Die and Stay Dead

by Nicholas Kaufmann

  “Stay back,” I told Bethany and Isaac as they came running up behind me.

  I kicked the door open and went inside, gun first.

  LaValle leapt up from where he was sitting in front of the surveillance equipment. He reached for the pistol at his hip, but I pointed my Bersa semiautomatic at his face. His hand froze on the grip of his gun.

  “Don’t,” I said. “Where’s Arkwright, LaValle?”

  LaValle grinned smugly. “Someplace you’ll never find him. You can’t stop him. Nothing can stop him now.”

  He drew his gun. I put three bullets in him, center mass, before he could fire. He fell back against the far wall, then slid down to the floor. He looked pretty damn dead to me, but I kicked his gun away from his hand anyway. I wasn’t taking any chances.

  “You shouldn’t have killed him,” Isaac said. “He might have had information.”

  “He said everything he was going to say.” I holstered my gun. I went to the bank of surveillance equipment, but I couldn’t make heads or tails of all the buttons and dials in front of me. “Can you operate this thing? There might be footage that tells us where Arkwright went.”

  Bethany and Isaac went to work on the equipment, but after a minute they stopped.

  “It’s been erased, all of it,” Isaac said. “There’s nothing saved on the hard drives. LaValle was keeping an eye on us. These are live feeds from all over the house, but nothing’s being recorded. Arkwright wasn’t taking any chances.”

  “Now what?” Bethany asked. “Arkwright could be anywhere. We’re no closer to finding him than we were before.”

  I looked at the monitors, the various rooms under surveillance around the house—the living room, a den, the master bedroom, the gallery, guest rooms, hallways. There had to be something here, something that could tell us where Arkwright was.

  “We should split up and search the house,” I said. “Nobody takes off this quickly without leaving something behind. Papers, a receipt, a Post-it note with a phone number, something.”

  Bethany looked down at LaValle’s dead body. “Be careful. LaValle was part of Arkwright’s security detail. If he’s still here, he was guarding something. Or someone.”

  We split up, searching different parts of the house. I took a carpeted stairway to the top floor, three stories up, keeping the gun in front of me. I checked behind door after door—a bathroom, a linen closet, a laundry room—but there was nothing to tell me where Arkwright had gone. Finally, I found a study. It was a big room with an antique wooden desk, a plush, leather couch, and a marble-topped, wrought iron coffee table. I searched the desk but didn’t find anything except for a few stray pens and pencils rolling around its drawers.

  A fireplace stood on the wall opposite the door. Several framed photographs had been arranged on the stone mantel. I studied them closely, hoping to find a clue. The photos were all of Arkwright at various landmarks around the world, the Eiffel Tower, the pyramids of Giza, the Great Wall. The man certainly got around. Maybe it was his farewell tour, one last hurrah before he commanded Nahash-Dred to destroy it all.

  The picture at the far end of the mantel caught my eye. It showed Arkwright standing beside a woman about his age. She was wearing a red parka, matching knit cap, and yellow, buglike goggles. They were standing at the bottom of a ski slope. Above them, part of a banner had been captured in the photograph. It read ASPEN SN.

  I picked it up. I’d seen the woman before. I’d seen this picture before, but … different. I turned the frame over and started to undo the back.

  My phone went off. Gabrielle’s name flashed on the screen. I put the photograph down and answered the call.

  “Gabrielle, where are you? Do you have Jordana?”

  “Trent,” she said, her voice shaking. “Jordana never told me where she lives, so I—I came to her office first. I thought she might still be here, or that I’d find her home address.”

  “Do you have her?” I asked again.

  “When I got here, they were—they were all dead,” she said. “Everyone in the office. They were murdered. Their bodies are burnt. There are burn marks all over the walls. It—it had to be the Thracian Gauntlet. It had to be Arkwright.”

  My fingers tightened on the phone so hard I thought it might break.

  “God damn it,” I said. “Why were they still at the office at this hour? What were they doing there?”

  “That’s the thing,” Gabrielle said. “I don’t think they stayed late. They’re already cold. They’ve been dead for hours.”

