by Elise Noble
All I could do was keep walking. Keep breathing. Until I couldn’t breathe anymore. I tried to inhale, and there was nothing but a horrible sucking sensation, as if someone was trying to pull out my lungs. Asher’s fingernails digging into my palm told me he was experiencing the same. The air was still hazy, and I tried to quell my panic as I undid the clips on the BCD and let it fall to the floor. Losing that weight was a relief, at least. It had to weigh twenty pounds, and my thigh muscles were burning.
“Keep going,” I gasped.
Asher didn’t answer, but he did start walking again, which I took as a good sign. What wasn’t a good sign? The wall of rock I bumped into thirty seconds later.
I clawed at the edges of the passage, but it was a dead end. Where had we gone wrong? We didn’t have time to go back and find a different route, and when I gave in and took a breath, the air was acrid, pungent with the stink of chlorine.
“Over here,” Asher told me, and he guided my hand to something sticking out of the rock. Smooth metal, cold, cylindrical… The rung of a ladder! I swarmed up it until my head hit the ceiling. Asher was right behind, and his arms wrapped around me, his body moulded to mine as we both gulped in the cleaner air at the top.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Bloody marvellous.” I sucked in another lungful of sweet, sweet oxygen. “Alive, so there’s that.”
“I thought I was dead. They left me there. Uncle Saul left me there.”
I heard the torment in his voice, the hollow agony at being betrayed by two people close to him on the same day. I couldn’t change the past, but I wanted to give him a future.
“Me too. So at least he won’t be looking for us.”
“How are we gonna get out of here?”
“Hold me steady?”
His arms tightened, and I reached mine up. Nobody built a ladder that didn’t go anywhere, and when I’d hit my head, it had been a clonk rather than a crack. The ceiling above us was wooden. A trapdoor. I climbed up a rung and shoved. There was a metallic clatter as something above fell over, and the panel flipped open with a heavy thunk. I stuck my head through the hole, and a creature skittered over my face. I’d never been so grateful to see a spider in my life.
The shed. We were in the old toolshed. A momentary spasm rippled through me as I thought of the time we’d spent there before. Those bittersweet moments when Asher had started opening up to me. When he’d peeled away the first layer of armour he wore and given me a glimpse into his soul.
I offered a hand and helped him out of the dungeon. “We need to get off the campus. Even if Saul and his buddies aren’t looking for us, they’re still around.”
Asher patted his pockets. “I’ve still got my car key. Let’s go.”
Hand in hand, we started down the path in the rain. There wasn’t much of a moon, but every so often, a flash of lightning helped to guide us. And so did the noise. As we got closer to the main building, I heard high-pitched ringing plus the squeals of several hundred panicked students. They were milling around everywhere, and I noticed Deandra standing at the side of the basketball court on her own. Such a shame.
“What’s happening?” I muttered, half to myself.
“Somebody’s set off the fire alarm.”
Who? Why? Had the chlorine gas triggered it somehow? Whatever the reason, I didn’t want to stick around to find out. I broke into a run. We could use the confusion to our advantage and escape. Blackwood’s rented house was only a few miles away, and if we got there, we’d be safe.
“Holy shit. This is your car?”
Asher had stopped beside a vintage muscle car, dark metallic blue with white stripes over the bonnet. It should have been in a movie, not a school parking lot.
“A 1967 Ford Mustang Fastback. I restored it myself.”
Okay, he was right. His talents were wasted at school. But while the car looked beautiful and the roar of the engine was music to my ears, I didn’t have time to stop and admire it because Asher suddenly hunched forward over the steering wheel.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“See that Mercedes going down the driveway?”
“Yeah?”
“That’s Uncle Saul’s car.”
Well, shit.
“Are you sure?”
“I know cars, Chem. What do you want to do?”
Duh. “Go after him.”
CHAPTER 40 - EMMY
OKAY, WHO SET off the fire alarm?
