Betrayals
Page 107

“Oh, thank you,” she said, breathing hard. “Thank you for having that fancy car. The taxi driver dropped me off on the wrong street, and I thought I was totally lost, and then I saw your car and—”
“Slow down,” I said. “Where’s Pepper?”
“That’s—that’s why I ran—” she said, gasping for breath. “I didn’t dare call. I couldn’t. He’s tracing my phone. He must be. He knew where we were going, and he took Pepper. He has Pepper, Liv.”
“Who?”
“The Huntsman. The one you warned us about. He grabbed Pepper. He said she wants her.”
“Who?”
“Aunika. Remember you said Damara told you it’s about Pepper? She’s right. It’s all about Pepper.”
“What’s all about Pepper?”
“I have no idea. But Aunika has her, and she’ll take her to the tunnels. She knows we don’t like to go there. Come on.”
“I need to get Gabriel.”
“There’s no time.”
“He’s right—”
“There’s no time.”
“Then I’m going to make time. I’m sorry, Melanie, but I’m not running off after Pepper without backup. Gabriel and Ricky are coming. I’m getting Gabriel now and calling Ricky—”
Melanie screamed. She grabbed my arm and wrenched, and I pulled away and twisted just in time to see the Huntsman swing out from behind a parked car. Melanie was already fleeing. I turned to follow, but he caught me, and as soon as he touched me, the pain was so sharp that I let out the first note of an agonized shriek. Then everything went dark.
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
I’d been kidnapped. My first thought on waking was, Well, this is new. With everything I’d gone through in the last five months, I had not been kidnapped before. Or, if I had, I couldn’t recall it, and I’ll blame that on my pounding head rather than the sheer volume of mishaps I’ve had.
Melanie had been right—I was exactly where she expected to find Pepper: in the tunnels under the drop-in center. I could tell by the smell alone, as I lay on damp earth that stunk of age and rot and mildew. I reached for my penlight, but given that it was attached to my switchblade, it came as no surprise to find it’d been taken from me, along with my gun and phone. I squeezed my eyes shut against the booming headache and struggled to focus. Bits and pieces of the day tumbled around in my brain, refusing to fall into place and tell me what was going on.
I remembered Melanie saying Pepper was gone, that she’d been brought here. By whom? An image of the rogue Huntsman answered.
Another image flickered. Gabriel. I’d been with … No, I’d been telling Melanie that I needed to get Gabriel. To bring him. Being smart, refusing to rush headlong into danger to save someone. And I’d be very proud of that, if the foresight hadn’t come too late.
Oh, no, Gabriel. I don’t need you along this afternoon. What’s going to happen? That rogue Huntsman will show up in the parking lot in the middle of the day and knock me out with his psychic powers? Ha-ha.
I kept sifting through memories, like reading a book backward. Gabriel, Huntsman, Melanie, Pepper, Aunika … How do they connect? What were we investigating?
The pieces fell into place, and when they did, it was as if someone had blown apart my jigsaw puzzle and when I was forced to reconstruct it, I saw an entirely different configuration. A different picture. A different solution. My brain said, “That’s not right,” and started moving pieces back to the answer I’d had before, but I stopped myself, put them in their new configuration, and …
And yes. That solution worked as well as the last. Better, even, because it contained the elusive element of motive.
I sat up, wincing as my stomach roiled along with my aching head. I blinked and took a better look around. I was in a tiny room, barely big enough for me to lie flat. No windows. One wooden door. What looked like a candle shoved into a crack near the roof. When I tried jumping to retrieve it, all I got was hot wax dripping on my face.
I looked around again. Remnants of rotted barrel slats—along with my visions from before—suggested the room had once served for Prohibition storage. Other than those bits of wood and the out-of-reach candle, it was empty.
I went to test the door only to find it wasn’t secured at all. Kidnapped and there’s no lock on the door? Definitely a trap.
I backed up and rooted around on the floor until I found a barrel slat pointed enough to do some damage.
I returned to the door and eased it open. The first thing I saw was another door. With my makeshift stake poised, I opened my door wider and saw …
An empty room, exactly like the one I was still standing in. Except, on a visual sweep, I realized it wasn’t exactly the same. On the floor lay a body. Melanie’s body.
I stifled the urge to rush to her side and slid carefully through the door. Then I walked the few steps to the next door. It didn’t budge, and when I looked through the crack, I could see a latch.
As I turned back to Melanie, I noticed metal embedded in the wall. Manacles, hanging on the ends of short chains. Leg irons rested on the floor below. I walked over and touched a manacle. My fingers tingled. Cold iron.
The room flickered. A man’s voice said, “You don’t like your bed, whore? Try these accommodations.” Muffled scream as he snapped on cold-iron manacles. Another snap, the leg irons presumably following. The lamia kept trying to scream, as if from behind a gag. The man laughed and said, “I’ll give you a day to wear yourself out. Then I’ll bring you some company. There’s a fancy man from the city who doesn’t like our beds, either. He pays very well for this particular arrangement.”