Wiser Than Serpents (12 page)

No, he wouldn’t leave his sister in the lurch. And he could hardly blame Yanna for acting the same way.

Once she got clothes, where would she go?

He stopped at the intersection, waiting on the light, or at least an opening in traffic. Beyond this street, he saw signs for lodging.

The bus station.

The first thing she’d do would be to get back to the nearest big city—Kaohsiung—and regroup, maybe fire up some of her electronic gizmos, see if she could get a bead on Kwan.

David, for one, planned on camping out at Kaohsiung Harbor until Kwan resurfaced.

The light changed and David followed the crowd across the street. She couldn’t be that far ahead of him, and he jogged past a clump of betel-nut-juice-spitting taxi drivers. “Bus station,” he asked, and they pointed him beyond the hotel and across the main thoroughfare. He didn’t wait for the next light, just darted out into traffic, dodging cars, the horns, the Mandarin that couldn’t be welcoming.

Across the street, up on either side of the sidewalk, scooters lined up like dominoes, one squashed next to the other, helmets perched on their seats. A two-foot-wide channel separated the rows and David quick walked down it, eyes on the end, where the busing kiosks began.

There. The woman in the brown-and-orange shirt, halfway down the row of scooters. She looked over her shoulder and he ducked his head. The minute she spotted him was the minute she’d vanish into some kiosk. The coast seemed clear because she continued walking quickly, her dark hair shimmery down her back.

He picked up his pace, breaking out into a trot.

Then his foot caught the exhaust manifold of a shiny red scooter. Like a waterfall the bikes began to tumble, one into the next into the next, dominoing down the row. He gave a halfhearted attempt to grab one, stop the wave, then surrendered to a full-out run.

He dodged the scooters—thwunk, thwunk, thwunk—and cringed as the entire block-long row tumbled over.

Yanna turned and, for a second, their eyes met.

Hers widened, and then she began to run.

His pants leg caught on the fender of a scooter. No! Behind him, he heard shouting and a glance over his shoulder told him that at least one irate owner had spotted him.

He yanked free and charged toward the buses. Way to tick off the entire country.

The woman in brown had vanished into a bus terminal. The Taiwanese busing system ran out of individual storefronts, each destination and bus line operating inside a street-side lobby. David read the signs overhead, looking for the Kaohsiung sign, scanning each passenger who sat on the outside vinyl seats, waiting for the bus.

A bus pulled up beside him and he sounded out the destinations on the side—thankfully the Mandarin had been transliterated into Western characters.

Taipei, Taichung, all north of Kaohsiung. He broke into a jog—how could she simply vanish?

Behind him, another bus pulled up. He turned around.

There, the woman just climbing aboard.

He sprinted back to the bus terminal, pushed through the line to the counter. “One, to Kaohsiung,” he said, and reached for his wallet.

No.
No!
He stared at the woman as she printed out the ticket. Backed away from the counter. Perfect, just perfect.

He wrestled his way back out to the sidewalk. The bus driver had exited the bus, was taking tickets, stowing luggage.

David beelined to the bus, aiming for the stairs, and plowed aboard.

Yanna sat slouched in the backseat, looking out the window, her head down, hair over her face. Her blouse might be clean and new, but she looked wrung out. As if, maybe, she’d spent the past twenty-four hours lost in the ocean. Windburned. Hungry. Tired.

“Yanna!” he shouted down the length of the bus.

A hand grabbed his arm. He whirled, but whoever the bus driver had been in a former life, he knew to duck. David stumbled, and the driver yanked him down the aisle and gave him a heave-ho onto the sidewalk. He scrambled back to his feet, but the driver had already closed the door. As the bus coughed and grinded into gear, David looked for Yanna.

He found her in the somber woman who gave a feeble wave as the bus pulled away from the curb.

“T
hat’s a decent-size goose egg, Gracie.” Mae Lund replaced the bag of frozen peas. “Are you sure you don’t want to see a doctor?”

“I’m fine, Mae.”

“So after you bonked your head on the door, and Bad Kosta had you by the jacket, then what did you do?” Mae Lund, recent retiree from the air force, sat back on the hardwood floor of their apartment living room, and leaned against the overstuffed sofa, her knees pulled up to her chest, her face alive. Gracie had wondered over the past month how Mae’s recent move out of military life and into the private sector would change her. Hopefully, it would also calm Vicktor down to know that Mae would be moving into Gracie’s extra room, although she didn’t know why he was so paranoid. Okay, maybe that wasn’t fair. After today, she did. It would probably be good for all of them since Mae was currently short on allies.

