Moving silently, we stopped at each row to check down the narrow walkways. We crouched and peered through shoeboxes and stacks of t-shirts in each before moving on to the next. Over a pair of four-inch platform boots, I spotted a figure. Luis motioned me forward. I darted across the row to the last shelving unit and pressed my back against the wall. Peeking briefly around the corner, I signed that I saw one person. I pressed my hand flat, then took a longer look from a crouched position.
The girl, or rather her breathing, talking skeletal remains, was splayed on the ground, her neck propped by a metal shelf and the far wall. She was babbling incoherently. A puddle formed between the v of her legs. The stench of urine filtered through my adrenalin. I didn’t see a weapon.
I heard Luis calling for an ambulance as I approached her. She wore black holey tights and a micro plaid skirt. Her mesh, long-sleeved shirt was pulled up on one side, revealing a piece of black rubber loosely ribboned around her arm. A syringe was pushed into a large angry red and bruised lump at the inside corner of her elbow. The t-shirt over the black mesh read ‘Daddy’z Gurl’ in neon pink.
“Hey.” I squatted next to her and checked her eyes. Her pupils were pinhead small in the midst of brown. “She’s wasted. Darryl, come here!” I took off my jacket and folded it behind her head. I didn’t smell or see vomit, and her airway remained clear. I checked her pulse and breathing. Shallow.
She dribbled spit as she slurred, “Cai, dun.”
“Rachel?” Darryl rushed over. He bumped my hand out of the way and attempted to take out the needle himself.
“Don’t,” I cautioned. “You might poke through skin.”
“I know how to take out a needle.” He gently removed it and checked the plunger. “Rachel?” He tapped her face a few times and blew out a breath. “She’s no fucking use.”
Luis checked his watch. “Forty minutes since the BOLO was called in. How long since you talked to her?”
“Right after I parked the car. Maybe five minutes before you picked me up.”
“Fuck.” I stood up and kicked the nearest object. Several boxes flew off the bottom shelf on the other side of us. My phone vibrated, bringing my tantrum to a halt. I looked at the screen. Text message from an unrecognized number.
—Still in surgery. Waiting 4 updates. Will txt when no more.—
Thank you officer Hutcherson. “You didn’t talk to Cai?” I asked Darryl.
“She said Cai was in back, trying to get the anklet off.”
It took one minute to locate the anklet resting on the shelf by Rachel’s legs. “Call his cell.”
“We need—”
“Quiet,” Darryl waved his hand rapidly at Luis as he pressed his phone to his ear and looked at the floor.
Nearby, a cell phone began to play. We all began the mad scramble for the phone. It was Luis who thought to check under Rachel’s back.
“That’s Cai’s phone.” Darryl grabbed it. “Weird. That’s not his ringtone.” He pressed some buttons on the cell and frowned, mumbling, “Thought he’d leave a text or something.”
Luis held up something when Darryl turned around to concentrate on the phone.
Shit. I started to adjust my thinking to the significance of the other syringe my partner found. “So he changed his ringtone?” I asked.
“Yeah, but…it’s weird. Cai wouldn’t ever have that ringtone. He has this thing about how classical music expands the brain blah blah blah. And the only way Rabbit and I will listen to it is if he plays it on our phones.”
“I’m going to wait by the door for the bus. You two can argue the semantics of fairy music.” Luis walked off.
The ringtone. A thread of thought pulled. I tugged at it. Cai was smart. Too smart. His message would be obscure but seem perfectly reasonable in his mind. I walked to the end of the row and did what always worked when threads of thought were stuck. I worked it out aloud. “The ringtone. What’s that song?”
“You got that look, Glass. You think it means something?”
“Of course it means something. Idiots,” Darryl muttered.
“Ambulance is here.” Luis walked out to meet them. My thread went with him. It was hard to concentrate with so much going on an so much weighing on me.
We all moved out of the way while the EMTs worked on Rachel. I tried tugging my thread from new angles while they all tried getting some sense from her.
I almost had something, but I lost it as they wheeled out the girl and I caught Darryl’s expression. His face was white, his eyes watering. “What?” I asked.
“She— Lying bitch.”