Ghosts of War (16 page)

Donovan shrugged. He was still shivering with the cold. “Possibly. Possibly not. Although it seems odd that our British spy would show an interest in something so localized if it were entirely unrelated.”

“My thoughts exactly,” said the Ghost.

Donovan looked up at him, searching his face with tired eyes. “How the hell are we going to get to the bottom of this, Gabriel? Are you going to try to catch another of those things?”

The Ghost shook his head. “No, I've got a better plan. I need to find out where they're taking them, all those people they're abducting. What they're using them for.”

“But you've tried following them before. You said they were too quick.”

The Ghost smiled. “Yes. But this time I'm going to let
them
do all the work.”

“What do you mean?” Donovan gave him a confused look.

The Ghost's grin grew suddenly wider. “Tomorrow night, Felix, Gabriel Cross is going to get himself abducted.”

“Y
ou're what?”

Donovan had hardly been able to believe what he was hearing. He knew that Gabriel could be reckless, but this new plan, to go and get himself abducted by one of the raptors, elevated things to an entirely new extreme. “Have you got a death wish?” he'd asked drily, only half joking.

The Ghost had met his eye, a grave expression on his face, his trench coat billowing up around him in a sudden, wintry gust. “Can you think of a better way to get to the bottom of this, Felix?” he'd replied, and Donovan had faltered, unable to find a response. Truthfully, he really couldn't think of a better way of locating the raptors' lair.

They still didn't, after all, have any idea of what the raptors were really up to, where they were taking the people they abducted, or what they were doing with them. There was a chance the whole business was mixed up with the British spy and whatever the commissioner was involved in. Nevertheless, it still didn't sit well with Donovan. The risks were manifold and immense.

“Look, I'll need someone to follow me. I can slow it down, give you time to follow behind in your car. I'll be delivered right into its nest, and you and Ginny—”

“Hold on! Are you insane, Gabriel?” It was this that had really set Donovan's alarm bells ringing. “I can't bring that girl with me on an errand like that. If you want to put yourself at risk, well, that's up to you. I'll even allow you to take risks with
my
life, if they're strictly necessary. But Ginny? We've made those mistakes before, Gabriel. Can't you remember?” Almost immediately after saying this he felt guilty for what he considered to be a cheap shot. But the point still stood.

The Ghost had looked away, glancing off over the rooftops for a moment and refusing to meet Donovan's eye. When he'd spoken again, his voice had taken on a stern, measured edge. “Of course I remember. But don't think for a minute that this is in any way the same situation. You've seen Ginny handle herself, Felix. She's no shrinking violet. And besides, you'll need someone to spot for you while you drive. She can call out directions.”

Donovan had sighed. “Fine,” he'd said, but his tone had made it clear it was anything but…and yet here he was, sitting behind the wheel of his car, the girl Ginny beside him, both of them watching the figure on the ledge high above. Now, Donovan wished he had argued harder. He was worried he'd allowed it to happen because he wanted company out here, tonight. Stakeouts like this always passed much more quickly with someone else around, and the Ghost had been right—when the time came he would need someone to spot for him while he tried to maneuver through the streets in pursuit of the raptor, trying desperately not to mow anyone down.

And who else was there? It wasn't as if he could bring Mullins. He, like the rest of the men at the precinct, saw the Ghost as some sort of radical, a criminal gone crazy, out to get even with the mob. Yes, they were happy to turn a blind eye when the Ghost was making their lives easier, breaking protection rackets and weeding out contract killers. Either that or they were too afraid to take him on themselves, either because they believed the superstitions and thought him to be some kind of superpowered monster, or else they were up to their eyeballs in the stink of their own corruption and were terrified he'd find them out.

It was a shame Mullins had fallen in with those idiots. He had the potential to be a great cop. But he was young and impressionable and hadn't yet learned the lessons that Donovan had—to always think for himself. That was the key to successful police work, Donovan had found—ignoring the received wisdom of others and taking a fresh look at anything and everything. That, in his opinion, was where so many others failed.

Mullins was learning, though. He had great intuition, but he hadn't yet learned to question policy and rhetoric. Until he had, he'd never be able to recognize someone like the Ghost for what he really was: the best hope the city had of ridding itself of the criminal blight under which it was now in sway.

The Ghost was unconventional, yes; free and easy with the law, certainly. Yet Donovan knew that Gabriel's heart was in the right place. The Ghost wanted only to do what was right for the people of the city, and frustrated by the bureaucracy and corruption that plagued the police force, he had taken it upon himself to act. Donovan could respect that. In some ways, he wished he could do the same.

