question without scaring her. “What was Niki planning to tell the police that would make Viktor want to kill her?” To me, it seemed it would have to have been something more than just the prostitution thing, because that’d just be his word against hers, right? And there was still that small detail of her having Parker’s business card.
Hanna finished her plate, daintily wiping her mouth with a napkin before replying. “Niki was good with numbers,” she said. “Crazy good. She worked with Viktor on stuff related to the money. You know the phrase…cooking the books.”
I sucked in a breath, my eyes wide. Okay, so that I could see was worth killing her for, especially if she’d been a snitch for the cops.
She eyed me. “What happened to you?” she asked, nodding toward my face.
The bruising was a lot better, but I hadn’t put on a bit of makeup today. “Uh, yeah, you were right,” I said. “Your neighborhood isn’t very safe.”
It seemed she needed no further explanation, or maybe didn’t want to know the details, because she just nodded, looking grim.
It was getting late and Hanna hid a yawn behind her hand, the heavy Italian food no doubt making her sleepy. I got to my feet and cleared away her dishes.
“You can have my bed,” I said, leading her back to my bedroom. “I don’t mind the couch.” She protested, but I wasn’t having any of it. I handed her some of my pajamas to wear and left her alone to go make up the couch.
As I turned off the television and lights and lay down on the couch, I realized I was really glad Hanna was here. It felt like I was doing something. Even if it was just helping one person, it was a start. I fell asleep staring at the ceiling and wondering how I could help Tania, too.
* * *
I woke up in the middle of the night, freezing. My air conditioner had kicked on, making the living room a lot colder than I’d planned when I’d made up the couch. Getting up, I tiptoed through my bedroom where Hanna was sleeping until I reached the master bath.
Leaving off the light so as not to wake her, I opened the linen closet in the bathroom. I was feeling my way in the dark—didn’t I have a quilt in this closet somewhere?—when I heard it.
The sound of the bedroom door creaking open.
Twisting to look out the open bathroom door, Hanna’s name was on my lips, but something made me keep silent. It wasn’t her. I could still see her form under the covers. I also saw two shadowy figures moving toward the bed.
My blood froze in my veins, a scream strangling in my throat. Strangers were in my apartment. Big strangers. Men who were at least six feet tall. One of them had something in his hand. The moonlight filtering through the window glinted off it.
A knife.
I couldn’t think. Couldn’t even breathe. I stood, cloaked in the shadows of the bathroom, staring as the men surrounded the bed. My limbs shook with fear and I thought of the men in the bar last night. Had they found me?
But they didn’t turn my way. The one with the knife leaned over the bed. I couldn’t see what he was doing, but I watched the lump I knew to be Hanna. She moved, sharply and abruptly, her legs straightening. I heard a strange gurgling sound, then nothing. The men turned and left as silently as they’d come.
I still couldn’t move. My feet seemed cemented to the floor, my joints locked in place. Had they really not seen me? Or was it a trick? How could it be a trick when they could so easily overpower me?
Hanna.
I forced my feet to take a step forward, then another and another, until I stood by the bed.
She was still there, a silent and huddled mass underneath the covers. There was something dark on the sheets, though, and a strange smell in the air.
My hand was shaking as I reached for the lamp on the bedside table, and I gasped when its light flooded the room.
Hanna stared at me, her eyes wide and unseeing. Blood from a deep gash in her throat soaked the sheets, the pillow underneath her dark hair, the pajamas I’d loaned her.
I wanted to scream, but I couldn’t. I just stared at her. She’d been alive just minutes ago. Then men had crept in and murdered her. She’d