Stone Cold Angel (The Perfect Order Book 2)

by Amy Deason

  ~ ~ ~

  The plane touched down just after four-thirty in the morning. Under normal circumstances, it should have been dark enough to see a few scattered stars across an ink-colored sky. But it was June, the peak month for St. Petersburg’s white nights and the sun never completely set. But inch by precious inch, the dusk was being burned away as it gave up its eternal battle with the sun.

  Cadence Montgomery was one of a handful to witness this war as she sat, barely awake in row 6, seat 18. Yawning, she stretched her arms over her head, trying to work the kinks out of her protesting muscles. She dropped her hands to her hair, running her fingers through the dark-brown strands tumbling over her shoulders in a tangled wave. Every muscle in her body felt zapped, drained of energy. The nap on the plane had done little to help her. It might have even made it worse. She was absolutely exhausted.

  Must be jet lag.

  Not a seasoned traveler, having never been more than a hundred miles from home, she’d heard of jet lag but never actually experienced it. Now that she had, she decided it was definitely something she could do without.

  Her eyes felt as if they were filled with sand and she rubbed at them absently, staring at the magnificent view just outside her window. It was true, no two sunrises were the same. The colors, the light, and even the shadows were different from the ones she’d watched from her home in Texas. It was inexplicably beautiful yet the moment was marred by the solitude of her surroundings. Though she was with hundreds of other passengers aboard this plane, she’d never felt so alone in her life. She had neither her mother or her father right now and the heart ache was crippling.

  Oh Mom.

  Her mother would have loved to see this place. While her mother was alive, she had always been up before the sun, waiting for its glorious appearance. And then, with a skillful hand, she would copy its brilliance upon an empty canvas, creating a mirror-like image out of nothing more than a few brush strokes with a rainbow of oil-based paints. It had been magical to watch her mother work and she’d loved every minute of the time they had together. But it had been much too brief.

  The cancer attacked Alicia from all sides. Without mercy, it worked quickly, stealing her sight first, rapidly followed by her brain and then eventually, her life. Now she was gone, remembered only by those who had loved her best. The ones who had been there in the beginning when she first became ill and those who had remained by her side until the very end.

  When at last she had given up the long, hard fight, there had been only two people left. And now, there was one.

  Stop it! Cadence’s mind shouted loud enough to shock her back to the present. There was no way to know it was true. She’d seen no real evidence indicating she was the only member of her immediate family left. And until she saw it with her own eyes, she would never believe it. Surely God would not be so cruel as to take both her mother and father away from her. It just wasn’t possible. She had to believe this or everything she’d worked so hard for, including her full scholarship to Julliard, would mean absolutely nothing. She couldn’t imagine how she would be able to go on if she were completely alone in this life. But she had to know if she was. Thus, her trip to Russia.

  In all of her life, she could have never imagined she would wind up here, like this. But she allowed, five months ago, things were a lot different. She’d just received her acceptance letter from the number one music college in the country and her father, a principal scientist in nuclear and biological research, had been nearing the completion of an ongoing project, rapidly approaching its third year. Life was good and they were happy. But then, out of nowhere, tragedy reared its ugly head again. Her father disappeared.

  Maybe disappeared wasn’t the right word, she thought crinkling her nose. She knew where her father had gone. The problem was she didn’t know what happened to him once he arrived.

  It all started with the damn phone call. The one which irrevocably changed their lives forever. If only they had known, she wouldn’t be here now. But since neither of them had been blessed with the ability of precognition, her father had answered the phone. And he’d accepted the invitation to be a guest speaker at a convention in St. Petersburg.

  Three weeks after the new year had come and gone, she drove him to the airport and put him on a plane, unaware it was the last time she would ever see him again. The email she’d received from him a few weeks later had been disturbing to say the least. It started off normal, describing his spur of the moment trip to Valaam and the beauty around him. But it was the last few sentences which chilled her heart. He suspected someone was following him. No indication of who or why. He warned her to be careful and to trust no one. He urged her to delete his email immediately after reading it. She never heard from him again.

  And now here she was, aboard this plane in a foreign country halfway across the world in search of him.

  Standing, Cadence slipped into the narrow aisle behind a plump, balding man. The yellow and green plaid jacket he wore hurt her eyes and his heady scent, a mix of cheese and cheap drugstore cologne, made her gag. Struggling to hide her disgust, she placed her hand over her nose and mouth, staying as far back as she was able to without climbing on top of the middle-aged woman behind her. She didn’t allow herself to breathe normally again until they reached the terminal and the smelly man shouldered himself away from the close vicinity of her nose.

  The terminal was a massive structure of steel and glass. Florescent lighting beat down from the vaulted ceilings only to bounce back at her from the highly polished tile beneath her feet. Square red and white signs were posted on the cerulean walls, their arrows indicating the various locations within the airport.

  Thank God some of them are in English.

  She’d brought along a Russian-English dictionary but had yet to learn enough to guide her through this crazy mess. Reading each sign carefully, she found the one leading to the luggage carousel. She weaved resolutely in and out of the babbling crowds, clutching her purse tightly against her as if it were a life preserver rather than just a leather bag.

