by G. R. Cody
CHAPTER 1
Eve strolled away from the spectacle, the coral-dyed pumps (Coral? Really, ‘Speth?) begging to sink into the turf. She stepped up onto the brick path, glancing at the text message again, wondering. Thankfully, a weak breeze surfaced. It ruffled her fine, shoulder length ginger hair, which tickled her nose. Annoyed, she pocketed her iPhone in her bra, ran the fingers of both hands through her hair from temple to the nape of her neck, grasped it with both hands, twisted it behind her, and snapped one of the ever present rubber bands from her reddened left wrist around the base of her skull, which caused a chill to run down her neck and through to her fingertips. A bead of sweat trickled down her right cheek and settled at the corner of the lips, which she summarily dabbed with her tongue.
The dampness from the late afternoon humidity traversing and enveloping the expanse of her body gave the coral, linen dress weight and a feel of permanence, and of unwelcomed control over her movements. She wished she was in her room, naked and sprawled on the bed under the fan, or else in the pool…
“Soon,” she prayed.
The sun was high in the sky and was beating down on her. The air was heavy with moisture, and felt as if it was filling beyond its capabilities, stretching to the limits of its capacity or possibly exploring new ones, before reaching critical mass. It seemed to be taunting her with the promise of slaking her misery, enjoying teasing her by trying to uncover how long she could endure before crying out in supplication. Her brain felt as though it were overheating, affecting its circuitry; it had become difficult to hold a thought, remember names of old acquaintances, concentrate on the remaining reception plans. She wanted to escape to the lobby of her hotel, the bar of some nearby restaurant, a theatre, anywhere with central air conditioning.
But the text said here, now.
She was thankful to get it honestly. Any justifiable distraction was welcomed. Eve had been dreading this day since the raised letter invitation had arrived from her stepmother.
Maj. and Mrs. Charles Ashley Pemberton
request the honor of your presence
at the wedding of their daughter
Sarah Elspeth
. . .
Eve had tried her best to get away with not having to attend her younger sister’s wedding, but her step-mother wouldn’t hear of it, which meant her father would be in agreement. She was, of course, going to be in the wedding party (despite, Eve was sure, her stepsisters best efforts to exclude her). No respectable southern wedding would have a family member in the pews, let alone on another continent.
“Come now, Evie,” Barbara had admonished her just two weeks hence, “The house won’t be too crowded. Mind, you may have to sleep in the guest room the night before. You know Nana can’t sleep on a full; she’ll need your queen with the pillow top. But ‘Speth will be just devastated if you aren’t here to help manage, and…no, no. That’s the wrong pink. It’s English Rose, not Hot Pink, Madeline…were was I? Oh, yes! And Lord knows I will need your help running interference with everyone’s comings and goings. And you know, Robert is staying with his folks next door…” she trailed off these last few words with a hint of a lilt.
“Mom, I’ve told you,” Eve interrupted in a measured tone, trying not to sound ungrateful and ignoring the Robert contrivance, “I’m on assignment until Thursday. The only flight I could get is out of Gatwick at 10AM Friday. That will give me just enough time to land at Hartsfield, hop on the train and get to the hotel in time to lay my head down and be up by six.” Eve hoped her stepmother had enough on her mind not to calculate the five hour time advantage between London and Atlanta.
“But sweetheart, I wish you weren’t so dedicated to that career of yours,” Barbara said with genuine disappointment. “It can’t be good for your health. All those plane rides, the changes in climates must be doing murder to your skin. Did you look into those creams I emailed you about? Fountain of Youth, I tell you; done wonders for my…”
“My skin is just fine,” she lied. The truth was that her eczema had returned and was worse than when she was a teenager, and there were bags under her eyes that sleep was not curing. “Plus, it’s not like I’m the Matron of Honor…”
“Maid, dear,” Barbara glibly corrected.
Eve bit her lip and took a deep breath before continuing. “She’s got Libby and Madeline to help her through it, and you. I’d honestly just be in the way.”
