It could be an ambush in waiting. It could be a death trap. But if it had been, Irene reasoned, then she’d be dead by now.
There was a wide range of reasons why she should walk through that brown door and down the stairs. They ranged from keeping her cover (as Jeanette Smith, Mob Boss, Girl with the Gun in her Garter) to avoiding the police who might have been trailing them. She also needed to keep Qing Song and his mob minions convinced by her diversionary tactics. But ultimately there was an even better reason why Irene headed for the door.
It was simple curiosity.
Irene hoped that none of her enemies ever realized how much she was driven by an urge to find out how, what, where, when and, in this case, who.
Nobody answered the door. She hadn’t really expected them to. She opened it and stepped into a narrow hallway lit by a swaying bulb, with a stairway entrance opening like a dark mouth on her left. The hallway’s whitewashed walls were dirty, but its tiled floor was scrubbed clean, still wet from recent work with a mop. She didn’t need to be a great detective to deduce that. The mop was propped beside the doorway in a bucket of brown-tinged water, like some sort of sentry.
She started to make her way down the unlit staircase, one hand on the battered rail. The wooden stairs creaked under her new shoes in spite of her attempts to move quietly, and she knew that whoever was waiting down there could hear her coming.
The door at the bottom of the stairs stood a few inches ajar, outlined by light on the other side. Irene hesitated for a moment, considering knocking, but then simply pushed it open.
Bright lights glared at her. A hand grabbed her wrist and dragged her into the room, twisting her arm up behind her back. The cold metal of a gun barrel nestled into the back of her neck.
‘How nice of you to join us,’ a voice drawled from beyond the lights.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
‘I had to do some shopping first,’ Irene answered, her mouth on autopilot.
As her eyes became used to the bright lights, she could pick out more of the room. It was larger than she’d expected, emphasized by the whitewashed walls and ceiling, which went past bland whiteness and all the way to stark sterility. Dark gleaming objects hung on the walls. On closer inspection, these were guns of all shapes and sizes, hardly any of which she recognized. A few armchairs were dotted around the room, upholstered in black leather. Two of them were occupied by seated men, expensively dressed and holding cocktail glasses. At the far end of the room was a weather-beaten table and half a dozen low banks of drawers, the sort that a craftsman would have in their workshop.
The whole room smelled of metal and gun-oil, right down to the person – it was a woman, Irene realized – who was holding Irene’s arm locked behind her back. Her gun was pressed into the nape of Irene’s neck and the cold metal focused Irene’s mind wonderfully. It was the sort of wake-up call that was usually bottled with caffeine and sold to college students or van drivers who’d been up all night. It reminded Irene that curiosity sometimes came at too high a price.
The man who’d spoken before chuckled, and took a sip from his glass. His heavy Southern accent – a little too heavy? – dripped like thick honey. ‘Well, I’d say that women always make that excuse, but it’d be mighty impolite to my little Lily there. She’s the lady who’s got one of her favourite guns pointed right at you.’
And as he spoke, a surge of fear swept across Irene like an ocean wave. It clenched her throat and chest, then dragged back through her body in a freezing undertow that put ice in her veins. The smell of cold steel seemed to sear her nostrils and the back of her throat. It was the fear of death and everything that went with it in this place: the fear of guns, the fear of violence, the fear of casual murder. The Library tattoo on her back ached in response like an old burn.
The woman behind Irene pushed her sideways, turning her so that she faced the wall, and casually ran her hand down Irene’s body. Through the terror that was trying to impose itself on her, Irene realized the woman was checking for weapons, patting her down professionally and checking her handbag. She’d released her grip on Irene’s wrist, but her other hand kept the gun at Irene’s neck.
When she spoke, her voice was clear and uninflected, with the faintest of local New York accents. ‘She’s not carrying.’
‘Now that’s a surprise. Turn her round, Lily. Let’s have another look at Miss Jeanette’s face. She’s come all this way here to visit us. It strikes me that it’s the least we can do.’
The woman turned Irene again, spinning her round to face the men. Again that rush of fear beat against Irene, as threatening as a gun against her lips.
But this time she swallowed it down. It wasn’t her own fear. Someone in this room – a Fae in this room – was trying to enforce it on her. Knowing that the fear was an external force made it easier for Irene to strangle it into compliance.
She brushed a stray hair back into place. ‘The least you can do is offer me a drink,’ she said calmly. ‘God knows I’ve come far enough to get one.’
There was a pause, almost a stunned silence, and then the man burst out laughing. But his laughter was a little forced, as though he was using it as a stopgap while he decided what to do next. ‘You’ve got just the cutest accent, Miss Jeanette. I should hire you to read the phone book to me all day long. Sure, have a seat. Dave, you fetch the little lady here a drink. What’d you care for?’
‘I’ll have a Black Russian,’ Irene said, as she walked forward to the indicated armchair. She could hear Lily’s footsteps behind her, high heels ticking on the tiled floor like a countdown.
The second man, who’d risen to his feet, halted. ‘What’s that?’ he asked.
Oh, wonderful, Irene thought. Yet again a Librarian engages in cross-cultural contamination. She couldn’t remember when a Black Russian had first been mixed, but she did at least know the recipe. ‘Five parts vodka to two parts coffee liquor, if you have it,’ she said. ‘Or I’ll take a gin sling – however you make them here.’
‘Maybe England’s got more to teach us than I realized,’ the first man mused. ‘Go see what you can do about it, Dave. And make yourself comfortable, Miss Jeanette. We’ve got a few things to discuss. I don’t suppose you know who I am?’
‘I’m guessing that you’re the gentleman they call Lucky George,’ Irene said. She sat down in the armchair and allowed herself to look him over as obviously as he was considering her.