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“Couldn’t get me there with a bowie knife at my throat or a cattle prod up my ass—excuse my language. Full of thieves, murderers, and lunatics. No offense.”
“None taken.”
When they stepped outside, Eve turned to Bree. “I’d like to walk down to the clinic, talk to the doctor who examined the partner. I can take this one if you want to start working on finding Chester.”
Bree looked to Annalyn.
“Yeah, no point traveling in a pack. We’ll let you know what we find when we find it.”
“Same goes. Since you’re headed back, maybe you could update the feds.”
“Yeah, what the hell. The clinic’s about four blocks, that way.” Annalyn gestured.
They separated.
“So,” Roarke began, “you’re looking for a woman of a certain age, an addict who knows how to run a con, doesn’t quibble about hooking herself to a pedophile, knows her way around a hard-line drinking establishment, and plays the game well enough to fool Vik. And he’s no pushover. She doesn’t mind sex with strangers, and making it rough enough to simulate rape, and is just fine with aiding in the abduction and imprisonment of a woman who helped her.”
“Yeah, she’s a princess.” Even the thought of her made Eve vaguely ill and bitterly angry. “She’s also organized enough to pull all this, and put things together on her own until McQueen got out.”
“In homage to our location, this isn’t her first rodeo.”
“No. She’s been riding for a long time.”
They stepped into the clinic, and she noted it did better business than the bar. The chairs lining the walls, more forming another backto-back line in the center of the room, were full.
Babies squalled, kids whined. Several women sported bellies testifying they’d soon bring more squallers and whiners into the world.
Eve walked to the counter where a woman in a floral scrub top worked feverishly on a computer.
“I’m sorry.” The woman didn’t pause. “The waiting time is two hours. There’s another clinic—”
“I need to talk to Dr. Hernandez.”
“I’m sorry.” The woman didn’t sound sorry. She sounded harassed and exhausted. “Dr. Hernandez is with a patient. I can—”
Eve palmed her badge, waved it in front of the woman’s face. “This is an urgent matter. I’ll be as quick as possible, but I need to speak with Dr. Hernandez.”
“Give me a minute. God, what a day.”
She popped up, scurried down a short hall, turned left, and vanished.
“Why is everybody sick or injured?” Eve wondered. “Thieves, murderers, and lunatics, sure. That’s why we love New York. But it looks like Dallas has a plague.”
The woman scurried back. “Listen.” She kept her voice low. “Every exam room and office is occupied. If these people who’ve been waiting so much as see a doctor, I could have a riot. Can you talk to her outside? Out the back?”
“No problem.”
“I’ve got to ask you to go out the front, walk around. If I take you back—”
“Riot. Got it. Thanks.”
“Not a plague,” Roarke said as they made the trip on foot. “More understaffed, likely underfunded, and the only free clinic for miles.”
“Okay, probably, but I’ve seen Louise’s clinic. Free, and sure crowded, but not like that.”
“Louise’s isn’t underfunded, thanks to you.”
She hunched her shoulders. “It was your money.”