“Well…” her stepmother said, obviously considering the point. After a few seconds pause, “Just do make it to the church by eight. That horrid job of yours is already making you miss the rehearsal and dinner…You know, your father cried last night…genuinely wept…I don’t know how he’ll get along without one of you under his roof.”
Eve smirked a bit, knowing it wasn’t the absence of his children from the home, but the realization that he would now spend the rest of eternity sharing it solely with Barbara, that was more likely the cause of his depressed state.
“I haven’t seen such emotion out of your father since…” The line went silent for a few seconds, then Eve heard her stepmother clear her throat, and could imagine her stiffening up to her full height, fiddling her pearls. “Just be there on time. Please. I’ll send your dress and shoes over to the hotel. Just call down for them after you check in, and call me when you arrive.”
“Okay, Mom,” Eve answered, knowing not to test her now, especially when she had given in. “I’ll text you…”
“No, please call me,” Barbara retorted, obviously still preoccupied with her previous thought, “Texts are so impersonal.”
This was code for ‘I have just gotten the hang of emailing from the computer; I haven’t got the time to figure out how to send one from my phone.”
“Okay, I’ll call straight away when I arrive. See you in a couple of weeks.”
Eve hit disconnect and lay her phone onto the bedside table. Realizing what she had just said, she snorted a bit. She was sure that when her stepmother had lain the receiver onto the cradle, she most likely muttered something to the effect of “Straight away? Good God, she’s turning into a Limey!”
Barbara had been Eve’s stepmother for most of Eve’s life. Eve’s mother had died along with her brother, Sam, when Eve was six. Eve got her light red hair from her mother, as well as her statuesque, thin frame and long, thin legs. Also like her mother, she stood around 5’9”, a quality that did not endear her to many of her suitors growing up, and also gave her a distinct disadvantage to her peers in practice with walking in high heels.
Barbara, on the other hand, stood no more than 5’2”, had short, thick back hair, and a stocky, fit figure from constant stair climbing workouts. When they walked together, Eve took one stride to Barbara’s two, and Eve constantly had to catch herself so as not to outpace her.
In temperament, her mother and Barbara also differed greatly. Eve remembered her mother as patient, loving and open. Her father had once remarked that these qualities were mostly a blessing, but could blind her to malice when others looked to take advantage of her.
Barbara, however, was a first rate control freak. But, Eve had to admit, she is probably what her father, and she, needed in those dark days after the accident. For almost a year, her father floundered to maintain his sanity, and it seemed that Barbara’s rigid attitude and adherence to structure gave him the lifeboat that he needed.
It was nearly one in the afternoon and she was still in bed. She glanced to her left and saw it was still raining and dark. Had it been a clear day, the sun would just now be peaking down Bickenhall Street and in through her window.
She was lucky to have this flat in Marylebone, she knew. It was in a very posh part of the city, full of people her own age, mostly in professional c
areers. She was quite a hit at the pubs when she first arrived. Not because of her beauty, or her intelligence, or her fashion style, which she had in equal measure, but for her southern American accent. Truth be told, she never thought she had much of an accent, having grown up in the suburbs of Atlanta. She had certainly heard worse from folks from Savannah, Macon, Tennessee and Alabama. She relished the attention for a while, but then started to feel like her Londoner friends and acquaintances were putting her on display.
Her roommate, Charlotte, owned the flat; or her father did. She was not quite sure, but never had any real reason or interest in finding out. All she knew was that Charlotte’s father had purchased it in the mid-‘80s when it was necessary for him to be in London for business and away from home on the Isle of Wight. He had been some sort of high finance investment banker, thinking up tax haven schemes for international clientele trying to shield their holdings from the tax authorities in their home countries. But then came the 2008 crash, when saving on taxes took a back seat to cash flow, and he was overleveraged and tried to get out too late. He found it necessary to take out a loan on the flat, which had appreciated significantly since he purchased it, to keep the family finances afloat. When he had a stroke a year ago, the ownership somehow evidently passed to Charlotte through some sort of family trust, and somehow the debt ended up being forgiven.
