B008AZB1XW EBOK (8 page)

When Simon reached the bottom of the stairs, he turned around. For a brief moment it was just the three of them. The man with the scar was still upstairs. He could tell from her expression that Elizabeth realized it too and her eyes took on a wide-eyed urgency. If they were going to move against the gunmen, now was the time.

The sound of a Glenn Miller record playing upstairs filtered down to them. The other man must have put on a record to muffle the sounds that would come from the basement. The sounds of their cries of anguish. Simon could not let that happen. The music distracted the man with the gun on Elizabeth.

This was Simon’s opportunity. He’d been plotting this moment in his head since they’d been taken from their room. First, a sharp blow to the temple to stun him and get control of the weapon. Second, a jab to the larynx to silence him. And, third, whatever the hell had to do to get Elizabeth out alive.

The man took his eyes off them and looked up the stairs. As he turned, the gun pivoted away from Elizabeth’s side.

Simon’s hand clenched into a fist. He started to lunge.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

Simon whipped his head around and saw the man with the scar standing at the top of the stairs, his gun trained on Elizabeth. He’d been too slow and it had cost them their chance. With a grunt Simon stepped back and caught Elizabeth’s eyes. They both knew the moment and quite possibly their one chance at escape had come and gone.

“Idiot,” the man with the scar said to the other as he tossed him a few lengths of rope. “Tie them up.”

He kept his gun trained on Elizabeth as his partner picked up the toppled wooden chair and positioned it back to back with the other. He moved the chairs so that they were about two feet apart and facing away from each other. The man with the scar motioned for Simon and Elizabeth to sit down and his partner bound Simon’s hands to the wooden slats and then added ropes around his waist and ankles to secure him to the chair. As the minutes ticked past, Simon could do nothing but sit helplessly by. His hands strained against the bonds as he tried vainly to reach Elizabeth, to touch her. She was only a few feet away, but it felt like so much more.

The worst part though, was not being able to see her anymore. If he could just see her…He tried to turn his head to catch a glimpse of her, but one of the men shoved his head back around. Once they were sure the ropes were secure, the man with the scar casually walked around to stand in front of Simon. He smiled down at him, but there was no kindness in it. This man was ruthless and took joy in it.

Music filtered down from upstairs. A pulsing big band song filled with the rhythms of life made a strange counterpoint to the slow methodical cruelty below.

Simon strained vainly against the ropes that bound him. He’d brought Elizabeth to England to ask her to spend the rest of her life with him. A rich, full life. It would not end this way, he vowed. These men would not take her from him. Not here. Not today.

The man with the scar placed a foot on one of the crates, lit a cigarette and leaned forward, casually resting an elbow on his knee. He took a deep drag off his cigarette and then exhaled slowly.

“You’ve made a mistake,” Simon said. “We’re not whomever you think we are.”

“No?”

“Let us go and we promise not to say anything about this,” Elizabeth said.

Simon heard the defiance and the fear in her voice. The man with the scar just laughed. Simon knew what that laughter meant. He closed his eyes and tried to calm himself. His only weapon was his mind. Maybe he could negotiate with them. He seemed to be their target.

“Let her go. You can keep me,” Simon said. He was desperate to find some way, any way to get Elizabeth out of there. “I’ll do whatever you ask, if you let her go.”

“Simon—”

“I could help you,” Simon offered. He tried to keep his voice calm. “I don’t know what you need, but I’m not without resources. But I’ll only help you, if you let her go.”

“I think it is the other way around,” the leader said. “You will help me
because
she is here.”

And then all Simon heard was the whip-crack of the man’s palm as it connected with Elizabeth’s face. She gasped and he could hear her swallow her cry of pain.

“No!” Simon said.

Simon tried to reach out and strangle the man smiling back at him, but the ropes cut into his wrists and the tethers on his rage were tested. His hands shook with the force of his effort, but the bindings were too tight. When he was free of them, he was going to make them both pay for that. He would beat them to a bloody pulp with his bare hands.

He heard Elizabeth take in a deep, unsteady breath. “I’m okay.”

The defiance in her voice made his heart ache and swell.

