Terrorscape (16 page)

Those women—no, some of them had been girls
—had not died quickly.

 

Some of them had been raped, first. Still others
had been dismembered.

(People will find me.)
He might kill her.
(I doubt that.)
He might do worse.

If she did not go, he would cut Jade…and carve
up his face as if he were a piece of fruit.
Or so he says.

No. That she believed. Look at what he had done
to Lisa—to Blake—to Jason—to all those innocent
girls whose only crime had been being born with a
rare phenotype.

I could get back on the bus. No one would know.

Val half-turned towards the street only to see the
bus pulling away from the timed stop and back into
traffic, merging onto the turn that went to Poinsettia
Boulevard. She watched it disappear from sight and
knew without checking the schedule that the next bus
would not be coming for another hour.

The rain continued to fall.

 

She imagined that she saw one of the curtains on
the second floor shift.

 

As if somebody from above were watching her
down below on the sidewalk.

 

Making sure she didn't run.

Val gulped and leaped up the steps, avoiding the
fallen rose petals. She opened the doors and the smell
of incense nearly knocked her over—heady and dark,
and savagely male: the sweet, musky scent was so
cloying that Val could scarcely breathe.

Dragon's blood. It was thick and viscous when
burned, but in crushed form it had a distinct crimsonbrown color that looked eerily similar to dried blood.
Val remembered reading somewhere that dragon's
blood had a history of being confused with cinnabar,
the lethal crystals of mercury that formed sometimes
near volcanic hot springs. She wondered why that
thought was coming to mind now.

Sitting behind an enormous desk that looked like
polished rosewood but probably wasn't was an old
receptionist
of
Indian
descent.
He
glanced
up,
spectacles flashing, as the bell over the door signaled
her arrival.

“Can I help you?” he inquired, looking her up
and down. His clipped tone bore no trace of an
accent.

Val wondered how she looked to him—a very
pale girl with choppy black hair pulled back for a
ponytail, dressed for the autumn chill in jeans and a
pea coat. Did she look like a guest? Like she needed
help? She was far beyond any hope of the latter.

“I…no.” She headed for the direction of the stairs.
“Are you one of our guests?” The helpfulness had

disappeared from his voice; now it was laced with
suspicion. “If not, I am afraid I must ask you to
leave.”
“W-what?”

She was afraid she hadn't heard correctly—and
even more afraid that she had.

She hadn't expected a reprieve. Certainly, she
hadn't expected one just to be handed to her as
though on a silver platter.

But the man continued. “There is no loitering in
the lobby, although you are welcome to return if you
decide to make a reservation.” His voice let it be
known how remote he thought this possibility.

Hope swelled inside her, so abundant that it
seemed to make her chest expand. She felt buoyant
with it. She could have kissed the cantankerous turtlelike man. “Okay,” she said, breathy with relief. “I'll
leave. I'm sorry.”

“See that you do.”

He looked as relieved as she felt when he turned
back to his paperwork. Like a man who believed he
had escaped what might be a very unsavory situation.

The phone rang then, splicing the silence with its
shrill ring, and the receptionist gave her a final
searching look before answering. His voice was a
bland mumble, muted, anxious and subservient. Val
did not hear the words being exchanged. She had
eyes only for freedom.

She had barely reached the marble columns when
she heard the sound of footsteps pattering against the
green speckled tiles, and the cry of “Wait!”

She turned, surprised to see the receptionist
hurrying after her, slightly out of breath, and felt the
first pangs of alarm. She wanted to run. Fast, leaving
the receptionist to chase fruitlessly after her.

But he wouldn't be the only one chasing me.

“Excuse me, miss,” the receptionist said, all
politeness once more. “I am terribly sorry, but is your
name Valerian Kimble?”

Her heartbeat became irregular as she heard the
name she had not answered to in months spoken
aloud from the lips of a stranger. She swallowed and
croaked, “It's Val.”

This, apparently, was good enough.

