Page 37 of Talk to Me

Mr. Cold kept me in place as I fought the struggle. He tilted his head like some scientist trying to figure out what I was.

“Now,” he murmured, dipping his head closer as if he were a lover. A shiver of revulsion went through me. “Are you ready to tell me where the files are?”

The files.

Don’t think about them.

I didn’t have any files here.

Just me and my brain and my code.

“No,” I croaked when he let go of my head and my mouth. I wasn’t ready. I would never be ready. Don’t think about the files. Just the code. I rolled my head around while I had the time.

“Pity,” he said. “It’s a real pity, Fallon, cause we’ve been discussing what to do to break you if you won’t cooperate.”

Shaggy put out his cigarette on my arm and the pins and needles came to life even as the smell of burning hair and flesh hit me.

I swallowed my screams.

“You win,” Mr. Cold said as he retreated to his chair. “We’re going to do it the hard way.”

That was when I saw the glass bottle.

Shaggy was reaching for my panties and I closed my eyes. This was going to hurt, but I needed to focus on the code.

Just the code.

Don’t think about anything else. Just the code.

Chapter

Twelve

REMINGTON

Despite our agreement to deal with whomever had broken into her house, we’d found nothing actionable. At least, nothing they were sharing with me.

I’d left skin tracers on both. The trackers let me keep an eye on them and slip in to plant bugs when they were less on their guard. Aware they could have done the same to me, I made sure to use rubbing alcohol on all exposed areas of skin.

Then showered three times.

Most skin tracers didn’t last past a second thorough shower.

Still, I didn’t need them to last that long. I just wanted to approach from a different angle at a different time when their guard might be lowered.

Unsurprisingly, neither left Estes Park.

But more amusing was they’d chosen hotels within walking distance of each other, though I suspected neither was aware.

It let me pick a spot to park my rental car, listening equipment armed, with a cup of coffee and I began my observation. Locke had a lot of skills. The hard drives, despite being present, proved difficult to crack.

That did not surprise me. Patch would never let her work or information be compromised. The fact we’d all recognized the danger in attempting—and failing—to access those hard drives meant we’d secured them again without disturbing them.

McQuade had also set a couple of cameras up in her office, then more in the house. To keep an eye on it in case someone returned.

I managed to get a sample from the blood on the desk. Taking it to a lab to get it typed and to see if DNA could be extracted would take time. What interested me most—beyond finding Patch—was the absolute lack of personal items or personal identifying items in her home.

There hadn’t even been paper bills. The only paper trash from her mail had been in the recycling and it was addressed to resident. I’d swung by her mailbox before leaving and it was empty. So did she just not get snail mail here? Or did she have other arrangements for it?