Dragging in a breath, he called up the mask he usually wore in Hughes’s presence. Slid a step to the side, so the metal door was at his back. “Relax, Hughes. I came along to help, that’s all. Booth sent me a note saying Surratt had just returned and they wouldn’t need me in Washington.”
He prayed it didn’t sound as stupid to Hughes’s ears as it did to his own. And if it did, then maybe a cocky smile would smooth it over. “As for your woman.” He added a shrug. “You know how she gets in storms, I imagine. Just eager for comfort. And after listening for hours to her moan and groan about how much she loves you and how afraid she is you wouldn’t believe her, I just wanted to shut her up. Thought I’d have a little fun doing it.”
Lord, forgive the lies. Please. Please save her.
Eyes wide, Marietta rubbed together the thumb and forefinger of the arm pinned to her side, over and again. He frowned until he realized it was a sign, one of the ones Elsie used frequently. What are you doing?
He hadn’t the words, silent or vocal, to answer. Giving you a chance, he wanted to say, but his hands didn’t know how and his lips didn’t dare.
So he had to settle for a command. One simple word, one simple motion of the hand from waist to heart, with his thumb up. Live.
She shook her head, though whether in answer to him or Hughes he couldn’t tell. The gun was level now, Hughes’s finger on the trigger. He knew she would do everything she could to keep the weapon from firing. Everything she could to affect the aim.
He owed it to her to try, one last time. With one final please, Lord he lunged for the crate.
Fire spat from the barrel of his revolver. She managed to jerk Hughes’s arm, but it didn’t matter. The car shifted, his foot slid. Fire kicked him. He reached out, trying to grab something, anything, to halt him. For one moment his fingers caught hold of the edge of the door, but the metal was rain-slick, and his hand would not obey his command to hold tight.
A scream. A curse.
Empty air embraced him. Nothing but air for an eternity, long enough that he saw the scarlet curls fly out the door after him. Saw them jerk back in. Long enough that he could be thankful she didn’t follow, that he heard no second shot.
Then earth, rock, tree limbs. Some rushing by, some reaching out greedy claws to grab at him, pummel him, bite him. The mountainside went on forever.
His arms wouldn’t obey his orders to reach out and find a hold. His breath wouldn’t come. His chest felt as though the locomotive had seared its way through him.
Crashing, snapping. Green filled his vision, then gray. So much gray, no color left in the world. Nothing but that memory of her fiery red hair.
Splash. The cold of the water made him jerk, twist, and blackest night edged out the gray. To live is Christ…to die is gain.
Eternity pressed down. He could see only a splinter of the world—the track on the mountain above him, the hillside he had just tumbled down. He could feel only the nothingness of the icy Potomac. He could hear only the din of a cry whose words made no sense.
“Aunt Abigail! Aunt Abigail, hurry!”
A wisp of blue that should have been gray. Of black that should have been red. A face, there one moment and gone the next. Something pressing, pushing eternity away.
More voices, jumbles of words. What and train and fall. Shot and bridge and ran.
Another face. A woman. “Who did this to you, mister?”
Did he have any breath left? He gathered what he could, expelled it on the name. “Hughes. Dev…” The black grew. The splinter shrank. The fire of pain both consumed and, somehow, numbed. He dragged in one more breath. His last words couldn’t, wouldn’t be that monster’s name. They had to matter. They had to matter as much as she did. “Lord…save…her.”
His answer was a bolt of lightning, a crack that rent the very air in two. A treetop rushing toward him.
The black descended.
Time was a dragon set against him, and as Walker ran down the dark streets, he felt it breathing down his back. He didn’t need a watch to know too many tocks had ticked. Didn’t need the knot in his gut to tell him things were all wrong. Didn’t need the cold bite of night air to send a chill down his spine.
Evil walked tonight.
“Lord, go before me. Make clear the way. Protect the family I left at home.”
Cora and their tiny son were doing well when he left them at dusk. Jess had woken up. That would have to suffice for now.
He sucked in a breath and turned the corner onto Tenth Street. He prayed that Hez had made it to Secretary Steward’s house and convinced them to be on their guard. He knew the family, which was why he’d been the one to go. But then he would try to make his way to the theater too.