Stone Angel

  Eric taunted, “Gallagher, you came to be part of a rescue mission, and look at you. You’ll die here, and so will your girlfriend.” He went in for another kick.

  Liam rallied enough to pull his body up onto his hands and knees.

  Eric watched, relishing each grunt of pain that escaped Liam’s lips.

  Liam took a slow, painful breath and yelled, “Amanda, get Sophia. And get out of here!”

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  LEAVE HIM?

  Liam meant for Amanda to leave him? Here? In this museum dedicated to blood, death and eternal stillness? For Liam, the Sculptor's mansion would be his tomb.

  And yet … what choice did she have?

  She loved Liam.

  But Amanda and Liam were adults. They had lived, not long, but they had lived. Sophia was a child. She deserved more than this sterile existence. She deserved the chance to grow up, to become a young woman and have a life.

  For a split second, Amanda looked into Liam’s swollen, broken face and met his anguished blue gaze.

  He nodded imperceptibly. “Go,” he whispered.

  She nodded back. “I love you,” she said.

  Eric observed the Sculptor as he staggered, half-blind, toward his workbench. Eric’s lips curled back from his teeth. “Girl, you’re in trouble now. The Sculptor will want you killed for ruining his Osgood-given physique.” He stalked toward Amanda.

  Behind him, Liam groaned as he half-rose. With a wild Irish war cry, he tackled Eric at the back of the knees.

  The two men went flying. They hit the floor with a resounding thud.

  Liam snapped Eric’s foot sideways.

  Eric tried to twist away.

  With an audible crack, the ankle broke.

  Eric roared in agony.

  Pale and gruesome, the Sculptor clutched his worktable, bent over it. Blood splashed onto the pristine surface, staining it with red.

  Amanda ran to Sophia, to the stone-like figure that was her sister.

  How to move her?

  Last night at dinner, Liam had confessed he had no idea how to unfreeze Sophia. He wasn’t even sure if there was a way.

  Jacqueline had assured them that if they could bring the statue to the mansion, all the Chosen and especially Rosamund, with her research skills, would figure it out.

  Yet the plans had involved the two of them, her and Liam, moving Sophia together. Amanda couldn’t deadlift her sister. She couldn’t drag her by her outstretched arm. It might break off. Sophia might shatter into a thousand pieces.

  How to…?

  The wheelchair!

  Amanda turned to grab it, only to find Liam and Eric struggling on the floor in front of it.

  The two men panted, wrestling.

  Eric punched at Liam.

  Liam kicked at Eric’s broken ankle, and all the while he kept twisting and turning, rolling away and grabbing at his own leg.

  Amanda looked around the bare room, sought a way to help him.

  But Liam had finally achieved his goal. With a grunt, he pulled the stainless steel brace from beneath Irving's sweat pants. He came up underneath Eric’s chin, and fueled by adrenaline, he stabbed the blunt end into Eric’s throat.

  It pierced the skin, broke into the windpipe. Eric gasped. Turned white. With a final gush of blood, Eric flopped back, and lay still.

  Liam threw the brace onto the ground, leaving streaks of Eric’s blood on the marble floor. He worked to disentangle himself from Eric’s limp body.

  But with all the swelling and bruising and bloody gashes, he moved like the old man he had been a few minutes before.

  The Sculptor lifted his head, and in his one eye shone as much power and malevolence as if he was the devil himself. “Liam Gallagher, it doesn’t matter how many you kill. I hold the power here! And before I hand the girls over to Osgood, I will destroy you.”

  Amanda grabbed her bag. Never taking her gaze from the Sculptor, she scrabbled among the pill bottles. And she found what she wanted: a narcotic-filled syringe.

  “I can’t let you do that. They are mine to protect.” Liam used the wheelchair to stand. He straightened to his full height. Looking over at Amanda, he smiled. “Mine to love.”

  The Sculptor oozed malice … and a wicked satisfaction. “The only thing you ever were, was one of the Others. Now you’re worthless. Look! You’re nothing but another statue for Osgood’s office.” Pressing his palm forward, the Sculptor released a bolt of cold blue lightning.

