New York to Dallas

sandwich. “Sorry about dinner, but I guess you’ve learned not to make the lady of the house mad. She’s got a temper, that one.”
    “Please, please, please. Wait!” No good, no good, nothing she could do to stop him. “Please, just tell me where I am. Just tell me, are we still in Dallas or—”
    “Dallas is the whole point. Be back soon.”
    He left the lights blazing. Melinda dropped her head on her updrawn knees, let out a keening wail for the child whose life would be forever scarred if McQueen had his way.
    She rocked, she wept, she finally released the screams burning her throat until, exhausted, she lay curled on the floor of the horrible room.
    She let her eyes track it now, let herself see where she was. A rectangle of walls, floor, ceiling, the single window barred and screened. Even if she could reach it, she’d need a tool of some sort to hack at the screening. No table, no chair, just a blanket tossed on the floor.
    And four sets of shackles fixed to the walls.
    He didn’t mean for her to stay alone.
    God, God, give her the strength to help whoever he brought in here. To help the children survive, to help her find a way to save them.
    Help her save their hearts and minds. It’s what she’d trained and studied for. And Bree, she had to trust that Bree would do the rest.
    If they were still in Dallas, as he’d said, there was a chance, a good chance. Bree would never give up, never let up. And she was smart, canny, tireless. A cop through and through, Melinda told herself. She’d started to become one the day they’d been saved.
    The moment Officer Eve Dallas had opened the door to that awful room in New York, Bree had set her path, and had followed it without detour.
    To protect and serve, Melinda thought as she closed her eyes, the victims, the abused, the marks, the shattered. And she’d used the career of the cop who’d saved them as her template. Setting the goal high, that was Bree. That was . . .
    She shoved up to sit, eyes open.
    Dallas was the whole point. Eve Dallas?
    Was it all just about revenge after all?

     
    Eve paced in front of her board , juggling the details, making patterns, taking them apart, reforming them. She constantly checked the time.
    It hadn’t been that long, not really, since they’d picked up Civet in New York. Pressuring solid information out of a dealer with his record and experience took finesse, effort, sweat.
    But why the hell hadn’t they pressured anything out of him?
    She stepped to the connecting door where Roarke worked three comps, muttering at all of them, in his search for McQueen’s accounts.
    “Maybe you could holo me in to New York, into Interview.”
    He paused, rolling his shoulders as he sat back to study her. “If that’s what you want, we can set it up.”
    “If I’m there it adds weight, and maybe I can hit him from another angle.”
    He said nothing for a moment, only watched her.
    “And completely screw up their rhythm,” she said. “Undermine their progress and fuck Peabody’s confidence to hell. I know what you’re thinking because I’m thinking it, too. But waiting here, it’s . . .”
    “Hard. Waiting is hard, and frustrating, even when you know it’s what you have to do. Maybe especially then.”
    He’d know, she thought. A cop’s spouse knew every layer of waiting. “Does it piss you off, too?”
    “More than a little at times.”
    “There’s nothing else for me to do tonight. Nothing else to dig at. All I can do is keep going over and over what we have, and fucking wait for somebody else to give me more.”
    “Then take a break, let it settle awhile. I’ll give you more on my area when I get it.”
    She retreated, got more coffee.
    She circled the board, told herself they had every area covered that could be.
    She checked the time.
     
     
    While Eve circled and studied, Darlie Morgansten tried on the most icy jacket ever. It was pink, her favorite color, and had sparkles all over the collar. Completely vid star.
    It also cost more than three months’ allowance, and since she’d already spent most of this month’s on a too totally mag purse, and last month’s plus on stuff she couldn’t quite remember but wanted so abso-complete, she was awesome short.
    Still, she modeled and admired herself in the mirror, ignoring the watchful eye of the salesclerk who’d given her and Simka, her best friend since ever, the eyeball treatment since they’d walked in.
    “Darl, you have to get it. It’s,