The Silent Girl

doing; she could feel new strength in her muscles, new steel in her spine. No, she would not be kept away from her daughter. She would survive this night, the way Iris had survived these past two decades, because nothing mattered more to a mother than seeing her child again. She fought gravity, straining her back and neck to rise to a kneeling position.
    “Regina,” said Iris. “She is the blood in your veins. The breath in your lungs.” Her voice was hypnotic, her words a whispered chant that sent heat rushing through Jane’s limbs. Words spoken in the universal language that every mother understands.
    She is the blood in your veins. The breath in your lungs
.
    Get to your feet, Jane thought. Get those keys.
    She rocked forward on her knees, coiling her muscles, and sprang up. Landed on her feet, but only for a few tottering seconds before she lost her balance and fell forward, her kneecaps slamming onto concrete.
    “Again,” ordered Iris. No hint of sympathy in her voice. Was she as ruthless with her students? Was this the way real warriors were honed, without mercy, pushed beyond their limits?
    “The keys,” said Iris.
    Jane took a deep breath, tensed, and sprang up. Again she landed on her feet and wobbled, but the wall was right beside her. She propped her shoulder against it as she waited for the cramp in her calf to ease. “I’m up,” she said.
    “Get to the far corner. That’s where the door is.”
    Another hop, another wobble. She could do this. “Once we get free, we still have to get past him,” said Jane. “He has my gun.”
    “I don’t need a weapon.”
    “Oh, right. Ninjas just fly through the air.”
    “You don’t know anything about me. Or what I can do.”
    Jane hopped again, landing like a kangaroo. “Then tell me. Since we’re probably going to die, anyway. Are you the Monkey King?”
    “The Monkey King is a fable.”
    “It leaves behind real hair. It kills with a real sword. So who is it?”
    “Someone you want on your side, Detective.”
    “First I want to know who it is.”
    “He’s inside you and me. He’s inside everyone who believes in justice.”
    “That’s not an answer.”
    “It’s as much as I can tell you.”
    “I’m not talking mystical mumo jumbo,” Jane panted and hopped again. “I’m talking about something real, something I’ve actually seen. Something that saved my life.” She paused to catch her breath. And said quietly: “I just want to thank him—or her—for that. So if you know who it is, could you pass that message along?”
    Iris answered, just as softly: “It already knows.”
    Jane made one last hop and her forehead banged against a door. “I’m here.”
    “It’s hanging about the level of your head. Can you feel it?”
    Brushing her cheek against the wall, Jane felt metal suddenly bite into her skin. Heard the soft clink of the hanging keys. “Found it!”
    “Please don’t drop them.”
    Jane gripped the keys in her mouth and lifted the ring off the wall hook.
We’re going to do this. We’re going to beat them …
    The squeal of the opening door made her freeze. Lights blazed on, so bright that she shrank back, blinded, against the wall.
    “Well, this is a complication,” said a voice she recognized. Slowly she opened her eyes against the glare and saw Mark Mallory standing beside Patrick. It has always been the two of them, she thought. Hunting together. Killing together. And the bond that linked these men was Charlotte. Poor Charlotte, whose every interest, every activity, had introduced predators to their prey, turning something as innocent as a tennis meet or an orchestra performance into an opportunity for killers to glimpse and choose fresh faces.
    Mark grabbed the key ring and wrenched it from Jane’s mouth. Gave her a shove and sent her toppling to the floor. “Does anyone know she came here?”
    “We have to assume so,” said Patrick. “That’s why we need to get rid of her car. We should have done it hours ago, if only you’d gotten back sooner.”
    “I wanted to see if anyone would show up.”
    “No one came for her?”
    “Maybe the tracker’s broken.” He looked at Iris. “Or maybe no one cares about her. I waited for four hours, and not a soul turned up.”
    “Well, someone’s going to be coming for
this
one,” said Patrick, looking down at Jane.
    “Where’s her cell phone?”
    Patrick handed it to Mark. “What are you going to do?”
    “It looks like her last text message was to her