Rise of Sirius: Chapter I: Lightning
It was a dark and stormy night.
Well, it was, Reid Hope thought darkly, as the thunder rolled and the lightning flashed, illuminating the landscape outside Manhattan in monotone like an early daguerrotype. It highlighted the gray leather that masked his face.
It was now, and it had been, that night with Jewel’s death, and the one that almost held -
He pushed the thought away as the headlights of a truck cut through the rain.
He knew exactly what it was carrying.
Heroin, that which had poisoned his sister until she depended on it, until she killed herself to end her slavery. He knew from “sources” that the truck would be on this road.
A mirthless smile tugged on his lips. His sources were never wrong. They were always himself.
Where that truck was headed and who was responsible was what he wanted to know.
Reid!
Jewel. That wild, haunted look that had crept into the eyes of the sister he could hardly be separated from.
The hands that grasped nervously at her rosary as she seemed to forget the golden head that lay, tousled, on her knee.
The nights she went missing and would come back after it rained, shivering, barely able to smile at anyone’s relief, only vaguely answering questions as though she’d forgotten the answers herself.
Burying her pain in anxiety so deep no one could find it.
Something racked him as though the car had been struck, but it hadn’t.
In his mind’s eye, he could still see the blue coat fluttering like a ghost as it hung over the edge of the bridge where it had been dropped.
He had known something was wrong, had seen the three, two men and one woman, who stopped Jewel more than once to give her a parcel, which only in his parents’ grief had been realized to be heroin.
He never knew how it started. All he knew was that he had seen Jewel panicking as she dissolved in front of him, eaten by a slavery she didn’t try to enter, one she was afraid to name. He had seen, but hadn’t understood, and a child’s desperate attempts somehow didn’t reach past the barrier the drug had built.
In his nightmares he could still see her eyes begging that her love for him keep her anchored, saw her eyes on the tabernacle at Mass, her eyes as she sang him to sleep.
He had followed her that night, out into the storm. She had called to him, said something as the lightning scalded her face, waved him away from the bridge.
Then she was gone.
Hope. Where was it? Where was she?
“No!” He grit his teeth against the memory, forcing his eyes to focus on the road.
This was why he hunted, why Sirius, the scorcher of evil hearts, had become his alter ego, swallowing him up every night as he roamed, tracking down any trace of illegal drugs that he could find, keeping his vow to serve God by freeing those bound in such slavery.
But despite what anyone said, Sirius wasn’t a vigilante.
He had been, briefly, before the Police Commissioner Virgil Valen had discovered him and brought him on as a special enforcer of sorts; still, it was easier for him to get things done when he was alone and free to move. Virgil understood that. He always did. He had been Jewel’s godfather, after all.
No matter where his thoughts turned, Reid could still feel the rain on his hair, though it was kept out safely by the roof and windows. He could still feel his heart drop.
“Not this again! Focus, can’t you!” he growled to himself.
Not right now -
“Not right now!”
It was a trembling voice, another voice that was tired and frightened and sick, another pair of eyes that turned on him without seeing him, where he had hidden. He had followed her, was following her, to this dark, half-shuttered den buried in the Little Italy of Manhattan, and it was dark, the lightning painting the walls black, making her reddened lips look like frost as she gazed wearily at the man who had summoned her.
“I’ve done what you asked, please let me go now!”
The man pushed his fedora back from his matted black hair, smoke from his cigar hazing over his face.
“Three jobs is what I asked. The money, the jewels, though this -” he nudged the parcel she had dropped before him. “-She asked for that one, who knows why. But three is what I agreed to.”
“I did them!”
“Yes, but the lady has asked for more, and circumstances tell me that I can’t say no.”
He rubbed the ring on his hand.
“Just a few more, and she’ll let you pull out. You’ll need another dose, I’m afraid.”
He had nodded to the man who stood at the doorway, holding a packet that Aphrodite had been eyeing, more despairing than anything else, too tired to argue. Not heroin, but just as addictive and deadly, and the eyes were the same as Jewel’s.
“Aphrodite!”
Why was she sitting on the road in front of him?
Furious, he crushed the brake pedal into the floor of the car, nearly snapping his forehead against the glass of the windshield with the violence of the stop.
Aphrodite vanished into the tattered mist of rain, along with the truck’s dim taillights.
He had saved her. She was fine.
But he wasn’t.
“Reid? Reid, are you listening?”
Reid shook himself, his eyes snapping back to the office wherein he stood. Warm sunlight flooded the walls, that of mid-morning, and the sound of the city floated up through the half-cracked windows, mingling with the passing click-click of footsteps. It was the old Police Headquarters he was in, not the thunderstorm.
