I frowned and showed it to Oliver. “I’ll track her phone. I’m going to assume that DNR stands for do not reply.”
I nodded. “It’s worrisome.
“Mm, yes.” Oliver stood up, and I followed. We took our mugs to the counter and headed out of the shop.
“Keep an eye on it and see if you can talk to her later tonight. O’Donald is supposed to be with her.”
“She doesn’t trust him. So she might just be leaving a bread trail.”
Oliver opened the car door for me. “And we’ll track it. I’m rather fond of her as your friend.”
“Yeah, let’s make sure she doesn’t die. Okay?” I shook my head and got in the car. “I don’t think I can take another loss right now.” Not to mention, she was the reason that I was alive at that moment. I had a feeling if the bullet stayed in my body, I would have been OD’ed on Thrills.
Oliver wrapped his hands around the steering wheel tightly. “I would do anything I could to spare you another loss like that, Abigail.”
And with that, he went silent and drove me back to the office.
This time when I walked into my office, it was empty. There was still the stack of files from before that needed to be archived and filed again, and right now, it was a welcome distraction from the strange text that Liz had sent me. I hadn’t heard any more from her since we’d left the coffee house, and I trusted Oliver to track her.
Anyone that was acting as a bodyguard for me got a tracker in their phone courtesy of Oliver. He didn’t want to risk someone betraying Levi and kidnapping me.
I sat at the desk and started to go through some of the files. I went through each one I checked the dates against the computer and then sorted them to be digitally archived or to go back to the file vault.
Back and forth.
Click after click.
Until finally I was at the last one. I opened it to find that it was an older file, and it was the only one marked cold case that I had seen so far. I opened it to see gruesome pictures of women on tables strung out and sliced to ribbons. My stomach churned as I realized that their lips had been sewn shut and there were scars on some of the unmarred skin.
It didn’t look like any modern place.
The tables were wood, and the tools in the pictures looked old, some of them almost archaic. Was it ritualistic?
The notes on the next page had no real answer.
The scene was discovered a couple states over. Authorities had been called due to complaints of a bad smell. The neighbors had noticed that no one had been in or out of the property for a month or so.
I frowned as I continued.
Three bodies had been recovered. Each one matched the description of a missing person. Strange markings had been on the scene, which was why it was handed to PIB. It was labeled as a cold case, as nothing came up in the system, and there were no real clues to go off of.
The house was under a false name.
There was no way of knowing what blood, if any, belonged to the culprit. I shook my head and closed the file.
I typed the case number into the computer, checked the digital archive, and then put it in the correct pile.
I was glad I wasn’t on that case. It probably would have given me plenty of nightmares to go along with my others.
I glanced at my phone when it buzzed and saw Oliver’s message.
“Liz is on the move. Not near PIB, but alive at least.”
I wasn’t sure if a moving GPS signal actually meant she was alive, but I was going to trust him. I glanced at the clock. I had time to drop the files off and snag lunch before coming back. My shoulder ached as if reminding me what happened last time I left the office for lunch.
It was healing already, but it stung enough that I did question if going for lunch was a good idea.
There was a knock at the door, and I frowned as I saw Agent O’Donald standing by the little window.
I stood and answered the door. “Boss.”
“Agent Collins. I wanted to talk to you about your files.”
I motioned to the desk. “I just finished the batch up. I was going to get lunch and then grab some more.”
He narrowed his eyes at me as if he was expecting me to complain and bitch or maybe not have any of them done.
“I work eight hours today. I get a lunch,” I offered in a friendly voice.
He glanced at the files and then back to me. “All of that pile is done?”
“Yep, were you concerned I wouldn’t get them finished?”
His jaw tightened, and then he shook his head. “I had expected your injury to slow you down a little, that’s all. Enjoy your lunch.” He walked back down the hall without another word.
He was hiding something. It didn’t take a genius to figure that out. I grabbed my bag and left the office to go to lunch.
The restaurant was busy as I made my way through the line to get food. I completed my order and waited for my number to be called. I had decided at the last moment that I was going to take it back to the office to eat because something was nagging at the back of my head.
I put the bag in the passenger seat and tried not to jump as my phone buzzed. I looked at it.
New coordinates from Liz. Once again, followed with DNR. I locked my jaw
