Chapter 8 · Dinner at the Lion's Den

The elevator opened into a kitchen.

Not a foyer. Not a hallway with art on the walls. A kitchen — white marble, copper pans hanging off an iron rail, a woman in a gray uniform sliding scallops onto two plates like it was any Tuesday and not the night I got bought.

"Ms. Vance." Marcus held the door with two fingers. "You'll eat."

"I'll do a lot of things. Eat isn't on the list."

"You're carrying my child on an empty stomach."

I walked past him. "I'm carrying my own stomach on an empty stomach. Different thing. A lawyer could explain it to you."

His mouth almost moved. That's as close as I got.

The place was a lie. Glass on three sides, the whole city stacked under my feet like I could lean down and knock it over. No photos. No mail on the counter. Nothing in it that said a human being slept here — except the smell. Cedar. Clean. Sharp. The same thing that had been on my pillow at six this morning, when I woke up in a hotel room with a stranger's arm across my ribs.

He took my coat.