  Her stomach grumbled angrily as she walked almost shoulder to shoulder with those around her. The in-flight meal consisting of a buttery potato soup and crackers, and although tasty, they’d done little to appease her appetite. Placing her hand over her midsection to quiet it down, she sighed. Sometimes it was hard being a vegetarian, a life-altering choice she’d made when she was seventeen after watching an extremely graphic animal-welfare video at school. While making the decision had been easy, following through with it was the hard part. She’d sworn off meat and instead sought her nourishment from vegetables, tofu, and soy products.

  But there were still times, even two years later, when she craved nothing more than a greasy double cheeseburger or a hot dog with the works. Maybe even an extra cheesy slice of hot pepperoni pizza. Her stomach complained again, this time more loudly.

  Striking a deal with her groaning tummy to grab a healthy bite as soon as possible, she found where she needed to be and from a distance, she spied her bags crammed in among dozens of others as the carousel spun like a slow-moving top. Jostling for position, she maneuvered herself just right between a tall, gray-haired man and a squatty, pimply faced boy and waited for her bags to come around again. Then she deftly scooped them up, thankful they were all there. The last thing she needed was to lose her luggage. Not that she’d brought much, just a blue knapsack and two small suitcases with wheels, but she had no desire to waste her money on new clothes. She would need every bit of cash she had for her expenses while she searched for her dad.

  In her mind, she saw his lean, smiling face and heard his booming laughter. Could he really have disappeared off the face of the Earth?

  It just wasn’t possible. He had to be here. He had to be okay. She wouldn’t be able to stand the thought of never seeing him again. The months already separating them had been
bad enough. Horrible actually.

  The anxious waiting, the constant worry. And it seemed no one knew anything. Not his research partner and best friend, Henry Collins. And not the United States government. Although both had come around, talking to her, asking her the same questions over and over. Who had he talked to? Why was his research missing from the lab? Did she know where it was? Had she heard from him yet?

  She had been tempted to tell them about his email but in the end, she hadn’t. She couldn’t. He’d asked her not to.

  But as the months crept by with no word, she grew more and more worried until it became impossible for her to just wait for something to happen. So, without telling anyone, she decided to look for her dad on her own.

  Canceling her summer trip with a group of people she’d known since grade school, she made the necessary arrangements to travel several thousand miles east, among total strangers, most of whom did not speak English. It was the craziest, most dangerous thing she had ever done in her life. And if any of her friends knew, she wouldn’t have made it this far but that’s precisely the reason she didn’t tell them the truth. Instead, she’d simply told them she needed time to deal with her dad’s disappearance. It wasn’t a total lie. She would be dealing with it. Just not within the borders of the United States.

  Pushing through the crowd, Cadence made her way outside to the front of the airport. The nip in the air made her glad she’d changed clothes during the layover in Germany. Shorts, a tank top, and flip-flops may be fine for a June day in Texas but here in St. Petersburg, she would have been freezing. Her current attire, blue jeans, furry white boots, and a cream wool sweater, should have been warm enough but she was still cold. Pausing, she leaned over and dragged out a puffy blue parka from one of her bags and slipped it on.

  Much better. Now if I can only find the car . . .

  She’d been extra careful to find a hotel that would send a car or shuttle for her at the airport. Everything she’d read on the Internet suggested it would be nearly impossible to find a cab driver who wouldn’t rip their patrons off. Especially Americans. And particularly Americans who knew very little Russian.

  Glancing along the sidewalk, she spotted the black sedan behind a row of red and white taxis. The driver, a tall, young man with dark hair and soft, brown eyes, stood beside the car, holding a sign emblazoned with her name in large, bold letters.

  CADENCE MONTGOMERY.

  “Well,” Cadence said aloud, “that’s me.” Dragging the other bags behind her, she walked briskly to the waiting car.

  Coming around to help with her luggage, the young man tipped his head to her. “Hello, miss,” he said, speaking in English. The Russian accent was thick but not so much that she couldn’t understand his words.

  Well, maybe this won’t be so bad after all. And if everyone I run into can speak a little English, I should be just fine.

  Still, she was glad she had bought the dictionary.

  Climbing into the sleek sedan, she settled into the buttery soft seat and yawned. As they pulled away from the curb, the gentle rocking lulled her and she leaned her head back. She rubbed her eyes, fighting the sleepiness tugging at her. A trickle of doubt began to creep in. What was she doing? Coming to Russia by herself to search for her dad? This city was huge. How was she ever going to find him here? The scared little girl in her spoke up in a voice so soft and pleading.

  It’s not too late to turn back. You can go back home. Or if you hurry, you might still be able to go to Florida.

  Her subconscious was persuasive and the thought of returning to the familiarity of home or even Florida was tempting. All she had to do was tell the driver to turn around and she could be back at the airport and on a plane in a matter of hours.

  No! You will not turn tail and run. You will not be a coward.

