by Chelsea Cain
He could hear more sirens now.
A Star Wars figure was sitting on the kitchen counter. Archie took a step toward it. He didn’t know which character it was, but could tell that it was supposed to be female.
The kid had been in the house. Maybe even earlier that night.
Archie looked closer. The action figure had a Jolly Rancher on its lap.
Flannigan was still sitting on the floor, back against the wall. “What is it?” he said.
“I don’t know,” Archie said. There was something under the figure—a slip of paper. Archie slid it out and unfolded it. It was a credit card receipt from Aquarium World.
“I know where they are,” Archie said.
CHAPTER
51
Roy could tell the reporter was afraid.
He liked it.
The boy hadn’t been afraid like that for a long time.
“Do what I want and I won’t hurt you,” he said to her, and he pushed her ahead of him toward the store’s aquarium display. Floodwater had seeped in from outside, and her boots smacked against the wet linoleum as she floundered forward.
“Is that what you told Patrick?” she asked.
The store’s power was off, and the moan of the generator running the tanks echoed through the room. The halide fixtures glazed everything with blue.
He turned to the boy. “I need a trickle filter,” he said. “An overflow box. A protein skimmer, and a couple of power heads.” The boy nodded and went in search of them.
The reporter turned and looked around. “So this is where you get your fish?” she asked.
He had been a faithful customer. Until the detective told him the store had given out his name. It was poor customer service. They deserved to be robbed.
“I need you to help me carry the tank,” he said. He took a step closer to her, but she backed away from him.
“You’ll have to untie me,” she said.
He took another step and she attempted to do the same, but he pinned her against a wall of freshwater tanks.
He put his face next to hers, nuzzling her neck, twisting his tongue around her wet hair, tasting it. “If you try to leave, I’ll punish him,” Roy whispered. He put his open mouth against her ear and licked his lips. “He cries when I punish him.”
He placed a hand flat against her chest and felt her heart fluttering under her breast, her nipple hard under his palm. Good. She was scared again.
If you wanted a loyal dog, the first thing you did was beat the hell out of it.
He pressed against her and reached around her hips with both his hands. He could feel the pant of her breaths against his neck, the wet knit of her sweater against his arms. He slid his hands down her arms to her wrists, and then untied her. She whimpered as he pulled the twine loose. He made sure she saw him drop it to the floor. He didn’t need it anymore.
“Good girl,” he said. He could smell the sweat between them. He bent his head down again and rested his face on the crown of her head.
“I have the stuff,” the boy said.
Roy stepped away from the reporter and she let loose a gasping sob. The boy was looking at them, his arms full of supplies. “Put it over there and get an air pump,” Roy said.
It wasn’t like the boy to interrupt him, and it crossed Roy’s mind that the boy had done it on purpose.
No, Roy decided.
The kid didn’t have the nerve.
CHAPTER
52
Aquarium World was on Naito Parkway, crammed into the first floor of one of the elegant old buildings facing the river. It had a small sign out front, no parking, and a front window painted to look like a tank full of fish.
Archie and Flannigan had made it to First Avenue, one block west of Naito, with two squad cars behind them.
“SWAT’s having trouble getting through,” Flannigan said. “Half the roads downtown are impassable.”
What had Heil said? Two feet of water was enough to sweep away a car?
“We need to continue on foot,” Archie said.
Downtown was dark and the falling mist was so fine it looked like fog. Water dribbled from awnings and fire escapes and gushed down the curbsides. The three-story buildings that lined First were ornate, their windows and roofs frosted like wedding cakes. But the first-floor storefronts and the offices upstairs had been evacuated, the electricty shut off, and their black windows were now illuminated only by the reflection of streetlights and the emergency beacons of the patrol cars.
The city seemed utterly abandoned. There were no people. No parked cars. Traffic lights were out. Water ran down the pavement like a wild brook. The thin wisps of trees lining the sidewalk shuddered, bare-leaved, in the wind. The whole world glistened wet and black, like the Pacific Ocean at night.
