In Plain Sight

“Everyone would,” Iggy gasped. “Rockefeller and Todd have been feuding for years.”

“And Todd is a paranoid hermit,” Alex said. “He’d accuse Rockefeller of starting the plague.”

Danny began to nod, a look of alarm on his face. “And Rockefeller wouldn’t take that lying down. It would start a war between them.”

“The New York Six are the most powerful and wealthy sorcerers in the world,” Alex pointed out. “With four of them gone, every other sorcerer in America would be lining up to support one faction or the other, hoping to move in once the dust settles. It would destabilize the whole country.”

“So, what do we do?” Danny said. “We don’t have any proof of this. You know Captain Rooney isn’t going to call anybody about this without ironclad evidence, especially not a sorcerer.”

Alex turned and ran out into the hallway. “You call Callahan and get someone over here to take charge of the bodies and the journal,” he called as he tore down the stairs.

“Where are you going?” Danny yelled after him.

Alex dashed downstairs and across the lobby, past the reception desk and the woman with the gossip magazine. Laying his good shoulder into the door, he stumbled out into the night, tearing off up the street toward the lights of the nightclubs. They might not serve any useful purpose, but you could always get a cab in front of one. He jumped in the first one he found.

“The Waldorf,” he said. “Quickly,” he added when the cabbie looked at him incredulously. Not many people went to the Waldorf from this neighborhood.

As the cab pulled away from the curb, Alex opened his kit and dropped Beaumont’s shoe inside, exchanging it for his 1911 which he slipped into his jacket pocket. Whoever had the plague jars had four targets, and one of them was Sorsha Kincaid. Thanks to Alex’s erroneous assumption that the Germans on the airship were the ones who owned the plague jars, she was right this very minute standing in a hotel ballroom at a conference of boring diplomats.

He might as well have put a bull’s-eye on her back.

* * *

To keep his mind off how long the cab took to reach the core and the Waldorf hotel, Alex paged through his rune book. He’d used a lot of his powerful runes in the last few days and there were precious little left. After flipping through it twice, he tucked it back in his pocket with a note of disgust. Unless he wanted to fix a run in the Sorceress’ stockings, there wasn’t much his rune book could contribute.

When the cab finally stopped in front of the Waldorf, Alex shoved all the money he had into the cabbie’s hand, hoping it would be enough, and ran to the enormous glass doors. Beyond them, inside the hotel’s vestibule, a security station had been set up. All the doors but one were blocked with potted plants, and two policemen stood on either side of the open door. Agent Davis stood in the doorway, clipboard in hand, and he looked up in shock as Alex came tearing through the door.

“Why are you here, Lockerby?” he asked, stepping in front of the open door. Alex stopped short to avoid running into the FBI man.

“Where’s Sorsha?” he demanded.

“Miss Kincaid is inside where she belongs,” Davis said. “Now why don’t you go back where you belong?”

“I need to speak to her! She’s in danger.”

Agent Davis laughed in his face. “She’s in the safest place in the city right now,” he said. “Those Germans aren’t going to get in here tonight or any other night.”

“You’re right,” Alex agreed. “Because they’re dead.”

Alex briefly relayed the story of finding the German alchemists and the details they had left behind.

“You have to let me talk to her,” he finished.

“Sorsha Kincaid knows how to take care of herself,” Agent Davis said.

“She doesn’t know this is coming,” Alex said. “She has to be warned.”

Davis vacillated for a long moment, indecision on his face.

“Fine,” he said at last. “She’s in the ballroom.” He stepped aside and let Alex through. “But don’t disturb the other guests.”

The ballroom of the Waldorf hotel was massive, three stories high with polished hardwood floors and arcades running along the side walls that housed recessed balconies. Carved columns ran up every wall to large painted cornices, and crystal chandeliers hung everywhere. The thick smoke of a hundred cigarettes hung in the room and a cacophony of voices filled the chamber with the incoherent buzz of conversation.

Alex stood paralyzed for a moment, scanning the crowd, but moments later a head of platinum hair in an A-line cut came into view. The Sorceress had taken off the hat with the veil and now her white-blonde hair shone like a beacon in the dimly lit room.

“Mr. Lockerby,” she said with an unamused smile when she caught sight of his approach. She quickly excused herself from the group she’d been conversing with and turned to meet him. “I used to like your penchant for showing up in the most unexpected places,” she said. “Now, I’m starting to tire of it.”

“Nice to see you too,” he said, taking her by the elbow and gently pulling her along in his wake. “We need to talk.”