Chapter 15: Conversations
"Hi Charlie", Dylan said a bit nervously, Nat hold her hand firmly sounding much more confident than her. "I'm sorry, I did not think, I really feel stupid."
"Well, Dylan, I can't say I'm not disappointed, but I never believe you would order someone to kill and I promise we sort things out", Charlie said and it cut Dylan right through the heart. He was so nice and had nothing on his mind, but to help her. Instead of shouting at her he only used those understanding kind words.
"It is imperative for me to know what exactly happened", Charlie asked his angel. "Please begin with you leaving the hospital:"
Dylan nodded and began to tell how she suddenly had the idea to use Troy to find his cousin Seamus. That she bumped then into Ian O'Grady without realising it. How she got hold of Troy and their little ride together. Thinking about it she realised that the Irish mobster probably had been right about that car following them. In great detail she described how she tied up Troy and it brought a big smile on Natalie's face.
"He spent hours like this", Natalie told her. "The nurse called the police and an ambulance, they were so busy focusing on the house and discovered him by only by chance."
"The nurse", Dylan spat, but had also a mild smile on her face. Troy really deserved it. On the other hand it might get her booked for enforcing bodily harm, among other things. So the red head went on telling them how she climbed up and overheard a bit of conversation between the nurse and Seamus. "I suspected as much", Charlie told her, "however she told the police she was forced to come along and this Ian you mentioned earlier, confirmed her story."
"But Anthony stabbed him", Dylan said.
Natalie nodded. "The nurse - which name is by the way Karen O'Reilly - saved him. He was about to bleed to death, but they fixed him up pretty good at the hospital. He gave his statement before the sun went up today."
That was indeed bad news. The angel committed the kidnapping and had intended to kill him, at least until seeing him, how was any one to believe her she did not said: "Do it." Especially when the odds were to against one. If Ian really was nuts about her killing his boss and relative he might be crazy enough to go to prison for it, if he was able to take her with him.
So her only hope was telling Charlie the rest of the story. How she saw her ex-lover and changed her mind. About her rescue and how she was beaten by Ian shortly before. The killing and her kidnapping. The only thing she did not mention were those almost kisses and how she was still attracted to the man that felt like so much like him. It did not matter that the other thought he was a double send to distract her.
It must be him, it made no sense for Dr. Sattler and anyone working with her to create a game like this. She believed Anthony that he was ordered to stop her and the other angels. If it had not been him, any other killer had already finished her. Finally a logic explanation, but she kept it to herself anyway. "Then Aurelie showed up and here I am", she finished her explanations.
"It does not look very promising, Angels, I already sent a lawyer on his way to meet you. After you set up your strategy with him, I recommend you turn yourself in. I'm confident I can get you out soon, but if indeed a trial comes up - It will be hard if we can't find evidence other than you statement, that they are lying. They made up a solid story", Charlie said a bit worried.
Dylan sighed and run her fingers through her hair: "You think I might get sent to prison?" She sounded a bit frightened, after all a kidnapping was kidnapping and with those two conspiring against her, her odds were not so good.
"I think we can avoid that, if we are going to avoid it", Charlie tried to ensure her. "So stay here, they already looked everything up. Take care, Angels."
"You too, Charlie", the two of them said and then he hung up.
The red head leaned to the other angel who wrapped an arm around her. "Don't worry Charlie will sort it out", Natalie tried to comfort her.
"He shouldn't have to", Dylan said . "Are you going to see Alex soon?"
Natalie looked at the watch: "Yeah, I guess I should be going in a few minutes. Pete decided to stay home with Spike, the poor puppy had already been to long without any of us."
"Hasn't he that major test at the university going on soon?"
Natalie smiled and told her friend again the date, how hard Pete was working to pass it. After meeting him at Corwin's place, they had thought he was nothing but a cute looking bar tender, that he had only worked there part time to finance his studies they hadn't discovered until Nat and he went out steady. "I really have to go now - take care", she said and squeezed her friend a moment tightly before she got up.
Dylan accompanied her till they reached the door and asked her to say "hi" to anyone and how sorry she was, she could not be there. Then Natalie left and the remaining angel decided to check upon their client. She wondered what the doctor was thinking about all that which had happened. Did she also believe that she wanted to kill her or at least was willing to help Anthony in the matter? The angel had to find out.
