“So, what exactly is it that you want us to do?” Racket says as we walk through the sliding doors.
“I want to take another look around the girl’s house, talk to the neighbors once more, see if they remember anything new.”
“Dammit, Byrne, we’ve finely combed that place. There is nothing...”
His words get cut off when a small body slams into us, so fragile that it’s almost knocked to the ground and I let out a curse, clasping the girl’s arm so that she doesn’t fall and she gasps. Looking down at her with brows drawn, I freeze.
It is her. The girl in the photo on my wall.
The girl that I have been looking for.
Her eyes roam over my face but if it is disgust that she feels at the sight of me, she doesn’t show it. Opening her dry lips she whispers,
“H...help me.”
And then she passes out and I let out another curse, scooping her up and she weighs practically nothing. I walk as if in a fog back inside and I notice that she is wet from the rain and dressed in white, fleece shorts and a white, fleece top.
She’s not wearing any shoes and the material of her clothes is so thin that I can see through to her breasts and her mound and I press her harder to my chest, making sure that nobody else notices her nudity.
Her head flops, her lids fluttering and I am barking orders at my colleagues while Racket is running after me. He’s saying something but I can’t hear what it is. All I care about is an end to that chill in the girl’s bones, care about her gaining some color in her face and I wince at the bruises along her legs and arms.
I grind my jaw when I see what else is there. First I thought that maybe it was dried blood but it’s not. Someone has written short quotes all over her body with a red sharpie.
"Death lies on her like an untimely frost.”
"Thus with a kiss I die."
And many more and I grind my jaw as I fill with revulsion. It’s words from Shakespeare, a British, medieval bastard I’ve never particularly liked and someone, someone who is still out there dared to soil her body like this. I know that when I find him, I won’t put him behind bars. I will kill him. Kill him for what he did to her.
Putting the girl down on a seat, I order a colleague to hand me a blanket and when she does, I drape it around the girl. Her head is drooping, leaning against the wall and her legs and arms are hanging loosely.
“Hand me a wet wipe,” I tell Racket and he raises his brows.
“What? Why?”
“Now,” I snarl and he goes to search for wet wipes and when he finds them, I snatch them to me, hurrying up with rubbing the red quotes off of her. I don’t want her to wake up and see them; don’t want her to be reminded of what has happened to her.
I’m done rubbing off the last traces when she startles, her body severely jolting and I automatically clamp down on her with my hands so that she doesn’t hurt herself. But I shouldn’t have done that because it scares her even more and she opens her mouth and screams.
The sound fills our halls and I immediately take my hands off of her. “Feck love, I didn’t mean to frighten you,” I say in a rushed voice and her mouth slams shut, the screams ebbing out but her eyes are still wide and cautious.
She stares at me. At my shoulders. My hands. My scars.
Licking her lips, she whispers, “Am I really safe? Will he hurt me ever again?”
“Nay,” I whisper, “nay, nay, I am here now. And I will never allow anything to happen to you.”
3
Melody
Almost against my will, I’ve been checked out by medical people then shooed into an interrogation roomtogether with a female officer. But it’s not her that I want in here with me. I want that man whose arms I ran into, the one who made me feel safe. I’m almost frantic for him, the need for him making my whole body feel uncomfortable and I flinch when the officer puts a hand on my shoulder.
“Sorry,” she murmurs, taking her hand away. “Can I get you something? Tea? Coke?”
I shake my head, murmuring, “Where is the Irishman? The one who gave me this?” I gesture at the blanket and the officer gets up from her crouching position.
“Detective Byrne, you mean?” she says and my eyes flutter. Is that his name? And I crave hearing his voice again, because it’s a voice so deep and raspy that he could be reading me the telephone book and I’d still fall into a trance.