Shadow Falls Academy had eight music rooms, two of which were on the ground floor. Only the one in the west wing had bookcases, so by process of elimination, we had to be in the right place. One minute, Nate was trying to work out which bookcase to blow off the wall, and the next, bells were ringing. Fucking smoke detectors. Maybe one of the kids was burning their stash? We’d worn DEA windbreakers for fun, battered down the front door, and marched straight through the building. The handful of students we’d come across had leapt out of our way when Alaric barked that we were there acting on a tip-off.
“Just blow them all,” Ana said. “We have enough charges, da?”
Then the shelves nearest to me began to move.
“Quiet!”
Everyone caught the urgency in my voice, and it took mere seconds for them to stack up either side of the widening doorway. Someone dimmed the lights. What the fuck was that stink? I wrinkled my nose. A cross between a swimming pool and one of Sofia’s science experiments? Ah, chlorine gas. I glanced over at her and saw she was putting goggles on, then she cut her hand across her throat. Message received. Bad shit. Standard operating procedure meant we all carried lightweight goggles in our pockets, and I followed suit, breathing shallowly. Sofia was the expert at this. If and when we needed to leave, she’d tell us.
A shadowy figure stepped through the opening, and Rafael lived up to his nickname—Quicksilver—and grabbed him around the throat. I saw the silhouette of a gun pressed to the man’s temple. The second suspect went to Ana, the third to Alaric. Black had finally turned up, and he snagged a fourth. We waited another thirty seconds, but nobody else appeared. I turned the lights up again and wedged the piano stool into the gap in case the bookcase decided to slide back. Fia was already throwing the windows open.
Who had we caught?
Well, well, well… Ezra Rosenberg. I recognised Sky’s chemistry teacher as well, plus the track coach and a member of the kitchen staff. As I watched, Rafael fished a revolver out of Ezra’s waistband and stuck it into his own. There was a contingent of Americans who wanted to arm schoolteachers, but I wasn’t sure this was quite what they had in mind. Hmm, where to start? In situations like this, I always went straight for the big dog. Ezra almost doubled over when I kicked him in the nuts, and I say “almost” because Rafael soon snapped him upright again.
“Where’s Sky?”
That grunt wasn’t really an answer.
“Blonde, my height, kind of mouthy?”
Vomiting didn’t help either. I stepped to the side so it didn’t splash on my shoes and tsk-tsk-tsked.
“Would it help if I shot you in the kneecap?”
“I-i-in the cellar.”
“Whereabouts in the cellar?”
“A h-hundred yards? Two hundred? F-f-follow the passage. She’s locked in a room.”
Two hundred yards? Fuck, that was a big cellar.
“And where’s your brother?”
“I don’t know.”
“Was he down there?”
Ezra managed a nod.
“Is there another exit?”
No answer, but Ezra’s eyes gave him away. There was another exit.
“Where?”
Silence. Obstinate silence. I booted him in the shin, hard, and he sagged in Rafael’s arms as he fainted. Ah, fuck. Why did bad guys have such low pain thresholds?
“Where did all this gas come from?” I asked the next asshole.
“I-I don’t know.”
I was pretty good at holding my breath, but I didn’t fancy se
arching a massive cellar without a respirator, especially if there were other gun-toting miscreants skulking around down there. We’d have to go slowly, and chlorine gas was nasty stuff. When it came into contact with the moist tissues of your eyes, your throat, your lungs, it produced acid that ate away at the surfaces. It wasn’t great for your skin either. I’d need to shower as soon as I got out of here.
But first, we had a problem to solve. Luckily, someone out there had done us a favour. Above the jangling din of the fire alarm, I heard sirens. Fire trucks. And they’d have breathing equipment on board.
“Get these fuckers secured and move them to another room. We need to borrow gear and search the cellar. Fia, you take Rosenberg. See what else you can get out of him.”
If four people stayed above ground with the prisoners, that left six of us to venture underground. Actually, make that five.
“Where’s Silver?”
