Unstoppable: Truth is Unstoppable (Truth and Love Series) (12 page)

VICTORIA

In the quiet of my room the walls bend around me. The floor rises up in waves. My body is slick with sweat and nerves and tears and salt and anxiety. I'm a fish on hot sand. And even when I close my eyes, I can still see his face and hear his voice.

Twenty-Three Days Before Victor King’s Death

(Late Evening)

He tries to come in quietly but I’m wide awake on the couch. I pretend like I’m sleeping, though, and watch him through squinted eyes. His hair is disheveled and his posture is stooped, exhausted. He heads upstairs and that’s when I notice he’s carrying his old luggage bag. Odd. He hasn’t used that one in years, not since I bought him a new set with his monogram sewn on each piece. After a few minutes, I hear a door shut, the shower turn on.

I stand and quickly, quietly make my way upstairs.

A single lamp illuminates his bedroom as I push the door open. His cell phone is on the nightstand and I check that first. The call log is empty. His texts are all clear. There’s not a single picture or video saved. It’s like he wiped any information from it completely.

I set it back down and move to the other side of the bed. Nothing. I go on my stomach and peer beneath it. Nothing. Finally, I open his closet and that’s when I see the bag. Crouching down, I unzip it, grimacing as the sound seems to scream in the quiet. I flip open the top.

“Oh my god,” I whisper. I’m about to reach out when suddenly, a rough hand grabs my shoulder and yanks me up. I’m whipped around and am face-to-face with my father’s furious gaze.

DEREK

Lucas's house is small. Nice, but small. I believe cozy is the word. But for what Sabrina and I are doing, we don’t need this to be some mansion. In fact, the more simple and unassuming it is, the better.

She already has the door open before I even walk up to it.

“Jesus,” she says, taking in my appearance. “What the hell happened to you?”

I come inside and fairly collapse on the living room couch. I tell her everything, from the moment I walked into the Steel Tower to the moment I was unceremoniously dumped outside of it. She grimaces.

“Are you okay?”

“I’ll live.”

“Well, if you can manage, come in the dining room. I have something to show you.”

She bounds in, and I follow at a much slower pace. She sits at the table and I take a seat beside her. Two laptops, one silver, one blue, are sitting side by side.

“What’s all this?”

“First things first.” She hands me a cell phone. It's square and black and doesn't have a screen on it. 

“Wow, where'd you get this? 2000?”

“Here's a tip: if the enemy uses Morse Code, you use smoke signals.” At my blank stare, she says, “Stay off their radar, Derek. The Corps use smart phones so it's in our interest to use old-fashioned ones. They're a bitch to get but impossible to trace. The FIOS is just on a totally different frequency and it’s…well, anyway, long story short: use this from now on. Throw away your old cell too. If we're about to get as deep into this as I'm thinking, you don't want the Corps knowing where you are.”

I accept the phone. 

“Now, I had an idea while you were gone. It’s cool that you went to the source, or y’know, tried to, but I figure let’s not forget about the place itself.”

“What do you mean?” 

Sabrina turns to her computers. Her hands are deft and quick as she logs onto the internet and types a series of numbers into the address bar. I watch with some awe as the screen fills with numbers and letters in random jumbles. Suddenly, the Google homepage is replaced by a picture of a familiar street corner. 

“I mean,” she hits the return key, “this.”

I lean forward.

“Is that...is that Oakland?”

Her fingers fly across the keyboards again. “And here's Downtown.”

Street cams, ladies and gents. I'm looking through street cams of Pittsburgh.

“How'd you do that?”

“Well, just have no friends for three years and you'll find yourself with the time to do anything.”

I shift uncomfortably. 

But Sabrina doesn’t comment further. Her fingers just keep flying. Images appear on screen and I know instantly what she’s trying to do. I tell her where Mr. King was shot, and she brings up the closest street cam, which unfortunately, isn't close at all. It's about two blocks away. Mr. King and Victoria were at Cappelli’s in Market Square, and he was shot as he was walking down a small alley shortcut that led to Fifth Avenue. Unfortunately, no store surveillance cameras caught the incident either. 

“Wait,” I say, pointing to the set of numbers in the lower left hand corner, “these are live feeds. How are you going to find out anything about the night Mr. King was shot?”

