Then there was Sheldon. The nerdy librarian tech who helped her with her research and gave her a place to catch a nap when she needed it. He routinely broke library rules for her and put his job on the line, which has to count for something. But she really didn’t know him that well. He was a sweetheart, and probably liked her as more than just a friend. But like Duane, she didn’t know what to do with him.
She turned it over in her head for a few more minutes, then came to a final decision. Without evidence to the contrary, she decided Junie and Derek were in. Simple. So far, they hadn’t let her down—not once, so they were golden.
Miller—he was out.
Duane and Sheldon—she put them on the maybe list.
* * *
Derek drifted in and out of consciousness after the beating from Striker. His body wasn’t responding to his commands to get up and fight, but he could still sense what was happening to him. He was on his back, and someone had a hold of his foot, dragging him along the cold cement floor. He tried to open his eyes, but they refused. Too much pain and not enough energy.
“Damn, you’re heavy for a kid,” a voice said. He recognized it. It was Striker, grunting and tugging. “Just gotta get you somewhere out of the way, until I can deal with you later.”
Striker hauled Derek down the hall for what seemed like forever. Eventually, he let go of Derek’s leg, letting it flop to the ground. Then there were sounds of keys jingling and a door opening.
Striker snatched Derek’s foot again and slid him another ten feet or so, then kicked him in the ribs with a powerful blow.
Derek gasped when what little air he had in his lungs shot out instantly.
“There. That should keep you quiet until I get back,” Striker growled as he slammed the door and locked it.
A heartbeat later, Derek faded into blackness, with only thoughts of Emily on his mind.
* * *
Emily and Shroedy, a cute pair of gingers—one human, and one feline—were approaching the border of Glassford Park where it ended at North Central Avenue when Shroedy stopped, arched his back, and hissed. Emily looked around, trying to find the source of the quantum kitty’s ire, but she couldn’t see anything—no dogs, no squirrels, no scary-looking street thugs, nothing.
Shroedy ran back and forth, rubbing his fur against her legs. Then he ran behind her, heading in the opposite direction.
“No, kitty. Wrong way. We’re going to the library.”
The cat jumped in the air, twisting and landing on all fours, then hissed again, this time with fangs exposed and ears pulled back. The kitty crawled low to the ground, inching his way toward her.
Emily didn’t know what to make of Shroedy’s weird behavior. Her eyes darted around the area, checking for predators again. But like before, she didn’t see any.
“What? I don’t understand. Is something wrong? What are you trying to tell me?”
* * *
Derek woke up in near-total darkness, slumped on his side, with his back pressing against something hard. Everything hurt: his head throbbed, his ribs ached, and his jaw was sore.
It took a moment for him to realize that he could see some light—a faint red glow blinking in a small room. The light was coming from above a door—an exit sign. His eyes faded in and out of focus as he rolled over, but they were able to report enough information to determine that he was in some kind of storage closet with a rusty metal desk piled with miscellaneous junk. Just beyond it was a tall set of wall-mounted shelves stuffed with white boxes—the kind for storing folders and records.
He took another minute to let his mind sharpen and adjust to his surroundings, taking in all that he was seeing and feeling. Then he remembered: Harry Striker. Drugs. The beating. Pain. The GM dumping him here and locking him in.
Derek crawled to his knees and worked himself to his feet. His head spun quickly, making him teeter off balance. He grabbed the front of the desk, trying to keep himself from falling over. It worked.
Despite the throbbing pain across his body and the dizziness, he needed to escape. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been out, and since Striker said he would be back, Derek knew he might only have a few minutes.
His wobbly legs carried him to the wooden door with a two-sided, keyed deadbolt installed. He wondered why a public building would need that type of lock on an interior door. Perhaps Striker used this room for more than storage, wanting to keep things from getting out, like him. He tried the doorknob but it was locked, as expected. He checked the door’s hinge configuration and it told him that the door opened out. Good news. He knocked on the wood, checking to see if it was a hollow door. The sound was deep and dull. Shit. Solid core.
He stepped back, aimed at the spot next to the doorknob, balanced on his left leg, and kicked at it hard with his right foot. His aim was perfect, but his plan wasn’t. The door didn’t budge, but he did, falling off balance and smashing into the ground, landing squarely on his elbow. More pain shot into his body, stinging the length of his arm.
He rolled and sat up, rubbing and massaging the new injury to help disperse the pain. His weary eyes focused on the exit. There was a small dent next to the knob, but it was clear that the door was going to be difficult to breech with only a single leg kick. He needed a new plan—one that would generate more leverage and force.
“Controlled force this time!” he scolded himself, massaging his elbow.
The items in the storage space left him with few options—nothing to use as a pry bar or a lock pick. He thought about sliding the desk out of the way to give him a few more feet of running room, then launch his body at the door, shoulder first. It might be enough. But then again, it might also dislocate his shoulder, leaving him defenseless if he ran into Striker or his men again.
Before he could act, a better idea flashed in his mind.
