The Sketcher's Mark (Lara McBride Thrillers Book 1) (21 page)

Behind her, she heard the access door open on the lower level.  She looked around for somewhere to hide.  She heard heavy foot steps on the ladder, he was coming up and in seconds he would be right here.  The best place to hide was the elevator housing thirty feet away, but there was no time to get there.  She took a breath and climbed down on to the ledge looking down at the ballroom far below, wedging herself in to the corner, praying he wouldn’t see her.

She listened for sounds above, heard feet crunching on the gravel.  He was up there somewhere, close by.  The edges of the skylight were in shadow and she pressed herself against the cold stone wall, hoping to melt in to the dark so he couldn’t see her.  She held her breath, closed her eyes and listened for his movements so she could track his position, but the blood racing through her head as her heart jack hammered in her chest drowned out all the other noise, making it impossible for her to hear anything else. She opened her eyes and looked up.  He was staring right down on her, perched on the edge of the roof like one of the gargoyle statues she had seen around the city.  She lost her breath in shock and fell forward, helpless to stop the momentum, landing on all fours on the thick glass skylight.

“Careful there,” he said, sounding genuinely concerned.

Beth knew she was in an impossible spot.  All he had to do to reach her was slip down to the edge and reach out for her.  She moved further away from the corner, going further out on the glass away from him, no idea if it would hold her weight.

“It will break,” he said with certainty and she believed him. 

He remained kneeling, watching, perching.  Beth thought if she stuck to the edges of the glass where it would be stronger, she could make it to the other side, climb up and get away. She had to stall him, make him wait until Jason and Lara showed.  That couldn’t be too long now.

She started crawling forward, feeling the cold dirty glass on her palms and her knees thumping beneath her.  The man with the scars on his face stood, silhouetted by the cold silver moon in the night sky and casually strolled along the edge above her.  He stopped and she saw him lean down and pick something up.  Beth moved away from the edge, further from his grasp, but she knew he had something in his hand.  He began to toss it up in the air and catch it in his hand.

“You know the thing about glass…is that it breaks.” 

Then she saw that he was holding a large piece of gravel he had picked up from the roof.  He tossed it up in the air, away from him and over her head.  It landed near her left hand, hard enough to crack the glass and bounce, skittering out toward the center.  Beth felt panic and terror explode in her chest but she was almost too terrified to move. The noise of another piece of gravel smashing in to the glass ahead of her made her stop and moan in fear.  He had hit the square pane ahead of her and the stone had cracked the glass.  Seconds later she looked over her shoulder and saw him throw another large piece of gravel.  It bounced off the large square to her left.  She knew what he was doing, weakening the glass around her so she would be trapped there, unable to move for fear of shattering one of the panes and the whole thing falling out from under her.  She had to move fast and get out of the trap before he finished setting it.  He reached down and selected another piece of gravel and tossed it out over the edge.  She was scrambling now, the panes weakening under her weight, creating a spider web of cracks.

She just had to wait for Jason and Lara.  Just buy a few minutes.  He was leaning down and she saw him pick up another stone.  He stood there, tossing it calmly up and down in his palm, teasing her.

“Nowhere left to go, but down,” he said, his voice sad and heavy with loss.

“Wait,” she said.  “You don’t have to do this.”

“They think I’m a failure. I’m going to show them I’m not.”

As he spoke, it seemed to her as though his mind was a revolving door and she kept catching brief glimpses of him before he disappeared back inside the catacombs of himself.

“You don’t have to do this.  Please.  Just help me out of here.”

“Don’t worry,” he smiled with genuine tenderness and pity.  “The fall won’t kill you.”

She caught her breath as she saw him pull his arm back to get some speed and force behind his throw.

“Don’t-“

He let the stone fly and it came at her like a bullet, smashing through the glass behind her, weakening the other four plates he had already cracked.  The sound of the band was suddenly louder.  She heard the scrape of the glass falling away on the panels around her.  Her mind raced to comprehend that this was really happening and she was not still asleep in the chair downstairs. She felt weightless for a moment and a cold chill breeze moved lightly over her shoulders.

And then she was falling.

Chapter Forty Three

Lara kicked the access door wide open, had the pistol in her hands and moved out on to the roof, searching for her target, moving with trained precision.  Jason was right behind her.  They were on the lower level of the roof and it seemed there were lots of places to hide.  They heard what sounded like glass breaking from somewhere close by.

“Beth!!” Jason shouted and they raced up the steps to the upper level.

Jason was now up ahead of her and Lara cursed him under her breath, angry he might get hurt and angrier with herself she hadn’t pulled him back.  He made it to the top of the steps, scanning the roof and saw a man running to the fire escape on the other side of the building.

“Lara!” Jason pointed after the fleeing man.

They took off after him, seeing him drop down, out of sight, to the fire escape.   They passed the edge of the sunken skylight and saw that it was mangled and a sick feeling seeped in to Jason’s gut like poison.  He stopped, looking down over the edge at the ballroom below.  Chaos had blown through the room like a hurricane, people were screaming and yelling, looking up at him and the damage.  The entire glass skylight had rained down on them, people were stumbling with injuries, bleeding, crying.  The glass had rained down on the unsuspecting guests and now the entire place was in turmoil and confusion.  One of the tables had been destroyed by something that had clearly fallen through the skylight, covering the table in glass and debris.  Laying to the side of it, half covered by a table cloth was Beth, bleeding and completely still.  Jason took a step back in shock and realized what must have happened.  The bastard had thrown her off the roof.  People were around her, trying to help, so much activity down there it was really just a blur to him.  Then rage filled him and he took off after Lara to the fire escape to get the man who did this while they had the chance.  He ran to the fire escape and started climbing down, seeing Lara one level below.

