I tossed my bag down and went into the kitchen. My stomach growled for food. I poured a drink of cranberry juice and seltzer, set the glass down on the counter and reached into my pocket for Largo Vance's phone number. And that's when
I felt a massive blow to the side of my head and everything went black.
31
Amanda Davies sat in the high-back leather chair and stared out the window. She wanted to call Henry, desperately wanted to hear his voice if only for a moment. Several times over the last few hours she'd reached for the phone, felt the plastic beneath her fingers, only to retract like she'd touched a poisonous plant.
The office was empty, dark except for a desk lamp and her computer screen. The minutes seemed to stretch into hours.
She watched the phone. He'd called once. She waited to see if he would call again. He didn't.
She'd told Henry she was coming here to sleep. She knew sleep wouldn't come easy. Not last night and not tonight. Not after what she saw.
Since joining the Legal Aid Society, Amanda had witnessed some horrible things. Mothers and fathers who beat their children within an inch of their life, starved them. Made seven-year-olds wear diapers for days and weeks on end.
Boys and girls who were found caked in their own excrement while their parents were out drinking, stealing or fornicating.
And no matter how hard they worked, how many children they rescued, it was like putting a Band-Aid on a busted dam.
There wasn't enough manpower, not enough funding. As long as society remained this screwed up, as long as there were hedonistic parents who put themselves over their child, there would always be children without homes. Just like her. Until she met Henry.
She thought about Mya Loverne. Hated the fact that she felt even a whisper of sympathy for the girl. But she did. It was tearing her apart, because she could still see Mya's arms wrapped around Henry's waist, their lips touching, Henry seeming to give in.
He should have ended it months ago. He should have severed all ties with Mya Loverne. But he hadn't, and last night showed why. He wasn't ready to give her up. Amanda lost the one person she could turn to, the one who showed her that there were relationships beyond her diaries.
She couldn't take it anymore. She grabbed the phone, nearly spilling a cup of water all over the desk, and dialed
Henry's cell phone. She waited as it rang, hoping that any second he would pick up and she would hear his voice, hoping there was more to the story. Henry was not a bad guy, like so many of the douche bags and deadbeats desperate women seemed to flock to. Guys who smelled like skunk residue and wore enough hair gel to paste King Kong to the
Empire State Building. Henry wasn't like them. She couldn't picture him cheating on her. Being with another woman.
Pressing his lips
(stop it)
Henry's voice mail picked up.
'This is Henry. Leave a message and I'll get back to you as soon as possible.'
She bit her lip, then spoke.
'Henry, it's me. We need to talk. Call me when you get this.'
For a moment, fear gripped Amanda. What if he was with
Mya? Couldn't be. He wasn't like that. He wasn't…
She hung up. Looked out the window again as the sun began to dip below the clouds, casting a golden hue over New York
City. In a city of millions, Amanda had never felt so alone.
32
Wake up, Parker.
I heard a voice in the distance, like a dream beginning to fade into the reality of morning. There was a beeping noise, like an alarm clock. Then just as abruptly it stopped. A gush of water hit me in the face, and the dream was shattered. I spit it out, coughed it out of my nose. My eyes opened. When I realized where I was, I wished I was still dreaming.
I was on the floor. Sitting up against the radiator. My hands were strapped behind my back. I couldn't see what was holding them together. My head throbbed and my neck felt sticky. My legs were numb, the tingling sensation of poor circulation. I had no idea how long I'd been here, but every muscle in my body felt some measure of pain.
The room was dark, a faint amber glow dying on the carpet. The sun was going down. How long had I been out?
My heart beat fast, fear and adrenaline spreading quickly, my pulse racing as panic began to set in. Water dripped down my face. It got into my eyes and I tried to blink it away.
Then I heard a sucking sound, looked over and saw a man
I'd never seen before sitting at the living room table, smoking a cigarette like he didn't have a care in the world. He was
flicking ashes into a neat little pile on the floor. There was an empty glass in front of him, water beading down its sides. I recognized it as a piece Amanda bought from a mail order catalog a few months back. She'd said my glassware looked so worn it was ready to turn back into sand.
The stranger cocked his head and smiled at me, like he'd just noticed I was there.
'You're a heavy sleeper, Parker. I thought I'd have to bring a marching band in here to get those eyes open.'
I blinked the spots from my eyes. The man in my living room was young. Mid-twenties. His face had no lines from age, but looked slightly weather-beaten, like he'd grown up in the sun and hadn't yet learned the dangers of UV rays. He was wearing jeans and a hooded sweatshirt. A blue bandanna was wrapped around his head. His eyebrows and sideburns were dirty blond, but the bandanna hid his hair's length and style.
He wasn't from the city. Nobody got natural tans living here.
Immediately I knew this man, like me, had come to New York from far away. He'd come for a reason. He'd killed four people without mercy or remorse. And now he was in my home.
The skin around his face was taut but smooth, like an older man squeezed into a younger man's body. His hands were veiny and strong, his expression one of both deep thought and intense malice, like he'd take a long hard thought before slitting your throat. This was the man who had ended four lives.
Mixed with fear, I felt a strange dose of excitement. The man sitting in my living room presented a fascinating story, one that I'd been dying to uncover. A spool that unraveled here-leaving me beaten and vulnerable, at a murderer's mercy.
He peered at me through a smoky haze as he took another drag and exhaled. I couldn't see any weapons on him, didn't know what he'd hit me with, only that it was heavy and knocked me out with one blow. I had a burning urge to write a very strongly worded letter to the landlord about the shitty security in this apartment building, but there were more pressing issues.
'How did you…' I said. My mouth felt like it was filled with cotton, my words slurred and slow.
'Please,' he said. 'Your building is easier to get into than my jeans. And it costs a whole lot less, too.'
He stood up. Moved closer until he was hovering over me.