Archie didn’t bother to park. He just stopped the Cutlass in the middle of the road, got out, and walked around to the trunk.
The two patrol cars following them stopped. Their red and blue lights were strangely comforting. They were something familiar in an environment suddenly defined by everything it was lacking—shoppers, office workers, bicyclists, buses, homeless teenagers with their dreadlocks and cardboard signs.
Archie opened the trunk and took off his jacket.
“Suit up,” he called to the uniformed cops, who were already stepping out of their cars. They were both young and skinny, clean-shaven, one light-haired, the other dark. “We’re walking,” Archie said.
He pulled a flak jacket out of the trunk and strapped it on, then handed one to Flannigan.
Flannigan put it on.
No one spoke.
Choppers droned invisibly overhead. They had become such a part of the downtown experience that they barely registered. It was just another sound, like the drum of rain on the hoods of cars.
Archie put his jacket back on over the bulletproof vest and faced Flannigan and the two patrol cops.
Up close, in the light from the headlights, Archie could see the silhouette of fuzz on the blond officer’s upper lip. He was trying to grow a mustache.
“This is a hostage situation,” Archie said. “Protect the victims first. We can always catch the bad guy. We can’t bring someone back from the dead.”
The two officers nodded, their hair already wet.
“Okay,” Archie said. “Follow my lead.”
He leapt, attempting to clear the wide swath of water running along the curbside, but landed ankle-deep and had to take another stride to get to the sidewalk.
Flannigan was next to him, the patrol cops a few steps behind. The trees spit rain at them from their wet, windblown branches.
Archie didn’t draw his gun. He didn’t want the others to. This was a public place, and anyone could appear at any moment. Downtown had been evacuated, but that didn’t mean that people weren’t dense enough to ignore the warnings.
The wet sidewalk sucked at his suede shoes as Archie walked and the cold water squished into his socks.
The name on the Aquarium World receipt was Elroy Carey.
It had been easy to bring up his driver’s license photo once they had a name and address. He was forty-three years old, with a soft, unlined face, rounded shoulders, and eyebrows lifted in surprise. His brown hair was parted on the side. He looked like an overgrown kid.
Carey had gotten his Oregon driver’s license three years ago, and registered a Dodge sedan at the same time. Before that, he’d lived in Everett, Washington, just a couple of hours by car from where Patrick Lifton had disappeared.
Were Archie’s feet somehow getting even wetter?
They had turned onto a side street and were headed down to the parkway. The water on the sidewalk was definitely deeper here. It splashed up Archie’s pant leg as he walked. Standing water. Not wet pavement. Not a puddle. Not storm drain backup. This was a cold inky blanket of water that lapped against the concrete. Archie could see the edge of it slowly creeping up the length of the street.
This water had a current.
Flannigan heard it, too. “What’s that?” he asked.
“The water,” Archie said.
Flannigan squinted up at the starless sky.
“It’s not the rain,” Archie said.
It had started.
Downtown was flooding.
On cue, Flannigan’s walkie-talkie crackled to life. “We’ve got a report of a breach in the seawall,” dispatch reported.
Flannigan pressed the talk button. “This is Flannigan,” he said. “We’re on Ash between First and Naito. There’s two inches of water here, and rising. What’s going on?”
“There’s a hole in sector eight near the Burnside Bridge. You need to get out of there, sir.”
“Are they sending a team to fix it?”
“Roger. But you need to evacuate. We’ve been told that whole wall could give.”
“What happens then?” Archie said.
“What happens then?” Flannigan repeated into the walkie-talkie.
There was nothing but static for a moment. “You ever see a bug hit a windshield?” came the eventual reply. “It’ll be like that. Only you’ll be the bug, and the windshield will be a ten-foot wall of water.”
The two patrolmen glanced at each other.