  It felt like the floor dropped out from under me. “Did you see Jordana? Is she there, too?”

  “I don’t know. Her—her office is empty. I didn’t see any burn marks in there, but that doesn’t mean … God, Trent, I don’t know how she could have gotten out if she was here when Arkwright came. He was thorough. It’s—it’s like he was enjoying himself. He didn’t spare anyone. There are bodies huddled together in the break room like they were hiding from him, but—but they…”

  She trailed off, unable to continue. I picked up the photograph again in my other hand. I smashed it against the corner of the mantel, shattering the glass. I pulled the picture out of the frame. It had been folded to show only part of the photograph. I unfolded it, making the image complete. The banner at the top now read, in full, ASPEN SNOWMASS 2011. Standing next to the older woman was Jordana. It was the same picture I’d seen on Jordana’s desk at work.

  My family went on a ski trip to Aspen …

  “I’m sorry you had to find out this way,” Jordana said behind me.

  I dropped the photograph, dropped the phone, and spun around, pulling my gun. She was standing partially in the doorway. I could only see her head and one shoulder.

  “Jordana,” I said. “There are easier ways to quit your job.”

  “But none quite so satisfying,” she said. “Luckily, I wasn’t looking for a reference.”

  She stepped fully into the doorway. She was holding Bethany by the arm, pulling her along. On Jordana’s other hand was the Thracian Gauntlet, its palm pressed to the side of Bethany’s head.

  “Put your gun on the floor,” Jordana said. “Now.”

  Thirty

  “Put the gun down,” Jordana repeated, keeping Bethany between herself and me as a human shield. “You know what this gauntlet is capable of.”

  “Okay, okay,” I said. Keeping my hands where she could see them, I bent down to put the gun on the floor.

  “Don’t do it, Trent,” Bethany said. “Don’t you dare put that gun down!”

  Jordana shook her. “Shut up, unless you want those to be your last words.”

  I put the gun on the floor. I didn’t have a choice. Even if I had a clear shot at Jordana, there was no guarantee she wouldn’t blast Bethany’s head off her shoulders first.

  “Now kick the gun away,” Jordana said.

  I did. It slid across the polished hardwood and didn’t stop until it hit the leg of the desk.

  “You’re why LaValle was here. You’re what he was guarding,” I said. “You were in this with Arkwright all along.”

  “Gold star,” Jordana said. “And now you’re going to give me safe passage out of this house. Unless, of course, you want to see what the gauntlet can do to someone at point-blank range.”

  Bethany’s eyes stayed hard and focused. If she was afraid, she wasn’t showing it. Where the hell was Isaac? Did he know what was happening? Or had Jordana already killed him?

  Jordana narrowed her eyes at me. “Isaac? Someone else is here, too?”

  “You’re a mind reader?” I asked, surprised.

  “I’m a lot of things,” she said. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter that you’re not alone. It’s a big house, and I’ll be long gone before Isaac finds me. Right?”

  She backed toward the door, staying behind Bethany. I glanced at the gun on the floor.

  “I said, right?” Jordana snapped.

  “Right,” I said. “Safe passage.”

  “T
hen you’re coming with me, too,” she said. “Try anything and I’ll kill both of you.”

  She backed out the door and into the hallway. I followed, leaving the gun on the floor behind me. I hated abandoning it, but I didn’t have a choice. I already knew what Jordana was capable of. I followed her and Bethany into the hallway.

  “Stay back,” Jordana warned.

  I kept my hands up. “You were the second bidder at the Ghost Market,” I said. “You killed Yrouel in Chinatown.”

  “That fat piece of garbage brought it on himself,” she spat. “Yrouel wasn’t even supposed to be here that day, but he came in to put some finishing touches on that stupid painting in the gallery. He overheard Erickson and me talking in the library. He was right on the other side of the door. He heard everything. The cult. The demon. I told Erickson that damn painting would be nothing but trouble, but he wouldn’t listen. He said it was ‘important family history.’ He said it was his heritage, proof that the Codex Goetia rightfully belonged to him. He should have listened to me. That painting compromised us. Yrouel had to be taken out.”

