Page 90 of She’s a Doll

“What materials?” Brenda asked. It was a good question. Ginger had said the mall was waiting for a shipment of something, but she hadn’t specified what. Fortunately, Brenda didn’t give me time to answer. “We’re just a quarry. A small, local quarry. We do rocks and dirt and stuff?”

“I am aware of what you are. I was told one . . .” I paused here and snapped my claws together a couple of times, hoping it sounded like I was clicking through tabs on a computer. “. . . Kyle Lawson would be on-site in lieu of the overseer this week. His name is written down as the contact person.”

“Wait. Is this for the mall?”

“I would highly advise he attend the site immediately. The driver is going to need his signature before he can off-load.”

“But it’s . . . it’s eight o’clock. P.M. Kyle isn’t in the office. He’s⁠—”

“One thousand dollars an hour,” I repeated, keeping my voice crisp and corporate. “I’ve got the driver on the other line. I’ll tell him that Mr. Lawson will be there before nine.”

“B⁠—”

I hung up.

I didn’t think it would work. A call like that would be easy to write off as a mistake, a prank, or a scam. The only thing that made me think there was a chance of Kyle rising to the bait was the way Ginger’s words had run together when she’d sat in Nicola’s car.

“There’s meant to be another shipment of tools or something arriving soon, but it’s late and⁠—”

“You think that’s why he’s been crying?” Nicola had all but snarled. “Over a late shipment?”

Ginger hadn’t thought that, but a part of me did. A part of me thought Kyle was the exact brand of fucked up to care more about his business, about impressing the big-city businessmen in their big-city businessmen suits, than about a couple of wanted posters with his name on them. He’d told me he was going to move to Sydney and launch a tech start-up, which was stupid, because the more I thought about it, the surer I was that he knew nothing about computers. I’d been to Krissy’s house a hundred times as a kid, a thousand, and I’d never once seen Kyle with a screen in front of him. He didn’t even like to game. So why would he want to start a tech company? The answer was as obvious as it was pathetic.

Silicon Valley. Forbes 30 Under 30. Rich boys in bad fashion. The image of success, the aura of it, the stink of it. He was drawn to it like a fly to shit. And when that hadn’t worked out, he’d just adopted his dad’s rock and dirt business and pretended that meant he was self-made.

And now he was weaseling his way into helping out with this mall. Why? Because there were American logos on the billboards, American brands, American money.

So. Yeah.

Maybe I was wrong, but maybe I wasn’t.

Maybe Kyle would care about a lost shipment. Maybe that was what was keeping him up at night. And maybe, just maybe, he’d take the chance, drive out, and see for himself if that phone call his office received was bullshit or not.

Or maybe not.

Either way, it was worth a shot.

It’s worth a shot, I told myself as I started to pace. It’s worth a shot. It’s worth a shot. It’s⁠—

I stumbled, almost falling flat on my still very porcelain, still very fragile doll face. My clanky new metal body was theoretically nimble enough to make a Mars rover weep, but still small, still new, and still hard to wield. If I didn’t stay focused, it was easy to trip over my new legs. I’d never had so many before; I didn’t know how Claudia managed it.

I kept pacing, trying as I did to make sure the time stream stayed steady and slow. It seemed strangely pliant just then, almost willing, moving at a pace that felt as close to real life as it could get. Minute for minute, second for second, beat for beat.

It’s worth a shot, I said again to the empty construction site. He might come. He probably won’t. But he might. It’s worth a shot. It’s worth a shot. It’s worth a shot.

Nicola was far away. So was Ginger. If they’d done what I’d asked them to do, they’d be sitting in a restaurant or café with security cameras, phones on, paying by debit card, easily traceable, not that I thought the police would get that far. I needed them to have a safety net just in case this went south, just in case Kyle thought this was a joke and accused Nicola of harassing him again, just in case Ginger somehow got roped into it all, just in case this went wrong.

It’s worth a shot, I reminded myself. It’s worth a shot. One fucking shot.

Time passed. A lot of time. Too much time. I checked the clock on my phone. It was past nine. He wasn’t coming.

Relief uncurled inside me. He wasn’t coming. But that was OK. Nicola and Ginger would get back from Sydney in a couple of hours, she’d yell at me for going behind her back, I’d apologize, and then we’d debrief. I’d tell her nothing happened, that Kyle hadn’t come, and she’d tell me about Sandy Brown. We’d figure out the next phase of the⁠—

“Hello?” A voice echoed off the concrete walls, masculine and slurred. “Hello? Is anyone here?”

My bolts tightened, my porcelain went cold, the globs of glue around my neck felt suddenly hot and choking. I stopped pacing and turned, slowly, phone still clutched in my crab claws.

Walking between the slabs of unused rebar and piles of gravel, beneath the billboard that still had the words Justice 4 Lucy spray-painted across it, was Kyle.