The junkie grinned; one of the uniforms said, in aggrieved tones, “Come on, man.”
“He just pissed himself,” Eve added.
When the doors closed on the junkie’s high giggle, the other passengers applauded.
With that success, she handled the elevator the rest of the way up.
“I’m going to update in my office, then tag Mira before I update in the conference room. You can take ten more on the salon venues once I head down to the conference room.”
Coffee first, always, and, with it in hand, she wrote up her notes, updated her book, then her board. She took a moment to study Roarke’s expanded list, to familiarize herself with it, then sent Mira a text.
As she passed through the bullpen, she called out, “Ten minutes, Peabody,” and kept going to start the next task on her list.
BEFORE
Violet had three children, and her love for them often made her heart ache even as it soared. Sometimes she looked in on her daughter, her two sons when they slept. No matter how many squabbles she’d dealt with during the day, those moments brought such peace.
In the twelve years since she’d collapsed, lost, frightened, nameless, in the road for Joe to find, she’d found peace, her place, her purpose.
She believed with everything she was that Joe had been meant to find her. They’d been meant to find each other, to make this life, to have these beautiful children.
She’d become an avid gardener and a good cook. She had twice-a-week help with the housework, but she and Joe had both agreed they didn’t want any live-in help.
The house, one they’d pampered and preserved and repaired, was only theirs.
Now that their youngest had started school, she took more time for volunteer work. She chaired the garden club, and enjoyed it, prized the friendships she’d made through it. She organized an annual fashion show with the profits earmarked for women in need, and was so, so proud of the work.
Joe held the vital and difficult job of chief resident in the ER, yet another source of pride for her. She’d considered working outside the home, but the home, and tending it and the children, gave her such satisfaction, such joy.
They had two dogs, a cat, and the three goldfish won at a local carnival to round out the family.
The summer before they’d bought a vacation home in Hilton Head, and she looked forward to years of memories made there.
Her life was all she could want.
Except for the occasional nightmare. She hadn’t told Joe—didn’t want to worry him when she woke shaking, her head pounding.
Terrifying dreams, even if she couldn’t really remember them clearly. Just the sensation of drowning, a child screaming. Screaming for her? A feeling, such a strong feeling of utter despair.
But they passed, they always passed. And in the morning everything was just as it should be.
Her life was far too busy and full of light to worry about those rare moments in the dark.
NOW
She woke in a different room, and, for a moment, Mary Kate thought she’d come out of a horrible dream. But it wasn’t her room. It wasn’t her apartment.
The horrible dream remained her reality.
But he’d moved her, she realized. He’d drugged her and moved her to another space.
No windows again, but a larger space with more furniture, and a small kitchen area. Not that she could reach it, because the chain shackling her to the wall was too short.
But she could move to a sofa—bolted to the floor—and noted rather than the cot she now had an actual bed. Also bolted down.
More lights—some in the ceiling, some bolted down.
On dim, those ceiling lights, but when she called for lights on full, nothing changed. She clapped her hands, and the three lamps came on.
She had a rug, she saw, on the concrete floor, what her grandfather called an easy chair, as well as the sofa. Books on a shelf, and she could reach them.
Old books, many yellowed with age, a lot of children’s books with them.
A bathroom area—toilet, sink, shower. She could have wept at the idea of a shower. A single towel, a washcloth, a tube of liquid soap, another of shampoo, conditioner.
No door, but she’d long passed the point of modesty. In any case she’d wait until she heard him leave before trying the shower.
And hunting for weapons.
She saw clothes folded on a table, but a set of stairs had her heart tripping.
Stairs led to a way out. She just had to find a way to get to the stairs, to find something to break the goddamn chains and get to the stairs.
Locked door, absolutely locked, but if she could get that far, she’d be damned if a locked door stopped her.