The Other Black Girl(96)

But there was more.

Hours after the kidnapping, as she lay on her bed replaying what she’d just seen, she got a call from the cell phone she’d watched get picked up.

She thought about declining it, but Owen wouldn’t be home for another hour—she had time.

She held it up to her ear, thinking it might be the Marvin Gaye doppelganger from Starbucks. But the fraught voice that filled her ear sounded like it belonged to someone’s grandmother. “Nella. You answered. Thank you.”

There was a pause.

“I’m sorry you had to see all of that. We weren’t really prepared for… There have been some people watching you, trying to look out for you. But I guess not closely enough. I told them to be more careful,” she added, more to herself than to Nella.

“Who’s ‘they’? Who are you? And what happened to that girl who got shoved into that car? Do you know anything about that? And what about her friend—that Black bearded guy? Where is he?”

“I can’t answer any of that. Just know that we’re trying to help you. I’m working on it. I need you to know that, and I need you to keep this conversation between us, okay? Don’t tell anyone at work about it.”

“You’re working on it?” A bang had clattered from somewhere out in the hallway—likely the neighbor bringing his bike up the stairs. “How do I know you’re not the person I was told to watch out for? And what’s Hazel’s real name?”

The line went silent. “You aren’t supposed to know that yet,” the voice said, exasperated. “Hm. Okay… you have two options. You can write me off as a lunatic, or you can find out who Hazel really is.”

“But—”

“Do some more digging.”

The call ended.

With this, Nella had contemplated smashing her phone with a saucepan and hiding under her favorite blanket. But before she could go anywhere, it pinged. The woman had sent her an image and the words, “Taken this past summer. Keep digging.”

When Nella enlarged the photo, she’d made out a young, short-haired Black woman wearing a sweatshirt imprinted with the words COOPER’S MAG, and when she increased her screen to full brightness, she could see the girl’s shining brown eyes clearly. They were filled with mirth and a sparkle of something else—ambition—and although she didn’t have an eyebrow piercing or long, flowing locs, Nella recognized that Lena Horne nose and that go-getter glint.

Nella’s fingertips had gone numb from gripping the phone too tightly. The call, the photo… it was all too much and yet still not enough to quell a small, sneaking feeling of curiosity. What had happened to that bald-headed, Black Pantheresque woman? Who was looking out for Nella, and why?

And who the hell was Hazel-May McCall, really?

“It’s hard out there, right?” Isaac barked, pointing at the room’s one tiny window. “Isn’t it hard out there? It may be hard in here, but it’s even harder out there. I want you to give me everything you’ve got. Squat. It. OUT!”

“Oh lord.” Malaika squatted down low once, and then a second time. “I had no idea this was going to turn into a therapy session.”

Nella squeezed out an otherworldly groan of protest that she herself didn’t altogether recognize.

“Although maybe you do need one,” Malaika continued. “Especially after what happened to you Saturday.”

Nella tried to scoff, but her lack of breath made it sound more like regurgitation. She asked, weakly, “What do you mean, ‘after what happened’ to me?”

“You know, when you froze. When you were this close to finding out who’s been creeping on you—like, literally, this close—but you let her go.”

Nella rolled her eyes. “Do we have to do this again? Now? While we’re listening to shitty top-forty music? I came here to bop it out, not in.”

Malaika’s squats had depreciated; now she just looked like she had to go to the bathroom. “Yes, we have to do this again. Shit, Nella… you were supposed to get the license plate of that car. You were supposed to get into another car and follow the bald chick’s car. But you didn’t follow the bald chick, and now you’re back at square one.”

“Well… not exactly.”

Keep this conversation between us, the woman on the phone had said, but what did she expect Nella to do? Sit with this new knowledge on her own? “Before the bald-headed girl disappeared, she told me that Hazel’s name isn’t really Hazel. And after that girl disappeared, I got a call from the phone she ditched.”

Malaika froze. “Wait. What?”

“I know.”

“Why didn’t you tell me before? What did the caller say?”

“That I needed to find out about Hazel for myself. Do some digging.”

“And that was it?”

“No… she also said that she and some people have been following me, too. But that they’re looking out for me.”

“What the fuck?” Malaika panted.

“I know, I know. But this woman sounded like she was being for real.”

“I don’t even know what to say anymore, Nella. This whole thing is getting scarier and scarier.”

“How do you think I feel?! I’m being fucking followed!”