Promise (Debt Collector 7) Read online

  Text copyright © 2013 by Susan Kaye Quinn

  May 2013 Edition

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  Cover by Steven Novak

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  The Debt Collector Serial

  EPISODE 7 – Promise

  Contains mature content and themes.

  For YA-appropriate thrills, see Susan’s Mindjack series.

  Promise is approximately 15,000 words or 60 pages, and is the sixth of nine episodes in the first season of The Debt Collector serial. This dark and gritty future-noir is about a world where your life-worth is tabulated on the open market and going into debt risks a lot more than your credit rating.

  Summary

  What’s your life worth on the open market?

  A debt collector can tell you precisely.

  Lirium tries to keep his promise to Madam A to do transfers for her kids, but he is afraid Kolek will go after his mom.

  Recommend read first:

  EPISODES 1-3

  And

  EPISODES 4-6

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  The rough carpet scratches my face. The smell of the decaying fibers fills my nose, but I can’t find the energy to move from where I’m curled up on the floor. Madam A’s safe house is only a tiny closet of an apartment, but I didn’t even make it to the musty mattress in the corner. An image of Ophelia’s blood-soaked body swims in front of my eyes, whether I keep them open or squeeze them shut. The wracking sobs have ceased, but the carpet under my head is wet with tears I didn’t bother trying to stop. Now I’m just numb.

  The weight of what’s happened lays on me like an invisible blanket of concrete, trapping my body to the floor, but it doesn’t keep my thoughts from flying back to that room above the skeet den. I keep replaying the scene, trying to figure how it could have turned out differently. When did Valac decide not to kill me? Was it in the moment of the act, like when I made my decision about the boy? Or did he plan it out, figuring the best time to catch Nico and Larry off guard would be when they thought I was already dead?

  I still can’t figure out why or if it would have made a difference if I’d known. Maybe Ophelia wouldn’t have tried to take on Nico. Maybe all three of us could have worked together. Maybe no one had to die tonight.

  The maybes don’t bring them back.

  At least Valac seemed to find something at the end. Something more—or perhaps different—than the death he had tasted before. I pray that whatever he found on the other side was something good; not just because I’ll likely join him someday, but because he deserves better than that bloody end at the skeet den. Ophelia, too. I offer up a fervent prayer that she finds it. I add to the prayer an insistence that she sacrificed herself trying to save me and that has to count for something.

  I don’t know who I’m praying to. Or why anyone would listen, especially to me. Does prayer even work if you don’t have a soul?

  I take a breath. My tears have turned the moldy carpet even more pungent, and my nose itches. I lift my head away from the floor and rub my face. My hand lights up; the motion has activated my screen. I stare absently at it, then remember I’m supposed to call. I have to reach deep inside to muster the energy to tap in Madam A’s number.

  The phone answers in one ring. “Lirium?” It’s a woman’s voice.

  “I’m here.”

  The voice on the phone says something, but my hand falls away from my ear, my last bit of motivation gone. I leave my hand palm up on the carpet, and my head slumps to the floor as well.

  A wave of exhaustion sweeps over me, and I welcome the numbing of my brain as well as my body. Time passes but I don’t feel it, floating in the twilight between sleep and wakefulness. Bodies crowd at the edges of my mind. They’re covered in blood, but they don’t reach me. They lie inert, their long black hair joining with the blood to flow rivers that course around me. They enclose me, building pressure, rising like a wall, a life force energy well that’s deep with years and years, eons of time—

  Someone touches me.

  I jerk awake and lash out, grasping onto an arm. I almost start to drain, but pain lances through my hand, flaming to life the burn I got when I killed Nico.

  Someone speaks. “Lirium! It’s okay. It’s me, Grace.”

