In the airplane restroom, Isabelle had washed her hands and face. She had been in there for such a long time, Samuel had been convinced she’d fainted or worse, and been ready to charge in to help her. But she had come out, smiling mysteriously, and still wearing the black catsuit, torn and stiff with blood.
His blood. Her blood.
Soap and warm water had done wonders for Samuel, too, but his Armani suit had been blasted by two gunshots, and so much blood had soaked his cashmere sweater he smelled like the goat that had donated the wool.
A good look for a corporate meeting.
Actually, considering the circumstances, maybe it was.
“Aleksandr’s behind us in a cab.” Caleb watched the cab zoom past.
“Now he’s ahead of us.” Leaning back in his seat, Aaron grinned at Samuel.
Samuel tried to grin back. He really did. But it felt like a grimace.
Isabelle rubbed her upper arms.
He whipped his head around to stare at her. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, Samuel. I’m fine.”
“That’s not the first time you’ve done that. Rubbed your arms.”
“They itch. That’s all. If that is the least of our worries, we’re a happy little group.” Her voice grew soothing. “Don’t worry. I truly am well, you saved me, and together we can do what must be done.”
“Yes.” She thought she knew him so well, yet she didn’t comprehend the breadth and depth of the conflict that raged within him.
None of the Chosen Ones did. They thought he was vulgar, obnoxious, irritating. They had no idea he used those traits to hide his true character from them . . . and from himself. They had no idea he was weak, easily tempted . . . tainted.
Traffic was impossible, start and stop, cars crammed together, door handle-to-door handle. In other words, typical Manhattan. The lanes slowed even more as they approached Times Square.
Yet for all their stately speed, Samuel’s heart pounded as if he were running. Turning his head to look at Isabelle, the miracle beside him, he said passionately, “Once we get this taken care of, I never want you to heal anyone ever again.”
Isabelle was quiet. Finally, she said, “We’ll talk about that later.”
He took a breath to argue.
“Crap!” Caleb thumped his head on the back of his seat.
“What?” Samuel looked around in alarm.
“Charisma is riding her bicycle,” Caleb said.
Samuel craned his neck, saw Charisma spin past. “That girl is such a pain in the ass. Ever since she saw the special on New York City messengers, she’s been riding that blasted thing all over town. Doesn’t she realize how important this is?”
“I think she does.” Isabelle’s rebuke was clear in her tone.
“In this traffic, she’s going to get there sooner than we are,” Jacqueline said.
Samuel exchanged glances with the other guys.
Women. They always stuck together.
“Where’s Genny?” Rosamund asked.
John glanced at his phone. He smiled the way he always did when he talked about Genny. “She texts that her cab is there, circling the block.”
“Then we’re all in place.” Samuel took a breath as they passed Times Square and headed for SoHo, to the site of the blast that demolished the Gypsy Travel Agency and everything it stood for.
As they reached their destination, Isabelle slid her arm around his shoulders and hugged him. “It’s okay, Samuel. This will work.”
“If we keep you alive long enough to get you to the meeting,” he replied vehemently. Then he shivered in a fear that had nothing to do with his anxiety for her, and everything to do with his own weakness and the secret knowledge that Darren and Patricia were right—he wasn’t good enough for Isabelle.
In fact, he wasn’t a good man at all.
“I’m alive.” Isabelle peered out the window, up at the behemoth rising on the same spot where the Gypsy Travel Agency had had its headquarters. “But I never thought that to stay that way, I’d have to enter the Osgood Building to confront the devil himself.”
Chapter 55
The Chosen Ones merged on the sidewalk across from the construction site. Genny had the cab drop her at the curb. Charisma hurried up, pushing her bike toward McKenna, who took it and put it in the trunk. Aleksandr loped over from the corner. They stood abreast, soldiers facing the field of battle, and looked up. And up.
The Osgood Building was thirty stories and growing. The bottom twenty-five floors were closed in, windowless, gray, and dull.
