ANOTHER CLUE
-Dis/Claimer- x x x . Chapter Thirteen . Carolyn pushed Riley, and the two of them ran right at Fischer as he pulled out his gun. She looked back startled to see how fast Horace was catching up, and Fischer had his gun ready to fire almost at point blank. She felt Riley slowing down, so she quickly shoved him forward, both of them landing in a pile on Fischer. People screamed as Horace fired a shot, and Carolyn quickly grabbed Riley as the subway slowed and stopped. “The door!” she said urgently. “Go for the door!” He scrambled to his feet pulling her with him, and he slammed his hand on the emergency button desperately next to the doors that now opened as the brakes were applied even more, shifting everyone in the car violently. Riley held onto the pole next to the door with Carolyn clinging to him to fight the force of falling. Frustrated grunts and yells came from Horace and Fischer as they tried to stand again and aim for their targets, and screams of panic rose again. And there it was. The platform. Riley grabbed Carolyn around the waist and lifted her with him as he jumped and rolled out of the moving subway train onto the hard cold ground. “Hurry! Get up,” he urged after shaking the impact off quickly. Carolyn sat up as Horace leaned out of the subway car shooting at them, but passengers within began to attack the gunman, pulling him back inside, fighting for control of the pistol. Over sixty feet away, the car finally came to a stop, and Riley took Carolyn by the wrist, running for the first sign of cover he saw. He led her over to one of the two available telephone booths through the crowd, pushing the door open quickly. “Get in. Hurry.” “Wh-? We aren’t both going to fit in there,” Carolyn said, stopping. “I’d rather be cramped than dead,” he said. “In! Now, please!” “Riley!” “Shh!” He slid in facing her, the space pinched as Carolyn had predicted, but he really didn’t mind right now. So long as they couldn’t be seen. He shut the door with Carolyn wincing in the tight booth, and he fought to close the blind for a few seconds until it gave. Then, he leaned his head back against the tinted and blurred glass behind him, catching his breath. “Riley, I can’t breath,” Carolyn said, wriggling. “Move back some.” “I can’t,” he said, looking down at their close position. They were pressed together uncomfortably, the pressure of the metal frame and glass hurting them, too. It seemed there was no way for this not to be awkward, and Riley tried to shift some, but nothing was calming down the shaken woman he shared the phone booth with. “Just… try to be comfortable,” he said, relaxing into her some. She gave him a look, and he returned it. “You’ll live, I promise,” he added sarcastically. “Just don’t bite my head off.” “I don’t bite,” she said. “But you do your fair share of barking.” She continued to glare at him, as he looked through a small gap in the blinds for signs of Horace and Fischer in the thinning crowd. She eventually leaned into him as well (conforming to cooperation for him as much as she hated it), and together they peered through the gap. “Are they out there?” she asked quietly. “I don’t see them yet,” he murmured. Riley leaned back, now looking around the booth. “Is there anything else we can do to hide ourselves better?” Carolyn looked up, light washing her clean. “Riley?” He looked up with her. “The light. Is there a switch?” Both of them immediately tried to look for one despite the cramped space and limited movement in the booth. “I can’t see one,” Riley said. “It must be controlled by the station power supply or something.” He looked out the blinds again to check for Horace or Fischer, and his face fell. Horace was sending Fischer up to the New York streets in search of them while he stayed on the platform with a very unpleasant expression. “Oh no…” “What?” Carolyn asked at his groan. She joined him at the blind, sharply taking in a breath at the sight of Horace pacing the platform in search of her and Riley. “We need to turn the light off! Find the switch!” “There isn’t one!” “Riley, we have to turn off the light! That blind does us no good with the light on! He’ll see our outlines and know it’s us!” “Alright! Hang on!” He thought. If they couldn’t get the light off, they were done for. Dead. Shot. Bleeding. In the clutches of Ian. Or not. He looked back at Carolyn with an idea while she was still squirming anxiously, looking through the blind every other second. He didn’t want to