  The blaze writhed toward Liam, wrapped him in its frozen light, freezing him as he struggled.

  Amanda stood like a statue herself, too shocked to move or scream.

  Liam had just said he loved her.

  And now she was going to lose him and Sophia?

  The Sculptor turned to her in triumph, his eye socket a bloody, gaping wound in his face. “You see, Amanda. Evil always wins.” With a hideous smile, the Sculptor walked to his worktable. He chose his largest hammer. Turning, he strode purposefully toward Liam.

  “No!” Amanda rushed at the Sculptor from the side.

  He flung up one arm as if to brush her off.

  She lunged with the syringe, slamming it into his neck and pushing the stopper.

  For a moment, he wore an expression of disbelief. He turned his head, breaking off the syringe in place. While Amanda watched, breathless, he swayed, fighting the drug’s effect, then fell to the floor, one hand still grasping the hammer.

  He hadn’t got the full dose. But it would knock him out for a while, hopefully long enough for her to get Liam and Sophia out.

  But how? The Sculptor wouldn’t sleep forever. And she had two statues and a way to get only one of them out of the Sculptor’s mansion.

  She had a choice: the sister she had raised, or the man she would love forever.

  She wanted to cry in frustration and longing … but some emotions were too deep for tears. She walked forward to Liam’s still form.

  Although he had fought the deadly lightning, his face was frozen in a expression, as though he had expected to die today. Perhaps he had suspected that this would happen, that she would have to decide who to leave behind.

  “Liam. If only I had known.” It was time to admit to herself that he hadn’t betrayed her. That she had needed someone to blame other than herself, for her own lack of vigilance. She had known there was a chance the Others would come eventually, seeking Sophia’s blossoming power.

  But she hadn’t protected Sophia. And this was her chance to make that right … at the expense of Liam’s life, and her own heart.

  Tears fell now, tears of sorrow and inevitable goodbye. As she leaned forward to give Liam one last kiss, she closed her eyes and pressed her cheek to his.

  Rather than the warm, living flesh she had caressed the night before, he was cold, hard stone.

  Her tears fell faster, and she whispered, “I love you, Liam Gallagher. I will love you forever.”

  And when someone clutched her arms, she jumped and screamed.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  AMANDA OPENED her eyes, and stared into Liam’s face.

  His blue eyes twinkled. And he blinked.

  She was going mad. She was hallucinating.

  Yet his hands gripped her upper arms.

  And he was changing. He was no longer rigid, petrified, blank. His skin regained its flesh tones. His head slowly tilted to the side, and he studied her as if he’d never seen a woman before.

  She couldn’t have pinpointed the moment, but somehow, Liam became human again, bruised and beaten, but no longer a statue.

  His lips moved. He spoke. “I love you too, Amanda.”

  Amanda gasped. She put her hand to her mouth to stifle the sound, and gasped again.

  He smiled with such pleasure she basked in the glow. He took her wrist, pulled her hand away from her face, and leaned forward for a salty kiss. His lips moved against hers. His words whispered across her skin. “Your tears are magic, darlin’.”

  As his meaning
penetrated her mind, she drew back. “M…my tears? Do you really think…?”

  “I know. I felt the drops on my cheek, warming me, returning me to life.” He kissed her again, hard and deep and thankful. “Let’s try those tears on Sophia. ‘Twould be easier than trying to carry her statue out of here and attempting a transformation. For I fear we haven’t got much time.” He glanced with satisfaction at the inert figure of the Sculptor, and nervously looked around for sign of more Others.

  “You’re right.” Amanda tore her gaze away from Liam. She looked at Sophia, still caught in a magic spell that trapped her body and her spirit.

  “I pray to God your tears are all she needs,” he said seriously.

  For a boy who had been raised in poverty and hunger, without love or any proof of goodness, his declaration meant the events of the day had changed him on a bone-deep level. And Amanda was glad. “I pray that, too.”

