Pawn's Gambit Read online

  Steven sprinted for the club and found Jonas replaced by a man resembling an Armani-clad linebacker.

  “Whatever you do, don’t let that freak inside,” Steven shouted as he dove under the rope and through the door.

  “Hey. You can’t—” The bouncer’s voice was cut off as the door slid shut. Michael Jackson’s Thriller faded into a remix of Depeche Mode’s Master and Servant. The thumping bass did little to help Steven’s throbbing head as he worked his way back through the crowd. Back at the bar, he found Jonas hunched over the spot where he and the woman in the black dress had been sitting minutes before.

  “Hey, Jonas.” He rested a hand on the bouncer’s shoulder. “You all right?”

  “I don’t… feel so good.” Jonas lifted his head from the bar and squinted at Steven through bleary eyes. “Think I need to take a break.”

  “I know what you mean. I’m having the weirdest night. That head case in the taxi was talking some crazy shit. I’m not sure what he—”

  Jonas rose from the stool. “Need to take a break.” He lumbered past Steven and into the crowd as if he were sleepwalking. Steven’s incredulous stare followed his friend until Jonas’ massive form disappeared into the mob.

  “Has everybody gone nuts?” Steven took Jonas’ stool, his eyes growing wide at the circle of cardboard resting on the bar before him.

  During his half hour wait at the bar, Steven had ample time to study every detail of this, the newest club in downtown Chicago, right down to the design of the coasters. Each displayed the black and gold Corners logo on one side and a famous quotation on the reverse. Steven’s had featured Nietzsche’s often-maligned line, “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.”

  The coaster resting at his elbow was not one of those.

  Checkered red and white like an old-fashioned diner tablecloth, the cardboard disc was an endorsement for the Red Checker Cab Company, complete with phone number and the logo “Our promise – To get you home safe and sound.” As old and battered as the cab waiting outside the doors of the club, it too appeared to have come from a different time. More interesting, though, was the message penned across the bottom.

  She is not who she seems.

  Steven scanned the crowd, his every instinct screaming he was being watched, but neither the woman with emerald eyes nor the mysterious cab driver were anywhere in sight. His heart racing in time with the music blaring from the speakers, he stole a furtive glance around, pocketed the coaster, and rose from the bar. Before he could take a step, a soft voice from across his shoulder sent the hairs on his neck snapping to attention.

  “Why, Steven,” came the already familiar Irish lilt. “Did you think I left without saying goodbye?”

  2

  Baptism

  Steven spun around to find the woman in black staring at him, her mouth twisted into a quizzical yet amused smirk.

  “Everything go okay with the cab driver?” she asked with more than a hint of derision.

  “Yeah.” Steven cast a quick glance back at the front of the club. “All taken care of.”

  “You’re all flushed.” She put a hand to his damp cheek. “So, where were we?”

  “You know, all of a sudden, I’m not feeling so hot.” He rose from the barstool. “Give me another minute?”

  Steven headed for the men’s room, an unsolicited image of the woman in black training a gun at the back of his head hastening his steps.

  She is not who she seems.

  Locking the door behind him, he went straight to the sink and barely recognized the harried gaze looking back from the mirror. He splashed some water on his face, hoping he would wake from whatever nightmare had taken over his life. In a fit of desperation, he tried the window, only to find it nailed shut.

  “Great,” Steven whispered. “Heaven help this place if there’s a fire.”

  Massaging the knot forming at the base of his neck, he cracked the restroom door and peered out at the crowd. The mysterious woman in the black dress was nowhere to be seen. Relief washed over him, at least until he realized her absence meant she could be anywhere.

  As Steven stepped through the door, a firm grip from the shadows descended on his right shoulder. He whirled about, fists up and ready to fight.

  “Steven.” Jonas’ deep base cut through the cacophony of the club. “Come with me.”

