I had to find Mercy.
I had to find Gabriel.
"Daddy."
The whisper was soft.
"Daddy, I found something."
"I found Mercy."
"I found the people who took you."
"I found the people who are going to help me find you."
The walk back to the bar was long.
The city was quiet at this hour—no cars, no pedestrians, no sound except my footsteps and the distant hum of something I couldn't identify. The moon had come out from behind theclouds, casting silver light on the cracked sidewalks, and I walked through it like a ghost.
The basement was cold.
I turned on the lights. The fluorescents flickered, buzzed, cast the room in shades of grey and green. The drain was still there. The pipes were still there. The locked door at the far end was still closed, the bolt cutters resting against the wall where I'd left them.
I walked to the wall.
The map was new—a city map I'd bought at a convenience store, spread across the concrete, held down with rocks I'd found in the alley. I'd marked the locations of my kills with red X's. The warehouse. The office. The building where Rue had died.
Now I added a new name.
Mercy Logistics.
I wrote it in black marker, in letters large enough to see from across the room.
Then I drew lines to the X's, connecting them, trying to see the pattern.
There was a pattern.
There was always a pattern.
I just had to find it.
The shower was cold.
I stood under the spray for a long time, watching the water run pink, then red, then clear. The blood was in the creases of my palms, under my nails, in the spaces between my fingers. I scrubbed until my skin was raw, until the water ran clear, until I couldn't see any trace of what I'd done.
The dress was clean.
I'd left it in the back room, hanging on the hook behind the door. Pale pink. Soft. The kind of dress a girl would wear to a party, or a date, or a job interview. The kind of dress that made me look innocent, harmless, forgettable.
I pulled it on.
The fabric was cool against my skin.
The knife was in my waistband.
The gun was in my pocket.
The phone was in my other pocket, dark and silent, waiting for the next message I didn't remember receiving.