  Taking her hand, Liam led her over to Sophia’s statue. Pressing her tear-stained cheek against her sister’s, Amanda waited for a long, anxious minute. Waited and, as Liam had said, she prayed.

  Nothing happened.

  Nothing happened.

  Nothing happened.

  She leaned back, rubbed her eyes and pressed the damp to Sophia’s face. “Come on, Sophia,” she whispered. “Come back to me.”

  But her sister was still stone.

  At the realization that she was helpless to bring Sophia back to life, Amanda leaned her forehead against Sophia’s forehead. Tears gathered under her lids, tears compounded of loneliness, heartbreak and love. They splashed on to Sophia’s face.

  She heard Liam’s indrawn breath.

  And beneath her skin, her sister grew warm.

  Amanda straightened. She hardly dared to look. She couldn’t wait to look. She gazed into her sister’s face — and into Sophia’s warm, green eyes.

  Sophia blinked. As if testing out the miracle, she slowly turned her head from one side to the other. She viewed the workshop with loathing, the bodies on the floor with fear, then Amanda and Liam with gathering excitement. In an outburst of youthful exuberance, she flung her arms around Amanda. “You came back for me!”

  “We would have never left you here,” Liam said.

  And Amanda believed him. How could she not? He had been willing to die so Sophia could live. “You look taller!” Amanda said.

  “You look tired.” Sophia sounded older, more mature. “What have they been doing to you, Mandy?”

  “Nothing.” Compared to the torture Sophia had endured, Amanda’s trials were insignificant. “Really nothing. Everything is fine now!”

  Crying and hugging, the sisters held each other.

  Liam gently separated them. “Girls! There’s time enough for a reunion later, when we’re safe.” He herded them into the entry.

  Sophia shivered and looked around. “So many people.”

  Amanda slowed.

  Liam kept a firm grip on her arm, and kept walking. “Be reasonable, darlin’. Even if your tears would work on them, you haven’t got enough fluid in you.”

  “Why wouldn’t they work?” Amanda asked.

  “Your tears freed us because of that one special ingredient they hold — love. You love us. Don’t you?” Liam’s blue eyes pleaded for her agreement.

  She nodded. “I do. You know I do!”

  “That’s why you could free us.” Liam appealed to Sophia. “Isn’t that right?”

  Sophia nodded. “He’s right, Manda. I know he is. And so do you.”

  Amanda reluctantly nodded. She cast another look at the statues of so many people held prisoner by hate. “I only pray that sometime soon, justice will be done.”

  “It will,” Sophia said with a young woman’s fervent belief in fairness. “I know it will.”

  “I think so, too.” Liam started them toward the door again. “Now let’s get back to Irving’s house before the Others realize what happened here.”

  “Are you saying you’re not up for another fight?” Amanda looked at him in concern.

  As he took each step, Liam winced, and every moment, the bruises on his face were darkening to purple. “Darlin’, I’ll fight for you every day of our lives together … and beyond.” He moved to Amanda’s side. Wrapping his arm around her waist, he gingerly pulled her close against him. “Just say you’ll marry me.”

  “Of course she will!” Sophia trilled.

  Amanda looked into his blue, blue eyes, and knew at last she had found her love. “Yes, Liam, of course I will.”

  He kissed her. “Once for luck,” he said, and opened the front door.

  The winter sunshine streamed in … and yet, in the air, there was a hint of warmth, and they heard the single, bright call of a bird.

  Spring was here. They had survived. And Liam and Amanda would be together forever … and beyond.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  THE SCULPTOR awoke to the cold of the marble floor against his spine, and a remarkable tiredness. He still held his hammer … he had been about to break Liam Gallagher to bits when … when that nurse-bitch had done something … to him…

  What had happened?

  In a flash, the horror of his mutilation came flooding back. That nurse-bitch had blinded him. She’d shoved an awl into his eye! He reached up.

  But his eye was there. He explored with his free hand. His eye was fine. Whole. Had he dreamed the whole scene?

  No. It had happened, for dried blood crusted his cheek, and like icy fingers, the first warning of cold fear slithered up his spine.