Sirius had vanished with the night, leaving the lawyer in his place; no one the wiser that he had ever been out in that rain, save if they could guess by the weariness that blurred his gaze. The only remnants of Sirius left for guesswork in the sunshine was the little battered pin on his lapel, a four-point star from which half the rhinestones had fallen out. It was the only possession of Jewel’s that he kept with him, besides the mother-of-pearl rosary coiled in his pocket, a Confirmation gift to Jewel from their grandmother.
“My apologies, Virgil. I didn’t sleep. I - lost the truck last night,” he muttered. He had half a mind that this was the reason for the summons.
“Reid.” Virgil tapped his pencil lightly on the desk, dismissing Reid’s dismay. “We’ll catch them another time. That’s not why I called you here. Right now, Sirius has a different problem. Take a look at this.”
He drew out a piece of fabric from his pocket and placed it in Reid’s outstretched hand.
It was a clothing tag, handwoven silk satin. An audacious ruby scarab marked it with gilded wings that braced a scrawling name in black.
“Ever-Ruby,” Reid muttered, glancing up. “That’s the designer who built the Obelisk last year?”
“That eyesore, yes. But take a look on the other side.”
Upon turning it over, Reid looked at him sharply.
“Where did this come from?”
Virgil leaned back, studying him.
“From the Obelisk originally, most likely. It was brought in this morning by a Mrs. Dunst, who recently ordered three pieces by Ever-Ruby. That particular tag came off of one of them. The other two were unmarked, by an SOS, that is.”
“Slave labor.”
“Maybe. Do you know anything about Ever-Ruby’s designer?”
“I don’t keep up to date with the fashion industry,” Reid said dryly.
“That’s because you haven’t got a wife,” Virgil teased. “Ask Aphrodite about it. You ought to be on good enough terms after the trial to get a passing understanding of the fashion world minute by minute.”
“Very amusing, now what were you trying to tell me about Ever-Ruby?”
Privately he was glad the Commissioner wasn’t aware that Aphrodite was waiting downstairs.
After said trial in which he’d defended Aphrodite and proved that she had been blackmailed, though the young woman had been cleared of charges, she was held under close watch by family and friends. The latter now included himself. With an unusual morning out of the law office while the Liljedahl family was kept busy with fundraisers, he had been watching over Aphrodite as she ran errands.
“Ms. Cleopatra Ever-Ruby is as much an Egyptomaniac as you’d guess by the Obelisk she built and the scarab on the clothing tags,” Virgil continued. “If she’s taking her apparent Egyptian history seriously, let’s hope she isn’t repeating the slavery of the Jews while she’s at it.”
Reid frowned at him.
“If she is, Sirius will find out.”
“And rescue the sender, I wager.”
“You know me. I wouldn’t write it off.”
“Speaking of writing off – you have some fan mail. Looks like a few more hoaxes in there, as well.”
Virgil slid a stack of opened letters across the desk and laughed at the look on Reid’s face.
Footsteps rang out in the golden-tiled lobby as Reid jogged down the sweeping staircase, the atmosphere more that of a hotel or a grand estate, if not for the officers who dodged each other and the young woman with golden curls and seafoam-green frock across the way, nervous hands soothed by the presence of a large black cat.
“I wondered if you would grace us with your presence, Homicide! Has he been regaling you with tales of the mice he’s caught, Aphrodite?”
“He didn’t need to, he caught one while I was sitting here and took it in for inspection. He also escorted me over to the lost children’s playroom. There were three children there, though two have left in the time since you went upstairs.”
“I hope I haven’t kept you waiting that long. Are you feeling well?” Reid’s voice dropped as he studied the face that was still pale, the eyes still tired when the girl wasn’t smiling.
“I don’t mind, since I’ve got a cat, and I’m alright.” Aphrodite stroked Homicide’s ears.
“Excellent work, Officer Homicide. You may take your leave.”
The black cat gave a tiny meow, stretched, and hopped from Aphrodite’s lap to give Reid a nod of approval before sashaying off, back on his beat.
“That is the most police-like cat I will ever meet.”
Aphrodite dusted cat fur off of her dress.
“He’s a good cat, even if his name is suspicious.”
She arose, pulling on her gloves, briefly removed to avoid catching fur all over them, and tucked her clutch under her arm.
“Is everything alright? You weren’t - called because of me, I hope.”
“Hardly. You would have been summoned with me or marched off in my absence.”
“What was it?”
Reid shook his head, staring out the glass of the doors leading into the street.
“Only something I need to look into.” He checked his watch. “I need to get you home, don’t I.”
“I promised Mother I’d be home by noon.”
“Well, it’s ten now, so we can get you home early.” He waved her after him and they descended the lobby stairs out into the bustle of the street.
Beneath the clouding sky, the wind was blowing chill, carrying the distant horns of traffic and road noise. It was autumn, but there were hardly enough trees left in the city to tell.
Aphrodite pulled her coat closer around her.