even bring it up for fear he might hurt him or claw his eye out or something. But it was an idea. He kept watching her. “I think we should run for it,” she said, unknowest to Riley’s contemplative eye on her. Riley shook his head. “No way. Fischer’s probably up at the entrance waiting for us incase the other guy runs us out. We have to stay here.” “He is going to see us anyway!” she argued. “And what are two people going to be doing in a phone booth together that they don’t even fit in? It’s too suspicious.” He kept watching her with a bad lurch in his stomach as she fussed with the blind. Desire was starting to weigh into the great idea of disguise, and Riley finally couldn’t help himself. This was for them, not him. He fitted him arm around her ignoring her bewildered eyes. This was a disguise, he repeated over and over to himself. Disguise, disguise, disguise… He pressed his lips against her suddenly, but the kiss was slow. It wasn’t so quickly that Carolyn had no time to stop it, but it was a rather swift motion that surprised her. This was Super Geek’s idea of a disguise? Given the situation, she chose not to fight it. Or the fragment of affection she secretly admitted to holding for him. She allowed him to pull her closer, her back no longer supported by the cold glass of the booth. Riley was shocked at all that she hadn’t kneed him yet, let alone gave into his desperate attempt to hide them. People could be kissing in phone booths… Carolyn kissed back cautiously. Riley, utterly dumbfounded at this (but not arguing), played more into it. Guiltily, it seemed to be played more off of his attraction to her than an attempt to stay hidden from the world outside the telephone booth. He scolded himself for it, but he didn’t dwell on it long. Could this be considered as a ‘killing-two-birds-with-one-stone’ thing? Probably. Remembering the other bird being about a disguise and hiding from the men chasing them with loaded guns, Riley gently broke the kiss. With a rapid heartbeat he looked at Carolyn, and they slowly leaned toward the blind again nervously to see where Horace was. “I don’t see him anymore,” he said. Carolyn glanced over at him before she resumed looking. “So was that your pathetic attempt at a disguise?” Riley gave her a look. “I didn’t hear you complaining at all.” “I’m complaining now.” “No your not.” Carolyn bent her brow angrily, but Riley was wearing her down with his eyes. He knew she liked it; otherwise she wouldn’t have kissed him, too. But before he let Carolyn get steaming mad that he had just read her so easily, he assured her silently that he was sorry and was probably about to let himself completely forget the hate thing and treat her respectfully. Carolyn’s face softened, the words being thought so loud she could almost hear them. Maybe he wasn’t so bad after all. And it did seem that whether they liked it or not, they would have to cooperate more if they wanted to elude Ian’s men. The mutually understood truce had finally come. Without words. In a phone booth. Their heads turned to the blinds again to look. Horace was still out of sight, heightening the awareness and tension of the two smashed together in the small box. “This is bad.” Carolyn leaned away, head swimming. Not knowing where Ian or his men were now scared her to death. “We have to get out of here.” “No! Don’t move.” Riley stopped her hand from reaching for the door or moving the blind. “If they see us in here, we are dead. Just wait a while longer.” There was a flustered silence where Carolyn recoiled her hand and looked around desperate, distressed, and rattled. She glanced at Riley again, his eyes shut in exhaustion and head leaning against the glass. “Maybe we should try our disguise again,” she suggested in the still. Riley lifted his head and opened his eyes with a confused look. Carolyn did not seem dejected by it. “You said it,” Riley told her in a warning voice. “Just so you know that I didn’t-“ “I know.” She drew in a hushed breath and kissed him. Both of their suppressions for the other were vanishing the closer they were and the more their impassioned kiss stirred their insides. It was not frantic or made their hearts beat wildly in the least way; it was more of a curious, gentle sensation that did not rise in passion, want, or need. It was only a brief ten seconds of this uncompromised state of lulled senses when the door of the phone booth suddenly flew open. Riley and Carolyn looked up in alarm still embracing, but