Snared (Elemental Assassin #16)(15)

“Gin.”

She slid her sunglasses on top of her head, pushing her blond bob of hair out of the way. Jade was a beautiful woman, and her makeup was as smooth and flawless as ever. But the expertly applied lipstick, powder, and shadow didn’t quite hide the tired lines around her mouth, the purple streaks under her eyes, or, especially, the fear and worry glimmering in her green gaze.

Something was wrong.

The longer I stared at her, the more certain I was. Jade had come to the Pork Pit not as a friend but as an underworld boss, which only meant one thing: she had a problem that she wanted me to solve.

Sure enough, Jade drew in a deep breath, then slowly let it out. “You owe me a favor, and I’m here to collect.”

I raised my eyebrows at her pronouncement. “Well, that sounds rather ominous.”

Her lips tightened into a grim slash. “Believe me, it is.” She glanced around the restaurant, then turned back to me. “Can we go somewhere private and talk?”

“Sure. Step into my office. You too, Silvio.”

I motioned for Jade to walk around the counter and over to the swinging double doors that opened into the back of the restaurant. Silvio grabbed his phone and followed us. I led the two of them past the metal shelves full of sugar, ketchup, cornmeal, napkins, silverware, and other restaurant necessities and opened the back door of the restaurant. I stuck my head outside, just to make sure that no one was lurking in the alley foolishly hoping to kill me, but the coast was clear, and the three of us stepped outside. Silvio shut the door behind him.

Jade looked up and down the alley, taking in the dirty, broken pavement, the overflowing trash cans, and the battered metal Dumpsters hugging the walls. The air wasn’t nearly cold enough to kill the stench of rotten meat, putrid vegetables, and other spoiled food mixed with the sticky-sweet and sour scents of crushed soda cans and broken beer bottles. Her crimson lips curled up with disgust, and she made sure to keep her boots out of the puddles of oily water that had filled in the cracks in the asphalt.

“Some office,” she muttered.

I shrugged and leaned a shoulder against the brick wall of the Pork Pit. “What’s up?”

Jade looked at Silvio, who was standing off to my right, his phone in his hands, ready to take down notes of our meeting.

“Does he have to be here for this?” she asked.

“Yes. He’s my assistant. He gets rather cranky when I don’t let him actually assist me.”

Silvio’s gray eyes narrowed, and he let out a little huff of disapproval, not liking my quip, especially since it was true. I winked back at him, teasing him a little more.

Jade bit her lower lip and glanced around the alley again, as if she was afraid that someone was going to overhear us. Of course, that wasn’t the case, since no one else was back here, and I got the sense that she was stalling, trying to work up to delivering whatever bad news she had. I wondered if the delay was for my benefit or for hers.

“Spit it out, Jade. What’s wrong?”

She let out a long sigh and finally raised her green eyes to mine. “One of my girls is missing.”

My eyebrows rose. Jade Jamison ran a variety of businesses, everything from temp services to cleaning groups to coin laundries to hookers.

“What kind of girl? Do you mean—”

Jade shook her head. “No, she’s not a hooker. She’s one of my talkers.”

My eyebrows rose a little more. “Talkers?”

“Yeah,” she replied. “Talkers. Women who go out with someone for the night and provide companionship only. No sex.”

“Who would pay for something like that?” Silvio asked.

Jade shrugged. “Older men mostly, ones who’ve lost their wives. Folks who need a plus-one for some charity event or party but don’t want the bother of finding someone to go with them. So they call me up and arrange a date.”

“And what exactly do these dates do?” I asked.

She shrugged again. “Most of the time, it’s just simple companionship, like I said. A young, pretty, friendly face by your side with no pressure of it being a real date. Lots of, well, talking. Hence the name. Talkers also help to keep the vultures and gold diggers away, especially at society events. I have some guys who are talkers too, who go out with older women, widows, and the like.”

“And one of your talkers is missing?” I asked.

She nodded. “Her name is Elissa Daniels, and she’s been missing since last night.”

Jade pulled her phone out of her jacket pocket and called up a photo. Her fingers trailed over the screen for a few seconds before she passed the phone over to me.

Elissa Daniels looked to be in her early twenties, and I was guessing that she was a student, given her dark blue Ashland Community College sweatshirt. She was a pretty girl, with a long blond ponytail, green eyes, and a shy smile. But what was most interesting about the photo was that her arm was slung around Jade’s shoulder and their heads were tilted together as though the two of them were best friends. No, it was more than that. Despite the fact that Jade was at least a decade older than Elissa, the two of them could have been twins, with their blond hair, green eyes, and matching features.

And I suddenly realized exactly why this was so important to Jade.

I passed the phone over to Silvio, who blinked and then brought the device closer to his face so he could get a better look at the photo.