Desperation in Death (In Death #55)(36)

“Okay, true enough. But why pay big bucks—and it has to be big bucks—to rape and brutalize when you can grab up a street kid for nothing? If you want a sex slave, a product, wouldn’t you pay more for one that does what you want, how you want it?”

“You think this is some kind of training. Target attractive young girls, lock them away from the familiar, indoctrinate them. The uniforms, the food, the hair and skin products.”

“Punishments, too. The carrot’s no good without the stick. Think of the military again, the old ‘drop and give me twenty.’ They have to break you down to build you up in their image, for their needs.

“A girl like Mina, who looks like Mina, who sells as a virgin, but one with sexual knowledge, one who’s gotten used to being photographed in the sexwear, or naked, or in sexual situations. You program a sex droid to be and do what you want, right? This could be like that, but with human girls.”

With a shrug, she polished off the waffles. “Or I could be way off base. But … Coincidence is bullshit, and it’s not bullshit that Mina Cabot and Dorian Gregg, same age, no prior connection, were both abducted, most probably from different areas, and both ended up in New York.”

She pushed up and began to load her pockets for the day.

“I’m pulling Willowby in, the SVU detective McNab knows. She may have some insight. I’ve gotta go.”

Roarke shot the cat another warning look before he rose, rounded the table. And laid his hands on Eve’s shoulders. “Take care of my cop.”

“I’ve got a magic shield.”

“I haven’t come up with one for that face of yours yet.” So he kissed it. “Wand that eye.”

“I will.” If she remembered, she thought, and left him.

In the car, she contacted Detective Willowby, asked for a meet, then drove through the gates.





8





While Eve battled traffic, Dorian stirred out of a fitful, feverish sleep. She’d managed to pry a thin board off a broken window and crawl through into what looked like an abandoned storefront.

Nothing in it but dirt, spiders—probably rats—but she’d needed to lie down, just try to sleep. Even with the pills and ice packs she’d stolen, everything hurt.

And under the hurt, fear bubbled. She didn’t know of what, or who, but she’d crawled through that window, cutting her hand on some of the broken glass, because everything in her had said: Hide.

She’d curled on the floor, shivering and sweating herself in and out of sleep for the day. Once, during the endless, miserable night that followed, she’d started to crawl out, to steal some food, but she’d just given up until she’d slept again.

Now she saw sunlight eking through the cracks of the board she’d tried to put back in place. Another day, she realized, and every instinct told her she needed to get up, to move, to find food and a better place to hide.

But everything hurt.

“Wondered if you’d wake up.”

The voice had her jolting, so her head seemed to balloon, then pop.

“Take it easy, squeezy.”

Since it was a kid who crab-walked over to her, the worst of the fear ebbed.

He had big brown eyes, an unruly thatch of purple-streaked brown hair, and a round, pink scar in the middle of his left cheek.

She thought he was younger than she was, though her blurry brain couldn’t pinpoint her own age.

She tried to tell him to go away, but her voice just croaked.

“You look sick. Beat up some, too. Hungry?” He held out a piece of untoasted bagel with a hand not altogether clean. “I ate the rest.”

She took it, gnawed on it.

“I call myself Mouser, ’cause I’m fast and sneaky.”

When she just stared at him, he shrugged. “I guess you can come with me if you want, ’cause you don’t look so good. We’ve got a place, lots better’n this. And cops might check in here like I did, ’cause you left blood on the window.”

“Where?” she managed.

“Not that far. Cops after you?”

“Don’t know.”

“Come on with me if you want. We can fix you up. Got beds and all, and food, too.”

“No shelter.”

He snorted, swiped the back of his hand under his nose. “Not like you mean. We look out for each other. Rule is—’cause we got some—see a kid needs help, you help if you can. So you can come with me if you want.”

“’Kay.” The cough hurt when it racked her. “Leg hurts.”

“Don’t look broken or nothing. Anything,” he said with an eye roll, as if some internal teacher corrected him. “You can lean on me. I’m stronger than I look.”

He had to help her get to her feet, and twice, she had to just sit back down because her head swam.

When she did, he sat and waited.

But when she stood, she found she could put more weight on her bad leg than she’d feared.

Not a lot, but enough to limp, and to lean against Mouser.

They got out the way they’d come in, but Mouser laid rags over the window to protect their hands.

They came out in an alley.

“What you do, see, is you just walk along like you’re going somewhere, got some business, check? Nobody pays attention much around here.”