Carefully she knocked at the door to the room that was given to Dr. Crushner. "Come in."
Dylan opened the door and took it as a good sign that the Doctor smiled. "Hi, wanted to see if everything was alright."
In fact it seemed so, since the last time the red head had seen the woman she was thin and pale, frightened to death. Now she was much calmer and her cheeks seemed to have got a bit colour back.
"I'm feeling much better", she sighed, "all that running around never feeling save anywhere. Coming here all that changed. I feel save here."
Dylan raised an eyebrow: "Even with me around?"
The doctor smiled more broadly. "Aurelie told me her suspicions, but I talked with Natalie about it …", she shrugged her shoulders. "Your friend knows you better than she I think, besides she is a little over protective and there is also… I don't know, but I think she took it pretty hard loosing her partner and the client on her first case. By the way - call me Anna."
"I guess you talked with Natalie about many other things as well", Dylan said and felt her stomach growl.
The doctor nodded: "I was not really open to talk before, but she broke right through the ice, she is such a nice girl. I guess she will be a wonderful mother."
"I'm glad you feel better", the angel told her. "Are you hungry? I had not a bit for almost twenty-four hours, I guess with all the stress I failed to notice so far."
Actually she had felt a strain in her belly, but it felt only naturally with all that she had to face.
"Good idea, believe it or not I'm a great eater - I can eat as much as I like and don't get any weight on", Anna locked down. "But the other way round it seems to work."
"I'm wondering", Dylan said leading the way out into the corridor. "Sometimes you speak with the strangest accent, then no trace left of it."
"My mother never knew much English, I grew up bi-langual, more Romanian then English at first. You see my father got only a job as a truck driver - he was seldom at home and Mum well there is not really much work to find for former circus artist."
"Circus artists - you're parents have been Romanian circus artists?", the angel interrupted her interested.
"Yes, but they left years before I was born. Father wanted something better for my mother and me, he said keeping to ourselves and the old tradition in this new country full of opportunities was a real shame."
Anna looked a bit sad: "I think it's a shame he never found out that I succeeded finally."
"What happened?", Dylan asked worried opening the door to the agencies kitchen.
Dr. Crushner walked over to the coffee machine. It was obvious that she was already familiar with the kitchen. "He got cancer and died about 28 years ago." She filled up the filter with the coffee powder and the compartment with water.
"I'm sorry to hear that", the angel said looking for microwave dinners in the freezer. "And your mother?"
"Oh, she took it pretty hard, she believed, that it was the fault of her grand-aunt", she told Dylan. "You know she was the seer - the head of the tribe and a woman that loved to have control over others. Mum had me walk around with sort of a talisman - father refused to do so."
In the back the coffee machine started to make noises.
"You believe in curses?", the angel said sensing that finally there was someone who might believe her about Anthony coming back from the dead. Holding a deluxe chicken-fricassee dinners in her hand. Apparently the good stuff was already gone.
"I guess so", Anna said. "There are so many things in this world that can't be explained by science and seeing your own mother and how real her fear of those things was - I guess it leaves you open for such things."
"Do you still have it?", Dylan asked. "By the way - we only have those and a package of hamburgers and of course French fries."
"I go for the burgers and the fries", the doctor said. "And no, I don't have it anymore - one day mother came - I was about thirteen and told me that we were free."
"Did she told you why?" the angel inquired as she put the dinner back and got the frozen fries and burgers out.
"That was the strangest part - she told me that the threat had been burned away", she shrugged her shoulders. "She never liked to speak much about them anyway - said it was bad luck."
Dylan gasped with open eyes and mouth as she heard that. Circus? Romanian? Burned? "Which year was that?", she finally asked.
"1978, why? You know something about it?", Anna wondered and took the fries out of Dylan's hands.
"Not really - I tell you when I know for sure, okay?", the angel had the strangest feeling. That was the year Anthony came to the orphanage. Could they be from the same tribe. Of course he would not know her, her parents must have been gone long before he was born. Anyway the doctor agreed and Dylan asked her more about her mother and how she ended up with Black Arrow. Secretly she wondered if it would have any influence upon Anthony's decision to go along with killing Anna.
They were a bit later busy chewing the lot of burgers and fries they had made and it seemed the Doctor normally ate even more than the angel. Being at her number three Dylan stopped as she heard the sound of the door bell. "Wait here, if something happens - go out the left door and hide behind the next door on the right. It's lockable from the inside and hard to come by - call the police then."
