The Rook

  99

  Lien-hua’s thoughts were still foggy, but she stood her ground, waited to see if Melice would fight her. “Are you that scared of me, Creighton? Scared of a chained-up girl? Maybe now I won’t beat you as badly as I did at the hotel, but I doubt it. You’re not nearly as good as you think.”

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a tripod on the edge of the deck above her. For a moment she thought it might be the device, but then she saw that it was a video camcorder.

  Oh, not good. Definitely not good.

  “I don’t want to fight you,” Melice said. “I want to watch you. See how you do compared to the others. And tonight the whole world will be watching. Lots of people out there with my taste in entertainment. An FBI agent? At the world’s largest aquarium? We’ll get at least eighty thousand hits by tomorrow. Maybe a hundred.”

  Lien-hua yanked her foot against the chain.

  “That’s good. Keep that up. The more you tug the better the video will be.” He began to climb the ladder that led out of the pool, leaving bloody prints from his wounded hands on each rung.

  “You broke my tank at the warehouse, but this should work just as good, don’t you think? Sorry to say, it won’t be a live feed, though.

  I don’t want us to be interrupted by any cops.” When he reached the deck he gazed around the animal husbandry area. “Kind of ironic, huh? That we’re back here where everything started yesterday morning.”

  Dread dripped into Lien-hua’s stomach. Be brave. You need to be brave. “Where’s Shade? Still too afraid to show his face?” she asked.

  “Shade is taking care of a few loose ends.”

  She worried that Melice might be referring to Pat, but she didn’t want to appear weak or scared so she didn’t let her concern reach her face. Melice glanced at his watch and then continued, “Be here in thirty minutes. I’m sorry you two won’t have the chance to meet.

  The filming will be done by then.”

  Then she had it. She realized Melice’s primary motive. “Pain.

  Shade’s going to kill you with the device. Make you feel pain.”

  “Oh yes.” He looked to the side, across the deck. “It’s already set up and waiting for me.” Then, he let his eyes roam back toward the acclimation pool and walk across Lien-hua’s body. “You look good in that dress, by the way. I’m sure your viewers will appreciate that you’ve kept yourself in shape.”

  Lien-hua looked around, tried to think of some way to escape, but saw no viable options.

  Not drowning. Please, no. Anything but drowning.

  Melice positioned the camera. “Now, you may need to work with me a little here. I’m not sure how quick that pool is gonna fill. I’ll probably have to shoot this a couple times, let some water out, and then refill the pool again, before I can get all the footage I need. So, do your best to hold your breath and you might last two or three takes.”

  And then, Creighton Melice stepped out of sight and turned on a valve somewhere, and the thirteen-foot-deep shark acclimation pool began to fill with water.

  100

  I came screaming to a stop at the aquarium’s little-used exit door near the two rusted dumpsters, leapt out of the car, and found the door locked. I might have been able to pick it but I didn’t want to waste the time. I shot out the lock, then slipped into the building.

  Melice’s face appeared beside the video camera. “You’re starting to feel it, aren’t you, Lien-hua? What we talked about in the interrogation room? The door to hope beginning to close. You’ll yank at that grate until your ankle is chafed and raw, you’ll try to unhinge the clasp, maybe try to pick the lock somehow. But all the while the water will be rising and then, finally—reality check—you’re not gonna get away. You’re going to die right there, tonight, while I watch.”

  Water to her knees. The pool was filling faster than she’d thought it would.

  Melice continued, “Don’t be upset. Just remind yourself that over the next few months you’ll be providing entertainment to hundreds of thousands of eager viewers.” Then he added, “Who knows, you might even make it to a million downloads by summer.”

  Tessa sized up the room. Wooden floor. Plaster walls. A queen-sized bed pushed into the corner, strewn with a tangle of filthy, rumpled sheets. There on the far wall, faded blue curtains in front of a narrow, airless window. The place smelled like the back room of a bar, and the only stirring of air came from a small oscillating fan beside the bathroom door.