  Inch by inch, he rolled over. He sat up with a groan. He hadn’t felt so tired in a long time, since Osgood saved him from that wasting disease, from his old age.

  That horrible fight, and the loss of blood … that had caused this fatigue.

  He used the hammer like a cane to help himself stand. His joints ached. He must have been unconscious on the marble floor for hours.

  He looked around his workshop, usually so tidy.

  Crimson spattered his white walls, his pristine worktable. His tools, always so carefully placed, were scattered everywhere. The wheelchair was overturned, the lap robe torn.

  No, he hadn't been dreaming. It really had all happened.

  Yet his eye was healed, and that must mean … that must mean Osgood knew what had occurred here.

  How? Did Osgood have spies here? Was someone watching the Sculptor?

  He glanced around, but saw no one. He hobbled over to the hypodermic needle discarded on the floor. Taking his time — he was so stiff, he had no choice — he leaned over and picked it up. Hand on his back, he straightened, and sniffed the narcotic. No wonder he’d gone out like a light. This was a powerful sedative and pain reliever.

  Amanda, the nurse-bitch, was gone, of course. But somehow she taken the Liam statue and the Sophia statue and fled with them. To move those two heavy statues, she must have had help…

  A horrible thought occurred to him.

  If she hadn’t had help, she must have somehow transformed them back into their human forms.

  Impossible. Liam and Sophia were stone. Only the Sculptor had the power to change them back to flesh and bone.

  The Sculptor's power was mighty.

  Yet the fact remained, they were gone.

  Now fear slid its bitter tentacles into his mind.

  Eric’s corpse was sprawled, face up, blood drenching his neck and chest, face contorted, eyes blind in death. How had that happened? Eric was the strongest, most brutal fighter in the organization. Yet somehow, Liam Gallagher had defeated him.

  Osgood spoke. You humans are so fragile. I shall have to find other tools to use.

  But Osgood wasn’t here. Not in person. It was worse than that. He was inside the Sculptor's head … and that cold, clear voice built terror to another level.

  The Sculptor touched his eye. Again.

  It really was whole.

  The Sculptor swallowed.

  Mercy was not a component of Osgood's charact
er. Yet … why would he have healed the Sculptor if he was displeased? Aloud, in a grateful tone, the Sculptor said, “Thank you, Osgood. I’ve tried to be a good servant to you, and I appreciate you saving my eye.”

  But as he spoke, the eye clouded over.

  He blinked. He rubbed it. Still cloudy.

  He shuffled into the entry, his aching joints making it hard to move. He wove around the statues — there were so many, he would have to rearrange them soon — and over to the large, gild-framed mirror that hung on the wall. He looked at himself — and staggered back in horror.

  Who was that old man in the mirror?

  One eye, the eye that had been pierced, was cloudy with cataracts. Paper-thin skin, covered with brown age spots, covered the fragile-looking bones of his face. Then end of his nose drooped as if it was tired. His neck sagged like a rooster’s, and his lips had vanished in a cyclone of wrinkles.

  Behind him, out of the corner of his good eye, he saw a hostile movement.

  Hammer in hand, he raised his arm and turned, ready to deflect and return a blow. He stared into the entry, heart pounding, chest heaving.

  But only the statues stood there, frozen and white.

  His body had been withered and broken. Was his mind failing now, too?

  No. No. It wasn’t fair. He deserved better than this!

  He clutched the hammer, ready in his defeat and fury to beat the stone, to pound the statues to dust.

  But when he lifted his hand, the sight of the bulging blue veins beneath the skin caught him by surprise. He flexed his fingers; the knuckles bulged with arthritis, and the nails were thick and yellow.

  Old. He was old … again.

  How had this happened?

  Osgood’s voice again. Don’t you know?

  Yes. The Sculptor knew. He had been stripped of his power, returned to the man he was before, and now he faced a slow decline into senility, pain, indignity and finally death. For he had failed to keep his end of the deal … with the devil. And this was his punishment.

  Osgood mocked him. Is it? Is it your punishment? For that was your fate before we made our bargain. Is this truly all the punishment you deserve?