"You lived in Phoenix.That is not the same."A pause."Take your medicine pouch.Keep it close.The protection travels with you, even away from this land."
"I will.Ben's going to check on you while I'm gone."
"Good.That boy needs feeding.Too much time eating gas station food."Ruth's tone softened."Find the girl, Kari.Bring her home if she'll come.But don't lose yourself in the looking."
After she hung up, Kari sat for a moment in the quiet of her mother's house.Outside, the desert night had fully descended, stars emerging in the vast sky overhead.In Los Angeles, she knew, those same stars would be invisible, drowned out by light pollution and smog.
Something was wrong in Los Angeles.And Tayen Chee was caught in the middle of it.
Kari picked up her phone again and dialed Lola's number.
"I'm going to L.A.," she said when her cousin answered."I'll fly out tomorrow."
CHAPTER FIVE
The smell hit Kari first.
Car exhaust and hot asphalt and something floral she couldn't identify—jasmine maybe, or some cultivated flower that didn't exist in the wild—all layered over an undertone of ocean salt.She stood outside LAX's Terminal 1, her single carry-on bag slung over her shoulder, and let the sensory overload wash over her.
The air felt wrong.Heavy and wet, coating her skin like something she'd need to wash off later.Back home, even on the hottest days, the desert air had a cleanness to it, a purity that came from vast open spaces and wind that had traveled hundreds of miles with nothing to collect along the way.Here, she could taste the city in every breath—fuel and food and fifteen million people packed into a basin between mountains and sea.
Phoenix had prepared her for cities, but Los Angeles operated on a different scale entirely.The traffic alone was staggering, an endless river of vehicles flowing past the terminal in waves that seemed to have no beginning or end.Horns blared.Engines idled.A shuttle bus hissed to a stop, disgorging passengers who scattered without looking up from their phones.Somewhere nearby, a man shouted into his phone in a language she didn't recognize, his voice competing with the mechanical announcements cycling through the terminal speakers, the rumble of rolling luggage, the constant thrum of aircraft overhead.
And the sky—what she could see of it—hung low and hazy, the blue leached to a pale gray-white that made her think of dirty dishwater.On the reservation, the sky stretched forever, so big it could make you feel small in a way that was somehow comforting.Here, the sky felt compressed, pushed down by smog and pushed in by the buildings crowding the horizon.
Kari found her rental car, a nondescript sedan that would blend into the urban landscape, and programmed the hotel address into her phone's GPS.The drive from the airport to downtown took nearly an hour despite being less than twenty miles, the freeway a parking lot of frustrated commuters inching forward in increments measured in car lengths rather than miles.Six lanes in each direction, and every one of them packed solid.She watched drivers eating, texting, applying makeup, staring straight ahead with the glazed expressions of people who'd made this commute so many times it had stopped registering as anything but lost time.
The landscape scrolling past her window offered no relief.Strip malls and billboards and concrete soundwalls covered in graffiti that ranged from gang tags to elaborate murals.Palm trees rising improbably from sidewalks, their fronds brown at the edges.Everything sun-bleached and tired-looking, as if the city had been left out too long and nobody had bothered to bring it in.
By the time Kari reached her hotel, her shoulders ached from tension she hadn't realized she'd been holding.She sat in the parking garage for a long moment after turning off the engine, letting the silence settle around her.
She was a long way from home.
She found herself thinking about Tayen Stern's Glimmer account, which had gone completely dark overnight, the profile now showing nothing but an error message.Whatever had prompted Tayen to disappear digitally, she'd done it thoroughly.The only lead Kari had was Elite Vision Modeling, the agency that had featured so prominently in Tayen's posts.
Her hotel was a mid-range chain near the Arts District, close enough to Elite Vision's office that she could walk there if needed.Kari checked in, dropped her bag in a room that looked identical to every other hotel room she'd ever stayed in, and splashed water on her face.The flight had been short, barely two hours, but something about air travel always left her feeling drained.
She touched the medicine pouch beneath her shirt, a reflex that had become second nature.Ruth's voice echoed in her mind:The protection travels with you, even away from this land.Kari hoped that was true.Standing in this anonymous hotel room, surrounded by a city of four million strangers, she'd never felt farther from home.
Elite Vision Modeling occupied the second floor of a converted warehouse in the Arts District, the kind of building that had probably housed manufacturing equipment fifty years ago and now contained yoga studios and artisanal coffee roasters.The agency's name was displayed in sleek chrome letters beside a frosted glass door.
Kari climbed the stairs and pushed through the door into a reception area designed to impress.White walls, white furniture, enormous photographs of beautiful women staring down from every surface.The air smelled faintly of expensive perfume and new carpet.
A young woman sat behind a curved desk, her own features so flawless that Kari suspected she was one of the agency's models working a day job.She looked up with a practiced smile.
"Welcome to Elite Vision.Do you have an appointment?"
"I don't."Kari approached the desk, keeping her body language open and unthreatening."I'm looking for information about one of your models.Tayen Stern."
The receptionist's smile flickered almost imperceptibly."I'm sorry, we don't give out information about our talent.If you're interested in booking Tayen for a job, I can give you our rates and availability."
"I'm not looking to book her.I'm trying to find her."Kari pulled out her badge, holding it where the receptionist could see."Detective Kari Blackhorse, Navajo Nation Police.Tayen's family is concerned about her welfare."
The receptionist's eyes widened."Police?Is Tayen in some kind of trouble?"
"That's what I'm trying to determine.When was the last time anyone here had contact with her?"
"I...I don't know.I'd have to check with Diana."The receptionist reached for her phone."Let me see if she's available."
