Wraith, page 23
She’s too damn pretty, I realise, as I clock the flutter of movement and talk around us. It’s a cat-and-pigeons situation right here. If her face has been especially designed to turn Satan’s head, it’s going to turn anyone’s. ‘Kit Tyburn’ will probably find out we’ve arrived before we even leave the terminal building and we’ll have lost any element of surprise. ‘We just need to get to Riley’s Island as quickly as possible,’ I say hurriedly, pushing my sweaty spectacles back up my nose, smudging the lenses even more.
I see a man standing not six feet away snap a furtive picture of Nuriel, before he sees me glaring and shoves his phone back into a pocket of his jeans. If he works out that the latest internet sensation has somehow made it from London to Florida at pretty much warp speed, we’ll soon have a crowd. We have to move.
Micah’s face has fallen at the mention of Riley’s Island — a mere five-minute drive from the terminal — but before he can back away in search of a better fare, I reach into my tote and hastily pull out the tan purse. I fold his fingers over it. ‘There are two hundred pounds sterling in here,’ I say crisply. ‘You can have it all, Micah Gittens, if you take us to Riley’s Island right now.’
I hook an arm through Nuriel’s, propelling her in the direction of the purple cab.
Waving his hand in apology at all the traffic we’re holding up, Micah hurries us across the concourse, shoving the purse back into my hands while using his keys to unlock the SUV.
‘You sure they on the island know you’re coming?’ he says as he opens the back door to let us in.
Nuriel slides in first, tension in every taut line of her slender body.
I get in next, nodding as I look up at Micah standing by the open passenger door. ‘She was personally invited.’ I jerk my head in Nuriel’s direction. ‘I’m just her frumpy assistant.’
Micah frowns. ‘The police been out to Riley’s Island many times. Even made the Keys News, I remember. People coming and going — people who told people they would be there, then they ain’t, they’re nowhere t’all, you know what I’m saying? Now two like you? Need to be extra safe. Funny things going on, on that island.’
Then he shuts the door and minutes later we’re turning out of the airport and left onto South Roosevelt Boulevard.
The Atlantic Ocean is a dark, moonless presence to our right as Micah pulls his SUV in under a row of towering palms dividing the roadway from a narrow pedestrian walkway overlooking the sea below. He points to a narrow single-lane bridge, not twenty feet away. ‘To get onto Riley’s Island, you’re gonna go through a security checkpoint right at the end, okay? Big steel gates, wise guys, the whole drill.’ He screws up his face and makes hulking big gorilla arms and shoulders to illustrate his point. ‘There are cameras. Dogs. Buster’s always been real particular about security. But…’
‘He hasn’t been seen for a while?’ I finish softly.
Micah turns and looks at us in the darkness. ‘Like I said, he’s nowhere t’all. Not just Buster. Girls, pretty as you two. They go in, they don’t come out. But no one can say for sure they were ever there. Always no proof, just hearsay. The police go in and everything looks spick, span, orderly — just another rich man’s house, you know? No sign of struggle, no sign anyone even been living there. You sure you don’t want me to keep on driving? Plenty of nicer places ’round the Keys.’
Nuriel’s response is to open her passenger-side door to signal that the discussion is over. We both watch her lurch out onto the walkway beside the road, stumbling into the shadow of one of the tall palms some distance from the car, hands over her face like she’s crying — or praying. I slide the small leather purse onto the armrest between the two front seats.
‘I can’t take two hundred pound, it’s too much, dear,’ Micah mutters, as he frowns at Nuriel’s hunched outline beneath the trees.
‘We don’t need money where we’re going,’ I insist. ‘You’d best head off now, Micah. You never saw us. We were never here either.’
Micah’s brown eyes on me are troubled.
The car engine doesn’t start up again until I set foot on the bridge with its tall set of automatic steel gates, topped by razor wire, barring the end of it, two guard boxes of stainless steel and glass facing each other just inside them. As I turn to give Micah a wave, I catch the whites of his eyes as he does a slow U-turn. He’s still looking back over his shoulder at us as he drives back the way we’ve come.
