A/N: Apologies for the massive delay in chapters. Life has been terribly busy and I haven’t had the time to update. I’m just a 17 year old girl! I’m sorry!

Publish Date: 09/22\03

Warning: Mild sexuality/violence.

Chapter 6: Three Times a Charm

The June night pressed around her as she made her way through the sleeping city. She wasn’t sure why she had left, there was absolutely no where she could go now – except back to her room. Nothing could be done about her residence until the sun rose in the night sky. Wandering aimlessly, her guard every present and hand on her revolver, she traveled the streets much as a shadow. It wasn’t until she reached a corner, the hazy light from inside streaming onto the gloomy street outside, that she paused.

It was a familiar place. A pub called The Standard. She had frequented it for some time now, swimming with the memories that she couldn’t drown. Opening the door, she slipped inside practically undetected.

The rank odor of humanity filled the place as cheap cigars and dated nicotine permeated the premise. Inexpensive liquor and stale perfume burned her eyes as the haze and dim light met her irises with a burning force. The warped wooden boards creaked under her weight as she passed over the floor, her cloak dragging on the ground behind her. Pushing back the hood, she went to the bar and ordered a shot of whiskey. The bartender knew better than to ask questions. He knew that the girl would pay her tab and leave as quickly as she came, but she would pull her revolver even faster if she were challenged.

Swinging back the burning liquid, she stood blankly as the drink seared down her throat before she asked for another one. Though her intention wasn’t to become drunk she was most certainly attempting to become numb. One drink quickly turned into three as she knocked back a fourth round, a roughish character came over to her.

Immediately, Angel knew that he wasn’t a regular. His clothes were nicer than the normal fare around the place, and his appearance in a nicer keep. Though he attempted to disguise the fact by mussing the fairly clean hair and the cheaply made clothes that were still relatively clean. The way that he carried himself was not the way of a factory worker, carriage driver, stable hand, or even a police officer. No, his was that of a higher ranking with proud shoulders not stooped from heavy labor and an arrogant swagger that made him stand out among the crowd. Her clean cool analysis took place all in the few moments she had before he spoke.

"I’ll pay for the next one, doll face," his suave approach and attempt at flattery failed miserably as she allowed her cupid bow lips to turn up into a coy smile.

"You’re new around here," she pointed out the obvious as the bar tender eyed them warily.

"What’ll it be?" he asked the man standing next to Angel, as if to distract him away from the lethal girl.

"Whatever the lady’s is having," his use of lady made her chuckle under her breath and as the bartender went to fetch the man’s drink she looked at him stoically.

"As I said, you’re new around here," she reinstated. "You know not how dangerous I could be to your health," she took another drink from her glass.

"Is that a warning or an intrigue?" he raised one eyebrow as she watched the bartender place the whiskey in front of him. Without realizing exactly what his beverage of choice was, he brought it to his lips and took down the entire thing. Instantly he choked as the potent beverage filled his cavity with an unexpected fire, Angel watched the tears spring into his eyes as he swallowed heavily upon the liquid fire. Then as he turned to her, she simply raised her glass toward him, brought it to her lips and took down the last of her drink.

"A warning," she answered simply. "Go home, you don’t belong here," she spoke more from sympathy than from actual annoyance, an odd thing from a killer.

"I belong here just as much as –," she didn’t let him finish as he edged closer to her she withdrew her metallic instrument with a deadly quickness.

"Go home," she instructed smoothly, and the bar tender watched them nervously. The bar attendees went about their usual fare without pause as the scene unfolded.

The man’s face shifted as he watched her, the cool facade falling apart almost instantly. The smooth features of his face contorted as hers stayed the same impassively mocking appearance. The ice blue eyes met her emerald orbs with a wide terror that she had witnessed far too many times for her young years. For one being faced with mortality so regularly though, a familiar pain shot through her breast as the guilt and faces of so many fallen flashed through her mind. What of this man whom was obviously out of his element? Would she drop him in the same fashion she had brought so many others to their untimely demise?

"Go home," she repeated, withdrawing her instrument and tucking it away before finishing the hard liquor, burning its way down her throat as she tried to drown the feelings and the memories that were rising inside of her.

The man exited, she had felt him leave without even having to look, but a new feeling replaced the one of self-loathing. Someone was watching her. Lifting her dark head, she removed her orbs from their previous fixation upon the scars in the wooden bar counter. With a dark, discreet gaze, she surveyed her area before shifting in a seemingly careless fashion to discover where the piercing gaze was originated. Her search ended in the corner booth of the establishment, the shadows hiding the viewer from discretion, but the unease they created was enough to send Angel towards the door. Payment for her drinks would have to come later.

