“No.” Firmer now to cut through the rise of grief and guilt. “No, it’s normal. It’s what every girl does sometimes. You’re not bad. You listen to me now. Don’t let him get in your head. Whatever happens, remember who you are, that it’s not your fault.”
“I’m not allowed to have sex.” Darlie wept.
“You didn’t. He raped you. That’s not sex. That’s attack, assault, abuse. It’s not sex.”
“Is he coming back?”
“I don’t know.” But she did. Of course she did. “Remember they’re looking for us. Everyone’s looking for us. Darlie, I’m going to do everything I can, but if I can’t stop him—”
“Please.” The shackles rattled as Darlie shot up in panic. “Oh please, don’t let him hurt me again.”
“I’ll do everything I can, but . . .” Melinda turned, cupped Darlie’s pale, wet face in her hands. “If . . . you have to, remember it’s not your fault. If you can, go somewhere else inside your head. Don’t let him get inside your head.”
“I want to go home.”
“Then go there in your head. Go—” She heard the locks give, felt Darlie cringe and shudder.
“Don’t, don’t, don’t.”
“Shh, shh. Don’t cry,” she whispered. “He likes it better when you cry.”
The monster opened the door.
“There’s my bad girls.”
His smile beamed indulgence, affection, but Melinda saw the hot glint in his eyes.
“Time for your next lesson, Darlie.”
“She needs a little more time. Please? She’ll do better if she has a little more time to absorb the first lesson.”
“Oh, I think she absorbed just fine. Didn’t you, Darlie?”
“Take me. I need to learn a lesson.”
He spared Melinda a glance. “It’s too late for you. Past your prime. Now this one—”
“I’ll be anything you want,” Melinda said as he stepped forward. “Anything. Let you do whatever you want. You can hurt me. I’ve been bad. I deserve it.”
“You’re not what I want.” He struck out, a brutally casual backhand that rapped her head against the wall. “Keep it up,” he warned Melinda, “and she’ll pay.”
“How about conversation? The woman you’re with? She doesn’t seem like she has a lot to say. It’s obvious she doesn’t have your intellect. We’re not going anywhere,” Melinda added, gripping Darlie’s hand hard under the blankets. “Wouldn’t you like to talk for a while? The day I came to see you, you wanted to talk and I didn’t let you. I’m sorry. I’d like to make up for that now.”
He angled his head. “Isn’t that interesting.”
“I can’t give you what she does, but I can offer something else. Something you must have missed, something you can’t get from her—or the woman.”
“And just what would we talk about.”
“Anything you like.” Her heart beat like a drum in her throat, and the beat was hope. “A man like you enjoys the stimulation of conversation, debate, discussion. I know you’ve traveled a great deal. You could tell me about the places you’ve been. Or we could talk about art, music, literature.”
“Interesting,” he said again, and she could see she’d intrigued him, amused him.
“You have a captive audience.”
He gave a bark of a laugh. “Aren’t you the sassy one?”
When he walked out, Melinda let out a breath. “Hold on,” she murmured to Darlie. “And be very quiet.”
He came back in with a chair, set it down, dropped into it. “So,” he said with a grin, “read any good books lately?”
15
She thought of herself as Sylvia. It was the name she used when she and Isaac were alone, the name she’d like to use when the game was done and they were living the high life. Sylvia was classy, elegant, and Isaac liked class.
The cop bitch called her Stella, but Stella was long ago. Another game, but that one had left her more dry than high. Richard Troy. Now that was a name from the past. How had that bitch of a cop known about Stella and Rich?
Rich’s flapping mouth, that’s how. It was the only way she could angle it. He must be doing time somewhere, the fucking asshole, and worked some sort of deal for flipping on her.
But how had he known to flip?
Didn’t matter. Not as long as Rich was jerking off in a cage somewhere.
She’d given the son of a bitch her best, too. More than her best. For Christ’s sake, she’d carried that sniveling brat of a kid in her belly for nine months. For Rich.
