The woman who’d reached out to me was leaning against the counter next to the cash register. She straightened up the second I walked in, a smile flashing across her face but her stance tensing. She was relieved and yet nervous to see me.
I filed away those observations as I came to a stop a couple of feet from the counter, as if I wanted to check out the hard drives and cables tucked away behind the glass underneath. My gaze stayed on her face.
This contact had picked her temporary code name to go with her message well. The first time Noelle had introduced me to her, I hadn’t met anyone with so many or such prominent freckles before. I’d asked why she had polka dots on her face. And the red part—well, her fiery curls must have inspired the usual code name she went by too: Scarlett.
“You got my message, then,” she said, sounding oddly breathless. “I was a little worried—I thought they might be wrong—well, it doesn’t matter.”
My body went on the alert. I stepped closer. “Who’s ‘they,’ and what do they have to do with me?”
Scarlett pursed her lips, her eyes darting around the store and then coming back to rest on me. “Someone reached out—I don’t know much about it—I don’t really ask questions, you know? They passed something on to me that they wanted me to get to you if I could. They seemed sure you were alive, but after everything I heard about what happened...” She shuddered. “Just a second.”
I shifted on my feet impatiently as she turned to rifle through a cabinet behind her. “Who passed this thing on?”
“I’m sorry, I really don’t know,” she said. “There wasn’t any face-to-face communication. They left the package on the counter while I was in the back. I guess they must have known I had some connection to you, so I’d have a decent chance of getting in touch.”
And whoever had gone to her hadn’t hoped to find me directly. Hmm.
“Did they say anything else about me or the murders?” I asked.
She shook her head, her curls jiggling around her face, and tugged a padded envelope about the size of a paperback novel out of the cabinet. “Just that if I could get this to you, I should. They were very emphatic about that.”
I peered into her pale eyes as she handed the envelope over. Had she been threatened with some kind of violence if she didn’t manage to complete the task? Offered a reward if she did? There seemed to be more at stake here than just handing over a package as a favor.
“And you really don’t have any idea who brought it?” I pressed. “Don’t you have security cameras in this place?”
Her mouth twitched. Fear. I knew that emotion—I’d watched it cross the face of enough of my victims. But I didn’t think it was me she was afraid of.
“Whoever it was, they were too careful to get caught that way,” she said, but I wondered if she’d even dared to check.
“If you’d let me have a look—” I started, and she shook her head more vigorously than before.
“It’s already been erased,” she said without further explanation, only confirming my suspicion that she was terrified of pissing off whoever she thought she was dealing with.
A wave of frustration rushed through me, but I couldn’t change what she’d already done or what she’d refused to find out. At least I’d gotten something here.
My fingers tightened around the envelope. “Thank you. I appreciate this.”
She dipped her head in acknowledgment. Her jaw worked as if she was debating what to say next. “You’d better go now. After what those people did to your colleagues—who knows if they’re looking for you too.”
She had a point. I nodded to her and slipped out of the shop as quickly as I’d entered.
I stopped outside a discount clothing store, facing an inflated image of a model in a dress that was much more sophisticated than anything being sold in the dank interior, and tore into the envelope. A small, cheap plastic flip phone slid out into my waiting hand.
What the hell? I looked it over, tapped the power button, and the screen lit up. But there was nothing on it, just a few basic apps like the address book, which was totally empty.
No answers. No information. It felt like another dead end.
Gritting my teeth, I slipped my hand quickly beneath the collar of my shirt, shoving the phone into one place almost guaranteed to avoid detection: in my bra, under the swell of my breasts. It wasn’t exactly comfortable, but it shouldn’t catch the eye of roving pickpockets or anyone else who might be concerned there. I tossed the envelope in a trash can next to the shop.
I was just turning toward the entrance when I spotted them from the corner of my eye. Three unfamiliar men were sauntering toward me from the direction of the electronics store, just a little too quickly for a casual stroll. Even without looking at them directly, I felt their gazes on me.
My instincts clanged with alarm.
I swiveled and strode into the store, approaching one of the clothes racks farther inside. As I skimmed my fingers over the outfits without really noticing them, I monitored the entrance at the edge of my vision.
The three men came into the store, which was full of dresses and blouses, nothing they looked likely to wear. And they fanned out with casual precision, moving so that they nearly surrounded me.
Oh, they thought they were getting away with that, did they? I didn’t know what their problem was, but I wasn’t letting myself be cornered.