Girl Missing

by Tess Gerritsen

  Bella was still studying Maeve’s photo. Softly she asked, “Who is she?”

  “My daughter,” said Adam.

  Papa Earl sat back, nodding with instant understanding. “So you lookin’ for your girl.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  Adam shook his head, puzzled by the question. “Because she’s my daughter.”

  “But she run away. She don’t want to be found. Girl like that, you ain’t never gonna find her ’less she comes to you.”

  “Then I suppose …” Adam looked down wearily. “I suppose I’d settle for just knowing she’s all right.”

  Papa Earl was silent a moment. It was hard to tell what thoughts were going on behind those clouded eyes of his. At last he said, “You’ll want to talk to Jonah.”

  “Jonah?” asked Kat.

  “He’s the big man now.”

  “Since when?”

  “Year ago. Took over when Berto went down. Anything you want ’round here, gotta go through Jonah.”

  “Thanks,” said Kat. “We’ll follow up on that.” She was about to stand when another question occurred to her. “Papa Earl,” she said, “did you know a boy named Nicos Biagi?”

  The old man paused. “I heard of him, yeah.”

  “Xenia Vargas?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Did you hear she died?”

  He sighed. “Lotta people die ’round here. Don’t stick in your mind much anymore, people dying.”

  “They both took the same drug, Papa Earl. This drug, it’s moved into the Projects and it’s killing people.”

  He said nothing. He just sat there, his sightless eyes staring at her.

  “If you hear anything, anything at all about it, will you call me?” She took out her business card and laid it on the table. “I need help on this.”

  He touched the card, his bony fingers moving across KAT NOVAK, MD printed in black. “You still workin’ for the city?” he asked.

  “Yes. The medical examiner.”

  “Don’t understand you, Katrina. You a doctor now, and you takin’ care of dead people.”

  “I find out why they die.”

  “But then it’s too late. Don’t do ’em no good. You should be in a hospital. Or open your own place out here. It’s what your mama wanted.”

  Kat was suddenly aware of Adam’s gaze on her. Damn it, Papa Earl, she thought. Save the lecture for another time.

  “I like my job,” she said. “I couldn’t stand it in a hospital.”

  Papa Earl gazed at her with sad understanding. “Those were bad times for you, weren’t they? All those months with your mama …”

  Kat rose to her feet. “Thanks for your help, Papa Earl. But we have to leave.”

  Bella and her grandfather escorted them through the living room. It never changed, this room. The chairs were set in precisely the same places they’d always been, and Papa Earl navigated past them like a bat with sonar.

  “Next time,” he grumbled as Adam and Kat left the apartment, “don’t you wait so long before visits.”

  “I won’t,” said Kat. But it sounded hollow, that promise. I don’t believe it myself, she thought. Why should he?

  She and Adam headed back down the four flights of stairs, stepping over the same broken toys, the same cigarette butts. The smells of the building, the echoes of TV sets and babies’ squalls, funneled up the stairwell and unleashed a barrage of memories. Of how she used to play on these steps, used to sit outside her apartment door, her knees bunched up against her chest. Waiting, waiting for her mother to calm down. Listening to the crying inside the apartment, the sounds of her mother’s anguish, her mother’s despair. The memories all rushed at her as she walked down the stairwell, and she knew exactly why she’d waited three long years to come back.

  On the third-floor landing, she paused outside apartment 3H. The door was a different color than she’d remembered, no longer green. Now it was a weirdly bright orange, and it had a built-in peephole. It would be different inside as well, she realized. Different people. A different world.

  She felt Adam’s hand gently touch her arm. “What is it?” he asked.

  “It’s just—” She gave a tired little laugh. “Nothing stays the same, does it? Thank God.” She turned and continued down the stairs.

  He was close beside her. Too close, she thought. Too personal. Threatening to invade my space, my life.

  “So your name’s Katrina?”

  “I go by Kat.”

  “Katrina’s lovely. But it doesn’t quite fit with Novak.”

  “Novak’s my married name.”

  “Oh. I didn’t know you were married.”

