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Theo was also intrigued by the man Gigi called her “ex-boyfriend.” She’d mentioned his clothes, his car, his money. His age was perhaps most telling. “Thirtysomething,” she’d said. He sounded more like a sex trafficker than a boyfriend, and if there was one thing Theo had carried with him from four years at Florida State Prison, it was an intense hatred for a sex-trafficking pedophile. Theo wasn’t sure what he would do if he found this scum. But it wouldn’t take more than one encounter with Theo Knight to convince him to leave Gigi alone.
“Our stop is next,” said Gigi, nudging him partly awake. The crackle of the conductor’s voice over the loudspeaker shook off any remaining slumber:
“King’s Cross St. Pancras.”
The blur of the platform whizzed past in the train’s window, slowing steadily to a stop. He and Gigi were the first riders to exit when the doors parted.
The largest Tube station in central London was so named because itserved two rail stations: King’s Cross and St. Pancras. Forty million riders coursed through the complex each year. Gigi led him to the suburban building, platforms 9 and 10 to be exact.
“Right there is where I met him,” said Gigi, meaning her “boyfriend.”
In theHarry Potterseries, King’s Cross is the starting point of the Hogwarts Express. Riders enter secret platform 93/4by passing through the brick-wall barrier between platforms 9 and 10. Real-life muggles capitalized on the phenomenon, erecting a cast-ironplatform 93/4sign on a wall next to the world’s first Harry Potter store. Part of a luggage trolley is mounted below the sign, half of it seeming to have disappeared into the wall. It’s the ultimate photo op for fans of the series, one after another taking turns at pretending to push the cart through the wall.
Theo’s quick take was that, for a guy like Gigi’s “ex,” this was exactly the right place to find girls of a certain age.
Definitely afucking trafficker.
“So now you’ll take me shopping?” said Gigi.
That was the deal. If she showed him where she first met this boyfriend of hers, Theo would buy her an age-appropriate outfit that didn’t make her coltlike legs and still-growing body look for sale. They took the escalator up to the mall level. Gigi made a beeline to the Forever 21 store. Theo wasn’t about to go inside with her. He gave her some shopping money, and she was happy to go it alone. Theo found a bench outside the store and put to good use a newspaper someone had left behind. The story above the fold was yet another sex scandal involving a minister of parliament. Theo’s eyes were drawn below the fold to a photograph of Imani and Shaky Nichols outside the criminal courthouse in Miami.
imanimurder trial to begin this month, the headline read. Theo continued reading. None of it was news to him, until he got to the part about Jack’s unsuccessful efforts to depose the retired homicide detective:
“Judge Cookson’s ruling is fundamentally unfair,” said Imani’s defense lawyer, Jack Swyteck. “Detective Cruz was among thefirst on the scene. He discovered the message that was written on the victim’s body, presumably by the killer. It was his decision to release that message to the media twelve years ago.” According to Mr. Swyteck, unless the defense is allowed to depose former Detective Cruz before trial, “we will be cut off from critical evidence that there is no connection between my client and this signature-like message from the real killer, ‘goodbye girl.’”
Theo stared at the words a moment longer—goodbye girl—and then laid the newspaper aside. Just then, Gigi rushed out of the store, shopping bags in hand and brimming with excitement.
“I got the coolest skirt,” she said. “And the top was on sale, two-for-one, so I got both the red one and the black one.”
“That’s great,” said Theo. “Hey, you hungry?”
“I’m always hungry.”
Theo coached basketball at the Coconut Grove rec center, and he could spot a kid on the verge of a growth spurt in an instant. Gigi had all the signs.
“How about pizza?” he said.
“Yum.”
They started walking toward the exit. “I know I wasn’t going to ask any more questions about your old boyfriend.”
“But you lied,” she said, seeming to know one was coming.
“Yeah, I kinda did. Do you have any idea why he called you ‘Goodbye Girl’?”
“Nope. Why do you ask?”
“Just curious,” he said. They walked a little farther, pushed through the turnstiles, and exited to the street.
“You think you could show me where your ex lives?” asked Theo.
“No,” she said firmly. “He said I should never, ever go back there.”
“I’m not saying you should go back. I just want you to show me where it is.”
Gigi stopped on the sidewalk. “Theo, no! I don’t want to get nearthat place! I don’t even want to think about that place! Do you understand?”
It was the harshest she’d ever spoken to him, and Theo could see the fear in her eyes.