they were not looking down the steel barrel of Horace’s or Fischer’s guns. They stood dumbfounded, red-faced, and shocked to see Ben unharmed, standing in front of them, a small smirk appearing. “Ben! Uh-“ “I’m not going to ask how this happened,” he said simply. “I know it’s probably a longer story than I’d want to hear.” Riley tried to get rid of his deep embarrassment, changing the subject. “Are you all right?” he asked in astonishment. “How did you get away from Ian?” Suddenly, four of Ian’s men – Walt, Carl, Fischer, and Horace – stepped out from beside the phone booth and surrounded Ben from behind. Carolyn panicked seeing them all before her. Ben kept looking at Riley as Ian himself stepped out next to Ben. “He didn’t,” the man said with sickening tone and smile at the stricken Riley. Carolyn felt Riley’s body stiffen against her, and she was paralyzed as well when Ian looked straight through her eyes right down into her churning stomach. “Well, well,” he said curiously, looking her over. Carolyn shook fearfully in Riley’s grasp, her heart pounding more and more. He was going to shoot him or reveal her or something worse, and she knew it. Ian did that sort of thing when he felt betrayed. And now, seeing his sister in the arms of one of his enemies, willingly and alive, he did nothing but smile in disbelief. “Take them to the car.” He turned leaving her with a disturbing expression that hinted extreme anger, which meant danger. Carolyn shook and began to feel sick as they ripped her away from Riley out of the telephone booth and pushed her towards the stairs. Things were now very serious. x x x Half an hour of tormented silence went by. Ben, Ian, Carl, and Walt left in one car to go find Noland and Abigail somewhere down in Cadman Plaza while Riley and Carolyn gave each other nervous, silent glances in the back of the car Fischer and Horace shared with them. They were instructed to take Riley and Carolyn back to the hotel to retrieve the George Washington at Princeton portrait, the Constitution replica, and Riley’s laptop and meet the rest of them later that night at Ellis Island. In the back of the car as they looked back and forth at one another, they neared the hotel quickly. Riley felt very afraid for his life but kept reliving the moments in the phone booth somewhat happily. Carolyn however, just felt sick. Ian saw her, knew she was alive and against him, Riley and the Gates family didn’t know who she really was and that Ian could reveal her at any given moment, and to make it worse, she really did admit to herself that she liked Riley. Sort of. All right, yes. She really did have a thing for him. A rapidly growing thing. She had to tell them the next chance she got. He had to know what was really going on and just try to make him see what a terrible position they were now in. The car stopped with a slight jolt. Riley and Carolyn looked out of the back window across the street at the large vehicle in front of the hotel. It was surrounded by FBI agents, and Riley had a mix of relief and worry overcome him when he saw who was getting into the car – Patrick, Charlie, and Sally. With a melted face, he watched the doors shut and the agents step back as the car pulled away, driving right passed them. Where were they going? “Just wait a few minutes,” Horace said to Fischer. “We gotta wait for all those law men to get out of there. They’ll never get in otherwise.” Carolyn looked over at Riley who faintly and briefly smiled. He knew she had seen him watching the twins and Ben’s dad leave the hotel with great interest. He hoped they were on their way somewhere safe now, away from all of this. x x x Riley and Carolyn, to bypass the FBI agents, walked in behind another family right up to the desk. When no one was looking, they slipped back into the elegant hallway and went clear down to the end, finding the stairs. Taking an elevator was too risky at this point, even though Riley wanted very much to catch the attention of the FBI. Once safely in the stairwell, Carolyn began climbing stairs without a word. Riley was behind her, his eyes going right to the large item in the back of her pants pocket. Recognizing the shape and size of the object immediately, he reached out swiftly, grabbing it from her pocket. Carolyn stopped and spun around with a shocked look on her face. Riley held up and waved his PDA around casually with a serious look. Carolyn began talking before he could. “I was tracking Ian with it,” she