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“Good. Give me one.” And because of his alarmed look (he’s such a dear): “Just in case.”

He smiles at that and singsongs, “Where are you going, my little one, little one?”

“It doesn’t matter. Don’t concern yourself. I’ll be back by noon at the latest.”

“All right. Here is your pill. Be careful with it.”

She kisses the corner of his mouth, then gives him an impulsive hug to boot. She loves him, and she realizes that this mess is really her mess. If not for her, Roddy would have just gone on fulminating, spending his retirement writing responses in his various journals (journals he sometimes throws across the room in disgust). Certainly he never would have published anything about the benefits of eating human flesh; he was smart enough (then) to know what such ideas would do to his reputation. “They’d call me Modest Proposal Harris,” he grumbled once. (He’d read the Jonathan Swift essay at her urging.) It was she who had moved him—them—from the theoretical to the practical, and she had the perfect test case: the spic who had dared cross her about the Poetry Workshop. Eating that queerboy’s supposedly talented brains had been a pleasure.

And it did help, she tells herself. It really did. It helped both of us.

Holly’s purse is on the living room coffee table, along with the hat she’d been wearing. Emily jams the hat on her own head and roots through the purse, past all the jumble of Holly’s on-the-move life (including masks and cigarettes—the ironic juxtaposition doesn’t escape Emily), and comes up with what looks like an entry card of some sort. She pockets it. The woman’s gun, the one she hurt Em’s wrist with, is on the mantel.

Gibney’s phone is long gone, but Emily made sure to comb through it before removing the SIM card and then putting it in the microwave for good measure. Access was easy enough; all Em had to do was apply the unconscious woman’s fingerprint to the screen, and once again, when opening location services in the privacy settings. She saw the last two places Gibney visited before coming here were her office and her home. Emily doesn’t dare go back to the apartment building in broad daylight, but she thinks the office is a better bet, because the troublesome woman actually spent quite a bit of time there.

Gibney has (soon it will be had) a partner named Pete Huntley, but when Emily finds Huntley on Facebook, she discovers a wonderfully fortuitous thing. He doesn’t post much himself, but the comments and messages tell Emily all she needs to know: he’s got Covid. He was at home, and now he’s in the hospital. The last comment, posted only an hour ago, is from someone named Isabelle Jaynes and reads, Tomorrow you’ll be back home and on your feet in a week or two! Get Well, you Grumpy Old… and then an emoji of a bear.

If Gibney is working for the elf’s mother, she may have taken time to write a report. If so, and if that’s the only artifact—other than Gibney herself, and she’ll soon be nothing but wet clumps in a plastic disposal bag—and if Emily can get the hard copy… or delete it from Gibney’s computer…

It’s a long shot, but one well worth taking. Meanwhile, their prisoner will be getting thirstier and more willing to talk. Maybe even craving a cigarette, Emily thinks, and smiles. This is a desperate situation, but she’s never felt more alive. And at least it’s taken her mind off her back. She starts to leave, then re-thinks that. She takes an Elf Parfait from the refrigerator—gray, with red swirls—and gobbles it.

Tasty!

The thing about human flesh, she’s discovered, is that you start off curious. Then you get to liking it. Eventually you get to love it, and one day you can’t get enough.

Instead of going out the kitchen door to get to the garage, she takes the long way around so she can speak to Roddy again. “Repeat what I told you.”

He does. Letter-perfect.

“Don’t go down there, Roddy. That’s the most important thing. Not until I get back.”

“Buddy system,” he says.

“That’s right, buddy system.” And she walks down the driveway to get the Subaru.

10

Besides her thirst, her pounding headache, and more other pains than she cares to count, Holly is scared. She’s been close to death on other occasions, but never any closer than this. She understands they’re going to kill her no matter what, and it won’t be long. As they say in the old film noir movies Holly is so fond of, she knows too much.

She’s not entirely sure what the big metal box is on the far side of the basement but suspects it might be a woodchipper. The hose goes through the wall and into whatever is on the other side of the small door in the workshop area. That’s how they get rid of them, she thinks. Whatever’s left of them. God only knows how they’d got their disposal unit down here.

She looks at the pegboard on the far wall and sees two items there that aren’t tools. One is a bike helmet. Next to it is a backpack. Holly’s knees weaken at the sight of them, and she sits down on the futon, gasping a little at the pain in her ribs. The futon moves a little. She sees the edge of something beneath it. She lifts the futon to see what it is.

11

Barbara has a key to Holly’s apartment but no gate-opener, so she parks on the street, goes down the ramp, and ducks under the bar. Right away she sees something she doesn’t like. Holly’s car is there, but it’s parked close to the ramp, and both of Holly’s assigned spaces—one for her, one for a guest—are much further in. And another thing: the left front tire is over the yellow line and intruding on the next parking space. Holly would never park that way. She’d take one look, then get back in her car and make the adjustment.

Maybe she was in a hurry.

Maybe so, but her own spaces are closer to the elevator and the stairs. It’s the stairs Barbara takes, because you need a swipe card for the elevator and she doesn’t have one. She goes up at a trot, more anxious than ever. On Holly’s floor she uses her key, opens the door, and pokes her head in.

“Holly? Are you here?”

No answer. Barbara checks the place quickly, almost running from room to room. Everything is in its place and everything is neat as a pin—bed made, kitchen counters free of crumbs and spills, bathroom spotless. The only thing Barbara notices is the lingering smell of cigarette smoke, and even that’s faint. There are aromatherapy candles in every room, and the only ashtray is in the dish drainer, clean as a whistle. It looks good. Fine, in fact.

But the car.

The car bothers her. In the wrong space, and sloppily parked.