Vegas Knights (26 page)
Authors: Matt Forbeck
"Thanks."
"Powaqa!" Mamaci called from somewhere up ahead. "Don't dawdle!"
The man holding me shoved me forward, and Powi followed right behind us. We laced our way through the empty club until we reached the service elevator in the back of the place. Mamaci stood there holding the door for us as we piled in next to Bill and the men holding him.
The lone man not grabbing anyone took his thumb off the Open Door button and pressed the button marked Roof. I felt my ears pop as the elevator dragged us fifty stories into the air in under a minute. The doors opened, and we spilled straight out onto the Thunderbird's roof.
I cringed like a vampire in the harsh midday sun. I blinked in pain until my eyes finally adjusted to the unforgiving brightness.
The roof of the Thunderbird was flat, but someone had painted all sorts of different designs on it. Most of them seemed to have a Native American theme, but I didn't understand any of them – except for the big yellow H on which a private helicopter sat. It was painted a brilliant turquoise and had the casino's logo emblazoned on the sides.
Mamaci led her procession around the helipad to a small geodesic dome that sat toward the back of the roof. It looked like an igloo or a wigwam made of layers of translucent plastic stretched over a steel frame of triangles only a few inches across.
The free man went to the wigwam's hatch, which sat near the ground, and undid the steel latches on it. When he opened it, smoke came pouring out of it.
"What the hell is that?" I said.
"A smoke house," Powi said. She gave me a nervous glance, then looked away. "We sometimes use it to cure the meat of wild game we catch on native lands."
A cruel smile curled at the corners of Mamaci's lips.
The man stepped away from the hatch, then patted Bill down and turned out his pockets. He tossed aside Bill's phone, a few business cards with scribbled notes on them, some loose change, and a thick roll of cash. Then he jerked his head toward the dome, and the men holding Bill duck walked him over to it and tossed him inside.
"This is how you're going to kill him?" Powi said. "By smoke inhalation?"
Mamaci nodded. "That or the heat. The temperatures in there can reach two hundred degrees. It's like leaving a dog inside a car on a summer day."
"No!" Bill screamed. Getting tossed into the smoky dome seemed to have revived him. Silent and beaten for the entire way up here, his survival instinct had kicked in. "Nooo!"
The man who'd frisked Bill slammed the hatch shut and latched it.
I reached into my pocket and felt the bracelet there. I started to pull it out when the man at the hatch turned and spotted me.
"Stop him!" he said.
The man holding me grabbed both of my arms in a viselike grip. I tried to wrench myself free, but he headbutted me in the back of my skull. Stars exploded in front of my eyes, and I felt myself pitch forward, dizzy on my feet.
"Jackson!" Bill screamed. "Jacksooon!"
I raised my head to see Bill's arms sticking out through two of the steel triangles. They were slicked with sweat. They pulled back and grabbed at the triangles. Bill's nose and mouth appeared at a triangle between and above them.
"Help! Heeelllp!"
A man strode forward and kicked Bill's face back into the dome. Then he stomped on his fingers until they disappeared too.
One of the men pulled my hands out of my pockets and patted me down. They tossed my things out onto the roof.
"What's that in his hand?" one of the men said.
Someone snapped the bracelet from my fingers. "It's just one of those rubber bracelets," a man said. "You know, like that 'Livestrong' thing."
"Or 'Wriststrong,'" another said with a laugh.
"Let me see that," said Powi.
"No!" I said. "It's mine!"
One of the men punched me in the jaw and then the guts. I bent over and retched.
Powi put her hand into the bracelet.
"Ah," Mamaci said, impressed. "A spirit world pouch? Excellent work, Powaqa. Bring it here."
Instead, Powi pulled out a pistol and pointed it at the man holding me.
"Let him go," she said.
Mamaci growled. "Powaqa! Such insolence! Put down that gun and bring the bracelet to me!"
"You can't shoot me," the man holding me said. "You'll hit your little friend here."
"Heeelp!" Bill screamed. He had shoved his face out through another part of the dome. "Jacks–!"
