“I’m in love!”
“Your job is to marry the man Da sells you to. And that’s Pyotr Tarasov.” I hate myself for saying his name out loud. “You were willing enough at Sunday Roast.”
“That was before…” Breagha’s voice goes dreamy again. “All those months, Kate… I’ve watched Nate working. He’s so kind. So patient. He’s a good, good man. I thought he was just being polite to me. But four days ago, he told me he can’t live without me. He loves me. And I love him too. So now it’s impossible?—”
Even as Breagha spews her hearts-and-flowers nonsense, I scan the crowd behind her. When Wolf and Tarasov stride around the bend in the footpath, I know this conversation has to end. I can’t even waste time wondering if Cole managed to convince Tarasov to take the drive.
“Come on,” I say, dragging my sister toward the toilets.
We thread our way through a tangle of pushchairs, and Breagha continues her campaign. “I know it won’t be easy, getting Mommy and Daddy to change their minds. But if you help me explain?—”
I push open the heavy green door, barely avoiding a mother who is wrangling twin pre-schoolers with faces painted like tigers. “Excuse me,” the woman says, in a frosty, exhausted voice, pushing past to catch up with her girls.
I know I’m supposed to step to the side. I should assure Breagha I’ll confront Mam and Da for her. I need to cross to a stall and close the metal door and turn the flimsy lock.
But I can’t move.
I can’t speak.
I can’t breathe.
The floor beneath my feet is paved with small green tiles, each one-inch square and as dark as a fir tree. The walls are tile too, but these are bigger, the size of an eight-year-old’s palm. They’re light green, speckled with black, like something isrotting beneath the surface. The ceiling is white, too high, too bright, blinding with fluorescent bulbs.
We’re in DC. We’re at the National Zoo. We’re just meters from the Panda House, from laughing, happy kids.
But this is the Cold Room. Larissa’s body lies in the dark holding pen just outside, stinky and cold. Breagha sleeps out there, her thumb in her mouth, her head resting on my blanket.
The Bad Man just asked me a question. The Bad Man just told me to choose.
“Kate?” Breagha’s voice is thick with concern.
The mirrors are melting. The floor is heaving. I can’t move, can’t breathe. I can’t answer the Bad Man.
“Kate?” Breagha asks again. “Are you okay?”
She touches my arm, and I have to push her away. I have to save her; I have to keep her safe. I whirl around, stumbling hard into one of the white porcelain sinks. Somehow, I find the door, and I crash past all the pushchairs, staggering over to a spindly bush beside the paved path. I double over, boking up vanilla ice cream and despair. My stomach clenches so hard I know it will ache for days.
“Kate!”
That’s Cole’s voice. I feel him by my side, gathering my hair, trying to take my weight.
“What the f—” he starts to swear, looking toward the toilets. “Who?—”
“He…” I start to say, but I have to retch again.
Cole stops asking questions. “Breagha!” He calls over his shoulder. “Help her.”
I’m vaguely aware of my sister taking his place. As she pulls my tangled hair back from my snot-streaked face, I want to stand. I want to scream. But all I can do is bend over and puke up nothing.
A woman screams. Someone shouts, “Sir! Sir! This is the Ladies’ Room. You can’t come in here!”
But Cole strong-arms his way into the tiled room. I hear metal crashing against metal. Those must be stall doors. Cole is trying to find my attacker.
“Pyotr.” Breagha’s voice is thready, washed thin by fear and shame as she speaks over my head. “Get him out of there.”
Tarasov pushes past us. And then I hear something else, something I hoped I’d never hear again this lifetime. It’s a very big man, with a very high laugh. The sound echoes off the green-tiled walls, louder and louder and louder.
The Bad Man is giggling, just like he did eighteen years ago.
