"You think this is it?" I asked, my voice hot with anticipation.
"I don't want to get my hopes up. We need to check." I could see the tension and frustration passing back and forth across Patch's handsome features and I knew what he was thinking. It was not so long ago that Connor and I had found ourselves in this position. We had made – or, at least, he had made - the exact right decision by waiting until the following morning. Based on what we had known at the time it had been the only way in which to proceed, but it had, of course, led to abject, crushing disappointment, and I'm sure the question had been in his head as it had certainly been in mine; did they leave because they saw us there during the day?
Now, Patch had to make a similar call and it was clearly worrying him. "What do you think?"
Whether he had been born that way or whether necessity had thrust it upon him as the older brother, Connor was a leader, he made decisions and stuck with them, shouldering the responsibility. Patch was simply not the same, he hated this decision being on him.
I glanced back in the direction of the store, which we had now passed, arousing no obvious suspicion as we had done so. "I think if we go back now and try for a closer look then we run a serious risk and we don't gain more than a few hours for it, which I don't think is worth the risk."
"Connor went and checked in New York," said Patch, with no particular inflection, though I felt there was an unspoken suggestion that if Connor had done it, then it was probably the right thing to do.
"Yes," I acknowledged, "but when Connor did it, we didn't even know we were looking for a Twisted Club. He had to check. This seems to be what we're looking for so we have the luxury of waiting. Plus, we know they can't have been here more than a few days so they're unlikely to move on before tonight."
Patch nodded. "You're right. We come back tonight and if there are people paying big money to get into a disused department store then we take it from there."
It was an agonizing day of waiting, knowing that Saorise could be within walking distance, and yet there was nothing we could do about it. Even Patch struggled to remain upbeat, though he did his best, throwing out comments as we spent the day watching trash TV in an effort to take our minds off things. But his usual wit seemed forced and blunted - he couldn't be funny while his brain was torturing him with images of what his sister might be going through while we waited.
Finally, after one of the longest days of my life, night fell and we set out again.
This time, we approached the store from a different route, one less visible from the warehouse entrance on which we had seen the guard. The streets were quiet around here as there were relatively few places to go, which just made our presence seem automatically suspicious. Patch led the way, sticking to the shadows, moving with a feline grace, like a cat stalking a bird. But as the store came into view up ahead, I noticed his cautious pace quicken and heard the sharp exhalation of breath.
In central New York, the Twisted Club needed to completely mask its existence because of the number of people around; here, it could afford to be a little less circumspect. They didn’t advertise their presence but already we could see the red light spilling from the delivery entrance of the empty store.
"Something's definitely going on in there," whispered Patch. He was shaking now, pent-up energy coursing through him. "And if it was a normal club then I think we'd be able to hear music." He cast his eyes about the open parking lot that lay between us and the building. "I think we can get closer."
"Do we need to?" I asked.
"We need to be sure before I call off Connor and Declan to come here. I just need a peek."
I hated to admit it, but that made sense. The fact was that this sort of space was ideal for illegal activities of every stripe. Twisted Clubs did not have the monopoly on law breaking that required a spacious yet secluded venue. If we called for Connor and Declan to join us and raid this place, and it turned out to be a meth lab or a dog fighting ring or whatever, then we would have dragged them away from their search for no reason.
In addition, three men and a veterinary nurse attempting to raid a meth lab or a dog fighting ring would likely not end well – potentially, the Twisted Club raid would go no better but at least it would be our target.
"Okay, let's go."
"No. You stay here," said Patch, firmly.
"I..."
"No argument."
"Alright. I'll yell if I see anyone coming your way."
But he shook his head again. "If you do that then they'll know there's two of us. If they take me then they take me. You need to stay safe and call Connor and Declan. Understand?" I didn't want to agree to that but the look in his green eyes held me to the spot. "Saorise is all that matters."
He turned towards the store but I grabbed his shoulder. "Then it should be me who goes in for a closer look."
Patch sighed. "I said, no argument..."
"And you also said that Saorise was all that matters. If they catch - if they even see - you then they'll guess who you're here for and they'll redouble her security. If they catch you then there's a good chance one of them will recognize you as a Selkie - think how easily Stanley spotted it - I can just pass myself off as a drunk who wandered off looking for a quiet place to have a wee. And let's be honest, when it comes to raiding the place, you'll be more use to Connor and Declan than I will. From the perspective of what's best for rescuing Saorise, it makes way more sense to do it this way. They aren’t going to call attention to themselves by murdering an unlucky passerby.”
I watched the thought processes pass across Patch's face. I was noticing that Selkie – or, at least, the ones I had met - were not particularly guarded in the way they thought, so I could read their faces like a book. Right now, Patch's face was an irritated book that knew I was right but was searching for something, anything, that might prove otherwise. In normal circumstances, there was no way Patch would have let me put myself in harm's way – but he knew I was right.
