Never Tell (Detective D.D. Warren #10)(65)

Again, I wait to feel … something. Mostly, I’m self-conscious and awkward.

“We’re missing something.”

Four pairs of eyes stare at me. Not helping.

“Popcorn. There was popcorn in little red-and-white-checkered containers. And it shouldn’t be this bright. No honky-tonk is this bright.”

Keith heads for the panel of light switches. Samuel disappears without ever saying a word, meaning he must know how to get popcorn.

That leaves me with the two investigators. D.D. is eyeing the food in the middle of the table.

“I’m hungry,” she says.

“You’re always hungry,” Quincy replies.

It’s like they’ve suddenly become besties. This, I have a feeling, will be less good for me.

Keith can’t figure out how to dim the overhead bulbs. In the end, he shuts them off. Given all the light still pouring in through the glass windows, the effect works out nicely. At least it takes the edge off the room, makes it feel less sterile.

Samuel returns with a bag of microwave popcorn. He opens the bag, the smell hits, and for the first time I feel it. Like a door opening in my mind. I can smell the bar, the beer, popcorn, melted cheese. I pick up the glass, take a small sip, and then I can taste it, too. I’d been so thirsty, so hungry, so scared.

Fake-Everett. That’s what I’d called him back then. Because he’d started my programming by taking away my name. No more Flora, just Molly. Molly in a hot-pink dress only a hooker would wear. And I was to call him by my father’s name. I didn’t even remember my father, but I had to believe he had loved me, so to call this beast by his name had hurt.

Everett, which I said out loud. Fake-Everett, which I used in my head, because silent rebellions were all I had left.

“Have a seat,” Samuel tells me, and I realize for the first time the others have already left. It’s just Samuel, and me, and beer, and country music and the smell of popcorn and a memory of one evening, already trying to claw out of my head.

“Where are you, Flora?”

“Molly.”

“Molly,” he amends.

“I’m hungry. So, so hungry.” I press a hand to my stomach. Then I pick up the first kernel of popcorn, tasting the saltiness of it against my tongue. Another small sip of beer. “He left me for the whole week,” I murmur. “Each day hungrier and hungrier. But I couldn’t leave the motel. If I did, he’d find me. He’d kill me. He told me so. And then he’d head north and kill my whole family. So I waited. Starving and starving. I waited.”

Sweatshirt is all wrong. Too warm, too comforting. I should be overexposed and shivering from the AC that always blasted away in the South.

No thinking. Doing. Shed the sweatshirt, followed by my long-sleeve top, until my arms are exposed in my gray tank top. Goose bumps ripple up across my flesh. Better.

“Where are you, Molly?” Samuel asks again. His voice is deep and rich. Hypnotic. It gives me a moment of uneasiness. I don’t want to be under anyone’s thrall. I don’t want to surrender control. Not when I’ve spent all these years fighting to get it back.

My choice, my choice. Another kernel of popcorn, concentrating on the buttery goodness.

Hungry. I’d been so, desperately, acutely, stomach-growling hungry. And that, as much as anything, takes me back.

—

“TWO BUDS,” I whisper. “Fake-Everett lets me have a beer. He hardly ever orders me food or alcohol. Waste of money, he’d say. The beer is nice. I’m grateful to him.”

“Are you sitting or standing?”

“I’m sitting. On a barstool. Fake-Everett stands behind me. Like he’s protecting me. I’m his girl.”

“What do you smell?”

“Popcorn. Oh my God, it smells so good! The bartender brings us some. Happy hour perk. I know the rules. I look at Fake-Everett. He nods. He’s going to let me eat free food. My hand is shaking so hard I can barely raise it. One kernel. One single kernel.”

On the table, my hand rises. Takes one single kernel.

“When you haven’t eaten in a while,” I whisper, “you have to pace yourself. Otherwise, you’ll get sick. And I can’t afford to get sick. Not when I never know when I’ll get to eat again.”

Another single kernel.

“Tell me about the bar,” Samuel intones. “The bartender?”

“Umm, white guy. Red flannel shirt over a black T-shirt. Busy. Nods at Fake-Everett once. Won’t look at me at all. Glasses above his head. Pulling them down, pouring beers from the tap, sliding them down the bar. Scooping out more popcorn. Moving, moving, moving, always in motion.”

“Name tag?”

“No.”

“What does the bar look like?”

“Dark wood. Very shellacked. Shiny. But sticky. Popcorn all over the floor. Pool tables behind me. Clink, clink, clink. Lots of people sitting around the bar. Guys in cowboy hats, women in tight jeans. I keep tugging my dress up. I feel ashamed. I don’t look at the bartender anymore. I don’t want to know what he thinks of me.”

“Is the beer sitting on a coaster? A napkin? Directly on the bar?”

I frown, squeeze my eyes shut, focus harder. “Coaster.”

“What does it say?”

“Bud Light.”