Roaring

by Lindsey Duga

  Then he’d left.

  Now it was my turn.

  I stood and opened the door latch. The hallway was empty. Colt was gone. For now.

  After I closed the door behind me and checked the hall, I made a left, heading for the front of the train. Most passengers were still settling inside their compartments, and it would be a few hours before they got restless and wandered around to stretch their legs.

  As I neared the end of my car, I gasped and ducked below the window of the door to the next car. Colt was a few feet ahead, chatting happily with a middle-aged woman. The way he smiled and laughed made me truly realize that our moments at The Blind Dragon had not been genuine. It had been an act. He’d been playing a role, like one of those fancy boyos on the silver screen or on the theater stages. I’d been nothing more than another prop. He charmed everyone—I was no exception.

  The middle-aged woman laughed while affectionately stroking Colt’s arm. Then she beckoned him inside her compartment.

  Even though I felt sick and angry, I was strangely glad I’d seen this. It reinforced my decision to leave. I waited until he’d stepped inside and then, holding my breath, sped down the hall of the next car. Two cars later, I paused and spared myself a moment to glance out the window.

  The passing scenery made my heart fill with song. Rolling gold, rustic orange, and lime green fields. The mountainous hills were like an old painting, but faded by distance instead of time. Which mountain was Mount Greylock? Were we even close to it? I didn’t know the route the Boston train took to Philly, but I hoped it would continue to show this beauty.

  Refocusing, I turned to duck into the dining car. As I’d predicted, there were few patrons. Just a couple men sipping coffee and puffing on cigs. A young flapper sat next to an older gentleman. Her elegant cloche hat, complete with feathers and a scarlet ribbon, covered her golden bobbed hair, and the feathers trembled as she took a large pull on her gasper and blew a trail of smoke into the air. Her decorated eyes cut to me then quickly looked away. No doubt I looked terribly strange with my disheveled waves and oversize doctor’s coat covering my stained dress.

  “Darling,” she said, turning to the older gentleman who could’ve been her father, “let’s go back to our first-class car. This one is getting too…” She glanced back at me and wrinkled her nose. “Stuffy.”

  I stepped to the side as the girl and her egg man hooked arms and exited the dining car.

  Their departure on my account reminded me of the maid on the street corner outside Colt’s hotel. I didn’t blame them. It was human nature to avoid trouble, and I was certainly a whole mess of it.

  “Can I get you something?” a small voice said to my left. I nearly jumped to find a girl in a uniform, probably no more than fifteen or fourteen, clearing dishes from an empty table. Her bobbed hair was pinned back, showing a face full of freckles.

  I took in her simple uniform and glanced around the rest of the dining car. She was a maid on a train. What a novel life that had to be! How she could be in one city one hour and then another the next. Had she seen the flat, windy plains of Kansas, or the infamous swamps and bayous of New Orleans?

  Maybe I couldn’t apply to work at this train, but there were others. Other depots. America was growing and I could see all of it on a train. Except at the moment, I just needed a way to blend in.

  “Um, miss?”

  Realizing I’d been staring, I blushed then gave the girl a friendly smile and shook my head no. The maid just shrugged and picked up the tray she’d been using to clear away dishes and headed through a staff-only door.

  With an idea forming, I waited a few minutes then followed her into a plain, somewhat grimy hall that led to several more doors. One by one, I began trying out each. The first led to a pantry full of food, boxes of coffee and tubs of sugar and flour, and the second was a bathroom. By the third door—a laundry room—I was getting antsy. Colt was probably still cozying up with that woman, but in the event that he wasn’t, then he would’ve noticed I was missing by now and would hunt me down yet again.

  Was it possible that he could sniff me out?

  After all, there were several moments where he’d seemed to be…more than human. Whether or not he was a monster like me, I wasn’t sure. But he had defeated a man twice his size, mortally injured, and lived. And he could somehow resist my voice.

  He had to be…something.

  Finally, I found what appeared to be a locker room. And, miracle of miracles, a small closet in the corner held a few clean maids’ uniforms. Locking the door behind me, I quickly exchanged my stained dress for the uniform. I left my old dress on the floor of the closet and hurried out, down the narrow staff hall, and back into the dining car.

  There were two middle-aged men at the bar—one reading a copy of The Boston Globe, and the other nursing a hangover with a cup of coffee. And a third older gentleman sat at a small table, a pipe between his lips, cheaters on his nose, dressed in a tweed suit with elbow pads. He was busy scribbling on a docket of papers spread out before him, while a fancy leather briefcase leaned against his chair.

  Moving past the three men, I headed into the next car. If I roamed all over the train, maybe it would make it harder for Colt to find me.

  Feeling hopeful, I hurried down the hall of the car and past sliding compartment doors. I was just coming upon one when it suddenly slid open and a woman appeared in the doorway. She was older, over sixty, but she had the bees to be sure. Her dress was top-of-the-line, decked with embroidered sparkles and ending in silk swatches. She wore a headband with a feather around her gray hair. Her outfit looked more like she was going to a Broadway show, not traveling on a train for hours.

  She shoved a bundle of clothes that smelled like gasper smoke and whiskey into my arms.

