Sleight (40 page)

Sirens broke Henry’s concentration on outlining our escape route. They were close by, though whether from police or ambulance, I couldn’t tel. Judging by the condition we’d left Tiny in, I didn’t doubt both would be on the scene. We hadn’t made it that much farther through town after bolting out the back exit, but we needed to get the hel out of SeaTac before the sirens caught up to us.

He folded the map and shoved it into his coat pocket, puling the final item from the store bag—a hat for him, identical to mine.

Simple but effective disguise, at least for the short term.

“We gotta get going, find a cab to Tacoma,” he said. “Are you alright?”

I nodded. Henry helped me into the straps of my backpack.

“Let me see your hand.” I extended my right hand and he unwound the bandages, wadding up the soiled gauze and dressing and tossing it into the Dumpster. “People saw you with a bandaged hand,” he said, his face apologetic. “Try to keep your fist closed so you don’t pul the burn or get it dirty. Just until we get on the train.” I looked down at the triangular wound, stil blistered on the edges. The burn gel had worked wonders keeping the skin moist and flexible, but the introduction of the cold air made it sting. The Hebrew script from the amulet was evident in the layers of skin, the curves and angles etched into the cels of my hand. If it healed like this, it would provide interesting fodder for future conversation. Of course, the operative word was “future.” We had to survive for that to happen.

Henry linked his arm in mine and we peeked around the front of the building. He moved ahead of me to make sure there weren’t any surprises lying in wait. Lucky for us, we were in an airport town.

Cabs were plentiful.

We slid across the hard plastic back seats of the first one we laid eyes on, a typical yelow four-door that looked like every other cab on the road, its toplight iluminated, black checked graphics splashed across the doors. At first, the driver protested the forty-minute trip, in heavy traffic, south to Tacoma. Until Henry flashed him a wad of cash. The cabbie’s eyes widened like a temperamental child staring at a pink cloud of cotton candy.

Even though we were in the back of a cab, speeding away from the imminent threat of discovery by Lucian, we kept our hats on and slumped down in the seats. Our timing was impeccable—tons of cars, busy sidewalks. Any one of those people could be working against us, and we wouldn’t have known it. I now understood Henry’s earlier paranoia.

Once the driver made it on to Interstate 5, the pace picked up some, thanks to the carpool lane. We sat up straighter, even dared to look out the window. I was reluctant to look at Henry, afraid of what I might see in his face.

“I wonder what happened to our ride,” I said. I had to talk, to break the images cycling through my mind, the flashes accelerating with the prolonged silence. The cab had a plastic shield that separated us from the driver, but I kept my voice low enough that he wouldn’t be able to hear our conversation over his blaring sports radio station.

“Obviously, Lucian got to him, whomever he was. Ted must’ve given Lucian the guy’s number and physical address in his effort to save Irwin,” Henry said, looking out the window at nothing but the grey blur of the concrete freeway divider. “He did the right thing.

It’s an impossible situation. I just hope he’s…” Alive. Neither one of us said it, but it didn’t need to be said.

Instead of talking, Henry stretched his right arm to me. I took his hand, but stayed on my half of the seat. I needed some blank-stare window time, too, and although his hand had returned to the usual safe, warm state he reserved for me, there was a severity to it, a chil. And I’d be a liar if I didn’t feel anxious as his hand wrapped around mine, after what I’d seen him do.

“I lost my letter G necklace. Tiny snapped it off,” I said, not moving my gaze from the landscape as it raced past outside the window.

“We’l get you a new one,” Henry said softly as he stroked my hand with his thumb. That was the sum of our conversation until the cab puled into the lot at the Amtrak station.

The driver made it to Tacoma ten minutes sooner than he’d said he would, likely with the hope of reaping a sizable tip for his skil behind the wheel. Reap he did; as Henry had done with the waitress, he doubled the fare and then some. If he continued his generosity with the members of the local service industry, we might be looking at finding passage to France as stowaways on a cargo ship.

A sense of guarded relief washed over me upon seeing a near-empty parking lot. No black BMWs, no police cars. We hustled toward the train station entrance, as near to without actualy running.

We also couldn’t risk lingering in the open.

I froze when we reached the main doors.

“What?” he said.