  “Was. My divorce became final six months ago.”

  “And you kept your ex-husband’s name?” He looked surprised.

  “Not out of affection, believe me. It just felt like a better fit than Ortiz. See, I don’t look like an Ortiz.”

  “Are you referring to your green eyes? Or the freckles on your nose?”

  Again, Kat paused on the steps and looked at him. “Do you always notice the color of women’s eyes?”

  “No.” He smiled. What a lot of practice that smile must have had, she thought. “But I did notice yours.”

  “Lucky me,” she said, and continued down the stairs to the ground floor.

  “Could you explain something?” he asked. “Who is this Jonah person you were talking about in there? And what’s a big man?”

  “The big man,” said Kat, “is like a—a head honcho. The guy in charge of this territory. For years it was Berto, but I guess he’s gone. So now it’s a guy named Jonah. He watches over things, keeps out rival gangs. If you want any favors, have any questions to ask, you have to go through the big man.”

  “Oh. A sort of unofficial mayor of the neighborhood.”

  “You got it.”

  They went outside, into a night that smelled of wind and rain. She glanced up at the sky, saw clouds hurtling past the moon. “It’s getting late,” she said. “Let’s get out of here.”

  They hurried down the steps. Two paces was all they managed to take before they both halted, staring in shock at the empty stretch of road beneath the streetlamp.

  Kat let fly an oath that would have made a sailor cringe.

  LAUGHTER DRIFTED DOWN THE DARK STREET, carried by the wind.

  Kat spun around and saw the teenagers, still standing at the far corner. They were looking her way and grinning. Damn punks, she thought. They think this is hilarious. In fury she stalked toward them. “Hey!” she yelled. “Hey!”

  Adam grabbed her arm and dragged her to a halt. “I think this is a bad idea,” he whispered.

  “Let me go.”

  “On further thought, it’s a terrible idea.”

  “I want my car back!” she said, and yanked her arm free. Rage was all the fuel she needed to propel her to the corner. The kids stood watching her, but they made no move. “Okay,” she snapped. “Where is it?”

  “Where’s what, lady?”

  “My car, asshole.”

  “You had a car?” a boy asked with mock innocence.

  Kat ignored him. “It’s not worth a hell of a lot, that car. And it’s sure not worth going to jail for. So just give it back to me. And maybe I won’t call the cops.”

  Some of the kids retreated and faded into the background. The rest—half a dozen of them—began to fan out into a semicircle. Suddenly she realized that Adam was standing right beside her, shoulder-to-shoulder. Amazing. He didn’t turn tuxedo and run, she thought. Maybe she had underestimated him.

  The kids were watching her, waiting for signs of fear. She knew how their minds worked; she’d grown up with kids just like these. Turn your back, show a flicker of anxiety, and you were theirs.

  She said, slowly, deliberately, “I want my car.”

  “Or what?” one of the boys said.

  “Or my friend here”—she nodded at Adam—“gets nasty.”

  All gazes turned to Ad
am. Just a bluff, Quantrell, she thought. Don’t fold on me.

  He stayed right where he was, solid as a wall.

  Now two more of the boys backed down and slid away into the darkness. Only four were left, and they were getting edgy.

  “No way you gonna get your wheels back,” one of them said.

  “Why not?”

  “Man, she’s long gone. Wasn’t us.”

  “Who was it?”

  “Repo dude. He’s in and outta here. Your car, lady, she’s chop.”

  Damn. They were probably telling the truth, she thought.

  “This is hopeless,” she muttered to Adam. “Let’s go.”

  “I thought you’d never ask,” he hissed between his teeth.

  Cautiously they eased away from the gang and quickly headed back toward Building Five. She would make her call to the police from Papa Earl’s apartment. As for her Subaru, well, at least it was insured.

  Kat was so worried about whether the boys were pursuing them that she scarcely noted the footsteps moving in the darkness ahead. Just as they reached the front steps of Building Five, two figures emerged from the darkness and barred their way.

  “Let us through,” said Kat.

  The boys didn’t move.