24
‘Nuriel!’ I hiss into the trees. ‘Please let’s go before I lose my nerve completely? I’d like to get the slaughter and mayhem over with while the night is still young.’
The salt-laced air is warm, but I can’t stop shivering.
After a moment, Nuriel straightens as if she’s come to a decision and crosses the hard shoulder of the road towards me, linking her arm through mine. Her skin is still fever-hot to touch, but gives off only the faintest gleam in the dark. I can feel how hard she’s trying, all the coiled tension inside her as she struggles to lock her light away. In this moment, she’s probably the most human she’ll ever be.
As we walk forward to the bridge together, banks of floodlights along the entire span suddenly flare brighter, turning it an eye-searing white.
I shield my eyes with my left hand, the glare bouncing off my plastic lenses, gut twisting with the fear that some trigger-happy clown is going to start taking pot shots. We’re so exposed out here. Our shadows stretch out before us, weirdly attenuated, and I have to force my feet to keep moving. Time becomes elastic, the road going on and on. The sweat pours off me, making my tee-shirt stick to my skin.
But Nuriel seems to grow taller as we progress, as if she’s remembering what she’s capable of, what she used to be. The light flares in the ends of her long hair, illuminating the pure, hard lines of her face. Beyond the gates, I glimpse a watchful shape emerge from the guard box on the right, then the one on the left, each man resting the flat of one hand on the assault rifle slung across his torso.
‘Human,’ Nuriel mutters immediately.
I nod, having come to the same conclusion only a beat behind her. ‘In that case, just stand there looking achingly beautiful and leave the talking to me,’ I whisper in return, my lips barely moving.
We reach the heavily spot lit area in front of the barred gates after an eternity of walking. I’m drenched in sweat as if I’ve sprinted the entire distance, though it’s been less than a kilometre at most. In contrast, Nuriel’s flawless, lit-up features could be carved from marble. Even under the harsh lights she’s radiant, something completely apart from the rest of us. She sweeps her heavy fall of honey-coloured hair away from her face, giving the two men behind the gates a better view of her arresting features, swan’s neck and perfect breasts. As they move towards the bars from their side of the gates, I approach them as well, pasting a huge, goofy grin on my dial and waving my hands over my head excitedly like I’m landing a chopper.
The men are only a couple of feet away now and I’m rocked by an intense feeling of relief that neither of them is the man — the one I’ve imagined beating to death with just the length of clear perspex and the fat romance novel hidden in my tote bag.
High on adrenaline, I cock my right hip, cross my arms and say in my best sing-song East Enders, ‘We’re here to see “the real” Kit Tyburn, gents? We’re expected, like?’
The two men give me cold, lizard-like stares for a moment before one of them returns to the guard box on the left and the gates begin to part smoothly. I have to resist giving Nuriel the double thumbs-up like an overexcited kid.
The two guards step forward through the open gates, rifles swinging slightly as they draw closer. They look down the length of the bridge in the direction of Key West before their suspicious gazes alight back on us: two oddly-dressed birds who’ve fetched up in the dead of night, looking well up for it.
As the men stare at Nuriel, I see a moment of pure confusion pass across their hard faces. She’s a vision, a mirage, the loveliest thing they will ever see in their lives, guaranteed.
‘Who’s asking?’ one of the men rasps finally in heavily accented English, as though he’s struggling to wake from a dream. He’s only just above average height, but built like a cube of muscle; his face and head are close-shaven, and he’s dressed all in black and fully menacing, just like Skorobogatov’s goons at the Argo.
‘Cibyyl, you know, love, the indie singer and next big thing?’ I give a girly snort-giggle, trying to channel bubbly airhead as I push my big, hipster spectacle frames back up my nose and flap my right hand near my face like I’m fanning myself. ‘The girl who just broke the internet? I’m her PA slash dresser slash publicist? We was invited, love?’
A flash of recognition crosses the security guard’s face as he considers Nuriel with deep-set, hooded eyes, licking his lips as if she’s something good to eat.
