Flee

by Francine Pascal

  Fact #1: I am fearless.

  Fact #2: I am always running away.

  There you have it: the sum total of my existence—Gaia Moore, in a hermetically sealed nutshell. Pathetic, isn’t it? A fearless girl who runs away? It’s on par with being a stunningly beautiful girl who has to wear a paper bag over her head or an investment-banking billionaire who lives in a trailer park.

  But let’s be clear here. True, I can’t feel fear. This is not the same thing as being brave, however. It’s not like I see myself in some Roman epic,weighted down with a hundred pounds of armor, taking on fifty lions or re-creating a glorious battle. I’m no gladiator. Gladiatorswerebrave. Because being brave necessarily means being able to experience fear and then being able to overcome it.

  But then, that’s my problem, isn’t it? I’m not just fearless. I’m “braveless,” too.

  At the very least, you’d think this little fluke in my genetics would enable me to stay in one place for a while. If I’m not afraid of anything, why the hell should I ever have to run away, right? To that end, fearlessness shouldn’t prevent me from making a true friend, either. Or actuallykeepinga true friend. Or falling in love and staying in love. I should be able to stand my ground. I should be able to face every single crisis and tragedy in my life with complete confidence. Running away is for weak-minded cowards.

  I tell myself these things. And then I tell myself: bullshit.

  Because when you get right down to it, going on the run isn’t about fear or bravery. It’s about the one principle that applies to every creature on this planet—from the bravest lion to the lowest forms of life, like my father or cockroaches: survival. Self-protection and self-preservation. Even the most fearless animals have a survival instinct. It’s what enables them to perpetuate their species. To multiply.

  And I can’t be any different.

  Although I have to be honest. I don’t really see myself multiplying in the future. In fact, I’d say the odds of my extinction are increasing by the hour.

  all that blood

  Add to that his dark yellow hungry grin, and you had the world’s most foulsmelling vampire pervert.

  Trail of Bread Crumbs

  I NEED TO FOCUS.Thoughts were smeared like tar inside Gaia’s head. Shapeless ideas were flooding her mind, melting together too quickly and hardening into an impenetrable black sludge.

  Where am I? What do I know for sure?

  The subway car suddenly lurched, taking a wicked turn at a high speed. Gaia bumped her head against the Plexiglas window behind her. She tried to steady herself on the hard, burnt orange plastic seat. The sound of screeching metal needled her eardrums. A thick film of sweat drenched her back, shoulders, and face—causing her brown dress to stick to her like a wet tissue. Her hair was in clumps, glued to the sides of her cheeks.

  She had no idea how long she’d been on the deserted train. She wasn’t even sure which line this was. She knew she was waking up from one of herpost-battle blackouts.

  But how long ago had she slipped into unconsciousness?

  And where the hell was she, anyway?

  She looked across the aisle at the bold white letter encased in a bright blue circle.

  C. I’m on the C train. Somewhere in Brooklyn, Ithink. Need to focus.Her eyes wandered to the mirrored siding of the train’s interior. Her muscles tensed. This in no way helped her to focus. Quite the opposite. Her reflection was divided into blurry stripes: some clear, some opaque, all completely distorted—a cubist painter’s urban nightmare. Finding herself in the reflection was next to impossible.

  Okay. She had to start from the present and work backward. That was the only solution: to follow the trail of disjointed memories back through time. . . like Hansel and Gretel. And bread crumb by bread crumb, the recent past began to materialize. A flash of running. The terrified look on Sam’s face as they fled the Bubble Lounge. Sam’s RA, Josh. Then there were Sam’s insistent warnings—forcing Gaia to run for safety through a maze of back alleys.

  Each new memory was like a sharp kick to the abdomen—even more painful as it settled into her mind’s eye, making it unexpectedly difficult to breathe. She and Sam had barely spoken a word in their last moment together on the street. Just a few sentences and one kiss. There hadn’t been time for anything else. But finally Gaia understood. Sam hadn’t turned on her, as she’d thought for so long.Someone had taken control of him.And judging from the look in his eyes at dinner, that “someone” hadn’t just taken control, they’d scared him in a way that had changed him, maybe for good. There wasn’t even aword for that kind of fear. Not one that Gaia knew, anyway.