  I’m drugged with sleep and fight to open my eyes. Slow blinks work my eyelids free. A woman kneels next to me, her dark pants brushing my jacket. Her black hoodie blocks the naked light bulb above the door, and its light forms a halo around her. It takes me another few blinks to bring her face into focus. I recognize her eyes: dark brown, the ones that remind me too much of Apple Girl. The woman said her name. Grace. Madam A’s right-hand woman. The one I had sex with in the stairwell.

  I struggle to sit up, swallowing so that I can speak coherently. I only make it half-way, propped on my screen hand, when Grace lets out a curse and draws back.

  I must look pretty bad.

  She recovers and touches my shoulder. “Lirium! Are you shot?”

  I push her hand off. For some reason, I don’t want to be touched right now. “No, I’m fine.”

  “You’re not fine. You’re bleeding all over.” She pulls a phone from her pocket. “I’m going to call a doctor—”

  I put my hand over the face of her phone. “It’s not my blood.”

  She stares at me. Her finger hovers over the phone.

  I sit up the rest of the way. My trashy boy-toy outfit is a well of blackness, but the skin-tight tank beams white… where it’s not blotched black-red with Ophelia’s blood. There’s a lot of it, covering most of my front. If it was mine, I would be on the way to the morgue. I shrug off my leather jacket, and the eerie glow of its blue panels replaces the stark white light of the entrance bulb. The bloody tank tries to stick to my skin as I peel it off. I set it gently on the floor next to the jacket.

  “See?” I hold my hands away from my body, closed so she doesn’t see the burn on my palm. There are still a few smears of black-red on my chest, but they’re small. I wipe them away, insisting, “I’m fine.”

  She frowns at the piled clothes, but nods. She doesn’t ask whose blood it is, for which I’m grateful.

  Instead she says, “It’s a good thing I brought a change of clothes.” She springs up from kneeling next to me and fetches a bag that’s sitting next to the door. When I peer in the bag, it’s all swaddles of light-absorbing clothes, like hers.

  “We can’t keep you here.” Grace is all business again, now that she’s decided I’m not mortally wounded. “You may have been followed, and—”

  “I wasn’t followed.”

  She scowls. “We can’t take any chances. And I don’t want to leave behind any evidence you were here, just in case. We need to get you back to Madam A’s. She’s agreed to offer you sanctuary for now. Assuming you’re serious about keeping your promise?”

  I’ve been staring at my blood-soaked shirt on the floor while she speaks, but the word promise draws me back. “I’m keeping my word to Madam A.” I start to pull clothes out of the bag; I need to move. Not because I’ve been followed—I’m sure I’m the only one from Kolek’s mob who left that bar alive—but because I have to keep ahead of the concrete blanket of numbness that’s threatening to crush me. Hold me in place. Make me curl into a ball and never get up again until someone finds me and puts an end to the misery. I hav
e to keep moving for the same reason I had to leave that room above the skeet den in the first place: to do something worthwhile with the life that Valac and Ophelia both died to give me.

  I slowly work my way to standing. Grace watches as I sway slightly. Vertigo threatens to send me back to the floor, but I hold still, and it passes.

  I clutch the bag of clothes in my hands. “We can go as soon as I wash up. And I meant what I said about keeping my promise. I’d like to do it right away, if possible.”

  I glance at the window, where the streetlights are burning. It’s late; past midnight. Madam A’s kids are probably sleeping. I frown, but my head is too numb—I can’t decide if she would wake them for the transfers or not.

  “There’s no rush, Lirium,” Grace says. “The transfers can wait until morning. Until you’ve… had a chance to rest.” She’s still looking me over—for wounds, I think.

  “I’d rather not wait. There’s something else I need to take care of, once we’re done. It’s fairly urgent.” Actually, two something elses: I want to pay Candy Kane Thornton a visit. And possibly Dr. Brodsky. But most importantly, I need to find my mom. I’m not sure how long it will take Kolek to figure out why his prized debt collector and top henchmen haven’t returned.

  But I’m positive he will want me to pay for it.