“It feels as though we may have an early winter, and rain, too,” she remarked, as they started down alongside the busy street. Once the center of town and a market place, now there was a constant stream of traffic on all sides of the stately marble building the police force called an office.
“Mm,” was Reid’s reply, noting that Aphrodite’s loose gloves warmed her hands, but she mischievously loved to “forget” her hat at home half the time, just as she had that morning. It was a detail strangely at odds with the otherwise perfect picture: the long, swishy skirt, billowing sleeves, dainty ribbon bows, the large teardrop pearl pendant she always wore, and clusters of faux flowers.
Reid watched her fondly. A little rebellion might have survived the end of the twenties, the same way her love of “pretty” had put that decade to shame; that rebellion was why her golden curls still hung long, clipped back by a barrette of bakelite roses.
An uncharacteristic smile crossed his face and he dropped his gray fedora over her curls.
“Hey! That doesn’t even match my dress,” Aphrodite complained laughingly, as she bumped it back from her eyes.
“I didn’t notice.”
Aphrodite measured the color against his own gray eyes, eyes that were forgettable beneath a mask, but not against the rare warmth in his face when he teased, the breeze ruffling the shaggy hair he neglected to slick back the way other men did. She smiled a little bit despite the cold anxiety she still felt, wishing he’d be at ease more often.
“I would have thought you did,” she sighed. “I put so much effort into it.”
“I wish you knew you didn’t have to.”
“Why do you think I skip wearing hats and chopping my hair?” Aphrodite stretched up to plant the fedora back on his head. She smiled though, touched, at any rate; for if anyone was willing to take his word for it, she would.
Still, Virgil was right. Aphrodite loved to play with color and fabric; it was her joy, though while she liked to experiment with sewing, she usually gave up, never finding a pattern she wanted. Instead she patronized New York designers to encourage the economy, her true passion, and left sewing to the details: of late, she’d taken to the Amelia Earhart leather jacket trend, but had decidedly stitched down lace on the lapels.
“Do you want to learn how to fly, or do you want to move to Paris?” Reid teased her lightly as he swung the car door open for her.
“Both and neither, thank you!” She ducked inside and waited until he’d come around and slid into the driver’s seat.
“I’ll settle for flying to Paris for a few days, if they ever get the cost down again,” she remarked.
“Or if you can find a way to make your vacation benefit the economy?” Reid laughed.
“Oh, wouldn’t it be a good idea?”
“It always is, Ro, but you might as well do it anyway.”
She crossed her arms.
“No, thank you, not yet. I’m on notice, not on holiday, if you haven’t noticed.”
“You don’t say.”
Aphrodite paused to let Reid focus on pulling into the traffic.
“At least we’ve got lights now, but this is still madness!” he grumbled, waiting impatiently for a string of cars to inch by.
“It will get worse before it gets better,” Aphrodite answered in amusement.
“Isn’t that my life.”
Beneath his impatience Reid’s thoughts still ran, running over the SOS cleverly stitched on the tag, in thread of a color just off enough to be noticeable in the right light. Someone who had known what she was doing, he reasoned, who had spent many hours, if not years, perfecting her skills.
The sight of the scarab on the tag kept reminding him – the ring in his pocket. That night, when he had rescued Aphrodite – the ring on the man’s hand.
It had come off in the scuffle among the rubble of the half-collapsed building. Its ovalesque face was marked with hieroglyphs. He had found it curious, certain it meant something; he had shown it to an Egyptologist at the Metropolitan Museum, and was waiting for a reply regarding the translation.
Three weeks prior, in another raid he had found notes penned in hieroglyphics, after chasing down a pair of gangsters who addressed each other with antiquated names, specifically Thutmose and Horus.
Then, there was Aphrodite: Aphrodite Liljedahl, whose father was the council member for Queens, who had been blackmailed with an unknown drug, a poison of its own, where the only “cure” was an ongoing dose, or many weeks of the worst kind of withdrawal.
Reid hadn’t known Aphrodite well before that day, when Mrs. Liljedahl had called Virgil and begged for Sirius to be sent out after her daughter.
Aphrodite’s father, Daniel Liljedahl, was the council member for Queens, though none of them could figure why Aphrodite had been struck. There were many others in New York City and its vicinity who had far more money and a wider sphere of influence.
Yet, it was Aphrodite who had been forced to steal money from her own father, heirloom jewels from her mother, and, oddest of all, the small faience hippopotamus statuette from the Metropolitan Museum, the one everyone had begun to refer to as William. Why, and why that hippo, was the most puzzling of all. It had little value beyond historicity and the fondness of the people. Even Aphrodite had no idea.
That led to Reid’s eyebrows progressively raising higher.
“Reid!” Aphrodite started laughing. “You’d best bring your brows back down to earth before they take off! What’s on your mind?”
