by L. K. Hill
Gabe cried out as searing pain scraped across his arms, momentarily blinding him—it felt like Norse was scraping the bones in his arm with rusty nails—and the knife gouged into Gabe’s chest. It didn’t go deep enough to draw blood before Gabe stiffened his arms again, but the tip pushed down against his sternum and he could feel the strength in his arms ebbing away.
Knowing he had to find the strength to beat Norse, or else die alone in this alley, Gabe pushed harder, praying like he’d never prayed before, believing he could triumph, and demanding the last bits of strength from every muscle he possessed. And…nothing happened. He pushed Norse back a fraction of an inch, but the man only countered, pressing the knife down harder. With sudden panic, Gabe realized that he really might die here. He’d worked the Slip Mire for years longer than most cops, but he’d never imagined the place would actually take his life. Gritting his teeth, he put every ounce of strength he had left into keeping the knife away from his chest.
What happened next shocked Gabe so much that, even without Norse’s downward pressure, he nearly stabbed himself.
Blood and gore exploded from the left side of the gangster’s chest. Gabe wrenched the knife up and to the left so that the tip hit the ground just above his left shoulder, but it sliced through the collar of his shirt and left a thin line of blood in its wake.
Kicking out from under Norse—who looked more shocked than Gabe felt as he fell slowly onto his back—Gabe half crawled, half crab-walked backward, eyes searching the alley wildly for where the shot had come from.
He saw the figure, crouched on one knee in the shadows, and his jaw hit his chest. The small, slender figure wore baggy, black clothes and had spikey, black hair and ridiculously blue eyes. She stalked aggressively out of the shadows to stand over Norse.
By then, the gangster was coughing and gurgling blood. Rivulets of it had jumped from the corners of his mouth and lay like wet, red spider’s webs across his jaw. He looked up at Supra from his back, and his eyes widened.
“You,” he managed to croak, his limbs shaking as much with anger as with pain.
Supra raised her gun, pointed it at Norse’s chest, and fired three more times.
Chapter 22
Detective Nichols flinched away when Kyra fired the gun again. He scrabbled backward until he sat up against the alley wall, then got jerkily to his feet. She noted he’d snatched up his gun from where it had come to rest on the pavement.
She turned to gaze at him, wondering what he thought of her now. And if he recognized her yet.
Without Norse, she’d have to find some other way into the gang that wouldn’t include rape or worse, but if he’d seen her here, helping a cop, he might have kept her from ever infiltrating the gang at all. She couldn’t have that. And worse, he’d just tried to kill a police officer, and had probably raped a little girl.
The detective’s eyes were on Norse, whose chest had stopped moving. When his gaze shifted to her, it was all she could do not to flinch. “Are you all right, Detective?” she asked, just to break the silence. She automatically deepened her voice, as she always did when she was Supra. She’d been doing it for so long now, her brain just went into Mireling mode as soon as she donned her costume.
He nodded, slowly at first and then more quickly. “Yes.” He stepped toward her, but she stepped away, and he didn’t move forward again. “Why did you…?” he stopped, shut his eyes briefly, and swallowed, shaking himself. “You shouldn’t have killed him, Supra.”
So he didn’t recognize her. Not yet. She’d donned Supra makeup on the way to Slip Mire. After months of doing it each day, she didn’t really need a mirror, but she couldn’t imagine it was perfect either.
She hadn’t put it on to hide from the cops—she expected Nichols to make the connection any moment—but to move safely through the Slip Mire. Gabe was right about one thing back in his Sergeant’s office: someone who looked like her couldn’t move through this part of town unmolested. Supra could. “He was trying to kill you,” she said calmly, wondering why she bothered using her deep voice at all. She should just tell him who she really was. So why couldn’t she bring herself to?
“Yes, but he was the only one who knew the location of a missing child.” Gabe’s eyes were still on Norse. He hadn’t given her more than a passing glance.