“I do apologize. Please, go right upstairs. You're
expected.”
Expected.

The word, and its implications, sent needles of
fear pricking at her skin.

“I
didn't
know
you
were
a
visitor,”
the
receptionist was saying, and something about the way
he said visitor, and the way he looked at her when he
said it, made her wonder what the voice on the other
end of the line had whispered. “If you could just sign
the guest book….”

Val wrote her name—her old name—without its
usual flourish and felt, ironically, as if she had just
signed a death warrant.

“I believe your gentleman is in two-one-seven.
That's on the second floor.”

 

Why are you calling him that? There's nothing gentle
about him.

Then she realized what those words meant.
He knew she was here.
He was watching her.

The urge to run was stronger than ever. With
effort, she suppressed it. Gavin had made it clear that
the consequences of fleeing would be worse than
whatever
it
was
that
he
had
planned
for
this
afternoon.

She froze again in the hallway, like a frightened
rabbit, torn between stairs and elevator. Her legs felt
rubbery and she wasn't sure she would be able to
manage the climb. On the other hand, the elevator
would be faster and she was in no hurry to get to her
destination.

She ended up taking the elevator. When it ground
to a halt she stumbled and fell in an ungraceful
sprawl on the wine-red carpet of a corridor plastered
with aged fleur-de-lis wallpaper.

A passing maid looked at her curiously, clucked
her tongue, and continued pushing her cart of
cleaning
supplies.
Val
barely
noticed
this
admonishment. As she pushed herself up her brain
had room for only one thought and it shrilled like a
klaxon, drowning out everything else:

Don't go don't go don't go don't go.

217 was no more sinister than the other identical
doors lining the hall. There was no lamb's blood
dripping from the frame, no eerie lights, no howls of
pain. Really, it was nothing more than it appeared to
be on the surface: a perfectly ordinary door. And that,
to Val, made her situation all the more terrifying
because when it came right down to it, it meant
nobody would ever suspect anything was amiss—
nobody but her, that is.

Just the way he wants.

 

Val took a deep breath, swayed slightly, and
knocked on the door.

It swung open with a creak to reveal a room
decorated in various shades of rose with cherry oak
accents. She started, like a cat, at the rusty hinges, but
when no human answered she nudged the door open
wider. Timidly at first, and then more boldly.

The unmade bed was the only sign of occupancy.
There were no clothes casually tossed over chairs or
tables, no shoes by the door, no suitcases, no food.

No personal effects of any kind.

But then behind the sofa—for she had gradually
wandered past the threshold and into the actual room
—her eyes landed on a chess set, carefully set up and
ready for play on top of the nightstand. When she
opened the single drawer, there was bible and a
phone book inside.

With a hand that was now shaking, she closed the
drawer and stared at the chess set. If she had any
doubts before, the chess set had erased them.

This is his room. I am standing in his room.

One of the chess pieces was missing, though. She
checked under the nightstand, wondering if she had
gotten too close and accidentally knocked it off
herself but the pale gray carpet would have revealed
one of the glossy wooden pieces easily.

Val turned, glancing longingly at the open door,
and regarded the rest of the room. The closet was
open. A few clothes hung on the steel bar. Buttondown shirts in black, white and burgundy. There
were two suits and a handful of belts and ties. The
dresser contained a similar color scheme though
when she realized one contained underwear, she
flushed and terminated the search, trying to clear her
head of the images that came, unbidden, to her mind.

The fact that she was still capable of thinking
about him in that way shocked and disgusted her
almost as much as his threats had—except this time,
all that loathing and repugnance was directed inward.

She found no books or newspapers, though there
was a small leather-bound journal that logged various
numbers and letters. She remembered this, yes. She
had seen one just like it five years ago. Chess notation.
She turned the pages, marveling at the sheer number
of games. He had to be playing at least twenty a day.

Maybe fifty.

