The Queen and I (25 page)

Chapter Thirty-Nine: Off to the Island

Being back in Manhattan should have been a somewhat comforting experience for Jeffrey, since the sights, sounds, and smells were so familiar, but instead he was consumed with an increasing sense of dread at what was looking for him, and potentially his former colleague, Jacob Stone, and onetime lover, Rachel Benjamin.

When he thought about it, he realized he was under no obligation whatsoever to help either one of them, but there was that voice deep inside that would not, could not, allow him to leave them to the slaughter at the hands of the monster that Heinrich Schultz had unleashed on the unsuspecting populace. Whoever this person was, Saul was convinced by what he had heard that he was very dangerous and would stop at nothing in finding Jeffrey. Saul had spent enough time in his life around the seedy people of the world who hired mercenaries to do their bidding, and knew that if a man like Schultz hired this mysterious hunter, the hunter would not stop until he had his prey.

Jeffrey first went in search of Jacob, because he seemed to be the one in the most imminent danger and asked for the two of them to meet at the downtown bar where Jeffrey sometimes liked to relax after completing a script. It wasn’t much to look at from the outside, and even less from within, but that served a purpose as well, because nobody who would be looking for Jeffrey would ever think to start in this place.

Jeffrey arrived in the dimly lit, stale-smelling pub and found Jacob sitting in the back booth near the pool tables nursing a pint of Guinness. He smiled weakly and motioned for Jeffrey to come to the booth. He extended his hand and offered a limp handshake. He had the look of a man who had not slept much and who was very concerned about things other than writing or doing interviews with the various tabloids of the theater community. Dark circles revealed eyes that were drawn in, pale skin led Jeffrey to believe that Jacob had not been out much in the last month or two, and the fact that he was not clean shaven alarmed Jeffrey even more. Jacob had always been very concerned about his outward appearance, and now he was more like a man who was waiting for death to stop wasting its time and finish the job already.

“You’ve looked better, Jacob,” Jeffrey offered.

Jacob shrugged his shoulders and coughed a harsh, raspy sound that made Jeffrey think that perhaps his former friend was ill. “They’re going to kill me, Jeffrey.”

It was a statement so matter of fact that it took Jeffrey aback some. Jacob was convinced he was a marked man, and Jeffrey could only begin to imagine what it was that he had heard or seen to make him believe such things.

“Who’s going to kill you?” Jeffrey asked innocently.

Jacob shot him a harsh stare and replied “Don’t bullshit with me, Jeffrey! You know who I’m talking about.” He drained his Guinness and motioned to the bartender that he wanted another. He looked at Jeffrey and silently asked if he wanted anything, and Jeffrey declined. Better that he remain sober while in the city, and from the look of Jacob, those were not good odds if he stayed with him for any length of time.

He coughed again, accepted the pint, and took another deep sip. “It’s my own fucking fault. I never should have gone into business with the bastard.” His eyes glazed over a bit as if to imply that he was holding back tears. “Schultz is a lunatic, and that little faggot who hangs around him all of the time is the most despicable human being I have ever had the misfortune of knowing.” He drained his second and said, “He likes you, though, something about your bone structure.” He smiled at that thought and said, “I can just imagine how he would never have left your side for a minute if you had agreed to write the script for Schultz instead of me.”

Jeffrey stared silently at Jacob and suddenly felt very bad for the condition he was in. What Jacob had done to him was unforgiveable, but it was not a crime worthy of leaving the man in the state of despair that he was now experiencing. Jacob had the look of a death row inmate who was just counting the minutes until the executioner came to finish the deed. The man looked, and even smelled, like a man who had given up and was awaiting the inevitable. There was no fight left in him; there was no hope.

“You need to leave town immediately,” Jeffrey said after a moment.

Jacob laughed and asked, “And where do you expect me to go? I’m the new face of Broadway, remember? Everyone knows me. I can’t go anywhere without being recognized. This is the one place in the city where I can have some kind of anonymity.” He lowered his head into his hands and sniffled. His hands were trembling, and the table was shaking due to Jacob’s legs rocking uncontrollably.