Archie wasn’t sure if Carey and the others were even downtown. Maybe they hadn’t made it. Maybe the receipt was misdirection. Maybe Archie had misinterpreted it. Maybe Carey didn’t even have Susan or the kid. Maybe they were already dead.
Archie had cost Heil his life. He couldn’t risk any others but his own.
“You better get out of here,” he said.
Flannigan hesitated. “What about SWAT?” he said into the walkie-talkie.
“I’m sorry, sirs. But they’ve been ordered to stand down until we get the all-clear.”
A streetlight popped across the street and began to smoke and send sparks arcing into the night air.
“Don’t go back to the cars,” Archie told them. “Stay on foot. Head west.”
The patrol cops didn’t need their arms twisted. They backed away a few feet, turned, and started to run.
Flannigan didn’t move.
“I know how to swim,” he said.
CHAPTER
53
By the time Archie and Flannigan got to Naito Parkway the black glass of the water was above their ankles.
The parkway was flooded, and beyond it Waterfront Park had all but vanished into darkness. It was all underwater, Archie realized. The vast expanse of grass. The promenade. The park benches. The monuments and fountains. Two helicopters hovered over a section of the seawall, shining their spotlights down, and Archie could see the cascade of black water spilling over a fifty-foot section where the emergency levee had given way. The churn they’d heard earlier was ten times louder here.
He could see the aquarium store four doorways up the street, a faint, now- familiar blue glow radiating from within—the tanks must have been powered by a backup generator. A row of sandbags was stacked along the seam where the sidewalk met the buildings, and Archie had to drag a hand along the top of them to keep his feet from going out from under him. Flannigan was close behind. Somewhere a car alarm started blaring.
The glass front door was broken.
“They’re here,” Flannigan whispered.
Archie peered into the store and listened. But if there was something to be heard above the sound of the choppers and the car alarm and the roaring water, Archie couldn’t make it out.
“Elroy?” Archie yelled. “This is the police. The river has breached the seawall. This area is flooding right now. I need you to give me the woman and the boy, so we can get you out of there.”
He directed his flashlight’s beam into the store. The water was bleeding in, finding every means of entry. It covered the store’s floor, reflecting the blue gleam of the aquariums.
Archie drew his gun and stepped over the knives of glass that still held in the doorframe.
The car alarm swelled in volume as Archie turned and looked past Flannigan to see the car in question float by, honking madly, parking lights flashing, half submerged in the water. Then the alarm stopped, the lights extinguished, and the car was gone in the darkness.
He took a step and raised his weapon.
“Susan?” he called.
Aquariums lined every wall, marine worlds encased in blocks of glass. They were fitted with black lights to highlight the neon of the colorful fish and exotic coral. Bright pink rocks. Fish of every size and color, feathery, plump, tiny, long. The tanks bubbled and gurgled. If Archie never saw an aquarium again, it would be too soon.
He took another few steps inside.
“You like fish, Elroy?” he called. “I like fish.” He tried to think of names of fish, and could only come up with the ones he liked to eat. “Salmon. Halibut. Black cod. Filet o’.”
“I like Leopard Wrasse African Blue Stars,” a small voice said.
Archie swung his flashlight in the direction of the voice, and saw Patrick Lifton sitting cross-legged on an orange molded plastic chair in front of a large tank of small red fish. He was wearing dark rain pants and a dark raincoat, but the hood was down. He had something in his lap.
A plastic bucket.
The hairs on the back of Archie’s neck bristled.
The kid appeared to be alone. Out of the corner of his eye, Archie saw Flannigan duck down an aisle to get at the kid from the other side.
“What do you have there, kiddo?” Archie said in as calm a voice as he could manage.
Patrick’s eyes flicked past Archie to a point somewhere behind him. “He wanted another one,” Patrick said.
Archie snapped his flashlight around, tracking the gun after it. But he saw only more fish. They jerked around in their tanks like anxious spectators. “Where is he?” Archie asked Patrick.