It wasn't that he didn't have his doubts about the Ghost on occasion, of course. He sometimes wondered if Gabriel's desire for vengeance stemmed not only from frustration but also from something darker inside of the man, a need to lash out at the world. What was it that Gabriel was fighting? Yes, of course, he could give it a name in the shape of the crime bosses and corrupt politicians, the serial killers and pimps. Donovan couldn't help thinking, though, that it was somehow more abstract than that, something more innate. He supposed he'd never know, wasn't sure that he wanted to. Gabriel had become a good friend to him, and the Ghost was a useful tool for them both. As long as he stayed on the right side, not of the law, but of Donovan's moral code, then he would continue to cover for him and keep his neck off the chopping block at the precinct.

Mullins, the commissioner, the other men at the precinct—none of those others would ever understand that. All they could see was a violent criminal operating outside of the law. If Donovan's association with the vigilante were ever to come to light, all they would see there, too, was his complicity.

Well, increasingly, Donovan was beginning to think it was Commissioner Montague who was complicit. Throughout the day he'd observed the comings and goings of the man and his visitors. He'd been surprised to see Senator Isambard Banks return for an interview that lasted over an hour, although this time Donovan had not been summoned to pay lip service to the man. Nevertheless, it did much to confirm Donovan's suspicions that the commissioner was mixed up in something he shouldn't have been.

There'd been more abductions, too, during the night. And even now Mullins was on the trail of those missing people, interviewing the family and friends, tracing their last known movements. Donovan knew it would be no use, though. If the raptors had taken them—which undoubtedly they had—the poor bastards would most likely already be dead. He'd know soon enough, anyway, if Gabriel's plan worked.

He'd had to call Mullins off the whole Lucarotti matter that morning. The commissioner had shut it down following their conversation the previous day. Mullins had informed Donovan upon his arrival at the precinct that morning that the decree had come during the night: all investigations into the background of Paulo Lucarotti were to be considered a waste of police resources and were to be immediately dropped. They should be focusing on finding the missing British spy, or quelling the fears of the population regarding the persistent rash of abductions, the commissioner had said.

This, to Donovan's eyes, was as good as an admission of guilt. There was now no doubt in his mind that the commissioner was involved in the whole affair. First, Montague's signature had inexplicitly featured on the man's release papers, and now this.

The whole thing made him utterly furious. The commissioner had traded in the press on his stance regarding bribery and corruption. He pledged honesty and openness. His entire tenure as commissioner had been built on those tenets. He'd spent years weeding out the corrupt elements in the force, stifling the reach of the mob. He claimed his dream was an untouchable police force, free from bribery and the fingers of organized crime. Yet it seemed now he was as guilty as any of the men he'd put away for such crimes. Worse, though, it made him a liar and a cheat, a hypocrite. And Donovan despised hypocrisy.

If the commissioner proved to be involved in the deaths of those twelve people and worse, if he had sold his soul to Isambard Banks, involving himself in a plot that sanctioned the creation of the raptors and the recent spate of abductions, Donovan would expose him. He would bring it to an end. The commissioner would rot in an uncomfortable cell, much smaller and less opulent than his office. He might even find himself in a box, six feet under the ground.

For now, though, Donovan had a very different job to do. Gabriel was up there on a ledge waiting for the raptors. Donovan had to keep him alive. He had to be ready for when the raptors swooped.

Tonight they would flush the diabolical things out of their nest. They would discover the truth about what had been going on, the reason for the abductions. And, with any luck, they would still be alive in the morning.

Gabriel stood on the ledge atop the building and looked out over the city below. The freezing fog of the previous night had cleared somewhat, and here and there between the thick, yellow clouds were windows to the starry night beyond.

It was cold, chilling him to the core, and his legs felt leaden with exertion. He'd had to climb his way here via the conventional route: taking the stairs. The elevators had been out of order. Perhaps now, he smiled to himself, he had a little bit more sympathy for Donovan.

He'd decided not to equip himself with the Ghost's many accoutrements this evening. It wasn't so much that he felt he didn't need them—he would probably need them more than ever—but more that he couldn't risk being recognized by the raptors. He had no notion of whether the things had any real sense of intelligence, or whether they even
could
recognize him from their previous encounters, but if they did, the whole enterprise would fall to pieces.

