CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Marcus pulled the SUV in front of the apartment building, hitting the brakes just a touch too hard.
The vehicle skidded and hopped the curb, aided by the snow its wheels pushed up in front of them.
Kate gripped the dashboard and braced herself, but the impact was gentler, and she felt only a trace pain through her ribs.
She hopped out of the vehicle, Marcus behind her.
Sirens from the Philadelphia police cruisers that were finally approaching the apartment complex.
Kate’s pleas had fallen on sympathetic but unyielding ears.
Gee, we sure do understand. Goodness, what a pickle this all is. If only we could do something about it.
That had changed when Marcus found a way through the roadblocks, driving the SUV through a small city park.
The four-by-four had bounced and jostled across the snow-covered dirt, but it had cleared a path.
An enterprising police sergeant had ordered a snowplow to widen that path and sent several cruisers behind it.
To Kate’s ears, they were about three minutes out.
She tried Darnell again. Nothing.
“Is he answering?” Marcus asked.
Kate shook her head. “No. Straight to voicemail.”
Marcus cursed. “Okay, take the left staircase, I’ll take the right. If Nora tries to leave, we’ll catch her on the way out.”
What he left unsaid was that if Nora tried to leave, it meant she was finished with Iris, and with Darnell as well. If she tried to leave, they would catch her, but they wouldn’t stop her, she’d have taken her final life and completed the Lawgiver’s task.
Kate drew her weapon and pulled the slide back, keeping the safety on as she climbed the staircase. Her heart thudded, and the phrase repeated over and over in her mind was, I should have gone with him. I should have run after him.
She hadn’t because she had gotten herself nearly killed the last time. And several times before that. She hadn’t because Cox knew she was weak and knew she would always go alone rather than wait that extra half-second for backup.
Only she wouldn’t have been alone this time. Darnell would have been with her. So, when it came down to it, she hadn’t gone with him because she knew Marcus and Winters would have disapproved.
Foolish, foolish, foolish.
She climbed the stairs two at a time. When she reached the third floor, she slowed, not wanting to alert Nora to her presence and potentially hasten a murder in progress. She opened the door gently and stepped through.
Just in time to see Darnell’s unconscious form lying on the ground. She gave up on quiet then, cursing and rushing toward the apartment. Marcus came through the other side, saw Darnell and swore, too.
Kate reached the door first. She turned the handle and said a brief prayer of heartfelt and intense gratitude that it wasn’t locked.
She stepped inside, and a blur of metal flew through the air toward her. Marcus shoved her forward, and instead of piercing her eye, the awl cut a groove into her head.
Marcus grunted, and Kate looked up to see his hand clasped to his neck. Blood welled between his fingers, and the world tilted.
Kate stared, eyes riveted, as Marcus staggered through the door. He tripped over Darnell’s body and fell backwards, teeth bared, eyes taut with pain. Kate got to her feet to run to him, and only the shriek of rage that erupted from Marcus’s attacker pulled her attention back.
Nora Avery rushed Kate, teeth also bared, but not with pain. Her eyes were blood-red, her face—more youthful and pretty than their projections had predicted—was twisted as ugly as sin. She held an object in her hand, something thin, silver and red in color.
Kate’s mind registered the object a split second before her body reacted. Sewing needle.
She brought a hand up, blocking the downward thrust of Nora’s hand at her eye.
She swung the barrel of her gun at Nora’s head, but Nora caught her wrist. Her forward momentum forced Kate backwards, and a spasm of pain rippled through her chest as her healing ribs strained to meet the raging woman’s strength.
She cried out and twisted her hips, hoping to throw Nora to the ground, but Nora overpowered her, bringing her to the ground. Kate held the hand with the needle, eyes wide as they regarded the thin spear of tungsten, mottled with blood.
Iris Doyle’s blood.
Nora shrieked again, using her body weight to wrench Kate’s other shoulder. She cried out, and the weapon flew from her hand, skittering across the floor to the wall.
Nora threw a knee into the small of Kate’s back, causing her to gasp and arch. She held the knee there, brought her other hand around to clasp the one holding the needle, and bore down, forcing the needle closer and closer to Kate’s eye.
Kate used both of her hands to fight, putting every ounce of her strength into it.
But her chest rippled with pain, and her right shoulder was rubbery and loose from the force of Nora’s attack.
Nora was shorter, but her muscles were compact and hard, and rage had boosted her strength while injury had sapped Kate’s.
