Angel Eyes (28 page)
With dimples.
“I know him!”
“Who is he?” Jake asks.
“He works at the Auto Body. In Stratus. He’s supposed to be on a date tonight with—”
Dimples has opened the trunk, and a pair of sequined army boots emerges, bound but kicking.
Kaylee!
I squeal and start forward, but Jake’s arm is already across my waist.
“We’ll get her, Elle,” he says. “But not now.”
I watch in horror as the tall man lifts her from the car. He’s not gentle, but he stands her upright, and I can see she’s able to stand on her own. Red flames surround her body, her hands and feet bound, a bag over her head. The tall man throws her over his shoulder, and Dimples leads him toward the sliding front doors. His head turns slowly this way and that, and after a minute he slides his key into the lock.
Despite the terror I have for Kay, the hands of the men enthrall me. They’re stained red, and I think again of Lady Macbeth.
Dimples unlocks the chain barring the doors, and they enter.
“Okay, Brielle,” Jake says, “tell me.”
“They’re talking,” I say. “I can’t hear them, but I can see they’re talking.” Because the light of the Celestial overrides any other light source, it takes me a moment to figure out what they’re doing. “The tall guy is waving something around the room. I can’t quite . . . Oh, he has a flashlight. He’s waving it around. Oh man, Jake, he’s pointing at certain ones, and Dimples is untying the kids he’s singled out. Three girls, my age maybe.”
The rest of the kids are hardly moving now, and I get a clear view of the girls as they cling to one another and trip after the tall guy. With Dimples’s gun pointed at their little bubble, the girls stumble ahead of him.
“He’s taking them into the office. The three girls and Kaylee.”
“We can’t wait any longer, Brielle,” Jake says, but I’m already reaching for the door handle, my eyes arrested by what’s happening in the little office. The tall guy’s gun is outstretched, menace written in the feverish colors of his face.
And then it happens. So fast. Two sharp blasts into the night air.
Pop! Pop!
Jake’s body tenses beside mine. I grip the door handle, unable to move, even to open it. I watch as the glass bowl shatters, sending potato chips flying like shrapnel. Involuntarily, it seems, the man’s right arm flies into the air as he twists in pain. Another loud
pop
, and the three girls behind Marco drop to the floor. They cover their ears as blood-red flames erupt around the man lounging on the couch. Erratically the inferno throbs into the light of the Celestial, until moments later the flames still and his thin, shadowy arm falls dead to the floor. The crimson flames are motionless now, but their brutal color stains the entire room, and at once I understand their significance.
“Who?” Jake asks quietly. He reaches slowly behind himself and places a hand on Marco’s stirring frame. Immediately Marco’s breathing returns to normal and the snoring resumes.
“The man,” I stutter, as hot tears spring to my eyes. “The slimy little man in the office. He was sleeping. The tall guy shot him.”
I’ve never seen a person’s life end before. I’ve been touched by tragedy more than any one person ever should be, but I’ve never seen it. I’ve never watched a person twist, and wheeze, and try desperately to find another heartbeat, only to come up empty. I think of my mom. I think of . . .
“Do you think it was like that for Ali?” I ask.
“Let’s not think about that right now,” Jake says.
He’s at my door, holding it open. I look into his face, alive with purpose, and I stumble upon courage. They cannot be allowed to harm any of those children. They won’t end another life. Not while I’m here. Not while I can see what they’re doing. What they’re really, really doing.
I take Jake’s hand, and we race across the ravaged street until we stand in front of the sliding warehouse doors. The chain hangs from the left door’s handle, dragging in the dirt. The door is closed, but with a quick tug of Jake’s hand it slides open several inches, bumping the chain with a soft metallic echo—still too loud for my comfort.
He pushes the door open a bit farther, just enough for the two of us to squeeze in. I follow and turn to pull the door shut behind us.
Jake’s hand stops me.
“Leave it,” he whispers, twisting his fingers into mine. “I won’t be able to see much if you close it.”
Around us, whimpers prickle like static electricity. Now that we’re closer, I notice that the black substance coating the floor seems to be oozing from the children—from their very skin.
“What is it, Jake?”
“What is what?” he murmurs, pulling me along.
“The black tar. It’s stuck to everything.” I want to scrub the hateful mud from each of their faces.
“Fear,” Jake answers. “Now you know why it’s so hard to shake.”
Seeing it like this is crushing. How do you eliminate something that multiplies? Something so prolific?
“It’s everywhere.”
“Yes,” Jake says softly. “Fear does that.”
The children are whispering now. They’ve seen us. I let Jake lead me to the center of the room where they’re gathered. They’re tied in groups of four or five around metal poles.
“We’re here to help you,” Jake says quietly. We drop to our knees, and I feel the tar soak through my jeans and slide up my thighs. Lukewarm and soupy at first, its temperature begins to drop, and my body is caught in a battle of climate: the heat radiating from the halo verses the icy fear wrapping me tight. Tears sting my eyes as I look around.
The children are so young—most of them too young to fight back, some of them closer to my age. Here and there they bear the marks of violence, a busted lip, a black eye. Transparent red flames consume these, and although Jake’s voice is kind, they shrink away from us, as far as their ropes will allow.
With both hands I pull the beanie tight to my head, craving the halo’s warmth. I shudder with relief as courage itself seems to creep from under the cap, chasing the chill of fear from my body.
From somewhere comes the sound of a door creaking open and slamming hard against metal. We look around, but even my Celestial eyes can’t find the source.
“Through there,” a boy says, pointing toward the office door, now closed. His eyes are wide in his hollow face, and though he’s far too thin, he’s most likely the oldest of the captives. “There’s a door that opens to the outside. That’s where they hose you off before they sell you.”