said. “And how were you doing that?” Riley asked as he continued their walk up the flights of stairs. Carolyn walked beside him, keeping up. “I used his cell phone number and tracked him through the GPS,” she said. “I wanted to make sure you were as far away from him as possible. That’s when I told you to hide the portrait the other night when we were on the phone. Ian came through the door not two seconds later, am I right?” Flustered, Riley looked at his PDA’s GPS, figuring in her story. Then he paused. “How did you know his cell phone number?” Carolyn froze a minute before saying, “I’m just as resourceful as you.” “Oh yeah?” Riley challenged. “Yeah. How many other people would think to use the GPS to track you and your enemy?” “Why were you in my room?” “Laundry,” she replied simply. “You’re pretty brave.” Carolyn gave a laugh at the understatement. Several flights later, they reached the twentieth floor, opening the heavy metal door quietly at the end of vast hallway. Carolyn slipped through leaving Riley to shut the door. “Which room did you stay in?” “Twenty-forty-one,” he said, looking at all of the nice doors that lined the textured walls. “Odds are on the left.” Carolyn walked down the hall with Riley behind her watching the sixties turn to fifties and eventually forties. She stopped at the door with the small golden numbers ‘2041’ centered at eyelevel. “This is the one,” Riley whispered. He pulled a small hotel card out of his back pocket and opened the door, both of them stepping inside. The room was now neat and clean – not the way Riley had last remembered seeing it. Almost everything was gone. Ben’s things, Patrick’s thing’s, Riley’s- Amidst his confusion of the state of the room, he ran over to the corner of a suitcase he saw sticking out from under the bed. Carolyn knelt with him as he pulled it out; it was his own suitcase. He rolled his eyes, hitting the suitcase in frustration. “What?” Carolyn asked. “Everything’s gone!” he said. “You saw Patrick and the twins leave! They took everything with them!” “Everything?” she asked fearfully. “Including the painting?” “Yes,” he said after a sigh. “They took the painting, too.” He stood up, looking around the room. “Of course they take the painting but forget my luggage.” “What’ll we do?” “I don’t know… I hope my duffel is still here, though.” Riley got on his stomach, looking under the bed more as Carolyn unzipped his suitcase. She saw within it a jumble of semi-folded shirts with creases. She pulled out a dark blue T-shirt and began folding it with a little more care than Riley had shown it. “Oh good.” Riley came out from underneath the bed with the duffel bag, sitting up on his knees. He went to unzip it to retrieve his laptop, but he looked over at Carolyn. “Our lives our on a stopwatch and you find time to fold clothes?” he asked. Carolyn shrugged. “You’re sloppy. What can I say?” “Give me that.” Riley grabbed the shirt from her, now noticing how bad of shape she was in. He shirt was torn, ragged, and ripped, and her jeans were in no better condition. “Look at you!” he said. “You need something else to wear.” “I didn’t exactly bring luggage,” Carolyn said bitterly as Riley went through his suitcase. “It was an… unexpected trip.” Riley pulled a long-sleeved red and gray striped shirt out of the jumble in his suitcase, extending it to Carolyn. “Here,” he said. “This might be a little big, but at least it’ll camouflage you some. Oh! And here.” Carolyn took the striped shirt as he handed her a red zip-up hoodie to go over it. She took it a little suspiciously. “I don’t think I brought a pair of pants you could wear, but- what?” “Nothing,” she said, standing up. “Where’s the bathroom?” “Over there,” he said, pointing. She went over to change quickly, Riley trying to grab all of his electronic equipment and shove it into his duffle bag. He grabbed his PDA out of his pocket and checked Ian’s location – right in Cadman Plaza where he should be. He quickly changed devices to Abigail’s cell phone. She was in Cadman Plaza, too. It was no use searching Ben’s cell phone after the shoot out in Fort Greene Park, but in any case, Riley thought it safe to say that Ben would be where Ian was for a while now. “Where’s Ian?” He jumped, looking over his shoulder to see Carolyn standing over him in his shirt and hoodie. He didn’t reply to her; just evaluated her in his shirt. “It’s a little long, but it fits alright,” Carolyn said as he eyed her. “Take this,” Riley