  But one thing was certain. Whoever had chased Gaia down those side streets must have been terrorizing Sam for months—all those months that he’d been such a bleary-eyed ghost of himself.Months.And all to get to her. Sam had said as much on the street: “It’s you they’re after.”Her stomach twisted. She cringed in shame.Shehad brought Sam into her relentlessly miserable existence. And for that, he’d been—well, who knew what? Blackmailed? Tortured? Worse?All for loving and trusting her. All for wanting to protect her.

  She sniffed, her eyes flashing back to the dark subway tunnel. She was to blame. For everything. For all the changes in Sam, for the stilted conversations and fights, for all that mistrust and poisonous distance. It was all her fault. Right from the start. Even their breakup, even the fact that she’d fallen out of love with him. . . yes, that was her fault as well. The thought of it was almost too twisted to face—too complicated and tragic even for her. The guilt was a hydraulic press. It crushed her entire body from both sides. She knew she still loved him somehow, in some way, but it would never be the same as it was. They had successfully destroyed that original emotion. Whoever the helltheywere.

  But at least now they’ll leave him alone,she tried to reassure herself. The train slowed. She nodded and wrapped her arms tightly around her chest for warmth. That was the only solace she could take from this nightmare: Sam would finally be able to start living his life again, without the curse of Gaia Moore hanging over his head. They couldn’t possibly use him now that Gaia knew the truth—that they had used him to get to her. He served no purpose anymore. They’d failed.

  She nodded again. She could take some comfort in that. But that feeling was quickly muted by flashes of disturbingly bleak violence. More images slashed through her mindlike jump cuts from some disgusting gory movie.Those two thugs who had followed her onto the train. . . .

  All that blood.

  The fight had taken place on the A train; she remembered that. She must have switched over to the C right before she passed out. Bile rose in her throat. She’d blown open one of the guys’ kneecaps with his own gun. But he had actually offed himself before she could get any information out of him. He must have known he was as good as dead after screwing up Gaia’s capture. Which meant, of course, that death was preferable to actually facing his boss and admitting failure.

  And that’s when it hit her—as hard and fast as the gunshot to his knee. She slid back on her seat andcrammed the palms of her hands into her eye sockets, trying to jump-start her dormant brain cells. Somehow she had skipped over the abundantly obvious. She’d been too distracted by the chaos and blood on that train.

  The man’s boss was Loki.

  Of course. Only he could be so fearsome, so intimidating.This was how Loki operated—using people like chess pieces in his own vast game, every little maneuver designed to inch closer to his opposing queen.Which would be her. But why? Why was he doing this? What could make him despise Gaia so much that he would go to such lengths to destroy not just her life, but any life she touched?

  And more important: who? WhowasLoki?

  If she listened to her uncle, it was her father. If she listened to her father, it was her uncle. It was an endless game of tug-of-war between two men she could never trust. . . .

  Sam’s strange words at dinner came floating back to her: all that stuff about what a great guy her uncle wa
s. Did that mean Oliver was Loki? Was he feeding Sam the lines? Forcing Sam into luring Gaia to him? Or maybe theyweren’tlines. If her father was Loki, then maybe Oliver was trying to send her a message through Sam—trying to get her safely away from her father. Maybe her father had never even left NewYork. He could have just gone into hiding, watching her, waiting for the right moment to strike. And what if her father was the one who was talking to Sam? How would Sam even know the difference? The endless questions were burning holes into the lining of Gaia’s skull.

  But her thoughts were cut short as the train pulled into the next stop.

  The doors opened. A disgustingly filthy man boarded the train and—given the choice of every other empty seat on the car—proceeded to sit down right next to her.

  Gaia’s jaw tightened.Of course.

  His once-white sweatshirt was almost entirely black, as was his wool hat. They matched his soiled black beard and eyebrows. The stench alone was almost enough to make Gaia pass out again; he reeked powerfully of alcohol and stale sweat.Add to that his dark yellow hungry grin, and you had the world’s most foul-smelling vampire pervert.Without hesitating, Gaia shot up from her seat and moved down to another. He followed. He sat down, rubbing his thigh against hers. Once again he slid as close as possible, widening his drunken grin. And then he spoke, spewing out an indescribable stink with each slurred word: “You show pity.”

