Ghosts of Manhattan (2 page)

A huge holographic statue of Pegasus dominated the lobby space, flickering ghostly blue as it reared up on its hind legs, its immense wings unfurled over the swathe of terrified civilians below. Above that, an enormous chandelier shimmered in the bright light.

Silence spread through the lobby as everyone turned at once to see who had burst through the doors in such a violent fashion. A woman screamed. The four mobsters offered Ollie and the other man a silent appraisal before raising their weapons.

Ollie was struggling to catch his breath. He couldn't feel his left arm anymore, and he didn't know if this was troubling or a blessed relief. He didn't have time to consider it any further before he found himself unceremoniously dumped against the wall.

"Stay there."

The man in black stepped forward, glancing from side to side. Ollie could see now that his billowing trench coat concealed a number of small contraptions, including what looked like the long barrel of a weapon under his right arm. Dazed, he watched the chaos erupt again before his eyes.

His attacker spread his arms wide, facing the rest of the Roman's men. "Time's up, gentlemen."

One of the mobsters opened fire. There was a series of loud reports as he emptied his chamber, yelling at the others to take the newcomer down. The man in black seemed unconcerned by the spray of bullets, however, waiting as they thundered into the wall behind him, failing even to flinch as the mobster went wide with his shots, too hasty to take proper aim. Ollie watched in dismayed awe as the man gave a discreet flick of his right arm, causing the long brass barrel of the concealed weapon to spin up on a ratchet and click into place along the length of his forearm. It made a sound like a steel chain being dragged across a metal drum.

The man swung his arm around toward the crook who had fired on him and squeezed something in his palm. There was a quiet hiss of escaping air, and then he gave his reply. A storm of tiny steel flechettes burst out from the end of the strange weapon, a rain of silver death, hailing down on the crook and shredding him as they impacted, bursting organs and flensing flesh from bone. It was over in a matter of seconds. The shattered body crumpled to the floor, gore and fragments of human matter pattering down around it in a wide arc. The teller who had been standing beside the felon dropped to the floor in a dead faint, the pile of cash in his hands billowing out to scatter all around him as he fell.

The vigilante didn't wait for the stutter of another gun. He rolled forward and left, moving with ease, and came up beside the holographic statue, his weapon at the ready. Another hail of flechettes dropped the man in the gallery above, sending him tumbling over the rail, his face a mess of blood and broken bone fragments. He crashed to the marble with a sickening crunch, his limbs splayed at awkward angles.

The mobster guarding the civilians-who Ollie knew as Bobby Hendriks-wasn't taking any chances. He leapt forward, grappling with one of the women on the floor and dragging her to her feet. Looking panicked, the heavyset man pressed a knife to her throat, which gleamed in the bright electric light as he turned the blade back and forth, threatening to pull it across her soft, exposed flesh. The woman-a pretty blonde in a blue dress-looked terrified and froze rigid, trying not to move in case she somehow made the situation worse.

"I'll kill her! I'll kill her!" His voice was a gravelly bark.

The man in black flicked a glance at Hendriks, and then back at the other mobster guarding the tellers, who were still furiously emptying the cash drawers. He stepped toward Hendriks and the hostage.

Hendriks stepped back, mirroring the movement. He pressed the blade firmly against the woman's throat, drawing a tiny bead of blood. She wailed in pain and terror.

A shot went off. The man in black flinched as a bullet stroked his upper arm, tearing a rent in his clothing and drawing a line of bright blood on his skin. He turned on the gunman, but Ollie realized he wasn't able to get a clear bead due to the tellers. Instead, the man reached inside his trench coat and gave a sharp tug on a hidden cord.

There was a roaring sound, like the deep rumble of a distant explosion. Bright yellow flames shot out of two metal canisters strapped to the backs of the man's boots, scorching the floor. Ollie stared on, bewildered, as the stranger lifted entirely into the air, propelled by the bizarre jets, and shot across the lobby at speed, flitting over the prone civilians and swinging out above the mobster's head. He didn't even need to fire his weapon. Bringing his feet around in a sweeping movement, he introduced the searing flames to the gunman's face, who gave a gut-wrenching wail as his flesh bubbled and peeled in the intense heat. He dropped on the spot, still clutching his gun, hungry flames licking around his ears and collar.

The man in black reached inside his coat and pulled another cord. The flames spat and guttered out. He crashed to the floor, landing in a crouch on one knee. All eyes were on him. He climbed slowly to his feet and stood, regarding the last of the felons.

"I'll kill her! I'll kill her!" Hendriks was swinging the girl around as he looked for an escape route, edging away from this terrifying man who had come out of nowhere and murdered his companions. "I'll kill her! I'll kill her!"

When he spoke, the vigilante's voice was drenched in sorrow. "You already have."

Hendriks looked down at the girl in his arms. Sudden realization flashed on his face. His knife was half-buried in the woman's throat, blood seeping down to drench the front of her dress, matting the fine hairs on his forearm. Shocked, he stumbled backward, allowing the dead woman to slide to the floor, the knife still buried in her flesh. "Oh crap. Oh crap. I didn't mean to do it. Hey, mister, I didn't mean it! I just-"

There was a quiet snick. Something bright and metallic flashed through the air. Hendriks' head toppled from his shoulders, the stump spouting blood in a dark, crimson fountain. The body pitched forward, dropping to the floor. The head rolled off to one side. Ollie glanced round to see a metal disk buried in the wall behind the body. He started to scramble to his feet.