Charlotte had moved into the flat in early 2008 while she attended University, which her father had encouraged, as it was more difficult for the bank to foreclose as long as there was a relative living there. With the cash from Daddy in short supply, Charlotte quickly snapped up Eve after meeting her at a CNC holiday party in December of that year.
Charlotte had spent a three month stint interning at CNC, while Eve had just moved after a year from their headquarters in Atlanta to work in their London bureau’s photojournalist desk. She had been letting a tiny flat in Whitechapel, and all she could think about for the three months she was there was Jack the Ripper. Eve was just as happy to pay the rent for a Marylebone address as Charlotte was to receive it. The flat was just two tube station’s ride from the CNC London headquarters on Great Marlborough, on at Baker Street Station over to Regents Park, then south to Oxford Circus.
After dropping out of University in 2011, Charlotte secured a position as some sort of personal assistant for an executive with the Chelsea football club, which meant she was traveling with him most of the time. And when she wasn’t traveling, she was staying with said executive at his flat on the Thames. So, for the better part of three years, she had the Marylebone flat all to herself, and Charlotte had very conveniently forgotten about the rent.
Eve stretched and turned onto her left side, sliding her hand down under the sheets. She playfully dug her nails into the flesh of Arthur’s firm cheek.
“Careful you! I’ve had plenty of time to recuperate from last night,” warned Arthur playfully in his deep, Scottish accent.
Just hearing him speak stirred something in Eve. She felt her stomach purr every time she heard his voice. She often thought her affinity for the Scottish accent, and probably for older men, came from her watching all those James Bond movies with her father when she was young.
She pressed herself against his back, gently kissed the back of his neck right at the hair line, then dug her fingernails in a bit deeper and nibbled his ear lobe…
She sat on a bench fronting 17th Street across from her hotel, The Atlantic, thinking of Arthur, wishing he could have been there with her. She looked at his name again on the text she had just received ten minutes before and smiled. What she would give now to be able to walk into that cool London rain.
She could see the entirety of the Atlanta skyline from where she sat. She looked out over the city she called home, but never really got to know from growing up in the northern suburbs. She was amazed at how many new buildings had come up along Peachtree, how many friends from school had shunned the suburbs and come to live in Midtown, or the Highlands, or even here in Atlantic Station. She saw signs of familiar international companies on the tops of new skyscrapers, the hallmark of a “real” American metropolis. Atlanta had really grown up in her absence. Still, it was no London. Atlanta might be bigger and growing, but what it still lacked, what it probably would always lack, was character. London has character, and New York, Chicago, Paris, Hong Kong, or San Francisco. Atlanta was still just a place to come when you couldn’t find a good enough job where you grew up.
Arthur’s text was professional, not personal. As the head of the photojournalist desk at CNC in London, he was technically her boss. His text was short, to the point.
Arthur: Got a tip that something’s up in ATL. Are you near?
Eve: Y
Arthur: Keep an eye out.
His dedication to his profession had most assuredly blocked out the fact that she was at her sister’s wedding reception. But she didn’t mind, and he would know that anyway. He seemed genuinely impressed with her enthusiasm for her profession and craft. Plus, she was tired of champagne, flowers, idle chat, and posing for photographs.
Instinctually, she raised her iPhone and started recording the skyline. Suddenly, a loud clap of thunder sounded, making her jump, and simultaneously a pattern of heat lightning crept across the late afternoon sky above the city. She hoped that her jolting had not disturbed the video; it had been truly beautiful.
She was thinking about pausing it and sending the clip to Arthur when what looked like another, much more brilliant strike lighted up her phone so brightly that she had to close her eyes from the pain of it, and not a half of a second later, a deafening explosion, muddled with the tinkling of shattering glass.
