Lost Girls(26)

The wind made the rain blow sideways, hitting the girl in the face, turning her hair into blue stripes that stuck to her cheeks. She looked young and vulnerable, her lip bleeding, a grinding fear in her eyes like a wounded animal. An unexpected impulse caused her to rub her left arm, accidentally tugging up her sleeve, revealing a row of track marks that looked suspiciously like mine.

“What are you taking?” I asked, pointing to her bruises.

“You know I’m dry as a bone after what you did!” she said with a scowl, dark circles under her eyes like she couldn’t sleep any better than I could. “Nobody’s buyin’ me nothin’ anymore. You got questions, you should ask your own damn girls.” She kicked the door shut with her right foot, the deadbolt latching with a dull thunk a split second later. But I could still hear her shuffling about on the other side.

She could have shouted at me, but she didn’t. Instead she spoke in a voice so calm it was almost scary.

“This here is your only warning. Get off my property now. I’m goin’ to get my gun, then I’ll fill your skinny ass with more holes than you can count.”

Her footsteps retreated into another room.

She was going to get a gun and, despite the terror that fingered its way through my gut, I wanted to wait for her to come back. I wanted to grab the gun from her hands as soon as the door opened and knock her in the face with it. I wanted to force her to tell me what drugs she was taking and who was giving them to her. I shifted my weight from one leg to another, my skin tingling, a thick coldness pouring over me, suddenly aware of everything around me. A bark of excited laughter rose from my chest, but I reminded myself that I hadn’t come here to fight. I’d come looking for answers and had gotten more questions instead.

I forced myself to turn and jog back to the car, feet sloshing through puddles, head tilted down to shield my face from the rain. Molly was waiting inside, just like I’d told her to do. She was safe and that was all that really mattered. My hands and legs trembled when I climbed in the driver’s seat. If I’d been alone, I would have gone for a run. A long run.

“Should I call the cops? Did she hit you? Are you okay?”

Molly’s voice filled all the empty spaces in the car, her words like little teeth, gnawing at me. My right thumb worked the muscles in my left forearm, kneading those track marks as if it would jump-start some hidden reservoir lodged beneath my skin, releasing a floodgate of what—what was I craving right now? I leaned forward, head against the steering wheel, eyes closed.

Who am I and what kind of person have I turned into?

My stomach heaved, bile in my throat. At the same time, I felt stronger, bigger, taller than I ever had.

That girl had recognized me and, for some reason, she was afraid of me. There were track marks on her arms, just like mine. She knew the same secrets as Lauren, but neither of them would tell me what I needed to know.

I slammed my fist against the dashboard, unable to hold back that urge to fight that was making all my muscles tense, even the muscles in my gut, the sound of my hand hitting the dashboard almost masking the footsteps that were splashing toward my car, the sound of someone running through puddles, a chaotic rapid-fire rhythm—

“Holy shit, Rachel, she’s got a gun!” Molly screamed.

I didn’t bother to look. I knew I’d see hatred and terror in the blue-haired girl’s eyes as she came to a stop just outside my door. Again, I reacted by instinct, something that was fast becoming second nature for me, no matter how weird it felt.

No, not weird—right.

I sensed her presence even before I heard her approach or Molly’s scream. My left hand grabbed the handle and I kicked my car door open, body slamming Janie Deluca and knocking her on her ass in the street. I was out of my car in an instant, rain streaming down on both of us. Janie struggled to gain control of that gun, holding it with trembling hands, trying to lift it and aim it at me. I kicked her in the side, in the arm, in the gut, each strike causing her to curl this way and that, and sending new moans from her chest.

It was almost like someone else was inside my body, calling the shots, someone both cold-blooded and vengeful. My fourth kick sent that gun tumbling away from her, skittering across the street into a storm drain where it disappeared from sight, a glittering bauble that dissolved in darkness.

Molly gasped, either before or after I started kicking the blue-haired girl, I’m not sure which.

Janie lay crumpled on the ground, hatred in her eyes giving way to complete fear, her weapon gone, her body bent at the waist, her arms and legs stretched out.

Even though Janie had tried to kill me, I wasn’t afraid of her. I was angry. Strange, disconnected thoughts started buzzing through my head.

She deserves to die.

She’s worse than a cockroach, she needs to be exterminated.

She’s weak.

And she lay in the street in front of me, soaked to the bone, blood on her lip, staring up at me, blue hair flowing around her face like tears that wouldn’t stop, that couldn’t stop, and an expression in her eyes that I knew I’d seen before. We knew each other, Janie and I, of that much I was certain. We’d fought each other before and, just like tonight, I had won. I stood over her, triumphant, knowing that I held her life in my hands and that this wasn’t the first time.

I pointed a finger at her and she winced as if I had just struck her.

“Never raise your fist to me again, do you hear me?” I said.