  This voice, a strong and fearless one, was so loud that for a moment it seemed she actually heard it. This was a voice she knew. The voice that had led her here in the first place. The one which would not allow her to give up. The one that put the steel in her backbone and courage in her heart. It pushed her forward, making her stronger with each step she took. It was the voice of her mother. How many times had Alicia told her young daughter, showed her young daughter, that she could do anything as long as she didn’t give up. It was a lesson so deeply instilled within her Cadence knew she couldn’t have resisted even if she had tried. And she wasn’t going to try.

  She was here and she was not going to turn around until she got what she came for. Answers to her father’s disappearance. She would find out what had happened to him come hell or high water. The chances were one in a million but she was willing to take the chance. Besides, she had a gut feeling that somewhere in this foreign city, the answers waited for her. All she had to do was find them.

  Reaching up, her hand feeling like it weighed a thousand pounds, she clasped the golden locket she wore around her neck tightly. The last thing her father had given her before he left. Feeling the familiar heart shape press into her palm, she closed her eyes and whispered, “Okay, Daddy, here I come.”

  ~ ~ ~

  The overpowering stench of mildew struck him the second he came to. Struggling against weighted lids, Phillip Montgomery opened his eyes but there was nothing to see. It was as if he’d gone blind. Turning his head, he felt the pain, sharp and excruciating, slice through his brain like samurai swords, cutting away his ability to think. He steeled himself against it and he raised his chin, breathing deep. The air was cold and damp, attacking his lungs and forcing him to cough immediately. A thick, coppery liquid filled his mouth, threatening to gag him. He recognized the taste of blood and spit it out, listening to the wet sound as it connected with the floor somewhere in the darkness.

  Seated in the dark, Phillip leaned forward, feeling a sharp pull on his shoulders.

  What the hell?

  He jerked back and forth but was unable to move more than a few inches in either direction. His hands were bound and when he flexed them, the binding dug deeper into the sensitive skin of his wrists. His legs were strapped, secured at the ankles. Fighting against the bonds, he tired quickly as waves of fresh agony raced throughout his body. Reclining his head, he panted nosily, each fresh breath searing his lungs.

  Slowly, painfully, his breathing returned to normal and he stared wide-eyed through the dark, trying to see something, anything that might be of some help to him. But there was nothing. Nothing but a deep, empty bleakness surrounding him. He was stuck here in obscurity until someone came for him. If someone came for him. And given the current situation he was in, the someone would not be anyone good.

  He should have never come here. He should never have left his home, his daughter, his country. Because now he was a dead man. Or soon would be. He felt it as sure as he felt anything else. How had it come to this? How had he ended up in a room, tied to a chair, waiting for God-knew-what? But of course, he knew the answers. He was here because of his research. His life’s work had finally paid off and because of it, he was here. His formula was the key to this mess he was in.

  Thinking back, he remembered the day he’d solved the riddle that had been eluding him for so long. Initially, he couldn’t believe it. It seemed impossible. How could something so complex be so simple? He’d reworked it over and over, long into the night. But the results stayed the same. The answer was hidden deep within the complexity of if all. His formula worked. It actually worked! He’d been ecstatic about the discovery and wanted to share the results immediately. But a part of him remained leery, even hesitating to reveal the news with his partner, Henry. And he’d known Henry his whole life. Hell, the man was his best friend.

  And yet, despite his misgivings, he’d still ended up here. All because he’d had a moment of weakness and had been duped into coming to Russia, under the pretense of scientific camaraderie. He should have known better but how
could he? He’d gone through the proper channels, the chain of command, ensuring everything was on the level. He’d seen the official paperwork from both the U.S. and Russian governments. There should have been no problem but now he was here in this hellhole, thousands of miles away from home on a trip he should never have taken. And he was going to pay for it. With his life.

  He could only thank God he hadn’t brought the formula with him when he’d made the trip to St. Petersburg. Or even to Valaam. If he’d been caught with it, not only would he be dead, but millions of others would suffer as well. His work would indefinitely change the world but in the wrong hands, it would become a weapon like no other, bringing entire governments and civilizations to its knees. Its radioactive power was amazing, but terrible, making him wish he’d never discovered it in the first place. But it was too late now and there was no going back.

  He’d been a fool for coming here but hiding the main component had been the smartest thing he could have done since completing the research. It was well hidden, in a place no one would ever think to look for it. And if by some chance, someone did find it, they would never know what they were looking at. There was only one other person who knew exactly where it was located and what it meant. And that person had given his solemn vow to never reveal it to a single soul, save one, and only if the circumstances called for it. Phillip prayed it would never come to that.

  From the far side of the room, the door opened, allowing a slice of pale light to filter in, revealing two shadowy forms. They entered the room and clicked the door shut behind them, immersing themselves in the suffocating darkness. Then came the soft scrape of shoe leather on concrete, a whispery, secretive sound which chilled him to the bone. Seconds later, the room was awash in light, the brightness spearing Phillip’s retinas. Blinded by the fluorescents overhead, he slammed his eyes shut against the glare. Footsteps and muffled Russian voices caused his heart to pound yet he refused to look.