The man they were chasing was three floors down already and moving fast.  Jason burned with anger and felt adrenaline surge through him, fuelling him to go on.  The man dropped from the fire escape in to the alley below and sprinted around the corner out of sight.  Lara almost there but Paris Police vehicles were pulling up at the other end of the alley, outside the hotel, their lights flashing and sirens screeching through the chill night air.  It was beginning to rain and the lights seemed cold and threatening.  Lara hit the alley running and Jason saw Police personnel coming in from the other end.  They didn’t know what was going on and might try to stop him and Lara.  The best thing he thought he could do right now was distract them, give her the opportunity to continue the chase.

“Aidez moi!  Aidez moi!” he shouted, calling for help as he jumped down to the alley.  The Police already had their guns drawn and trained on him.  He put his hands up and decided to play dumb.  He was right about having to distract them- they might have shot Lara McBride by accident.

An ambulance was pulling up out front of the hotel and more Police vehicles were arriving.  The scene was frenzied but he saw Lara had managed to get to the other end of the alley and disappear around the corner.  He wished he could follow.

Chapter Forty Four

Guillotine had missed the Police Officers by mere seconds.  What a simple twist of fate that the Police arrived and had their attention focused on his pursuers and not him.  The scene in the ballroom would almost certainly provide enough of a chaotic distraction to give him the precious minutes he needed to slip out of the area.  He stopped behind a street billboard advertising his show.  How delicious.  Paris felt like his own macabre playground tonight and he was the master of ceremonies.  Then he saw Lara McBride sprinting across the street towards him.  He hadn’t counted on a foot chase, this was not how he had wanted things to play out.  The woman was fearless and persistent and he was in awe of her.  But, there was no time for admiration now.

He took off, running as fast as he could, past the storefronts on Avenue George Cinque, figuring the Police would be coming up the Champs d’Lysees.  He looked over his shoulder, saw that Lara was on his trail and she had a pistol.  He dodged right, running through traffic to the other side of the street, weaving between the people on the boulevard.  Lara followed, trying to get a bead on him with the gun, but there were too many civilians around him, he knew she could not get a clean shot, nor would she risk wounding a bystander or killing him. He could count on that.
 

She was gaining on him, but he knew the streets better.  They were coming up on the huge American Cathedral of Paris, a white stone building with intricate statues of Saints looking down on the Boulevard.  It was a favorite tourist spot, Guillotine knew there would be more people there and he could lose her in the crowd, double back around and escape.

As they closed in on the huge Cathedral, Guillotine saw that he was wrong.  There was no crowd tonight as he had imagined.  There were, however, two motorcycle cops stationed out front, stood beside their Police issued bikes, seeing him and Lara approach.  She started shouting to them, trying to get their attention.  But she had the gun and Guillotine could play it off as though he was the victim.

“
Une folle
!!” he shouted, pointing back at her, the crazy woman.

“Stop him!!!”  Lara called from behind, about fifty feet behind now and closing.

The motorcycle cops began to reach for their weapons.  Guillotine bolted in to the oncoming traffic. Cars swerved and two collided, smashing together, one being knocked in to a spin that saw the car mount the sidewalk and slam in to a storefront, shattering glass and debris across the boulevard.  People raced for cover, screaming.  Car horns blared.  Lara made it to the middle of the street and saw him cut over to Rue de Boccador. She ran out in to the traffic, making the cars hit the brakes, holding her hands out to stop them and shouting to the drivers.  She made it across the street without being hit and took off after him, leaving behind a devastating scene of carnage. The motorcycle cops were shouting in to their radios, one of them running to the crashed car in the mouth of the storefront, while the other scrambled to get on his bike, revving the engine to follow after Lara.

Guillotine’s heart was pounding, but excitement was pushing him further and faster now than ever before. He was having so much fun, he was laughing.  He saw the Theatre des Champs-Elysees ahead.  Perfect.  He saw the stage door, ran as fast as he had ever run and burst through the door to the back of the theatre.  Behind him, Lara saw the door close as he went inside and slowed down, the gun ready, the safety off.  Behind her, she heard the rev of the motorcycle cop heading down the street toward her.  She had to get inside the theatre now or risk losing him.  She threw the door open and saw a burly Doorman holding a newspaper sat on a chair inside, already startled by the man who had just run in.  When he saw the pistol pointed in his face, his face went white.

“Where did he go?” she shouted.  The Doorman pointed to a set of stairs across the wooden hallway and Lara took them two at a time.

She found herself backstage, and heard the sounds of an opera performance on the main stage.  She could not see it through the large curtains covering the rear of the stage, but could clearly hear a man and a woman with strong voices in the middle of an aria.  Through breaks in the long flowing velvet fabric, she could see the opulent interior of the theatre.  It was red and gold and every seat on all four levels was filled. She was crashing a performance in progress and that meant more innocent bystanders could he hurt. The ceiling depicted an enormous painting that wrapped all the way around, leading to a centerpiece that looked like a golden rose.  She saw all this and hoped he hadn’t escaped out there somewhere.  No, if he had, all hell would be breaking loose right now.  That meant he was still back here somewhere, looking for a place to hide- or a way out.

She was moving along the back of the stage, making her way to the other side of the building. There were assistants and cast members, dancers in costume up ahead, they hadn’t seen her and she didn’t want to startle them with the gun and risk causing a panic.  She lowered the pistol, hid it behind her and saw that none of the people ahead looked as though a stranger had just pushed past them.  Then she looked over to her right and saw a set of steps leading down below the stage and a door at the end of them.  She hurried down the steps, knowing she had little time before he found some alcove or corridor in what was likely a maze down there to hide in.