  “And I suppose I brought it on myself, too, when you tried to kill me,” I said. “Three times.”

  “Oh, don’t look so wounded,” she said. “As I recall, you took a few shots at me yourself on top of that truck. Didn’t anyone ever tell you you’re not supposed to hit a woman?”

  I remembered our fight on the truck, the feel of bandages under her black sweats. Now I understood. It had been part of her disguise, a way to make sure nothing could be traced back to her. She’d bound herself so she wouldn’t look female.

  “Why are you doing this, Jordana?” I demanded.

  “He’s my stepfather. It’s like I told you, he’s all the family I have left. I would do anything for him. He needed the Codex Goetia. I knew you would lead us to it, so I did what I had to.”

  “You got in my head. You read my mind so you’d know where the fragments were as soon as I did,” I said. “Neat trick.”

  “My birth father was human. My mother was a succubus. That left me with a few tricks up my sleeve. All it took was one kiss and I had a bridge directly into your mind. I could read your thoughts. I could influence you. Make you think things. Feel things.”

  “That’s sick,” Bethany said.

  “Jealous much?” Jordana hissed in her ear.

  “That’s how you kept finding us,” I said. “The library. Battery Park. I’m guessing you would have been at the fountain, too, but Arkwright wanted to be there himself to take the last fragment. Some men can’t resist the urge to grandstand.”

  “You don’t know anything about him,” she snapped. “Don’t pretend you know him!”

  She pushed the gauntlet against Bethany’s head. There was something unhinged in Jordana’s eyes. I didn’t have any doubt that she would kill Bethany if I pushed her too far.

  “Okay, okay,” I said, showing her my hands, trying to keep her calm. “I’m sorry. I spoke out of turn. Let’s not let things get out of hand.”

  She laughed bitterly. She sounded nothing like the Jordana I knew. But which one was the real one? The one who’d laughed and cried with me over drinks in Brooklyn, or the murderer currently threatening Bethany’s life? How much of what she’d told me was true, and how much were lies meant to keep me wriggling on the line? Was Lucas West real?

  “I can still read your thoughts, Trent,” Jordana said. “And the answer is no. You’re not Lucas West. The Lucas West I told you about was a boy I knew in high school. He died in a car crash before graduation. Drunk driving. I just told you what you wanted to hear—that you had a normal family, a normal life. You’re so pathetic. I didn’t even have a bridge into your mind yet when I fed you that story. I didn’t need it. You were so easy to read.”

  A lie. Lucas West was a lie. It tore a hole in me. I’d wanted to believe it so badly I was blind to all the red flags. Bethany had seen them. She’d tried to warn me, but I didn’t listen. If I had, then maybe Bethany’s life wouldn’t be in danger right now. Maybe we wouldn’t be in this mess at all.

  “You should have just given me that fragment when I asked you to,” Jordana said, dragging Bethany backward down the hallway. “It would have saved you a lot of trouble.”

  “Jordana, please,” I said, hoping I could still reason with her. “It doesn’t have to be like this.”

  “Doesn’t it?” she said. “In the end, which side did you think I’d be on, yours or my stepfather’s? I told you, he’s all the family I have left.”

  “So not everything was a lie,” I said. “The things you told me about your mother, your brother, they were real. The trip to Aspen, the demon you saw there, that was real, too.”

  Her mouth made a hard, tight line, and for a moment she didn’t say anything. I thought I’d gotten through to her, thought maybe I saw a hint of the Jordana I knew in her face, but it was gone in a flash.

  She smirked. “Lies work best when there’s some truth to them.”

  “Jordana, your stepfather isn’t who you think he is. He’s using you—”

  “He’s not using me, he loves me!” she yelled. “He’s all I have left, and I’m all he has left. I would do anything for him. I even carried magic when he asked me to, spells that gave me unbelievable speed and agility. I took that magic inside me willingly, because it was what he wanted and I knew it would help him. That’s what you do for family. Not that you would know.”

  A chill came over me. “My God, Jordana, he infected you. Arkwright purposely infected you.”