Then the angel left for the entrance hall and used the spy to see who was in front of the door. A well trained man in his fifties and a woman in her mid twenties, that looked very much like him. Both had the same tone of gold blond hair and bright blue eyes. She decided to open, since they really did not look like the sort of killers that were send out by this secret organisation.
"Hello, you must be Ms. Saunders - the woman Aurelie is so worried about", the man smiled. "I'm Robert Norman, her boss, this is my new secretary and also my daughter. Claire Norman."
He hold out his hand and Dylan took it and then the woman shook hands. Besides them on the ground were two large pilot suit cases. "Wow, she said someone was coming, but she did not mention it was you - by the way - where is she - she left to get you", Dylan said as she saw the taxi leaving.
"Strange, I thought she was to stay with our client", Claire said and looked very disapproving.
"She asked me and Natalie to take of Anna", the angel said, "but please do come in."
"So Charlie finally convinced her that you could not be the leak", Robert said, putting the two cases down and helped his daughter out of her coat, before he lost his own. Then he walked like being here before over to the wardrobe and hung them up. "Don't look so surprised Dylan, Charlie and I are old colleagues."
"You seen him?", Dylan said eyes sparkling with excitement.
"Sure, but I doubt I recognise him today - the last time I saw him - that was before you were born. He'd become a very private person. I never knew much about him", he smiled and for some reason Dylan began to like him. No wonder Aurelie was so protective about her firm - they also had a very nice boss.
"I'll take you to Dr. Crusher or should I show you the other guest room first?", the angel asked the two of them.
"First the client then the comfort", Robert told her and picked up his luggage.
"We were just eating a bit", Dylan explained and called out loud as they approached the kitchen. "Anna, it's alright - your bodyguards are here."
The two of them already had eaten, so while Anna finished, they went on to their rooms and just as they meet in the social room to have a chat. Aurelie came back through the back door. A happy look on her face, something about it alarmed the angel instantly. "Oh, you are already here, I must have missed you."
The falseness in her words was obvious to anyone.
"Aurelie, you never were a good liar and we never agreed that you come to get us from the airport. So where have you been?", Robert Norman seemed a bit upset, but also worried. 'Like Charlie', Dylan thought and judging from the uneasy look on the black woman's face, what he thought about her, meant a great deal to her.
"Okay, I went back to see if there was anything to find about the assassin or his organisation, but nothing", she explained and made a nervous chuckle.
"Was that all?", Robert asked and it was like he could see right through her.
The fact that Aurelie was torn between not to lie to her boss and not wanting to tell was obvious to anyone in the room. Yet the way the black woman looked at Dylan told the angel that she had met the Thin Man. "What did you do to him?", Dylan jumped up from the sofa.
Aurelie frowned. Annoyed and with a mocking tone she said: "I killed your little assassin! I bet you would have preferred it the other way round, hmm?"
Unbelieving the angel shook her head. She did not want to picture how this trigger-happy person shoot Anthony. 'Damn it,' the angel thought, 'how could this woman be so cold about it?' The others remained silent and were not sure how to reply to her statement. Except Dylan, she felt the growing urge to lunge at Aurelie to bet the shit out of her.
Only knowing what letting her wrath out had achieved the last time helped her to turn away. She could not look in this beautiful face that bore an expression as if the angel was the evil doer here. 'I did not shoot someone', Dylan told herself. She fled out the door, down the hall, then left and down the stairs. As she stopped the angel saw that she was right in front of the back door.
The red head felt that she need to know for sure. If he was shoot - no doubt about Aurelie using her guns - and if he was the very same Anthony - it could give her the answers she had been yearning for. Nonetheless she was afraid to find a dead body. Dylan was not sure whether she could bear the sight again. It was decided in a matter of seconds. She took Alex spare keys and her coat and headed to the parking lot.
Luckily someone had brought it back here, hers was probably still in the underground garage or at the police impound. Forgotten was the warning to wait here and for the lawyer. The angel's mind was focused on Anthony. Would he come back once more. What if not? What if this had been a one time miracle? Then Dylan would never know whether she had deluded herself or if her feeling had told her the truth.