Kyra gazed at him for a moment before answering. She doubted she could tell him what she’d already found out without revealing enough for him to realize who she was. But then, maybe it was too late to worry about that anyway.
“How,” he looked up at her again. “How did you know to be here?”
“I didn’t,” she lied. “I came from Norse’s residence. Got there just in time to see you take off chasing him. Right after you left, they found the little girl. I got close enough to hear some of the officers talking about a box under the floor boards. She’s alive, but she’s obviously been…” her throat tightened and she couldn’t finish. “I followed you, then. Didn’t want you getting yourself killed unnecessarily.”
The tension drained out of Gabe’s shoulders, but whether it stemmed from relief or sadness over her news, she couldn’t say. Probably a bit of both. He crossed the alley to stand in front of her. “Supra, why are you helping me? How did you know to be at Norse’s to begin with?”
She gazed up at him, a heavy sadness weighing her down. So, he hadn’t made the connections. Yet. He would, eventually. But if he didn’t, so much the better. She could retain her anonymity. “I told you, I’m not really a junkie. I may do what I must to survive out here,” she glanced down at Norse, “but that doesn’t mean I condone murder or pedophilia.”
He gazed down at her critically, his exhausted eyes searching her face—no, not hers, Supra’s face—for answers. “That doesn’t answer my question.”
He was right. It didn’t. In truth, between trying to get her makeup on quickly enough and just trying to make it to the Slip Mire as quickly as possible, she hadn’t thought about the implications of Supra showing up where Gabe was. Now, she had no idea what to tell him.
“I—”
A shout and a scuffle of feet brought both their heads around. Up head, where the alley broke into multiple routes, all heading in different directions, the figures of two men moved toward them from the one to the far right. The dull red lights of the alley glinted off metallic objects held in their hands, and fear clutched Kyra’s heart.
“More Sons of Ares. We have to go.” She grabbed the detective’s hand and ran toward the figures, turning sharply to take another route when they reached the dividing point.
“Are you sure?” the detective asked, though he ran a step behind her without resistance.
“Yes. Norse brought you this way for a reason.”
Unlike the long alley the detective chased Norse along, this one was full of intersecting paths and labyrinthine turns. Kyra turned, again and again and again, trying to shake their tail, but she could still hear the two men behind them, and they seemed to be getting closer.
Eventually they came into an area Kyra recognized. Somewhere along this stretch was a dark niche, virtually invisible unless you were actually inside it. From the alley, the niche looked like exactly that: a shallow depression in the wall. Shadowy, but looking at it, you see every part, or so you thought. Kyra had once curled into a ball on the floor of the niche, hoping her dark clothing would camouflage her in the shadows. Once down on her elbows and knees, she’d crawled forward, into a short tunnel not visible from the alley or even from a standing position in the niche. It opened to a small, square space behind the alley wall where she could straighten up again. She’d waited there for her pursuer to pass by. She and Gabe could hide there now, though the space behind the wall would be barely large enough to fit them both.
It was their best bet, though. They wouldn’t even have to re-emerge from the niche. On the other side of the hidden space, an even narrower alley reached away into the darkness. They could squeeze through it and come out half a mile a
way.
Kyra slowed, running her hand along the alley wall, looking for the depression. The alley was so shadowy, she was afraid she’d miss it if they didn’t slow down, but the footsteps behind them grew louder every second.
“What’re you doing?” Nichols asked, glancing back over his shoulder.
“Shh. Give me a minute.”
It was more like two minutes, but she found it. “Follow me,” she said, dropping to her hands and knees and crawling into the niche.
“But—” He cut off and said no more, probably because she disappeared into the niche and he realized she had a hiding spot. She made it into the square space on the other side of the tunnel and pressed her body into the far side so Gabe would have room to squeeze in. He struggled out of the tunnel and to his feet, glancing around. There was more space than she’d thought. At least, they weren’t fully pressed up against one another, which would have been awkward. They were toe-to-toe, though, his head just above hers.