"Okay. But be careful. And I’ll be watching the whole time."
"Thanks for the advice, I was going to go over there singing a song."
Joking made me feel less nervous. Marginally. What the hell had I volunteered for and why the hell had I done it? Same reason Patch was letting me do it; I had seen the chance to help Saorise and I was taking it. I knew in my heart that she would have done the same for me.
My heart was in my mouth as I crept away from Patch. There were a few abandoned cars, one burned out, that littered the parking lot, and I dashed from one to the next, hiding behind them, peeping out to check I was safe, and then moving on.
My heart pounded, presumably in my chest, although it felt like it was at the base of my throat. I needed to get close enough to hear what was being said; hopefully, then I would catch some careless talk about what this event was. I sneaked a look out through the broken window of the car behind which I was crouched, towards the door to the club. It gaped like the mouth of hell, red light pouring out, catching the wisps of stage smoke that escaped from the interior. I strained to listen but although I could catch voices, the words remained too vague.
I needed to get closer. I took a few deep, slow breaths, trying to steady my nerves for my next run.
But before I could move, I heard shouts and cries and the sound of a struggle back in the direction from which I had come. At first, I just thought a drunken fight had broken out, but as I managed to pick out some of the shouts, a cold sensation settled across me.
"What are you doing here?"
"Hold still! Hold him!"
"Holy fuck, he’s strong as a motherfucker. Hit him with the Taser but don’t kill him. I think we got ourselves another specimen, boys."
I shrank into the shadow of the car, hoping it afforded me more camouflage than it felt it did.
An involuntary tremor passed through my whole body as, from the dark of night, four figures emerged. One walked alone, carrying his own nightstick and those belonging to two of his companions
who walked beside him. Slung between these two was the fourth figure, unconscious, or, at least, incapacitated, they held his arms and dragged his limp form behind them.
Patch.
I covered my mouth to stifle my involuntary cry.
"There's a skin in his bag," announced the lead guard gleefully. "Must be a Selkie."
"Male, huh?" came a voice from the entrance. "Well, I guess he'll do. Maybe we can make them breed." The others laughed as I looked on, helpless as Patch had been dragged into the club and out of my sight, collecting my thoughts.
There must have been guards patrolling the perimeter who had spotted him. Terror mixed with fury seared through me.
I realized that I wasn't breathing and gulped in air, trying to control the mixture of emotions pouring into me and still the tears of frustration that were already starting to streak my flushed cheeks.
Taking a deep breath, I went back the way I had come, dodging and dashing from car to car. I reached the streets unnoticed and found that even that angered me - why had I been able to get away so easily and yet Patch had been taken?
It wasn't fair.
Those three words continued to beat a repetitive pulsing path through my mind as I hurried back to the hotel to call Connor and Declan with the news.
That another one of their siblings had trusted me to be their partner…had trusted me with their lives and I had failed them.
Again.
Chapter 12
It was Declan who picked up the phone when I called, and I was quietly relieved to speak to him rather than Connor. I wasn’t sure how he might react to what had happened - what I felt I had allowed to happen.
But in the event, talking to Declan was at least as bad, though for different reasons; while Connor masked his grief in anger, Declan had no such defense, and telling him that his brother had been taken by the same thugs who had his sister tore me in two.
Declan assured me that he and Connor would be there as soon as possible and there was nothing else for me to do but sit down and wait in the hotel room that Patch and I had made our own so recently.
It now seemed wrong to look back on those memories.
Was it possible that us sleeping together had in any way caused his capture? Not really. But that didn't make me feel any less guilty about it. The bottom line was that Patch was gone and I was still here. They would have asked him if he was alone and, if not, then where was his accomplice. The fact that no one had come to look for me told me that he had said nothing, and that just made me feel all the more guilty. I tried not to think about how they might have treated him, how they might have tried to make him talk.
Saorise might not be in the best of hands, but she was worth something to these creeps as a female Selkie who was also a beautiful girl. She was worth her weight in gold. Patch had some value, to be sure, but not enough to stop them from mistreating him.
I sat and stared morosely at the wall of the hotel room. I had tried watching TV to kill the time but it felt wrong somehow. I was not merely watching TV, I was specifically watching TV without Patch.
With an effort, I pulled myself together. This attitude was not helping Patch and it was not helping Saorise. Rather than sitting here bemoaning the fact that there was nothing I could do to help them, I ought to be figuring out what I could do. I couldn’t act before the others arrived – or, at least, doing so would be foolhardy - but I could plan. I had a brain and it was about time it got some exercise.
Patch being taken was a blow, but it also meant that we had a man on the inside. They were sure to keep a very close guard on him, but that did not mean that we couldn’t use it to our advantage. Unlike Saorise, Patch knew for certain that we would be coming, he knew to be on the look-out.