Yet above them, the largest crane in the history of New York lifted steel beams into place. Metalworkers, yellow hard hats in place, rode the elevators to the top floor, where the framework sketched the outline of the structure to come. Welders sparked and the rhythmic blasts of riveters created acoustic bedlam.
On the ground, front loaders roared, delivering material from one spot to another, and like some bizarre trim on a dirt cake, a dozen blue Porta Potties lined the perimeter of chain-link fence.
Office workers scurried through the pitted, filthy site in plywood tunnels built to protect them from dropped tools or, more ominously, the wall frames that were giving form to the offices.
“Is that legal,” Genny asked, “to have the building open at the same time it’s being constructed?”
“No.” Aleksandr, Caleb, and Jacqueline spoke at the same time.
John added, “But Osgood gets what Osgood wants.”
“His power is growing,” Jacqueline said.
Samuel didn’t know if she was having a vision or simply stating the obvious fact.
John assumed the leadership mantle he wore so effortlessly. “All right, we’re going in. McKenna, stay close. Park, or circle the block. We may need you and we know we can depend on you to be there in a minute.”
“Yes, sir, you can.” McKenna’s brogue was strong and steady.
“McKenna, don’t forget—drive carefully for my bike’s sake.” Charisma smiled prettily.
“As opposed to the way I drive when it’s merely you I’m transporting.” McKenna glared in Celtic exasperation. Returning to the Rolls, he opened the door and said, “I think I speak for Mr. Shea and Martha when I say . . . this is as brave an act as any Chosen have ever done, and it has been a privilege to work with all of you.” Getting in, he closed the door and drove away.
The Chosen Ones exchanged glances.
“Some people might think that sounded like farewell,” Charisma said.
“Just in case we weren’t scared enough,” Aleksandr said.
“We would have to be fools not to be scared.” Isabelle spoke in a low voice, reminding them of what they already knew. “For years, Osgood has been the vague, shadowy power behind every corrupt operation on the East Coast from Florida to Maine. His was the name whispered in the night, the man no one ever saw, a myth to scare children, and now”—she gestured up at the building slicing like a razor blade into the blue winter sky—“he’s no longer anonymous. He has so much power, he feels indestructible.”
“Personally, I’m terrified,” Samuel said.
A ripple of nervous laughter went through the group.
They thought he was joking to lighten the mood.
He was not.
“Stick together.” John pinned them, one by one, his gaze a slap of cool good sense. “Be strong. Be swift—we want to get in and out before the sun sets. Stay close to Isabelle.”
“I’m fine, John,” she assured him. Assured them. She clasped Samuel’s hand, reminding him of the battle he had steadfastly fought and so far won . . . reminding him why he fought that battle.
“We intend that you should stay fine,” John answered. “Please don’t forget—stick together.”
“You said ‘stick together’ twice,” Rosamund pointed out.
“That’s the important one. We are the Chosen Ones. When we are shoulder-to-shoulder, we’re invincible. But we’re only as strong as our weakest link.” J
ohn’s gaze lingered on Samuel.
John had come back to the Chosen through an anguished, torturous path. He must suspect the truth about Samuel.
Samuel looked him in the eyes, put his hand on Isabelle’s shoulder. “I have my reason to remain as one with the Chosen.”
John was worried. All too obviously, he was worried. But he nodded, then started across the street.
With Isabelle in the middle, protected by their bodies, the Chosen Ones followed.
The gate into the construction site was their first hurdle. The guard didn’t want to let them in without proper ID.
Using a little mind control, Samuel convinced him they had proper ID.
They joined the other office workers in the tunnels, who eyed them oddly.
But nothing was said. In fact, the office workers didn’t speak to the Chosen Ones or one another.
It was quiet. It was grim.
“This is spooky.” The atmosphere must have been weighing on Aleksandr, for he spoke with a tense conviction that caught Samuel’s attention.