‘Why don’t you check with one of them higher-ups?’ I can’t resist saying. ‘Your boss won’t thank you for making him wait! You know what a temper he has. Got an itch in his pants, that lad, and I don’t blame him. I mean, look at her.’
At an impatient signal from the other man, Cube stumps reluctantly back into the guard box on the right to make what I’m guessing is an urgent call back to the main house while the second guy — taller, with a wiry build and close-cropped black hair — starts circling the two of us, his gaze immediately dismissing me, the plain bint in the oversized face furniture.
He ogles Cibyyl unashamedly, eyes running all over her like a pair of wandering hands. But all she gives him is an imperious, unblinking Go to hell stare that would put even Irina to shame. The man actually looks away first, a faint blush on his high cheekbones.
Then he squints at me as if he’s only just remembered what he’s supposed to be doing out here, and raises his hands in my direction like he’s reaching for a couple of ripe melons. He squeezes the air between us and I back up in haste.
‘Whoah there, buddy!’ My laughter sounds strained, even to my ears. ‘Looking, no touching, mate. We’re ladies.’
The Cube stumps back out of the guard house on the right at that moment and swings the muzzle of the semi-automatic he’s wearing up into my face. ‘No touching, no enter,’ he drawls, waving at his compatriot to deal with me while he gets on with a full body search of Nuriel.
His expression goes dreamy as he walks towards her, flexing his thick fingers like he’s about to play the piano.
I close my eyes at the taller man’s approach, fearful of the violations that are about to occur, when the ground begins to tremble beneath my feet. It’s so faint at first that I think I’m imagining it, until there’s a sudden sharp retort like the distant boom of cannon fire, or something cracking.
My eyes flash open as one of the security guys yells, ‘Ty che, b’lyad?’
I recognise one of Irina’s favourite profanities.Which makes these guys as Russian as the hired muscle at the Argo.
But there’s no time to wonder about it now, because bigger shocks start transmitting up through the ground into my feet.
It feels like Great Eastern Street all over again and I hiss in Nuriel’s direction, ‘Are you doing this?’
There’s another sharp retort, louder and closer this time, and I rock on my feet, hands and arms shooting out to steady myself.
Nuriel’s headshake is barely perceptible. Her dark eyes are so wide and watchful now they seem black; her posture so steady she might be floating just off the ground. But I can’t look down to check, because I’ll fall. It’s taking everything I’ve got to stay on my feet as the side-to-side rocking of the bridge goes into overdrive, like a waking animal trying to shake us off.
Somewhere behind us, the bridge is giving way.
Nuriel’s hand shoots out and grasps me hard by one elbow.
‘B’lyad!’ the other man shrieks as the two guards fall at our feet, roaring in fear.
A large crack opens between us and the thrashing bodies on the asphalt. It snakes across the bitumen like forked lightning. Through it, I can glimpse the darkly churning sea. The noise is immense.
Then the metal halide light banks overhead fail simultaneously, exploding outwards in blistering sprays of metal and glass, and we’re plunged into instant darkness. Hot fragments of glass rain down painfully into my hair.
The gap widens, the lip of the broken roadway rising before me as the men try to grab for my ankles across the parting span. I lurch backwards, tipping, halfway to falling on my arse on the wrong side of the gates, when Nuriel loops an arm like an iron band under my armpits and —
Vaults us up and over the gap.
It lasts forever, for the blink of an eye.
There’s so much effortless power in her it steals my breath away.
I imagine I hear the sound of giant wings as we pass over, and I know I have felt this before — flight. Mercy made the same sound leaping off the ground in the Argo. She — we — fell on the demon Hakael from above like cold fury. The sense of déjà vu I’m feeling is dizzying. She’d been in me, at the wheel. We’d done it together — torn him apart. I feel intense nausea at the fleeting memory.
All I get is an impression of the men’s pale and terrified faces at least eight feet below us as we sail across the widening breach in the darkness, nothing but air beneath my wildly cycling legs.
