“Excuse me,” I said, breathless and damp. “I’m looking for a tour group from West River High School. Do you know where I can find them?”
The woman behind the counter looked at me, her face pinched and her posture rigid in her starchy Smithsonian blazer. Conscious of her stare, I withdrew my newsprintcovered hands from the desk.
“I’m sorry, dear.” She eyed me, taking in every detail of my appearance with a tight smile. “I have no idea where they might be. Would you like me to have someone paged?”
“No,” I said quickly when she reached for her phone. “That’s okay. I’ll find them.” I couldn’t have him paged. Couldn’t attract that much attention to myself.
I turned, pausing at two stories of thousands of people. The killer wanted me to find Teddy. He would make it easy. There had to be a message, a clue I wasn’t seeing.
I turned back to the clerk.
“Has anyone left a message? Maybe an envelope?” Doubt clung heavy to each word.
The woman opened a drawer. “Let me check. What’s the last name?”
I hesitated, remembering the visitor’s log at the hospital, my gut telling me it was pointless to lie.
“Boswell,” I finally said, turned away to scan the crowd.
“Here you are, Miss Boswell.” The woman slid a white envelope across the counter, my name printed in crisp blue letters across the front. “This must be for you.”
My arm was heavy as I reached across the desk. I drew a narrow ticket from the envelope.
“Oh, no.” She frowned over my shoulder. “You’re too late. That ticket was for the four thirty show.” She looked at her watch. “It’s already over. The planetarium is closed.”
I sprinted for the stairs, barreling through the descending wave of tourists. Shoving them aside, my sleeves clutched tight around my hands, I bumped past them like a pinball. When I reached the top, I looked out over the gallery wall and caught the high, agitated voice of Mrs. Smallwood, Teddy’s teacher. Mall security officers gathered around her in the lobby below, her arms gesturing wildly with her clipboard. My heart sped up. Teddy must already be missing.
Across the gallery, the double doors of the planetarium were closed, the ticket windows shut for the night.
Too late.
I slipped between the velvet ropes, checking over my shoulder as I tugged the handle. Locked. I leaned back against the door. There had to be a way in. Every theater has more than one exit. I looked right, then left. Another set of doors. I ducked under the rope, staying tight to the wall. I tugged the handle and it eased open with a quiet sigh.
Inside, it was night. The hall was narrow and close around me, dark except for tiny blue-white runners illuminating the way. A light glowed at the end, the hall opening into a high domed theater where hundreds of empty seats radiated from a projector in the floor.
There was no movement. No sound but the rush of blood in my ears.
“Teddy?” My voice cracked. “Teddy, are you in here?”
I took a tentative step, then another. The theater was cavernous and dim.
Beyond the doors, a muffled overhead speaker repeated, “Teddy Marshall, please meet your party at the welcome desk in the first-floor lobby.”
The projector cast a swirling pink-and-purple glow against the ceiling, but the rows and rows of folding seats were cast in deep shadow. I gripped the rails, following the diffused blue glow of the runway lighting through the room. Taking slow steps, I searched each aisle, and had almost given up when I caught a faint green glow near the floor. I walked toward it, tripping over something hard.
Teddy Marshall’s shoes. Teddy lay face-up between the rows, his feet breaching the aisle. My heart leaped into my throat. I pulled myself to my knees. Whispered his name and reached for his hand. It was nothing but cold when I touched it.
The green light emanated from his right arm. A cluster of glow-in-the-dark stars—the kind they sold in the gift shop downstairs—stuck to his forearm. They twisted into a shape. A number. Five.
I pushed myself farther into the aisle toward his face, wedging myself between his shoulders and the seats. His glasses hung askew inside a clear plastic bag that clung to the opening of his nostrils and stuck in his mouth. The plastic sucked tight over his face—and didn’t move. I couldn’t breathe. The bag was knotted at Teddy’s throat, tied with his own shoelace. I reached out to tear it, to rip it away from his face. Breathe, Teddy, breathe!
A dark hand shot in front of me before I could reach the bag. A glove clamped over my mouth and I screamed into it. Bucking and kicking, I grappled with the arms around my chest. They dragged me down the aisle, away from Teddy, pushed me against the tunnel wall, and cupped my mouth tight. My breath raced in and out my nose, whistling over the leather glove.
“What the hell are you doing here?” The voice was deep and angry, but familiar. Reece released his grip. “You shouldn’t be here.” He peered anxiously down the mouth of the tunnel before bringing the full force of his gaze back to mine.