But this? This felt good. No more Florida. No more sweat plastering her back and hips into the coach seat. Just cold wind brushing at her cheeks and chin and forehead. Refreshing.
Finally, she opened her eyes and lurched to life again, placing the bundle of mail on the table — a stack of envelopes and one small box, none of which she would worry about for now. God, it felt good to be home.
A blur caught her eye — a smallish shape darting through the kitchen, a blond mop flopping around atop it. Her son, Lucas, had practically sprinted through the front door as soon as she’d unlocked it. Now he was careening around the apartment like a pinball. Why were eight-year-olds so hyper all the time?
She walked that way, getting her phone out as she did. Opening the fridge blasted her with a fresh wave of cool, and the Fiji water she plucked from inside the door poured a little of the chill right down her throat.
After a few drinks, she thumbed through her contact list and tapped the name she sought. Her manager was probably annoyed that she hadn’t responded to any of his messages, but she’d told him over and over that she refused to take business calls when she was on vacation. That was the whole point of going away, wasn’t it? To get away from the real world for a while?
She glanced at the time while the line rang. It was late here in New York, but it was three hours earlier in L.A., and Tom usually worked into the night. Maybe that was his problem. For Tom, life was all work, work, work. She couldn’t remember him ever mentioning taking time off.
Tom’s assistant answered, as always.
“Hey Marcy. It’s Amelia. We just got in from the airport, but I know Tom’s been trying to get ahold of me.”
“Of course. Great to hear from you. He’s actually on a call with one of the execs from Universal. So it might be a bit of a wait.”
“It’s no problem.”
The phone clicked and then went quiet. Amelia took another long drink of water.
“Mom, I’m going to open this.”
She turned to see Lucas standing in the entryway near the pile of mail, one of the small boxes clutched in his hands.
“What is it?”
Lucas looked down at the cube in his hands. Squinted.
“Well… I think it’s my new controller.”
“What does the return address say?”
“There isn’t one. But it was supposed to get here today, so this has to be it.”
“There’s no label on the box?”
She took a step that way, but then she stopped herself. Thought she heard the click of someone coming on the line. Waited to hear Tom’s voice spurt from the earpiece of her phone. But there was nothing.
Meanwhile, Lucas shrugged.
“Looks like part of the label got ripped off. I don’t know. I’m going to open it.”
“Fine. Go ahead.”
Clutching the cardboard to his chest in a hug, the kid fingered the taped seam of the box with the opposite hand, tiny digits scrabbling there to find purchase. A fingernail caught and peeled the clear packing tape, curling it into a half-moon shape, but then his progress stopped abruptly. The tape wouldn’t budge.
“Scissors are in the kitchen,” she said, still half-listening to the silence in her ear even as she spoke.
Lucas nodded once and headed that way. He adjusted his hug on the box, bony arms hoisting it higher to keep it from sliding down toward his waist.
Amelia turned on her heel and paced through the living room. Flipped on a lamp there. The silence in her phone ear seemed to swell now — a vacancy, an abyss. The squish of her pulse became audible against the void.
She paced back and forth like that a few times, half watching the small figure in the kitchen out of the corner of her eye each time she passed the doorway. The boy had placed the box on the counter, rifled through a drawer, and now took the scissors to the tape.
She heard the snipping, only half paying attention as the tape was sliced and parted. The cardboard edges scraped against each other, tape sort of swishing and lisping where it touched, crinkling as it bent.
Then the kitchen got quiet. Too quiet.
Amelia stopped pacing. Listened to the silence overwhelming both ears now.
“Everything alright in there?”
No answer.
“Lucas?”
She walked that way, and life seemed to flip into slow motion. Every breath stretching out. Every stride taking longer and longer.
That doorway into the kitchen framed her vision, the wooden casing partially blocking her outlook. It made her boy slide into view slowly, slowly, one piece at a time, a little more with each step. Just one shoulder, then the back of his head. Like the stylized cinematography in one of her movies — a slow zooming shot to build tension.
“Got the controller.”
Lucas turned around and beamed at her, holding up the custom modded PS5 controller that had cost her over $100. He unsheathed it from a plastic cellophane bag, then turned it over in his hands a few times.
He looked up at her and crinkled his eyebrows, waiting for her to respond in some way.
“Oh. Oh, good.” She stopped herself from saying more. Embarrassed now by that moment of fright, and somehow not wanting to admit to it out loud.
The kid darted away again, exploding through the doorway and building speed in the straightaway of the hall, that blond mop throbbing up and down again.
“No video games tonight, though,” she called after him. “It’s late, honey. You need to get ready for bed.”
She pried the phone away from her ear. Thumbed the red icon to end the call. It somehow didn’t matter anymore. Not tonight. Her career would still be there in the morning.
She took a deep breath, and delayed relief seemed to flood her being. God, that moment of tension had really gotten under her skin.
She walked into her bedroom and flipped on a lamp. Then she leaned into the en suite. Nudged the dimmer on the bathroom lighting all the way up and cranked the hot water handle on the shower. The water cascaded out of the showerhead and sizzled against the porcelain tile.