Might that be enough to give us an edge?
Shoving my self-pity and guilt to the back of my mind - where such self-indulgence belonged - I grabbed a used envelope from out of my bag and began to make some notes. I could still put this time to good use.
Connor and Declan arrived late that night, stressed from worry, but both eager not to wait before being brought up to speed. I laid out the situation as clearly as I could, explaining what had happened on the previous night, and why Patch had been taken while I had not.
"Again, I'm really sorry," I concluded, the guilt rising in me again, accompanied by tears.
"What are you sorry for?" Declan sat down next to me and put a comforting arm around my shaking shoulders. "It wasn't your fault. I think we're very lucky that you weren't taken as well.”
"Still," said Connor, grimly, "we do have to figure some things out as we now have two people to rescue rather than one and are a man down."
It was not said unkindly or accusatorially, but it was still hard for me not to blame myself for what had happened. They say that those who have lived through plane crashes suffer from something called 'survivors' syndrome', questioning their own worth, why they had survived when their fellow passengers had not. That was where I was now. If I had been captured instead of Patch, the whole situation would be better, he would be so much more use to Connor and Declan than I was.
But, hopefully, my plan would change that.
"I've got an idea for how to rescue them."
Connor looked up at me from his seat. I fancied that there had been an evolution in our relationship over its brief lifespan. Not so long ago, he would have discounted any plan of mine out of hand without even having heard it, or would, at best, have listened with extreme skepticism. Now, while I didn't see a lot of optimism in his eyes, he was ready to listen and give me a fair hearing - he still trusted me.
Thank god.
“We keep trying to sneak in blind.”
"Right," nodded Declan, nonplussed. “And?”
"What if we don’t? What if I found a way to get in as a visitor? They won't look twice at me and then I can get a lay of the land, count the guards, figure out exactly where they are and--"
"No." Connor shook his head. "It's too dangerous."
"If you have a better idea then I'd love to hear it."
"What if the guard from New York is there? He saw us together."
"I'll wear glasses, I'll do my hair differently. It'll be fine. We’ll find a way to get an invite, it might take some cash, but I have some savings and--”
“No.”
I pressed past Connor’s protest. “I'll mention that I heard through the grapevine that they have a male Selkie and ask to see him."
It had occurred to me that the Twisted Clubs were probably more set up to cater for male patrons than women, and I could use that to my advantage by posing as a wealthy woman who will pay extra for a close encounter with a male Selkie. Greed is a great motivator. If they said no then, at worst, I could get the layout of the club. If they said yes then I would be able to let Patch know that we were coming for him and to be ready.
"The only question is," I continued, "how much would it cost to get into the club and pay for a private audience with Patch?"
"That is not the only question," said Connor sternly. "There are several others concerning how dangerous this is."
"It's less dangerous for me than it would be for you..."
"That's not the point..."
"If I was a man you wouldn't even question it."
"Well, you're not," snapped Connor. "And that has nothing to do with it. I don't want you putting yourself in danger. Patch wouldn't want it, either."
"Saorise and Patch are already in danger," I argued back. "Their actual danger trumps my potential danger with room to spare."
Connor ground his teeth. He knew I was right and, as Patch had the night before, he hated putting me in danger even though he knew it was the right thing to do. But, in the end, logic would win out. Though none of us said it, we all knew that Saorise's life was probably not in immediate danger - horrid though that life might have become - but Patch's could well be.
Time was more of the essence now than ever before.
Declan nodded s
olemnly. "We've got plenty of money."
"Declan." Connor admonished his younger brother but Declan was unrepentant.
"She's right, Connor. You know she is. There is no real reason for them to suspect her at all."
Connor snapped back testily, "Doesn't mean I have to like it."
It had always appeared to be that the Selkie travelled light, carrying a bag each, plus the backpacks in which they stowed their skin.
Declan now opened his bag and unzipped a compartment at the bottom to reveal more money than I had ever seen in one place.
"How much are we thinking she should bring?"
Chapter 13
Cards on the table, walking back toward the Twisted Club was not made any less terrifying by doing so brazenly rather than covertly.
It was made still more hair-raising by the presence of more money than I had ever seen in one place, burning a hole in my bag. I felt like I had a sign on my front saying 'I'm here to secretly infiltrate your club' and another on my back saying 'I am holding vast quantities of cash, please mug me'. I had asked, of course, where the money had come from - I don't like to pry but... Damn. They hadn't been remotely shy about it - money meant little to a Selkie, it was merely useful at times like this.
"People lose things at sea," Declan had explained. "Often worthless things but often valuable things. We pick them up and sell them."
"Sell them how?"
"eBay."
I'd stopped questioning it after that. The whole concept of seals selling sunken treasure on eBay was pretty weird.
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