She makes a face. “What’s he like?”
“Overprotective.” We both laugh. “He’s very sweet. But he’s pretty focused on his career right now and that takes priority in his life.”
I take a pair of scissors from my desk and cut open the top. It’s taped tightly shut. Inside is a Styrofoam container almost like a cooler.
“Ohhh, this looks like dessert from Milk Bar,” Sabrina coos. She bounces a little in her chair and I admit that I am excited. What a sweet, thoughtful gift.
When I pull off the top, a terrible stench rises. We both peer into the box and then scream. I shove the box away. Sabrina lunges for it.
“What is that?” she cries.
I don’t know what it is, but I know what it means. It means that there is no safe place for me. I can feel myself shutting down into a huddle at the corner of the sofa. Wave after wave of panic hits me. I gasp for air, but my lungs have tightened and seized and every breath I take is painful. I stare at the box, not seeing the cardboard or the white foam lining but the red mass that lays inside. The acid bile in my stomach gurgles and burns a scorching path up my throat. I clench my teeth and try to swallow it back. The tears come, but I can’t stop everything.
Distantly I can hear Sabrina talking, but I don’t know if she’s addressing me or someone else. It’s too much. The sound of her voice, the scream, the stench of rotted flesh, and my own putrid fear.
I draw down into myself trying to make myself small and unseen. I tuck my head to my chest and roll my knees up and let the panic drown me.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
JAKE
“Tell me what happened,” I demand. Sabrina is shaking in anger and fear while Natalie is rocking in a near catatonic state in a corner of the couch. I raced up here, having heard the screams even downstairs in my office.
“A package was delivered,” Sabrina repeats for the third time. She points to a cardboard box no bigger than a foot square. “Some guy in a white truck delivered this. She thought it might be a gift from Oliver. Who would do this?”
I pick up a pair of scissors discarded in the table and drag the flaps of the box downward. Inside is the body of a very small animal. Because it is so damaged it’s difficult for me to discern exactly what kind. Dog, cat, a rabbit? It is vivisected, and some of the internal organs are pushed out. Sabrina is weeping and Kaga, who was in my office at the time discussing the background checks of his new employees, leads her away. I let them go. I don’t have time now to be worried about the Kaga situation, because someone sent a dead animal to Natalie.
I approach her slowly. She doesn’t move. She’s somewhere lost in her own headspace. Bending down, I pick her up. Her limbs are clenched together and she doesn’t loosen them even as I carry her to the bedroom. Holding her with my right hand so that I don’t drop her, I grapple with the blankets, shoving them down awkwardly. I lower her gently and pull the covers over her. She doesn’t move or speak. I only know that she’s alive by the small rise and fall of her chest. Her skin feels cold and clammy to the touch.
I wonder about taking her upstairs to my room, but decide against it. When she wakes up she will want to be somewhere familiar. I’m not leaving her, so I text Kaga. He appears at the doorway about five minutes later. I can tell by the look on his face that he’s annoyed at being dragged away from Sabrina.
“I left the office door open. Can you shut that for me? I don’t want to leave her.” I motion toward the bed.
“No problem.”
“And send Mike up here. He’s the tall blond. Looks like a Viking.”
Kaga leaves and a few minutes later I hear Mike thundering up the stairs. Ordinarily I wouldn’t have anyone in Natalie’s space, but we need to be on this right away.
“This way,” I tell him, intercepting him at the top of the stairs. In the office, I show him the box. “Someone delivered this today. I want you to find out who the deliverer was, where the carcass came from, who paid for it. I want this information within the hour. I don’t care how many people you have to pull off existing jobs. This needs to be done now.”
“Want me to call the police?”
“No, not until we know what we’re going to find. Sometimes it’s best if we take care of it ourselves.”
He nods. The police knowing about this could be a hassle if I need to teach someone a lesson about messing with me and mine.
I dismiss him and return to the bedroom. The huddled shape underneath the covers has not changed. In the back of my head, I hear Oliver barking at me to call Natalie’s therapist. I’m not doing it. She doesn’t need sedation or therapy at this moment. She needs answers. I’m going to provide those to her. While we wait, though, I’m going to address her physical needs. Her body is going to be cramped and sore if she doesn’t loosen her muscles. I start by pulling gently on her legs drawn tight to her chest. After a few tugs, they give way.
I start rubbing them to get the circulation going. Everything is tight; even her feet are curled. I press my thumbs into the soles of her feet until her toes straighten, and then move up to her calves and the muscular thighs. Beneath my hands, I can feel her relaxing, inch by slow inch. It’s no hardship to touch her, but it breaks my heart that she’s nearly comatose because her safe place—my safe place for her—has been desecrated.
Whoever did this is going to pay for a very long time.
I roll her onto her stomach and stroke my hands down her lovely skin. She sighs, a hiccupy, sad sound.
“Shh, I’m here. No one can hurt you now.”
She seems to understand and better, even believe, as her body sinks into the mattress under my massage.
Mike comes up a half hour later, coughing slightly at the door. I cover her and walk out, shutting the door behind me.
“The delivery truck is from a private delivery service based out of Newark. Our security cameras picked up the license plate and had the background information already available. I talked to the driver, one Kelly Pierce. He is forty-two and has a drunk-and-disorderly charge from three years ago. Zachs is pulling the police report on that along with all his financials.”
“What’s the name of the delivery service?”
“The delivery service is Here Today, Gone Tomorrow. It delivers packages locally. This one was a fax order with a Western Union payment. They were directed to pick up a box from a pizzeria in the Financial District and then deliver it here.”
“What does Western Union want from us in order to get their videotapes?” Western Union, like most cash exchange places, records every transaction.
“The manager said nothing without a warrant.”
I rub my forehead. I do not want to get the police involved yet. “Is there anything that you have on the manager that you could use to leverage the information out of him?” Mike shakes his head. “We got nothing yet. Maybe in a day or two?”
I think quickly. Oliver would help even if it meant leaking the secret of his connection with Natalie. “Is he a Cobras fan?”
“Who isn’t?” Mike says quizzically.
“Go to the pizzeria and see why they are in the business of dealing with dead pets. In the meantime, I’ll go to Western Union. Which one?”
Mike gives me the address of one in Midtown on the East Side before he leaves. I find Kaga and Sabrina in the kitchen, looking slightly mussed and guilty, but I can’t summon a give-a-damn.