  No overhead light. Just a small lamp beside the bed. Riker walked over and snapped it off, so that now the only light in the room came from the murky yellow haze climbing through the window and resting expectantly on the bedsheets.

  Then Riker came to her, took her hand, and, speaking soft and comforting words, led Tessa toward the bed.

  I hurried through the dizzying maze of filtration tanks. I didn’t know if Lien-hua was dead already; I could only pray she was still alive. When we arrested him, Melice had said that she would be his next girlfriend, and I knew all too well what he did to them.

  That’s why I was heading for the shark acclimation pool. It seemed like the logical place for him to bring her. And I was close.

  Just a few more turns and I’d be there.

  Tessa’s heart trembled with exhilaration and fear. The fan’s twitching air brushed across the curtains, they rippled faintly, and Tessa thought that in the dim light, the bluish curtains appeared purple.

  And with that thought, Poe whispered to her, his words riding through the centuries, rising from the grave, “And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before.”

  Fantastic terrors.

  Never felt before.

  Tessa had never hooked up with a guy. Not like this. It was something her mom had been really intense about, and ever since she died, despite two close calls, Tessa had honored that wish. No.

  It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.

  Terrors never felt before.

  “So, I was thinking …” Riker said. “No.” She pulled away from him but stumbled a little. Off balance. Everything was off balance. “No. I need to go.”

  “We just got here.”

  She backed away. “I need to go. I have to leave.”

  Riker came toward her and grabbed her forearm. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, Raven. Not so fast.” His grip was tighter than it needed to be.

  “I said no. Now, let go of my arm.”

  No, this can’t be happening.

  He held her.

  “Let go!”

  He let go slowly but stood with arms flexed ready to grab her again. “I’ve been thinking it’s time we made a little trade.”

  Terrors never felt before.

  “What kind of trade?” She reached for a rubber band on her wrist. Found none.

  He let a smile wander across his face, but it wasn’t really a smile.

  “You don’t really believe I’d let you have a tattoo like that, five hours of work, for $180. Lachlan’s the best around. You’re wearing over $700 worth of ink and time.”

  Though faint, the music was pounding behind his words. A dark heartbeat. “You told him to give it to me.” Tessa was edging toward the door. “To give me whatever I wanted.”

  “That’s right. I did. I gave you what you wanted, and now it’s time for you to give me what I want. And the way I figure it, I’ve got at least a couple hours coming to me.”

  Her stomach filled with ice. She rushed for the door but was too slow. Riker beat her to it and nailed it shut with one strong arm.

  She began to back away from him, toward the window.

  It was the only thing she could think to do.

  To jump.

  Jump.

  101

  I stepped past the wet suits hanging behind the staircase and saw Lien-hua chained to the bottom of the shark acclimation pool, water to the middle of her thighs. When she saw me I pressed a finger to my lips to signal fo
r her to keep my arrival a secret, and then with the other hand I fingerspelled, “How many?”

  With her hand hidden behind her leg she fingerspelled back to me, “One, maybe two.”

  I could hear Creighton Melice’s voice. “Do you miss your sister, Lien-hua?”

  Sister?

  “What did you just say?” she called to Melice, her voice cold, unyielding.

  “Weapons?” I asked her with my fingers.

  “Gun. Darts. Device,” she signed to me while she stared at him.

  “Your sister. Chu-hua. Do you miss her? I miss Mirabelle. It must be different for you, though. I hear identical twins share a special connection.”

  Lien-hua never mentioned a twin sister.

  “When one twin feels pain,” Melice said, “sometimes the other one does too. That’s what they say. When one dies, the other feels like half of her life is gone. Is it true? I’ve heard it is. I’ve always wondered.” I began to creep up the steps.

  Eliminate the greater threat first.

  Melice or Shade? “So Agent Lien-hua Jiang,” Melice went on. “How does it feel to know that you’re about to die the same way she did?”