While most of the alleys in Slip Mire were made of brick, consisting of the sides of the buildings that flanked them, this part was wood. The only reason this tiny space even existed was because someone, at some point in time, had added on to the side of this particular building. The hidden spot was just negative space between wooden add-ons. Because of that, though Kyra and the detective were well-concealed from the alley, they could hear everything going on only inches away, on the other side of the thin boards.
The skidding of shoes on pavement—loud in the nighttime quiet—announced that their pursuers were level with their hiding place.
Kyra’s heart still pounded from the chase, and her breathing wasn’t slowing as quickly as she would have liked. She clapped a hand over her nose and mouth to muffle the rasp. The detective put his hands on her elbows, as if to steady her. She glanced up to find him staring down into her face, searching it as if for answers. For an instant, she thought she saw a spark of recognition there, but it faded.
It occurred to her how strange their position would look to anyone else: standing close together in an almost romantic stance; him leaning over her, gazing down into her face, hands on her elbows; her with a hand clasped over her nose and mouth, as if she’d just gotten horrifying news. Kyra never let anyone get this close to her on the streets and, to her surprise, she found she was nervous. Nervous to have his hands on her. Nervous to feel his breath on her neck. Nervous that he would make the connection between her and Tanya at any moment. Or perhaps that he wouldn’t.
No, it would be better if he didn’t. He hadn’t recognized her yet, but he hadn’t truly looked at her. Now his face hovered inches away. In the darkness. Turning her face to the ground, she leaned forward and rested her forehead against his shoulder. Don’t recognize me, don’t recognize me.
If she could just get him back to his cop buddies and slip away, she’d never have to see him again. She had no doubt that he’d put the pieces together eventually, once he’d gotten some sleep and had more than five seconds at a time to reflect on all that had happened. But at least by then she’d be long gone. She wouldn’t have to look him in the face.
“Where’d they go?” the first voice on the other side of the wall had a hint of a Spanish accent.
“Don’t know,” the second was deeper. “Let’s keep going.”
“This alley is long,” the first said. “We should be able to see them running up there.”
“You think they turned into one of the other alleys we passed?” the deeper voice sounded skeptical.
“Maybe. I’ll double back and see what I can find. You keep doing down this way. Don’t just look into the shadowy places. Run through them. Make sure there’s nothing hiding in them that you can’t see. I’ve seen that blue-eyed woman around here before. She has a way of hiding in plain sight.”
The sound of shoes hitting pavement came again, moving away from them in both directions at once and fading quickly. The one who continued going the way Kyra and Gabe had been running went slowly, probably searching every cranny with his eye, and kicking things, as evidenced by the variety of thuds and crashes he made as he went.
It must have been a full fifteen minutes before the sounds of his searching faded completely. Once they did, Kyra lowered her hand from her mouth and looked up at Detective Nichols. Shadows cloaked his eyes, but enough red light from adjoining alleys filtered into the space that she could see the contours of his face.
“You all right?” he asked in a low whisper.
She nodded. “You?”
He nodded absently before trying to step back from her, though there was really nowhere to go. “Should we…?” He made as if to bend his knees toward the tunnel.
“No,” she put a hand on his arm. “We shouldn’t re-emerge here. If one of them doubles back, we’ll be sitting ducks. We can get out this way.” She turned and angled her shoulder into the narrow passage leading away from them.
The detective put a hand on her shoulder. “How do you know about this place?” he whispered. “Are you sure that leads to anywhere?”
“It does,” she nodded in the darkness. “I’ve been through here before.”
Though she couldn’t see it, she felt him frown. “You mean you’ve had to hide here before.”
It wasn’t a really a question, and she pretended not to hear. “Come on,” she said.
The narrow space wasn’t wide enough for her to walk forward through it, but if she turned sideways, walking at an angle, she could get through. Not so for Detective Nichols. His chest and shoulder blades scraped the walls, even though he turned completely sideways and sucked in. Something metallic scraped along the wall. Probably his belt buckle or holster. Maybe even his gun if he’d put it back on his belt. Kyra knew the alley would get narrower before it got wider. It hadn’t been a problem for her, but she hoped the detective would be able to push through.
