Flash Point Read Free

enough.”
    “Chess?” the bald man said. “Not exactly a ratings grabber.”
    “She’s athletic.”
    “That’s not enough, by itself. Although the poverty might help. She’ll be willing to do anything.”
    “She’s clearly intelligent.”
    “But not pretty enough!”
    “I’m a bit worried about that defiant streak in her—although it could be an asset.”
    “Could also be a liability. If it’s us she gets defiant toward.”
    “Even then. Viewers might like it.”
    “I vote instead for the redhead with the great boobs.”
    “Alex, this isn’t the program you used to produce! Mark, what do you think?”
    The young man shrugged without looking up from his tablet. “I don’t care. I don’t know why I’m in on this meeting at all. My tech will work with whomever you pick.”
    The bald man said, “She has a likeable quality—I’ll give her that. Worth a screen test to see if it comes through on camera.”
    The woman said, “Shape that hair a bit, enhance the eyes . . .”
    The gray-haired man cleared his throat. The others immediately fell silent and turned toward him. “Take her,” he said. And that was that.

Two
    T HURSDAY
    AMY WALKED HOME to save the bus fare: 102 blocks.
The city in miniature
, she thought, and then snorted because the thought was so unoriginal. Even graffiti on the side of a crumbling building said TIMES BE TOUGH MAN . Like everyone didn’t already know.
    First the waterfront: idle rusting machinery that used to bustle with container ships coming and going. Empty warehouses on streets that she would never have dared walk after dark. A lot of the buildings had been colonized by homeless people, including the packs of abandoned children that roamed the city, begging and thieving. Farther on was a shopping area with half the stores boarded up—but at least that meant that the other half were open. Then uphill to an actual thriving neighborhood with pretty houses, flowerbeds, and heavy-duty electronic surveillance. The pretty houses gradually grew shabbier until Amy trudged past the kind of apartment houses where the “courtyard” was full of discarded syringes. More stores, becoming brighter and cleaner the farther she walked, until she passed a high brick wall topped with barbed wire. Back in there, she guessed, were houses for the rich—not that she would ever find out for sure. Then more houses, these subdivided into apartments, becoming seedier and cheaper until she reached her own.
    Two blocks before she got there, the bottoms of her feet ached so much that she sat for a moment on a crate left out for the trash. Since trash pickup was erratic at best, a crate could be there a very long time. Now, however, it was still solid and relatively clean and Amy sank down gratefully. At least with all that exercise she was no longer cold.
    A half-dressed girl ran out of the nearest house.
    The phantom that sliced into Amy’s mind was so sharp it brought her to her feet.
A baby rabbit, struggling to free itself from an iron trap around its leg, the cruel teeth cutting into the bloody flesh
. However, this girl was no baby. She was about Amy’s age, beautiful and wild-eyed, her bright red lips drawn back and her exposed breasts turning blue-veined with cold. A man dashed out after her, caught her easily, and pinned her arms to her sides. He began to drag her back inside.
    “Stop!” Amy cried before she knew she was going to say anything.
    The girl and man both looked at her, and it was the girl who spoke. “Mind your own business, slut!” She twisted in the man’s arms and snarled, “I said twenty, and I mean twenty!”
    “All right, all right!” He let her go and glared at her. They both walked back into the building.
    Well, I certainly misjudged that
. So why the rabbit in a trap? Were her phantoms becoming inaccurate? No—the images that leapt so unpredictably into her mind were always true. This particular rabbit was so deep into the trap that she didn’t even