He stood and walked to the metal desk that had been pushed parallel against the shelves with its drawers trapped on the other side. He swept his arm across the surface to clear the contents and make it easier to work with. The right end of its top had a bit of an overhang, allowing him to wrap both hands around it. He leaned back and to the left, pulling and yanking to get the desk to move. It did, sliding its metal legs across the floor an inch at a time, screeching with each thrust. He continued to tug and pull until its end was aimed at the door.
One of the lower desk drawers had rolled open in the process, showing him a stack of phone books inside. He checked the other drawers and found the same—someone was hoarding phone books, adding to the massive weight of the unit. He removed the phone books and tossed them to the ground in a loose stack, counting as he went—twenty-seven.
The desk was about two feet from the door, but still not in the correct position to execute his plan. He turned and slid his back down the metal end, pulling his legs in as he dropped to the ground. He took a deep breath and pushed at the bottom of the door with his legs. The desk began to move away from the door and toward the shelving, scooting more easily now that the phone books had been removed. He felt the movement stop, indicating that the other end of the desk was now wedged against the shelves where he wanted it.
He stood and sat on the end of the desk closest to the door, raised his legs, and checked the distance.
“Just might work,” he mumbled. “Or it might break both my ankles.”
He paused, taking time to gather his energy and sharpen his resolve. His vision was still a bit fuzzy and his body felt weak, but he needed to hold it together and unleash one massive strike.
“Come on, Derek. You can do this. Make it happen,” he convinced himself.
He rocked on the desktop, aiming his legs at the dent he’d made earlier. He took three long, deep breaths, allowing his adrenaline to build. He bit his lip and let loose a mighty kick with both feet, using the metal desk as his anchor point.
His feet hit the door precisely where he had aimed, springing the door open with a small shower of splinters shooting into the air. It swung on its hin
ges and smashed against the outside wall.
Derek stumbled into the hallway with only one thing on his mind: run!
* * *
Shroedy ran in a circle, then back to Emily and pawed at her legs with his claws extended.
“Ouch!” she yelped, feeling his sharp weapons dig into her skin. She stepped back, puzzling over the quantum kitty’s strange behavior. Emily wished she could use her sixth sense to get a read on him, but her gift only worked on humans.
“Why are you acting this way?”
Shroedy let out a child-like cry, then sprinted west for ten feet, stopped on all fours, and looked back at her.
“What? I don’t understand.”
He ran again, stopped, and looked back.
“Do you want me to follow you?” she asked, just as a searing pain hit her in the forehead, right between the eyes. She winced and staggered to a landscape boulder and sat down, holding back the urge to vomit.
Over the next minute, the pain dissipated and an intense feeling of confusion replaced it. Then her mind’s eye activated, showing her a remote vision of a long hallway. She was seeing through someone else’s eyes as the person walked with panic in their thoughts. More imagery, thoughts, and feelings arrived through the link, telling her whose eyes she was seeing through—Derek’s.
Emily doubled over in pain as a direct transfer of pain shot across the connection from his ribs to hers. His bones felt like they might be broken. Her face—his face—felt swollen, and a number of other pain reports came streaming in from his body.
He was in trouble and desperate. Trying to get away and find safety.
Then the word striker came across the link. Was that an object or a person? Or was he saying “strike her”—two words running together and sounding like one? She wasn’t sure what it meant, if anything.
She saw through his eyes as he made his way through two more hallways and found a stairwell. He went up two flights and pushed through an exit door, and found a parking lot where a fading sunset was waiting.
Derek stumbled, looking back at the door behind him. The psychic link started to fade, but Emily caught one final flash from him—a shiny, rectangular placard on the door. It was partially obscured, but the section of the sign she could read said ‘—obile Arena Service Entrance. Employees and Deliveries Only.’
Arena? Service Entrance? –obile?
Her mind crunched the clues and came up with the answer. There was only one arena in the metro area that contained the letters from her vision. She knew where he was. The Quick-Mobile Arena on the west side of downtown. By one of the service entrances.
Her dizziness and pain dissipated when the link disconnected, allowing her to take off at full speed. She headed west, the same direction that Shroedy wanted her to go earlier. Somehow the cat must have known Derek was in trouble and was trying to warn her. It’s the only answer she could come up with, even though it seemed impossible. How can a cat have her same physic power? Even a special quantum kitty like Shroedy.
Emily glanced back at the tabby, but he wasn’t following her. He was sitting upright on his hind legs, pawing at the air. She didn’t have time to convince him to come along, nor did it seem like he wanted to, so she ignored him and focused on the path ahead.
She knew that the Quick-Mobile Arena had been recently completed, and was located not too far from Glassford Park. She remembered the public outcry when its construction was first commissioned—few thought Phoenix needed another sports arena, especially one built for hockey—in the blistering desert, of all places.
The local NHL franchise in Glendale was struggling to stay afloat, and most of those who opposed the new arena used that fact as the basis for their mud-slinging campaign. But in the end, the city council passed the funding measure by a unanimous vote. Not that she cared; she lived on the street and didn’t pay taxes.