After Mae had hopped aboard a C-130 transport to Russia and flown an outdated tin can across protected airspace in order to save her friend Roman from execution, it was either resign or face discipline. Although she’d easily landed a job as a SAR pilot for a local Emergency Services crew, she had to miss her life of training and commitment. Still, maybe the move would be good for her. She looked comfortable in civilian duds—her brown crop pants, the green T-shirt. Then again, tall and slim, Mae looked good in just about anything. She’d let her hair grow, and the curly mane of auburn only made Gracie wish she hadn’t let herself be duped into cutting her straight blond hair short, nearly into a pageboy.

Next to Mae’s easy style, Grace felt like a refugee in her old jeans, sleeveless tee, and with the purpling goose egg over her eye.

Now, Mae acted as if Gracie might be telling her a campfire ghost story, all wide-eyed and wearing disbelief on her face.

Probably exactly how Gracie had looked as she’d driven up to her brownstone and stumbled up the three flights of stairs, banging the door open and slamming it behind her, dead bolting it. Good thing Mae was already inside unpacking, because Gracie planned on barricading herself in.

“I don’t know, Mae, I just lost it. I guess I was right back there in the past, with the Wolf dragging me out to his getaway plane, about ready to blow me up, and I just reacted. My therapist says that it’s normal to feel you’re right there, for the smallest things to trigger a memory, and that—”

“What did you do, already?”

“Oh, I stabbed him with my keys. Right in the hollow place in his neck. Then I went for broke and kneed him, just like I learned in self-defense, jumped in my car, locked the door and floored it home.”

Mae sat back in her chair and stared at her, a new admiration in her expression. See, she wasn’t helpless. Mostly.

“Do you think you were followed?”

“I doubt it. It was a pretty crazy drive home.”

Gracie lowered the peas, touched the bump on her forehead. “Think I should tell Vicktor?”

Mae got up and went to the pile of boxes in the corner. She opened one, began to dig through it. “Want him to lose it? Because he will. He’ll be on your doorstep by morning. Well, for the few seconds before they deport and/or jail him.”

Gracie made a face. Yeah, that pretty much summed up her fiancé.

She put the bag of peas on the ground, began to break up the ice chunks that made sharp edges under the plastic. “I think I need to go back there.”

“You need to go to the police is what you need to do. Right now.” Mae returned, holding a hand mirror. “You might think you’re fine, but take a gander at this.” She handed Gracie the mirror.

Gracie held it up, grimacing at the black-and-purple swelling on her forehead. She touched it gingerly, wincing. But as she put down the mirror, she shook her head. “And what do you propose I tell them? That I think a young girl is being held at the hotel against her will? How do I even know that? Do you know how stupid that sounds?”

“It’s not stupid if we can get her parents to file a missing-person’s report.” Mae picked up the bag of peas and pressed it again to Gracie’s forehead. “Her parents’ testimony, combined with your Rocky Balboa-size bump—maybe you can get someone to listen.”

Gracie let the words sink in, looked again at her wound. Smiled. “See, I knew I’d enjoy having you for a roommate.”

“I’m getting my keys. I’m driving to Ina’s house, and I’m going with you to the door, because I might look skinny, but I did take a few how-to-take-a-man-down classes in the army, you know.” Mae grabbed her jean jacket, slipping it on.

“Wow, my own bodyguard,” Gracie said, climbing to her feet. Her head did a slow whoosh and she grabbed the sofa, closing her eyes.

“Methinks one with a near concussion shouldn’t be so sassy,” Mae said, and looped her arm through Gracie’s.

The Gromenkos’ town house seemed dark and quiet as they drove up, the blanket in the window sending a clear leave-now message, especially when combined with the absent outdoor light. Gracie noticed that the tomato plant had fallen from the stairs, cracking, the mud spilling out onto the stairs and the walk.

They sat in Mae’s Jeep Liberty, staring at the house. Down the street, a dog barked, then another in response. Ten feet farther, a streetlamp pooled light on the pavement, but Mae had parked far enough away that it didn’t splash against the black of her Jeep.

