Page 24 of Taken By Raider Kings
Oh, Lucy.
“Miss Wilson, something happened Friday night.”Andreeson’s gaze was entirely too sharp.He indicated a chair; she moved mechanically toward it.“Miss Cavanaugh— Lucy—was attacked.”
The world swayed under her.A funny haze marred the mirrored table, streaks of mist like clouds.She tore her attention away, tried to focus.She had to stay sharp to get through this interview; everything depended on it.“Attacked?Is she all right?What happened?”You’re never going to guess what happened to her.Not in a million years.And I can’t tell you, either.She folded down gingerly in the chair, guessing he wanted her there because he turned out to be the only thing she could look at unless she craned her neck to stare at the window blinds.
Margo inhaled sharply.She swept the door closed and stood like a guard, almost bristling with protective indignation.With the room shut tight, the smell of hairspray and grubby, mildewed raincoat intensified.
“Miss Wilson, Lucy Cavanaugh is dead.I’m sorry.”He even sounded sorry, too.His mouth pulled down fractionally, bitterly, as he dropped into his own chair, touched the folder with almost-gentle fingertips.“I’m trying to find out all I can about her, so I can catch her attacker.Can I ask you some more questions?”
The clouds on the table swirled together.Sophie’s empty stomach trembled as if she was going to throw up.The room was stifling, walls suddenly shrinking, closing up on her.A rattling started in the center of her head—that horrible buzzing, copper-bottomed pans striking one another.“Dead?”she whispered.
Somehow, hearing him say it made everything too real.The all-too-familiar pressure of secrets to keep squeezed her entire chest until a black hole of pressure-panic bloomed.She had to watch where she stepped, or she would fall off the narrow thread of safety.
Just like when Marc got that look in his eye.Oh God, help me; Luce, forgive me.Please.If you can.
Margo stepped close and put a pudgy hand on Sophie’s shoulder.The clogging reek of hairspray swirled; her eyes flooded in self-defense.
Or was she crying, again?
Oh, Jesus.What do I do now?She looked up from the table’s cloud and found the detective watching avidly, tense like a dog before the leash is unclipped.His fingers drummed once on the folder’s front, and she glimpsed paper stuffed inside.
There were probably pictures, too.
Sophie did the only thing she could do.She let go, and burst fully into tears.
It wasn’t too hard to pretend confusion.If Sophie was used to anything, it was parrying well-meaning—or gossip-hungry—questions.
Yes, Lucy was her best friend.No, she hadn’t heard from Lucy all weekend, and what exactly was this all about, anyway?Oh, myGod,no, not Lucy.No, she had no enemies.Everyone loved Luce.How could younotlove her?Well, except for Marc, but he was angry because Lucy had testified during the divorce hearings, and?—
The small broken-nosed detective listened, jotted notes on a crumpled steno pad, and patted her shoulder awkwardly exactly once before Sophie flinched, hard.Margo glowered, arms and legs crossed, in the chair just to Sophie’s left.
It wasn’t that shewantedto lie.But she knew very well what would happen if she started talking about being kidnapped, ranting about vampires and werewolves.She’d end up in the hospital, “under observation,” then Marc would find out.
And all sorts of Unpleasant Things would happen.
No, if Sophie wanted to stay out of the psychiatric ward and in her degree program, she had to keep her mouth shuthard.
The instinct to hide things from the police wasn’t that far away even at the best of times.She’d spent a long time covering what Marc did to her, only partly from fear.
The worst part was the dull, hopeless, endlessly familiar shame.
“Well,” Andreeson finally said, “that about covers it.I’m so sorry to bring you bad news, Miss Wilson.Here’s my card.”
Sophie stared at the rectangle of white paper laid on glossy black glass.The business card looked innocent and two-dimensional, compared to whatever trick of light was making the table run with cloudy streaks.She was too goddamn exhausted to figure out why she was hallucinating.It had to be something wrong with her glasses, or just plain fatigue.
Margo leaned forward, scooped the card up.“Thank you,detective.You can find your own way out.”
“That I can, ma’am.”Andreeson stood, swept that horrid, clean manila folder into the attaché case.She was suddenly beyond certain it contained pictures, most likely of Lucy.
Autopsyphotos, to be precise.In glaring, stunning, ruthless detail.
Fresh, sharp grief welled from the black hole in her chest.The detective shuffled away, and the moment he closed the door with a quiet click Margo began fussing.“…let it all out, and here’s a tissue.My, he certainly won’t win any prizes for tact, will he?Oh, sweetheart, you need some lunch.Here, I’ll tell Amy to run down and grab you a sandwich?—”
It was actually a relief to give in and let the blue-haired Battle-Ax have her way.Sophie finally escaped to the ladies’ room, and the smell from the commodes was almost enough to drive her back out again if she hadn’t needed sanctuary so badly.She locked a stall door behind her and cried until she threw up the dry toast forced down for breakfast.
The keening inside her skull was full of black, tar-thick guilt.It shouldn’t have been Lucy on the floor of that alley.The rumpled little detective would never catch her killer.Life wasn’t fair.
And the worst unfairness of all was that it wasn’t a dream.Lucy was really, inarguably, irrevocably dead.