  “God, Jonas. You scared the crap out of me. What are you—” Steven stopped, not understanding what he was seeing. Jonas’ eyes were different, their usual dark brown now the grey of a January sky. “Okay, what the hell is—”

  “Quiet.” Jonas’ voice was dead. “This is far from over.”

  “What are you talking about?” Steven’s eyes narrowed as understanding overtook him. “Where is she?”

  Jonas scanned the crowd through squinted eyes and pointed a trembling finger. “There.”

  Steven followed Jonas’ gaze. The mysterious woman in black stood atop the bar at the far end of the room, her head cocked to one side as if listening to something. Or someone.

  Somehow unnoticed by the surrounding mob, she fixed a cold stare on Steven like a jungle cat surveying its prey. She shook her head in mock sadness and her frown turned up into a gleaming grin. Steven sprinted for the door, his heart pounding. Halfway across the crowded room, he chanced one last glance across his shoulder and immediately wished he hadn’t.

  At the woman’s casual wave, eight jets of black flame shot out from around her feet, swept down the bar, and onto the floor. The twenty or so people closest to her screamed in unison as the dark fireball set their clothes and hair aflame. Their agonized wails went silent as the middle third of the bar exploded in an erupting volcano of ebon fire. Chunks of wood and concrete flew in all directions, the largest impacting the face of the mammoth aquarium behind the bar. The glass held for the briefest of moments before shattering outward like an enormous aquatic bomb, the shards of glass and coral cutting down at least a dozen more.

  “My God,” Steven whispered.

  The room continued its descent into chaos as several thousand gallons of rushing salt water filled with flopping, gasping fish flooded the space. Forced toward the door, hundreds of bodies scrambled over each other like panicked cockroaches. Steven watched helpless as a young woman an arm’s length away was crushed beneath the crowd’s trampling feet. He lost sight of Jonas in the mad rush, and before he could form another coherent thought, Steven found himself outside. The scene just inside the club’s open door sent ice through his veins.

  The woman in black swept across the checkered floor as if carried by a gale force wind, the dark flames playing about her feet like excited bloodhounds.

  The cab driver. He tried to warn me.

  Steven spun around and scanned the opposite side of the street. Where the red-and-white-checkered vehicle had been parked rested a silver Honda decorated with a “Gore/Lieberman 2000” sticker from the most recent election.

  “Shit.” Steven’s pulse pounded in his head as he sprinted up the street. Alternating north and east for several blocks, he took refuge in the shallow doorway of a corner coffee shop marked “Open Soon.” A quick inspection confirmed he was alone and the block deserted.

  Across the street, an empty construction site shone in the filtered moonlight like the ribcage of a giant’s skeleton. He hunched over for several seconds, working to catch his breath, and felt in his pocket. Pulling out the red-and-white-checkered coaster, he rubbed the bridge of his nose and reread the scrawled writing at the cardboard’s edge.

  She is not who she seems.

  “There’s a news flash.” Steven flipped the coaster over, eyed the number printed there, and reached for his phone only to find it had been lost in the shuffle.

  “Dammit. Now what?”

  Across the street at the edge of the construction site, a section of not-yet-destroyed wall sported an old payphone just visible in the dim light. One more look up and down the street and Steven sprinted across the four lanes of downtown
boulevard. His hands trembling, he pulled a couple of coins from his pocket, dropped them into the phone, and dialed the number from the worn coaster. The phone rang several times before a strained voice answered.

  “Hello?”

  “I need a cab right away.” Steven squinted in the dim light at the road signs at the corner. “I’m at the intersection of—”

  “Look.” The voice on the other end went from strained to irritated. “This stopped being funny years ago.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Red Checker went under in 1988, dumbass. Look it up.”

  “But—”

  “I told her we should change this damn number.” The man’s voice grew quieter with each angry word.

  “Wait. I need your—”

  Click. Then nothing but dial tone.