Train it, he’d said. Train it and sell it. Plenty of men like young meat, and plenty of them paid top dollar.
But he hadn’t been the one carting that weight around. He hadn’t been the one strung out for months, because drugs were off the menu.
He hadn’t wanted the kid coming out fucked up—damaged goods didn’t rate top dollar—so who’d paid that price?
Maybe it had been useful for a while, even though it cried half the goddamn day and night. Still, marks went even softer when you added a baby to the mix.
They’d made a good living running baby scams the first couple years. But then what had she gotten out of it? A whiny brat, that’s what.
Then a bloody lip when she’d found out Rich had been skimming the take and called him on it. But she’d played it right, hadn’t she? Going along, playing the game with the bastard and the brat until she’d pocketed a cool fifty large and walked.
Run maybe, because Rich would’ve beat the shit out of her if he’d caught her. Instead, he’d been stuck with the kid, and she had the take. Lived pretty damn well off it until it had run out.
She’d loved the cocksucker once.
Not like Isaac. Everything was different with Isaac. He treated her good—like Rich had in the beginning, and a couple others along the way. He appreciated her. He’d even sent her flowers. Imagine thinking of that when he was in prison.
And he told her she was beautiful, and sexy, and smart. He made plans with her.
Maybe they didn’t tear up the sheets as often as she wanted, but he had a lot on his mind right now. And what did she care if he banged the kid she’d found for him? The kid deserved it for being stupid.
And it put him in a really good mood. After he’d finished with the brat, they’d drink his fancy wine, she’d take a couple pops, and they’d talk and talk.
Big plans, big money, and they’d pay the cop back for screwing with him in the first place. Bitch would never have gotten the drop on her if she hadn’t been lucky.
Her luck was about to run out.
It burned her ass the way the cop had talked about Isaac, how that cunt had tried to turn her against him. They had a future, and they were going to build it using the cop’s blood for glue.
Isaac would make that bitch pay double now.
She slit her eyes open. The watchdog cop sat at the door, a big, burly lump of shit, in her eyes.
Whatever they’d done with her ribs helped her head. And so did the little dose of juice they’d finally given her. Better yet, when they’d taken her down to work on her, they’d had to loosen the restraints.
She hadn’t lost her touch, she thought, running her thumb over the laser scalpel she’d palmed while faking a seizure. Smooth as the Samaritan gambit she’d worked as a kid—and the scalpel was worth a hell of a lot more than some do-gooder’s wallet.
Time to make the move, she told herself. She didn’t believe that crap the Dallas bitch had spewed about closing in on Isaac. But she had to warn him, had to get to him. And he’d take care of her.
Maybe he’d buy her flowers again. Then they’d deal with Eve Dallas.
She moaned, tossed from side to side.
“Help.” She made her voice weak, putting herself into the part.
“Settle down,” the cop suggested.
“Something’s wrong. Please, can you get the nurse? Please, I think I’m going to be sick.”
He took his time, but he stepped over, pushed the call butto
n. A few seconds later, the nurse’s face came on screen.
“Problem?”
“She says she needs a nurse. Says she feels sick.”
“I’ll be there in a minute.”
“Thank you.” Sylvia closed her eyes, just left the slit under her lashes. “It’s hot. I’m so hot. I think I’m dying.”
“If you are, it’ll be hotter where you end up, end of the day.”
He turned as the nurse bustled in.
“Says she’s sick, says she’s hot, says she’s dying.”
“Nausea’s not unusual after the procedure she had, and the meds.” Laying the back of her hand on Sylvia’s brow, the nurse raised the bed.
On a moan, Sylvia tried to turn, straining against the cuff on her right hand. “Pain. There’s a pain.” When she began to gag, the nurse grabbed a bedpan.
“Can’t. Can’t. Cramp. Need to—I can’t.”
“Just breathe. I need to take off the right restraint, ease her over. She’ll boot all over both of us otherwise.”