Ryder was trussing up Ezra now, flex cuffs on the fucker’s arms and ankles and duct tape everywhere else. He jerked his head towards the door.
“He went to check the Rosenberg residence.”
For fuck’s sake. I tried raising Rafael on the radio, but I only got a crackle in response. Bloody storm.
“He can take care of himself,” Black said.
“Yes, I know, but rescuing Sky is our most pressing problem right now. We need all hands on deck. Time’s ticking.”
“He’s gone to look for Saul. Ten bucks says there’s an exit at the house.”
“Fine.” I had to concede that did make a certain amount of sense, and there was a chance Saul could have taken Sky with him if she was incapacitated. “Let’s get the kit we need.”
We didn’t bother to ask the firefighters if we could use their stuff. Thankfully, they were too busy herding running students and trying to work out where the fire was to even notice us rummaging through the trucks. My coat was too big, and Black’s was a little tight across the shoulders, but the breathing apparatus worked just fine.
The gas was still thick as we descended into the bowels of the school, and the place sure lived up to its name. Dark, shadowy, ghouls hid in every corner. Ezra Rosenberg hadn’t been kidding about the distance either—the passages went on for what seemed like miles. I was impressed. It put the arrangement of tunnels underneath Riverley to shame. But we’d done ours with an excavator, and here it looked as if a small army had carved the maze out of the limestone rock a million years ago, so I guess they’d had a head start. Fifty yards in, I tripped over a body. When I flipped her over with my foot, I recognised Saul Rosenberg’s assistant. Ah, well. Saved me a job later.
We carried on.
What was this place? Through the haze, the passage opened into a cavern. Some pretentious prick had even installed a fucking chandelier.
“Is this a church?” I asked. “Are those pews?”
“A synagogue,” Xav told me. “That closet looks like the Aron Kodesh.”
“The what?”
“The Holy Ark. The place where they keep the Torah scrolls. My people have been persecuted all their lives. Some decided it would be safer to worship underground.”
“Literally underground?”
“In this case, it appears so.”
No, in this case it appeared they’d lost their faith entirely. The Holy Ark and most of the pews were covered in a thick layer of dust and the odd cobweb. Nobody had worshipped there recently, that much was clear.
“Do they all keep stolen shit in a side room too?” Ana asked. “These are paintings, yes?”
I ran over to take a look. Holy hell, again quite literally. I read the scribbles on the first crate. Hieronymus Bosch—The Last Judgement. There had to be over a hundred wooden boxes in that room, most of them slim and flat enough for paintings. The Master wasn’t just a thief, he was a bloody hoarder. But the paintings weren’t the priority tonight.
“Sky isn’t in here. Keep looking.”
“I found the source of the chlorine,” Sofia said from across the room. “And this dead guy has two phones in his pocket. Is one of them Sky’s?”
It was—she had a picture of my cat as her screensaver and the “I’m Sunshine with a chance of Hurricane” sticker on the back came courtesy of Bradley. The dead guy on the floor could have been Sky’s handiwork too, but where the hell was she?
“Clump of long blonde hair caught on the door frame over here,” Dan called. “Might be Sky’s.”
“Get after her.”
I was about to follow, but movement by the passage from the music room caught my eye. The enemy? I got my gun up, then lowered it just as quickly. It was Black. Better late than never, but what did he have in his hands? The gas cloud shifted in a draught, and I got a clearer look.
That cunning, conniving, devious motherfucker. I had to hand it to him. That was slick. Real slick. As soon as the remainder of the team disappeared through the far doorway, he stepped forward.
“Put them in there,” I told him, pointing to the side room Ana had found.
He didn’t hesitate, just strode inside and stacked his offerings with the rest of the loot. One wooden box and one aluminium briefcase.
“You kept the pay-off all this time?”
“Thought it might come in useful one day.”
“I don’t know whether to kiss you or kill you.”
“If you don’t do the first, you might as well do the second.”
