Lien-hua and I crept through the walkway and entered the filtration facility. The series of pathways that meandered around and between the filtration towers and foam fractionators were lit only by the dim operating lights high above us and a few amber bulbs attached sporadically to the walls. The air hummed with the low murmur of the motors pumping, filtering, cleansing the millions of gallons of water needed for this aquarium.
A few scattered signs pointed to the animal husbandry area, the Seven Deadly Seas purification station, the water management center, and a number of other behind-the-scene locations. But other than that, the paths fingered out all around us into a gloomy maze.
The area really was creepy, just like Maria had said.
As we rounded the third tower, I heard movement behind one of the water storage tanks about eight meters ahead of us.
Maria said no one ever goes down here.
“Stop,” I said. “Put your hands in the air.”
Footsteps.
I raised my gun.
“I said stop right there.”
Then someone rounded the corner; I raised my weapon and eyed down the barrel.
At Tessa.
“Don’t shoot!” she screamed. “What are you doing aiming a gun at my head?”
I swung the gun to my side. My heart slamming, my hand shaking. “Tessa? What are you doing down here?”
“I got turned around.”
I reholstered my gun. “How could you get turned around? This area is off limits.”
Her voice was jittery, I assumed because of the gun. “I was just looking for the little girls’ room.”
As if I believed that.
“This place sure is spooky, huh?” she said.
To my left, Lien-hua pushed an exit door open. Blinding sunlight swept through the chamber. “Pat. C’mere.”
I glared at Tessa and corralled her over toward Lien-hua.
Outside the door, a road ran past a pair of rusty dumpsters on the way to the food service’s main delivery platform another forty meters or so farther down the building. “The delivery road,” Lien-hua said. “If he dragged her down the steps, he could have had a car waiting back here and never would have had to drive past the guard station.”
I saw something small on the floor beside the exit.
A dart.
I bent to inspect it and heard Tessa shuffle up to me. “Step back, Raven.”
“Is she dead? Is Cassandra dead?” I glanced at Tessa and saw that her face was flushed. I heard her snap the rubber band against her wrist.
“See?” I could feel my anger rising. “This is why I don’t want you to come along on these things. And would you stop it already with the rubber band thing?”
Snap. “She’s dead, isn’t she?”
“We don’t know where she is,” I said sternly. “We don’t know what happened to her. I almost shot you, do you hear me?”
“That would have really sucked.”
“Yes. It would have.” I handed Lien-hua my cell phone. “I’m taking Tessa upstairs; can you take some photos? The dart. The exit.
The pathways.” Lien-hua accepted the phone, and I took Tessa’s arm and led her through the palely lit passageway and back up the stairs.
I could feel my gun, uncomfortably weighty in my shoulder holster.
I was furious at Tessa.
Furious, because I loved her.
But mostly I was terrified, because I’d just seen my stepdaughter’s face at the end of a gun barrel while my finger was pressing against the trigger.
Maria greeted us at the top of the stairs with an anxious, perplexed expression. “Where did she come from?”
“I got turned around,” said Tessa innocently.
“Maria,” I said, “can you please lead this young lady to the front counter?”
Tessa stared at me with fierce independence, but I also saw a shade of fear. “Stop yelling at me. OK? I didn’t know where I was.”
“I told you not to wander off.” Tessa shouldn’t have been down there, but I still hated myself for yelling, for making her afraid.
That was the last thing I wanted to do. Images of the slaughterhouse flashed past me. That tangle of anger and fury. Rising, rolling, coursing through me.
I noticed Lien-hua ascending the stairs but addressed Tessa, “I’ll deal with you in a minute.” She just shook her head and walked off with Maria.
Resting a gentle hand on my shoulder, Lien-hua spoke softly, just loud enough for me to hear. “Are you OK, Pat?”
“Yes. I’m fine.” I took a slow breath. “I’m OK.”
She let it be at that. “So, good news. While I was downstairs taking the pictures, I got a call from the water control center. All the water tests are clear, no human blood. Nothing on video either.
Cassandra wasn’t fed to any of the sharks.”
“The drag marks support that conclusion too,” I said.
“I’ll let the police know about the drag marks, have them search the filtration area. Make absolutely certain no one is down there.
Maybe they’ll be able to get some prints off the exit door.”
“I need to check on a couple things in Cassandra’s office, then I’ll meet you by the entrance.”
Without another word, she left, and I picked up my computer bag and returned to Cassandra’s office. I’d had an idea earlier, while searching through her files.
This morning I’d suggested that Aina look for a return address on Hunter’s envelopes. Well, maybe we didn’t have a return address on an envelope, but we might have one on an email.