More to the point, that big-ass body was going to be in the way if Jim made any move for the doorknob.
Releasing his tight muscles, Jim eased up his body and looked over his shoulder at the bureaus. Adrian was pulling open drawers in a methodical manner and rifling through whatever was in them— and there evidently was a lot given all the rattling.
“Fine,” Jim murmured. “Guess we should join in the Easter-egg hunt?”
“I know it's hard,” Eddie said. “But you have to trust me.”
Eddie clapped him on the back and together they turned to head over to his buddy. Jim followed one footstep—
And wheeled around for the doorknob. As the fallen angel barked out a curse, Jim yanked open the slab of wood and jerked to a halt.
A young woman was hanging naked and upside down over the porcelain tub, her legs open in a V, her ankles bound with black rope to the circular rod that should have held a shower curtain. Her hands were tied together with the same black rope and pulled tautly up her body so that her fingers just barely touched the top of her sex. All around her belly there were deep cuts, arranged in a pattern of some kind, and red blood covered her white skin, running down her torso before splitting around the jut of her chin and jaw and flowing through her blond hair.
The tub was plugged and full.
Oh, Lord…about two inches above the pool she hung. Her eyes were open and fixed straight ahead, but her mouth was working ever so slightly…“She's alive!” Jim called out as he leaped forward.
Eddie caught him and yanked him back. “No, she's not. And we've got to get out of here now, thanks to you.”
Jim thrashed free of the hold and rushed forward, raising his hands, ready to start on the complex series of knots—
A hard, heavy palm locked onto his shoulder. “She's fucking dead, man, and we've got a problem now.” When Jim shook his head roughly and fought against the hold, Eddie's voice rose. “She's
Jim's eyes careened around her body, desperately looking for a shallow draw of breath or recognition in her face that she was going to be saved…something…anything…
“No!” He pointed to her fingers as they twitched ever so slightly. “She's alive!”
As he strained until he roared, the scene changed before his eyes, flipping from current horror to remembered tragedy. He saw his mother surrounded by blood, her eyes blinking slowly, her mouth working to form the words necessary to get him to leave her.
Eddie's calm voice came right into his ear, as if the guy weren't so much speaking, but implanting the words: “Jim, we've got to get the fuck out of here.”
“We can't leave her.” Was that his voice? That reedy croak?
“She's gone. She's not here anymore.”
“We can't leave her…She's…”
“She's not with us, Jim. And we have to go. To save Vin, we have to get you the fuck out of here.”
Adrian's voice exploded from the doorway, “What the
“Shut the hell up, Ad.” Eddie's words cut through the interruption. “He doesn't need you busting his balls right now. Jim…I want you to back out of the room.”
Jim knew the guy was right. The girl was dead, bled out like nothing but an animal, and that wasn't the worst of it. Her frozen death mask was one of horror, as if her suffering had been great. “Come on, Jim.”
So help him God, he knew he had to listen to the angel and force himself to accept that there was no battle to be fought here: The time for conflict and the possibility of victory had come and gone without his even being aware it existed. And he believed Eddie about the taking off part. At this moment, risking an altercation with Devina would not have been good.
Right now one-third of the team was a total head case.
Jim went to turn around, but got slapped from behind, Eddie's huge hand catching his face and holding it where it had been.
“Keep your eyes straight ahead and back out with me. Do not move your head. Do you understand? I want you to step back with me and keep your head where it is. We're going to back away
“I don't want to leave her,” he moaned. “Oh, shit…”
Such suffering, the terror etched into the soft, pale planes of her lovely face. Where were her parents? Who was she? As he stared at the young woman's corpse, he memorized everything about her, from the mole she had on her thigh, to the light blue of her lifeless eyes, to the pattern that had been cut into her stomach.
“She's gone,” Eddie said softly. “Her body's just a leftover—her soul's not here anymore. You can't do anything for her, and we are in a dangerous situation right now. We need to get you out of here.”
The more he looked at her though, the more his insides started screaming again and he couldn't— All at once, he heard a rush of noise that sounded like the feet of rodents in a sewer. It wasn't hundreds of rats, however. The clocks had started up, every single one of them energized at precisely the same moment, the chaotic ticking of countless second hands rising up in the loft, filling the air. Abruptly, Adrian's voice was grim instead of angry. “We have to leave—”
His words were cut off by a rumbling and then a vibration that emanated from the floor, one so great it rattled the smoky window over the toilet and created waves on top of the blood in the tub.
“I don't want to leave her—”
Eddie's voice turned into a growl. “She's gone. And we need to—”
“Fuck you!” Jim lunged forward.
Eddie's massive arms were iron bars. Even as Jim fought the hold, and went animal on the guy, clawing and ripping to get free, he got nowhere.
Voices rang out—his and Adrian's. But Eddie was silent as he started to pull Jim from the room.
Then Eddie cut through the vocal chaos and the flapping of clothes: “Knock him the fuck out! I can't keep him from seeing the mirror!”
Adrian stepped in, rolled up a fist, and cocked his arm back. The strike was hard and fast, the crack cutting through everything…and stunning Jim into compliance.
He was dragged out in a daze, the heels of his Timberlands streaking across the hard floor, his head ringing like a bell. Once his boots were past the bathroom door, Adrian slammed the thing shut, and Eddie flipped Jim up off the floor and into a firemen's hold.
Dizzy and disoriented, Jim tried to place a new fleet of strange sounds that came from a vast distance. Glancing over at the counter in the kitchen, he saw that the knives were moving around, arranging themselves, making order out of the mess they'd been in. And it was the same with the dressers—which explained the reverberations: The chests of drawers were trembling on their feet, finding positions like soldiers called for a lineup.
He barely remembered leaving the loft and he didn't register much of the trip down the stairs…but the cold air outside did revive him enough so that he was able to push himself free of Eddie's hold and make it to the truck on his own two feet.
As Adrian drove them away from the warehouse, all Jim could see was the girl's face.
There was no singing as they went off this time.
No talking, either.
Chapter 34
Devina's taunt ricocheted around Vin's inner pinball machine, triggering all kinds of evil bells and anti-bonus points: Jim and Marie-Terese had been alone…in her car…going back to his studio…
“You know everyone you've been with?” Devina said to Marie-Terese. “You must have an incredible memory. But right now only one of those men matters—isn't that true, Vin?”
