“Boss, you’re going to want to see this,” Jon called from the other side of the house.Careful not to touch anything, he followed the direction of his voice.“Look at the vehicle in the garage.”
His stomach knotted at the black truck parked inside the small space, and the company logo on the side.Nelson Home Inspections.They’d found Ivy’s stolen vehicle.
“Jesus Christ,” Ross shouted from the other side of the house.“Jude, call in the FBI.Unless this woman had a licensed daycare, something fucked was happening here.”
Jude had his phone to his ear as he and his team crossed toward the basement where Ross had disappeared.He cautiously descended the wooden stairs and his lungs squeezed at the smell of human waste.A dozen cribs and high chairs lined one wall of the cellar, and changing tables and diaper pails were arranged on the other.“Ivy, what the fuck did you get yourself into?”he whispered under his breath.
Chapter Eleven
Ivy had justfinished typing emails to the homeowners of her inspections for the day, apologizing that she was going to have to cancel, when the doorbell rang.She jumped up, knowing that Jess and Ash had keys and would just come in when they were done with their morning walk.She bounced up on her toes and checked the peephole.Jude stood on the other side of the door, his hair mussed and features drawn with exhaustion.She slid open the dead bolt and opened the door.His expression softened when their eyes met, a look of relief washing over his face.
“Come in,” she said stepping back to give him space to enter the condo.“Are you okay?What happened?”
Jude stepped over the threshold and closed the door behind him.He relocked the door and then turned to face her.His face was ravaged, and her heart squeezed.He’d gone from hiking through the woods to safety, to bringing her to the field office to be interviewed, then out again after the phone call she’d received.
“Why don’t we go sit down?”he suggested.There was something skirting the edges of his voice that made a sick feeling twist inside her belly.He walked into the living room and waited for her to sit before moving into the space next to her.“Where’s Ash and Jess?”
“They went for a walk.They should be back soon.”She clutched her hands together, bracing for whatever he was going to tell her.
“Okay.”He scrubbed his hand over his face, and she noticed the dark circles beneath his pale eyes.“You mentioned earlier that you’ve never worked with this particular Realtor before, correct?”
“That’s right.She said that she’d gotten my name from a real estate convention last year.I was there, so I didn’t think anything of it.Were you able to find her?Why was she calling me?”
Jude cleared his throat and leveled his gaze at her.“We went to her office first and found nothing amiss.Her home was outside of San Diego in Coronado.We found her there, but she was deceased when we arrived.”
Ivy gasped.“Oh my God.What happened?”
“Looks like a homicide.”
She clapped her hand over her mouth.“Is it my fault?Was she calling me for help?”None of the past forty-eight hours seemed real.Had she been the last person to hear the real estate agent’s dying breaths?Pressure built in her chest until she swayed slightly.
“Breathe.”Jude’s sharp words had her sucking in air, then coughing.
A shudder swept through her body as she thought of the pretty young woman’s picture on her email signature.Her heart thudded, and she stared up at Jude’s battle-hardened face, searching for answers.
“This isn’t your fault,” he growled.“She may have had more to do with those men’s plans than what I had originally suspected.I thought that maybe, like you, she’d had been hired for the real estate alone.We now have reason to believe she might’ve been part of the plan.I don’t think it was her who called you last night.At first glance, it looks like she died much earlier in the day.”
“So…” Her voice quaked as her mind ran through all the horrible possibilities.“Who was it then?”
“I have a theory,” he said scrubbing one hand over his face.“But it’s only that.”
“Will you tell me?I’m sure any of the possibilities going through my mind right now are just as horrific.”She hated the breathless tremble in her voice but couldn’t help it.
“I don’t want to lie to you, Ivy.”He paused, looking her over before resting a large hand on her knee.“Your truck was found in the garage of her home.”
Bile burned in the back of her throat.“You said she was murdered.Does that mean I’m a suspect?”
“No.”He shook his head.“We reported your truck stolen and you have a solid alibi because you weren’t out of my sight yesterday.You were also seen by my team and Agent Levine.What it does mean is that it’s possible one of the men who entered the estate, or both, drove your truck to the real estate agent’s home.Maybe she was upset they took it and threatened to call the cops.Maybe she realized she was in too deep with their scheme.Regardless, she was murdered.What she’d been holding for the men was then cleared out of her house.”
Her heart rate sped up.“What do you think she was holding?”
His expression darkened.“Children.The ones referenced in the audio recording.”
The breath whooshed out of her lungs.She wasn’t sure how Jude performed his job, day in and day out, pushing the horrors he saw to the dark recesses of his mind.
“My team is reviewing residential street cameras to see if we can identify another vehicle that might’ve picked up the men.There may be other holding sites that they were looking to merge into one operation, but they won’t risk going back to the estate you inspected.I fucked up telling you to answer that call Ivy and as a result, you’re in more danger now than you were before.”
“Don’t say that.None of this is your fault.”She leaned closer to him, leveling her gaze.The last thing Jude needed was to take more blame for things he couldn’t control.“The fault lies with the men who did this, not you.Who do you think was on the other end of that call?”