  Grace nods and points to a battered door in the corner. “The bathroom’s in there.”

  I take careful steps so that I don’t trip over my own feet and end up on the floor again. I leave my blood-soaked clothes behind and hope that Grace will make them disappear before I’m done changing. It will be easier once you’re not wearing her blood, I tell myself. I don’t really believe it. Keep moving. One step at a time.

  It’s the only thing I can do.

  The streets are quiet and dark, plus our hoodies throw shadows on our faces that even the sizzling light of the streetlamps can’t fight. I don’t see a soul the whole way, although Grace keeps looking over her shoulder. She takes me into Madam A’s through a back door. The heavy steel closes behind us with a muffled thud, and Grace activates a side table lamp that barely illuminates the small apartment. It’s enough for us to see our way forward, and she wastes no time leading me to a door that opens to the main floor.

  The one with dying children in their hospital beds.

  Small bedside lamps are turned down low for the sleeping children, but they still cast fingers of amber light that reach into the blackness of the alcoves above. My eyes adjust to the dim glow of the erstwhile church, but we’re too far away to see the kids’ faces. Still, I search for Tilly’s. And her sister, Elena’s. When Annabelle came to visit me at Kolek’s, she said Elena was living here now, so it’s not unreasonable to think she might be at Tilly’s bedside—

  “Lirium!” Grace’s hushed insistence snaps my attention to her. She’s halfway up the stairs, wondering why I’m not following.

  “I’m ready to pay out now.” I gesture to the beds. “I don’t need to wait until morning.” I’m not sure either one is true, but I do need to make good on my promise as quickly as possible, so I can start the search for my mom. I’m not sure how I’m going to do that either.

  “It’s the middle of the night. Come on.” Grace beckons me from her station on the stairs. “Madam A will want to see you first, anyway.”

  I nod. It doesn’t take much to convince me: I’m too exhausted to argue. My eyelids are heavy with shock and fatigue, and I’ve had a slight shake in my hands that I’ve been trying to hide from Grace all the way over. I trudge up the steps. She waits until I catch up, then leads the way to Madam A’s office. The same one where I so boldly bargained to get into Kolek’s mob and rescue Ophelia.

  Ophelia.

  I miss a step at the top of the landing and grab the rail. I tell myself it’s just because of the dark, not that the shakes have progressed to messing with my coordination. Grace frowns, so I pretend it’s nothing and stride ahead, now that I know where we’re going.

  Madam A waits in her office, perched on the edge of her giant mahogany desk. I expect to see her dressed to the nines, and she doesn’t disappoint, glittering in a gold lamé gown that stretches up to her neck and down to her ankles.

  What I don’t expect is to see Apple Girl by her side.

  My feet stop walking, leaving me halfway across the room. I’m open-mouthed staring at Elena, who returns it with a look that’s cold, even in the warm, dim light coming from Madam A’s desk lamp.

  She knows. There’s no way she could be here, in Madam A’s office past midnight and not know that I used her dying sister as a bargaining chip to get into Kolek’s mob.

  “I… I can explain—”

  Elena breaks her glare and looks at her feet. She doesn’t want to hear it. And what could I say anyway? What explanation can I give for using Tilly to get what I want?

  “I’m very glad to see you alive, Lirium,” Madam A says.

  I manage to shut my mouth and force my gaze to Madam A’s dark, glittering eyes, which are inspecting me, as though she can read me like tea leaves.

  I let out a slow breath, still feeling the heat of Elena’s disapproval like an iron bar through my chest. “Thanks.” I direct my words to Madam A. “For the safe house. That… helped. But I’m back now, and I’m ready to do whatever transfers you need. The sooner the better. We can start with Tilly.”

  I can’t help but glance at Elena, whose gaze is on me again. I desperately hope my actions will make some kind of difference. That maybe she’ll see I’m not a monster. Or perhaps less of one than she thinks.