  Steven slammed down the receiver and pulled it back to his ear to dial 911. A flicker of movement on the periphery of his vision caught his attention. A block away along a sidewalk that had been empty seconds before, the woman in black bore down on him. Like a dark swan on a placid lake, she glided effortlessly down the sidewalk faster than Steven would have thought possible for a woman in heels. Closer and closer she drew and Steven did his best to ignore the impossible fact his senses screamed was true.

  Her feet weren’t touching the ground.

  She lit on the opposite corner and inclined her head to one side as she had done in the club. Their gazes again met and her eyes narrowed with cruel design. Gone was the Hollywood smile, replaced by a mask of utter disdain. The face of a killer.

  A snap of her fingers and obsidian flames flared to life at Steven’s feet. He leaped backward half a second before the concrete beneath him erupted in dark fire. He turned to flee and found his way blocked by the fence surrounding the construction site. After failing two attempts at scaling the twelve feet of chain link and barbed wire, he chanced upon a torn section and scuttled under. Steven sprinted across the concrete slab, too terrified to look back. Though his ears registered no footsteps but his own, he took little comfort in the surrounding stillness.

  Halfway across the maze of steel and concrete, a hurried look back in the direction he’d come confirmed he was again alone. He stopped for a moment to catch his breath and took cover behind a pile of bricks. Perking his ears for any hint of his pursuer, Steven heard nothing but his own raspy breathing. He rose from his hiding place only to find the woman in black waiting in the moonlight.

  “Steven, Steven, Steven. Are you really going to make me chase you all night?” Her smile had returned, though in the darkness it more resembled the bared teeth of a predator closing in for the kill. “And here I thought you and I had real potential.”

  Steven took a step back. “What do you want with me?”

  “Merely to continue our date, hopefully in more luxurious surroundings.” Her stiletto heels clicked on the concrete. “I promise a night you’ll never forget.”

  “Back off, lady.” He picked up a piece of rebar from the concrete. “I’m not afraid to use this.”

  Her smile faded, replaced with a cold look of regret. “Very well. This could have been so easy and, no doubt, quite pleasant, but if you insist, I suppose we can do this the hard way.”

  In a blink, a halo of black iridescent light surrounded the woman’s lithe form, the effect reminding Steven of a photographic negative. Her eyes filled with detached contempt, she raised her right arm. A sphere of shimmering darkness enveloped her hand. The ball of crackling energy expanded for several seconds before dissipating like a snuffed candle. Where the dark electricity had been, the woman now held a cylindrical object in her clenched fist.

  Between the low light of the construction site and the waves of darkness emanating off her body, Steven could just make out the object’s shape. No longer than the woman’s arm with a serpentine relief fashioned into the dark metal, the rod culminated in a fist-sized orb of dark crystal. An unbidden image of the Queen of Spades flashed across his mind’s eye, the Bed Post Queen from his college poker days. He caught his breath as the scepter crackled with the same obsidian force that surrounded his pursuer’s form.

  “Nobody move!”

  Steven spun in the direction of the unheralded shout and found a uniformed guard standing next to a concrete column. Though his sidearm was leveled at Steven, the guard’s attention remained focused on the woman.

  “This is private property,” the guard said. “State your business.”

  He approached them, retrieving a radio from his belt with one hand while keeping the gun aimed at Steven with the other. Respecting the firearm aimed at his chest, Steven let the rebar fall to the ground and put his hands in the air though he too kept his eyes on the real threat, the woman clothed in darkness.

  “Not even a Pawn in the struggle.” The woman directed her attention to the guard and sighed, a contemptuous smirk spreading across her face. “I almost pity you.”

  Black fire erupted from below her feet and raced in the guard’s direction, the fiery trail stopping just short of his protuberant belly. Without warning, a tongue of flame shot up and licked his fingers. His hand’s reflexive jerk sent his sidearm flying. Disarmed, the guard gaped as the woman snapped her fingers and disappeared from her end of the river of black flame. A moment later, she reappeared before him, the serpentine scepter held high above her head. Still nursing his blistered hand, the guard’s knees hit the unforgiving concrete, his previously boisterous voice reduced to submissive whimpering.