“See this?” she asks, pointing to the screen. She clicks on the link, which is actually nothing but a series of numbers and lower case letters. They don't spell out a thing. “This is access to the archives. Now, according to my research—”

“Research?” I ask dubiously.

She glances at me. “Yes, Derek. Research. Anyway, traffic cam footage stays on file for a few months, just in case anyone ever contests a ticket or something, or a car is stolen, or who knows. All I know is that the footage stays on file. And since your girlfriend’s father was only shot like, two days ago, we should be able to access it.”

Sabrina puts the pointer on a link, then holds down the control key and starts typing like mad again. But whatever she's doing is working because a series of numbers come up. Dates.

“October 8th,” I say. “That's when it happened.”

“Do you know the time?”

“A little after eight.”

Sabrina clicks on the date, and the video for it instantly comes up, starting at exactly 8:01 PM. “Fast forward a bit,” I say. “Maybe we'll see someone running from the scene.”

Sabrina doesn't have to say yeah right. I hear the words sound in my own head. But she doesn't argue with me or tell me we'd have better luck winning the lottery. Instead, she fast forwards several hours. A scummy looking group of guys come into frame a few times, once at the beginning, then again around ten, then again around midnight, but that’s it. After a few more views, she shuts the window and logs out.

“Shit. That camera angle is all wrong. We can’t see anything.”

Sabrina nods. “What do you want to do?”

I sit back. The answer comes in an instant, and my body temperature drops ten degrees. I point to the screen. “Those guys walked into frame three times. I’d bet my life that they hang out there all the time.”

“Hang out? Don’t you mean live there?”

I look at her. “Exactly.”

Sabrina doesn’t need to hear more. She stands and gestures with her chin to the front door. “We’ll take your car.”

VICTORIA

Someone is screaming.

Guards are yelling.

A gunshot explodes in the nighttime.

Twenty-Two Days Before Victor King’s Death

(Evening)

I tiptoe to the phone on my desk. The red light is on. Carefully, I pick up the receiver, hold it to my ear.

“…I’m not doing this,” a voice says,
a stranger
. “I’m not playing games.”

“This is the best for everyone. If you would only see that I’m—”

“You’re not trying to help. Don’t ever say you’re trying to help.” The voice goes mean, vicious… “You know what you’re really doing. People have been doing it my whole life and I’m done. It’s over. No more.”

I can hear Dad breathing.
It’s a strained, hard sound
.

“Please,” he says. “We need to talk about this—”

“There’s nothing to say.”

“Look, it’s not easy to just…I’m asking for three goddamn hours. Can’t you wait?”

A pause, then: “You have two.”

Before Dad can answer,
the stranger hangs up
.

DEREK

It doesn’t take long to get into town. Because it’s Sunday and it’s late, I make a spectacularly illegal turn into Market Square, and stop on a street that isn't even open to vehicles.  I don't care though, because that's when I see them. My headlights illuminate the scene. The four guys from the video feed. Some of them are in ragged shirts and jeans and, for lack of a better description, they look like street bums.

I look at Sabrina. “You can always stay in the car.”

She opens her door.  

I follow suit and together we walk to the group. They watch us as we approach. There is one guy in particular, with a long woodsman beard and a bottle of beer in his hand, who watches us with narrowed eyes and a curl in his lips. 

The smell is what hits me first. It's a horrible combination of pee, body odor, and something else, completely indefinable. 

I reach into my back pocket and take out my cell. Victoria’s picture is already displayed. “Hey,” I hold it up. “Have you seen this girl? She was here a couple days ago.”

The guy with the beer looks me up and down like I'm something slimy and three-headed.  I don't back down. I barely refrain from glaring at him too.

I turn to another guy and ask him the same question. I show him the picture.

Sabrina moves beside me. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a handful of cash. A quick glance and I see a few twenties. She extends her hand. 

I take the money from her and pull out my wallet. I add another one hundred and seventy five dollars to the total. “Look, guys, we're not Corps or anything. We just want to know if you saw her. That's all.”

One of the guys blows cigarette smoke in our face. I look at him and my whole body tenses. He takes another drag.