“Come stay at my cabin,” Jeffrey said. He could not believe he heard the words come out of his mouth, but once they did they did not feel wrong; they felt like he was doing the right thing, and he hoped Jacob would accept.

Jacob looked at him and answered, “You don’t swim with sharks with a bag of chum around your neck.”

Jeffrey smiled at the answer. Jacob had always had a unique way of putting things, and this was his way of trying to convince his former mentor that he did not want anything to do with him, that being anywhere near Jacob would prove to be nothing but a fatal mistake for both of them.

“True,” Jeffrey answered. “But if you catch enough sharks, you can make a very nice soup.”

“I hear that soup is really gooey and not very good.”

Jeffrey shrugged and continued, “Two billion Chinamen can’t all be wrong.”

Jacob played with the stubble on his chin and looked off into the distance staring at nothing, and said calmly. “I really am sorry about what I did.” He looked at Jeffrey with tears in his eyes. “I just wanted to have what you did, to be the man everyone wanted to be around. I wanted people to think I was something that I was not. I really fucked it all up.”

Jeffrey said nothing and shook his head in silent agreement and said, “Let’s go to your place and pack some bags.”

“We can’t,” Jacob said. “He’s at the apartment.”

* * *

Louis walked around Jacob’s small studio apartment and admired his collection of vintage superhero figurines. They stood like silent sentries guarding the home of their master and the lair where they could hide their mythical identities. Whenever Louis saw items of this nature, he was both delighted and enraged at the same time.

He had always liked the “color books,” as his mother had called them, and was a fan of the Man of Steel and the Caped Crusader and had often daydreamed he was their friend and confidant. He was the man who they trusted with their secret identities and the man who would one day lead them all to their greatest triumph. He looked at a statue of Wonder Woman and felt his heart rate increase. The emotions that she evoked had never changed from the time he was a young boy until now, and he wanted so very deeply to control her, to dominate her. That would be a true mark of a superhuman, to do what even the son of Krypton could not and would be Louis’s crowning achievement.

He thought at that moment of the woman, how he longed to possess her and what he was going to do with her once he had her for himself. Perhaps the music would grant him the permission to recreate her in the image of the Amazonian woman from the color books. Perhaps he would remake her in his mother’s image, and just when she was made into the perfect specimen, just when she was what he had always desired, he would end it all and sacrifice her to the music. His gift in return would be the clarity that it had enticed him with for years and that it promised would one day belong to him. Louis would no longer be the monster that most people only knew about on the fringes of their minds; he would be the one with whom they would come to worship in the manner that the music dictated.

He held Superman in his hands and admired the craftsmanship that had gone into the detail of the facial features, the rippling of the muscles, the raised letter
S
that signified who he was, and he was overcome with hatred and fear. He knew that in a world where there were supermen, he would never be able to dominate the woman the way that he and the music wanted him to. He had to destroy those who wanted to control him, starting with this figurine.

He shattered it into a hundred small pieces with only the grip of his giant hand and watched as small droplets of blood formed where the statue had pierced the skin. Louis looked up and saw the half-naked Wonder Woman staring at him and held her gently in his hands, rubbing the blood all over her, baptizing her in the Way as he made a silent confirmation that he would do the same to the woman. He would not allow anyone or anything to keep him from possessing her.

Louis closed his eyes and listened to the symphony playing in his mind and the words the Way was speaking to him. They spoke of the destiny that had been laid out for him and the conquest that waited. He suddenly felt a very strong pang in the pit of his chest and began to breathe heavily, labored. He struggled to calm his breathing, but was increasingly more aware of the fact that it was an outside source that was dominating him. It was the Way speaking to him, and it was telling him what he wanted to know.

Jeffrey David Rothstein had come home.