Subconsciously she even avoided the civil patrol, by taking the other and longer way round. It was a bit complicated to find the way back. The angel had not paid much attention, to much trouble on her mind, she only recalled the general direction. Once the red head reached the neighbourhood, she had to drive to several streets until she recognised the graffiti painting on the opposite house.
Leaving the car she rushed to the entrance and up the stairs. The door to the room where she had been hold was open. Slowly she crossed the distance and took a look. She gasped in shock and laughed relieved at the same time. There was a huge blood stain already dried on the carpet, but no body. In the wall behind where four holes and all very close together. The bullets removed from it. It seemed that Mademoiselle Barracuda was quite the assassin herself.
Where was he now? Dylan's eyes fell upon the not pad that lay on the ground. 'Maybe he comes back here', she thought. Taking a deep breath she left a note. She ripped the sheet from it and took the pad itself with her. The angel wanted to re-read what he had written earlier. Heading down the stairs she looked whether he was lurking somewhere in the shadows, but he was not.
As Dylan opened the door and stepped outside, she was shocked to see that she was suddenly in the middle of a huge crime scene. Police officers with pale faces walked around and then Detective Thompsen saw her. "Miss Sanders - finally you show up. Dare I ask what you were doing here?"
"I- I got a tip that the person who is after our client was here", she sighed. "I needed to check it, I would have come round after that, I swear."
He eyed her: "Well consider yourself arrested." He signalled to an officer. Dylan walked closer to him, curious what they were investigating and also to show that she was not running from them. Then she saw why everyone was so pale. There was a door to a cellar and on the outside of this door a woman was nailed against. Large iron bolts were stuck in her body through the door, her face stuck with terror. The angel turned around.
"Sorry, you had to see this", he said and took her hand, "and sorry for this also." The young officer had given the Detective a pair of handcuffs, but just as he was to close it around her wrist, he saw the blue ring made from the earlier cuffing. "Where did you got this?"
"It's a long story, but in fact I owe this to Ian O'Grady."
Thompsen took a deep breath that seemed to say 'I knew it'. "Ok, Officer Grahmes, I think we can do for once with out the cuffs - please escort Ms. Saunders to the station." Then to her: "I'm sure things will work out, but then you should have been more careful with the cameras."
"Hi Charlie", Dylan said a bit nervously, Nat hold her hand firmly sounding much more confident than her. "I'm sorry, I did not think, I really feel stupid."
"Well, Dylan, I can't say I'm not disappointed, but I never believe you would order someone to kill and I promise we sort things out", Charlie said and it cut Dylan right through the heart. He was so nice and had nothing on his mind, but to help her. Instead of shouting at her he only used those understanding kind words.
"It is imperative for me to know what exactly happened", Charlie asked his angel. "Please begin with you leaving the hospital:"
Dylan nodded and began to tell how she suddenly had the idea to use Troy to find his cousin Seamus. That she bumped then into Ian O'Grady without realising it. How she got hold of Troy and their little ride together. Thinking about it she realised that the Irish mobster probably had been right about that car following them. In great detail she described how she tied up Troy and it brought a big smile on Natalie's face.
"He spent hours like this", Natalie told her. "The nurse called the police and an ambulance, they were so busy focusing on the house and discovered him by only by chance."
"The nurse", Dylan spat, but had also a mild smile on her face. Troy really deserved it. On the other hand it might get her booked for enforcing bodily harm, among other things. So the red head went on telling them how she climbed up and overheard a bit of conversation between the nurse and Seamus. "I suspected as much", Charlie told her, "however she told the police she was forced to come along and this Ian you mentioned earlier, confirmed her story."
"But Anthony stabbed him", Dylan said.
Natalie nodded. "The nurse - which name is by the way Karen O'Reilly - saved him. He was about to bleed to death, but they fixed him up pretty good at the hospital. He gave his statement before the sun went up today."
That was indeed bad news. The angel committed the kidnapping and had intended to kill him, at least until seeing him, how was any one to believe her she did not said: "Do it." Especially when the odds were to against one. If Ian really was nuts about her killing his boss and relative he might be crazy enough to go to prison for it, if he was able to take her with him.
So her only hope was telling Charlie the rest of the story. How she saw her ex-lover and changed her mind. About her rescue and how she was beaten by Ian shortly before. The killing and her kidnapping. The only thing she did not mention were those almost kisses and how she was still attracted to the man that felt like so much like him. It did not matter that the other thought he was a double send to distract her.