But that would require a complete set, so where is the
black queen?
Suddenly, it seemed imperative that Val
find her, that missing piece. Why, she couldn't say.

The trashcan was mostly empty. There was an
apple core, a plastic container that had once held
cologne and was labeled in French, a couple of
tissues, and a few pieces of crumpled up paper that
proved to be receipts.

Val looked around the room again. Each one of
her footsteps sounded too loud and in the buzzing
silence she could clearly hear the sound of her own
heart like a large timpani drum.

Every instinct in her body was now telling her—
no, screaming at her—to leave. Now. While she still
could. Oh, and she desperately wanted to, but she
had to wait, because if she didn't at least try to play
by the rules he wouldn't hesitate to punish her and
the people she cared most about.

Any clue she found might help. For whatever
reason, Gavin did not appear to be around. Maybe,
after all these years, she would finally get the
evidence she needed to destroy him once and for all.
Just as he had destroyed her.

The only place she hadn't snooped was the
bathroom, which would take the least time to scan.
And then, after that, she would consider this whole
agreement—or whatever it was—null and void.

Gavin couldn't accuse her of defying him. The
receptionist would back her up.

 

Right
, her brain mocked.
Since when has he ever
played by his own rules?

He twisted them around whenever it suited him.
And hadn't Gavin called to deliver his instructions?
That had to mean that he knew she was here. That, or
somebody else was in on this, which she doubted.

But then where is he?
And where is the black queen?

The bathroom door was closed—
was it closed
before?
—and when Val pulled it open the first thing
she noticed was the steam. It was so hot and humid
she could feel her hair frizzing. Beneath the dye, she
still had red hair the same color and consistency of
copper wire.

Val shrugged off her pea coat and looked around,
fanning
herself.
The
bathroom
was
decorated
similarly to the bedroom—rose towels and bathmat,
ivory soap, and a jewel-tone collection of shampoos
and lotions provided by the inn. Everything was
spotless save for the mirror. In the steamed-up glass
somebody had written the word checkmate. And
there, yes, there, in the soap dish, was the missing
black queen.

Somebody had pounded a nail through the spot
where its heart would have been had it been human.
The symbolism of that was not lost on Val, and she
was treated to the additional bonus of seeing her
reaction in the mirror, eyes wide, lips parted in mute
terror.

She gasped aloud, clutching onto the doorknob as
if for dear life as the floor beneath her reeled.

He left it there.
He left it there for me to find. He really
does want to kill me. He wasn't bluffing. Oh God, I have to
get out of here.

Behind her the door slammed.

Val stumbled out of the bathroom, slipping and
skidding on the still-damp floors, and came face to
face with him—Gavin—the grandmaster—the man
who had stalked her in her nightmares for nearly five
years and who was now here, in the flesh, leaning
against the closed door with his arms folded.

He was wearing the black leather jacket from
before over a white shirt, one of the white buttondowns from the closet, with half the buttons left
undone. His black jeans looked freshly pressed, with
creases so sharp they looked lethal.

“Val.”

The silver chain glinted at his bare throat, making
a soft clinking sound as he tilted his head in a way
that reminded her of a raptor.

“I didn't think you'd come.”

His words flew through the hush like a fleet of
arrows. Val jerked visibly at the sound of his voice.
He looked her up and down and his lips parted into a
smile that wasn't at all friendly.

“You see, I still wasn't quite sure what I might do
if I saw you again.” He took a series of quick steps, his
eyes never once leaving her face as he approached.
“But now? Yes, now I know, because you helped me
decide.”

Val was finding it hard to breathe. He was mere
feet away now. If she had so desired, she could have
reached out and brushed him. But she did not desire.
Time had done nothing to temper his fury. She could
see the fiery intensity of it burning in his pale eyes as
clearly as if they were windows into his twisted soul.

Something had changed.

And then she knew. What she knew, exactly, she
did not know. But whatever it was, it caused her fear
for her own well-being to eclipse that of Jade's.