Girls of Glass

by Brianna Labuskes

  Alice knew the answer, could read it in the set of Zeke’s shoulders, the reluctance of the words, the disgust that pulled at the bridge of his nose. “No,” she said with barely any voice behind it.

  He heard her, though. Shaking his head, his eyes not leaving hers, Zeke repeated the simple word that said far too much.

  “No.”

  “Did you know?” Alice asked, but she could read the answer on Nakamura’s face.

  His lips pinched downward. “Of course not.”

  “Come on,” Alice said. She’d known, she had. But there was something about it being confirmed out loud that set her blood on fire. It was rage—fierce and hot and ugly—that poured through her now. The helplessness she felt in the face of Sterling Burke’s power only threw gasoline on the flames. “There’re always rumors, right? You’re telling me this family? This family got away with something like that without anyone knowing?”

  He slapped a hand against the mint-green tile that lined the wall outside the interrogation room. “No. Jesus. Do you think I wouldn’t have done something?”

  “You know what? I don’t know what to think.” Alice threw her arms out. “This town is so far up his ass, it’s unbelievable. We can’t even get a warrant, and you want me to think you would have, what, moseyed up to his house? Knocked on his door like a good little Boy Scout?”

  “We’re not all like that,” Nakamura bit off. “This town’s not all like that.”

  “Get me a fucking warrant and maybe I’ll believe you,” Alice said. “Bring that asshole in here. None of that ‘Can we have a minute of your day, sir?’ I want him handcuffed to that table.”

  “You know what? I get it.” Nakamura pushed off the wall, got in her space a little. She held her ground. “I get that you’re pissed. But getting irrational isn’t going to help the situation.”

  And, no. “Irrational? You think I’m overreacting? My emotions getting a bit much for me to handle?”

  Emotional. Erratic.

  “I think this case is a lot,” Nakamura said, pitching his voice low. “And I think you haven’t slept in days. You’re running on stubbornness and black coffee right now, and cuffing the city’s most prominent judge to an interrogation table without cause is irrational. The fact that you can’t see that is telling enough.”

  Her fingers curled, begging to hit him. She wanted to hear bones crack, and she didn’t even care whose they would be.

  It was scary, the way she felt right now. Wild, angry, and as emotional as they always said she was. The control she had on the wildfire gathering in her chest was tenuous at best. She knew she needed to get out of this situation, but she couldn’t quite make herself walk away.

  Instead, she pushed him. Hard. So that he wasn’t looming over her anymore, and when he stepped back, she followed. She pushed him again, and then again and once more until his back was up against the wall.

  “Don’t you ever talk to me like that again,” Alice said, her voice calm. His eyes were dark and steady. “Sterling Burke is a child molester and a rapist. And you’re telling me I don’t have cause.”

  “You don’t even know that,” Nakamura said. “They’re rumors, Alice. You have nothing even confirmed.”

  Her brain was foggy, and it took the words too long to make sense. “What?”

  Nakamura didn’t try to get around her, didn’t try to get her out of his space. He just watched her with a calm expression. “All of that stuff? It’s based on rumors and unfounded allegations.”

  Her lungs heaved, struggling to keep up with her breathing. “Please. You know it’s true. If there are rumors like that going around, it’s true.”

  “No . . . that’s not . . . You can’t say that,” Nakamura said. “You’re not thinking straight.”

  She wasn’t. She didn’t even know why it had set her off, except that everything seemed so fragile and raw these days.

  “Alice, you can’t charge based on rumors,” Nakamura said, and she hated him for being rational. “You know that.”

  “We don’t need to charge him.”

  “What do you mean?” he asked.

  “We need a warrant and we need him in here,” Alice said, frustration eating at her stomach lining. “Show me you’re better than I think you are right now.”

  Nakamura’s lip tightened. “You know what this looks like.”

  “It looks like a child molester’s granddaughter turned up dead.” She knew that’s not what he meant, though. “Connect the puzzle pieces.”