  “Listen, girl, my husband needs these laundered right away. Starched and pressed. No dilly dallying.”

  Without waiting for me to answer, she slid the compartment door closed in my face.

  I stood there for a brief moment, opening and closing my mouth. Now what was I supposed to do? Well, I wasn’t going to actually launder them. That was for sure.

  But my waitress-server habits were hard to break. I couldn’t just throw them off the side of the train—though I dearly wanted to. Thinking I’d drop them off in the laundry room I’d found earlier, I headed back the way I’d come.

  Just as I was about to step through the door, I caught a glimpse of familiar broad shoulders and light brown hair…

  Colt.

  “Rhatz!” I hissed, dropping down below the window. Maybe he really could track my scent.

  Before I had time to figure out my next move, the dining car door slid open and I winced, shutting both eyes, not yet ready to see Colt standing above me.

  “Excuse me, miss?”

  I opened one eye, then the other, taking in the appearance of the academic-looking gent from the dining car. He had his briefcase in one hand with his pipe tucked into his coat’s breast pocket.

  “Did you fall, miss? Let me help you,” he said, bending and offering me a hand.

  As I shifted the pile of laundry into my other arm, I noticed a faint white scar in the center of his palm. Before I could think anything else of it, he grabbed my outstretched hand and yanked me to my feet. I stumbled and felt something sharp prick my skin.

  Gasping, I wrenched away. The center of my palm had a large purple bruise already forming. And in the center of his hand protruded an onyx stinger, like a scorpion’s. It came right out of his flesh and glistened with a clear liquid. The stinger was covered in blood. My blood.

  A wave of nausea hit me like a physical blow and I fell. The man caught me with one arm as all feeling escaped my limbs. The soiled laundry slipped from my grasp. The last thing I saw before my vision went black was white dress shirts and black slacks flapping in the wind, flying into the countryside.
r />   Chapter Twelve

  The Agent

  Of course she ran. I’d actually expected her to. What I hadn’t expected was finding her dress in the closet of a staff laundry room. Had she known I was able to track her by my blood’s scent on her dress? And if she knew that, then she had to have realized I wasn’t entirely human, either.

  It was possible that she’d just wanted to get rid of her bloody dress. But either way, I hadn’t been thinking clearly. I shouldn’t have stopped by another passenger compartment to smooth-talk my way into getting fresh clothes. I’d been arrogant.

  Like a damn sap.

  And now it was taking far too long to find her again.

  Where in the devil is she?

  I closed my eyes and tried to think. I could scour the whole train for her. Surely she couldn’t hide forever during the ride. But on the other hand…the girl was resourceful. She’d stolen a maid’s uniform to blend in. She was clever. Kind.

  Unfortunately, I was used to dealing with the inept. Foolish. Cruel.

  I could try to track her scent, but I didn’t know it as well as mine. Plus, there were a hundred thousand scents on this rattler. I’d never be able to find her sweet, natural smell in the cloud of other perfumes, colognes, coffee, and smoke.

  There was no other choice, I had to flex my gumshoe skills and look for her the old-fashioned way.

  I left the dining car, that familiar heat in my chest pushing against my rib cage, sizzling my bones and yearning to get out. Pausing outside every compartment, I took deep, long breaths, trying to locate her scent. When one smell I detected overpowered anything else, I made some excuse to knock and look around inside. Some women invited me in, some men offered me a game of cards.

  But none of them had Eris.

  With every car I looked through, the panic got worse and worse and the heat burned hotter and hotter.

  On my way through the third-to-last car, I bumped shoulders with an older gentleman in a tweed jacket and a pipe nestled in his breast pocket.

  “Pardon me, my good sir,” he said with a tip of his chin in my direction.

  I said nothing, too consumed in my search, and kept going.

  But as I got to the end of the car, I paused. That scent…it was familiar. His pipe smoke. I had smelled it in the dining car, and I recognized his tweed jacket. He’d been there right when I’d been looking for Eris.

  Coincidence, maybe, but…

  BOI training taught me that there were no coincidences.

  I stayed where I was until the gentleman had passed through the car and into the next. Then I turned on my heel and followed him.

  Waiting outside, I watched as the man in the tweed jacket made it all the way to the end of the next car. He knocked on the second compartment and another man stepped out. The two shared words and that was when I noticed the old gent’s hand was bandaged, a strip of linen wrapped around the palm of his hand. A small dot of crimson against white.

  My fingers twitched with the need to claw something.

  I knew that particular wound.

  Manticores’ stingers came out through their hands, breaking their skin whenever they did so. A painful process, but it was very useful when shaking the hand of another mob boss. Poison shot through the stinger, paralyzing its intended victim. Stinging their neck or wrist—anywhere the blood flow was strong—could carry the poison right to their heart and kill them. Because of these talents, manticores were incredibly useful. And somewhat rare.

  If this manticore had taken Eris, which I strongly suspected, who was he working for? Who had enough money to employ a manticore?

  The manticore and the lackey wrapped up their conversation and exchanged places. The man in the tweed jacket entered the compartment and slid the door closed while the other headed down the hall.