Already the liquor was taking its toll; though still sharper than most, her senses were numbed and dulled far part their normal perception. Drawing her hood closer around her face, she moved in and out of the flickering shadows as if she were part of them. The daughter of darkness and death deftly determined her direction, the nagging feeling that someone was watching her hadn’t subsided though and that made her wary.

It’s the alcohol, she reasoned. You haven’t drunk in a month – no wonder you’re skittish. She tried to calm her nerves as she slipped through the streets. Her mind continued to race however as the erratic beat of her heart seemed to reverberate off of the silent, stone walls. She knew it was feeble excuse, as it seemed that base instincts were never wrong, even if you were slightly tipsy.

Grasping the mahogany handle of her revolver, she kept walking swiftly among the flickering shadows. The bullets of sweat on her forehead matching those of lead in the barrel of her weapon as she whirled around, cocking her weapon and aiming it into the oblivion as she focused her eyes on everything around her. There was nothing there. Keeping her weapon high and ready she jerked her head in every direction, tempted to call out into the darkness for the persons to reveal themselves, but she stopped herself. This was crazy, her emotions and nerves were already running on high as she felt the apprehension and fear churn within her. Not a single nerve had been soothed or a single fear quelled by the transparency of the party that was no doubt following her.

No identification had ever been made or any positive note that there was even a person there, but there was a very sickening apprehension in her gut that didn’t allow itself to subside no matter how she reasoned with herself. The alcohol must have been the reason behind it, or perhaps the building stresses of her situation, whatever the cause, she couldn’t help but feel ill at ease. Ever sense and trained alarm was ringing full force and the lovely buzz that the liquor had induced was nothing more than a painful distraction. She knew better than to consume so much alcohol on such little food and after such a long abstinence from the hell fire liquid. She had half a mind to join the prohibition movements simply for the havoc the golden liquid wreaked on her wits, but she also enjoyed the numbness it entailed. However, that numbness was something she cursed currently as her hands trembled with the adrenaline that was searing through her.

Every fiber of her being was screaming with the knowledge of another’s presence in her world. It wasn’t a friendly aura as the hackles on her neck stood straight and the slick surface of her fleshy palms caused her to re-grip the mahogany handle of her metallic instrument. A single bullet of perspiration slid down from the swear slicked forehead that was unconsciously creased with worry as she felt the bead slid down her smooth cheek and pool in the corner of her slightly parted lips. Heavy breaths came from those lips as they hung open slightly, everything within her buzzing with extreme anticipation for something she wasn’t assured would occur. Licking those cherub bow lips, she clumsily cocked the revolver, the nerves and the alcohol pulling a dangerous toll upon her as she forced her brain to function rationally.

"Who’s there?" She called into the slightly hazed backdrop of shadows. "Show yourself!" She ordered. The tremolo in her voice painfully obvious as she swallowed a mouthful of nothing, her pallet having long gone dry with anxiety.

A short eternity passed as she stared into the murky darkness. A thin sheen of fog glistened with the iced liquid crystals that floated in the dingy light of a flickering street lamp, casting eerie and sometimes unreal shadows upon the world around her. Like a curtain of a fine sheer silk, the misty sheen separated as one of the shadows seemingly detached itself from its world of darkness and brought itself into the dancing light. Momentarily, her breath was purloined from her breast as she surveyed the creature that seemed more surreal than mortal flesh.

The heavy woolen duster seemed terribly out of place in the world where the night was warming with the season of summer coming and spring was becoming a distant memory. Though her long dark cloak was equally impractical for the season, it served its purposes. The heavy hat couldn’t even be described as a bowler or a top hat as it sat much like a rag would without shape or form, covering the top half of his head with shadows from its uncouth brim. His stature wasn’t anything of intimidation as he was barely three inches taller then she was, with a small frame and gaunt looking slopes to his shoulders. The heavy brown moustache looked out of place on the narrow face with the poorly structured jaw.

"What do you want?" she swallowed heavily again on the saliva that wouldn’t come. "Who are you?" she kept her weapon held high, and tried to steady it, as her arms were growing tired from the continuous uplifting of its heavy form.

"I need to speak with you," his voice was strangely deep for his weak form and she felt a shiver shoot down her spinal cord.

"Why?" she replied, somewhat breathlessly as the surreal character’s expression remained hidden except his impassive mouth.