  “No.” Nakamura shook his head, still calm. “You know what this looks like. It looks like Charlotte snapped after she found out her daughter was going through the same abuse as she had. You want me to pull my head out of his ass? Pull yours out of your own.”

  It was too much. She stepped away, her hand dropping to her side.

  “Stop being the woman who lost a child, and start being a cop,” Nakamura said, and it was the harshness of it, coming from him, that broke her.

  She was on him, her hand a hard edge against his windpipe. He was larger and stronger, but she had rage coursing through her, and he wasn’t struggling anyway.

  There was something in his eyes that looked like satisfaction. Like he’d wanted to push her off the ledge so that she would finally fall.

  She moved back again, releasing him. His hand came up instinctively to his throat, rubbed there. “Fuck off,” she said.

  “What does it look like, Alice?”

  “It wasn’t Charlotte,” she said.

  “You don’t think it’s Charlotte because you don’t want it to be Charlotte,” Nakamura said. “You have to stop investigating Lila’s murder.”

  “I’m not,” Alice said, and for once she felt on solid ground. “I know who killed Lila. I don’t need to investigate it.”

  Nakamura shook his head. “You’re still investigating it.”

  There would probably be a bruise where her fingers had dug into his neck, and he still said it. Maybe he did have enough backbone to actually get her the warrant after all.

  “I have to go.”

  “Where are we going?” Nakamura asked.

  “No,” she said. “Just me. I have to go.”

  He looked at her. Don’t do anything stupid. He didn’t say it. He didn’t have to.

  She ducked her head, turning toward the exit. “Get me my warrant. And we need to talk to Sterling Burke.”

  Not waiting for an answer, she headed down the hallway toward the exit and reached into her pocket for her phone.

  She opened a new message. Her fingers were shaky as she typed.

  Meet in 10?

  The response was almost instantaneous.

  Where?

  Alice texted an address, pausing only for a second on the station’s back stairs to do so.

  It was time for damage control.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  TRUDY

  July 19, 2018

  Ten days before the kidnapping

  The Burkes’ summer party was the invite of the season. Hollis was meticulous in planning it, with no detail left untouched.

  Mellie had selected Trudy’s outfit for the day, a light pink thing that was reminiscent of one she’d worn when she was five. If Mellie was trying to convey purity, she would have to pull out more than just a high-necked sheath dress.

  The pearls were a step too far. They were the collar Southern ladies locked around their own necks as if they were a badge of honor. Trudy had little interest in playing those games. She left them on the dresser where Mellie had laid them.

  It was midday by the time Trudy made her way down the long curving staircase. Her fingers dragged against the polished wood, the smudges from the oil on the tips marring its gleaming perfection.

  Guests were being routed to the back gardens where the tents blocked the worst of the sun. Air-cooling units set up in the corners did their best to battle the humidity, but there was only so much they could do.

  After nabbing a glass of champagne from a
passing waiter, Trudy wove her way toward the little crab cakes stacked high on one of the cocktail tables. She washed the expensive meat down with a swig of the wine, and the bubbles were sharp against her tongue, coating her throat in sugar.

  The flute was yanked from her hand before she could take another sip.

  “Trudy. Absolutely not.” Hollis’s voice was drenched in censure but pitched low so no one would overhear. “At least pretend you are not misplaced trailer trash for one day. I think even you can handle that.”

  Trudy turned and walked away without answering her grandmother, without even looking at her. Finding another waiter would be easy. Disappearing into the crowd even easier. Hollis would be distracted by some tiny flaw that would itch at the back of her neck until it was fixed.

  Mellie, meanwhile, was at least halfway to sloshed herself, pressed up as she was against an uncomfortable businessman in a seersucker suit.

  Sterling sometimes watched Trudy at parties like this, his eyes on her skin, her hair, her shoulders. Others probably saw a devoted grandfather. She’d learned to stick to the shadows.

  But today he would be somewhere cozied up with the legions of ass-kissers who were gagging for the smallest crumb of attention.

  That left only Charlotte to deal with.

