Page 34 of Lure

“Eleanor is dead?” She was already pushing up on her elbows despite the harrowed look on her face. “You said she was dead. I didn’t imagine that?”

The lost note in her voice made me want to assure her it was all a bad dream. Except it wasn’t…

“No,” Bones answered her in a firm, if even tone. “You didn’t. But you also passed out so let’s take it easy, shall we? Then we can go over more of what happened, compare notes—that’s what a real debriefing should be.”

The really weird thing about the whole argument, he wasn’t wrong. Grace wanted to be involved, and she should be. It was her life. Shielding her seemed as natural as breathing. Goblin was already moving over to rest his chin on the sofa next to her and she lifted a hand to pet him, though Voodoo didn’t abandon his position.

“What does she need?” Bones directed the question to Voodoo.

“Electrolytes. Water.” He studied her and raised his brows. “And do you have any history of fainting or low blood pressure we need to know about?”

Fuck. Medical issues. I looked at Lunchbox but he already had a hand up like, hang on. He had it. How badly had we fucked this whole thing up?

“No, and no. Water is fine.” She was already sitting up. I really didn’t like how ashen-faced she was. Based on Voodoo’s nearness, neither did he.

“We can call Doc later,” I said, and yes, I was calling whether they agreed or not. “If anything else comes up, we can take her to see him.”

We had others we could use—like the guy at the clinic. The Network allowed us lots of resources. Doc, however, was one of us. Him we trusted.

“I’ll be fine,” she said to me, still petting Goblin. “I Just—I can’t believe Eleanor is dead.”

“I’m sorry,” I told her.

“Me too.” The sadness in those eyes cut me. But she didn’t embrace the sympathy or the sadness, she focused on Bones and raised her chin. “What do you need to know?”

“Everything.” He wasn’t wrong. “Every single detail and start with at least a week before you were supposed to meet your sister.”

“Why a week?” It wasn’t a denial from her, just curiosity. Lunchbox motioned to the door and I lifted my chin. He was going to get her fluids.

“To make sure we don’t miss anything,” I answered for Bones. Because taking her and her sister hadn’t been an impulse. The more info she gave me, the better chance I had of teasing the data out of surveillancesomewhere.

Yes, I liked this plan.

“Bones is right,” I said. “We need to know everything and I need my tablet…”

Chapter

Thirteen

GRACE

Recounting everything that happened took way longer than I imagined. Then it became a series of explanations and questions until they knew what I did. Maybe. Who knew, since they kept discovering new questions to ask. Despite fresh coffee and all the water with electrolytes they kept pressing on me, I still had a sore throat.

Bones had a pen up on awhiteboardof all things, and he’d drawn an actual time line and began to link events. Any places I had gaps because I couldn’t think of something and they added a question mark.

Next to the whiteboard, there was a screen with information scrolling on it—including video surveillance and images from security cameras in various areas. How Alphabet kept finding them so swiftly puzzled me, but the questions kept coming and it kept me from focusing too much.

“There,” Lunchbox said, his voice slicing across mine and I swallowed the rest of the answer. He was pointing at something on the screen—no, he was pointing at someone. Alphabetzoomed in. The more he blew it up the blurrier it got so he backed off a little. “Him.”

“What about him?” I asked before anyone else said anything. I leaned forward to stare at the screen. Where were they? Oh, it was the Met Gala. Eleanor had gotten me a ticket cause I’d always wanted to go. She would rather put her feet up and do her crossword puzzles while binging the latest season of…

Pain spasmed around my heart. I’d just found out she was gone and instead of actually grieving, I was what? I folded my arms and tried to focus on the screen again. Thinking about Eleanor hurt.

“He’s in a couple of the other surveillance images we were looking at,” Lunchbox said, then slanted a look at Alphabet. “Can you run one of those—” He waved his hand in the air.

“Forensic software to compare the facial features with others in the image captures?” The desert dry tone pulled a real if reluctant smile from me. “Find me the other clips where you saw him…”

“Why are you looking at images from the Met Gala?” That wasn’t recent. At least not in the window of time they’d given me.

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