  Gaia almost flinched. Obviously he had meant to say, “You’re so pretty.” But the former version wasstrangely unsettling. Maybe because it wasn’t true. She didn’t show pity; she didn’t evenfeelpity. Certainly not toward this man. She only felt rage. But she told herself that she’d simply ignore him and bolt for the doors at the next stop. She didn’t need to expend any more energy right now.

  Then he grabbed her.

  His hand clamped down on her inner thigh. The grip was surprisingly strong. Without a moment’s thought Gaia snapped his hand from her thigh and began to crush the bones of his fingers with every ounce of her strength. The perverted smile dropped instantly from his face as he let out a pathetic tortured moan and stared pleadingly into Gaia’s eyes. It never ceased to amaze her how quickly these assholes turned into little boys at the first sign of pain. Gaia stared back at him with nothing but cold rage. His desperate eyes meant nothing to her right now. He wasn’t even a person to her at this moment. He was just a symbol. A symbol for all of them.

  She increased the pressure to his hand, watching his entire arm begin to shake as beads of sweat turned into black rivulets falling down his filthy face and neck. This poor scumbag had no idea what he’d just walked into. He had no idea what Gaia felt like doing to him at this moment—to all the faceless sadists who wouldn’t leave her alone, who never gave her a moment’s peace in her life. Maybe she’d goahead and break each and every individual bone in his body. Send them all a message. She could feel her rage about to take over completely, all the lessons of honor and necessary force right out the window. No one else played by the rules; why should she? She gazed deeper into his shit-colored eyes, aching to rip him apart. . . when something in his expression changed.

  The shift was so subtle, she barely even noticed, but somehow his grimace had begun to even out. . . into a smile. What the hell was he smiling about? Was he unaware that Gaia was about to permanently dismantle his hand? Had he finally lost all the feeling in it?

  “You like that, don’t you?” he whispered knowingly, running his tongue across his rotting front teeth. The look of recognition increased in his eyes as he stared Gaia down with a new and disturbing confidence. “Bad girl,” he slurred, leaning toward her with an almost menacing giggle. “You’ve been a bad girl.” His giggles were turning into hearty phlegm-ridden laughs.

  Gaia dropped his hand and took a huge step back, searching deeper into his crazed eyes. Something in those disturbed but knowing eyes. . . . What was it? Watching him laugh in her face, Gaia was ninetyninepoint-nine percent sure he was nothing more than a psycho pervert train dweller. But now, aftereverything she’d learned on this interminable night, there was a new possibility—however infinitesimal it might be—that he was something far more dangerous. Now Gaia realized that every single man or woman in her vicinity. . . could be one of Loki’s people. Every cabdriver, waiter, and store clerk was a potential plant. Every anonymous suit with a cell phone and every bum. That was how Loki worked. And in that brief moment, staring into the sinister eyes of that sicko, whether he was the real thing or not, the sense of imminent danger had just quadrupled. It was no longer just an inkling or a bad vibe, it was something Gaia knew: she had to get the hell off of that train and run.

  As the train pulled into the Fulton Street station in Manhattan, Gaia kicked into high gear. The pervert took one last step toward her, but she snapped out her leg with a pinpoint side kick to his jawbone, sending him instantly to the floor. She ripped the wool cap from his head and leaped between the closing doors out onto the platform. She took each staircase with two leaps, jumping over the exit turnstile and finally reaching street level. The sky was still dark. She must not have been out for that long. A quick glance at the digital clock of a bank told her it was only a few minutes after midnight. She stuffed her matted blond hair—her most identifiable feature—under the filthy wool cap. The gusts of coldwind felt twice as deadly against her naked shoulders and sweat-drenched dress, but that didn’t stop her from launching into a full-fledged gallop heading uptown on Water Street. If she wasn’t running, she wasn’t safe. She knew that now.