He made it through the narrowest point without too much trouble. He did get stuck and have to shove his way through, but managed it with only mild cursing.
“I’m sorry, Detective,” Kyra whispered. “It won’t get any narrower. I promise. It’ll only widen from here.”
He nodded and motioned her on, though she doubted he was very pleased with the situation.
The narrow space widened gradually, until they could both walk facing forward, though they still had to go single file. Eventually it let out into a perpendicular alley that ran parallel to the one they’d entered the niche from. They could take it back toward Norse’s place. The other cops were probably still there and Gabe could hitch a ride with them to wherever he planned to go next.
Kyra moved to step from the narrow passage into the perpendicular alley when the sound of a man cursing reached her ears, and it wasn’t the detective. She froze, stopping so suddenly that the detective ran into her. She flung her arms out to brace on either wall, but still just kept from falling through the opening.
The man cursing was walking down the perpendicular alley toward them. He had a deep voice, but Kyra couldn’t tell if he was one of their pursuers. Somehow, she doubted it. Even if the two gangsters looking for them had forsaken the previous alley and were just searching helter-skelter, what were the chances they’d make it to this spot at the same time Kyra and the detective did?
Still, whoever this newcomer was, he didn’t sound happy, and if Kyra and Gabe wanted to avoid the Sons of Ares, they needed to stay under the radar. A confrontation with a deranged hobo was the last thing that would help them.
The voice grew closer—only a few steps away—and Kyra pushed Gabe back from the entrance. Putting her back against the wall, she fell silently into a crouch, motioning Gabe down beside her. Plenty of light made it into their narrow space, but because of the angle of the buildings, the bottom four feet were in shadow. The two of them crouched in that shadow, and Kyra prayed it would be enough to hide them.
A moment later, a tall man, strongly built for this part of the city, stumbled by them. He didn’t seem drunk, but it wa
s hard to tell because he dragged his feet, as though he couldn’t make them walk any more quickly. Shaggy hair fell almost to his shoulders and whatever item of clothing he wore from the waist down was short, leaving most of his legs bare. Kyra couldn’t tell anything else about him, though. He passed by their alley, not even glancing in their direction, muttering to himself. She couldn’t understand what he said, other than catching vile curse words every so often. He was definitely angry.
She had no idea who the man was, or if he was dangerous, but something told her to stay hidden until he passed. A dim, sticky feeling built up in her chest as he passed, and for a few seconds, the shadows around the alley seemed to move. Kyra blinked and shook her head to dispel the sensation. Her fatigue must be getting the better of her. This day needed to be over now.
She waited, listening to the hobo’s retreating footsteps and mutters. It would be another few minutes before it was safe to emerge. She felt a soft pressure on her leg and turned her head. Detective Nichols was looking at something on her pants and had put a finger on it, raising his eyebrow.
In her hurry to reach Norse’s place, Kyra hadn’t been able to change her dress slacks. She didn’t have an extra pair of jeans in her bag, and didn’t want to take the time to go back to the hotel. To make them look different, she’d torn holes in the knees on her way to the Carmichael district, and even run through muddy areas or puddles several times to get them dirty, as well as scruffing up her jacket and buttoning it closed. She had no idea if Detective Nichols would recognize a pair of slacks—probably not—but she’d wanted to take precautions.
Going out the bathroom window had been tricky. Only because she was in decent physical shape—she was very small and flexible—had she managed it. She’d wiggled her body up and around and over, then held onto the sill by her fingers and swung over to a drain pipe which she climbed down. It went smoothly, for the most part, except for one instant when the corner of the window got in the way. She’d pressed through it, but scraped her thigh, gritting her teeth to keep from crying out in pain. In the end, it was only a scratch, and she hadn’t thought about it again.