“I know you,” Patrick said.
“I’m Archie,” Archie said. “We met in the river.”
The kid blinked in the light, but his eyes didn’t waver. He looked directly at Archie. His eyes were a startling dark green, with a brown rim around the irises.
“I need you to hand me the bucket,” Archie said slowly.
“I can’t,” Patrick whispered.
They didn’t have time for this. Archie needed to find Susan and get her and the kid out of there. What did the parenting books say? Never negotiate? “I have something that belongs to you,” Archie said quickly. “Your Darth Vader figure. You lost him near the river. I found him. I’ll trade you.”
Patrick looked down at the bucket and seemed to hesitate.
Archie put his flashlight under his arm, and extended his hand, and took a step toward the boy.
“Archie,” he heard Susan say from behind him.
If it had been anyone else, he might have reacted differently. He might have secured the boy first before turning around. But it wasn’t anyone else, it was Susan, and Archie acted on instinct, swinging his gun around to his left, following her voice, away from the boy. The flashlight was still pinned under his arm and its beam careened sideways. He dropped it, caught it in his hand, and lifted the light to find Elroy Carey holding Susan in front of him, one arm around her waist, the other hand securing her by a fistful of her hair. The top of her head came to the top of his shoulder. Archie aimed his weapon at Carey’s head.
“He’ll put his hand in the bucket,” Carey said. “If I say so.”
Archie couldn’t see Patrick. The boy was behind him. If Archie turned, it would mean taking his gun off of Carey. “It’s okay, Patrick,” Archie said. “You don’t have to do what he says anymore.”
Susan was limp in Carey’s arms, her head twisted back like a rag doll. “Heil’s dead,” she said. It sounded like an accusation.
Archie couldn’t see if Carey had a weapon. If Archie shot him, he’d have to kill him, or risk h
im hurting Susan, and he’d have to kill him instantly. SWAT called it “aiming for the apricot.” The apricot was the medulla oblongata—the lower half of the brainstem. It controlled involuntary movement. Done right, Carey wouldn’t even flinch. But Archie wasn’t a marksman. And Carey kept moving, rocking back and forth, shifting his feet. And Susan was so close.
“Did you hear me?” Susan said. “He killed Heil.”
“I know,” Archie said. He kept his gun trained on Carey, along with the flashlight, hoping the light might limit his vision. He needed to buy time for Flannigan to work his way around to the boy.
“You need to help me get everyone out of here, Elroy,” Archie said. “It’s flooding.”
Susan’s body stiffened. Archie thought it was the threat of the flood.
Carey adjusted his grip on her, still rocking, moving in and out of Archie’s sights. “My name’s Roy,” he said. He was hunched over Susan, his chin on her shoulder, their heads pressed close, like a couple posing for a photograph.
Archie’s feet ached from the cold water. Carey and Susan had been there longer. Their feet had probably moved through pain to numbness. It could make Carey clumsy.
“Okay, Roy. My name’s Archie.”
Carey’s attention shifted to a spot behind Archie. “Come here, Sam,” he said.
Archie couldn’t let Carey get the boy. If Archie had ever had an ounce of parental authority, he needed it now. “Stay there, Patrick,” he said.
Archie listened. He could barely make out the sound of the generator powering the tanks. Aquariums gurgled. The water was a few inches deeper now. The whole room flickered with aqua light. It reflected off the water, the metal fixtures, the empty tanks. Archie steadied his weapon and lined the sight right at the center of Carey’s chin. Recoil would push the shot upward, and if Archie had to fire, he wanted to be sure to kill the bastard.
Carey’s lip curled.
“I like the name Elroy,” Susan said. She was talking to Carey, but her gaze was leveled right at Archie. “It’s a good name. Why did your parents choose it?”
What was she talking about?
Carey’s lips peeled back in a strange smile. “My mom named me after my granddad,” he said.