"Because otherwise, you will die," she then heard the familiar click of a hammer of a gun being pulled back and the hard metal of a barrel being pressed to the back of her neck through the cloak’s hood. So enthralled she had been with the suspicious and seemingly unearthly shadow, she hadn’t kept her senses alert to the area around her. Black curses ran through her mind as she thought she saw a smirk overcome the thin mouth underneath the heavy moustache as she watched him take a step forward and reach for her weapon when she reacted.

"Stop!" she yelled and he did, seemingly surprised. "Take another step and I kill you," she hissed, bluffing, but he didn’t know that. There was a long pause as she kept the gun level with his head. "I don’t give a damn if I die," she informed. "But I won’t be treated as a captive," her words were nothing more than a growl as she didn’t trust herself to raise her voice any further.

There was a pause in which entire civilizations rose and fell, and Angel knew that the man in front of her was silently communicating with the party behind her, whomever it might be. Then a chuckle began to resonate from the small surreal man before her. The chuckle was unnerving and irritating as he made a jerk with his head and the gun was drawn away from her head. Suddenly all of her senses were screaming warning, but it was too late to react as a blinding pain shot from the crown of her cranium to the soles of her feet. The searing pain burning down every nerve of her body as she felt her unwilling arms slump with the rest of her body as her eyes rolled back into her head – and then it was black.

As it tends to happen, the conscious reality and subconscious reality began to blur together as the darkness receded into nothing more than a memory. The silken fog had seemed to cast a veil over her thought and her vision as she waited for completely and total comprehension to settle over her mortal mind. A dull throbbing pulsated annoyingly on the crown of her skull and radiated through the whole of her being with each slow wave of agony as her eyes became emerald slits in her face. The first thing she was aware of was the rough wood that touched the bare skin of her hands and the coarse rope binds that entangled her wrists. Then the light that seemed annoyingly and unnecessarily brilliant struck her, sending a coursing surge of nausea throughout her being. Hard wood pressed against her back and rear as she noted that the cheap wood of the chair was what brushed so roughly against her hands. Black curses came to her mind as she remembered the alcohol, the apprehension and fear, the surreal shadow man, and then the splitting pain.

Accursed liquor.

"So she wakes," The deep voice came as she began to identify other objects in the room as the offending light faded into somewhat acceptable. The lovely buzz was now nothing more than an additive to the ache that pulsated through her whole cranium.

"Where am I?" Angel demanded, her voice slightly hoarse from the firewater and recent awakening. "Who are you?"

"You’re safe," he answered and Angel noted that the small room was not well furnished. Several cheap brass lamps were mounted on the undecorated walls and the warped wooden floor didn’t even have a rug to cover it. The table and chairs overtook much of the space and she noted the poor workmanship and the cheapness of the material used to build the furnishing. The stark surroundings did nothing to comfort her as dark stains covered the otherwise dingy white walls. "For now," The man added the ominous phrase with a strange quirk of those thin lips. His ensemble was the same of what he wore outside, the floppy hat the same as the heavy trench coat.

"What do you want from me?" she ordered, now seeing an average sized man walk around in from behind her in the windowless room. "Why am I here?"

"We have a proposition for you," he picked up the shiny metallic instrument off of the table, the mahogany of its handle gleaming in the bright light as he turned her revolver over in his small hands. "Its been brought to our attention that you are connected to various – establishments – around New York," he picked his words carefully and Angel’s heart jumped to her throat. Did they want her to commit another assassination?

"Whoever informed you of such, was lying," Angel spat on the ground, physically showing her distaste for her captor, and both of them men looked coolly amused.

"No need to be coy, miss," the larger of the two spoke, his voice a smooth tenor as he peered at her from his slightly pudgy face. "We know of your connections to Robert Harvey and Peter Anderson’s operations," he informed and she felt her stomach drop into oblivion.

"What the hell do you want?" she growled, not denying the accusation, but not attempting to prove herself less guilty to the charges.

"We have reasons to believe that these two establishments are running illegal gambling procedures, but we don’t have any conclusive proof," the smaller man explained, his unusually deep rasp filling the bleakly decorated quarters. "And we know that you could help us," he explained and suddenly the dull ache was much stronger in Angel’s head. The small men with big hammers began pounding the alarms in her mind until the pain was nearly unbearable. Whatever numbness the alcohol had provided at one point was now nothing more than a memory.

"What’s it to you?" she quirked one eyebrow, not appreciating the way that the small stranger was fondling her tool of the trade. Her voice held much more confidence than she felt and she brushed her sweaty palms against the rough, splintered wood, feeling that the binds on her wrists were secure. Too secure to easily remove like those of Teddy, or rather, Peter.

