One shot rang out, or perhaps two at the same time. Hatchet-Face jerked where he stood and turned to face Her, wavering in place as he raised the gun. Another shot rang out and he jerked again. The arm with the gun dropped a bit then came back up. Another shot. Hatchet-Face staggered closer to Her. His eyes burned with loathing. He leveled the gun at Her again. Pure rage and hatred keeping him on his feet.
Macak bunched and leapt.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Maeko stared at Hatchet-Face, knowing that the loathing in his eyes was mirrored in her own and hating him even more for making her feel it. The gun leveled at her and time stopped, his finger tightening on the trigger. Then Macak leapt up and latched himself onto Hatchet-Face’s back. The man bent backward, letting out another roar of pain, his shot going wild. He flailed with his other hand, trying to strike at the cat now attached to his back. While he thrashed about, bleeding from several gunshot wounds, Hugh grabbed the wrist of the mechanical hand and stepped into him, slugging him square in the nose.
Hatchet-Face dropped like a rock.
Hugh looked down at him in the frozen moment that followed, then back at her. “He’s like to bleed out from those wounds before he wakes.”
Once, she had helped Hatchet-Face get back into the world. It wasn’t a mistake she meant to make again. She met Hugh’s eyes and a cold lump settled in the pit of her stomach. “This time, I’ll take the guilt.”
“Dad!”
Ash’s voice was muffled, one hand over his nose, blood running out between his fingers. Garrett ran past her over to his son. He pulled Ash’s hand away from his face. Blood ran fast from his newly crooked nose.
“It looks like it’s broken.”
“I neber would’b guessed,” Ash answered.
Chaff chuckled. “About time that pretty face picked up a little character.”
Ash gave Chaff a cross look and flicked blood at him, though a pained smiled tugged at his lips. “Shuddup.”
Macak leapt up into her arms then and she hugged the cat close, pressing her cheek to his head and squeezing her eyes shut. Her chest felt like it might explode. The gentle hand that touched her cheek a few seconds later didn’t help.
“You all right, Pigeon?”
She opened her eyes and nodded, not trusting herself to speak.
Hugh walked over to Ash and his father. “This is going to hurt.” He didn’t give time for the words to sink in before he grabbed Ash’s nose between his hands and cracked it back into place.
Ash cried out and reflexively punched Hugh in the gut.
The big man let out a small grunt and stepped back. “You’re welcome.”
“Thank you,” Garrett offered, giving the man a fleeting glance that spoke of much shared guilt. Of things that they had done together here that neither wanted to talk about or be reminded of.
Next to the softly wheezing Hatchet-Face, who she hoped would bleed out soon so she didn’t have to listen to that tortured sound much longer, sat the briefcase full of blueprints she had left in the sleeping quarters.
She stared at it. That he’d had it meant he must have seen her with it, which meant he must have been in the room when she put it in there. Had he been there when she hid under the bed, watching her? Waiting for the right moment to confront her?
Maeko shuddered and Chaff pulled her close against his chest, cat and all.
“Good work, mate,” he said, giving the cat a scratch on the head. Louder, he said, “We’ve got Mae and Garrett. We need to get out of here and meet up with the airship before we run into more trouble or, worse, get bombed by our own people.”
Maeko pulled back from him. “How long do we have until Drake and the others arrive?”
“Not long. He was itching to get going. He was worried that they might interrogate you and find out about the attack and he’d lose the element of surprise. I doubt he’ll wait the full twelve hours he promised.”
Garrett glanced over at them, the dread in his look confirming what Joel and Thaddeus had said.
She caught his eyes and held his gaze as she spoke. “They already know the Pirates are building a battleship. They’ve developed guns to take it down.”
“Whad!” Ash’s eyes widened, his shirt was painted with blood from his nose, though they had stuffed some cloth or something in his nostrils to try to stop the bleeding.
Garrett nodded solemn acknowledgement. “They do have the guns, but not all of them are functional. The two on the front corners of the wall are operational. After they finished testing the first two and were satisfied with the results, I designed a flaw into the next four so they would fail under the stress of firing. I knew they had plans to test the first two, so I had to make them functional. I was trying to appear cooperative given that they said they knew where my family was hiding out. I couldn’t take the chance that it was true.”
“Ad leasd id’s only doo,” Ash offered.
“But two of those guns functional is enough to take down any battleship that doesn’t know they’re there,” Hugh added. “They also have a mobile gun, but I don’t believe it’s functional yet.”
“Can we disable themb?” Ash asked.
“We have to,” Maeko answered. “We have no way to warn the battleship before it gets here, especially if they’re planning to move in early.”
Garrett looked away then. He heaved a sigh. “She’s right. We can’t let them fly into those guns. Hugh and I know where they are and how to disable them. We can take care of that and meet back up with you three somewhere.”
Hugh was nodding as he spoke, but Ash shook his head vehemently. “I amb nod leabing you. I jusd god you back.”
“We’ll have a better chance if we go in small groups,” Maeko stated before Garrett could voice the argument in his eyes. They didn’t have time for a standoff of stubbornness. “We’ll split up and meet back at the rendezvous when the guns are disabled.”
