Desperation in Death (In Death #55)(37)

The sunlight hurt her eyes, made them water, but she tried to look like she had some business as they came out of the alley onto the street.

“Got a name? You can make one up.”

“My head feels wrong. Everything’s all messed up, and I can’t remember stuff.”

“Like your name? No shit? That’s kind of frosty.”

“Doesn’t feel frosty.”

“You know two plus two?”

She sent him a look well-known to teenage girls. “Like four? My head’s messed up, not stupid.”

He just grinned at her. “You sound like a frog.”

“Throat’s sore. Where are we?”

“Down to the downtown.”

“Downtown where?”

“Jeez peas. New York.”

“New York,” she whispered. “I was in New York. I think. I think. It hurts to think.”

“So stop.” Then he sighed, dug into a pocket of his dingy baggies, and pulled out a mini tube of Coke.

“You can have it. I just snatched it and the bagel.”

She chugged some down, coughed violently, chugged again.

“You’re all sweaty. Maybe from being sick or whatever, ’cause it’s not so hot yet. Down this way.”

He led her down another alley, then pulled up a break in a security fence. Her leg hurt more now, but he kept going until he stopped in a skinny, scabby-looking lot and dragged up a metal cover.

“Now we go down.”

“Down there?”

Heat washed over her, and cold swept after it.

“Tunnels.”

“Best way to get there. They don’t use ’em anymore ’cause they changed the grid or the something, and don’t need this one.”

“Tunnels,” she repeated.

“They ain’t—aren’t scary. It’s like a secret, okay? You can’t tell. Hurry up.”

Her mind turned off. She saw walking, walking. Running, walking. Had to hurry, had to get out.

Away.

Everything echoed, outside her head, inside.

She stumbled.

“We’re almost there. Swear to God. Come on, get up.”

“Can’t.” Curling into a ball on the rough concrete, she let the tears come.

He tried patting her head, patting her back, but the tears didn’t stop.

“I’ll be right back, okay? Here, here, you take the light. I know the way.”

Then she was alone. She’d sleep, she told herself. And if she didn’t wake up, okay. She was so tired, so sick, so scared. She didn’t need to wake up again.

She thought she heard footsteps coming fast.

They’d found her, she thought as she drifted away. She’d known they would. But they couldn’t hurt her now because she was going to sleep. Forever.

She didn’t feel the hand cool on her face, hear the voice speak.

“Poor thing, she’s burning up.”

“Leg’s hurt. She could hardly walk on it.”

“Mmm. Well, we’ll see what we can do.”

Arms lifted her. Somewhere inside she flailed out. But she only moaned and muttered.

“All right now. We’ve got you, and no one’s going to hurt you.”



* * *



Because she beat her way through traffic in good time, Eve went straight to her office to write out her thoughts and theories. A kind of boot camp, she considered, for sex slaves. Training facilities.

She pushed up, got coffee. She knew something—something from the dream. Something connected to it.

“Not pretty enough.”

Squeezing her eyes tight, she willed memory back.

Troy, Richard Troy. Did he say that? Something about her not being pretty enough, never going to be pretty enough to bring the big bucks?

Rent instead? Rent her out, use her up, sell her off?

“Am I making that up? Just projecting?”

She walked to her window, stared out, stared down.

“Needed seasoning. Goddamn it, I’m not pulling that out of the air. You need some seasoning, little girl. I can hear him say that.”

Because it made her sick, she pressed her forehead to the glass. She needed to stay steady. If something pushed through, she’d still stay steady.

But if not pretty enough meant something—something relevant to the investigation—she’d need to dig down for it.

She turned at the tap.

Detective Willowby stood in the doorway, her knuckles still resting on the jamb.

“Lieutenant, Detective Willowby. I’m a little early. I only live a few blocks away, and thought I’d come right in.”

“No problem. Coffee?”

“Yeah, sure. A little milk, one sugar. Do you mind?”

Eve nodded when Willowby gestured to the board.

While the detective studied it, Eve programmed the coffee.

She didn’t look like her name, Eve thought.

On the short side with a compact, athletic body, Willowby hooked her thumbs in the front pockets of black, straight-legged pants. With them, she wore red high-tops, a white T-shirt—with confetti-framed sunshades hooked in the neck—and a red bomber-style jacket.

She sported a colorful braided cloth bracelet on her right hand, and a tattoo—a crescent moon and three stars—on the back of her left. Her hair, a razor-sharp short bob, read ink black except for the crown and thick fringe dyed dark blue.