Breathe. Keep moving. Listen. It became her mantra.
When she came out into a clearing she skidded to a stop. She saw a building, but no movement. No lights. She moved back into the forest, hid behind a tree, and stared at the corrugated metal. It was like a mirage. She wondered if she might be seeing things.
Then she remembered—there was a nursery out here. And a field house. Lucy had told her about it. She couldn’t remember what it was. The Taser had blocked off portions of her memory.
She tried to concentrate. Griffin had said something about the field house. That he wanted to keep the teenagers away from it. Why? She couldn’t remember. It didn’t matter. He had a connection to this place. He had to know she would stumble across it. That she’d be tempted to consider it as a shelter. In fact, he probably counted on it.
And yet, she had to believe there would be something inside she could use to cut her wrists free. And warmth. If only for a few minutes.
CHAPTER 66
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Julia hated hospitals. She told Rachel she’d wait outside the exam room but the crowded ER made her feel even more anxious. Her mother had died in a place like this. Almost twenty years had passed and they still looked the same. It was as if she were seeing it through the eyes of a ten-year-old girl, instead of those of a homicide detective.
Across from her a woman cradled her bleeding arm. Knife wound. Under the thin stained gauze Julia recognized a tear in the flesh. Probably a kitchen knife, serrated blade. All she needed was a glance at the red-faced man accompanying the woman to guess it had been a domestic case, an endgame compromise—I’ll forgive you but you have to take me to the emergency room to get patched up. No incident report would be filed. The exhausted intern would ask the volley of questions but end up writing in whatever “accident” the woman invented.
Julia was moving on to the next victim when Rachel stepped out of the exam room. Her eyes were wild and frantic and searching for Julia.
It took Julia a second or two before she could stand. Oh God, this can’t be good.
She couldn’t remember the last time her knees actually wobbled. Is this what being in a relationship was all about—anxiety, stress, fear? Why did she think she was missing out on something? She had been fine on her own. Just fine.
No, that’s not, true. You were lonely, she told herself.
She weaved her way through the line waiting for the desk clerk. She steeled herself, the way she did when entering a crime scene. This was different. So different.
The relief on Rachel’s face when she finally saw her made Julia’s stomach fall to her feet. She was looking to her partner for strength. That expectation, that obligation fell like a weight on Julia’s shoulders. She couldn’t do this. Didn’t have it in her.
Rachel reached for her hands.
“They’re running an IV. CariAnne’s really dehydrated.” Rachel’s lower lip trembled. There was something more. Julia could see it in her eyes. “They said other kids from the school are ill, too. They won’t tell me what all is going on.” She shot a look over her shoulder, not wanting CariAnne to hear her. “It’s bad. I think it’s really bad,” she whispered.
Her grip on Julia’s hands was so tight it hurt.
“I can’t lose her,” Rachel said.
“You’re not going to lose her.”
In the past Julia had always left herself escape hatches. She constructed them almost as soon as she entered a relationship. It was—she truly believed—a smart survival tactic. She never allowed herself to feel so much that she couldn’t resurface. She was Houdini, looking out for number one because if she didn’t, who would?
“Go back in with CariAnne,” she told Rachel.
“I’m so scared. Come with me.”
Julia cringed. So this was what it felt like to have your heart break.
“I’ll be right here,” she told Rachel. “There’s something I have to do.”
She was surprised how convincing she sounded. Rachel nodded, wiped her face, took one more squeeze of Julia’s hands, and went back to her daughter.
Julia leaned against the wall. She sucked in gulps of disinfected air. When she pulled out her cell phone, her fingers shook so much she could barely hit the correct numbers.
The phone rang forever and she was torn between anger and frustration. He wouldn’t recognize her number. Please don’t send me to voice message. She wouldn’t know what to say and she wouldn’t have the nerve to call again.
Finally an answer.
“This is Benjamin Platt.”
“I need a favor,” she said forgetting to even tell him who was calling.
CHAPTER 66
WASHINGTON, D.C.