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“I’m coming.” She shuffled the envelope to the front of her pile as she walked in front of Bishop. “My building, thank you very much. I can call my own elevator.”
She punched the button. The elevator came quickly, and the doors opened.
“Then you should walk faster.” He snagged the Chinese food menu she had mentally labeled for the recycling bin. “This might come in handy if I keep hanging in these parts.”
That was a nice thought—him hanging around, making himself at home—and Ella grinned as they walked inside the elevator. “If you insist. One day, we can talk about how animals are treated.” She tore the envelope open and pulled out the homemade card. As she opened it, something struck her as wrong. Homemade? Her mom didn’t do homemade. “And thereareethical options, free… range…”
Confetti scattered to the ground.
Not confetti.Dime-sized cutoutsof her faceinterspersed with circular cutouts of graphically mutilated animals. Her stomach dropped as she jumped back. “Oh, God.”
“What the…” Bishop dropped forward as she pushed back to the elevator wall, letting it catch her.
Vomit teased the back of her throat, and watery acid coated her tongue. There was so much violence and blood captured in the bite-size photos scattered on the floor. Ella’s weak grip slipped from the railing, and she slumped, her weak knees propped against the wall. “It’s… that’smemixed in there.”
When she leaned closer, she saw that the eyes had been poked from each of her pictures.
“I’m going to be sick.” Surrounded by the grotesque images, she couldn’t understand why her eyes had been gouged out, why there was such depravity, or why people had done such horrific things and taken the time for pictures. She collapsed, bile slushing in her stomach.
Eyes closed, crying maybe, hyperventilating for sure, Ella felt Bishop’s powerful arms scooping her off the floor as the elevator stopped. He pressed the Stop Elevator button so the door would stay open, then he took off. Down the hall they went, him cradling her to his chest. She hadn’t been sick, but her entire body had gone numb, except for the tears. They flowed freely. “Where were my eyes? And why was there so much blood?”
He didn’t answer. At her door, he dropped to his knee, supporting her against the wall, still hugging her to his chest as he went through her purse. With her keys in hand, he unlocked the door, turned off the alarm, and moved through her unit before placing her on the couch. “Ella, I’ll be back in two minutes. Don’t answer the door for anyone but me.”