Jack and Djinn (The Houri Legends, #1)(52)
Nadira Nasri, a cocktail waitress on the casino floor, had seen Miriam, she said. Miriam had actually knocked into her and spilled a tray of drinks. She’d seen Ben, too, or rather, she’d seen a tall, angry-looking guy following Miriam, and had heard people screaming that he had a gun. That was all she knew, Nadira had claimed.
Maybe things had gotten…tense. If Miriam had tried to leave and Ben had chased her, they’d end up in the casino, almost by default. Carson prowled the casino, trying to think like a fleeing, terrified girl. The casino was huge and sprawling, the exits distant and not clearly marked. It was designed to keep you in. The confusion and chaos was intentional: no windows, no clocks, no evidence of passing time, no obvious exits. It was clever, almost diabolical, really. And if you were a scared girl, you’d have no way to know where to go.
Then he’d seen the bay of employee-only doors in the distance, and that had seemed an obvious choice. Doors meant escape; doors meant away. So he went through the doors, flashing his badge to employees protesting his presence. White hallways like an illusion stretching out in a further maze, silent after the chaos…Carson found himself disoriented, so he could only imagine how frantic and confused Miriam must have been. One random turn after another, and then suddenly he was in the parking garage. If she had gone left instead of right, maybe there would have been a different outcome. One direction would have led her to a break room, or a cleaning supply room, whereas she’d ended up cornered in the garage, where something truly unusual had taken place, a sequence of events that was still a mystery to Carson.
He had a clear picture of how events had led to the parking garage. He’d looked at the security tapes again, and had finally found a single, brief image of Miriam pushing through the crowd, obviously terrified, chased by Ben. The cameras had caught them in the casino and the back hallways, and entering the parking garage, but that was it. No footage of Ben’s death. So how had Ben died? What had caused the fire? Had Miriam done it?
And again the question: Where the hell was Miriam?
*
Back at his desk, Carson stared at the casings, trying to piece the rest of the story together. The body had been burned, which meant it was likely that someone else had been shot. But there were no burn marks, no scorch marks, not even where the body had fallen, which suggested that the fire wasn’t natural. If Miriam was able to…what? Manipulate fire somehow? That would explain the mysterious nature of the burned body. Maybe she had torched him somehow in self-defense. Maybe she had been shot in the process and run, or been found? But then, none of the hospitals had reported any gunshot victims that fit Miriam’s description.
He had a pretty good idea of the people involved and the sequence of events, but it still left him stuck in the same place he’d been at the start: a charred skeleton, a missing girl who might or might not have been responsible for the burned body, a missing girl who might or might not be alive.
At his desk, Carson sat staring at the file. He had to solve this case. He had to know if Miriam had killed Ben, and how.
He hoped Miriam was still alive to tell him.
Author’s Note
Domestic abuse features heavily in this story, and it is a subject that has affected me personally—there is a reason the hero in this story is named Jack.
I could fill this note with statistics on domestic abuse, I could give my own story, I could do many things. Instead, what I will say is that I chose to write this story because abuse is something that affects people all over the world, from every ethnic, religious, and socioeconomic background. It is a real and tragic problem, and it deserves attention. I’ve received criticism regarding Miriam before, people saying she’s weak for sticking with Ben for so long despite the abuse. But that, sadly, is a reality. You start to think you have no other choice. You start to think you’ve earned it, you deserve it, that no one can help you. That there is no escape. That every man will treat you the same way.
I escaped. It took a lot of courage, but I did it. And I found a man who, like the Jack in this story, treats me with the love and affection that I deserve.
That I DESERVE.
Do you hear that? If you’ve experienced anything like what I did, you know how hard that can be to believe. And if you know anyone who is in the middle of such trauma, you know how impossible it can be to convince them of it.
There is always another option. No one has the right to treat you or anyone you know with cruelty, with emotional or physical violence. Seek help.
There are any number of websites dedicated to the topic, but here are a couple to get you started.
http://www.womenhelpingwomen.org/what-is-abuse/domestic-violence/
http://www.thehotline.org/
http://abuseintervention.org/help/friend-family/
Continue reading for a sneak preview of
Djinn and Tonic
By
Jasinda Wilder
Coming Soon
Djinn and Tonic
Chapter 1: A Breath of Wind
Detective Carson Hale wasn’t sure how he ended up at the Old Shillelagh again, a highball of gin and tonic in hand, watching replays of the Tigers beating the Rockies. He had left the station after work, but hadn’t felt like going home.