I stood frozen
for a long moment, staring at the bloody keys on my kitchen counter. They had
been in my pocket last night. I remembered stuffing them in there with a
handful of mints I’d swiped from Will’s desk before we left the precinct. They
should have been in evidence with everything else that had been on me when my
body was found. What the hell were
they doing here?
The sandwich and chips were alarming, too. My
memory was a bit scrambled, but I wasn’t one to leave food lying around for the
bugs to snack on. Someone had been here. Someone was still here, I realized as my ears pricked at the sound of creaking floorboards
behind me.
I ducked just in time. A baseball bat whooshed over
my head. As I spun around to get a visual of my attacker, a foot landed in the
center of my chest, sending me backward over the counter. The chips and
sandwich went flying. My hand slapped out to brace my fall, and I managed to
snag my bundle of keys before flipping ass over elbows and landing in a mangled
heap on the floor.
I hurled the keys over the counter, trying to buy
myself time as I scrambled to my feet and into the pantry where I kept a spare .380
hidden in a breadbox on the top shelf. When I spun around and took aim at the
intruder, my breath caught in my throat.
The girl was a hundred pounds tops, all razor-sharp
bones under flushed skin. Her tangle of brown hair was wet and dripping onto
the collar of one of my mother’s terrycloth bathrobes. The bat shook in her
hands, and her eyes darted back and forth between the gun and my face.
“Shit, shit,
shit,” she chanted.
I lowered the gun an inch but kept it trained on
her. “What are you doing in my house?”
“You were dead.” She gave me a twitchy, nervous
shrug. “I didn’t think you’d mind.”
“So you stole my keys and decided to help yourself
to my amenities?” I was beside myself. What kind of person took keys off a presumably
dead body? Wait— “You were at the warehouse.” I lifted my gun again as a knot
tightened in my chest.
The girl shifted her weight from foot to foot as if
preparing to bolt. “Hey, I tried to help. I was just…too late. Or so I
thought,” she added under her breath. Her gaze slid down to my neck.
“What happened down there? What did you see?” I squeezed
the grip of my gun tighter to keep my hands from trembling.
“Nothing! Okay?” She blew out a disgruntled sigh
and tilted the bat back to rest over one shoulder. “Your secret’s safe with
me.”
“Secret?” Nausea stirred in my stomach. Maybe I
didn’t want to know what had happened in the basement. What if I’d done
something even worse than watch my partner die?
I swallowed and panted my next few breaths while my
vision clouded over, washing the room and the strange girl in shades of red. That
was new. Something was definitely wrong with me. Vin was right. I needed to
schedule an appointment with my doctor.
The girl squinted at me. “Oh, man. You don’t know.
Do you?” She took a tentative step toward me, her hands wringing the neck of
the bat.
“Get back!” I shook the gun at her, determined to
hold my ground. “I’m… I’m—” Placing you
under arrest for breaking and entering. The words were there, but my train
of thought had barreled ahead before I could get them out.
If I turned her in, I wouldn’t be the one
interrogating her about what had happened at the warehouse. I wouldn’t be
allowed anywhere near the investigation—not now that my partner was dead and
I’d spent the day in the morgue. I’d be required to take a few weeks of leave
and go through a dozen therapy sessions before Mathis even considered giving me another case.
Someone else had probably already taken over the
investigation. They’d be interviewing me soon,
and I didn’t have half a clue what to tell them. I needed to find out more
first, and this girl was the only lead I had. But calling her sudden appearance
luck was premature, especially considering she’d made herself a little too at
home for my liking.
“What were
you doing in that basement?” I asked, trying to keep the panic out of my tone.
The girl sucked on her bottom lip and lowered the
bat to the kitchen counter before sliding onto one of the barstools. “Probably
the same thing you were.”
“And what is it you think I was doing?”
“Looking for those missing girls.” Her eyes met
mine for a brief second, and then she looked down at her hands. “I promised I’d
come back and bust them out.”
I recognized her now, from a photograph in the
file. It had been dated, taken when she was in foster care. Maybe eighth grade.
“Amanda?”
“Mandy,” she said, giving me an offended sneer.
“Mandy Starsgard.”
“Are you homeless?” I asked, deciding I could
forgive her for breaking in if that were the case.
She glanced around the kitchen and cocked an
eyebrow. “Not at the moment.”
“Well, Mandy,” I said, finally lowering my gun to
my side. “I’m going to need you to tell me everything you know. Who runs this
prostitution ring? Where are their headquarters and other locations of
operation? Do you think you could identify them and their affiliates from a
suspect lineup?”
Mandy let out a hiccup of a laugh and grinned at
me. “You don’t give up, do you? Not even death stands in this one’s way.”
“I had an aneurysm,” I said, blushing at the
absurdity of Vin’s theory. “Or something like that. It’s nothing, and I’m sure
my doctor will agree tomorrow.”
“I wouldn’t be too quick to check in with your
doc.” The amusement faded from Mandy’s expression. “The humans can be
problematic and draw a lot of unwanted attention from the higher-ups.”
