"I don't need sorry! I need to know where they are!" I was shaking him now, desperation overriding any concern for his injury. "Talk to me, Martinez!"
"Maintenance." The word came out slurred. "Guy in a maintenance uniform... said there was a gas leak in the pipes... I turned to check the panel and—" He touched his head, fingers coming away red. "Fast. Professional. Hit me from behind before I even heard him move."
But I already knew. Carter was too smart to leave a trail. He'd planned this. Every second I'd been at that cemetery having my emotional breakthrough, he'd been here. Watching. Waiting. Executing.
The failure was mine. Not Officer Martinez's.
Sirens wailed outside, growing closer. James. I must have triggered a silent alarm in my panic.
I stumbled toward my office, driven by some mechanical need to dosomething—check the feeds, call someone, anything but stand there drowning in helplessness.
That's when I saw it.
A single sheet of my own monogrammed stationery. The expensive cream-colored kind with "JHS" embossed at the top. Placed squarely in the center of my otherwise pristine desk like a calling card.
The handwriting was that same sharp, aggressive slant from the florist card.
You took something from me, Jack. Twenty months of my life. So I'm taking something from you.
The words blurred. I read them twice. Three times. As if the next read would change the impossible reality in front of me.
He had them.
Carter had my daughter. He had Anna.
The note was monogrammed with my own damn initials, a deliberate mockery. He'd used my stationery. Probably taken it from this very desk while my daughter slept down the hall and I'd been miles away, talking to a gravestone.
My hands curled into fists, crumpling the edges of the paper.
Moments later, James burst through the door, followed by a wave of uniformed police and paramedics. His face was grim as he took in the scene, his detective's mind cataloging the evidence.
He came to me as the paramedics attended to Martinez. "Jack. Talk to me."
"He has them. There was blood on Daisy’s windowsill." The words felt ripped from somewhere beyond language. "He left a note."
James paced the room while he spoke. "We have anAPB out on him. We'll check traffic cams, building's external feeds?—"
"He's not driving around with them," I said, desperate intuition clawing through panic. "He wants a scene. A statement. He'll take her back to where it started. Where he had control."
James's eyes locked on mine. "The apartment."
"The apartment they shared. He'll want to drag her back into that past. He thinks it's his territory."
James was already moving, barking into his radio. "I need a tactical team at 2147 Briarwood Lane, apartment 4B. Possible hostage situation. Suspect armed and dangerous. Five-year-old child and one adult female. ASAP!"
He grabbed my arm as I moved to follow. "Jack, you can't?—"
"He has my daughter."
My phone buzzed in my hand.
I almost didn't look. But some terrible instinct made me glance at the screen.
Unknown number. A video file. And a single line of text:
Unknown Number
Watch me.
