After her shower, Rainy put on yesterday’s clothes and headed to Red’s for aspirin and some toiletries. Her headache was starting to make her feel fried. Red had a soda fountain along the back near the pharmacy, and she ordered a coffee and a bagel with cream cheese. She watched the few stragglers ambling about—mostly employees dressed in red vests. A man drank from a water bottle near the automatic doors, his suit sagging off his body like it was more exhausted than he was. She pulled her phone from her bag and stared at the screen. She touched cool fingertips to her eyelids, breathing in. The bagel rolled in her stomach, threatening to slide back up on a wave of cream cheese.

Rainy finished off the rest of her coffee and tossed the cup in the trash. She urgently needed to be done with this place and to get out of there. Her headache hadn’t subsided with the caffeine and aspirin as she’d hoped.

She checked her phone again. Only a text from the gallery in New York saying they’d sold her Jar of Parts piece to a private collector. The piece had sold for a hundred thousand dollars, an amount that was impressive and worth celebrating, yet the moment fell flat.

When she looked at her phone again, there was a string of texts from the Tiger Mountain group.

Ursa: What? Braithe’s not flying home with us, either. She finally got an appointment with that psychic she’s obsessed with.

The whole psychic thing hit differently today.

Rainy crossed Main Street, leaving Red’s behind her. So Braithe had found a reason to stay, as well. It bothered her, but she couldn’t put her finger on why.

Mac: Let us know when you get back and stay SAFE.

Tara still hadn’t responded to any part of the thread when Rainy tucked her phone in her back pocket, and neither had Braithe.

She went to the Canary for breakfast, where the same kid was there, setting out sugar caddies on the tables. Derek. Marvin had said he was Taured’s kid. Taured probably had a dozen kids by now; when she lived at the compound, there had been rumors that he’d fathered some of the pregnant women’s babies—she remembered the bratty, crying kid from her very first day, Enoch Aaron—but at fifteen, looking into that hadn’t been a priority.