Bedlam Boyz(7)

Call . . . my parents? Kayla thought in dismay. She looked down at the form and at the second line, where she was supposed to write in her address. What am I supposed to do now?

Maybe if I just fill it out quickly, then I can ask to go to the bathroom or something and get out of the building.

Then I'll find Liane, and we can find Billy at the hospital. He'll know what to do, he always does.

Good plan.

She wrote in carefully: 6925 Hollywood Boulevard. Hollywood, California.

The other questions were just as bad; she put down fake names for her parents, grandparents, school, and everything else.

Cable took the form from her, scanning it quickly. Kayla sat and waited, trying not to look nervous. The policewoman walked to the door with the form still in her hand. "I'll be back in a minute, Kayla," she said, and left the room.

Maybe I should try to get out of here now, Kayla thought, then decided against it. Somebody would probably stop her before she could get to the front door. No, waiting until the right moment, that was a better idea—wait until someone was taking her home, she could just walk away and then head back home, to Suite 230.

Home. Once upon a time, that had meant something better than an abandoned office building in downtown Hollywood. She thought about what the policewoman had said about calling her parents and fought back the sudden tears that threatened to escape from her eyes.

I wish you could call my folks, lady, she thought. I just wish you could.



Elizabet Winters set down the case folder, rubbing at her eyes with a tired hand. Too many blank pages left to fill out . . . the file on that last runaway child would keep her here for another hour, when all she wanted to do was go home and get some sleep. At least there'd been a happy ending to that story, unlike most of them. She and Lieutenant Simmons had escorted the boy to the LAX airport, where she'd seen him off on the midnight plane to Chicago, knowing that the boy's anxious parents were waiting for him on the other end of the line.

Sometimes these things worked out.

Sometimes they didn't. Elizabet didn't want to think about Marie, a lovely sixteen-year-old who'd been brought in to the station for child prostitution at least five times. The last time, they'd taken her to the county morgue instead, with five knife wounds in her. No suspects in that case yet, and Elizabet doubted they'd ever find any.

"Hey, Elizabet, you got a minute? I need some help."

Elizabet looked up, to see Nichelle Cable from Detective Headquarters Division. Nichelle looked just as tired as Elizabet felt. "What's up?"

"I have a girl who witnessed a double homicide tonight on Sunset Boulevard. I didn't think there was anything unusual about her until she gave me this." Nichelle held up the witness identification form and pointed at Line 2.

"So, she lives on Hollywood Boulevard? What's strange about that?" Elizabet asked.

"I wouldn't have thought anything was weird about it, except that when I was in high school, I worked in a particular movie theater for a few months. This girl gave me the address of Mann's Chinese Theater." Nichelle smiled. "I ran her name through the runaway database, and it came up cherries. Kayla Smith, state ward. She's been in Juvie twice for shoplifting and is currently reported missing from a foster home in Orange County. She ran away two months ago. God knows what she's been doing since." The homicide detective dropped the form on Elizabet's desk. "She's all yours, Elizabet."

"Thanks," Elizabet said with a wry smile. "Anything else I should know about this child?"

"She's bright and obviously thinks fast on her feet. Doesn't look like she does drugs, though she's wearing a half-trashed denim jacket that would cover any tracks. No terminal case of the sniffles or jitters, anyhow, so I doubt she's a crackhead. Maybe you can do something for this one."

"Maybe." Elizabet stuffed the case folder in her briefcase. "Is she in a holding room or one of the offices?"

"Simmons' office. There's still some fresh coffee in there, if you need it." Nichelle yawned and stretched, smiling tiredly. "I'm calling it a night. You might want to buzz Collins and get him ready to process this kid. I doubt anyone would want to drive her over to Juvie at this hour."

"You're probably right about that. Thanks for the coffee, Nichelle, I'll need it. Good night."

"Good luck," the policewoman said with a grin.

Elizabet picked up her briefcase and her jacket and headed over to Simmons' office. Ten feet away from the office door, she stopped, closing her eyes for a brief moment.

She knew.

She'd felt it earlier, an "incident" in the city, magical power like a flare going off, as someone called down magic with all the subtlety of a high-explosive rocket. She'd wanted to go investigate, but with the boy to escort to the airport, there had been no chance. But now . . .