gasp one of them made through my fingers clamped on his mouth. We weren’t driving to dinner where Alessandro would be charming and clever and make me laugh while I drank my wine. We were going to do terrible things.
Alessandro reached over and touched my right hand. I jerked my hand off the wheel, the Nissan veered right, and I caught it just before it jumped the curb. I glared at him. I must have seemed a bit freaked out, because he rolled his eyes.
“The coffee shop offer is still on the table.”
“What the hell was that?”
“You were gripping the wheel so tight, I thought your fingers would break.”
“I wasn’t.” Yes, I was. My hands hurt.
“I’m good at this. I won’t let you get hurt. We’ll get what we need, get home, and I’ll sample that mythical pithivier I’ve been promised. We’ll have dessert, we’ll have coffee, everything will be fine. You won’t die there.”
“That’s not what I was afraid of.”
“You’re not scared of dying?”
“I am. And I’m scared of getting hurt. But I’m more afraid of what I’ll have to do to walk out of there.”
For a long moment we were both silent.
“You can always stay in the car,” he offered, his voice seductive, as if he were trying to tempt me with expensive chocolate. “Or you can come inside and watch me work and tell me how good I am. I’m very susceptible to flattery.”
“Not susceptible, Alessandro. More like dependent on, addicted to, live only for.”
I pulled into the nearly deserted parking lot overshadowed by trees. The twelve-floor office building towered over the lot, its big black windows dark. Only the lobby was lit, a haven of warm electric light trying to push back the night.
“So judgmental,” Alessandro said. His tone was light, his mouth was smirking, but the humor didn’t reach his eyes. They were hard and sharp. “First you tell your family that I’m a bad person, now you’re accusing me of vanity.”
“I have an idea. Why don’t I go in and you can sit here in the car and look pretty?”
He heaved a dramatic sigh. “But what would I do alone for hours with no one to admire me?”
“Take selfies, kill random people, take selfies of you killing random people?”
“Is that why you think I’m not a good person?”
“No, lots of people take selfies. You just do it more than most.”
I stared at the building looming in front of us. I had to get out of the car.
Alessandro turned, leaned over, and looked me in the eyes. “Catalina.”
I really hated the way he said my name. It cut through the constant busy hum of my thoughts like a knife. I could never let him learn about it, because then he’d purr my name in the middle of random conversations just to mess with me.
“You don’t have to go in there. Once I’m out of the car, drive away. Don’t park anywhere, keep moving. I’ll call you when it’s done.”
I opened my door and got out of the car. The cold night air bit at me. I shivered, retrieved my sword sheath, buckled it on, and put on my trench coat. The weight of the weapons inside was comforting and familiar, like hugging an old friend. I started toward the building.
He caught up with me. “Why are you so stubborn?”
“I’m here because a girl is missing. Someone killed her mother in a horrific way and took her from her bed in the middle of the night. It’s wrong and I’m going to fix it. As much as it can be fixed. It’s my job, Alessandro.”
“Good,” he said.
The doors slid open at our approach. The cavernous lobby lay empty, the grey and cream modern walls rising two stories high. A polished concrete floor, a matching shade of grey, reflected the cluster of white oval lights floating like glass jellyfish suspended from the ceiling by thin wires. At the opposite wall, a bank of elevators offered access to the top floors.
After the gloom of the parking lot, walking into a brightly lit, huge space, with its polished floor and shiny light fixtures, was like striding out of a dark passage into a sun-drenched arena. The sound of our steps sent echoes scurrying up the tall walls. In my imagination, they morphed into the beating of a drum counting heartbeats until the start of a fight. The space between my shoulders itched, expecting a bullet. I couldn’t see the other fighters, but I knew they were waiting.