Then I’m back on solid ground — there’s not even a jolt as my feet touch the earth — and Nuriel propels us forward through the open gates at a run, her arm still around me like a vice. The fearful, flighty creature who wouldn’t even meet my eyes at the warehouse is gone. Nuriel’s steeliness, her absolute lack of fear in this moment, remind me so much of Mercy it’s uncanny. I can see how, once, they would have been like sisters.
I rub at the hard nub beneath my breastbone. The ground on this side of the rift is completely still, reassuringly solid. At a look from my companion, the heavy security gates behind us swing shut with a groan — the mechanism forced backwards along its tracks by Nuriel’s will alone — barring the two howling, terrified Russians outside the island estate.
She slows to a walk on the lamp-lit, paved carriageway that leads in a series of sinuous, terrain-hugging curves up to the main house. She doesn’t look back again, but over my shoulder I catch sight of the bridge peeling away in sections from the Key West end, the destruction an unstoppable chain reaction like the spine of some giant prehistoric beast collapsing. The section beneath the two men falls away, and they drop straight into the water with the rest of the debris, their screams lost in the roar of falling concrete.
I blink and swallow, unable to tear my eyes away from the space where the bridge had been. Not even the supportive concrete pylons remain. The Atlantic has taken everything, and the island is an island once again. Between us and Key West now lie hundreds of metres of open water.
‘That should — what is the term you people use? — buy us some time,’ Nuriel murmurs, her eyes never leaving the road ahead.
I turn back and study her profile fearfully, realising that when the elohim make judgment, they carry it out. Absolutely and without hesitation.
‘If it wasn’t you who did that to the bridge,’ I whisper, ‘who was it?’
Her eyes flick upwards in reply and I see, above the trees, the sky glowing a bright crimson.
‘Whoever did that,’ she replies tersely.
I flinch as a wailing alarm splits the night air.
‘Ours not to reason why, ours but to do and die — isn’t that what you English like to say? Friend or foe,’ Nuriel rasps, ‘the chaos can only be to our advantage and we must use it. Lucifer is already under attack.’
She picks up her pace, stalking up the driveway lined with lush, tropical foliage towards the fire raging in the distance. I have to take three running steps to keep up with just one stride of hers.
As we come close to the end of the curving drive, I see a natural, grassy plateau, encircled by tall palms. Through the gap in the trunks up ahead, I catch sight of Buster Strang’s sprawling colonial-style mansion already well alight. Flames lick out of multiple chimneys, roar up the whitewashed walls. Even as I watch, the fire engulfing the main house begins to branch out — moving like no fire I’ve ever seen. It spreads out in arrow-straight lines across the manicured emerald lawns, racing towards the showy, glass-fronted garage to the right of the house before climbing up the floodlights surrounding the clay court to the rear. From somewhere inside the mansion there’s the sound of an assault rifle going off in a series of erratic bursts, followed by a bloodcurdling scream. Then I hear an explosion of superheated glass— probably the conservatory wing going up.
It’s as if the fire is sentient. It streaks across open green spaces devoid of viable fuel. The flames fork and split all over the place, like that crack that almost tore the front of the Darley Hotel into pieces, as if the fire is searching for something specific. There’s another burst of uneven gunfire from within the tree line somewhere close by and I see a burning man stagger out of the undergrowth, his rifle still clutched in one hand. He falls face-first onto the edge of the lawn and lies still, and I could swear the heat spikes in intensity for a second.
Before my eyes, things that shouldn’t burn — an elegant stone fountain, a grouping of cast iron garden chairs and tables — are all consumed by these questing flames that have a corrosive tinge of silver-grey at their heart.
Demonsign.
Nuriel sees it, too, and her dark eyes, brilliant in the firelight, narrow dangerously.
She shakes me off like an irritant. I have to run to keep her in sight as she plunges through the line of palms bordering the plateau, each one going up like an outsized sparkler: boom, boom, boom. Even the floral border of the circular drive is ablaze, the inferno sucking up all the oxygen, taking everything in its path. There’s a huge flash of light as something to the rear of the garage goes up — maybe an electrical transformer or some kind of generator — and I’m almost floored by the sound and the shockwaves that follow.