It must be him, it made no sense for Dr. Sattler and anyone working with her to create a game like this. She believed Anthony that he was ordered to stop her and the other angels. If it had not been him, any other killer had already finished her. Finally a logic explanation, but she kept it to herself anyway. "Then Aurelie showed up and here I am", she finished her explanations.
"It does not look very promising, Angels, I already sent a lawyer on his way to meet you. After you set up your strategy with him, I recommend you turn yourself in. I'm confident I can get you out soon, but if indeed a trial comes up - It will be hard if we can't find evidence other than you statement, that they are lying. They made up a solid story", Charlie said a bit worried.
Dylan sighed and run her fingers through her hair: "You think I might get sent to prison?" She sounded a bit frightened, after all a kidnapping was kidnapping and with those two conspiring against her, her odds were not so good.
"I think we can avoid that, if we are going to avoid it", Charlie tried to ensure her. "So stay here, they already looked everything up. Take care, Angels."
"You too, Charlie", the two of them said and then he hung up.
The red head leaned to the other angel who wrapped an arm around her. "Don't worry Charlie will sort it out", Natalie tried to comfort her.
"He shouldn't have to", Dylan said . "Are you going to see Alex soon?"
Natalie looked at the watch: "Yeah, I guess I should be going in a few minutes. Pete decided to stay home with Spike, the poor puppy had already been to long without any of us."
"Hasn't he that major test at the university going on soon?"
Natalie smiled and told her friend again the date, how hard Pete was working to pass it. After meeting him at Corwin's place, they had thought he was nothing but a cute looking bar tender, that he had only worked there part time to finance his studies they hadn't discovered until Nat and he went out steady. "I really have to go now - take care", she said and squeezed her friend a moment tightly before she got up.
Dylan accompanied her till they reached the door and asked her to say "hi" to anyone and how sorry she was, she could not be there. Then Natalie left and the remaining angel decided to check upon their client. She wondered what the doctor was thinking about all that which had happened. Did she also believe that she wanted to kill her or at least was willing to help Anthony in the matter? The angel had to find out.
Carefully she knocked at the door to the room that was given to Dr. Crushner. "Come in."
Dylan opened the door and took it as a good sign that the Doctor smiled. "Hi, wanted to see if everything was alright."
In fact it seemed so, since the last time the red head had seen the woman she was thin and pale, frightened to death. Now she was much calmer and her cheeks seemed to have got a bit colour back.
"I'm feeling much better", she sighed, "all that running around never feeling save anywhere. Coming here all that changed. I feel save here."
Dylan raised an eyebrow: "Even with me around?"
The doctor smiled more broadly. "Aurelie told me her suspicions, but I talked with Natalie about it …", she shrugged her shoulders. "Your friend knows you better than she I think, besides she is a little over protective and there is also… I don't know, but I think she took it pretty hard loosing her partner and the client on her first case. By the way - call me Anna."
"I guess you talked with Natalie about many other things as well", Dylan said and felt her stomach growl.
The doctor nodded: "I was not really open to talk before, but she broke right through the ice, she is such a nice girl. I guess she will be a wonderful mother."
"I'm glad you feel better", the angel told her. "Are you hungry? I had not a bit for almost twenty-four hours, I guess with all the stress I failed to notice so far."
Actually she had felt a strain in her belly, but it felt only naturally with all that she had to face.
"Good idea, believe it or not I'm a great eater - I can eat as much as I like and don't get any weight on", Anna locked down. "But the other way round it seems to work."
"I'm wondering", Dylan said leading the way out into the corridor. "Sometimes you speak with the strangest accent, then no trace left of it."
"My mother never knew much English, I grew up bi-langual, more Romanian then English at first. You see my father got only a job as a truck driver - he was seldom at home and Mum well there is not really much work to find for former circus artist."
"Circus artists - you're parents have been Romanian circus artists?", the angel interrupted her interested.
"Yes, but they left years before I was born. Father wanted something better for my mother and me, he said keeping to ourselves and the old tradition in this new country full of opportunities was a real shame."
Anna looked a bit sad: "I think it's a shame he never found out that I succeeded finally."
"What happened?", Dylan asked worried opening the door to the agencies kitchen.