  “Little man, you have seen what must not be seen.” Her gaze shot to Steven. “And you. You just had to run, didn’t you? It’s a shame, really. No one else had to die tonight.”

  Steven charged the woman who in turn leveled her scepter at the terrified man, her face no more affected than if she were about to swat a fly. The countless gems and stones decorating the engraved serpent’s coils shone with a dark inner fire, the cold glimmer of the jewels mirrored in her icy stare. The guard hands before his face did little to protect him from the jet of black flame that flew from the scepter’s tip and engulfed his entire body.

  The horror of the moment stopped Steven in his tracks. His stomach threatened to rebel at the crackling sound of burning flesh mixed with the stench of singed human hair. The man’s eyes bulged from his head and his skin fissured while his tormentor looked on, impassive. One last burst of flame and the guard’s soul-wrenching screams ceased. As his immolated corpse fell at the woman’s feet, she again turned her attention on Steven, her cold green eyes alight with a dark fire all their own.

  Steven sprinted for the fence, fighting off another wave of nausea, all the while trying to banish the man’s dying screams from his mind. Only fifty yards of concrete jungle remained between him and the next street, but it might as well have been a mile.

  As what remained of the guard’s body disintegrated into grey ash, black fire again erupted from the ground at the woman’s feet and followed Steven as if he trailed gunpowder. The flickering trail of obsidian flame shot past him and with an audible snap of the woman’s fingers, she again appeared squarely in his path.

  “You can stop running any time now.” Her tone wavered between sarcasm and boredom. “You’re only making this harder on yourself.”

  “You killed that man. All those people.” Steven trembled with anger. “Why?”

  “Our Game isn’t a spectator sport.” The woman took a step in his direction and raised the scepter above her head. The trail of flames ending at her feet grew low, the fiery orchestra hushing as their dark maestro prepared to start the final movement.

  This is it. Too terrified to even pray, Steven’s eyes slid shut in preparation for the firestorm that was sure to come. Katherine’s smile flashed across his mind’s eye, followed by an unbidden image of his father’s face. He’ll never know what happened.

  The flash of high beams and the piercing screech of squalling tires jerked Steven back to the present. He opened his eyes to find the red-and-white-checkered cab hurtlin
g at his enemy. Striking the fence like a runaway train engine, the car penetrated the chain link barrier as if it weren’t there. A mix of anger and surprise flashed across the woman’s features, and then, in the blink of an eye, she was gone.

  The cab screeched to a halt inches from where Steven stood. His knees threatening to buckle, he gasped when the back driver’s side door again opened of its own accord.

  “Get in,” the driver grunted.

  This time, Steven followed the command without question. The door slammed shut behind him like the jaw of a rabid dog. “Get me out of here,” he said between panting breaths. “God, get me out of here.”

  “As you wish, Steven.” The mysterious man behind the wheel let out a quiet chuckle. “Buckle up.”

  3

  Jaunt

  The cab hurtled along Chicago’s darkened streets, the roar of the engine a guttural counterpoint to Steven’s pounding heart. One block at a time, the driver zigzagged across the city, his gaze shifting constantly from road to mirror. Too frightened to speak, Steven clutched the dark leather seat to keep from being flung from side to side. At every turn, he expected the vehicle to explode into black flames and more than once considered leaping from the cab to take his chances with the rushing pavement.

  “Where are you taking me?” Steven could barely keep the tremor from his voice.

  “Away from her, for a start.” The driver’s tone was flat with a hint of fatigue.

  Steven’s entire body tensed. “Take me home. Please. Whoever you are. I can pay cash, check, whatever you want. My address—”

  “I know where you live, Steven Bauer. Going to your home, however, would be far from prudent. As the opposition has determined who you are, it is fair to assume they also know where you live, work, even where you take your breakfast on Saturday mornings. They could be at your home this very moment, awaiting your return.” The driver took a screeching right turn. “And you are in no way ready to face them a second time.”