  Loki could be anywhere and everywhere. For all she knew, Loki could have been responsible for every single violent encounter she’d had in New York City. He’d probably been watching her every move since day one. He’d had Ella under his thumb and now Sam. He could invade Gaia’s personal life at will. He could mess with anyone he pleased, and that meant no one was safe.

  Not that she hadn’t felt it a thousand times before, but now it was official: Gaia Moore was poison to anyone remotely close to her. She had to leave them all behind. She didn’t just need to hide, she needed to disappear immediately—deep undercover. No time to say good-bye to Paul and the other Mosses. No time to say good-bye to Sam or even alleviate her guilt by thanking him for all the sacrifices he’d obviously made. Besides, Sam would probably be ecstatic to finally have Gaia out of his life for a while. No time even to say good-bye to Ed. . . .

  Gaia suddenly found herself stopping in the middle-of street, though she wasn’t sure why. It was almost involuntary. Like her body knew things that her mind didn’t. Had there been any cars on the road, she wouldhave been mowed down. She dropped over and clung to her knees for support, gasping for air and ignoring the razor-sharp cramps in her stomach.Run, goddammit!she chided herself.What the hell are you stopping for?

  Her frustration mounted with every additional second she stood still, but she needed those few seconds to answer her own question. Ed. Ed was the reason she’d stopped running. What was it? Was it the thought of abandoning him—a sudden image of Ed alone that made her stop? Or was it the thought of not having him—of not having the one true friend she’d ever made in this life besides Mary? Leaving Ed without some kind of good-bye. . . it was simply too cruel. Sam knew the kind of danger Gaia was in. He knew why Gaia had to disappear. But Ed. . . Ed knew nothing. All he would know was that he’d put all his trust and all his faith into someone who’d simply vanished without the slightest explanation—without a word. She’d be no better than her father. That’s what it was.

  That had to be what it was.

  A note. She would write Ed a note and slip it under his door. Then she would disappear.

  Crossed Wives

  CROUCHING ON THE FLOOR IN THE back of a car—particularly in these tiny French numbers, the Deux Chevaux, which were really no bigger than go-carts—could never be called comfortable. But comfort was the last thing on Tom’s mind. He was safe. Or at least safer than he would be sitting in the seat, with his head a moving target for some sniper. His
bones rattled with every bump. No doubt he’d be aching by the time they reached Amsterdam.

  “You okay back there?” Henrik asked from the driver’s seat.

  “Fine.”

  As the car curved around corners and sped toward the highway, Tom’s thoughts sped as well. It was going to be tricky piecing together exactly what Loki’s interests in Chechnya were. If there even were any.

  “What has this physicist been doing since the fall of the Soviet Union?” Tom asked.

  “What everyone else has,” Henrik mused grimly. “Trying to profit from the leftover scraps of the cold war.” He sighed. “I’m sure that’s why Loki has been paying him.”

  “Maybe,” Tom said. “It’s likely just another decoy.” Yes, a sale of nuclear weapons on the black market certainly didn’t fit with the strange message theinformant had been so desperate to impart in Berlin.DNA. . . kidnapping. . . Gaia. . . terrorist. . .For the thousandth time the words ricocheted through Tom’s skull like bullets. But maybethathad been a decoy.

  Or was Loki planning on bartering Gaia for some reason?

  Under other circumstances, Tom might have laughed aloud at that possibility. But there was nothing remotely humorous about this situation. Such wild cut-and-paste versions of the informant’s message had to be considered. Every possibility was plausible. The absurd had always provided inspiration for Loki. Tom knew that better than anyone. All those years Loki had spent underground, he had been hatching something grand and obscene. He was nothing if not predictable in his unpredictability.

  “We’re out of the city now,” Henrik said. “I think it’s safe to come back up front.”

  Flashes of countryside whipped past the window as Tom crawled into the front passenger seat. It was the familiar northern European terrain: muddy fields, the occasional roaming herd of cattle, silos stretching up into the sky. Rural Belgium. Tom relaxed, at least as much as he could. Unconsciously his hand fell to his waistband, where a pistol lay hidden. They would be prepared now if a car pulled up alongside them.