A shower would feel good. Wash away the grime of travel. She always felt a film of other-peopleness lacquering her body after huddling in airport terminals and packing in even tighter on the plane. Scrubbing it away would make her feel more alive again.
That was when she noticed the toilet seat. An open mouth gaping up at her. Water pooling down in its throat.
She turned to yell out the doorway.
“Lucas! For the thousandth time, if you’re going to use my bathroom, at least put the seat down.”
Before she could turn back to close the toilet, she saw something out of the corner of her eye. Her eyes had glided past it at first, but now they snapped straight back.
A box rested on the pillow of her bed. And not just any box. A Tiffany’s box — she’d recognize the pale blue packaging with the white ribbon anywhere, even without the “Tiffany & Co.” logo stamped on top in bold black letters.
A shaky breath rushed into her lungs. Right away her heart beat faster.
She chuckled as she moved toward it. Nervous, breathy sounds whispering out of her, almost inaudible. And once again, her life seemed to switch into movie mode. The slow tracking shot as she zoomed in on something exciting.
Mike. It must be from him. They’d gotten into a fight before she left and hadn’t talked since. That part wasn’t unusual in and of itself. Mike wasn’t big on the phone, either talk or text, so whenever one of them traveled, they were incommunicado for a few days. She’d gotten used to it over the eighteen months they’d been together.
But this? A gift waiting when she got home? This was above and beyond for Mike.
For just a second she felt guilty. She hadn’t thought about him much while she and Lucas were on the beach or wading through the fanny-packed masses at Disney World. Too busy with vacation stuff to worry about the fight. Too busy living her own life to concern herself with a relationship that, to be blunt, seemed a
bit half-assed and not long for this world.
She’d been waiting, she realized, for Mike to make a gesture like this. Something big and bold to renew her faith in the relationship.
And what if…? But no. It couldn’t be a ring. The box was too big.
Still. Tiffany’s? Maybe they should fight more often.
She lifted the box from the pillow. It felt heavy in her hands, a heft she hadn’t expected that seemed to pull to one side in a swaying motion, almost like some liquid lurched against the walls of the container. Strange.
She caught a whiff of that subtle perfume scent that seemed to accompany all things Tiffany’s related — warm amber and sweet vanilla wafting up to whet her appetite for fancy, sparkly things once more.
She pulled the lid off the box, and something clicked inside — a sharp metallic sound like cracking open a can of beer. Just as she got the lid out of the way, the blue cardboard jerked in her hands.
Fluid burst out of the box, jetting in all directions like a sprinkler. Lukewarm liquid doused her face. She dropped the box, and her upper body went rigid, neck and shoulders pulling upright in a flinch and freezing there.
The oncoming flood had made her eyelids snap shut before she could really see much. In her memory, the stuff had been pale yellow, almost the color of straw, but it’d been so fast that thinking about it now, she couldn’t be sure.
She felt the juice collect and drain down her cheeks and forehead and went to work wiping it out of her eyes with her fingertips.
And for a second she thought she’d been pranked. Slimed or something like that. Maybe Mike had set up a hidden camera somewhere in the room.
But no. That didn’t make sense.
What the fuck?
A pungent smell seemed to arrive then, finally breaking through her shock to make itself known. It reminded her of apple cider vinegar but stronger, danker, more chemical.
Vinegar? Why?
A faint motorized noise at her feet interrupted that thought. It sounded like a pulsing spray bottle, hissing and spitting out its rhythmic report. Even with her eyes still closed, she realized the box was still spritzing out its payload even now. Jetting more vinegar all over her rug and her shoes, the drizzling sound pattering her ankles and the bottom corner of her comforter.
She let out a squeal.
That was her brand new duvet cover from Neiman’s.
She kicked at the parcel. Felt the box slide away, the sound muffled now underneath the bed.
She blinked a few times and tried to open her eyes. Heard spit sizzling between her teeth, frustrated sounds escaping her now like steam.
But then it started to sting.
And then it started to burn.
Real fucking bad, it burned.
The sting took hold in the flesh around her eyes first. Searing pain flaring up out of nowhere. Lighting her up.
It spread from there. Engulfed her lips and chin and cheeks and nostrils. Intensified into something white-hot. Blistering pain.
She gasped and gulped and backpedaled away from the bed, away from the box. Panic emptied her head of thoughts until only those bolts of pain and the dark were real.
She managed to peel her eyes open partially. Looked through slitted eyelids at a smeared world. Blurry shapes and contours huddled around her, the topography seeming to morph with every step she took.
Instinct moved her toward the bathroom. Used the colors as much as anything to guide her. The pale purple smudge was the bedspread. The brown splotch below showed her where the rug ended and the wood floor began. The glowing area signified the bathroom doorway, all distorted now so the hard lines of the edges had gone soft, almost making it more oval than rectangle. She could hear the crackle of the shower still pounding water onto tile, but she couldn’t fully process it.
She hurtled herself through the bright threshold and groped at the vanity until her hands found the knobs. The faucet hissed as it jetted water into the sink.
Cupped handfuls of water flung themselves at her face. Slapped against her nose and cheeks and eyes before it fell away. The cold of the water brought no relief, though. Only seemed to make the hurt burn brighter.