  The moment Creighton Melice mentioned Chu-hua’s name, it all came back. The memories, the regret, the terrible images burned in Lien-hua’s mind, they all came howling at her from her past, found the moment, and blistered apart inside of her.

  Chu-hua facedown in the pool … Maybe she was still alive …

  She might have been … Maybe Lien-hua could have saved her if only she’d tried. If only she’d known how to swim. If only she hadn’t been afraid of the water.

  Lien-hua slid her fingertips between the metal bars of the grate and yanked until the metal began to groove through her skin, but the grate didn’t budge.

  “You never believed it was an accident, did you?” Melice went on. “That’s what the cops told you, but you wouldn’t believe it.”

  He was right, and she hated that he was right. It’s why she’d become a detective, then a profiler, to give others what she’d been denied—the truth.

  Pat, you need to hurry.

  “It’s too bad we don’t have time for me to show you the footage,” Melice said. “She was my first home movie. My first real girlfriend.”

  Creighton smiled. Yes. Shade, his friend, his fan, really had been following his career, really had found the blog entries.

  Really had chosen him for a reason.

  It was all so perfect.

  A complete circle.

  “I hadn’t thought of the chain back then,” he called to Lien-hua.

  “It’s a lot better this way, though, don’t you think?” The next few events happened in only a matter of seconds.

  Tessa backed up all the way to the window. Tried opening it.

  Locked.

  Riker just watched her. Then he came at her, fast, grasped both of her shoulders, and shoved her against the wall.

  “No, no, no.” Tessa felt queasy, tired. Why did she have to have those drinks? It was hard to focus, to know what to do. She tried to kick her knee into his crotch, but he must have been expecting it because he turned his leg to the side, and all she caught was his thigh.

  Riker slid his hand from her shoulders to her upper arms and squeezed his right hand into her tender tattoo. A flare of pain sent bursts of sharp light sprinkling across her eyes. She wanted to cry out, needed to cry out, but refused to make a sound. Refused to give him the satisfaction of making her cry. He squeezed harder, and a tear eased from the edge of her eye, but Tessa didn’t let herself cringe.

  “I was hoping to do this the easy way.” His voice was low and filled with malice. “But we don’t have to. It’s your choice.”

  Think fast, think fast, think fast. “I need to get ready.”

  “You look ready to me.”

  Stall, Tessa. Stall. “No. I’m serious. I just need a minute in the bathroom, OK?”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “Shut up. I do. It’s girl stuff. Let go.”

  She wasn’t sure he would do it, but at last he slowly released his grip.

  Thank goodness. The screaming pain in her arm began to quiet itself.

  “All right. Five minutes. Get yourself ready. But if you don’t come out in five, I’m coming in. And I won’t be so gentle then.” Tessa snatched up her canvas satchel, pushed past him, and slammed the bathroom door shut behind her.

  Here she could be safe.

  Here she would be safe.

  She reached to lock the door but found that the doorknob had no lock. She spun around. No window. No other door. No way out.

  And then a chill, raw and deep.

  “They know me here,” Riker had told her just after they entered the club. “I come here a lot.”

  “Oh, no, please God, no,” she whispered, and as she said the words they became a terrified prayer. “I’m not the first one.”

  Now at the top of the stairs.

  Go for the greater threat. Look for a gun.

  With one smooth motion I stepped forward onto the deck and swung my gun at Melice. “Hands to the side where I can see them, get on your knees.” I didn’t see a gun in his hands, but eight meters away I did see the world’s most perfect assassination weapon device, aimed right at my head. The removable cesium-137 pack was in my car, but I wasn’t sure; the device might still work.

  There’s one person, maybe two.

  Eliminate the greater threat first.

  I put three bullets into it, shattering the device and sending it tottering back into one of the quarantine tanks, where a steamy sizzle of water told me it hadn’t been designed to be waterproof.

