Left To Die

As they descended the stairs, dipping beneath a dank, stone overpass, the area became less illuminated. There were far fewer people around now.

“We are here,” said the man, his French markedly improved all of a sudden.

Marion glanced at him, then noticed something odd. The man noticed her gaze and then gave an apologetic shrug. He dropped the blanket. A small, toy baby—the type that would cry with their bellies pushed—was strapped to the man’s forearm. The baby’s plastic eyes peered out at Marion.

The man winked. “I told you he likes the shade.”

Marion wrinkled her brow in pleasant confusion.

A moment too late, she saw the surgeon’s scalpel in the man’s left hand. Then he shoved her, hard, the plastic doll crying quietly in the night.

CHAPTER THREE

Adele stood before the stone steps of the school, eyeing the crowd of children with the greatest of suspicion. She shook her head once, then glanced up at her mother. Her gaze didn’t have to travel far; already, Adele was taller than most of her classmates. She had hit a growth spurt when she still lived in Germany, with the Sergeant, and it hadn’t seemed to stop until this year.

Now fifteen, Adele found the boys in Paris paid more attention to her than the ones in Germany had. Still, as she stood studying the flow of students into the bilingual secondary school, she couldn’t help but feel a jolt of anxiety.

“What is it, my Cara?” her mother asked, smiling sweetly at her daughter.

Adele wrinkled her nose at the nickname, wiping her hands over the front of her school sweater and twisting the buttons on the cotton sleeves. Her mother had grown up in France, and had particular fondness for the Carambar caramels which were still popular in candy shops and gas stations. She often said the jokes written on the outside of the caramel’s wrappers were a lot like Adele: clever on the outside with a soft and sweet middle. The description made Adele gag.

Adele Sharp had her mother’s hair and good looks, but she often thought she had her father’s eyes and outlook.

“They are so noisy,” Adele replied in French, the words slow and clumsy on her tongue. The first twelve years of her life had been spent in Germany; re-acclimating to French was taking some time.

“They are children, my Cara. They are supposed to be noisy; you should try it.”

Adele frowned, shaking her head. The Sergeant had never approved of noisy children. Noise provided only distraction. It was the tool of fools and sluggish thinkers.

“It is the best school in Paris,” said her mother, reaching out a cool hand to cup her daughter’s cheek. “Give it a try, hmm?”

“Why can’t I homeschool like last year?”

“Because it is not good for you to stay trapped in that apartment with me—no, no.” Her mother clicked her tongue, making a tsking sound. “This is not good for you. You enjoyed swimming at your old school, didn’t you? Well, there is an excellent team here. I spoke with my friend Anna, and she says her daughter made tryouts the first year.”

Adele shrugged with a shoulder, smiling with one side of her mouth. She sighed and then dipped her head, trying not to stand out over the other children so much.

Her mother gave her a kiss on the cheek, which Adele returned halfheartedly. She turned to leave, hefting her school bag over one shoulder. As she trudged toward the school, the sound of the bell and milling children faded. The secondary school flashed and the walls turned gray.

Adele shook her head, confused. She turned back toward the curb. “Mother?” she said, her voice shaky. She was now in the park at night.

“Cara,” voices whispered around her from the looming, dark trees.

She stared. Twenty-two years old. It had all ended at twenty-two.

Her mother lay on the side of the bike trail, in the grass, bleeding, bleeding, bleeding…

Always bleeding.

Her dead eyes peered up at her daughter. Adele was no longer twenty-two. Now she was twenty-three, joining the DGSI, working her first case—the death of her mother. Then she was twenty-six, working for the FBI. Then thirty-two.

Tick-tock. Bleeding.

Elise Romei was missing three fingers on each hand; her eyes had been pierced. Cuts laced up and down her cheeks in curious, beautiful patterns as if gouged into felt, glistening red.

Tick-tock. Adele screamed as the blood pooled around her mother, filling the bike trail, flooding the grass and the dirt, threatening to consume her, to overwhelm her…

Adele jerked awake, gasping, her teeth clenched around the edge of her blanket, biting hard to stop the scream bubbling in her throat.

She sat there in her bed, in her and Angus’s small apartment, staring across the darkened room, breathing rapidly. It was all right; it was over. She was fine.

She reached out, groping for the comforting warmth of Angus, but her fingertips brushed only cool sheets. Then she remembered the previous night.