She kept going. More water. Scrubbed her fingers at her eyes and nose. Trying to clear the fluid, flush the acid, whatever the hell it was.
The mucus membranes — the wet places — burned worse than the rest. Eyes. Lips. Nostrils. Fiery and gleaming. Some insane part of her half expected to see smoke rising from her face when her vision cleared.
Little by little, she was able to see some. The matte surface of the fogged-up mirror before her. Steam filled the room now. Tumbling out from behind the dark curtain where the shower’s spray sizzled.
She could jump into the shower. Really wash this goo away. Clean.
She swiped her hand at her face, and her fingertips came away red.
Blood. It looked watered down. Other fluid diluting its opacity and thickness. Making it run down her fingers like cloudy pinkish water.
She swiped the wrist of her shirt at the mirror. Cleared the steam away with back-and-forth motions until her reflection became visible in the glass.
The bloody face there in the mirror did not look like her own. Not anymore.
The flesh seemed to bulge and sag. Pulling away from the skull in baggy pouches.
Falling off.
Melting.
Holy shit.
Forget the shower. She needed to call 9-1-1.
She fumbled to get her phone out of her pocket. Eyelids blinking rapid-fire. Hands shaking.
The phone squirted out of her bloody fingers. Splashed as it belly-flopped into the toilet.
Fuck!
She scrambled back out into the bedroom. Tried to yell. Her voice came out raspy and whistling. Reduced to a quiet croak now.
Her vision started to blur again. Everything fading back to that smeared topography. Reality pulling away from her.
Amelia shambled down the hall into the living room, her arms held out in front of her, face drooping down her skull.
Lucas jumped back when he saw her. Mouth and eyes going wide. No sound coming out of his gibbering lips. Scared absolutely shitless.
And she stumbled near the landline there on the console table. Fell. Took out the lamp as she went crashing down. The bulb sizzling a split second. Guttering out like a snuffed torch.
The room plunged into darkness just as she hit down. The wood floor seemed to come up, thumping her good and hard. Cracking her on the chin. Making her teeth clack together. Spinning confusion into her head.
The dark reduced the blurs around her to shifting tendrils of gray and black like smoke. Shadows lurching for her. Cinching around her. Eager.
She tried to push herself up onto hands and knees, but the strength had left her arms, left her legs. She squirmed there on her belly. Writhed like a worm drowning on the sidewalk in the rain.
And now she was hyperventilating. Passing out. In the dark. Face fucking melting. Falling off the bone.
The shadows opened wider then and swallowed her whole.
CHAPTER 17
When they arrived at the building on East 14th Street, the entire block was lit up like a Christmas tree. The strobing lights of the first response vehicles flashed and flickered. Glowing red and blue streaks spiraling over brick and glass and concrete. Police. Fire. Ambulance.
Darger’s heart thudded as they closed in on the scene of the latest crime. She could feel the misshapen muscle knocking in her chest, hear the blood beating in her ears. She looked up at the brownstone. Tried to steel herself for what they were walking into.
Something horrific had happened here tonight. Something almost unthinkable had taken place within the very walls she was staring at. Something Tyler Huxley had set into motion. She and the rest of the task force had been tasked with stopping it — stopping him — but so far they couldn’t.
She swallowed hard at the thought. Heard a juicy sound in her throat. Tore her eyes off the build
ing and turned her attention back to the street.
A uniformed NYPD officer was directing traffic away from the area but waved their car through when Laboda flashed his credentials out his open window.
“C-IED is in the house with their bomb-sniffing dogs now, double-checking there aren’t any other surprises waiting inside.”
Laboda parked on the sidewalk behind a fire engine. As they climbed out, Darger spotted the gurney being loaded into the back of an ambulance farther up the street. She couldn’t really see any details through the dark and blinking lights, but Darger didn’t imagine it was a pretty sight. From what they’d heard so far, this explosive device had been filled with some sort of corrosive acid that had left the victim covered with chemical burns.
She and Loshak formed a small huddle with Fredrick and Laboda several houses down from the victim’s building.
Fredrick was giving the run-down on the victim. Amelia Driscoll. Thirty-four years old. An actress.
Darger searched the woman’s name and found a Wikipedia bio which stated that she was discovered by a modeling agency at a Sbarro Pizza when she was nineteen. She’d parlayed that into acting.
“Was Driscoll conscious when the paramedics arrived?” Darger asked.
“It sounded like she was in and out,” Fredrick said. “She’d wake up while they were working on her, scream for a bit, and then pass out again.”
There was a whistle from the front door of the building. It was the SWAT team leader from earlier, waving them over. When they reached his position, he stuck his thumb in the air.
“It’s all clear.”
“Thanks, Fitch,” Fredrick said. “I’m not sure you folks have been formally introduced. Agent Fitch here is overseeing all the CIRG activities on the task force. If you need anything from either C-IED or SWAT, he’s your man.”
The man’s hand was so massive compared to Darger’s, it felt like she was shaking hands with a baseball mitt.
Violet Darger | Book 8 | Countdown To Midnight Page 9