  She laughed. “Do I look infected to you? Am I growing an extra arm, or a tail? Do you see any mutations anywhere on my body? As I recall, the last time we were together you got a pretty good look.”

  “The infection doesn’t always change you physically,” I said. “But it affects your mind. Always. You know that.”

  “You’re wrong,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with me. In fact, I’ve never seen things so clearly before. I won’t let anyone come between me and my stepfather. Especially not you.”

  If I thought my heart couldn’t break any more, I was wrong. “Was it all a lie?”

  She looked at me with mock pity. “You were so easy to manipulate. So lonely, so desperate for someone to know you. But look at you. Did you really think I could love you? That anyone could? Every time you kissed me, every time you touched me, I cringed inside.”

  Bethany squirmed in Jordana’s grip. “Don’t worry about me, Trent. Just take this bitch out already. She’s earned it.”

  But I didn’t. I couldn’t. Not Jordana. There had to be another way. I was starting to think this was all a mistake. A misunderstanding. I cared about this woman. I loved her. I couldn’t hurt her.

  Jordana laughed. “See? Even now, your thoughts are so easy to mold.”

  I snapped out of it. Damn. I was like putty in her hands. How much had she influenced my thoughts over the past two days? How often had she steered me away from realizing the truth about her?

  “What about Calliope?” I asked. “You killed her, too, because she was getting too close. Only you got your inner sadist on, big time. Why? What did she ever do to you?”

  “I hate to break it to you, loverboy, but I never even met the woman,” she said.

  “You mean Arkwright killed her himself?” That could explain the different M.O., but Arkwright didn’t strike me as someone who liked to get his hands dirty.

  Jordana laughed derisively. “Please. That injury to his leg is real, courtesy of Nahash-Dred. It’ll never heal right. He can barely walk without a cane. Doesn’t exactly make him the perfect killer, now does it? Sure, Erickson was keeping tabs on Calliope after she started getting cozy with Yrouel, but he didn’t kill her and neither did I. Much as I would have loved to off that nosy bitch for him, I didn’t get the chance. Someone beat me to it.”

  Someone else killed Calliope? That sealed it. It had to have been Nahash-Dred himself. Somehow, the demon had found her. He’d broken in through
the attic window and killed her. But that still didn’t feel right. There’d been no sign of a struggle, just some blood on the stairs and the horror show in the bedroom. Nahash-Dred killed them with but a thought. Was that how he’d pulled it off? With magic?

  Jordana dragged Bethany around a corner. Turning the corner after them, I saw Isaac standing farther down the hall. He was holding my gun in his hand. I’d never been so happy to see anyone.

  “You’re going to want to let her go now, Jordana,” Isaac said.

  Jordana spun around, startled. She backed against the wall, keeping Bethany in front of her. She pressed the gauntlet against the back of Bethany’s head.

  “Don’t come any closer, either of you!” she yelled.

  “Jordana, we can help you,” I said. “The magic inside you is infecting your mind. This isn’t you. I know it’s not.”

  “Shut up!” she yelled. “Just shut up! I need to think!”

  “The things you told me about yourself were true. The tears you cried for your brother and your mother were real,” I said. “Look at what you’re doing. You’re hurting people. Killing people. Is this what they would have wanted?”

  Something snapped in her. Her face reddened with fury. “You leave them out of this! Don’t you talk about them!”

  She took the gauntlet off of Bethany’s head and pointed it at me. It started to whine, powering up. I dove to the floor as the blast tore a blackened chunk out of the wall behind me. Several burning, framed paintings flew over me. An antique wooden end table exploded just inches from where I lay with my hands over my head. Pieces rained down around me like hailstones.

  I looked up to see Jordana swing the gauntlet toward Isaac, the blast moving in a wide arc across the hallway and destroying more of the walls. Isaac threw himself through a nearby door and into the room beyond it. The blast tore a chasm in the floor and blew apart a section of the wall.

  The hallway was filled with smoke and dust. I coughed it out of my lungs and got to my feet. Through the haze, I saw Jordana drag Bethany away, farther into the house.