Louis placed the Wonder Woman in the pocket of his coat and left the apartment. Jacob Stone would have to wait, as would the woman. His target, the main target, was in the city and moving toward him. Louis knew the feeling and was confident it would never lead him in the wrong direction.

He smiled to himself and thought about the pleasure he was going to experience in destroying the man Heinrich so desperately wanted. He would never deliver him to his employer, of course. He would own him for himself and do what he wished until it was time to turn him over to the Way; then he would have her.

He closed the door behind him and quietly walked down the steps leading out of the building. Beyond them was the city that he knew better than any other place on earth, the place where he did his best hunting, and the place where he would finally realize his true destiny. He needed only to find Jeffrey.

* * *

Jeffrey sat across from Rachel and her boyfriend, Richard Kearney, and could barely hold back the urge to jump to his feet and strike the already battered man into an even more unrecognizable pulp than he currently was. His anger at her betrayal was still fresh, but he could not ignore the fact that the two of them had been through a lot together, and he owed it to her to keep her safe from whatever evil, demonic plot Heinrich Schultz’s monster had in store for them. None of them were safe, and Jeffrey needed to do his part to see to it that he had done his part to keep her out of harm’s way.

Saul had insisted he leave her to the wolves, but he did not press the issue once he realized Jeffrey was determined to be the hero in all of this and wanted to provide some form of sanctuary so the two of them could remain safe.

Jeffrey was certain of only one thing in regards to the man who was now hunting him and his friends; he would not stop until he had them in his possession, and the only person whose location he was unsure of was Jeffrey’s.

If the monster coming for him had known about the cabin in Zion, he would have already shown himself and done God knows what to him. No, he did not know about the cabin, and that, for the moment, gave them the advantage.

“There is no way I’m going back to that haunted madhouse,” Richard said defiantly. Jeffrey smiled to himself and thought that this was the one person who should be bowing down to and kissing the feet of Jeffrey as his savior, since it was Richard who had sold him the haunted house to begin with, had slept with his girlfriend, and so far was the only person who had the scars to prove the existence of the mysterious man.

“Feel free to wait here for him to kill you,” Jeffrey answered. “I know Saul was looking forward to seeing you again, but he’ll manage somehow.”

“That’s the fucking thing’s name? Saul?”

“I’d watch the way I speak about him, if I were you,” Jeffrey said angrily. “You shouldn’t have even been offered this opportunity, but I thought it would cruel of me to leave you to this thing that is hunting us. Saul disagreed, but he conceded.”

Rachel looked at Kearney and then Jeffrey; this was very uncomfortable for her, being in the same room as her former lover and her current one. To be honest, she was not even sure she wanted to be with Richard, but she felt obligated to care for him in his time of need. She knew that things were done between her and Jeffrey, and she regretted that, but what her real problem now was that she needed to get to a safe place and away from the man who had left so much destruction in his wake to this point.

“I don’t think I can do this,” she said.

“Do what? Save your life?” Jeffrey asked. “This guy is hunting me down, and the only way he can find me is to find you first.” He paused to let the words sink in and continued, “I’m not going to beg you, but I am going to ask that you think long and hard about it. Just don’t take too long; I know that it’s not safe here anymore, and I’m sure the cops would be of no use.”

He turned and walked toward the door. He had hoped he would be more convincing for her sake, but he had to accept the fact that she was the same person she always was and was not willing to accept defeat in any way. Running from the city to the sanctuary of Jeffrey’s cabin in Zion would be an admission of failure, and she was not willing to do that. She needed time, and he hoped that it would be enough.

He turned back and smiled at her, and a sudden feeling of guilt washed over him. He was not certain he was making the right decision to leave her here, but his obligation to her only went so far now that the two of them were no longer
the two of them
anymore.

He had to go and gather Jacob and get out of town before he was discovered. Knowing that Schultz was the man behind this scared him. It scared him to think that the eyes of the city were on him from places that he could not imagine, and it frightened him to think that no matter how hard he tried to keep himself and his friends safe, he would ultimately fail and their blood would be on his hands.