Free Kingdom of Strangers by Zoë Ferraris

of their public impropriety.
    Deflated, Katya stood up. “Well,” she said, “I’d better get back to work.”

8
    N ow it was a refuge, sitting at her computer, straightening up the files. She determinedly refused to think about what she’d just done. She would not admit that she felt the beginnings of suffocation, sand heaping around her while she made no effort to push herself free.
    She recognized Inspector Zahrani the moment he stepped into the lab. Behind her, three women quickly covered their faces, a flock of hens startled by a large human leg, but Katya had decided not to give in to that impulse anymore.
    She didn’t know very much about Zahrani, just enough to realize that he didn’t give a damn if a woman’s face was exposed. The first time she’d met him, he’d even extended his hand to shake hers and thanked her for processing evidence so quickly. There was a slight accent to his voice that suggested he was Levantine—probably Palestinian. But his face was classically Bedouin: dark skin, long nose, giant almond-shaped eyes. He was a recent addition to Homicide, had migrated from Undercover for reasons no one knew. He’d worked on two cases in the past weeks, both of them pulled from the department’s unsolved crimes. He hadn’t managed to solve either of them. Now he was in charge of the serial-killer case. Chief Riyadh was clearly willing to let Ibrahim do whatever he liked.
    He didn’t usually come into the lab, but that was because Katya preferred to bring her findings downstairs. It was part of her plan to stay visible, to get more involved.
    “Miss Hijazi,” he said. He was holding half a dozen files.
    “Good afternoon, Inspector Zahrani,” she replied. “I see you got the files.”
    “Yes,” he said, setting them on her desk. “And please call me Ibrahim. There’s one thing in your report I didn’t quite understand….”
    The women grew a little quieter at the back of the room.
    “I’d be glad to look at it,” she said.
    “You know…” He was flipping through the folders. “It looks like I’ve left one file downstairs. Sorry. Do you mind?”
    “No, of course not.” Katya was already logging off her computer and getting to her feet. “I’ll come down with you.”
    “Great.” He swept the files into his arms.
    Once the door to the lab had shut behind them, he stopped and turned to her. The hallway was empty, but only momentarily. “I have to ask you a favor,” he said. “It’s very important.”
    The change in his demeanor startled her. “Go ahead,” she said.
    “In private,” he said, looking around. “If you don’t mind.”
    He motioned her into the ladies’ bathroom. She hesitated. He could be setting her up, but his anxiety was palpable. She followed him inside, and he locked the door behind them.
    “A friend of mine has gone missing,” he said. “I’m very worried about her.”
    Katya waited for an answer to the obvious question: Why was he telling her?
    “I don’t know many women,” he said, “and certainly none I could trust with this information. Most people don’t even know that I am still in contact with this woman.”
    So that was it. He had a girlfriend. She was mildly surprised but guessed it was probably more common than she’d thought. “So you haven’t reported her missing.”
    “No. It could just be—she could have left.”
    “I see,” Katya said. “What do you need?”
    “She works at a clothing boutique at the Chamelle center. Do you know it? It’s a women’s shopping mall.”
    “Yes, yes, the one at al-Hamra.”
    “I can’t go in there, obviously, and I need to know if she’s shown up for work recently.”
    “Have you tried calling them?”
    “I’ve been trying for the past few days. You have to leave a message and sometimes they’ll call you back if you’re wealthy and you’re planning on spending large sums of money, but normally they don’t. They don’t know about me either, and I’d like to keep it that