the street, sticking to the shadows.
The ghost of a classic car drove through a cross street at the end of the block. Dark, sleek, like the paint was oil. The halogens made it impossible to identify the color.
Marcel. It had to be.
The car turned the corner heading to the highway and the rumbling engine faded into the night.
Any hope flickering in Jacob’s chest snuffed out.
“What’s wrong.”
Jacob realized he’d stopped at the curb. “Nothing.”
“Do you see something?” Ben followed Jacob’s gaze.
“Apparently not.” Jacob led Ben into the shadows. There he made Jacob stop and took the lead, gun clutched in his right hand.
But holding a gun and having good aim were two different animals. “You can hit something, right?”
“I used to do pretty good at the range with my uncle.”
“How long ago was that?”
“Five years?”
“That’s a long time.”
“Yeah, let’s hope it’s not long enough for me to forget how to hit a target.” Ben stopped at the point where the building under construction joined the parking deck.
Fluorescents escaped through unfinished walls, casting ghostly halos beyond glassless windows. Plastic curtains rippled on a breeze.
Ben pushed down one of the sheets as it flipped up into their path. “I don’t suppose you have any idea where to start looking for him?”
Jacob wished he could tell Ben yes. Even if it was a lie. Even if all he could do was guess and take them somewhere in hopes of doing something.
The thought must have shown on his face because Ben nodded.
“We should split up.” Jacob leaned against the wall, using the shadows as cover.
“Hell, no.”
“We can cover more area. We’ve got, like, fifteen minutes max.” And they wouldn’t be able to clear half the building going their own way. But half was better than a fourth.
“You don’t have a gun.”
No. But then Jacob wasn’t sure how much good one gun would be. This Yvette probably had people with her. If she did, there was no telling how many.
People who would make a joke of Logan’s men.
“We stay together.” Ben held Jacob’s gaze. “Now, what do you know about the layout of the building?”
Five stories, wider than tall, attached to a parking garage, and occupying a spot that had once been the location of an organic grocery store and a park.
“Not a lot.”
“How long have they been building it?”
“A couple months.”
“Is the garage finished?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you see them frame-up the storage bays?”
After they closed the park, Jacob had been so disgusted he’d avoided the area. But the health clinic where he got tested was less than a block away, and the bus route passed right by the new building.
There’d been a lot of shiny metal I beams, too lightweight to hold up a building.
“Yeah, I think so.”
“Were they isolated to a certain area or spread all over?”
Jacob scanned the building. “I think…” Nothing from the outside served as a reminder. “I’m not sure, but I think the front part didn’t have the same amount of metal framing. Is that important?”
Ben lifted a shoulder. “Sometimes climate-controlled places like this will have office areas too. Cheaper because the spaces are practically extra-large bays with a view.”
“No glass in the windows would make it easy for someone to escape.”
“Exactly.” Ben stopped at a panel of plywood blocking a doorway. “And if it were me, I’d stick close to where my car was in case I had to bail.”
“Usually parking decks are connected to buildings by a stairwell and an elevator.”
Ben pushed aside the piece of wood. “Then let’s check the back first.”
Streetlamps cast orange slices through plastic covering the windows, streaking dangling wires, and creating an upside-down forest of insulation and copper. Skeletal walls carved out the expanse of concrete, and florescent lighting escaped through the gaps in the block wall on the far side.
To the right, beyond the elevator shaft, darkness ruled.
They wove through abandoned building supplies and machinery too large for someone to pick up and carry off but small enough to fit inside the building.
Wires coiled from a metal tank held to a concrete pillar with strips of duct tape.
Squares of black cradled wads of gray putty.
“Is that what I think it is?” Ben said.
“A bomb?”
“Yeah.”
“Fuck, I hope not.” But what else could it be?
“Jesus, they’re everywhere.”
Every other pillar, a tank. Some lay on the ground, the wires dangling free, the ends stripped to the copper.
SICARII: Part III Page 18
