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“Still, you know Athelinda better than anyone else here.”
“She hasn’t got more time for me than any other human.”
“She saved you.”
“Athelinda didn’t save me. She wanted to punish me.”
Barbara opened her mouth to reply as her phone pinged with a message. She picked it up and glanced at it.
“It’s the prints I took off the glass at Nathan Bell’s house,” she said.
Tucker leaned forward. “He’s in the system?”
She clicked on the attached file. “Looks that way.”
The photograph was fairly recent. Unmistakably Nathan Bell. The same sallow face and sullen look. Tousled dark hair, longer in this picture.
Arrested for assault and disorderly conduct. And not the first arrest. There was a long list of previous convictions—theft, fraud, burglary.
That didn’t surprise her.
What did surprise her was the name underneath the mugshot.
Mitch Roberts.
She stared at Tucker: “He’s not Nathan Bell.”
Her Rescuer was thin and gangly. Long, dark hair tied back. His teeth were yellowed with sharp incisors, one slightly cracked.
He was dressed in patched jeans and a dirty T-shirt, and he looked nothing like the girl had hoped for. Rescuers in books were always gallant and handsome. Not like this.
“What are you staring at?” he asked. “C’mon. We haven’t much time.”
He held out a key. She inserted it into the lock around her leg, releasing the manacle.
“Thank you,” she said.
He looked at her, frowning. “You got any other clothes?”
She glanced down at her thin sundress. “Well, I guess I have some other dresses.”
“They all like this?”
“Mostly.”
“Okay. We’ll grab something from upstairs.”
Her Captor’s clothes? But her Captor was an old lady. Before she could question him, he had grabbed her hand. His palm felt rough and calloused. “C’mon. I knocked her out. But we need to drag her down here before she wakes up.”
“She’s alive?”
“Yeah.” He pushed her toward the stairs. “We don’t want the police turning up and finding a dead body. We lock her down here. Hopefully, it’s a while before she’s found. We’ll be long gone.”
They climbed the stairs and emerged into a small hallway. The girl paused, suddenly feeling dizzy. The first time she had been upstairs, out of her basement room for…how long? The air tasted different. The light was so bright it made her squint.
“I’m gonna run up and get you something to wear.”
Her Rescuer disappeared up another staircase.