I pointed my chin at the newspaper boxes. Henry nodded and opened the front door. “I want you to go into the bathroom and wait for me.” He entered first, tucking me behind him. “I’l knock three times on the door when I have our tickets.” I puled on his arm and stopped him, petrified by the prospect of being separated from him for even a second. “No. I’m coming with you. I’l stand to the side, but I’m not going anywhere that you’l be out of sight.” It didn’t do any good for him to argue with me. I was gluing myself to his side. It couldn’t be any other way, not now, not after our near miss at Denny’s.

The gods were finaly showing us some favor as the next train on the Starlight route was due in forty minutes. Henry purchased tickets for us to get to Los Angeles, although our itinerary hadn’t yet been nailed down. He booked a private sleeper cabin so we could avoid mixing with other southbound travelers. We made good use of the vending machines and smal coffee-and-snack kiosk inside the waiting area and filed what little room was left in our backpacks with candy and granola bars, chips, muffins, cookies, and a few pieces of fruit.

I didn’t want to stop moving, didn’t want to sit in the waiting area amongst other passengers. Families were clumped together, looking happy and excited about the adventure chugging its way down from Seattle. I had to look away from the middle-aged couple tucked into one of the high-back benches, chatting casualy, the wife twisting her rings around her fingers, the husband’s arm comfortable around her shoulders as they watched a toddler a few benches in front of them. It al looked so normal, so easy, so uncomplicated. The entire scene made me sad.

“I need to use the restroom,” I said. “But you have to come with me. No separation, remember?”

Henry didn’t argue, instead folowing me into the bathroom designated for families. Like a true gentleman, he turned away while I did my business. It was truly bizarre to be peeing with Henry present, in this faraway train station, so distant from my life as it existed just a few days ago. Never in a milion years did I expect this week to close on such a ludicrous note. As I sat on the toilet, I laughed. It caught me off guard.

“What’s so funny?” Henry said, his back stil turned.

“I was thinking about how annoyed I was with Junie the other day, how she wanted me to go with her to some party,” I said, fumbling to pul up my pants with one hand. “To think that was the biggest of my worries.”

“Funny how life does that.”

“I don’t know about funny…,” I said, messing with the faucet to get the water temperature right. A scald to the already existing injury was the last thing I needed.

Henry puled paper towels off the dispenser for me.

“You gotta go, too? I promise not to peek.”

“No, I’m good, thanks,” he smiled. His hand was on the doorknob but before he turned it, he faced me. His smile faded, his expression pained.

“Gemma, I’m so sorry. For al of this. I don’t know what else to say.”

“Please, stop. We’ve covered this already. I don’t want you apologizing. This is no more your fault than it is mine.” I touched his arm with my uninjured hand.

“But the thing at the pool hal, with Tiny…,” he paused. “You shouldn’t have had to see that. I’m just realy…embarrassed.” Henry brushed my cheek with his fingertip. I flinched involuntarily.

“See? Now you’re afraid of me.”

I flattened his hand against my cheek, my hand on top of his.

“Henry, I am not afraid of you. Yeah, what happened was freaky as hel, but Tiny got what he asked for. I saw you—I heard you—try to convince him to let go,” I said. “And I am honored that you stepped up to protect me. No one’s ever done anything like that.”

“You mean no one’s ever electrocuted another human being because he puled your hair?” he smiled. Warmth coursed through his palm into my face. That was the Henry I was used to.

“Nope, but I sure could’ve used you when I was a kid. Ash thought it plenty funny to pul me around by my braids.” The smile again dropped off Henry’s face. “Ash… about Ash,” he said, his eyebrows knitted together.

“What?”

“I wasn’t going to mention this until after you’d had some rest,” he said.

“What about Ash? Did Lucian get to him?” I said.

“You could say that.” I dropped my hand from Henry’s. Panic threatened to overwhelm me yet again.

“Oh my God, oh my God, Junie! What about Junie? Lucian said something about her.” I grabbed the lapels of his pea coat.

“No—it’s not that—I don’t know if he has Junie. I’m sure she’s fine, at least for the moment.”

“What are you saying, then, Henry? Please!”

He took a deep breath. “When Lucian answered the cal earlier, before I handed you the phone, Lucian said that Ash was with him.”

“What? First he tortures Irwin, and then he kidnaps Ash?” I began to shake.

“He didn’t kidnap him.” Henry took a moment to let his words sink into my head.