  I hung back, weighing my options. Somehow these two men had made it onto the train where the siren was. Which meant there had been more men on the platform than the ones that had attacked her.

  Who were these people? How could they track her movements so well now when they had left her alone for seven years?

  There was so much more to this assignment than I’d first thought. But it wasn’t my job or responsibility to figure out who else was after her. Only to bring her in, back to the BOI. Where she’d be safe—I mean, for the whole country to be safe.

  Clenching my fists, I took a step away from the door and glanced to my left. Wrought-iron rungs climbed the side up to the top of the train. The wheels click-clacked over the rails and I could smell the coal fires in the air and taste the humidity of the billowing steam.

  Reconnaissance. I needed to know what I was protecting her from. And if it could help McCarney locate the mob boss who wanted her, and who probably created her in the first place, then that was just the icing on the cake.

  Decision made, I headed down the length of the train car, following the lackey. I’d take him out and get as much information as I could, then I would double back and confront the manticore. But I couldn’t afford to waste too much time. I didn’t want them hurting Eris.

  As I was about to step out onto the platform, I got a backward elbow to the face.

  My neck snapped back on impact as sharp pain stabbed through my nose, cheeks, and into my spine. The blow wasn’t hard enough to break my nose but definitely enough to make the world tilt, spin, and grow hazy. A hand grabbed my shirt collar and yanked me forward, out the door. On the attacker’s second swing, I ducked and drove my shoulder into the man’s gut. His hands fisted my shirt and his feet tried to gain purchase as I started to throw him over my shoulder, and over the train, into the passing countryside.

  I was one thrust away from achieving my goal when he boxed my ear. My ears rang and rang with incessant stinging, forcing me to drop my arms. The man went for me again, and I just managed to swerve to the side, his fist catching only air. He came after me, pummeling my stomach with hard blows until he had me pressed up against the railing. One fist after the other, each punch knocked precious air from my lungs and I folded over, hacking and coughing while instinctively trying to shield my organs from internal bleeding. Another blow to my stomach and my vision jumped into double-view.

  Head throbbing and blood pounding, I reached around and found what I was looking for—the iron rungs.

  I needed a reprieve or my body would never be able to bounce back. Climbing to the top of a moving train would not have been my first choice, but it was my only option.

  As I pulled myself onto the rungs, the man grabbed hold of my pant leg. I kicked him in the face and continued upward, not waiting to see if I’d been able to break his nose. Rung by rung, I climbed the side of the train and heaved myself to the top. The wind whistled through my hair and batted my clothes against my body. Judging from the scenery, we’d left Massachusetts and entered the Connecticut Shoreline. Waves crashed against the rocky coast as the rattler slowed to maneuver around the terrain. But even slow, it ran close to sixty miles per hour.

  If I fell, I was a goner.

  The lackey was nearly on top of me, but the crisp wind helped to clear my mind, and when he held up his fists like a professional pug in a boxing ring, I was ready. First came a jab, jab, with his right then a cross with his left. I jerked my head to the left twice and on his cross, I ducked and threw an uppercut to his stomach. As he doubled over, I drove my elbow downward into the back of his neck. The blow was too hard for him to stay standing, and he dropped to the hard metallic surface.

  As I bent to grab the back of his shirt to heave him up and drive a knee into his gut, he rammed into my shins. I lost my balance and rolled across the top of the train, the wind blowing over me like a tidal wave, pushing me further and further toward the edge. My foot slipped and the sole of my shoe hit only air. My pulse skittered as my heart leaped into my throat. I kicked against the side and started to heave myself forward.
But my opponent was already there. Waiting for me.

  He ground his heel into my bad shoulder. I cried out as warm blood blossomed under my new shirt. Agony rippled through me and my strength waned, my body slipping further toward the edge. He pressed harder until my legs swung off and my hands gripped the top of the train car.

  I was now dangling over the sharp rocks of the Connecticut coast.

  This man wasn’t a monster. He would’ve used his powers by now. Even so, he was a good fighter.

  But there was no way I was losing.

  With a growl, I relinquished my grip on the side and grabbed the man’s ankle. He teetered as I squeezed my fingers harder and harder into his Achilles heel. Howling with pain, he bent down to try and pry me off. Seizing my chance, I hauled myself up and head-butted him, driving my forehead up into his nose with a movement that rivaled the speed of the train. I earned a satisfying crunch from above and the man jerked back with a muffled groan.

  My whole body was on fire, burning with heat and fighting spirit. My blood felt like it was boiling under my skin. The raging wind helped to cool it, but not my temper.

  The lackey held his face, blood oozing over his fingers.

  “Who sent you?” I roared. I tasted the salt spray on my tongue as my words rode the wind and waves.

  The man just spat blood and bent at the hips, as if preparing for another attack.

  But this fight was over. In three short steps, I stormed at him and aimed a front push-kick, driving my own heel into the man’s groin. He stumbled back and back, disappearing over the edge with a scream.

  I took careful steps to the edge, arriving just in time to catch a glimpse of his broken body against the clay-colored rocks. The saltwater of the Atlantic mixed with the iron crimson of his blood. It became smaller and smaller as the train carried us further down the coast.