Chapter Eight
Gage
Fortunately—or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it—Finch gets assigned to help me with the case since Detective Trumbull is AWOL. The captain decided to release Dylan, warning him to stay away from Kara Becker’s apartment. Hopefully he passed along the same advice as it relates to Tayler. She’s out on bail thanks to Luke, so Dylan needs to stay far away from her as well. And with the new information from Forrester, Tayler has a good shot at fighting the charges. Hopefully her lawyer’s good enough to see the evidence against Tayler is circumstantial at best. With Dylan’s knowledge about Kara attempting to blackmail at least one person, her chances are even better.
That’s where Finch and I start off our day—trying to figure out who Kara was extorting by searching her apartment again. The initial search was more superficial. The team gathered fibers, got fingerprints from every surface, took a multitude of photographs, etc. Now Finch and I are going through her place with a fine-tooth comb, and while we’re here, Detective Dan has decided to put in a day’s work as well. He’s going through all of Becker’s social media accounts, phone records including text messages, and the stuff we got from her car, including a journal she had in her glove box.
“Sir,” Finch says from her bedroom. I gave him the task of going through that room, making sure not to leave any stone unturned because you’d be surprised where people hide stuff. Example: The freezer is a common hiding place, as are the backs and bottoms of drawers.
“Yeah?” I say from the kitchen.
“Found something.”
Stepping into the bedroom, my feet sound like I’m walking on dry leaves thanks to the shoe covers I’ve got on. Rubber gloves and a hair covering help round out the outfit. “Whatcha got?”
Finch has the mattress pushed off the bed. It’s now leaning against the wall. He points to the platform bed, where a manila envelope, one about nine by eleven inches, has been hidden between two boards. He’s right. He found something.
“Let’s take photos before you extract it.” Pulling my phone from my back pocket, I take pics of the slats on the platform then back up and take more shots from different angles. “Okay.” I nod.
I watch as Finch carefully tugs at the corner until it slides free. Bending the metal closure, he opens the top and peers inside. “Photos.” He turns the envelope over, the contents landing on the bed frame. As he leans in, I step closer. Using his gloved hand, Finch spreads them out farther so we can see each one.
Finch speaks first. “Weird that these are printed out.” On photo paper, no less. “These days, it’s all digital files.”
“Hmm. True. For effect, maybe.”
“Huh?”
I stare down at six eight-by ten-inch photos. Three include images of a man and a woman. You can’t see the woman, only her arms and legs, but it’s obvious what they’re doing. “You know, I bet she printed them off so she could mail them or show them without having her camera or phone grabbed. Plus, a hard copy is going to have more impact. For effect,” I repeat so he understands what I mean.
“So, who are they?”
“No idea.” I lean closer to the images. “The guy’s older.” I point to the hair.
“They’re in some kind of office.” Finch looks up at me, then back down. “There’s a desk and some bookshelves.”
“Yep.” And it’s obvious what they’re doing since the man’s pants are down around his ankles.
Finch pushes the top three photos aside to reveal two images of Tayler with Luke. They’re kissing in one and holding hands in another. I bet those pissed off Dylan. The last image has the same effect on me because this one is of Quinn Maxwell. She’s sitting alone in what looks like the HUB on the Iowa State’s central campus. She’s looking at a book as she bites into something, a pastry of some kind. Standing up to my full height, I tell Finch to “Bag and tag everything including the envelope” before adding, “We’ll need fingerprints done on that.” I turn to head back into the kitchen but stop. “Good job, Finch. Let’s keep going.”
“Right, sir.”
Sir?That’s the second time he’s called me that. Maybe I was wrong about Finch.
As I’m about to return to my kitchen search, a knock sounds on the door. Without thinking, I step up and open it. “Daisy?”
“Oh, um…,” she starts nervously. “I, uh, saw you go into her apartment. I thought I’d see if you needed anything.”
I blink a few times, wondering if that’s all this woman does—watches out her door. “No. I think we’re good.”
“Oh. Right.” She titters nervously. “It’s just… I made some cookies.”
“Cookies?” says the guy I thought “wasn’t so bad” a minute ago. Poking his head out from the bedroom, Finch sees Daisy and smiles, and it pisses me off. “Did you say cookies?”
“I did.”Why is she smiling at Finch?“When you take a break, just knock on my door and I’ll have some ready for you.”
“Awesome.” Finch’s huge smile is ridiculous.
Shutting the door, I glare at him. “You act like you’ve never had food before.” The jackass.