Samuel gave him a sharp look.
The kid was still too thin, and his eyes were haunted.
Again Samuel resolved to have a talk with him . . . as soon as this was over. As soon as Isabelle was safe from assassination.
Isabelle . . . She moved easily, the signs of her ordeal diminishing every moment. But she examined Osgood’s people as if their existence made her uneasy.
Samuel put his hand on her waist. Leaning close, he said, “I’m not going to let them get you.”
“I know, Samuel.” She wore her faith in him serenely.
She understood him so well. She thought she had seen the worst of him.
But she didn’t understand the test he now faced. Why would she? She had never faced the frustrations of his life. She had never hungered for more, hungered for . . . everything.
Genny stopped, stared at the plywood-covered entrance, at the construction sign scrawled in black Magic Marker that proclaimed this the Osgood Building. “This is so obviously unfinished, I feel sorry for the staff.”
Samuel and Aaron opened the glass doors sheathed in plywood. “We’ll worry about them another time,” Samuel said. “For now, let’s get this done as quickly as possible.”
Charisma stepped through to the lobby.
He heard her gasp.
Crap! What now?
Aleksandr rushed in close on her heels. He stopped. “Wow. Cool.”
Jacqueline bumped into him. “I didn’t expect this,” she said.
“Who would?” Caleb pushed them inside.
Isabelle walked through the door.
Genny and John trailed after. “You have to be kidding,” John said.
Rosamund said, “How exciting!”
Samuel exchanged glances with Aaron, and they walked in, letting the doors close behind them.
The lobby was nothing like Samuel expected.
It was lavish, stylish, complete in every way, from the elegant milk-white marble columns that grew treelike out of the ice-white marble floor, to the gold-embellished chandeliers that sparkled with crystal splendor, to the polished white stone benches that lined the walls.
No way it should be here. Not yet. For how could this have been built and decorated so quickly and without interference? Osgood used the slipshod exterior to disguise his masterpiece, to hide this demonstration of power over city inspectors, politicians, laws, artists . . . and time itself.
The splendor and the glory made Samuel’s mouth water.
But he ignored his envy and walked to the guard at the elevators. “Tell Osgood we’re here.”
“Do you have an appointment, sir?” The guard—Elvin, according to his name badge—watched him coldly.
“Tell Osgood the Chosen Ones are here to speak with him.” Samuel kept his gaze firmly on the guard, wordlessly commanding him.
The guard didn’t move.
John took his place at Samuel’s side. “Osgood will want to know that we’re here. Are you going to tell him you turned us away?”
“I would not—if I believed you were the Chosen Ones,” Elvin said, his scorn both biting and obvious.
John laughed, leaned across the podium, and opened his frosty blue eyes wide. “I could crush you like a bug.”
He wasn’t using his considerable power, yet Elvin shook as if he’d been exposed to an icy wind. His hand slipped down to the holster at his belt. Cautiously, he stepped back, fingering the safety on his pistol as he pushed the button for the elevators. He got in, pushed another button, and as the doors closed, he kept his gaze fixed on them.
“I guess you don’t call up to Osgood’s office,” Genny said wryly.
The Chosen and their mates spread across the lobby.
Rosamund found her way to the centerpiece, a dark granite plaque and a mural in stone three feet high, running the length of the lobby. With the lack of caution that characterized her when she studied, she walked along it, scrutinizing each panel, her brow furrowed with fascination.
Aaron followed close at her side, watching her unwary back, protecting her.
Clearly the mural told a story in pictures, although Samuel didn’t have the urge or the curiosity to look. He was busy watching Isabelle as she rubbed her arms, up and down, up and down.
What is wrong with her arms?
Charisma sat on one of the benches, her hands beside her and flat on the stone. Lifting one hand, she placed it on the column, smoothing the marble as if communicating with the stone.
Aleksandr stood apart, hands in his pockets, head down.
