Serial

58

New York, the present

Verna Pound had spent all her money in a deli. She’d had only enough for junk food displayed in the racks, and she tried to stretch it as far as possible. The dark-skinned woman behind the counter-maybe Indian or Middle Eastern-didn’t even bother with the extra three cents Verna owed her for the day-old cupcakes and apple turnover. She wanted Verna out of the deli as soon as possible. Not after making a big scene. Just out. Verna’s presence was bad for business.

On the way out, Verna used her body to conceal that she was stealing a plastic bottle of water. The dark-skinned woman might have said something behind her, but Verna didn’t stop to find out. There was a certain cost to doing business in some Manhattan neighborhoods. Besides, water shouldn’t be something a person had to steal.

Back out on the sidewalk, lugging the white plastic bag of what for her would be one of her better meals all week, she made her way toward Ben’s for Men’s. It was a low-tomedium-priced men’s clothing store with an entrance that was a dog-legged tunnel of display windows full of suits, coats, and various other men’s apparel. The shop was closed until tomorrow, so the windows were dark, but the deep and concealing shadowed tunnel was accessible. The recessed entranceway was one of the few places in the neighborhood where Verna could feel almost completely safe and relax.

Even though it was dusk and still fairly early, Verna was exhausted. But then, that was her usual state. She waited until no one seemed to be looking, then shuffled into the show-window tunnel, going in as far as she could but at the same time being careful not to touch the shop’s glass door. There would almost certainly be an alarm system.

Verna lowered her aching body and sat with her back against the brick surface beneath the display windows. She let out a long sigh, wondering if other people ever got this tired. The way she lived must be whittling away at her life, making her old though she was still in her thirties.

Someday…

No, Verna cautioned herself. Someday was today, and tomorrow didn’t look any brighter. Hope could be cruel. In her circumstances, it was better not to let hope through the door. If hope wanted to hang around outside and taunt her, let it. She knew that you couldn’t trust hope.

Hungry as well as tired, she wolfed down one of the chocolate cupcakes and gulped some water.

One of the shadows toward the front of the entranceway moved, startling her. It might have been simply someone walking past, back-lit by the faint glow from the street.

But she knew that wasn’t true. She was beyond the crook in the zigzag glass panels.

The shadow moved again, and a man appeared.

From where Verna was sprawled propped against the bricks beneath the glass and a display of blazers, he appeared tall. He was wearing dark clothing, probably black. A light jacket, even though the evening was warm. He was carrying a gym bag.

He obviously expected to find her there. Must have followed her and watched her enter beneath the Ben’s sign. Then he’d waited for the right moment to come to her. It was almost completely dark now, time for the monsters to come out and play.

Verna didn’t move but kept her eyes trained on the man. She didn’t think she knew him. He wasn’t one of the neighborhood street people.

Or did she know him? He did look vaguely familiar.

He stooped beside her and placed the gym bag nearby. He smiled at her, then unzipped the bag and reached inside. She saw no fingernails and realized he was wearing flesh-colored rubber gloves.

When his hand came out of the bag, it was holding a knife with a kind of blade she’d never seen before. It was short and curved, and looked sharp and wicked.

Verna knew that if she tried to scream she’d be dead or unconscious within seconds. She was too tired to scream, anyway. Too tired to resist.

“You know who I am?” the man asked, placing her plastic water bottle aside carefully so it was a safe distance away and wouldn’t spill.

“I read the papers,” Verna said, “even if they’re a few days old. I know who you are.”

He reached into the bag again. “I’m going to put some tape over your mouth,” he said. “It’s a precaution. Try not to be afraid.”

“You don’t have to do that. I’m not going to scream.”

Very quickly, using both hands yet somehow not nicking her with the knife, he applied the tape. When she raised a hand to peel it off, he grabbed her wrist, then taped both wrists together. He ran a long strand of tape around her waist and arms so she couldn’t raise her hands high enough to touch her lips. Her right leg moved reflexively to kick him, but he merely intercepted the feeble effort and pressed her knee to the tiles.

“You’re going to scream,” he told her. “But this way it won’t be out loud.” He mashed her knee hard against the concrete, sapping the strength out of her leg. Then he grinned. “By the way, it’s okay to be afraid now.”

Verna bowed her head and closed her eyes. This man didn’t know she was beyond certain kinds of fear. Over the past few years she’d learned to endure. That was her strength, to let whatever was going to happen simply roll over her and happen. Afterward she would assess the damage. Whatever was left of her soul and body, she would drag from the scene after the madness had passed.

And if there was to be no afterward… that would be a mercy.

The sharp smell of ammonia jolted her so her eyes flew open. She gagged and choked, her body heaving as the rectangle of duct tape blocked her screams. Her coughing seared her throat and made sounds like a dog trying and failing to bark. The man’s powerful hands held her still until the coughing stopped. She could handle this, she told herself. If only she kept calm, she could endure it and then it would be over. She concentrated and forced herself to breathe evenly through her nose. The sharp ammonia scent was still in the air, nauseating her.

The man gazed down at her as if he pitied her. He was so calm and looked so kind. He might have been an angel here to rescue her from everything her world had become. He was that, she told herself.

You might not know it, but you are my salvation.

Then she remembered. It had been a long time ago, in her muddled mind, but she remembered. This was the man who’d wanted to talk to her. By the church.

I know you! The cop! You’re the one who gave me the five dollars. You helped me!

Kindness meant a chance. If nothing else, a less painful passage into death.

She tried to beg with her eyes, feeling like a bad silentfilm actress but not caring. Hope was stronger than she’d thought. Stronger than she was.

He wasn’t a cop-that was for sure. Still, he’d given her the five dollars…

“It isn’t going to be easy for you,” he said.

Very methodically, he sliced away her clothes and then taped her legs tightly together.

You’re a friend! You helped me! Help me! Help me!

His betrayal was of a magnitude that crushed her.

Verna understood that she was not beyond pain.

She did somehow manage to hold panic at bay. The kind of mindlessness that would turn her into something less than human. She kept repeating to herself that this would pass. She tried to beg for mercy through the tape but couldn’t make more than a low humming sound, over and over.

“That’s my favorite tune,” the man said, as he used the knife on her.

At first he bent to his task casually, but his concentration grew and the blade bit deeper and deeper and established a repetitive rhythm.

She noticed through the pain and horror that gripped and gripped and gripped her that he’d somehow found the time to light a cigarette.