Manhattan Is My Beat (Rune 1)

"Please, Rune," the marshal said.

Beneath her feet, through the grating, the train eased into the station, brakes squealing.

Choose!

Come on, you've gotta trust somebody....

She bolted toward Dixon, ran to his side. He put his arm around her. "It's okay," he said. "You'll be all right."

She blurted out, "There's a man after me. In the alley." And saw a car pulling up at the curb beside them.

The bum turned the corner. He stopped cold as Dixon drew that huge black gun of his.

"Shit," the bum said, holding up his hands. "Hey, man, I'm sorry. I just wanted her purse. No big deal. I'm just going to--"

Dixon fired once. The bullet slammed into the bum's chest. He flew backward.

"Jesus!" Rune cried. "What'd you do that for?"

"He saw my face," Phillip said matter-of-factly, lifting the suitcase and purse away from Rune.

From the car that had just driven up, a woman's voice said to Dixon, "Come on, Haarte, you're standing right out here in broad daylight. There could be cops any minute. Let's go!"

Rune stared at the woman; it was Emily. And the car she was driving was the green Pontiac that had tried to run her and the other witness down at Mr. Kelly's apartment.

Wrong place, wrong time...

Phillip--or Haarte--opened the back door of the Pontiac. He shoved Rune inside, tossed her purse and suitcase into the trunk. Haarte got into the backseat with Rune.

"Where to?" Emily asked.

"Better make it my place," he answered calmly. "It's the one with the basement. Quieter, you know."

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Lost in a forest.

Hansel and Gretel.

Rune stared at the ceiling and wondered what time it was.

Thinking how fast she'd lost track of the hours.

Just like she'd lost track of her life over the past few days.

It reminded her of the time she was a little girl, visiting some relatives with her parents in rural Ohio. She'd wandered away from a picnic in a small state forest. Strolling for hours through the park, thinking she knew where she was going, where her family's picnic bench was. A little confused maybe but, with a child's confidence and preoccupation, never even considering that she was lost. Never knowing that hours had passed and she was miles away from her frantic family.

Now she knew how lost she was. And she knew, too, how impossible it was to get home again.

Welcome to reality, Richard would've told her.

The room was tiny. A storeroom in the cellar. It had only one window, a small one she couldn't possibly reach, barred with twisty bars of wrought iron. Part of the concrete floor was missing. The dirt beneath was overturned. When Haarte had shoved her into the room she'd noticed that right away: the dug-up dirt. She told herself it was just because he was doing some work down there. Replacing pipes, putting in a new concrete floor.

But she knew it was a grave.

Rune lay on her back and looked at the cold streetlight coming through the unreachable window.

Back-street light.