Page 8 of Just Me

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“Yes. She needs access to a device.”

“I don’t want to give her back her device,” Connor argued, sounding next-level mad. “There’s no telling what she’ll do with it.”

Fraser clasped his hands, looking at Connor with an expression that suggested he was drawing on reserves of patience, but they were not unlimited.

“I’m not allowing her to access an FBI device at this time,” he explained. “So, her own device is the only other choice. As she pointed out, she does need to use something.”

With an exasperated sigh, Connor got up and marched out of the office. He was clearly heading back to the interview room where he’d left her belongings that had been seized, and Cami felt a brief flare of hope that she might, at last, be reunited with her phone, even if just for a while. Being without it felt as if she had one hand tied behind her back.

She didn’t know what this was about. It all felt weird. She needed to find out. If ever there was a time that she needed to be a jump ahead of them, it was now.

Fraser wasn’t saying a word and his face gave nothing away.

She felt as if she was in uncharted waters. Actually, no. She revised that. She knew she was in uncharted waters, but someone had thrown her what appeared to be a lifeline. But the lifeline might actually be a disguised snake.

For a moment, she wondered if it might be better to spend a few minutes going through the motions and then say she’d found nothing.

But then she rethought. She couldn’t do that. She didn’t think she was capable of lying that way. And besides, this was a murder case.

This wasn’t just changing the FBI website because she was pissed at them, and she could. This was a serious crime, and it seemed from one of the dates she’d noticed, that it was very recent too.

She had to help if she possibly could. If that was what they needed from her, she’d make the effort, even if she didn’t know exactly what the challenge was. Even if they threw her in jail for it afterward, like she was sure they were planning on doing.

She could feel the tingle of excitement in her belly that she got in class when she was up against a challenge that she needed to solve quicker than the others. She couldn’t help feeling that way.

It felt like Connor was gone for a long time, but in reality, it was probably only two minutes. And then he was back and sitting down beside her, shoving her phone angrily at her.

With a sigh of relief, she unlocked it and went hunting.

The information in the file wasn’t enough, but it gave her the starting point she needed. Her fingers flew over the keys. On a phone, she was a bit slower.

“I’m faster on a keyboard,” she explained, in case they were wondering about the delay.

There was an expectant silence in the room, broken only by Connor tapping on the desk. Cami barely noticed it.

She looked up at Fraser.

“How long do you think you’ll need?” he asked.

Cami shrugged. “How much detail do you want?” she said.

“Well, let’s stick to the basics. How soon can you get information on what they were doing? Their online activities prior to the…to the incidents. The game or virtual reality activity they were in? Is there any way of ascertaining that?”

“The game they were both playing before their devices were shut down is called Bordercross. It’s a very popular action and espionage game with distinctive avatars that players can personalize,” Cami explained. “This first IP address here uses the name FemmeFatale, and this second one uses VixenThree. Those are their in-game names,” she explained. “And those small pictures that were found at each murder scene are their avatars. That’s what their characters looked like in the game. What else do you want to know?”

There was a different kind of silence in the room now. A shocked kind of silence.

Fraser looked stunned and incredulous. Connor looked disbelieving, but at the same time, angry, as if he knew he’d only end up making a fool of himself if he did question this.

“You got all that in that time from your phone?” Fraser said carefully.

“Yes. There’s other stuff I can get, but it’ll take longer. I don’t want to waste your time,” Cami said.

Fraser blinked. She had the strange feeling that for just one moment, he was trying to suppress a smile, like she’d said something wildly funny.

Then he opened his mouth and said something she’d never, ever expected at all.

“I’m going to offer you a deal. We need specific technical expertise on this case, and we need it urgently. It seems you can provide it. So, here’s the choice. Help us solve it and we’ll scrub your record. Refuse, and you’ll spend the next twenty years in jail.”


Tags: Blake Pierce Mystery