The man with the scar casually waved his gun toward Elizabeth. “Your wife is a lovely woman, Professor Cross. It would be a shame if anything ruined that.” He put the gun down on a crate. The ball of fear in Simon’s stomach was suddenly electrified.

“Guns are so messy, so indelicate. So quick.”

It was just a few feet away. So damn tantalizingly close. If Simon could just reach it.

Then the man pulled out a switchblade and flicked it open. He cut the air with the knife. “Knives are a tool for the artist.” He motioned for the other man to come to him. He handed him the knife and the man grinned.

“Alas, my friend is no artist. He’s clumsy. Too bad for your wife.”

The man took the knife behind Simon to Elizabeth. Simon’s entire body was on fire. “Elizabeth!”

He struggled against the ropes, cursing every moment that had led them to this. If his will alone were a weapon, both men would have dropped dead on the spot. Simon raged against the helplessness and fixated on how he would exact his revenge. If they touched her…

“Don’t listen to him, Simon.”

“Cut out her tongue.”

“No!” Simon roared. Simon squeezed his eyes shut to wipe out the image from this mind. “Please. What do you want from me?”

The man with the scar waved for his partner to stop. “Now that we have an understanding, we can begin in earnest. Who do you work for?”

Simon stuck with their script. If he could get them to just tell him what they wanted, he could come up with a way to deal with them. “I work for the United States government. I do research in alternative materials.”

“Don’t tell them anything!” Elizabeth cried.

“Elizabeth, please.”

“You should listen to your husband. But then most wives don’t, do they? I know mine doesn’t.”

He smiled at Simon as if they shared some common kinship. It made Simon sick to his stomach.

“We’re here on family business,” Simon said. “It’s got nothing to do with the war.”

The man with the scar leaned back. “Everything has to do with the war.”

“Not this. We’re just here to take her uncle home.”

The smile faded from the man’s face. “Do not play games with me. What do you know about the Shard? Do you know where it is?”

The Shard. Simon’s mind raced for something, anything to latch onto, but there was nothing. He’d never heard of any Shard. He wished to God he had. He’d tell them anything they wanted to know if it meant saving Elizabeth. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The man with the scar nodded to his partner. Before Simon could protest he heard the horrible sound of another slap. Simon tried to lunge out of his chair, but the ropes held him back. His chair rocked forward and then fell back into position. His arms strained against his restraints. The only thing he wanted in the world at that moment was to burst free and strangle them both with the ropes they’d used to bind him.

“I am not a patient man. But I will ask you again. What do you know about the Shard?”

Simon tried to think of something, anything to buy time, anything to keep the focus on him and not Elizabeth. He wracked his brain for any mention of a shard in history. “The Shard,” he repeated. “Maybe if you can tell me—”

Suddenly, the music stopped. Simon and the man with the scar looked toward the top of the stairs. Someone else was there. Please, dear God, let them be on our side, Simon thought.

The man with the scar picked up his gun and motioned for his partner to stay put. Slowly, he started up the stairs. The door to the hallway burst open and a gunshot rang out. Simon ducked reflexively, but ropes held him in place. The man with the scar grunted and stumbled back down a few stairs. He clutched his shoulder; blood seeped from the wound and stained the white of his shirt beneath his jacket. He returned fire as he retreated back into the basement.

It was deafening. In the small room each gunshot was an explosion of sound. Elizabeth screamed and Simon tried to turn to her. The other man yelled something in German. Bullets ricocheted off the brick walls. Each strike exploded the brick into tiny pieces that rained down onto the floor like crackling hail. A bullet buried itself into the crate near Simon with a whump. More shots were fired and Elizabeth screamed again.

“Elizabeth!”

In the midst of the madness, Simon rocked his chair and tried to move it toward her when more gunshots cracked from the top of the stairs. Whoever was up there had better cover and pressed his advantage. The wounded gunman edged along the brick wall toward another doorway in the corner of the basement. He yelled something in German, fired again and opened the door.

The man on the stairs inched his way down, gun at the ready. When he came into the light Simon saw that it was the American from the Ritz, Jack Wells. They caught each other’s eyes briefly and Wells was as surprised as he was.

“Look out!” Elizabeth shouted.

