“You really know how to ride one o’ them things?”
“For the gods’ sakes! Yes!” Not in quite a while, but I wasn’t going to tell doubting Marsden that. “Michael, can you get two of the motorcycles to the meeting point in time?” I asked. “It’ll be somewhere near Farringdon Tube, probably on the west side of the road.”
“Yeah. I’ll have to shuttle them, but it’s not too bad a trip. They’ll be there. We’ll need some kind of safety straps, in case. ” He swallowed hard, worried. “In case Will can’t hold on.”
I nodded.
We made a list of the things we’d need and where Michael and Marsden thought we could find them. Clothing was on the top.
I’d left the hotel in my business suit two days earlier and had only the contents of my purse, some paperwork, a passport, and TPM’s credit card with me. Since then I’d escaped from the Red Guard, scrambled through abandoned Underground stations, hidden out on a boat, been captured and led toward certain death, evaded vampires by scuttling through temporaclines, and fought a vicious ghost in the ruins of an old prison. I looked a bit rough to go out on business. And I imagined Will would look even worse when we got to him. It’s much easier to evade pursuit if you don’t look like you’re running away. Even once we were clear of the immediate threat in Clerkenwell, we’d have to get Will on a plane for home or into a doctor’s, depending on his condition when we found him. We could fake a lot, but four-day-old clothes that had been worn hard would stand out.
There was also the matter of Edward’s stolen property. I might not be able to reclaim his control in London, but I could salvage as much as possible and give Edward options to fight back against Wygan once Alice was out of the picture. Right now, Edward was in a corner—wherever he actually was.
Wygan would pull the plug on Alice as soon as he knew she’d lost me. I had no doubt the nasty piece of work I’d met in that Clerkenwell club would lose no time telling him, but I didn’t intend to let Alice survive long enough to be a problem for Wygan or his white-skinned kin. And I thought I knew right where to lure her to make sure she didn’t come back from this death.
“I shall meet you tomorrow noon at Angel,” Marsden reminded me as we finished our plans. “Be sharpish.”
He had no idea how “sharpish” I felt already.
CHAPTER 44
After we’d agreed on our plan and used up all the water in the Morning Glory’s tanks trying to wash away the sense offilth that clung to us after our brush with Norrin, Michael and I slept on it and started out in the morning to see if Edward’s credit was any good outside of Clerkenwell. Marsden had taken off to tend to his own mysterious needs as we went shopping.
Michael had directed me on and off buses and now we were strolling along a section of Oxford Street I hadn’t seen on my last trip to the area, looking for a building called the Pantheon. Traffic was a little lighter due to the intermittent rain, but we still had to dodge a few unneeded umbrellas, and the pedestrians were grumpier to make up for their sparseness.
“Are you sure shopping with this guy’s credit card is safe?” Michael asked. “I mean. y’know. these guys are dangerous company.”
“Agreed, but it’s a simple test without much risk,” I replied. “They either accept the card or they don’t. And if the use gets reported, I don’t think we’re going to be mobbed by vampires in Marks and Spencer. If they don’t take the card, then I’ll know I was set up right from the start.”
Michael had been the one to suggest “Marks and Sparks” on the grounds that it had nearly everything we needed, but it wasn’t anything special—just a chain store, really, no matter how nice. Opulent Harrods, on the other hand, seemed far too likely to be observed by exactly the people we didn’t want to tangle with.
“Oh. You know, you—you don’t have to. do this. I could go to the cops.”
I didn’t stop walking down the sidewalk, which was gently speckled with rain and lined with tall, broad buildings—some older than my home state—but I did slow down a bit to match Michael’s suddenly dawdling stride. I glanced at him but didn’t stare; I could see he was wrestling with his thoughts.
“Do you want to?” I asked. “We can alter the plan if you’ve changed your mind.” I doubted that would work out well for the Novaks or myself, but I didn’t want to give Michael the impression I was pushing him. It seemed unfair after all the weirdness he’d had to endure that he should also be coerced by someone like me, someone he was inclined to trust, but probably shouldn’t even know. I was coercing him a bit and I knew it. I needed Alice dead in a permanent way and I had to get Will out of her clutches. I didn’t mention the difficulty of getting the police involved, or explaining the problem to them in a way that didn’t make Michael sound crazy. It wasn’t likely to happen that way. I let him argue himself out.
“We. could ask Sekhmet. ” Now, that was a pretty crazy suggestion. Suicidal even.
“Sekhmet? Where did you come up with that name?”
“You and Marsden talked about her. I know who she is—she’s the Egyptian goddess of war and justice and women.”
“Do you believe in goddesses now, Michael?”
He glanced away. “I don’t know. I didn’t think I believed in ghosts or vampires. or talking statues. But if she’s real. wouldn’t she be more powerful than we are? Couldn’t she just. fix it?”
“I wish. I don’t think that’s how she works, though. She’s kind of fierce and. well, I don’t think it would be a good idea to ask. She told me to go solve my own problems and do it right or she’d be angry. Angry goddesses are a lot of trouble. They usually break more than they fix.” And I didn’t want my heart to be dinner for Anubis.
Michael looked pensive, nodding. “Hm. Yeah. I guess she might not be a good choice.”
“Do you want to back out?”
“No. I guess not. I’m just worried. I mean. what’s going to happen.?” Michael looked small and scared.
“To you and Will?” I finished.
He nodded, mute and keeping his head down as he walked on.
“Once we’re out of this, I think you’re safe. Alice is the only person interested in hurting you two to get at me. One of us will not be walking away from this. I intend for it to be Alice.”
“I feel creepy when you say that. I mean. ” He dropped his voice to a harsh whisper. “We’re talking about killing someone.”
“Yeah. It creeps me out, too.”
The buildings of stone and brick kept reeling by and it seemed surreal that we were having this conversation on a civilized street in London with a mist-fine rain touching our faces and dewing our hair with tiny lights and jewels. A dank bar in some abandoned, dark place would have been more appropriate. We walked for a while without speaking, our pace more normal, but our thoughts bleak.
“We’re going to do it. Aren’t we?”
“I’m going to do it,” I said. “Because I have to. You’re going to stay out of it, wait with the bikes, and then take Will and run like hell.”
“They’ll be waiting for you—they know you’ll come after my brother.”
“I’m counting on it. We’ve got a plan, remember? And if that doesn’t work, I’ll wing it.”
“Do you need ice cream for that, too?” He snorted a sudden laugh, breaking the uncomfortable tension with a blow of the improbable.
“I hope not. I barely fit in these pants as it is.”
We found the big department store and went inside to test the legitimacy of my job through retail therapy. In the end, the card worked like a magic wand and nothing bad happened. Knowing Edward hadn’t hung me out to dry was more reassuring than I’d expected, but I thought I’d better make the rest of my arrangements without getting back in contact with him, just in case. Michael split to drop off supplies and start moving the motorcycles. I watched him go and then doubled back to the ladies’ washroom to change into my new clothes before I went on about my end of the business.