Chaff gave her forehead a quick kiss then turned to the others. “Ash, you and your dad go to the one on the near corner. You’re injured, so you shouldn’t be expected to go too far.”
“You were shod,” Ash argued.
It wasn’t until then that Maeko noticed the three bullet holes in the arm of Chaff’s shirt. Her gut did a spin.
He looked at the holes and grinned. “Metal arm,” he answered cheerily. “Hugh and I will go for the far one. Maeko will take Macak back to the airship and let Crimson and Wells know what’s going on.”
“Oh no,” she protested. “I’m not leaving you four to do all the dirty work.”
Chaff turned to face her, hunkering down to look her in the eyes.
“You’ve done enough already. Macak needs you and the two in the airship deserve to know what is going on. Besides, they might have to do an emergency pickup if things get rough. Trust me,” he mussed her hair, “you’ll have plenty of opportunity to get into more trouble.”
She glanced past him at each of the other three. Three sets of eyes stared back at her, unyielding. Even Hugh had taken his side.
“No. Chaff, I…”
He stopped her with a kiss, his lips soft and full of sweetness and warmth. “It’s our turn, Mae.”
She swallowed hard, feeling the sting of tears. Her arms tightened around Macak, but the cat made no complaint. He only purred louder.
“Id’ll be all righd.”
She released a shaky breath. “I expect you all to make it to the airship in one piece.”
Chaff smirked. “That’d be an improvement over last time.”
“You want this back?” Hugh held Travis’s gun out to her.
She shook her head, managing not to recoil visibly. “No. You’ll probably need it more than me.”
Chaff took her hand then and she let him lead her toward the exit with the others, grabbing the briefcase on the way past and leaving Hatchet-Face to die next to the officer he had killed.
At the door, they left in pairs. First Chaff and Hugh, who had the farthest to go, after she
kissed Chaff once more and made him promise to be as safe as possible. Then, a few minutes later, Ash and his father struck out after she gave Ash a tight hug. Lastly, she and Macak stepped out into the darkness and started creeping toward the building that they were supposed to meet the airship on top of.
Travis was still locked up in that building. Perhaps she should go in and set him free. If he was still in the cell when the attack started, he wouldn’t be able to get out of harm’s way. Besides, no other patrols had been in that building. It would almost be safer to pass through there then to walk around outside where a wall patrol might spot her.
Holding Macak close, she veered toward the near door of the building and ducked quickly inside. She waited for two counts of sixty beside the door, listening for any new sounds that might suggest additional company. All she heard was Travis whistling a lively tavern tune from back in the cell.
She smiled to herself. He might turn into a decent bloke given the right opportunities. Hugh was working out and that was why she was here, wasn’t it? To give the youth a chance at something better than this. That and the fact that it seemed safer to go through here than stay out there. She already knew what to expect in here.
She hadn’t quite taken a full step when the door swung open behind her and something struck her across the side of the head before she could finish turning around. Macak flew from her arms and she hit the ground, tasting blood in her mouth as her teeth slammed home on her tongue. Her ears rang so loud it took a few seconds before she even realized there were now people standing over her and speaking.
“Don’t kill her, Joel,” Thaddeus warned, much to her distant appreciation. “We need to find out where Hugh and Garrett are and how she planned to get out of here with them.”
Someone grabbed a handful of her hair and started using it to pull her to her feet. She grabbed their hands, trying to help lift to get relief from the sudden pain.
“Bennett, go raise the alarm.”
When she was on her feet, she finally managed to look around, determining by his absence from view that Joel had been the one to pull her so ungently to her feet. Bennett still stood by the door, not rushing off to follow his orders. He was looking at Macak who was crouched a few feet away with his hackles up.
“Blood and ashes, man,” Joel snapped. “It’s only a cat.”
“It’s a killer,” Bennett murmured. “A kindred spirit.”
“You can keep the blasted thing if you like,” Thaddeus offered, “so long as it doesn’t make a nuisance of itself before you get back and you do as you’ve been ordered.”
Bennett met her eyes then, and she longed for some reassurance in those cold eyes. Anything that would promise her, at the very least, that Macak would be all right. There was nothing. No emotion at all that she could find in those bottomless pits. Her chest tightened as he glanced once more at Macak and went back outside.
“We obviously have some urgent matters to discuss,” Thaddeus remarked, staring hard at her now. “Bring her along, Joel.”
“What about the cat?”
Thaddeus glanced at Macak who laid his ears back and hissed.
“Feeling’s mutual,” he answered. “Grab that briefcase. I’m sure the wretched cat will follow her. Come along.”
With that, he started further into the building and Joel discouraged her thoughts of dissent by prodding her in the back with his gun.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
“Do you know who founded the Literati?” Thaddeus asked as he led the way into a small office.
Maeko was rubbing the side of her head where Joel had struck her. She spat blood to one side, finding a small pleasure in how much it stood out glaringly red on their nice sterile white wall.
“No. And I don’t really care.”