  Her aunt was nursing some pretty lemonade concoction out of a mason jar, and Trudy would bet good money there wasn’t even a whiff of alcohol in the drink. Ever the perfect lady in public, that was Charlotte.

  She was in a light blue wraparound dress that played into her strengths, her hair slicked back into a low chignon with not a single strand out of place, her makeup subtle, highlighting her sharp cheekbones and downplaying the slight slope to her eyes that, with a smoky shadow, could turn her wide gaze into a sleepy bedroom invitation.

  From the outside, Trudy knew most people thought Charlotte was the favorite.

  It was curious how so often people saw only the surface of one another. They filled in the blanks they didn’t know or couldn’t understand with preconceived notions that had no grounding in reality. They thought Charlotte was the beloved, perfect daughter because that’s what she presented to the world. And nobody questioned why a twenty-four-year-old unmarried woman with a five-year-old daughter still lived with her parents.

  No, for them it simply made sense that Charlotte was the heir apparent in the social dynasty that was the Burke family. She was sleek and controlled where Mellie was messy and wild. Her hostessing skills were second only to Hollis’s, and she had an innate way about her that made others feel relaxed in her company. Grace, some people might call it.

  Charlotte was Hollis, but prettier, nicer, and with a warmth the older woman could never understand.

  And that’s why Hollis hated her.

  It had taken a long time for Trudy to realize it. There had always been little barbs directed at all the women in the Burke family beneath Hollis’s reign of terror. When Trudy had been younger, she’d assumed it was just how families talked to each other. Everything from subtle put-downs to vicious hostility.

  Then Trudy slowly began to realize it wasn’t normal. The constant barrage of corrections and veiled insults toward first Charlotte and then Trudy were the manifestation of the ugliness of her grandmother’s soul.

  Mellie, for the most part, was immune. Only in recent months when Ruby, sweet baby Ruby, became the newest target of Hollis’s rage did Trudy start to wonder why that was.

  Her brain circled the truth, shrinking back when it touched the deep, pulsing darkness that awaited her there. Sterling had never paid attention to Mellie.

  Charlotte glanced up as if she could hear Trudy’s thoughts, as if there were a line of silk thread between them, pulling her aunt’s attention.

  It would have made sense for the venom that was directed at them to bond the two, but it hadn’t. Instead, it had turned them mean against each other. Well, it had turned Trudy mean. Charlotte was much too good a person for that kind of behavior. It had turned her icy instead.

  Trudy blinked first, and when she broke the moment, Charlotte moved away.

  “Look at you.” The deep, booming voice surprised her enough that she didn’t back away in time to avoid the dry lips that landed just a bit too close to the corner of her mouth. The dodge did nothing to deter the older man they were attached to, who was still invading her personal space.

  “Mr. Cooper,” Trudy murmured, stepping out of the circle of his arms. He was her grandfather’s age, but the years had not been as kind to him as they had been to Sterling. The thick shock of white hair was the only saving grace to draw attention away from the rolls under his chin and the craggy deep orange skin that he absolutely thought made him look younger.

  “You’ve grown up well, girl,” he said, slicking his tongue along his bottom lip before taking a deep sip of his drink.

  “Not quite yet,” she reminded him.

  “If you’ll excuse us, Mr. Cooper.” Charlotte came up behind Trudy, her arm going around Trudy’s shoulder. Her fingers dug into the bones there, but Trudy hid her wince. “I have to borrow my niece.”

  Cooper smacked his mouth but didn’t put up a fight. “Of course, of course, ladies.”

  Despite the relief coursing through Trudy as Charlotte directed her away from the man, she bristled. She’d never been particularly good with gratitude. “I don’t need you to protect me,” she said instead of “Thank you.”

  Charlotte’s body stiffened against hers. If she had Trudy’s personality, she would have lashed out with a thin whip of emotion. But she had no actual backbone, so she simply dropped her arm and stepped away.