Dr. Crushner walked over to the coffee machine. It was obvious that she was already familiar with the kitchen. "He got cancer and died about 28 years ago." She filled up the filter with the coffee powder and the compartment with water.
"I'm sorry to hear that", the angel said looking for microwave dinners in the freezer. "And your mother?"
"Oh, she took it pretty hard, she believed, that it was the fault of her grand-aunt", she told Dylan. "You know she was the seer - the head of the tribe and a woman that loved to have control over others. Mum had me walk around with sort of a talisman - father refused to do so."
In the back the coffee machine started to make noises.
"You believe in curses?", the angel said sensing that finally there was someone who might believe her about Anthony coming back from the dead. Holding a deluxe chicken-fricassee dinners in her hand. Apparently the good stuff was already gone.
"I guess so", Anna said. "There are so many things in this world that can't be explained by science and seeing your own mother and how real her fear of those things was - I guess it leaves you open for such things."
"Do you still have it?", Dylan asked. "By the way - we only have those and a package of hamburgers and of course French fries."
"I go for the burgers and the fries", the doctor said. "And no, I don't have it anymore - one day mother came - I was about thirteen and told me that we were free."
"Did she told you why?" the angel inquired as she put the dinner back and got the frozen fries and burgers out.
"That was the strangest part - she told me that the threat had been burned away", she shrugged her shoulders. "She never liked to speak much about them anyway - said it was bad luck."
Dylan gasped with open eyes and mouth as she heard that. Circus? Romanian? Burned? "Which year was that?", she finally asked.
"1978, why? You know something about it?", Anna wondered and took the fries out of Dylan's hands.
"Not really - I tell you when I know for sure, okay?", the angel had the strangest feeling. That was the year Anthony came to the orphanage. Could they be from the same tribe. Of course he would not know her, her parents must have been gone long before he was born. Anyway the doctor agreed and Dylan asked her more about her mother and how she ended up with Black Arrow. Secretly she wondered if it would have any influence upon Anthony's decision to go along with killing Anna.
They were a bit later busy chewing the lot of burgers and fries they had made and it seemed the Doctor normally ate even more than the angel. Being at her number three Dylan stopped as she heard the sound of the door bell. "Wait here, if something happens - go out the left door and hide behind the next door on the right. It's lockable from the inside and hard to come by - call the police then."
Then the angel left for the entrance hall and used the spy to see who was in front of the door. A well trained man in his fifties and a woman in her mid twenties, that looked very much like him. Both had the same tone of gold blond hair and bright blue eyes. She decided to open, since they really did not look like the sort of killers that were send out by this secret organisation.
"Hello, you must be Ms. Saunders - the woman Aurelie is so worried about", the man smiled. "I'm Robert Norman, her boss, this is my new secretary and also my daughter. Claire Norman."
He hold out his hand and Dylan took it and then the woman shook hands. Besides them on the ground were two large pilot suit cases. "Wow, she said someone was coming, but she did not mention it was you - by the way - where is she - she left to get you", Dylan said as she saw the taxi leaving.
"Strange, I thought she was to stay with our client", Claire said and looked very disapproving.
"She asked me and Natalie to take of Anna", the angel said, "but please do come in."
"So Charlie finally convinced her that you could not be the leak", Robert said, putting the two cases down and helped his daughter out of her coat, before he lost his own. Then he walked like being here before over to the wardrobe and hung them up. "Don't look so surprised Dylan, Charlie and I are old colleagues."
"You seen him?", Dylan said eyes sparkling with excitement.
"Sure, but I doubt I recognise him today - the last time I saw him - that was before you were born. He'd become a very private person. I never knew much about him", he smiled and for some reason Dylan began to like him. No wonder Aurelie was so protective about her firm - they also had a very nice boss.
"I'll take you to Dr. Crusher or should I show you the other guest room first?", the angel asked the two of them.
"First the client then the comfort", Robert told her and picked up his luggage.
"We were just eating a bit", Dylan explained and called out loud as they approached the kitchen. "Anna, it's alright - your bodyguards are here."
The two of them already had eaten, so while Anna finished, they went on to their rooms and just as they meet in the social room to have a chat. Aurelie came back through the back door. A happy look on her face, something about it alarmed the angel instantly. "Oh, you are already here, I must have missed you."
The falseness in her words was obvious to anyone.