“They don’t look home,” Gracie said, remembering the last time she’d knocked. But they’d surprised her then, and maybe Luba was in there, in the dark, not sure what to do, needing a friend.

Gracie toggled the car handle. “Let’s do this. Before I go home and climb into my bed and hide under my down comforter.”

Mae turned off the car and reached past Gracie to open the glove compartment. She grabbed a small silver can. “Pepper spray.”

“Oh.” Of course Mae would be prepared. Gracie got out, rounded the car and took a breath. The fragrance of rain tinged the night air, and down the street, one of the dogs had begun to whine. Shouting came from another house. Somewhere in the distance, a car started. Gracie’s heart thumped, threatening to climb up her throat and maybe lodge there for safekeeping.

“This is silly.” But memories of the day in Russia when she’d stood outside her best friend’s apartment, creeping inside only to find her worst nightmare, rooted her feet to the pavement. She swallowed, but her throat tasted of bile.

“I’ll go first. Or maybe you should just stay here,” Mae said.

Gracie nodded, then followed Mae as she crossed the street. Sometimes, probably more than she wanted to admit, she wished she were like Mae. Tall, redheaded, graceful. Mae knew how to fly a plane, and wasn’t easily rattled. More importantly, she’d been Vicktor’s first love. Although Gracie had never viewed Mae as competition, she couldn’t help but compare.

And in all her measurements, she came up lacking. She even stood at least four inches below Mae’s chin.

What did Vicktor see in her, or worse, was she just the consolation prize? The girl who couldn’t take care of herself?

Mae stopped at the steps, looked at the plant, then the front door. She put her hand out to stop Gracie. “The front door is ajar.”

Gracie came up behind her. Sure enough, the front door hung open by an inch. Mae started up the steps, but Gracie touched her arm. “I know them. Just in case someone is home, maybe I should go in first.”

Mae moved aside. “I’m right behind you.”

Relief rushed through her. She might not be as tall and beautiful as Mae, might not be able to fly C-130s, but she could speak Russian, and most of all, she could be just as gutsy as Mae. Really.

“Luba?” She pushed the door open.
“Zdrasvootya?”

The small, shadowed entryway opened into an eating area, and then the kitchen. And running right up from the front door, a stairway led to blackness. “Hello?”

A blue light flickered from over her shoulder. Mae, with a penlight on her key chain, scanned the room.

Now why hadn’t Gracie thought of that? Obviously she’d have to work on her sleuthing skills. That, and maybe talk her legs into moving a bit farther into the house. Mae even gave her a nudge. “Let’s check upstairs.”

Somehow, Gracie found herself moving upstairs. “Luba? It’s Gracie Benson, I was here—”

“Did you hear that?” Mae grabbed her arm. “Shh.”

Gracie stilled, straining to hear above her thumping heart. A Dr. Seuss rhyme from her old
Cat in the Hat
books filled her head:
They should not be here when Mother was not. They should not be here, they should not!

She held her breath.

Moaning.

“Luba?” Gracie ran up the stairs, felt for a hall light, found it and flicked it on.

The luminance bathed the destruction in the hallway. Books were scattered on the floor, a picture lay shattered. And in the doorway beyond, whimpering.

“Luba?”

Mae panned her light toward the door. In the bluish glow, Gracie barely made out Luba hunched over a still form.

“Oh, no.” Mae rushed past Gracie. She flicked on the bedroom light.

Yakov lay in a heap, blood oozing from his ear, his face cut and bruised. Luba sat above him, rocking, her hair loose and disheveled, her shirt torn.

As Mae checked for Yakov’s vitals, Gracie pulled Luba away. “We need to call nine-one-one—”

“
Nyet.
No militia!” Luba practically screamed.
“Nyet!”

“Okay, okay,” Gracie said, glancing at Mae. She was probing Yakov’s head for wounds, her hands covered with blood. She gave Gracie a grave look.

“What happened?” Gracie asked.

Luba covered her mouth with her hands, shaking her head, staring at her husband. One side of her face had already turned purple. Someone had hit her, and hard.

“Ya neznaio, neznaio—”

“She doesn’t know?” Mae translated, although Gracie got it. “What does she mean?” She looked up. “He’s still alive and breathing, but he needs medical help, right now.”