Wells ducked just in time. The bullet hit the wall above his shoulder. Then, Simon heard a grunt of pain coming from behind him. Wells fired in the direction of the sound, over Simon’s head. Another gasp quickly followed, and then the sound of a man falling to the floor.

“Elizabeth?” Simon said. “Are you hurt?” He managed to turn his chair enough so that he could see her.

“I’m okay,” she said.

Wells dashed toward the doorway the German had fled through and ran out after him.

“Are you sure?” Simon said twisting against the ropes.

Elizabeth nodded. “Yeah. You?”

“Damn these ropes,” Simon said as he strained against them.

Wells reappeared in the doorway and stuffed his gun into his shoulder holster. “Funny meeting you two here.”

“For God’s sake untie us,” Simon said.

As soon as Simon was free he moved to Elizabeth’s side, nearly tripping over the dead man on the floor at her feet. He quickly surveyed her for injuries, and aside from a bright red cheek, she looked unharmed. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

She nodded, but kept staring down at the dead man. Blood oozed out into a deep red puddle beneath the body. Simon gently tilted her head so that he could see into her eyes. He knew what she was feeling. He was feeling it too — anger, confusion and shock. He said her name again and she broke out of the daze.

“Thanks for that,” Wells said with a grin, nodding toward the body.

“For what?” Simon asked.

Wells smiled. “He was just about to plug me when she, uhm, kicked him in the fatherland.”

Elizabeth shrugged demurely. Simon smiled inwardly; that was his girl. She laughed nervously. “Score one for Uncle Sam.”

Simon knew the bravado wasn’t real. He could hear the tremor in her voice.

“Come on, let’s get out of here.” Wells slipped the dead man’s gun into his pocket and gestured toward the stairs.

“Who
are
you?” Simon demanded as he helped Elizabeth toward the stairs. “And what the devil was that all about?”

“Hell on earth, Mr. Cross,” Wells said. “Hell on earth.”

Chapter Nine

Simon, Elizabeth and Wells left the music store through the storeroom and the alley door. Simon kept a tight hold on Elizabeth’s hand, mostly to make sure no one could take her from him, but partly to stop his own from shaking. They were safe, for now, but the worst could have happened. Would have happened if it hadn’t been for Wells. They passed the German’s car and Elizabeth abruptly stopped and ran toward it.

“What on earth are you doing?” Simon said.

She opened the back door and reached in for something. She held up her prize. “My purse!”

Simon stared at her incredulously.

“What?” she said as she hurried back to his side. “It’s got all of my papers and half of our money.”

“Women,” Jack said. “Come on.” He got into a brown sedan and reached back to open the suicide door to the backseat for them.

Simon hesitated before getting into Wells’ car, but at this point he had to trust the man, at least enough to get them away from this damned place. He let Elizabeth get into the car and slid in after her. Wells sped away into traffic.

“Were those two Nazis?” Elizabeth asked.

“They weren’t Sunshine Girls,” Jack said.

Simon examined Elizabeth’s cheek as she chattered on nervously. It didn’t appear to be too injured, but it was beginning to swell.

“Yeah, I guess not. Wow. Am I talking really loud? I think I am, but I can’t tell. My ears are ringing.”

“It’ll get better in a few minutes,” Jack said loudly.

Simon took Elizabeth’s hand and squeezed it. He couldn’t quite get past how close he’d come to losing her and, despite her bravado, he could tell she felt it too. His worry and love for her was raw and exposed. It left him feeling angry and vulnerable. He saw Wells’ eyes on them in the rearview mirror.

“Who the hell
are
you?” Simon asked.

Jack laughed. “I was just wondering the same thing about you.”

Simon hardly felt there was anything funny about what had just happened. He was about to point that out to Wells when Elizabeth spoke.

“Simon,” she said. “He did just save our lives.”

Simon grunted, but he had to agree on that point. “Yes, thank you.”

“How did you know we were there?” Elizabeth asked.

“I didn’t. I’ve been keeping tabs on Hans and Otto for a few months now. I got wind that somebody had gotten into the car with them, extra chummy-like, you know? So, I headed over to the music store as fast as I could. I figured they weren’t planning a spring social.”