But all of that was ancient history.
There was a new wrinkle.
Simon had a pair of stringers he used from time to time, Temple University students who had the same notions about journalism that Simon had once held. They did research and the occasional stakeout, all for a pittance, usually just enough to keep them in iTunes downloads and X.
The one who had some potential, the one who could actually write, was Benedict Tsu. He called at ten after eleven.
'Simon Close.'
'It is Tsu.'
Simon wasn't sure if it was an Asian thing or a college thing, but Benedict always called himself by his last name. 'What's up?'
'That place you asked about, the place on the waterfront?'
Tsu was talking about the dilapidated building under the Walt Whitman Bridge into which Kevin Byrne had mysteriously disappeared for a few hours earlier in the night. Simon had followed Byrne, but had to keep a discreet distance. When Simon had to leave to get to the Blue Horizon, he called Tsu and asked him to look into it. 'What about it?'
'It's called Deuces.'
'What's Deuces?'
'It's a crack house.'
Simon's world began to spin. 'A crack house?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Are you sure?'
'Absolutely.'
Simon let the possibilities wash over him. The excitement was overwhelming.
'Thanks, Ben,' Simon said. 'I'll be in touch.'
'Bukeqi'
Simon clicked off, considered his good fortune.
Kevin Byrne was on the pipe.
Which meant that what had become a casual endeavor-following Byrne to get a story-would now become a grand obsession. Because, from time to time, Kevin Byrne had to score his drugs. Which meant that Kevin Byrne had a brand-new partner. Not a tall, sexy goddess with smoldering dark eyes and a freight-train right cross, but rather a skinny white boy from Northumberland.
A skinny white boy with a Nikon D100 camera and a Sigma 55-200mm DC zoom lens.
19
TUESDAY, 5:40 AM
Jessica huddled in the corner of a dank cellar, watching a young woman kneeling in prayer. The girl was about seventeen, blond, freckled, blue-eyed, and innocent.
The moonlight streaming through the small window cast brusque shadows across the rubble in the cellar, creating buttes and chasms amid the gloom.
When the girl was done praying, she sat down on the damp floor and produced a hypodermic needle and, without ceremony or preparation, stuck the needle in her arm.
'Wait!' Jessica screamed. She made her way quickly across the debris-strewn basement with relative ease, considering the shadow and the clutter. No barked shins, no stubbed toes. It was as if she floated. But by the time she reached the young woman, the young woman was already depressing the plunger.
You don't have to do that, Jessica said.
Yes I do, the girl dream-replied. You don't understand.
I do understand. You don't need it.
But I do. There is a monster after me.
Jessica stood a few feet away from the girl. She saw that the girl was barefoot; her feet were red and raw and blistered. When Jessica looked back up-
The girl was Sophie. Or, more accurately, the young woman Sophie would become. Gone were her daughter's roly-poly little body and chubby cheeks, replaced instead by a young woman's curves: long legs, slender waist, a discernible bust beneath the ragged V-neck sweater with the Nazarene crest.
But it was the girl's face that horrified Jessica. Sophie's face was drawn and haggard, with dark violet smudges beneath her eyes.
Don't, sweetie, Jessica implored. God, no.
She looked again and saw that the girl's hands were now bolted together and bleeding. Jessica tried to take a step forward but her feet seemed frozen to the ground, her legs leaden. She felt something at her breastbone. She looked down to see an angel pendant hanging around her neck.
Then, suddenly, a bell sounded. Loud and intrusive and insistent. It seemed to come from above. Jessica looked at the Sophie-girl. The drug was just taking hold of the girl's nervous system, and as her eyes rolled back, her head tilted upward. Suddenly, there was no ceiling above them, no roof. Just the black sky. Jessica followed her gaze as the bell pounded through the firmament again. A sword of golden sunlight split the night clouds, catching the sterling silver of the pendant, blinding Jessica for a moment, until-
Jessica opened her eyes and sat upright, her heart rattling around in her chest. She looked at the window. Pitch black. It was the middle of the night and the phone was ringing. Only bad news made the trip at this hour.
Vincent?
Dad?
The phone rang a third time, offering no details, no comfort. She reached for it, disoriented, frightened, her hands shaking, her head still throbbing. She lifted the receiver.
'H-hello?'
'It's Kevin.'
Kevin? Jessica thought. Who the hell is Kevin? The only Kevin she knew was Kevin Bancroft, the weird kid who lived on Christian Street when she was growing up. Then it hit her.
Kevin.
The job.
'Yeah. Right. Okay. What's up?'
'I think we should catch the girls at the bus stop.'
Greek. Maybe Turkish. Definitely some foreign language. She had no idea what these words meant.
'Can you hang on a sec?' she asked.
'Sure.'
Jessica sprinted to the bathroom, splashed cold water on her face. The right side was still slightly swollen, but much less painful than it was last night, due to an hour of ice packs when she'd gotten home. Along with Patrick's kiss, of course. The thought made her smile, the smile made her face hurt. It was a good hurt. She ran back to the phone, but before she could say anything, Byrne added:
'I think we'll get more out of them there than we will at the school.'
'Sure,' Jessica replied, and she suddenly realized that he was talking about Tessa Wells's friends.
'I'll pick you up in twenty,' he said.
For a minute, she thought he meant twenty minutes. She glanced at the clock. Five forty. He did mean twenty minutes. Luckily, Paula Fari- nacci's husband left for work in Camden by six, so she was up. Jessica could drop Sophie off at Paula's and have just enough time for a shower. 'Right,' Jessica said. 'Okay. Great. No problem. See you then.'
She hung up, threw her legs over the side of the bed, ready for a nice, brisk nap.