A fit of coughing cut him off. I knew he wouldn't last much longer.
I planted my feet on the ground and tried as hard as I could to break free of the man's grip. I stomped on his foot and came down on steel-toed boots. Nothing I could do would get me free.
"Let him go!" Powi cocked the pistol. "Now!"
"Granddaughter!" Mamaci said. "Give me that gun!"
"Jackson!"
"He's dying!" I said. "Do something!
NOW!"
NOW!"
Powi turned and fired a shot at the man nearest the hatch. The man holding me froze in surprise. I put everything I had left into one last try, and I wrenched myself away from him.
I stumbled across the roof and landed on my hands and knees. Without pausing, I scrambled over to the smokehouse and fumbled with the latch.
"Stop him!" Mamaci said.
"Freeze, Walter!"
Powi fired the pistol, and my captor – who'd been chasing after me – dove face-down onto the roof and covered his head with his hands.
"Don't shoot, Powi!" he said.
"Then don't move!" She waved her gun at the others, and they all put their hands up. "Andy, Robbie, and Danny! Go lie down next to Walter." The men moved to comply.
"What in the names of all the spirits are you doing, Powaqa?" Mamaci said.
"I've had enough, Grandma," Powi said. "These boys may be idiots, but they don't deserve to die for it."
I got the latch open, and Bill tumbled out through the hatch. He hit the roof coughing and wheezing. He was sweaty and flushed, gasping for air, and his eyes were wide and bloodshot.
"This is a war," Mamaci said to Powi. "There are going to be casualties. Would you rather have them on our side or theirs?"
"I'd rather have none at all, Grandma."
"Put down the gun, Powaqa. Right now!"
"I am not a little girl, and I am not one of your goons."
"Hey!" one of the men said.
"Sorry, Walter, but that's what you are."
"Powaqa. I understand why you're upset. This sickens me too, but Mr Weiss has backed us into a corner. We do not have any other choice."
"You've told me that before, Grandma, and I believed you. Now I'm not so sure. Killing boys who make stupid decisions? Just because they wind up on the wrong side of the line? That's something Houdini would do. Not us."
I hauled Bill to his feet and put his arm around my shoulders. Together we staggered toward the elevator, and I hit the call button. Bill wheezed the whole way, but he'd stopped trying to hack up his lungs. I had high hopes that he would be all right, especially if I could get him to a doctor or a healer fast.
"Powaqa Annachiara Strega! We are done talking. Give Walter the gun and leave." If Mamaci had been able to manage it, I think fire would have shot out of her eyes right then.
Powi backed toward Bill and me, keeping the pistol trained on the men on the ground.
"She is not going to shoot you," Mamaci said to her men. "Get up and grab her!"
Walter rose to his knees, and Powi put a bullet right over his head. He hit the roof again.
"Stay down!" Powi said. "I'm not that good with this thing. I might hit you by accident."
The men all tried to lie flatter. Mamaci snarled at them and stalked toward Powi. "This is ridiculous," she said. "You wouldn't dare to shoot me. You can't hurt me even if you did."
"Don't make me try." Powi's voice shook but her hands stayed steady.
The elevator dinged. The doors opened, and I hauled Bill in. "You staying or going?" I said to Powi.
Mamaci strode up and grabbed Powi's wrist. "You have disobeyed me for the last time, Powaqa."
Powi wrenched her arm free, and Mamaci tumbled backward onto her rump. "I wouldn't count on that, Grandma," Powi said as she joined Bill and me in the elevator and thumbed the button for the ground floor.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
"Thank you," I said. "You didn't have to do that." Bill coughed in agreement.
"Of course I did, dammit. I couldn't just let her kill you." Powi smacked her head against the elevator doors. "I am in sooo much trouble right now. I don't know if Grandma will ever have me back."
"We haven't quite gotten out of here yet," I said. "Let's worry about that first."
"Right. Right." Powi pressed the button for the fifth floor.
"Why are we stopping there?"