Thaddeus sat in a seat behind the desk and gestured for her to sit in the only other chair. For a moment, she considered refusing out of sheer defiance, but she was feeling a touch woozy, so she sank into the seat, leaving Joel to stand off to one side. Macak hopped up into her lap, but didn’t settle there. He stood staring at Thaddeus and Joel in turns, perhaps trying to decide which posed more of an immediate threat.
Thaddeus leaned his elbows on the desk and steepled his fingers.
“I’m glad you asked,” he resumed, not at all discouraged by her lack of enthusiasm. “One of the queen’s most trusted advisors was involved early on naturally, though he didn’t take much interest beyond serving his primary purpose of getting the queen to approve of Literati activities. Initially, it was intended to be strictly a scientific community comprised of inventors wanting to brainstorm their ideas with likeminded fellows. An idea championed by none other than the late Lucian P. Folesworth and a young talented inventor from a wealthy family that he’d taken a fancy to, one Dominic Rakeley.”
Her attention perked up a bit, though she took care not to show it. Dominic Rakeley. A young inventor from a wealthy family. D. Rakeley. Drake? Could it be? It would explain a lot.
“Of course,” Thaddeus continued, “as it grew, the organization started gaining political clout and some of the members began pushing their own agendas. There were those who wanted more influence in the city. They wanted a way to force their inventions into production and public consumption. They were looking for a way to control the populace they needed to consume their work. That was how the Literati police force was born along with several other discreet arms of the Literati that would extend influence in other ways. The queen’s advisor remained involved only as far as he was needed to convince her to avoid taking too much interest in their expanding activities.
“The Literati quickly grew out of the scope of its founding ideals. When the original vision appeared to have become lost before the ambition of some of its members, Dominic was the first to extricate himself. Lucian followed his example soon after. Although he continued to provide some funding and ideas, he refused to be involved in their heavy-handed tactics. When it became clear that Lucian was no longer going to share any of his remarkable inventions with the community and that his company was going to be taking away from the consumer pool they wanted to monopolize, they approached Joel to find another way to get their hands-on Lucian’s inventions and his share of the riches. Unfortunately for Lucian, he wasn’t willing to come around on the subject, so Joel called on me to brainstorm some more extreme options. Soon after that was when you came into the picture, I believe.”
She spat some more blood from her oozing tongue onto the desk, and Thaddeus leaned away, eyeing the spot of red with disgust.
“What does all this have to do with me?”
“Your detective friend. Ah, late detective friend,” he corrected with a look of mocking sorrow, “was stirring up some trouble through the Bobbies. Trouble we thought we’d put down when we took care of Commissioner Henderson and my brother. With the detective out of the way, things were looking up and victory was all but assured. Now, thanks to the right ears in the right places, we know we should be looking up quite literally.
“The Pirates, it seems, must have at least one very wealthy individual working on their behalf who can afford to fund a battleship. Needless to say, a battleship attacking this facility would draw quite a bit of attention we don’t want at this juncture. Throughout these recent complications, you’ve caused our organization more trouble than one small girl should even be capable of, especially tonight. But we will find Garrett and Hugh. My men will come back from your supposed rendezvous in Whitechapel and report that it was all a lie. Then things will settle down again. However, they won’t stay that way unless we can stop this battleship from paying a visit.
“So what does all of this mean for you?” He leaned further back and put his feet up on the desk. “It means that, unless you want to watch Joel gleefully skin that cat alive for practice before he starts on you, you need to tell me where the Pirates are building that battleship.”
Maeko smiled in the moment of expectant silence. She didn’t feel like smiling.
She felt like heaving. But she smiled instead. “I don’t hear an alarm.”
Thaddeus’s face went red, his eyes narrowing as he realized she was right. He pulled out a gun, training it on her, and glanced up at Joel. “Go see what’s going on.”
It was only a brief reprieve. The instant Joel was out the door, Thaddeus turned his attention back to her and she didn’t have an answer to give him. She could tell him where the stronghold was, assuming that the Pirates would arrive soon and take out this facility and the majority of the Literati’s power base with it, but then, what if they failed? There were too many people at Drake’s estate who would suffer. And she could see by the look in his eyes that she had already hesitated too long. He wouldn’t believe anything she said now.
“I can’t tell you where they’re building the battleship.”
Thaddeus lifted the gun. “I guess that’s it then. It appears that you are of no use to me.”
There was a loud boom from somewhere behind Maeko, in the direction of the large development building near the back of the prison. Seconds later, another explosion shook the building they were in and Maeko cried out, throwing herself to the floor with Macak clutched tight in her arms. For perhaps a minute, she wasn’t sure if Thaddeus had fired or not. She held her breath, waiting for pain. What came was another explosion and a crack split the ceiling of the room, dust raining down on them.
The first explosion had come from the back of the facility, which meant the battleship had approached from behind. Now that she thought about it, that was probably the smarter approach. Just as people never tended to look up for danger, they also tended to expect it to come from in front. It might also give the others time to disable the big guns before it got into range. However, it also meant guards would be running for those big guns, which put the other four in significant danger.
The Girl and the Clockwork Crossfire Page 19