Reid forgot to laugh, but he did snap out of his thoughts as he dismissed her inquiry.
“Reid, why won’t you trust me if something is on your mind? You trusted me with who you are.”
She looked up at him, gaze softening back into a smile that he had honored her with that trust.
“I wanted you to feel safe,” Reid replied. “You were so frightened, Aphrodite. I wanted you to know that nothing will happen to you again, but if it does, you know where you can find me.”
“But you don’t tell everyone you rescue that,” she protested.
“No.” He paused, shoving his free hand into his pocket. “There was trust, too.”
His fingers brushed the ring again. Aphrodite touched his sleeve.
“Reid - thank you for trusting me.”
“That man who drugged you - Bruno, was it?”
She nodded, smile fading.
“I haven’t been able to track him. Usually it doesn’t take long, but I haven’t found a trace of him anywhere. Are you sure he wasn’t referred to by any other name?”
By the way she bit her lip, Reid knew she wasn’t sure and didn’t want to think that far back. Pulling information from her had to be done delicately. Recovery had been only just, and she turned aside from anything that reminded her of the incident.
“If it hurts, it’s alright. I won’t push you.”
“He was only called Bruno once.” Aphrodite folded her arms and watched the traffic slow to a near standstill. “Another man called him something else, it sounded Egyptian, but I can’t think clearly that far back.”
“Another one,” Reid muttered.
Reaching over, he patted her shoulder.
“Thank you, Ro. Another question. What can you tell me about Cleopatra? Ever-Ruby, not the original.”
“I think the original you’re referring to was the seventh, Reid! It’s a coincidence that you ask. I just told Mother this morning that my next designer of choice is Ever-Ruby. Her designs are truly beautiful, though at her prices I’m not likely to buy more than one in my lifetime,” she added, but was thrown forward when Reid slammed on the brakes.
“Thank you for the lack of a signal, friend,” he muttered at the car that had darted in front of them, and caught Aphrodite before her head could strike the glass.
“-Thank you. She says she can trace her ancestry back to Cleopatra, that is, the seventh you refer to,” Aphrodite resumed.
“Of course she does.”
“Like her predecessor, she’s passionate about her people - those of America, France, Egypt, and Greece, respectively - and she donates to a children’s fund annually, too.”
“So she says.”
Aphrodite peered through the shadow cast by the brim of his fedora and knocked it back a bit.
“You don’t think it’s true?”
“If she’s so noble, why did someone find an SOS stitched into a tag?”
Aphrodite’s eyes widened.
“. . . slave labor?”
“That’s my guess, and there shouldn’t be, not in a haute couture house where everything is hand-stitched on the premises.”
His own eyes were dark.
“What do you plan to do?”
“Set an appointment with her under the pretense – and the truth – of organizing a charity ball, the kind Mother has been wanting to host. If Ms. Ever-Ruby is as fond of charity and glamour as you say, I’m sure she’ll take me up on the offer, and I’ll be able to guess whether she’s the cause of the SOS, while ascertaining the layout of the Obelisk before I go in on my own. Whatever Valen says, you have to admit it’s a nice facade compared to the rest of the city; but that may be merely a facade, if it hides what I fear.”
As the skyline widened around the turn, Reid measured a brief glimpse of the Obelisk’s point against the pinnacle of the Empire State Building in the distance, a sight everyone was used to now. The Obelisk, however, was often railed against as “not fitting the scene”, and for good reason, for it was as close to a true obelisk out of Egypt as a skyscraper could be.
“Reid – please do let me go with you to meet with Cleopatra. I have a lovely excuse,” Aphrodite coaxed.
Reid’s scowl didn’t deter her.
“Please, Reid, you know how some people might think of you going, and I do have a good excuse to help you. I promise I can tag along just to discuss an original design with her. She won’t think anything of it if I’m careful, and isn’t it better that way?”
Reid kept on frowning as he parked the car in front of her family’s estate.
“Reid, stop exercising your brows,” Aphrodite said gently, tapping his forehead. “You’ll get frown lines, if you’re not careful! You’ll take me with you, won’t you?”
He sighed and obediently quit the frown.
“As you wish, we’ll go separately, together. I’ll call you when I know what time I’ll be meeting with her. Now, behave yourself, young lady, and don’t go scaring up the hippopotamuses again.”
Fun Facts:
If you want to know more about the true story of “Officer”Homicide, and the hippo named William, follow these links:
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Great beginning! Feels like we're off on an adventure. I'm loving all the details of life, fashion, architecture, etc. And the Egyptomania tidbits are perfect for this kind of story. Looking forward to the next one.
Ooooh, this such is a great start! Reid and Aphrodite are so cute together, and the heavy sense of tragedy and ruin in that opening is just palpable. I'm looking forward to seeing the story develop.