Trust Me

54

On the long flight to Chicago, Luke Dantry sat with his battered, bruised face behind dark glasses and made his plans, filling a little notebook he’d bought at the airport with scribblings, and put it in his pocket. Things he wanted to tell his father, ask his father, if they made it alive through this horror. But he also thought about how the Night Road might use its hundred-plus bombs.

The plane, to his horror, was grounded in New York due to inclement weather in Chicago. They sat on the runway for an extra six hours. Luke felt sick with waiting. Finally the jet took off again; it lost another hour orbiting Chicago as the last of a violent storm cell cleared out from the city.

When he got off the plane into the dark Chicago midnight, he knew the danger would be after clearing customs, after walking toward his rental car, that the Night Road could be waiting for him.

He could not shake Henry from his thoughts. Let him know abandonment, let him feel what it was like to have your life taken from you and wadded up like trash.

He walked toward the rental car station. He kept glancing over his shoulder, because whether it was Quicksilver or the Night Road, they had known how to find him when he traveled. To trap him. Not again. He signed off the rental car paperwork, using the false ID and credit card Drummond had left him. He walked out into the parking garage and found his car on the top level. The attendant had him inspect the car for pre-existing damage, and sign the form. He barely looked at the rental, a Lincoln Navigator SUV, and scrawled his false passport name on the paper.

The attendant said, ‘One second, I’ll get you the keys.’ He vanished into the office and when the door opened again it wasn’t the attendant, it was Frankie Wu, the pilot who had flown him and Aubrey to Chicago for Quicksilver.

Luke froze. Glanced around. All the attendants seemed to have disappeared.

‘Are you all right?’ Frankie Wu asked.

‘Yes.’ He’s part of Quicksilver, he’ll help me, Luke thought. Luke wouldn’t have to do this alone.

‘Let’s get in the car,’ Frankie said, gently. ‘We can talk about your dad.’

Wu got behind the wheel. The passenger seat was full of gear, and Wu didn’t move it, so Luke sat in the back.

They got in the Navigator, drove out of the garage – Luke noticed that the guard at the exit simply waved Frankie Wu through, no checking of the rental car papers – and into the darkness.

‘My dad. I have to go help my dad,’ Luke said. ‘You have to help me.’

‘No, Luke,’ Wu said, ‘I have my orders. We don’t engage with the Night Road. I’m sorry.’