Simon Says_. Walk (Kate Morgan #6)(20)
Author: Dale Mayer

He nodded. “It’s a heavy flow, too heavy.”

 

“If she was with a john, could it have been a rough encounter?” she asked. “For lack of a better word.”

 

He nodded. “She has had sex, forcible sex, recently,” he concurred. “So quite possibly we’re seeing the end result of a rough rape.”

 

She turned to Rodney, standing beside her. “And the pimp doesn’t consider it rape because he owns her,” she said in a hard voice.

 

“We don’t know much at this point,” Rodney reminded her, “that it even was him. He was pretty damn confused too.”

 

“That’s true,” she agreed, thinking of Stone’s response. “Anyway …” She looked over at the doctor and sighed with a heavy heart. “Call social services, and we’ll get started on checking her history. Someone has to be missing her, and she needs care, and she needs somebody—outside of the pimp—to give it to her.”

 

“We’re on it,” the doc replied, as he turned and walked back to the patient. Then he called out, “Good thing you brought her in. She probably wouldn’t have lasted another forty-eight hours out there.” And, with that, he disappeared behind the curtain again.

 

Back at the registration desk, Kate quickly handed over her details and contact information, requesting a call for any change with the patient, also looking for any ID on the patient as well. If they came up with anything, they were to let her know. If the patient woke up, they were to let her know.

 

With that, she turned around and headed toward the parking lot.

 

*

 

Simon’s voice slammed into the phone, even though he tried hard to modulate it. “What’s wrong?” After a long moment of dead silence on the other end, he winced. “Okay, let me try that again,” he said in a slightly calmer voice. “I got a message that something was wrong. And I guess, after last time, I’m feeling a little sensitive.”

 

Kate’s snort on the other end made him grin. She’s the only person he knew who could communicate so much with just a sniff. Sometimes it came across as a huge whiff or a sneeze, and sometimes it was a simple curt snort, but always she got her point across. “In other words, you’re fine, I hope.”

 

“I’m fine,” she replied, but her voice was low, modulated, as if she might be fine, but something did happen.

 

“You want to tell me what’s going on?”

 

She gave him a rundown about a teenager they’d found, when talking to a pimp. The story didn’t surprise Simon, but it saddened him. “So she’s in the hospital right now?”

 

“Yes, and they’re supposed to let me know when, … if … she wakes up. She wouldn’t have survived another forty-eight hours if she’d stayed where she was,” she murmured. “Of course that makes me feel even worse.”

 

“Why?” he asked. “You didn’t have anything to do with this.”

 

“No, it wasn’t me, but, at the same time, what a nasty-ass world we live in that this is how you treat another person. All he had to do was get her help. And yet it was too much for him.”

 

“The only reason he gave her to you now is because she would cost him if any of the other girls got sick, which would also drop them, and he’d be out of his daily income. Most of these pimps—now I’m not trying to excuse their behavior—but you also have to understand that generally they also pay enforcers or mafia or street owners as well, so he’s got bills to pay himself.”

 

“Yeah, I don’t give a fuck about that,” she snapped, again bringing a big grin to Simon’s face. She called a spade a spade, and God help you if you got in her way.

 

“I can check in at the hospital later and see how she’s doing,” Simon offered. “Yet you probably have them on speed dial to double-check to see where she’s at.”

 

“Somehow,” she admitted, with a note of humor in her voice, “you seem to know me so well.”

 

“I do know you”—he chuckled—“who you are at the core. You might still be fighting it, but I’ve definitely seen that rescue heroine on the inside.”

 

She laughed. “You need to go take another look, buddy. Anyway I’m off. We’re still trying to find information on Patricia’s former life. With her stepfather released from prison, we need to figure out exactly where he is now and whether he had anything to do with her murder.”

 

“I don’t think I heard about the stepfather,” Simon noted, his voice neutral.

 

“Ah, all part of an ongoing case,” she replied in that breezy tone she used—almost as a brush-off—that he absolutely detested.

 

He glared at the phone, all his good humor disappearing again.

 

And then, in a complete twist, she added, “Missed you.” And she disconnected.

 

His emotions were all over the place, as he fought against catching her brushing him off for further information that would also help her to deal with this case. This one action kept him firmly, squarely on the personal side of her life, but not in her inner circle. Despite his own inner turmoil, he recognized that she was fighting against the myriad emotions inside her.

 

And here she said, just right there, something to him that would absolutely break his heart wide open if he let it.

 

Missed you.

 

He slowly pocketed his phone and carried on to his next rehab project. His stomach growled, a reminder that he needed some food. The pretzel was a long time ago, even the second one he had had as well today. As he walked into the next rehab project, his foreman was yelling into his cell phone. Simon sighed, as he waited till his guy was off that call, then turned and acknowledged him. “Don’t tell me. More crap.”

 

“It’s always more crap.” The foreman glared at him. “We’re living in the shitstorm these days.” He was raging like a storm too.

 

From Simon’s experience, his foreman would go on and on for some time.

 

“Nothing’s being delivered. Everything’s stuck at the docks. The containers aren’t being unloaded. It’ll be weeks, they say. Then they tell me that it’ll be months. But wait. Oh, hey, look at that. You might get it next week.”

 

Simon knew all that and still let his foreman rage.

 

“They’re all full of shit.”

 

Simon hid his grin, knowing that his foreman was fully justified in being frustrated, but it was a global issue right now. No supplies to be had, and what are you going to do? Give yourself a heart attack? Not Simon’s style. By the time they had done an evaluation of today’s current problems, trying to come up with a solution for suppliers who could help them in a pinch, Simon’s stomach grumbled again.