Luckily, Makayla didn’t seem at all curious about it, or about Nicole’s job in general. Which was good. Nicole didn’t exactly want to explain to her daughter that there were men who liked girls Makayla’s age.
As she turned her head from side to side and massaged her tense shoulders, she thought about how they had busted PDXer the day before. With a subpoena, Nicole had been able to trace the computer’s address to the home of a fifty-two-year-old shoe salesman. BubbleBeth had agreed to meet him at a bus stop downtown. The FBI weren’t allowed to use decoys to fool the perp, so there was no real girl to meet him. Instead, there were fifteen agents, including Nicole, all of them stationed around the stop.
PDXer turned out to be tubby, with a bad, graying perm. He paced up and down, holding a dozen roses, looking for the thirteen-year-old BubbleBeth but seeing only joggers, shoppers, construction workers, and people waiting for the bus.
Nicole walked up, pulled out her badge, and said, “I know why you’re here.”
He didn’t even bother to hang his head. Some perps were relieved when their problems finally caught up with them. “Yeah, I’m here to meet a thirteen-year-old girl and take her to my house and have sex.”
She had cuffed him a little tighter than was strictly necessary. The only thing that had helped curb her anger was knowing that Innocent Images had a 98 percent conviction rate.
Wincing in pain, Nicole pressed her fingers as far back along her neck and down her spine as she could. She hadn’t noticed that Leif had stood up, too, until he said, “Hey, try this to get the kinks out. First, put your hands up.” He turned to face her, and she was conscious of his height. A lot of guys in the Bureau were shorter than Nic, but Leif was well over six feet.
He held out his hands, palms facing forward, on either side of his head, looking like someone about to be arrested. “It’s called a dorsal glide.” He waited until Nic put her hands up, then tucked his chin as he slowly moved his back in a straight line. She did the same.
Something clicked into place between her shoulder blades. The pain wasn’t gone, but it lessened remarkably.
“Hey,” she said. “Thanks.”
She saw a few of the other agents looking at them, and she grabbed her headset and quickly sat down. She liked Leif, and respected him, which weren’t always the same thing, but she didn’t want to send the wrong message. Being a single woman meant she was grist for the office rumor mill. Nicole knew what some of them said about her behind her back. That she was a lesbian. And/or a man-hater.
Nicole ignored Leif ’s sideways glance when he sat back down next to her. She had a reason for the way she acted. A better reason than she would ever tell any of them.
SAFE HARBOR SHELTER
December 21
Hello, you must be Sonika. I’m Allison Pierce. I’m a lawyer.” When Allison stuck out her hand, the slender woman with huge, dark eyes flinched.
“Sorry,” Sonika said. She hid her mouth with her hand, reminding Allison of Nicole. Only Sonika’s teeth were already perfect, even and white. Glossy black hair framed her heart-shaped face.
The caseworker had told Allison that Sonika was a Cambodian immigrant without much English. And that her husband beat her. Sonika had come to the shelter several times, but always said she couldn’t stay. She wouldn’t even take a brochure, out of fear that her husband might find it. The hope was that Allison could get her to change her mind about accepting help.
Because of Lindsay, Allison had done a little research on domestic violence. It accounted for more injuries to women in America than anything else—more than heart attacks, cancer, strokes, car wrecks, muggings, and rapes combined. To try to help, Allison did a little pro bono work for the shelter. Not as much as she thought she should, but far more than she had time for. Especially now. But so many volunteers were unavailable so close to Christmas that the shelter had begged Allison to come today. To come right away, before this Sonika got too frightened. Allison had reluctantly agreed.
Once the baby came—the idea was now a refrain that played through her mind every few seconds—Allison would probably have to stop volunteering altogether. She put her hand on her abdomen for a second, then dropped it when she saw the other woman take it in. Sonika had the hyperawareness typical of abused women.
They were in the children’s room, but at the moment there were no children in it. The smell of Play-Doh made Allison’s mouth water, which was better than her reaction to most smells these days. She sat on a green plastic Playskool chair and gestured for Sonika to pull up the red one.