* * *
“Thanks, Bobby. I appreciate it,” Striker said in a hasty voice on the concourse level.
He looked at his watch, frustrated. It had been almost twenty minutes since he’d put the kid in the closet. He needed to get back and figure out what to do with him. Even though he thought his tracks were covered, he couldn’t risk it. If it came out that he was smoking pot and drinking on duty, and then beat the crap out of some teenager to cover it up, it would be the end of him. Even his pals on the police force wouldn’t be able to help.
“Just thought you should know,” the manager of the arena’s food service, Bobby Morris, said with sincerity. “Now there’s just one more thing—”
“Look, the game’s about to start and there’s a million and one things I need to do. I really don’t have time for this crap right now. So suck it up and figure it out on your own. That’s what I pay you for.”
“You okay, boss?”
“Just do your damn job already!” Striker snapped, leaving before Morris could delay him further.
Striker knew his food manager was wondering why he wasn’t taking the time to micromanage him like usual. But truth was—tonight—right now—Striker didn’t give a shit about anything other than his captive in the closet. The rest could wait.
He made it to the service stairwell and flew down the steps and into the locker room hallway. He ran through the maze that would lead him to the storage room where he’d left the delinquent, Derek Morgan.
When he rounded the final corner, he found the door standing open, with splintered wood sprawled across the floor.
“Oh, shit!” he said, running to look inside. It was empty. No sign of the kid.
He put his hands on the sides of head and screamed. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”
* * *
Almost there, Emily thought. Run, girl, run! Faster. Faster. Don’t stop. Oh God, please let him be okay. Please.
She kept her legs pumping, running faster than she had ever run before. Faster than the night when the Locos were after her and Junie; quicker than the day she’d come out of a jump in the middle of a shopping mall; harder than a few nights before when she and Derek needed to get away from the condo after she’d killed a fat biker.
Derek was hurt, and he needed her. That’s all she knew. And somehow it kept her muscles churning, even though she was exhausted and starting to cramp up.
Ignore the pain, she convinced herself as the link between them flashed on and off like a strobe light. She didn’t know why it was happening, but it worried her.
When she sprinted around the last corner and the arena came into view, she slowed to a medium jog, trying to decide where to go next. She could see the main entrance to the building, but where was the service entrance? Probably around back, she decided, but it was a huge building—it could have more than one.
She angled right and ran towards the building’s massive digital marquee that said:
ICE DOGS vs. WRANGLERS TONIGHT
FAN APPRECIATION NIGHT!!
There were police officers directing traffic, but she couldn’t risk asking one of them for help. Interactions with cops never turned out well for her, so she decided to blend in with the dozen or so fans waiting to enter the building. She picked the shortest line, knowing she couldn’t get in, not without a ticket, but that didn’t matter. She had a different plan in mind.
Even though it only took a minute to make it to the front of the line, it seemed like an hour. A middle-aged black woman with short-cropped hair and a pair of gold middle teeth was waiting at the turnstile with a ticket scanner in hand.
She looked at Emily. “Ticket please.”
Emily held her hands up to show the woman they were empty. “I’m not going to the game, but I do have a quick question. Can you help me? Please?”
The woman pointed to her left. “Step over here, dear. Let the others pass.”
Emily did as instructed, walking around and standing to the side of the turnstile.
“What do ya need?” the woman asked, still grabbing tickets and scanning them with brisk efficiency.
“Sorry to bother you,
but my cousin works here and he told me to meet him at the service entrance. Can you tell me where it is?”
“Which one, honey? There’s two of them. Do you mean the loading dock?”
“No, I don’t think so. He said it was—” Emily said, pausing to search her memory. “—like a regular door where they make deliveries. Not raised or anything like that.”
“Okay, sweetie. That’s gonna be just around there—” she said, leaning forward and pointing to the left. “It’s just past the Zamboni ramp. You know, where they dump the shavings. Just look for the pile of ice and it’ll be around the very next corner. Can’t miss it.”
“Thank you so much!” Emily said, trotting in the direction she was given.
She darted into a wave of approaching hockey fans, then stopped in her tracks when she saw what she thought was an Orange Man across the parking lot. He wasn’t moving—just standing still between two parked cars with his briefcase—watching her. Someone bumped into her, taking her attention from the Orange Man. When she returned her eyes to his location, he wasn’t there.
“Must be seeing things,” she said, taking off at a full gallop to the corner of the sprawling building. She made a left and tore through the side lot, zipping past the Zamboni ramp and ice dump, where she found Derek lying face down next to a service exit door.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Emily knelt on the ground next to Derek and turned him over. He was breathing, but his face was red and puffy. His left eye was swollen.
“Derek! Derek!” she screamed, rocking his shoulder gently. “Babe? Can you hear me? Please wake up! Say something. Come on, talk to me.”
His eyes blinked open. He groaned and then spoke in a weak voice. “Em? What are you doing here? How? How did you find me?”
“I can’t explain it. I just did. Add it to the list of things I need to tell you.”
Glassford Girl: Part 3 (The Emily Heart Time Jumper) Page 10