said, standing with his duffle bag as he handed her the PDA, “and don’t let anything happen to it. I’ve got GPS on my laptop, so incase we get split up we’ll both know where Ian is at all times.” Carolyn nodded as they headed for the door, leaving Riley’s bag outside of the room for an attendant to find. He shut the door as they headed back down the hall towards the stairs. “So how good of an artist are you?” Riley asked out of the blue on their way towards the stairs. Carolyn laughed. “Why?” “I don’t know. I always thought it’d be cool to have a portrait of myself above the fireplace in my room.” She laughed again, this time Riley contributing a smile “Maybe if we find this treasure, you’ll be really good,” he said. “You’ll have so much money to go back to school. And I can get a Lamborghini.” Carolyn lowered her head as they trotted down the stairs quickly. She was an artist, but she wasn’t in college. She was lying to him. And she had to tell him before Ian did it first and destroyed everything. He had a nasty little habit of doing that. “Riley-“ He suddenly slammed his arm out in front of her, pushing her into the wall in the lobby as two of the FBI agents walked by. She held her breath and slowly let herself breath again, but Riley was listening to their conversation as they passed. Carolyn didn’t catch any of it. “Come on.” Riley pulled her out of the hotel lobby into the street, and they waited for traffic to clear a path so that they could safely cross back to the Chrysler Fischer and Horace waited for them in. “Did you hear what they said?” “No,” Carolyn said in confusion. “What are you talking about?” “The agents just now in the lobby,” Riley told her as they crossed the street, “were talking about Patrick and the kids. They sent them back to Philadelphia to Ben’s dad’s house until everything’s cleared up.” “Is that good?” Carolyn asked him. Riley made a noise of repulsion. “Yes,” he said. “It’s a lot better than here. The FBI there is monitoring the house, too. That’s what I heard.” They stopped next to the back car door. “So they’re safe?” Carolyn asked to be sure. Riley didn’t answer, having already opened the door for her to get inside the car. She went in reluctantly without an answer as Riley followed with his duffel bag, shutting the car door. Immediately, the Chrysler spun its wheels back into traffic. x x x “I don’t see any painting,” Ian said as Horace and Fischer brought Riley and Carolyn forward on the dark docks. He stood in front of Riley expectantly, the Statue of Liberty glowing behind him in the harbor. “W-Well, you see-“ “Where is it!” “Philadelphia!” Riley yelled, holding up his duffel bag in defense. “It’s in Philadelphia!” As Ben stood there with his wife guarded by the rest of Ian’s men, he sensed Abigail on the same thought process as he, wondering as much as Ian how this had happened, or if it wasn’t just a lie. Ian produced a smile. “How did it end up in Philadelphia? And try not to lie to me.” He brandished a small pistol and held it to Riley’s heart, which immediately began to beat faster. “Ben’s dad was taken back to his house!” Riley half-shouted in alarm. “The FBI took him and the kids back to his house in the suburbs, and he took everything with him! Everything!” “How would you know this?” asked Ian, clicking the gun. “I overheard some agents talking in the hotel lobby as we snuck out!” Riley’s voice was getting higher pitched and broken. “I swear! Promise!” “Ian, he’s telling the truth,” Carolyn said, interceding. His eyes on her scared her at that moment, but she kept speaking calmly. “I was there.” Ian just laughed at her. “I don’t trust anything you say,” he said with a dangerous glare. When all seemed as if she was going to be exposed and/ or shot, Ian shoved the gun hard into Riley’s chest before turning and walking towards the edge of the dock. Riley clutched at the painful spot beneath his shirt. “Well, it seems that we’re all here and alive for the time being,” Ian said. He looked over at Ben. “Shall we take our cruise now?” Ben moved forward before he could have been shoved, and Abigail walked beside him towards the small boat waiting for them to boarded. Walt, Carl, and Noland went behind them, and Ian smirked back at Riley and Carolyn, a none-too-pleasant notion. “I have a special job for you two.” He stepped aside, swinging his arm out to let them pass. “If you’d be so kind to step aboard.” . Please Review .
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