And maybe I’ll see you around, Lieutenant.”
“Nice to see you, Mia,” said Dr. McCarthy.
Gray grunted an indecipherable response, then added, “Don’t forget your monkey tea.”
A simple “thank you” would have sufficed. She turned with a sigh and started walking toward the cement steps. “It’s monkey-picked oolong,” she muttered under her breath as she retrieved her mug. She placed one foot on the landing before pausing and turning back toward Gray. “You have my card, Lieutenant,” she said.
“Yes.” He didn’t bother looking up from whatever object on the ground was holding his attention.
Mia nodded. “Good.”
She paused when she heard the quick successive clicks of a camera. Up at the top of the embankment, reporters were waiting for her. Mia turned her back to them. “Hey, Lieutenant?”
He glanced in her direction. “Yes?”
“You’ll want to be careful what you say to them.” She pointed to the media. “Valentine won’t take kindly to hearing about a copycat.”
She proceeded away from the scene and ignored the reporters who nearly tackled her when she reached street level. By then uneasiness had settled in her gut. She couldn’t place its origin. All she knew was that she couldn’t shake the feeling that something very bad might have just happened, and that she’d failed to recognize it.
Mia couldn’t hide in the bathroom stall forever. She knew that. Someone would inevitably come looking for her, slipping beneath the stall door to find her perched on the back of the toilet like a queen on some perverse throne, her high heels wobbling on the seat, her fists clutching at the fabric of her gown to keep it from falling into the chemical-blue water.
Just the guest of honor having another anxiety attack. Nothing strange about that.
Thirty minutes until dinner. Mia propped her head up on the heel of her palms, resting her elbows on her knees, and tried not to think about the crowd. Her doctors assured her she was making progress and that her difficulty processing information wouldn’t last forever. Progress was slow. Tonight there would be swirls of colors and smells and noises that confused her senses, and she doubted she was equipped to manage this. Not yet.
Mia closed her eyes and focused on her breath, trying to resurrect the calm she’d felt on those few occasions she’d actually made it to yoga class. These days peace and solitude were indulgences that she could enjoy in only small doses before those around her became alarmed. The key was to find that sweet spot between enjoying much-needed isolation and triggering a minor manhunt. Everyone was always so concerned, and she found it exhausting. She winced when people spoke to her in ellipses. How are you holding up, Mia? You know, considering....
Was it any wonder she needed to hide?
Somewhere to the left, a toilet flushed. Mia opened her silver clutch to check her watch. The hotel ballroom was right down the hall. She could wait here for twenty-six more minutes and still have time to make the dinner.
A group of women came chattering into the restroom. It would be only a matter of time before someone curious fidgeted with the stall door, found it locked and started to wonder why she couldn’t see feet when she peered underneath. Time’s up.
Mia eased herself to the floor. She exited the stall and saw the line beginning to form. She took care washing her hands, singing “Happy Birthday” to herself twice while lathering, and then entered the fray.
The ballroom was so much louder than the muffled bliss of the women’s restroom, and her senses were instantly assaulted by a wash of colors, conversations and smells. She hovered by the back of the room, starting when someone pressed a cold glass into her hand.
“I thought you’d made a run for it.” Mark flashed his own tumbler and raised it to his lips. “Drink up. You’ll feel better.”
She doubted that very much but did as instructed. She cringed at the burn of the liquid. “Rum and Coke?”
“Diet Coke. Finish it. It’ll put some hair on your chest.”
“Not the look I was going for.” She lowered the glass to her waist, happy to at least have something besides her clutch to hold on to. Being empty-handed felt so awkward.
Mark issued a shrug that told her she could suit herself. Then he leaned forward until his breath was in her ear. “I know this isn’t easy for you. But you should at least pretend you’re enjoying yourself. Do it for Lena.”
Her gut still tensed at the mention of her sister. “Are you trying to motivate me, or make me feel guilty?”
He straightened. “Whatever works at this point. You can’t hide in the bathroom. You’re a guest of honor, and it’s undignified. People here are excited about your triumphant return to the spotlight.”
“I’ve never sought the spotlight,” she said wryly.
“But the spotlight sure found you, Dr. Perez.”
Mark Lewis would know about minor celebrity. He’d sought and found it as a young entrepreneur. Now he was a millionaire many times over, and his construction company, Eminence Corp, was poised to break ground on what would become the city’s tallest skyscraper. He lived in a penthouse at the Ritz-Carlton next to some of Boston’s athletic heroes, and he had standing invitations to the most exclusive events in the area.
All of it fascinated Mia, who had less than no desire to actually live such a life. Growing up the daughter of a father who taught high school and a mother who sold an occasional painting, she hadn’t learned a thing about high-fashion designers, crystal or silver. His was a foreign lifestyle. But since Lena’s murder, she and Mark each understood what the other felt in a way almost no one else in the world could. They’d each lost one of the people they’d loved the most, because before she’d vanished, Mark and Lena had been engaged.
Mia smoothed a clammy palm down the front of her dress before remembering how much it had cost her. Wouldn’t Lena have loved to see her older sister in a designer gown? Mia must have selected the garment in a weak moment, because when she’d put it on that evening, she’d been appalled to see how the dress she’d convinced herself was tasteful and modest was actually quite sexy. The shimmering steel-blue fabric clung to places her other clothes normally smoothed over, and the slit up the left side was much higher than she’d appreciated at first. She took another sip of her drink, and her face puckered again.
“You look beautiful,” said Mark. “Try to enjoy yourself.”
“I am enjoying myself.”
“And I’m Santa Claus.” With a flick of his wrist, he lifted the drink from her hand and helped himself to a generous gulp. “What can I give you that you’ll actually drink? I need to get you from completely frozen to thawed around the edges before your speech begins.”
She smiled. Mark wasn’t one of the people who spoke in ellipses, and she’d always appreciated that about him. She touched him lightly on the arm. “I’ll get my own drink. Can I get you a seltzer water?”
His