Muttering, the cop unlocked the restraint. In one vicious swipe, Sylvia slashed the laser across his throat. Even as he stumbled back, spurting blood, she pressed it to the nurse’s cheek.
“One peep, one sound, and I carve your face off.”
“Let me help him.”
“You’d better help yourself and unlock the other cuff. This thing will slice you open at five feet. You’d know that, being a nurse. Get the cuff off. Hurry.”
To get her moving, Sylvia gave her a shallow nick. Freed, she flexed her fingers. “Got some blood on you,” she commented. “But that happens in hospitals. Strip.”
She thought about killing the nurse, but it might involve more blood. Too much on the scrubs might cause too much attention. Instead she used the restraints, gagged her with medical tape.
“You got big feet,” she commented when she put on the nurse’s shoes. She pulled her hair back, fixed on the ID card, then grabbed a tray, tossed some supplies into it.
“Give Dallas a message for me. Tell her Isaac and me, we’ll be coming for her.”
She walked out, walked briskly with her tray—and remembered belatedly she should’ve taken the nurse’s ’link. But by the time she walked out the exit, she was smiling.
Cars had ’links. It’d been a while since she’d boosted a car.
Just like old times.
Melinda kept him engaged, considered every moment he focused on her rather than Darlie a gift. The nights she’d spent studying him as she might a disease that had infected her had paid off. She knew his profile, his pathology, all of his background that had been discovered and published.
She knew he was well-read, considered himself an erudite man with exceptional taste. She discussed classic literature, segued into music—classical, contemporary, trends, artists.
Her head throbbed like a rotted tooth, but Darlie stopped shivering and eventually went limp in sleep.
When she disagreed with him she walked a tightrope, carefully navigating the shaky line between opinion and argument, conceding, flattering, even forcing out a laugh now and then as if he’d scored a point.
“But I like a good, silly comedy now and then,” she insisted. And thought she’d have sold her soul for one cool sip of water. “Complete with pratfalls. Especially after a long, hard day.”
“Without wit it’s mindless.” He shrugged. “If it doesn’t make you think, it’s not art.”
“Of course you’re right, but sometimes mindless is just what I want.”
“After a long, hard day. Counseling all the bad girls.”
Her heart tripped, but she nodded slowly. “It’s good to tune out and laugh. But as I said, you’re right about—”
“And do you spend all day telling them it’s not their fault, like you told our little Darlie here?”
She deliberately looked up at the camera above the door. “We both understand I knew you were watching, listening. I wanted to keep her calm. To help her adjust.”
“So you lie and lie and lie some more. Because we both know, too, that they want what I give them. You did.”
“It’s difficult to understand at such a young age, the—”
“Women are born understanding.” Something dark passed over his face and had her stumbling heart slamming against her ribs. “They’re born liars and whores. Born weak, and devious.”
He set his palms on his knees, angled forward, his tone mild and lecturing. “The young ones, they need to be trained, educated, controlled. They need to learn they’re here for a man’s pleasure. Toys, really, he winds up at his whim. That he brands, like cattle.”
He smiled as he wagged his finger back and forth. “You erased my brand, Melinda.”
“Yes. But you put it back.”
“That’s right. That’s absolutely right.”
He leaned back, waved a hand in the air. “The older ones have their uses. You just might be useful with another couple decades of seasoning. They like to serve, or pretend to like it. They want to be flattered and petted, want pretty, shiny things. And promises.”
He let out a sigh, a shake of his head, but his eyes sparkled with an ugly glee. “They’re so pitifully grateful for the attention. So calculating in their attempts to manipulate a man. They need to be used—all while flattered and petted, of course. A woman will do everything she’s asked if you dangle the bright and shiny, if you give her some poetry—and a good fuck now and then.”
He shifted in the chair again, wrapping his hands around his knee, smiling his smug smile until Melinda wanted to beat his face bloody with her fists.
