Under the Stars

I move her to the side, pushing her in the direction of our friend. “Joshua, keep an eye on her.” Then I’m running down the hall, taking the short flight of stairs at the bottom.

Just as I round the corner, I’m body-slammed by the woman I’ve been panicking over for the last half hour.

“Mark!” Lara grabs my arms. Joshua’s gray blazer is over her body, but she’s still in her costume. “We’ve got to hurry! Gavin, Molly—”

“I saw them. Gavin got away, but I left Molly with Joshua.”

We hurry up the steps and then the hall. Lara leans heavily on my arm, trying not to fall as she runs in needle-thin heels.

Outside, the entire alley is empty.

It’s quiet and damp, like we’ve stepped into another world.

“What…” I look all around. “Where did they go?”

“Where is she?” Lara’s voice is a gasp. “We’ve got to find her. She’s determined to finish this.”

The noise of sirens growing louder tells me we don’t have time to figure it out in this location. Cops will be flooding into this place in less than two minutes, and the last thing we need is for Lara to be implicated in an underground sex-trafficking ring. She’s dressed for the part, and it would take too long to explain.

“Come on.” I pull Lara to me, and we run down the alley, searching for another passage to the street. Digging in my jacket pocket, I pull out her phone. “Text Joshua. See if he’ll respond.”

I stop when we round a corner, and she rips off the pink wig followed quickly by the stocking cap

over her dark hair. They fall to the ground, and her dark hair spills in waves around her shoulders. Still, her face is garishly made up, and she’s only wearing panties under that blazer.

“I need to get some clothes,” she says.

Looking back over my shoulder, I realize we left the plastic bag with her jeans and sweater in the alley behind the dumpster.

“That place is swarming with cops by now.”

“Good. I hope they arrest every one of those men.” Her jaw is tight. “I only wish they knew everything.”

“Hang on.” We step into the alley again, and I pull off my jacket and my shirt. Handing them to her, I pull off my white tank and hold it out as she hands me back my clothes. “At least you’ll have a shirt.”

“Panties and your undershirt.” She shakes her head. “Thigh high fishnets and stilettos. I still look like a hooker.”

“First souvenir shop we pass, I’ll grab you a Seattle sweatshirt.” We’re still breathless, making our way up the sidewalk toward Joshua’s apartment. Lara leans heavily on my arm, doing her best to stay upright in those shoes.

“Joshua hasn’t texted me back,” she says, looking at her phone.

“What do you think?”

“We could go to Montage…” Her blue eyes meet mine, and I nod.

“Here.”

We step into a small drugstore, and Lara opts for black leggings and flip flops instead of a sweatshirt. It’s not ideal, but we’re moving faster now.

Two more blocks, two corners, another street, and we reach the club. It’s lit up like a rave, and music blares from inside every time the door opens. A crowd of club kids congregates on the street and into the alley like every other night. The scent of pot is thick around them, and as far as they know, nothing happens outside these four corners. It reminds me of theater life in New Orleans.

“I know where he is,” she says, darting out ahead of me.

I lunge behind her, grabbing her arm. “Stop. You can’t charge in there. We don’t know if he’s armed—”

“Molly is in there!” Her blue eyes are wide.

“Let me go first.”