So, instead, he'd come dressed as a civilian, as Gabriel Cross, and he hoped that this would be enough to lure them in. He would make himself seem like easy pickings, offering himself up to the brass flock.

Gabriel had upon him a number of concealed weapons, of course, including the long barrel of his fléchette gun, hidden in the arm of his pinstripe suit. He hefted it now, feeling comforted by its weight, by the feel of the rubber trigger bulb in his palm.

The wind whipped Gabriel's hair about his face. He felt naked, disadvantaged, without his night vision goggles or his black trench coat and rocket boosters. It was as if, up here, awaiting these demonic, shining golems, he had come without his protective mask, and the feeling unnerved him. Perhaps Ginny had been right. The Ghost was no more than a simple disguise to hide behind.

Tonight he was not
Gabriel Cross
, the playboy millionaire, the exsoldier. Nor was he simply the Ghost in plain clothes. Tonight, this was the real Gabriel, standing there, vulnerable on the rooftop. The thought terrified him. For the first time in years he was revealing himself to the world. The lines were blurring. One man was becoming the other.

Gabriel closed his eyes and held his arms out at his sides, feeling the crosswinds here at the top of Fifth Avenue buffet him gently, rocking him back and forth on the ledge. The previous night, Donovan had asked him if he had a death wish, and he'd been unable to answer the question directly. He'd pondered on it afterward. He certainly wasn't scared of death, but nor did he welcome it. What terrified him most of all was how quickly it could come. It wasn't so much the abstract concept—the notion that one day he would simply cease to exist—but more how swiftly a life could be extinguished, how quickly all of those hard-won experiences, all of those innermost thoughts and emotions could blink off like a light. He'd seen it a hundred times, a
thousand
times, during the war, and he'd seen it since. He'd been responsible for dealing killing blows himself, and it was the look in the eyes of those dying men that haunted him—the sudden shock, the surprise of it all, the knowledge that everything you are or could ever be was about to cease to exist.

It was a lonely thought, but then Gabriel's was a cruel, lonely world.

Perhaps he deserved to die? Perhaps the universe was seeking to redress the balance, to take an eye for an eye? Perhaps that was it. That would suggest there was some greater design in the emptiness of the universe, however, and Gabriel didn't believe in that, either.

No, he didn't want to die. He wasn't looking for release, wasn't driven by a desire to find solace in a box, six feet beneath the earth. He wanted only to protect the city he cared for and the people who lived within its walls. He wanted to protect his way of life, to uphold the freedom of the citizens below, to weed out those elements that would see that dream crushed for their own gain.

Gabriel sighed. He could barely feel his extremities with the cold. He'd been there for over an hour, nearer to two. Another hour longer and he'd have to give up, assume the raptors weren't coming, or that they were hunting further afield that night. He'd picked this place—on the roof of his own apartment building—because the police reports suggested a number of abductions had taken place in the area in recent days.

A case of hypothermia wouldn't get him anywhere, though. He'd hold out for a little while longer, and then he'd have to call it a night.

Gabriel reached inside his overcoat and withdrew a packet of cigarettes, hoping that he might be able to eke some warmth from smoking one of them. His hand was shaking as he withdrew it from the packet, put it to his lips, and pulled the self-lighting tab. He sucked hungrily at the nicotine, dragging it down into his lungs.

He glanced down at the sounds of a passing police siren and caught sight of the sleek, black vehicle careening along the avenue, flashing past his building, bell ringing loudly to warn any pedestrians to get out of the way. Across the street, Donovan's car—an almost identical model, all black curves and sweeping lines—was parked alongside the curb. Donovan would be behind the wheel, ready, he knew. He could tell the car engine was already running by the black, oily fumes that were issuing from the exhaust funnel at the rear of the vehicle, coiling into the night sky like genies escaping from a lamp.

Ginny was leaning out of the passenger window, staring up at him, seemingly oblivious to the cold. She was wearing a pink cloche hat studded with glass beads, and they reflected the moonlight back at him, glinting as she moved her head. He couldn't make out her expression from so high up. He didn't want to. He'd had a blazing row with her that afternoon, too, when he'd outlined his intentions. Of course, unlike Donovan she'd insisted on accompanying him, but not, as he had intended, as a navigator for Donovan. No, Ginny, perhaps fearful that she risked missing out on all the fun, had declared her intent to accompany him on the rooftop, to get herself abducted by the raptors too. She'd strenuously put across her case that he was not to be left to the mercy of the raptors alone, and that she should come with him back to their nest for added protection.