All around, people were screaming, getting up off the floor, and rushing toward the exits. The massacre was over. Or at least Ollie hoped it was over. He needed to get to his car, fast.

The man in black stooped low over the body of the dead hostage. He seemed to be whispering an apology, but Ollie wasn't quite able to hear over the noise of the crowd.

Ollie backed up, edging toward the burst double doors. His arm was hanging limp and useless by his side, he was sure his rib cage had been shattered, and he was still bleeding from the back of his skull. Even if he made it out of there alive, he'd never be the same again.

He saw the stranger's red eyes lift and fix on him from across the lobby. He didn't know what to do, didn't dare turn and run or take his eyes off the stranger for a second. The man watched him for a moment, unmoving. Then in three or four graceful strides, he was on top of him. He grasped Ollie by the collar and the fat man whimpered as the vigilante leaned in close. He could feel the hot breath on his face, smell the coffee and whisky it carried. Ollie's heart was hammering hard in his chest. Was this how it was going to end?

"Today, you get to live."

Ollie nearly fainted with relief. "I ... I-"

"But you take a message to the Roman for me."

Ollie nodded enthusiastically, and nearly swooned from the movement.

"You tell him he's not welcome in this town anymore."

The stranger dropped Ollie in a heap on the ground and then stepped over him, making slowly for the exit, his boots clicking loudly on the marble floor.

Ollie's mouth was gritty with blood. He called after the mysterious figure. "Who ... who are you?"

The man shrugged and kept on walking. "Death," he said, without bothering to look back.

ggs! I need eggs, Henry. Two of them. With a side of toast." Gabriel Cross dropped the morning paper onto the breakfast table and leaned back in his armchair, stretching his weary limbs. He was a thin, wiry man in his mid-thirties, clean-shaven, with hair the color of Saharan sand. He was dressed in an impeccable black suit, of the expensive variety, but wore his collar splayed open, betraying his innate sense of informality. Some, he knew, would call him louche for such behavior, but he preferred to consider himself freethinking, unbound by the stuffy conventions of the age. In truth, he was simply unbound by the conventions of money; he had about him the casual air of the exceptionally rich.

Yawning, Gabriel surveyed the aftermath of the prior evening's entertainment. His eyelids were heavy with lack of sleep. All around him, devastation reigned. The drawing room was cluttered with discharged glasses, a few still holding the remnants of their former owners' drinks. Accompanying these were the pungent stubs of fat, brown cigars and pale cigarettes; even a woman's red silk scarf and a man's topcoat, abandoned there in the early hours by drunken lovers, carefree and searching for intoxication of a different kind.

Gabriel had a love/hate relationship with New York society; it loved him-or rather, it loved his wealth and status-and he hated it. He disliked "society" as a concept. To him it was a metaphor for the socially inept, the "upper" classes, a means of filling one's head with notions of self-import and grandeur. Yet he adored people. He needed people. He surrounded himself with them, night and day. He was an observer, a man who watched life. An artist without a canvas, a writer without a page. He lived to amuse himself, to attempt to fill the vacant space where a real life should have been.

Gabriel Cross was a nothing. A man defined by his inheritance, characterized by his former life. He'd heard people whispering in hushed tones at the party, huddled in small groups under the canopy on the veranda, or leaning up against the doorjambs in the drawing room, drinks in hand. "Yes, it's true! He used to be a soldier. I heard he fought in the war." Or, "A pilot, I heard. But now he just throws parties. Parties! Who needs parties?"

Gabriel knew they were right. Yet they swarmed to his Long Island parties like honeybees searching for pollen, intent on finding something there that would make their own lives that little bit easier to bear. He had no idea what it was. If he did, he would administer it to himself in liberal doses.

Gabriel rubbed a hand over his bristly chin. "Better send a Bloody Mary with those eggs, Henry. God knows, it's going to be one of those days." He turned and looked out of the window at the sound of a motorcar hissing onto the driveway in the watery morning sun. Its wheels stirred the gravel track, whilst black smoke belched from its rear funnel. He recognized the sleek curves of its ebony bodywork, as well as those of its owner, who sat in the driving seat, her head and shoulders exposed to the stiff breeze. It ruffled her shock of bright auburn hair as she turned toward the house and saw him watching. Smiling, she raised her hand and offered him a brief wave. Gabriel smiled and raised his own hand in reply. He watched her climb out of the car's side door, swinging her shapely legs down from the cab. Gabriel felt his heart beat a little faster in his breast. Celeste. Celeste Parker.

He'd missed her at the party. Missed the opportunity to peel away with her to a quiet spot and blot out the presence of everyone else. But he was also pleased, in a sense, that she hadn't come. She didn't need the party, not like everyone else needed the party. And for that reason, if no other, he was very much in love with her.

Gabriel listened to the sound of her heels crunching on the gravel, a soft rap on the front door with a gloved fist, Henry's footsteps as he crossed the hallway to let her in. Smiling, Gabriel retrieved the newspaper from the breakfast table and rustled it noisily, as if intent on continuing with an article he had earlier abandoned. He attempted to exude his most nonchalant air. He knew Celeste would see through this ruse, but then, such was the game they played.

A moment later the drawing room door creaked open. Gabriel didn't look up from the newspaper to watch Celeste enter the room. She hovered for a moment at the threshold, silent save for her soft inhalation, awaiting his acknowledgement. The moment stretched. Gabriel turned the page and pretended to scan the headlines.