"You’ll be exempt of any charge brought against you by the state of New York," the smaller man spoke, obviously he was the brains of the operation. The heavy moustache moved systematically with every word he spoke, looking as though a furry caterpillar had taken rest upon it.

Exempt from charges? The words ran through Angel’s mind with the clarity of a lightning bolt as she suddenly realized who these men were. They were with the police – and they wanted her help! The possibilities were mind boggling. If they knew about her connections with the two establishments, especially since the one she had made with Peter Anderson was new and fragile to say the least, could they possibly know of her lethal occupation? Is that what they meant by exemption from the law? The possibilities were endless and she chose to play the mute as she waited for him to elaborate. At this moment, the less she spoke the better.

"I think she has discovered our secret," The smaller man smirked, his moustache quirking curiously. "We are with the police," he confessed and Angel’s gut reaction was a deep and terrible fear that made her eyes nearly double in size. "And we need your help," he leaned over the table at that moment, his face still staying a mystery to Angel as the large brim of his hat remained over his eyes and nose.

"If I say no?" she tested and the larger man let out a low chuckle and an ironic smile pulled at the smaller man’s mouth.

"No one said that was an option," he had a deadly finality in his voice that made a shiver run down her spine, but she didn’t show it, instead she transcended the fear into an indignant mask.

"No one said it wasn’t," she retorted and the small man’s mouth took a hard straight line, but the larger man seemed slightly amused. "Besides, how can you claim to know who I am? There are several girls out there that could be the one for whom you are looking," she offered the alternate idea, looking to see either of their expressions flicker, but they didn’t. "For all you know, I’m just another whore getting a few drinks to forget a bad lay," she let her tongue flick out over her cupid bow lips suggestively, but neither changed expression.

"We will give you a new residence and whatever you need to complete this mission," the small man didn’t even seem to take her insinuation into consideration. "After you are done, all connections or things you did while connected to the gangs will be absolved without question," he continued dispassionately. "And you will be paid handsomely," he added as he flicked at the hammer of her revolver. "If not, we will dispatch you as you have dispatched so many others," his voice was so cold and convincing Angel felt her face pale dramatically.

"Make up your mind, miss," The larger man insisted, and Angel picked up on a slight British accent, his own heavy beard moving as he spoke.

Angel’s mind raced at all of the implications brought forth by this. A triple agent? The proposition was nearly unfathomable, as she had no idea how she would have been able to handle working for two masters, not alone, three. The dilemma wasn’t that heavy as she knew that if nothing else, she would have to agree to this, whether she wanted to or not. Chances were she would be able to play one of the three sides until she was just able to skip town, disappearing into a sea of people that didn’t know her and didn’t care to. She wasn’t stupid, she knew that the offer they were making her wasn’t negotiable. It seemed that they knew more about her than she cared for them to know, so with a mind swirling with thoughts and plans for her next move she looked where she imagined the smaller man’s eyes to be.

"Where will I be staying?" she quirked an eyebrow, and the larger, bearded man chuckled.

"We have that all worked out," the smaller man set down the gun and pulled a sharp looking knife out of the inside of her jacket and stepped behind her. Angel felt the rough binds around her wrists freed and she brought her hands around in front of her, rubbing at the chafed skin and glaring at the officers coldly.

"Then," she felt the ache in her head grow as all of the implications of her three-way deal began to strike her. "It seems we have much about which to converse," her tone was aloof as she reached for her gun and placed it in the pocket of her cloak.

It was going to be another very long night.

A/N: Kind of short, but a very crucial turn in the plot. How in the devil am I going to resolve this? Well, I guess you will just have to keep reading. Constructive criticism craved.

Knightengale: Yes, Angel is surrounded by jerks, but you know it sure makes it fun to write. I am sure that my stories are full of errors grammatically, but when I go back and revise, hopefully, I’ll catch them all. Mrs. McNeil is the boarding house owner’s wife, who is not Robert Harvey, but is a big wig in the gambling ring. I hope that clears that up.

Scotia Rain: Out of it is a good way to describe Mrs. McNeil, she is a sweet woman. I’ve got an interesting plan for her in the future of this story. ^_^ I hope it works out. Lynch and Ice and both just jerks, so is Cowboy, but they are all nescisary.

Fountain Pen: I’m glad that you have enjoyed my story and hope you continue to enjoy it in the feature.

Demeter Rose: I’m completely undeserving of your flattery, but I really do try to balance Angel’s character. While she is a criminal, she is a victim in her own right, and she does want out of it, even if she doesn’t quite know how to get out. Thank you for pointing out that sentence and when I revise I will definitely give it a bit of a tweak. Thank you for your careful reading and your compliments.