Page 17 of Burn

It was sweet.

Over the next seventy-two hours, we returned several of our passengers to their home cities or to relatives. We checked each place before we left them. I made arrangements for papers as needed. Voodoo provided them with funds, and a card. If they needed us for any reason, they just had to call.

It wasn’t until our pixie was the last one left that she admitted her name and her address.

Grace Black. Manhattan.

She was the farthest away of all our passengers. Driving, it would take us another couple of days yet. “New plan,” Lunchbox said. “Two of us take Miss Black home and you two take care of the tour bus.”

“I could just go to the airport,” she offered, all the while she was petting Goblin.

“You could,” I told her. “But then you’d have to say goodbye to Goblin a lot sooner and that might break his heart.”

A smile flickered over her lips.

“We don’t mind taking you home,” I said, lifting my chin to Lunchbox. Thankfully, she didn’t take alotof persuading. The wariness in her eyes had seemed to grow heavier with each passing day. I wasn’t the only one who’d seen it. Instead of being relieved to be farther and farther away from her captivity, she seemed to worsen.

Bones and Lunchbox seemed equally as puzzled. The one thing that settled her was Goblin. So, we would let Goblin help take her home.

An hour after that conversation, she was posted up in the back of the four door SUV Voodoo picked up for us. It wasn’t the best gas mileage, but it would be comfortable. Instead of driving all night though, we stopped at hotels out of the way.

Never hurt to play it safe. We gave her her own room and took the one next door then spelled each other out for watch.Goblin slept in the room with her. I kept waiting for her to open up more, to say more, but she didn’t.

The last night before we were going to get into Manhattan, she was glued to the news on the television. Every single channel. If Lunchbox knew what she was looking for, he didn’t share it.

It was closer to four days later that we pulled up in front of her brownstone. Lunchbox pulled into an empty spot across the street. It had limited parking but we wouldn’t be here that long.

“Stay,” I told Goblin as I eased out of the front passenger seat before I opened the back door for her.

“You don’t have to walk me in…”

“Just going to walk you to your door and make sure you’re inside and safe,” I told her.

She hesitated, standing there next to the car with a lost look on her face.

“Problem?”

“I don’t have my keys,” she admitted. “I don’t—I don’t have anything.”

I pulled open the door to the front seat and took the kit Lunchbox tossed me. “Do you have an alarm?”

“Yes,” she said, then gave me a mystified look when I held up the pouch. “But I am going to have to call someone for a key.”

“Or not,” I said. “I’ll get it open, you take care of your own alarm.”

When she blinked at me, that puzzled look back in place, I motioned to the building.

“Come on, you want to go home, right?” It was a lot like coaxing a wounded animal. There was something so fierce and vital about her but it was coated in a miasma of—darkness. I had no other word for it.

Frankly, I didn’t fucking like it but no one asked me.

She gave Goblin one last look before crossing the street with me. The slow pace she set was easy to match, but it was like watching someone heading to a firing squad.

I wanted to tell her something, anything really, to make this easier for her but I had no idea what that could be.

At the front door to her brownstone, I pulled out my tools and went to work. Not all locks were easy to pick. If there was an inaccessible deadbolt on the inside, this definitely wouldn’t work.

The first tumblers gave, then the second. I freed the top lock then went to work on the handle lock. Four minutes later, I opened the door for her.

---