I try one last time. But if I thought they would be forthcoming, I was wrong. They just stand there and continue to glare, and the asshole beside me keeps blowing smoke in my face. Finally, I look at Sabrina and wordlessly pocket the money, and we step back and start for the car. But before we take two steps, the guy with the beer bottle calls out.

“Hey,” he says, “I might've seen her.”

“When?”

“Lil' bid ago.”

Sweat rolls down my face and back. It’s so humid. I don’t wipe it away though. I don’t want to let these guys know I’m uncomfortable in any way. 

“What was she wearing?”

He shrugs. 

“Did you see anyone with her?”

“Nope. She was by her lonesome.”

I know he's lying. Mr. King would have been with her. I decide then and there this is just a waste of time so I nod and start walking again. Sabrina is right beside me, but then, in the next instant, she screams and is jerked back. The man with the beer bottle has her by the arm and he's trying to get his hand into her jeans pocket, searching for more money. Yeah, she's strong and tall, but the guy is stronger and taller.

I take a step to run over to them, but Cigarette Guy steps in my way. He grabs my shirt with both hands to hold me back.

I don't think. I simply strike. 

I punch the man’s face, wondering if it actually hurt him more than it hurt me. A shooting pain goes up my arm and back down. It only lasts for a moment. But the pain is not debilitating; in fact, it just makes me more angry. I punch him again and he falls on the ground, holding his nose. Someone grabs me from behind. I turn and swing, but the guy is so greasy my fist seems to just skim right off him. He's a better fighter than the first and he comes back with a punch that puts stars in my eyes. Another punch and the moon joins them. 

Through the rush in my ears, I hear Sabrina scream. I don't know if it's because she saw me get hit, or because someone is hurting her.

The greasy guy tries to hit me again, but I charge him. His swing is too wide, and it misses me completely. I knock him to the ground, but manage to keep my own footing. I run over to Sabrina. She's pulling, kicking, trying wildly to get away, and for a minute she does, but the guy tackles her and they fall.   

I am on him in a second. I wrap one hand around his throat and yank him up by the hair with the other. I almost lose him though; he’s sweating so much it’s like he’s covered in Crisco. His punch comes out of nowhere and my head snaps to the side. He punches me again and I feel the sting in my lip, then warm blood. But when he tries to get another shot in, I duck and come back up with an uppercut, and hear his teeth click together. He falls to the ground, and I straddle his chest and punch him once, twice. A third time.   

“Derek, stop!” Sabrina yells. “Let's go!”

She screams again and I finally let it penetrate. I get up and grab her hand. My knuckles are killing me. We run to the car and just as I slam my door shut, my entire side window explodes.

“Aah!” Sabrina screams.

Pellets and shards of glass rain down on me. The fourth guy, who must’ve run and got the bat somewhere, rears it up again and swings down in a hard arc against the windshield. It does not shatter but, with a horrible, high-pitched crunch, splinters and fans out in a grotesque spider web. 

I throw my car in reverse and slam on the gas. The engine roars and hollers, but for some reason we’re stuck in place. I feel like I'm in a cartoon, where the cat is moving, but he's not moving. 

Sabrina screams again as Greasy Guy throws himself against her door. He sticks out his tongue, his gestures obscene. Cigarette Guy delivers another blow to the windshield. And most terrible of all, the guy who first attacked Sabrina is getting to his feet. I see the gun in his hand.

“You son of a bitch!” he screams.

Sabrina screams my name. I slam on the accelerator and the car still doesn't move.

The main guy raises the gun and fires. The bullet hits my headlight. “You're a fucking dead man!” 

“Derek,” Sabrina screams, “hurry!”

He's walking to us fast, getting closer and closer. 

“Go!”

“I'm trying!”

The guy fires again. The bullet hits the top of my car. My foot stomps on the gas and that's when I finally understand what's happening. My car is a stick shift. I'm in neutral. I jerk the gear shift and abruptly, finally, we're moving. The back tires swerve and mark the pavement but we're moving. The guy fires repeatedly as I reverse farther and farther away from him. I hit a trashcan,
which sends both Sabrina and me flying forward, but I put the car in drive and we're heading down Stanwix, the mob long gone behind us.