  “Just move aside,” said Adam calmly. “And there won’t be any trouble.”

  They laughed, and Kat saw them glance past her, behind her.

  She whirled around just in time to spot the rear attack.

  A figure flew at Adam’s back, thudding into him so hard he staggered forward to his knees.

  Now the two in front launched their assault. A fist slammed into Adam’s jaw. Grunting, he brought his arm up to fend off the second blow.

  Kat leaped into the fight. With a cry of rage she threw a left hook at the nearest attacker. Her knuckles connected with cheekbone. Pain exploded in her hand, but the triumph of watching the punk stagger away was worth it.

  By now Adam had hauled off and landed a blow on his forward attacker. The rear attacker was still pummeling him on the back. Adam flung him loose. The kid rolled a few feet, then leaped to a crouch. Something clicked in his hand—a switchblade.

  “He’s got a knife!” yelled Kat.

  Adam’s gaze instantly focused on the silvery blade. He was unprepared for the sideways tackle by the other punk. They both landed on the ground, the punk on top.

  The boy with the switchblade moved in toward the struggling pair.

  Kat let fly a kick, felt an instant thump of satisfaction as her shoe connected with the back of Mr. Knife’s knee. He groaned and fell forward, but didn’t drop the knife.

  Something thudded into her from behind, made her stumble to her knees. A fourth? she thought in confusion as hands gripped her arms. How many were there?

  Her hair was jerked back, her throat laid bare.

  The boy with the knife crouched beside her.

  “No!” yelled Adam. “Don’t hurt her!”

  The blade touched her throat, lingered there a moment. She caught a peripheral view of Adam struggling to reach her, panic stamped plainly on his face. Two boys had him by the arms. A third kicked him soundly in the ribs. Adam doubled over, groaning. “Leave her alone,” he gasped.

  “We won’t cut you,” whispered a voice in Kat’s ear. “Not now. But you stay away, you hear, lady cop? ’Cause she don’t want to be found.”

  “I’m not a cop,” rasped Kat.

  The knife bit sharply into her flesh; she felt a drop of blood trickle down her neck. Then suddenly the knife was lifted away and her hair was released. Kat knelt on the ground, her heart thudding, her throat closed down by terror. She touched her neck, then stared at the blood on her fingers. “I thought,” she said hoarsely, “that you weren’t going to cut me.”

  “That?” The kid with the knife laughed. “That’s not a cut. That’s just a little kiss.” He signaled to his buddies that it was time to leave. With startling efficiency, they picked Adam’s wallet, stripped off his overcoat, relieved Kat of her purse.

  “This time,” said the kid, “you get off easy.” He gave Kat a kick in the shoulder, which sent her sprawling onto the glass-littered sidewalk.

  “No goddamn car is worth it,” said Adam, gingerly holding an ice pack to his cheek. The left side of his face was swollen, and dried blood had caked in his eyebrow. His tuxedo, which had started the evening crisply immaculate, was now in tatters.

  He fit right in with the other down-and-outers sitting in the Hancock emergency room waiting area. The benches were filled with a tired collection of the bruised and sick, coughing kids, wailing babies, all of them resigned to the long wait for a doctor.

  “Anyone with a modicum of sense knows when to fight, and when to turn tail and run,” said Adam. “You should’ve run.”

  “I didn’t see you running,” she shot back.

  “How could I? I wasn’t going to let you take them on by yourself.”

  “Well, I do appreciate the gesture.”

  “Let me tell you, I wasn’t the least bit happy about getting killed over some old Subaru.”

  “I liked that car,” muttered Kat. “It was the first car I ever bought brand new.”

  “It could’ve been the only car you ever bought brand new.”

  A man staggered into the waiting room, rolled his eyes back, and fainted. He was quickly scooped up by two orderlies and wheeled into the inner sanctum. Everyone in the room gave a collective sigh of unhappiness. The wait would be that much longer.

  “I tell you what,” said Adam. “Next time this happens, I’ll buy you a new car.”

  “I can buy my own car,” said Kat. “I just don’t like getting ripped off.” She—as well as everyone else—looked up hopefully as the ER nurse came into the waiting area.