  “No!” Melice roared. I leveled my gun at him, but I could see I was too late. He’d drawn on me and now fired, a bullet ripped into my left thigh, and the impact sent me sprawling back down the stairs, tumbling, spinning, reeling, crashing to the bottom.

  “Raven, I’m waiting,” Riker yelled. Fire had crept into his voice.

  “Three minutes.” Tessa needed to come up with a plan.

  But she had absolutely no idea how to get away.

  I stared at the ceiling, trying to gather my wits and mentally separate myself from the pain coursing up my leg.

  I’d been shot, the water was up to Lien-hua’s waist. I needed to save her and I needed to do it fast.

  I inspected the gunshot wound. The bullet had entered the front and exited the lateral side of my quadriceps. Missed the bone. Missed the femoral artery. I’ve never believed in luck, but at that moment I was tempted to start. I might be able to walk, but it would be dicey and very painful. I pressed one hand on the entrance wound, the other on the exit wound. You need to find a way to control that bleeding.

  “No,” Melice was raging from the deck. I imagined him fondling the shattered device. “No. No. No!”

  Good. So he could feel pain after all—the pain of having all of his hope snatched away. I wondered if experiencing pain was all Melice had dreamed it would be, but by his furious cries it sounded like the pain of slaughtered hope wasn’t exactly a dream come true.

  It was never pain he wanted, but freedom from a painless hell.

  “You’re dead, Bowers!”

  My gun. Where was my gun? I’d dropped it. Yes. But where?

  You dropped it when you jerked backward. When you hit the side of the stairwell.

  It might be on the deck, I hoped not. I scooted around the corner from the stairs in case Melice or Shade decided to come down to finish me off. I scanned the area for my SIG.

  Nothing.

  Then I looked through the glass at Lien-hua and saw her tugging at the grate, and I realized my gun was lying at the bottom of the acclimation pool. A SIG will fire even when underwater, but it was too far away. She couldn’t reach it. “Hey, Bowers.” A razor blade cut through Melice’s words. “I’m coming for you and I’m gonna kill you slowly, but first I want you to watch her die. That’s your reward.”

  Weapon. I needed a wea
pon.

  If only I’d called for backup before I left the hotel!

  Assess the situation: I had no phone, no gun, the water would be over Lien-hua’s head in a matter of minutes, and I’d been shot.

  Before I could do anything I needed to control the bleeding.

  I scanned the area and saw the wet suits hanging behind the stairwell.

  Neoprene is waterproof, it’ll seal off the wounds.

  If there was a weight belt with the wet suits, I might have a chance.

  As quickly as I could, using one hand I dragged myself around the stairs. With every movement deep jolts of pain flashed through my leg. But I kept moving. I had to.

  After flipping four wetsuits aside, I finally found a neoprene weight belt hanging on a hook. I dumped the weights from it and cinched it around my thigh, not tight enough to be a tourniquet but snug enough to act as a pressure bandage. The bleeding eased.

  I could think again.

  I clicked through my options in my mind. None of them were good . Melice has the strategic position. Even if you make it up the stairs, he’ll shoot you on the spot. If you try to get to the car to go for help, it’ll take too long, Lien-hua will drown.

  From the other side of the glass, Lien-hua fingerspelled “Hurry,”

  then flashed the sign for “I need you.”

  “I’m coming,” I signed.

  I pulled myself to my feet, and, with my leg rebelling against every step, I shuffled through the doorway to the foam fractionator tower that rose past the offices on the deck above me.

  Access. There was access to the husbandry area. Then I grabbed the ridged edge of the tower, and with my left leg hanging as dead weight, I began to climb.

  “Two minutes,” yelled Riker.

  Tessa scanned the bathroom. Toilet paper. Toilet. A single lightbulb in the center of the room. No mirror, why wasn’t there a mirror? There should have been a mirror! Paper towel dispenser.

  Toilet plunger. Bath towel draped over a towel rack. She looked under the sink for some kind of cleaning chemicals that she could splash in his face. Nothing.