The Colour of Death Read Free Page B

who tried to escape were killed and buried under there.”
    “Who says the slave trade’s been abolished?’ Jordache muttered wearily.  “The sleazeballs promise the girls money and a better life, then lock ’em up, take their passports, get them addicted to drugs and force them into the sex industry.”  He sighed.  “Christ, the girls are little older than my two daughters.  They all got out OK?”
    “Yep.”
    “The Russians?”
    “They’re being taken down to the station for processing.  Two are badly burned but they’ll live.”
    “That’s too bad.”  Jordache watched an unconscious, blackened figure being moved to the ambulance on a gurney.  “Is that her?  Is that their mystery savior?”
    A nod.  “The girls are calling her their guardian angel.”
    “Avenging angel more like.  I heard she appeared out of nowhere with an axe and busted them out.”
    “That’s what they say.  The Russians confirm their story and claim she was alone.  They assumed she was police.”
    “Police?  She’s not one of ours.”
    “She doesn’t belong to anybody so far as we can gather.  No agency knows anything about her:  who she is, where she comes from, what she was doing here, or how she even knew the girls were down there.  She’s got no ID on her, just a silver locket round her neck.”
    “A real mystery, huh?”  Jordache watched the medics load her onto the ambulance and slam the doors shut.  As it pulled out and the siren wailed into life he climbed back in his car.  “Finish up here, Danny, I’m going to learn a bit more about our friend.”
    Twenty minutes later Jordache found himself in the emergency room of Portland General Hospital, standing in front of a fiercely protective intern who was refusing to let him get beyond the green curtain screening the mystery woman.
    “I need to ask her some questions, Doc.”
    “She’s not speaking to anyone,” the woman replied.  “Not till we’ve checked her out.”
    “Help.”  The cry from behind the curtain was so raw it didn’t sound human.  The doctor swiveled and pulled back the screen.  The woman on the bed was sitting up, a blackened arm propped against the wall, the other pointing at an empty gurney to her right.  “Help him,” she rasped from her smoke-ravaged throat.  The whites of her terrified eyes looked huge and unnaturally bright against her blackened face.
    “What’s wrong?” the doctor said, rushing to her side.  “Help who?”
    The young woman collapsed back on the bed, arms falling by her side.  “The man with the knife in his chest.  Can’t you see the blood?  Do something.  He’s dying.”
    Jordache looked at the empty gurney.  “There’s no one there,” said the doctor.
    The young woman shook her head, dazed.  Despite the soot and grime, she had an ethereal, otherworldly beauty.  “What’s happening to me?” she whispered to no one in particular.
    The doctor shone a light into her eyes and examined her head.  “You’re hallucinating.  You experienced a trauma above the left temple.  The bullet only grazed your skull but you were unconscious and are still in shock.  The detective tells me you’ve been to hell and back.”
    Jordache moved closer and noticed how luminous her eyes were.  Her clothes were plain and simple, possibly homemade:  cotton top, loose jacket and dark denim trousers.  The only distinctive thing she wore was the silver locket round her neck.  He could see a catch on the side and wondered what it contained.  Who was this girl?  How had she known about the girls in the basement?  And where had she found the courage to go down there alone, armed only with an axe?  When she saw him looking at her locket she clutched it to her chest like her life depended on it.  He smiled.  “My name’s Detective Karl Jordache.  I’m here to help you.  Can I ask you some questions?”
    “Not now—” the doctor started to say.
    The young woman rested a blackened hand on