"I screwed up." Powi handed me Bill's bracelet. "If we just head back down to the club, Grandma will have a team of security guards waiting for us there. We have to find another way out."
"Can you fly?" I asked.
She goggled at me. "No, can you?"
"I saw Houdini do it. I figured if you knew how to do that, we could just find a balcony and take off."
"Not many magicians can fly. I've seen Grandma do it, but that's about it. Even so, she only does it at night. Too many cameras around in Vegas. During the day, she'd get caught."
We reached the fifth floor, and the elevator doors opened. Powi stepped out, scanned the area, and then beckoned for us. Bill was still having trouble breathing, so I helped him out into the service hallway and leaned him up against a wall.
"Can you help him?" I asked. "Like you did for me?"
Powi squinted at him for a moment, then nodded. Without a word, she put one hand on his chest and another on his head. She closed her eyes and began to hum softly to herself.
I couldn't see her glowing in the well-lit hall, but I could tell when Bill started to feel better. The red tint faded from his skin, and he began to breathe easier again. He closed his eyes too, and when he reopened them, they were as clear and sharp as ever.
"I think you took away my hangover too," he said to Powi as she removed her hands and stepped back to examine her handiwork. "Thanks."
She dismissed that with a wave of her hand. "Let's move," she said. "They'll be after us any second."
She charged off without bothering to see if we'd follow, and we stuck as close to her as we could. She shoved her way through a doorway and into a long, curved hall lined with guest rooms. She sprinted along it at top speed, and Bill and I struggled to keep up with her.
"Where are we going?" I asked.
"Parking structure," she said. "We can't get out through the casino. They'll have every exit blocked for sure."
When we reached the far end of the hall, Powi slipped through a glass door and snaked through a short corridor that emptied out into an open-air concrete
parking structure.
"Don't they have cameras out here too?" I asked.
"Not as many." She dashed down the ramp and into a concrete encased stairwell.
We raced down the steps, pushing past a group of spring breakers coming up toward us. When we made it to the second-floor landing, we heard voices below.
"Yes, ma'am!" a woman said. "We are in place and prepared for contact."
Instead of continuing down, Powi yanked open the door and ushered us back into the parking ramp. "That was Lieutenant Nodda from security. She'll have a team of people helping her."
"Can we just run past her?" I asked.
"Only if you like getting Tased then pepper sprayed by a dozen people at once."
"So that's a no," I said.
"Can you two go stealth?" Powi asked. "Silent and invisible?"
I glanced at Bill, who shook his head. I remembered the silenced pistol Gaviota had shot me with, but I hadn't thought yet about trying to duplicate the effect. "We've never tried," I said.
She reached out. "Hold my hands," she said. "Normally I couldn't manage to affect so many people, but since you're magicians too, it might work."
Bill and I complied, and Powi closed her eyes. Bill still seemed pretty shaken by nearly getting killed. I could see his hand shivering in Powi's grasp.
The world grew dim around us, and everything went quiet, as if someone had stuffed plugs into my ears. I could still see Powi and Bill, but they looked blurry around the edges.
Powi opened her eyes and nodded toward the stairwell. I reached out and opened the door, still holding onto her hand. It swung on its hinges without a sound.
The three of us crept down the stairwell, me in front, Powi right behind me, and Bill in back. When we reached the ground floor, a woman in a dark suit and sunglasses blocked our way, an automatic pistol at the ready in her hand. A pair of security agents stood out on the ramp beyond her, scanning the area as intently as her.
I looked back at the others and shrugged. I didn't see how we could get past her. Powi jerked her head around to suggest that I continue on down into the basement, so I pushed on in that direction.
We emerged into a well-lit sublevel ramp packed with cars. Once we were in the open, Powi took the lead, dragging Bill and me along by her hands. She brought us deeper into the ramp until it came to a dead end in which stood a rusty steel door that had once been a brilliant green. A large steel bar had been padlocked across it.
At that point, Bill yanked his hand away from Powi. He'd been trying to say something, but Powi's spell had silenced him.
"This isn't going to work," he said. "We're trapped."
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