“Sell you?” I ask, spitting the bitter words from my mouth.
Large, sad eyes stare back at me, but no one answers.
“No one’s getting sold tonight,” Jake says. “I promise.” He looks around, squinting. “You might not see us for a bit, but we’ll be back.”
Something grabs my free hand, and I jump. I turn to see a girl, no more than ten, clutching at me. Her dirty brown hair has been braided recently.
“I want my mom,” she says.
My jaw trembles. “Me too.”
“Let go, Ali,” an older girl whispers, pulling the child away. The two halves of my broken heart clank and bump together until my chest rises and falls.
“It’s okay,” I tell the older girl, and she loosens her grasp on the child. “Your name is Ali?” The little girl nods at me, and I can’t contain the tears now running down my face. “That’s a beautiful name.”
Child after child inches toward us. I feel another hand on my back. Little fingers close around my ankle. I have never in my life felt so utterly helpless and so absolutely necessary at the same time.
“Feel her hand,” I hear a small voice say.
“His too,” comes another voice.
The child Ali runs an icy finger down my forearm. “You’re warm like the sunshine,” she says. I pull her tiny frame against mine and squeeze with all my might, wishing the heat of the Celestial could warm each and every one of them.
More noise. Heavy thuds echo through the warehouse.
We freeze in our hunched positions as the sound of running water pounds the side of the aluminum building. I stand, knowing I’m the only one able to see through the darkness. I turn my eyes toward the office and focus hard.
I see the vile man dead on the floor and focus on the far wall beyond him. It, too, thins out, and I see all three girls lined up against the building. Dimples directs a garden hose at each of them, and they turn this way and that according to his command. The tall man stands close, his hand wrapped around Kaylee’s bicep. She’s next to him, still bound, still blind, her entire body soaked in fear.
I swallow. “They’re hosing the girls off out back.”
Another car, maybe two, can be heard pulling into the gravel lot outside. And then voices, many different voices, fill the night, heated and arguing.
“We’ll be back,” Jake says, his voice heavy with emotion. “I promise.”
As he says these binding words, the golden light of the Celestial breaks through a smear of tar on Ali’s forehead. The fear glued there dissolves like sugar in water.
I am shaken by this reality—that how we feel, what we do, is all connected inextricably to this realm. It seems the choices we make start here somehow.
The Celestial is every bit as real as the world we walk around in every day, and as I stare around this room of horrors, it occurs to me that the Celestial holds more truth than I’ll ever fully comprehend. The Terrestrial is a facade, a place where we can control how we’re viewed, how our friends and neighbors see us. Here, though, in this heavenly realm, nothing can be covered, nothing hidden. Fear is
literally
painted on the faces of the afflicted.
I turn and look at Jake. His eyes glow white with compassion as he takes in the sea of hopelessness that surrounds us. I, too, would die before I let anything else happen to these children.
“We need to hide,” he says.
Like me, Jake is wrapped up in little arms, all straining against their bonds to reach us. We gently pull ourselves away and scamper to the darkest corner of the warehouse, ducking behind a pile of garbage. As we hunker there I realize we have absolutely no plan. The more I think about it, the more foolish it seems to have come all this way empty-handed. Although what I’d do with a gun, I have no idea. So instead of gripping the lifeless steel of a handgun, my hand blazes hot inside of Jake’s, and I feel brave. Whatever it takes, we’ll get these children out of here.
Still I wonder: Will help come?
Where are the angels when so many lives hang in the balance?
T
wo Shields cut through the air, Helene taking the lead, Canaan just behind. He’s never encountered an angel as fast as she is, and keeping up with her swift movements is exhilarating. A wind, warm against his Celestial skin but frosty cold in the Terrestrial, has picked up, sweeping the storm along with them toward the city. Through flashes of clouds and shimmering raindrops falling anxiously to the ground, they fly.
Canaan opens his mouth and allows the praises of the Almighty to flood his lips. The swell of his tenor is joined by Helene’s melodic alto, vibrantly rich and full for such a tiny being. Together they sing, on and on, until before them, like the surge of a perfect storm, the clouds gather heavy and full. In the distance shocks of lightning fall, and the rumble of thunder shakes the sky. Canaan pulls up, arriving at Helene’s side.
Her mind speaks. “There’s more than one.”
Canaan follows her line of sight until he locates the warehouse nestled at the base of a massive bridge. It’s hardly visible through the haze.
How he hates fear!
Its thick sludge shamelessly glues men to their anxiety, but even worse is the sense of dread it brings as it settles around them like fog. So heavy, so thick is
this
concentration of terror that the two angels can see it easily from a distance.
Atop the warehouse, like the grotesque gargoyles haunting the gothic cathedral of Notre Dame, three demons crouch vigilant. Their forms have deteriorated over the centuries, the light taking its toll. Their strength, however, is not to be underestimated.
“Damien is not among them,” Canaan notes.
“I have no doubt he will join his brothers before long.” Helene is tensed for battle, her hand already resting on the hilt of her blade.
“We must move carefully.”
Helene’s hand eases off her sword, and she drops her head in prayer. A moment later her white eyes find Canaan’s.
“Forgive my impatience. I have worked alone for far too long. I did not expect my attachment to the Father’s beloved to be such. Their sorrow, their fear, is heavy upon me, and your caution is well received. I do not wish to be rash.”
“Victory is secured for the little ones,” Canaan assures her. “Of that I am certain. But there are other lives at stake. We must act decisively.”
She turns her face to the warehouse. “I will follow your lead.”
T
hrough the garbage heap in the far corner of the warehouse, my eyes focus on the gaggle of strangers who have entered. They stand in clusters near the entrance. I’ve lost track of the number of cars I heard pull into the gravel lot outside, but for now at least, all the visitors seem to be indoors.