Eve’s heart leapt to her throat. The hair on her arms were standing on end, and her eyes snapped open. Her iPhone was still focused on the skyline. She could see on the screen that several floors of the Bank of America building about halfway up were black with smoke. The sound of what might be a hundred car alarms wailed in the distance. Chunks of brown marble and glass were hurdling earthward, innumerable sheets of paper fluttering from all sides of the fissure in the building.
Then, the adrenalin hit her brain.
Eve shoved the iPhone back into her bra, leapt up and sprinted to her hotel just across the street, leaving her pumps behind on the ground. All she could think of was her camera, which was nestled in her suitcase on her bed in her room.
Just then, the air that had been taunting her seemed to relax, releasing its torrent in a deluge. The pumps wilted under the water’s weight, and started to bleed their coral dye onto the steaming pavement.
CHAPTER 2
Eve’s bare soles slapped the wet pavement as she hurtled past shoppers with bags in hand, momentarily oblivious to the sudden downpour, transfixed on the scene just a couple of miles away in midair. As she mounted the sidewalk, Eve noticed the patrons of the hotel lounge with their faces pressed to the glass corner window, curiosity and shock expressed in each one.
Eve rounded the corner, flew past the bell stand and through the hotel doors. She was now soaked to the bone, and her dress was more restrictive than ever. She barely noticed the sudden change in temperature, from the warm, summer rain to the cold, dry lobby, until she skidded to a stop on the marble floor of the elevator bay and slapped a wet hand on the “Up” button. In the few seconds she waited for the carriage to arrive, admonishing it with a few “Come On! Come On!”’s, she noticed her teeth chattering and her legs seemed to suddenly feel unstable, as if she was wearing a weighted suit. Whether it was due to the cold, the rain, or the shock of what she had just witnessed, she did not know, and right now there wasn’t any time to care. There was only the need to push on.
The elevator finally arrived, and she pushed past a couple who were exiting, brushing up against the woman and wetting her blouse.
“Hey!” the woman exclaimed as she turned back just in time to see this wet mop of a girl, dressed for a wedding reception and barefoot, slamming at the buttons on the inside wall m
uttering to no one “Let’s Go! Let’s Go!”
The din of the crowd in the lobby suddenly muted as the elevator doors slid shut. As she stood transfixed on the floor display above, tapping her nails of her right hand against the wall unconsciously, her ears registered a new noise.
“If you like Pina Coladas, and gettin’ caught in the rain…”
“Come on! Come on! Hurry up!” she exclaimed at the digits which seemed to be changing at a snail’s pace.
14…..15…..16
“If you like making love at midnight…”
19…..20…..21
“Then let’s plan our escape.”
The elevator dinged at the 25th floor, and she darted out before the doors could fully open, to the left and down the corridor.
Eve reached the door of her room, and she felt the blood suddenly drain from her face. She had left her purse at the coat check in the restaurant.
“FUCK!”
For a split second, she considered going back down to the lobby and getting another key, but that thought quickly vanished. With the commotion outside, the fact that she had no ID other than her press pass that lay on the other side of this door, and the fact that she probably looked like a drowned rat, she immediately abandoned the logical approach as futile. It would waste valuable time.
Eve backed up against the door opposite hers in the corridor, bent down and tore open the seam on her dress. Then she charged headlong at the door. She extended her right leg, making contact with the door with the sole of her foot just to the side of the door handle.
Sharp pain stabbed at her heel, and her hip felt a pinch. The door did not open, but she could see that it gave a little. Eve reset, bit her lip and kicked again.
The door swung open and clattered against the wall inside.
She ran into the room without thinking to close the door. Eve reached back and unzipped the sleeveless dress almost halfway, extracted her arms and shimmied it off of herself as she made her way to the bathroom. The dress plopped unceremoniously onto the tile floor with a thud. She went to unlatch her bra from behind. As she did so, her iPhone dropped from the front, landed in the sink, and clattered apart.