“Then, they have to be ended because they’re so unspeakably boring. Which you’re not—yet. You will be, but for now you’ve been very entertaining. You working so hard to make this connection with me, Melinda, has given me a delightful time. So unnecessary, though, as we made a connection so long ago. Erasing the brand doesn’t sever that connection. Nothing can. You’ll never forget what I did to you. Never forget what I taught you.”
“No, I won’t.”
“Well now.” He slapped his hands on his thighs before he rose. “Time to move along to the younger generation. I have to thank you, honey. You really did stimulate me. I know I’m going to enjoy giving Darlie her next lesson.”
Melinda braced. It would be useless, end badly, but she wouldn’t let him take Darlie without a fight. She had her teeth, her nails. At the least she’d give him pain.
His ’link sounded. He paused to pull it out of his pocket. “The old bad girl checking in,” he said, then frowned at the unfamiliar display.
“Do you know a Sampson Kinnier? Neither do I,” he said before Melinda could answer. “Crossed transmission, I suppose, but we’ll let it go to v-mail, see what Sampson has to say.”
When Sylvia’s voice came on, McQueen’s eyes went flat as a snake’s.
“Isaac, baby, it’s me. Answer the ’link! There was trouble. That fucking bitch Dallas tracked me to the other place. I made the assholes, but she crashed the van. She hurt me, baby—but not like we’re going to hurt her. Come on, answer the goddamn ’link! I got patched up at the hospital. I got out—took a cop down doing it. I’m on my way to you. I need a boost, baby, need one bad. They wouldn’t give me any decent shit at the hospital—had me tied down like a crazy person. I fixed it. Mama needs some candy, baby. Fix me some candy, will ya? I’ll be there soon. And we’ll make her pay. We’ll make her bleed.”
Isaac studied the ’link, held his silence. Watching him, Melinda thought she saw confusion in his eyes, and felt another blossom of hope.
Then he sighed. The smile returned; the eyes stayed flat. “We seem to have a change of plans.”
He pocketed the ’link. And he unsnapped the sheath on his belt, drew out his knife.
Eve snatched at the EDD reports the instant they came in. Video was toast, Feeney reported, and audio was fragmented. But they got solid chunks of the transmissions and more would come.
Eve closed h
er eyes, played them out.
McQueen’s voice, smooth as cream, hinting of seduction. And Stella’s—no, Sylvia’s, she reminded herself—excited, flirtatious.
Don’t know what I’d . . . without you doll. Can’t wait . . . won’t . . . longer.
. . . come up to see you. Everything’s set . . . could come back with you when . . .
Be patient . . . need to check security at our place. Don’t want to . . . problems once we get started.
. . . just there yesterday. Soundproofing’s finished . . . can’t hear that baby crying half the damn night down the . . .
. . . security cams tested . . . count on you sweetheart.
You can . . . stalled last week. Tech tested all three . . .
Good girl. You’ve got your eyes on the prize?
Check her every day. Miss you, baby.
Miss you right back.
Can you send some money? Rent’s . . . on our place in a couple days.
. . . run through your spending money already? . . . buy yourself something pretty?
Gotta look pretty for you, baby.
I’ll take care of it. We don’t want Maxwell’s credit getting any black marks. My time’s up. Just a couple more weeks and . . . with you.
It’s killing me to wait . . . so close.
Soon doll.
She noted down the date and time of the transmission, and on the text copy highlighted key words and phrases.
“Copy and send file to Detectives Jones and Walker, to Agents Nikos and Laurence, marked urgent. Orders to narrow search using highlighted text.”
Acknowledged. Working . . . File copied and sent.
“Begin search for apartments within a twenty-mile radius of listed address. Search for rentals with payment due on the fifteenth of the month. Further narrow to leases under the name of Maxwell—first or last name. Unit will be two or three bedrooms. Building will have direct access to parking garage.”
Acknowledged. Working . . .
She e-mailed Roarke the names, the dates. Easier than actually speaking to him right now, she decided.