Again Samuel looked around the amazing, luxurious lobby. He scrutinized Osgood’s staff as they walked back and forth, got into and out of elevators—although never the one the guard had used—looked at clipboards and computers. “They remind me of something,” he said.
At once Isabelle said, “This is the flip side of the Gypsy Travel Agency.”
“The flip side ...” Samuel muttered.
She was right. He had seen people like this before, exuberant, interested, at the Gypsy Travel Agency.
Now he was here, in some ghastly negative of that organization. These people, these office workers, were special, knowledgeable, passionate. They spoke dead languages, carried ancient manuscripts, looked interested in their jobs.
Osgood had superimposed his own order on the site where the Chosen Ones had fallen.
Once again, Samuel’s flesh crept in horror . . . and in fascination.
He had to be careful here. So careful.
Here there was no hiding from himself. Here he would face his true nature.
Would he have the strength he needed to deny it?
Genny observed the workers. “They carry in them the seeds of their own downfall.”
John put his arm around his wife’s waist. “What do you mean?”
“Can’t you see it?” Genny leaned against him as if needing the comfort of closeness.
“I can,” Isabelle said. “These people . . . they’re the antiquities experts. They’re the dead-language graduates. They’re artists and writers. They were unemployed.”
“Or asking customers if they wanted fries with that,” Genny said. “The economy’s in a downturn, and out of the clear blue sky, they got a great job offer for fabulous wages doing what they love. It seems too good to be true. They realize there are discrepancies, things that are odd, like working in a building while it’s under construction, but they’d be fools not to grab any employment, much less a cushy job like this.”
“Most of them haven’t got a clue what they have gotten themselves into.” Isabelle’s eyes filled with tears. “They can never escape.”
Charisma rolled her bracelets up and down her arms, pressing the stones too hard and leaving marks on her skin. “That’s right, Isabelle, but how did you know?”
“I can feel the pull of a wounded earth, of a thousand souls waiting to be broken and damned. I want to heal them all.” Isabelle kneaded her upper arm
s as if they ached. “And I know I can’t.”
Samuel looked at her. To the casual eye, she looked normal, healed completely, but what she was saying . . . that was new. That was different. She had returned to the land of the living as the same being, but she was changed, and he could see the frailty in her.
She worried him. He must save her, and yet . . . would he have the strength?
She didn’t know about him. She didn’t know—and if she had realized the truth, she would never have rescued him from death.
Jacqueline shivered. “I feel a vision pulling at me, and I know I shouldn’t give in, for I fear I would never find my way out.”
“Be careful, Samuel,” Isabelle warned. “Don’t use your mind control again.”
“Yeah, because”—he remembered the message Dina had thrust into his mind weeks ago—“there are traps to catch power like mine.”
Dina . . . Was she still alive somewhere? Had she escaped Osgood’s vengeance?
Samuel hoped so. She might be one of the Others and wicked as any witch, but her bone-deep love had kept Irving alive, and Irving’s search for her had motivated him through hours of agonizing physical therapy. The old man wanted to do more than survive—he wanted to find Dina, and for that, he needed to be mobile, articulate, and alert.
Samuel waved John close, spoke softly. “No matter what happens, no one should use their gift here.”
“Great,” John said.
Samuel understood the sarcasm. For what if this venture went awry? They carried no weapons, only their wits and their gifts.
The elevator opened. The guard stepped out. He pointed at Isabelle. “Only you.”
Samuel stepped up to stand with her. “She doesn’t go without me.”
“Only you,” the guard repeated to Isabelle.
Isabelle laughed, a chime of merriment that dismissed the guard’s authority. “We’ve proved ourselves to be foolhardy enough to face Osgood on his own ground. Is he afraid of us here?”
The guard hesitated. Put his finger to his ear as if listening—but he wore no earpiece. Yet he nodded as if to some inner counsel. “All right.” He pointed at Samuel. “You can go up, too.” He held the elevator doors open.
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