  “I didn’t do it because I don’t think you can take care of yourself, Trudy,” Charlotte said, only a bit of the exasperation on her face seeping into her voice. They were in public, after all. “I know what it’s like, though.”

  And wasn’t that the crux of the problem? They both knew too well what it was like.

  “Well, you can take that savior complex of yours and shove it up your tight ass. Do you think it will fit?”

  Charlotte’s eyelids slipped closed, her cheeks pale despite the heat of the day, and Trudy wondered if her fingers itched to slap Trudy right across the face. The smack might make them both feel better. It would relieve some of the guilt Trudy had for the need that throbbed within her to make her aunt hurt. To slice at her skin with jagged words, to try to make marks on a psyche that was already thick with scar tissue.

  It would make Charlotte feel better, too. Because that control she employed with such a steady hand was killing her. The energy she dumped into making sure she kept all the pain and grief and anger and pettiness and sadness bottled up was slowly draining the life from her body. Soon, she would be left with nothing.

  One way or another, it would break her.

  But Charlotte was Charlotte. Instead of her fingers leaving angry red imprints on Trudy’s cheeks, they turned into themselves. Trudy could almost feel the way those nails dug into her palms.

  “Be more careful next time” was all Charlotte finally said when she opened her eyes.

  “Because it’s my fault some creepy guy cornered me?”

  “In this world? Yes,” Charlotte said, her eyes locked on Trudy’s, and something that felt like dismayed understanding fluttered between them.

  “Wow.” Trudy turned away, breaking the moment. “You always manage to live down to my worst expectations for you, dear Charlie.”

  She stepped away but hesitated when Charlotte puffed out a small breath of air. “Right back atcha, babe.”

  It was so quiet that Trudy wondered if Charlotte had even meant for her to hear. She glanced back over her shoulder and smirked, for once impressed with her aunt. Then she turned to grab a half-drunk glass of champagne from the nearest table, not caring that there was already red lipstick on the rim.

  She needed oblivion and she needed it immediately.

  Two days after the summer party, Charlotte dragged Trudy and Ruby to the mall t
o buy replacement panty hose for ones she’d ripped.

  They were in the food court when a man in a stained wifebeater brushed against Trudy’s arm. He left behind a layer of sweat and body odor so pungent that it cut through the thick Cinnabon scent that clung to the air around them.

  “Why are we even here?” Trudy asked Charlotte again, to be obnoxious. There was something inherently cheap and disgusting about being in a mall that made Trudy want to scrub her skin clean of other people’s sadness.

  “You could have stayed in the car,” Charlotte said in the same measured way she’d answered the past five times Trudy had complained.

  “But we gotta get ice cream.” Ruby hung off her mother’s hand, and Charlotte spared her a distracted smile as she navigated them all toward the department store at the end of the building.

  “Trudy, can you get the ice cream and meet us?” Charlotte asked.

  “Cash.” Trudy held out her hand.

  Charlotte shot her a look but started digging in her Louis Vuitton. “You could put it on your card.”

  “Like Hollis wouldn’t ask what I was doing in a mall?”

  There was a reluctance in handing over the ten-dollar bill Trudy knew too well, but she was unsympathetic as she snatched the crisp paper out of her aunt’s fingers to tuck underneath her bra strap.

  “Panty hose section” was all Charlotte said as she turned and pulled Ruby behind her.

  “’Nilla, Dee-Dee,” Ruby called. “With sprinkles.”

  Trudy made little finger guns at her to signal she’d heard, then tried not to breathe too deeply as she navigated the grease-laden air of the food court. There was a pimple begging to break through one of her pores just from the secondhand contact.

  She flirted with the teenage boy who was scooping the ice cream and lingered in the warmth of his admiration. He had pretty green eyes and a mostly forgettable face, which made it easy to concentrate on the approval in his gaze instead of any actual interest on her part.

  Eventually, the ice cream in Ruby’s cup slipped over the side of the flimsy cardboard container, the melted sweetness sticky against the inside of her finger. She licked at the edges to contain the damage as she made her way toward where Charlotte had disappeared.