Playing God (Helford #2)

(2) Gold

I was still recovering from falling, even one year later walking through the heart of New York City. The traffic of Manhattan pushed obnoxiously against my skull, pounding and threatening to explode from my head. The doctors told me the pounding against my temple would not go away, that the head trauma I received was so severe that I was lucky to be alive. They called me a miracle, but I called it a punishment.

The fall hadn’t meant to be like that, but we had all known the consequences going into it.

Every step I took was a spasm in my brain and one more step away from Avenger’s a pang in my heart. All I could think about was how it had been two years since I had least seen Jonathon and how I am now in the same city as him, but I knew I would not see him again, even if I came to New York a million times while he was still hiding here. The closer I was to him and the longer did nothing but number his days, so I would try my hardest to stay away, and I would succeed. No matter how much it hurt, in both my head and my heart.

He would never recognize me now, anyway. I looked so different and I acted so differently, much more formal. I had a ringing in my head and I was not the same Caitie Alastair that he had known.

I took in a deep breath of the American city air through my nose, considering how long it had been since I had been home.

When it came to New York City, I enjoyed calling it my favorite city in the world. I loved the concrete jungle and the people all moving together in their different lives and the fast-pace motion of it all. I loved how the city merges so completely into trees in Central Park and I loved how the city came to life at night. I loved the smell, which is strange to say of cigarette smoke and dirt and dreams to be made, but it was unique. I loved the buildings stretching up into the sky. I loved the bridges and I loved the one glass tower, hovering above it all.

I met Woodburn by the Balto statue in Central Park and found him waiting for me when I arrived six minutes early.

“Extreme promptness much be a residual effect of Black Ops,” I teased him, sliding down onto the park bench beside him.

Woodburn glanced over at me but didn’t respond other than that. He looked up at the statue on the rocks, watching a group of laughing teenage girls pose by the iron figure, big smiles on their faces. I couldn’t have been more than three years older than them.

“Do you know why this statue is here?” he asked me patiently, one hand fiddling with a leather glove absentmindedly, my eyes continuously drawing to the movement as if expecting him to pull a weapon. I smiled easily at his question, watching the girls live their lives, wondering what their carefree laughing felt like.

“I saw the movie once.”

“One simple animal can become the representation of bravery, courage, determination; the statue isn’t a large one, but it still stands for something. I’m not trying to make this a history lesson, so you can spare me the sideways glances, but I have seen the way you have been acting lately. You are extremely restless, and you are not pleased with the way things have been moving. I understand you completely, Caitie, trust me. I have been working many, many years on this project, but you have to believe me when I say that we will see the end soon.”

I had heard this speech one or two times over the last couple of months, so I kept my eyes trained on the overcast sky as Woodburn spoke to me in low Russian, out of hearing range of the bodyguards milling about in plain clothes, keeping an eye on their ambassador. I had always found it humorous, that a Black Ops director needed so many other people to protect him, but in moments like this, it was simple to see how old Woodburn was. There was age in his eyes, exhaustion written into his face.