I stared at him for a beat, considering. I’d told Black to fix things for Alaric and he had, but Sky was still missing, and if anything had happened to her…
Black could wait. I turned and ran after the others.
CHAPTER 41 - SKY
“HAVE YOU GOT your seat belt on?” Asher asked.
No, but I did it up pretty damned quickly as he accelerated after Saul. The Mustang was fitted with six-point belts—the kind you got in racing cars—and it went like a rocket. What the hell did it have under the bonnet?
“How fast does this thing go?”
“It’s not about the top speed, Chem. I’ll never reach that. It’s about the acceleration.”
“So how fast does it accelerate?”
“My best eighth-mile pass is four point eight seconds at a hundred and fifty-three miles per hour. She’s got a thousand and forty-five horsepower from the engine alone, but another seven hundred when you add the nitrous.”
“What does that even mean?”
“It means she’s high-maintenance. Now do you see where most of my money went?”
Until that point, we’d been keeping Saul’s Mercedes in sight, but now Asher flipped a switch on the dash and the car shot forward as if a giant foot had kicked it. In an instant, my head was jammed back against the seat and we were kissing Saul’s rear bumper. Asher flashed the headlights.
“Just saying hi. You wanted to catch him? Well, we’ve caught him.”
“Okay, so I’m not sure I totally thought this through.” I didn’t have a phone and neither did Asher. We couldn’t call for help. “The last chase I was in was a lot slower.”
At least I had gas money this time. I’d started carrying fifty bucks in my back pocket, just in case.
“The last chase?” Asher shook his head. “I really don’t know you at all, do I?”
No, but at least this time when he said it, he didn’t sound quite so pissed.
“We can do a Q and A session later if you like, but for the moment, do you have any ideas?”
“Yeah.”
“Care to elaborate?”
“When we were in that cellar, before the gas came, Saul gave me a choice. He said it was time to decide between my family and my stupid infatuation. ‘Think with your head,’” Asher mimicked. “‘Not your dick. If you’re not with us, you’re against us.’”
“And I was the stupid infatuation?”
“So Saul thought.” What did that mean? “Then he told me he’d given my mother the same ultimatum, and she’d made the wrong decision. He pushed her away. Made her life hell
. And he thought he’d do the same to me.”
“I’d give you a hug if you didn’t hate my guts and if we weren’t going at…” I leaned over to see the speedometer. “At a hundred and freaking ten miles an hour.”
“You want to slow down?”
“I wouldn’t mind.”
Smoothly, so smoothly, Asher inched forward and gave Saul’s bumper the tiniest nudge, and we shot past as the Mercedes began to fishtail wildly. I twisted in time to see it careen into a tree and disappear into the darkness.
“Now we can slow down.”
My breath came in pants as the car drew to a halt. Did that just happen? Did Asher really just run his uncle off the road?
“That? That was your plan?”
“I might regret it in the morning, but right now…” He shrugged. “I’m good. Prison won’t be any worse than that fucking school.”
“Prison?” I fumbled to undo my seat belt. “No way.”
“What are you doing, Sky?” he shouted as I slammed the car door. “Where are you going?”
“I’m going to check he’s definitely dead.”
Dead men told no tales. And if Saul was still breathing? I’d finish the fucking job.
Saul, it turned out, hadn’t bothered to buckle up. The way his brain had splattered across the crazed windscreen reminded me of a Jackson Pollock painting. An expensive mess. But hopefully one that could be written off as an accident rather than the artist’s intention. The storm… A wet road…
Twigs cracked as Asher scrambled down the slope behind me.
“Don’t look,” I told him. “You don’t need to see this.”
“Is he…?”
“Yup. Does your car have much damage?”
Had he looked?
“Barely a scratch. It’ll polish out.”
Of course he’d looked. I backtracked to the rear of the Mercedes, and there were so many dings and dents from its trip through the trees that I wasn’t sure an extra one would matter. The road was quiet. No witnesses. Was there anything else we needed to consider? Something niggled me about this picture, but I couldn’t put my finger on what.