And just like that, my hope evaporated. I stared at
her, wondering if maybe I should call a psychiatric ward rather than the
police. Taking her statement about the warehouse incident seemed a bit futile
at this point, but even mentally ill people provided useful tips from time to
time.
“Yes, the humans. Such a pain,” I said, unable to keep
the sardonic tone out of my voice.
Mandy picked a stray potato chip off the counter,
one of the few that had survived our introduction, and popped it into her
mouth. “You think I’m crazy. That’s okay. You’ll figure it out soon enough.”
I sighed and tucked the .380 into the waistband of my
pants. “You can stay here tonight, but tomorrow, I’m taking you to the station so
you can give your statement, and then to the woman’s shelter.”
“I don’t need a shelter,” Mandy snapped. “I need to
find the Scarlett Inn and bust my friends out before it’s too late. Girls don’t
last long in that place, not even the ones they turn.”
“The Scarlett Inn? That’s what they call it?” I
wanted to be excited by the new detail, but my faith in Mandy as a reliable source
had been crippled. I couldn’t take her seriously now. My focus shifted to the unquenched
thirst that had plagued me since waking in the morgue.
I yanked open the refrigerator door and grabbed a
bottle of orange Gatorade. Mandy gave me a horrified look as I twisted the lid
off.
“This isn’t going to end well,” she said as I
turned the bottle up and chugged.
The liquid burned on my tongue and gums, almost as
if it were carbonated. Or half-cut with battery acid. The sensation only worsened
as the drink ventured down my throat and sloshed into my empty stomach. It
gurgled once, twice, and then I was suddenly a stunt double for the Exorcist.
The Gatorade spewed across the room in a wide arc, creating a vomit rainbow
over the countertop before sloshing against the back of one of the chairs at
the kitchen table.
Mandy had retreated from my trajectory in the nick
of time and pressed herself against the back wall next to the sliding glass
door. “Told you so.”
I gave her a dirty look. “How could you have possibly
known that would happen?” I wiped my chin off with the back of my hand and then
coughed up a clot of blood across my knuckles. That wasn’t a good sign.
“You need blood,” Mandy said, creeping back to her
abandoned barstool.
“I hardly see how a transfusion is going to help.”
“To drink.” She raised both eyebrows and gave me a
pointed look. “And don’t even think about asking me. I would scrub toilets in a
truck stop before opening a vein for a bloodsucker.”
“Bloodsucker?” I swallowed and winced at the
searing pain in my throat. And I’d thought I was thirsty before. “Maybe I
should stick to water.” I opened a cabinet and pulled down a glass.
“Water won’t be any better. Maybe hold your head
over the sink this time?” Mandy suggested.
I ignored her warning and filled my glass at the
tap. I meant to take a small sip, but I was so thirsty. Before I could stop
myself, I’d downed half the glass, greedily gulping until cool water spilled
over my chin. It soothed my tongue and throat. For a few seconds anyway. And
then I was choking and gagging up water over the sink like I’d just survived
the Titanic.
“What. The. Hell?” I glared accusingly at Mandy.
“I tried to tell you.” She sighed and rested her
chin in the palm of one hand. “You’re dead, Miss Detective Lady. But don’t take
my word for it. Have you checked your pulse yet?”
“What?” I shouted at her. I wanted to roll my eyes,
but my fingers were already pressed to the side of my neck, searching. It felt
like a million years, but I did finally feel a gentle pulse against my fingertips.
“Ha! I have a heartbeat. What now, crazy pants?”
She snorted and rapped her knuckles along the
counter’s edge. “How many beats would you say per minute?”
My fingers went back to my neck, and after a few
seconds of waiting, my patience evaporated. “I’m not a damn doctor. I’ll
schedule a physical tomorrow, and everything will be fine.”
“If you do that, House Lilith will sic their agents
on you,” Mandy said, a serious note creeping into her voice. “I won’t help you
if they get involved. They kill mutts like me for sport.”
“Nothing you say makes any sense!” I screamed at
her. I was starting to lose my cool. Not being able to keep anything down and choking
up blood probably hadn’t helped. I seized the dishtowel hanging off the oven
door and wiped my hands and face off while I waited for my temper to dissipate.
“You probably have some contagious disease that you’ve passed on to me—”
“I’m healthy as a horse.” Mandy gave me a smug grin.
“My digestive tract and heart work fine, but then again, I’m not the walking, talking,
bitching undead.”
“I’ve had about enough of this. I’m calling the
police.” I snatched the phone off the wall cradle beside Mandy, but before I
could punch in any numbers, she ripped the entire base free with one hand,
leaving a gaping hole in the drywall. The plastic cracked and groaned in her
grasp, and the inner workings wheezed out a dying ring.
“You want my help finding those girls, and I want
yours,” she hissed. “So quit being stupid and get your shit together. We have
work to do, and I don’t have time to coddle a baby bloodsucker through the
change.”
I ground my teeth and stared at her until my vision
turned red again. My hand went to the .380 in my waistband, but I didn’t get a
chance to draw it. The doorbell made us both jump, and the heavy pounding that
followed sent my lagging heart into overdrive.
“Skye, open this damn door before I kick it in,”
Captain Mathis shouted from my front porch.
I was going to strangle Vin.