She watched the needle come closer, closer. An acrid smell came to her nostrils, sweat, but not hers this time. A detached part of her mind wondered if she should close her eyes or watch the needle pierce the left one. Was it long enough to reach her brain?
“Hey!”
Marcus’s shout was loud enough to snap both Kate and Nora out of their focus. Kate looked up to see Marcus standing in the doorway, feet spread, gun lifted and aimed at Nora’s head. The gash in his neck leaked blood, but not as much as before. Nora’s awl had injured him but not seriously.
Nora cried out and yanked Kate to her feet.
“I can make this shot, bitch,” Marcus snarled, fear translating to rage in the tightness of his jaw, the narrowed red of his eyes. “Let her go.”
His hands and shoulders were steady, though. His military training shone through. Kate realized that he could make that shot.
Nora realized it, too. She slowly pulled the needle away. Kate cried out with relief as she was spared the threat of blindness or death. Marcus relaxed too, just slightly.
Nora leaped at the chance. She shoved Kate forward and dove for Kate’s handgun. Marcus swore and caught Kate, moving his handgun out of the way to keep from accidentally shooting her in the collision.
Nora came up with the gun, crying out in triumph. She aimed at Marcus, eyes bright with hate.
“No!” Kate shouted.
Nora pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. She hadn’t disengaged the safety.
Marcus rushed forward with the speed of a cat, swiping with his left hand and knocking the handgun out of Nora’s hand.
Nora moved toward it, but Marcus was on her, clotheslining her with the hand holding his weapon and succeeding where Kate had failed a moment ago, throwing Nora over his hip and dropping her face first to the ground.
He landed on top of her, carefully decocking his handgun before swinging one leg around to force Nora’s right arm behind her back. He held it there, leaning to put pressure and keep her still, then holstered his handgun and pulled out his handcuffs.
As soon as Nora heard the latch click, the strength went out of her. “No!” she wailed. “Oh, no!”
She went limp, no longer resisting as Marcus finished cuffing her and got to his feet. He looked at Kate. “You all right?”
Kate nodded. She tried to ask about him and had to force her jaw to slacken to open her mouth. “You?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I’m good.”
A wet, rasping sound came to her ears. Marcus spun toward the sound, drawing his weapon in a blur. Then his eyes widened. “Oh, God. She’s alive.”
Kate didn’t need to ask who she meant. She rushed to his side and saw.
Iris Doyle was on the floor, her face and throat covered in blood. A small object—also covered in blood—rested to her right. Kate saw the hole in Iris’s throat and realized she was looking at an artificial voice box.
Nora had torn that out to make sure no one could hear her scream.
That was the only reason Iris was alive.
She wanted to keep her alive to torture her first. The three sutures binding the right corner of her mouth proved that.
The string of catgut hung over the hole in Iris’s throat, fluttering as the woman wept, her damaged vocal cords croaking a noise like papyrus dragged over wicker.
Footsteps sounded outside the door, and a moment later, Kate heard a voice call, “Shit, we’ve got one down! We need medical!”
“Make that two down,” Marcus said. “We have an injured civilian, too.”
Four officers rushed into the apartment. One of them grabbed Kate’s arm gently and asked, “Are you all right, ma’am?”
Kate nodded, unable to take her eyes off of Iris. The poor woman’s tears mingled with her blood, leaving thin red tracks on her deeply wrinkled cheeks.
Kate hadn’t saved her. Nora’s hate had saved her. Had she kept her emotions clear, she would have killed Iris before Kate and Marcus arrived.
“My fate is intertwined with yours, Scapegoat,” Nora said. “We must both atone, just as your father atoned.”
Kate turned to Nora. The woman was on her feet now, in between two police officers. She’d stopped on her way out of the apartment to deliver this message, chest heaving, eyes flashing.
“What?” Kate asked. “What are you talking about?”
“That was his message to you, the one I made hard to decode. ‘This circle will end where it began. My fate is intertwined with yours, Scapegoat. We must both atone, just as your father atoned.’” Her lip curled.
“I didn’t want to make it easy for you. I thought the circle was too much of a clue. I guess you figured it out anyway.”
Kate stared at her, chest heaving, trying to understand what she had meant by that. What Cox had meant by that. Before she could form a question, Marcus called, “Get her out of here.”
The officers complied. Nora went quietly. Kate stood in the middle of Iris Doyle’s apartment, half-listening as Marcus applied first aid to Iris, giving one-word answers to the officer talking to her.
We must both atone, just as your father atoned.
This circle will end where it began.