Andy made his way to an alcove not far from Narelle’s room and called Wilt. His friend answered immediately.
“Hey, what’s up? Am I needed back at the office?” That was the last thing he wanted, but he would do whatever was required.
“No, but I didn’t think what I found out could wait.”
Immediately, Andy straightened, his instinctsscreaming that what Wilt was about to say wasn’t great. “What is it?”
“You asked me to search Narelle’s accident site to see if there was any footage of it.”
“I did.”
“I don’t think it was an accident. I think Narelle was targeted.”
It took Andy a couple of seconds to fully comprehend what his friend was saying. “What do you mean targeted?”
“Exactly that. The truck that hit her was a fair distance behind her and sped up instead of slowing down as it approached Narelle. Whoever was driving, deliberately set out to harm her. As you know, they took off after hitting her. Because of the bulbar they had on the front of their vehicle, the hit didn’t affect them as much as it did Narelle.”
Andy pinched the bridge of his nose in an attempt to put all the puzzle pieces together. “Are you sure about this? Why would anyone want to deliberately hurt her?”
He didn’t like questioning his colleague, but nothing made sense.
“I’m very sure. I replayed the footage quite a few times to make sure I wasn’t making a big assumption. I did some further investigation and was ableto trace her journey from the accident to the train station she got off at. The car was behind her the whole way. The driver got off the train too.”
“Fuck! What the hell is going on?” Had Narelle known she was being followed? She might have seen the truck in her review mirror and not paid much attention to it.
“I knew you’d have some questions, so I looked into her a bit more. And before you say anything, I know I took liberties, but after seeing the accident and how calculated the move was, I couldn’t leave it alone.”
“It’s fine. I’m glad you did. Thank you. What did you find?”
Was there something in her past that had caused this person to go to such extreme lengths to get rid of her? Because Wilt had said the move was calculated, which could only mean that someone wanted her dead.
But who?
“She works as an HR manager for a recruitment agency. She’s got a mortgage she’s pays regularly. Has a reasonable amount in savings. There are no red flags. Nothing to explain what happened.”
Was it horrible of him that Andy wanted there to be something for them to latch onto? Perhaps,because if there was, it would make it a lot easier to ask her about it. Now he had nothing he could lead with.
“There must be something,” he muttered. “No one does what they did without a reason.”
“I know. I’ll keep looking. In the meantime, I think you need to be on alert for anything out of the ordinary.” Wilt cautioned.
“I will. Thanks again, man. Appreciate it.”
“Not a problem, and you know you have all of us watching your back, and now Narelle’s.”
“I do.” Andy disconnected the call. His mind swirling with all of Wilt’s information.
How did he approach this with Narelle?
She was recovering from a major accident. Him telling her that it wasn’t an accident and that someone could be after her wasn’t an easy subject to bring up.
He needed to see the footage before he went any further. Maybe he could see something that Wilt had missed, not that he expected their resident computer expert to miss anything. However, sometimes a set of fresh eyes and a different perspective could see things the other missed.
He fired off a quick text to Wilt, and a few seconds later, a link to the footage appeared.
Having seen the accident in real time, he didn’t want to relive it again, but if whatever he saw could help Narelle, then he’d watch it a hundred times.
Andy clicked the link and watched it all unfold again. He saw the moment Wilt was talking about when the truck appeared to pick up speed. There was no hitting of the brakes to slow them down until the last minute as they plowed into the back of Narelle’s car. He winced at the violence of the moment and had to pause it to take a breath. Was the timing of them hitting Narelle accidental or deliberate?
