Page 36 of Devil's Due

“Maybe,” she said. “First priority is to take you someplace safe, so you can rest. You look ready to collapse.”

Lucia settled back in the seat, took out her phone and called Jazz.

Omar made the last two turns and slowed the SUV. It was a bleak industrial area, all solid blocks of buildings with grimed windows and blank concrete faces. He slowed to a crawl in the middle of the block. “There?”

It was a warehouse, just like the rest. Three stories, windows on the top floor and a blank front below with three roll-up doors, all rusted and apparently securely fastened.

“That’s it.”

“So how do we get in, exactly?”

“Pull up to the door.”

He turned the SUV up the incline and to an idling stop at the bay door. Nothing happened.

“And?” he asked.

“Wait.”

They waited. After three or four minutes of silence, the bay door began to move upward—not slow and creaking, as you would have guessed from the looks of it, but smooth and silent, and much faster than a typical garage door.

“Go. Manny won’t keep it open long.” And true to her word, the door began to crank back down when the SUV was halfway through. Omar swore and hit the gas, and even so the door barely missed the back bumper of the truck. “Park under the light.”

There was a single working light on the ground level, illuminating a patch of bare concrete floor. Everything else was in inky darkness, except for the slight suggestion of a staircase over to the side. Omar pulled the truck up as instructed and put it in Park.

“Engine off,” an amplified voice ordered, loudly enough to penetrate the closed windows of the SUV. Omar shot Lucia an amused, questioning look, and she nodded for him to follow instructions. She rolled down her window, and Omar did the same.

“Manny!” she called. “It’s Lucia!”

“I can see that.” He didn’t sound pleased, not pleased at all. Manny Glickman, on his own ground, seemed a lot more commanding. “And before you even ask, the answer’s no.”

“Manny—”

“No. Sorry. Can’t come inside.”

Omar opened his door and stepped out, looking around. Lucia sighed and got out, too, walking around to join him. He didn’t seem very impressed. “This is it?”

“No,” she said. “Believe me, there’s a lot more to it than this. Manny, can’t we just come upstairs and talk about it?”

“Too many people.”

“I can vouch for Omar—”

“No room at the inn, Lucia. Sorry, but that’s how it is.”

The last of that was delivered in person, an echoing voice from the bottom of the stairs. He shuffled out of the shadows and into the pool of light, looking different from the man who’d taken charge back at the office yesterday. He slumped, which spoiled what might have been an otherwise impressive entrance. Having Pansy in his life had been a good influence, but he was still phobic, still flinched at loud, unexpected noises, and he didnotenjoy company. Having Lucia, Omar and a strange woman on his virtual doorstep wasn’t waking any innate feelings of hospitality.

“Look,” he said, “I like you, okay? I like you fine. You come alone, you’re welcome. You call for help, I do what I can. But you’re coming to my house right now without asking first, and look, you broughtpeople.I need you to go.”

“This woman’s in trouble. Manny, you have the safest place in the city. Put her up for just a few days—”

“No!” he snapped, then looked away. “I’m sorry, but no. I’m not the friggin’ Witness Protection Program, here. I doconsulting forensic work.I took in Jazz ’cause she’s family. Pansy …” He tried to come up with a phrase, and failed. “I’m not running a dorm. I’m out of room.”

“You’re kidding,” Omar said, and looked at the size of the ground floor. “Upstairs has to be a couple hundred thousand square feet.”

“No.”

Lucia held up a hand—not to Manny, to Omar. “It’s all right,” she said. “Manny, it’s your space, I completely understand and respect that. I was asking for a favor. You can choose not to give it. That’s all right.”

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