  She turns to Madam A. “It’s past midnight.”

  “It can wait until the morning,” Madam A says. “We have a place for you to stay—”

  “I can’t—” I stop, because my voice has pitched up, and I sound slightly crazed. “I would prefer we didn’t wait. I have other urgent business I have to attend to. Getting out of Kolek’s mob left… complications behind that I need to take care of.”

  “I see.” Madam A frowns. “We usually have the parents on hand for the transfers.”

  I look to Elena. I know her parents are dead, and she is all Tilly has. But her look has turned colder, and she’s crossed her arms.

  “He can pay out to Tilly tonight,” she says to Madam A. “Then he can be on his way for his urgent business.” The last words are poisoned darts aimed at me. They stab my chest, and I have to steel myself not to physically flinch.

  “We agreed to more than just one payout,” Madam A points out.

  “I know.” The weight of everything drags my shoulders down. I want to keep my promises, do all the transfers I agreed to and more, but I have to find my mom and keep her safe. “I’ll do whatever transfers you want now. But then I need to leave. I’ll… I’ll come back and do more for you. I could even sign on full-time, like you wanted before.” My hands are out now, pleading. “Please. I just need to take care of something first.”

  “If I were you,” Madam A says. “I wouldn’t be in such a hurry to show my face around the east side. I don’t know exactly what happened during your time in Kolek’s mob, but I doubt he will be happy to see you alive.”

  “No,” I say. “He definitely would prefer me dead.”

  She nods.

  “Look…” I wrestle in my mind with telling her about my mom, then swallow down my hesitation. “Kolek threatened to hurt my mother if I didn’t collect for him. And tonight, I… I…” Tonight I got Ophelia killed, as well as Valac, a collector I didn’t even know was a friend. Their blood is on my hands, and Kolek won’t forgive me any more than I can forgive myself.

  I stare at my hands. The burn mark is an aching reminder of the skeet den. The truth is I’m a killer who doesn’t deserve Elena’s approval, much less anyone’s trust. I look up. All three women—Grace, Elena, and Madam A—stare at me, waiting for me to speak.

  “Tonight, I killed two of Kolek’s men.” I force the words out. “I need to find my mother before Kolek does. That’s the busi
ness that won’t wait.”

  Elena shifts as she leans against the desk. I think maybe my plight has softened her. Or perhaps it’s just the low-light, combined with the pounding in my head, and the wishful thinking taking hold. Either way, it’s the truth. Or at least part of it.

  Madam A nods. “I see what you mean about complications. With Elena’s permission, you can pay out to Tilly before you leave. But once you go, Lirium, you’re not welcome back. At least not directly. I can offer you sanctuary here, but I can’t have you leading Kolek, and whatever feud you have with him, back to my doorstep.”

  “Of course.”

  “When you’re done with your business, you can use the safe house again. From there, we’ll decide if we can bring you back in.”

  “Thank you.” Relief makes my knees weak. “That’s very generous of you.”

  “I expect consideration in the form of future transfers.”

  “I’ll be happy to do them.” And I mean it. I have all the life energy I collected in the mob still inside me, and I would like nothing more than to spend the rest of my miserable existence hiding within Madam A’s cloistered walls and performing charity hits as penance for everything that’s gone before. I know Valac would approve. Even if it used me up in the end, he would think it was a worthwhile way to spend that life.

  Elena unlocks her arms and strides across the room. As she brushes past me, she says, “Come with me.” She is still angry. But then she has every right to be. I follow after her, my steps light. She has agreed to let me pay out.

  It’s a start.

  Tilly looks the same as I remember, curled up on her side, brown hair spilling across the pillow. She’s a miniature Elena, her face smooth and untroubled in sleep—the way Elena would look if she wasn’t scowling at me from the bed next to us.

  There are fewer small bodies in the beds of Madam A’s charity ward than when I was here two weeks ago. I swallow and try not to think about what that means.