"Aurelie, you never were a good liar and we never agreed that you come to get us from the airport. So where have you been?", Robert Norman seemed a bit upset, but also worried. 'Like Charlie', Dylan thought and judging from the uneasy look on the black woman's face, what he thought about her, meant a great deal to her.
"Okay, I went back to see if there was anything to find about the assassin or his organisation, but nothing", she explained and made a nervous chuckle.
"Was that all?", Robert asked and it was like he could see right through her.
The fact that Aurelie was torn between not to lie to her boss and not wanting to tell was obvious to anyone in the room. Yet the way the black woman looked at Dylan told the angel that she had met the Thin Man. "What did you do to him?", Dylan jumped up from the sofa.
Aurelie frowned. Annoyed and with a mocking tone she said: "I killed your little assassin! I bet you would have preferred it the other way round, hmm?"
Unbelieving the angel shook her head. She did not want to picture how this trigger-happy person shoot Anthony. 'Damn it,' the angel thought, 'how could this woman be so cold about it?' The others remained silent and were not sure how to reply to her statement. Except Dylan, she felt the growing urge to lunge at Aurelie to bet the shit out of her.
Only knowing what letting her wrath out had achieved the last time helped her to turn away. She could not look in this beautiful face that bore an expression as if the angel was the evil doer here. 'I did not shoot someone', Dylan told herself. She fled out the door, down the hall, then left and down the stairs. As she stopped the angel saw that she was right in front of the back door.
The red head felt that she need to know for sure. If he was shoot - no doubt about Aurelie using her guns - and if he was the very same Anthony - it could give her the answers she had been yearning for. Nonetheless she was afraid to find a dead body. Dylan was not sure whether she could bear the sight again. It was decided in a matter of seconds. She took Alex spare keys and her coat and headed to the parking lot.
Luckily someone had brought it back here, hers was probably still in the underground garage or at the police impound. Forgotten was the warning to wait here and for the lawyer. The angel's mind was focused on Anthony. Would he come back once more. What if not? What if this had been a one time miracle? Then Dylan would never know whether she had deluded herself or if her feeling had told her the truth.
Subconsciously she even avoided the civil patrol, by taking the other and longer way round. It was a bit complicated to find the way back. The angel had not paid much attention, to much trouble on her mind, she only recalled the general direction. Once the red head reached the neighbourhood, she had to drive to several streets until she recognised the graffiti painting on the opposite house.
Leaving the car she rushed to the entrance and up the stairs. The door to the room where she had been hold was open. Slowly she crossed the distance and took a look. She gasped in shock and laughed relieved at the same time. There was a huge blood stain already dried on the carpet, but no body. In the wall behind where four holes and all very close together. The bullets removed from it. It seemed that Mademoiselle Barracuda was quite the assassin herself.
Where was he now? Dylan's eyes fell upon the not pad that lay on the ground. 'Maybe he comes back here', she thought. Taking a deep breath she left a note. She ripped the sheet from it and took the pad itself with her. The angel wanted to re-read what he had written earlier. Heading down the stairs she looked whether he was lurking somewhere in the shadows, but he was not.
As Dylan opened the door and stepped outside, she was shocked to see that she was suddenly in the middle of a huge crime scene. Police officers with pale faces walked around and then Detective Thompsen saw her. "Miss Sanders - finally you show up. Dare I ask what you were doing here?"
"I- I got a tip that the person who is after our client was here", she sighed. "I needed to check it, I would have come round after that, I swear."
He eyed her: "Well consider yourself arrested." He signalled to an officer. Dylan walked closer to him, curious what they were investigating and also to show that she was not running from them. Then she saw why everyone was so pale. There was a door to a cellar and on the outside of this door a woman was nailed against. Large iron bolts were stuck in her body through the door, her face stuck with terror. The angel turned around.
"Sorry, you had to see this", he said and took her hand, "and sorry for this also." The young officer had given the Detective a pair of handcuffs, but just as he was to close it around her wrist, he saw the blue ring made from the earlier cuffing. "Where did you got this?"
"It's a long story, but in fact I owe this to Ian O'Grady."
Thompsen took a deep breath that seemed to say 'I knew it'. "Ok, Officer Grahmes, I think we can do for once with out the cuffs - please escort Ms. Saunders to the station." Then to her: "I'm sure things will work out, but then you should have been more careful with the cameras."