  “Ripped off,” said Adam, “is better than beaten to a pulp. I can’t believe they did that to us. And all over something so trivial.”

  “But it wasn’t over the car,” said Kat. “Don’t you get it? My car had nothing to do with it.”

  The nurse called out: “Novak!”

  Kat shot to her feet. “Here.”

  “Follow me.”

  “Wait,” said Adam, tossing aside the ice pack. “What do you mean, your car had nothing to do with it? Then what was that fight all about?”

  “Your daughter,” Kat replied, following the nurse out of the waiting area.

  Adam was right behind her as she went into the treatment room.

  “You’ll have to wait outside, sir,” said the nurse.

  “He’s with me,” said Kat.

  The nurse looked at Adam’s battered face, then at Kat’s black eye. “I think I can tell,” she said, and shook out a paper drape. “Lie down and put this over your blouse. So it doesn’t get blood on it.”

  “It’s already got blood on it,” said Kat as she settled back on the treatment table. The nurse began to clean the knife slash; the sting of Betadine was almost worse than the blade itself.

  “What makes you think Maeve had anything to do with this?” said Adam.

  “Something our friend with the knife whispered in my ear.”

  “Hold still,” snapped the nurse.

  “He said, ‘Stay away, lady cop. Because she doesn’t want to be found.’ Now, that tells me a couple of things. First, he’s stupid. He can’t tell a cop from a civilian. Second, he’s warning us that she doesn’t want to be found. Who do you suppose she is?”

  “Maeve,” he said, looking stunned.

  The ER doctor came in, a shaggy version of Dr. Michael Dietz, with the same look of battle fatigue. Kat wondered how many hours he’d been working, how many bodies he’d laid hands on. He glanced at her neck wound. His name tag said DR. VOLCKER.

  “How’d you get it?” he asked.

  “Switchblade.”

  “Someone try to kill you?”

  “No, it was an accident.”

  “Okay.” The doctor sighed. “I’ll skip the dumb questions.” He turned to the nurse. “Suture se
t. She’ll need about three stitches. And hand me the Xylocaine.”

  Kat winced as the needle with local anesthetic pierced her skin. Then there was the moment’s wait for the drug to take effect.

  “I can’t believe she’d do it,” said Adam. “I mean, we’ve had our differences. But for Maeve to have her friends assault us …”

  “She wasn’t attacking you, specifically. She probably didn’t know who the hell was asking about her. We might’ve avoided the whole scene if we’d just told Anthony right off that you were her father.”

  “You’re saying Anthony warned her?”

  “He left the apartment while we were still there, remember? Before you said anything about her being your daughter. Probably went straight to Maeve.”

  “And she had her friends jump us.”

  “Well,” said the doctor, tying off the first stitch. “You two lead exciting lives.”

  They ignored him. “Maeve must be scared of something,” said Kat. “Why send the troops to attack at the first sign of strangers?” She glanced at Adam and saw his troubled look. “What’s she afraid of? What did you forget to tell me?”

  He shook his head. “She’s in trouble.”

  “What kind of trouble?”

  He sank into a nearby chair and wearily ran his hands across his battered face.

  “Does it have to do with Jane Doe?” asked Kat. “With Xenia Vargas and Nicos?”

  “Maybe.” His answer came out muffled, as though he wanted to bury the words in his throat.

  “Or does it have to do with Cygnus? Some miracle drug you’ve got in development?”

  He looked up in anger. “Why blame it on Cygnus? None of your tests are back! You don’t know what the hell those junkies were shooting up.”

  “Do you know?”

  He started to speak, then saw that both the doctor and nurse were watching them in fascination.

  “Are you going to sew her up or what?” Adam snapped.

  “I was hoping I could hear the end of the story,” said the doctor. He tied off the last stitch and snipped the thread. “All done. Come back for suture removal in five days.”

  “I can pull them myself, thanks,” said Kat. She sat up. The room seemed to sway around her like a boat. She waited a moment for everything to stop moving.