“He’s…helping? He’s helping Lucian look for us?” I whispered.

I relaxed my grip on his coat, my fingers cramping against the thick, coarse wool.

Henry swalowed hard and placed his hand on my shoulder. As if the bottom hadn’t falen away from under my feet often enough as of late, now my circus brother, my lifelong playmate and friend, had gone traitor. He was helping the enemy, a blood-lusting beast, to hunt us down. Ash had gone to the dark side, final proof that he was the shalow, self-serving deviant I’d oft suspected him to be.

Outside in the hal, I could hear a smal child whimpering about having to go pee-pee. A slight knock on the door happened at the same time as the speaker in the ceiling announced the arrival of our train.

“That’s us,” Henry said. “Let’s get into our cabin, and then we can talk al night, okay,?” He lifted my chin with his finger. I nodded.

He opened the door to a little girl bouncing up and down, on the verge of tears. The dad looked unhappy as he pushed past us.

“It says ‘families’ on the door, not teen hangout.” I would’ve given him a dirty look if I’d cared enough.

An Amtrak employee with a sizable roling cart was creeping down the hal in front of us, blocking our way into the main terminal lobby. There wasn’t enough room to squeeze past on either side, and the guy pushing the cart was preoccupied with a heated discussion in rapid-fire Spanish on his wireless headset, oblivious to any other human on the planet.

Overriding the cart attendant’s conversation, I heard snippets of another exchange, the voice familiar.

Henry stopped and puled hard on my arm. He turned and pushed me ahead of him, down the hal in the opposite direction, opening the door at the end that read “Emergency Exit Only.” An alarm set to buzzing right away, but Henry ushered me through quickly enough that by the time the hydraulic arm of the door puled it back into its frame, ceasing the alarm, we were clear of the building.

“Is he here? Is Ash here? I heard him!” Henry put his fingers to my lips to quiet me.

“The amulet—is it warm?” Henry stopped in the darkness at the corner of the building, the only light from a mercury vapor security light flickering its last from high up on a light standard. The train was in sight, a mere twenty feet across the platform to where the conductor was helping passengers up the stairs into their respective cars.

I reached for the charm but it was cool and heavy against my chest. “It’s cold…the amulet is cold,” I said.

Henry fished our tickets out of his jacket pocket. “I want you to walk in my forward shadow, just to my left. Do not look back into the terminal. Keep your eyes on the conductor at the third car from the engine.”

“What—”

He interrupted me, his voice gentle but firm. “Yes, it’s Ash. He’s at the counter talking to the ticket agent.” I knew it. I’d heard him.

“Just move. Quick and quiet, and do not look around. Stay focused on the train.”

I nodded and hooked my arm through his.

“Let’s go,” he said. I did what he’d told me, my head down, moving in unison under the cover of his height, not quite paralel but almost. I watched Henry’s feet and maintained his pace, matching him step for step. From a certain angle, no one would’ve noticed that there were two people walking across the platform, so wel timed were our steps.

Henry shielded me as I handed my ticket to the agent standing at the entry to the third car. She tore a stub from the ticket and handed it back to me, repeating the action for Henry as I scurried up the steps and scoured the door fronts for our cabin number. Henry was fast on my heels and we reached for our cabin doorknob at the same time.

“Ladies first,” he said, pushing the door open for me. The cabin was tiny but private, and for the time being, safe.

Henry dropped my backpack onto the floor and rushed to draw the blinds over the window before turning on one of the reading lamps. He also locked the cabin door, though not before hanging the “Do Not Disturb” sign on the exterior. The conductor would likely come through to double-check our tickets before departure, but for now, perhaps the sign would keep food services and other wel-meaning staff away from this cabin.

We sat across from one another in the dim light, listening as people scooted past in the narrow hal. Someone with a two-way radio outside the window stuffed luggage compartments along the train’s side. The vibration of suitcases being hoisted in and the solid latch and lock of the steel doors resonated through the floor. I was relieved to be sitting, hidden from view, though my head was itching from the coarse yarn of the hat. If Ash had shown photos or given the ticketing agent my physical description, they would’ve easily picked me off had my hair been exposed. Wherever we were headed in the next thirty-six hours, I knew I’d be wise to dye and cut it off. I needed to transform myself into every girl so that I would no longer stand out in a crowd.