Page 31 of The Lovely and the Lost

“Wades like to talk.” The shopkeeper’s tone reminded me that Mac had said that most people in Hunter’s Point didn’t care much for his kind. “And they like to drink.”

We waited for Bella’s mom to reply, but she didn’t.

“Talking and drinking doesn’t preclude the possibility that they could be telling the truth.” Free never had trouble inserting herself into conversations. She rocked back on her heels slightly, her eyes eagle-sharp. “Hasanyone else gone missing?”

I thought back to what Gabriel had said, his face moonlit and his tone impossible to decode.Around here, people go missing all the time.

Our trip to town was supposed to be a distraction, but all I could think, looking between the shopkeeper and Bella’s mom, was that what Saskia and I had done, the evidence we’d found—it wasn’t enough.

I needed to move. I couldn’t bring myself to walk past Bella’s mother, so instead of leaving the store, I stalked toward the back wall.Pull it together, Kira. This wasn’tmytragedy. I wasn’t Bella. The shell of a woman in the doorway wasn’t my mother.

For all I knew, my mother hadn’t looked for me at all.

I focused on the sound of my own breathing. I fixed my eyes on a point in front of me—and immediately wished that I hadn’t. Sitting on the shelf, there was a large metal trap, the kind that didn’t concern itself with being humane.

Meat smell. Food. Girl crouches, hunched on all fours.I shook, but couldn’t fight it—and suddenly, I didn’t want to.Girl knows which berries to eat now, which berries not to, but this…this…

Meat smells good.

She creeps closer, her eyes stinging, her hands aching to reach out, to bury themselves in the meat.

Eat it.

Eat it before someone can take it away.

A rustling sound stops her. She freezes, her head whipping around.Wolf.She remembers the word. But words don’t matter. Nothing matters but the creature stalking towardhermeat.

She darts forward, and the animal’s hackles rise. It snaps its jaws, and Girl falls, scrambles backward.

Watches the wolf turn its attention from her to the meat.

Watches the wolf step forward.

Thunk.The sound is sudden, bone-crunching. The wolf snarls and fights and bleeds, but it can’t escape. The monster has it.

The monster almost had Girl.

The first thing I heard when I came back to myself was the sound of the shop door opening. I smelled fresh air and dirt.

Meat.The memory lingered longer than it should have, vivid enough that my nostrils flared.

“Mr. Ferris.” It took me a moment to place the voice behind me as its owner greeted the shopkeeper and then continued, “Mrs. Anthony, I thought I might find you here.”

I turned. There was nothing particularly aggressive in the sheriff’s posture.

I still shifted to put my back to the wall.

“Please don’t tell me to go back to the hotel, Sheriff.” Bella’s mother’s voice was muted. “I can’t just sit around waiting for updates. You can’t expect me to.”

The sheriff placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. “The FBI is sending a team to join the investigation. The rangers are calling in reinforcements. I assure you, ma’am, we are doing everything we possibly—”

“I’d like access to all your missing persons reports for the past five years.” Mrs. Anthony was quiet but forceful. “I appreciate what you and your men are doing, but for my own peace of mind, Sheriff, I need to see those reports.”

There is no peace,I found myself thinking as I wound my way back toward the two of them—and toward Free and Jude.The human mind is not a peaceful place.

“You need to go back to your husband, Angela. Keep your phones charged. The feds will want to talk to you both.”

Something about the sheriff’s too-gentle tone hit me like a rusted knife to the gut. I knew what it was like to be handled with kid gloves, to be treated like avictiminstead of aperson.