Rain City Lights by Marissa Harrison

Author:Marissa Harrison [Harrison, Marissa]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pine City Press

Chapter Twenty

After their fight, Birdie never came home. Monti had returned to First Avenue, hoping to find her and fearing the worst. That her mother had actually left for good.

Standing next to a street clock, its beige face marked with Roman numerals and its hands frozen with neglect, Monti shivered, wrapping her new, black leather jacket around her body. Scuzzo had given it to her, and she’d agreed to work. Underneath she wore a tight pantsuit with a halter top from Birdie’s closet, canary yellow with the pants rolled high to capris because they’d been too short.

The Market sign’s red light made the street, which was slick with melted snow, glow orange. Every girl looking to date stood at her favorite corner, hovering over a square of pavement while her eyes bored into the windows of each car passing by.

A silver Lincoln pulled to the curb.

Monti jumped in and put her head down near the driver’s lap. They drove away from the Market, up Third and stopped outside of the Ethelton Hotel. Monti thought of the girl Evie who’d been taken from her room, and found later with her face so pulverized it looked like carcass meat. For all she knew, this middle-aged, clean-cut guy with black hair and a mustache could be the Headbanger Hunter. But she was out of choices. What hope did a sixteen-year-old girl without a high school diploma have of making any real money, enough to keep a roof?

“I need half,” she said to the man. He handed her a wad of bills.

“I want everything,” he said. “A good blow and a better lay.”

Monti swallowed over the lump in her throat.

“Okay,” she said.

The man reached behind his back. Her heart pounded, and her instincts signaled danger. She looked around the car for some type of weapon, a screwdriver or jumper cables or an empty pop can. She pictured her quickest escape and found the door handle. But he’d already locked it with the automatic feature. He reached for her, with something silver in his hand. A knife? She lifted a foot, ready to smash his nose into his mustache and scrap with her last ounce of strength when he said,

“Police! Show me your hands!”

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