I scrubbed my hands down my face. “All right. And there aren’t any abandoned buildings you guys came?—”
“No,” King said, interrupting me.
I shot him a look. I hated it when people did that, but when he just gave me a defeated shrug, I knew he and his guys already exhausted all of their avenues.
Which was why they called on me.
“Okay,” I said breathlessly as my hands fell away from my face. “So the fuckers that took her got creative. We just have to figure out what that was.”
King thumbed over his shoulder. “The only building in this vicinity at all is the abandoned building through the woods about half a mile that way.”
I looked in the direction he pointed. “Did you guys walk through it at all?”
“It’s not as abandoned as we thought when we talked up on it.”
I grabbed the two tote bags from him. I hated it when King sent me on these wild goose chases whenever he had all of the information at his disposal that I needed. But I also knew how my brother’s mind worked. He didn’t want to get ahead of himself. He wanted to make sure that someone else took the exact same logical steps that he had before jumping to conclusions.
“You’re on the right track, let’s go,” I said.
I heard him sigh with relief as he fell in step to my right with Dozer to my left.
If there was anyone who had eyes on everything around this town, it was the homeless population. We didn’t have a robust population like that, but we had enough that it was a city-wide problem that the mayor was attempting to fix. But in the meantime, they usually took up in some of the abandoned warehouse buildings that shuttered their doors long ago as manufacturing jobs and plants dried up in the area.
No wonder my brother needed me.
The instant the abandoned building came into view, I heard footsteps scuttling. King and his crew weren’t the greatest with these guys, mostly because their sizes and scowls wereintimidating. But I saw a few heads peeking through smashed and chipped windows, and someone shouted out.
“It’s Anna! She’s got bags!”
I smiled and held up the two tote bags. “Who wants goodies!?”
One by one, the vagrant population that had taken up residence in the warehouse funneled out the door. My heart broke for some of the kids who had aged out of a system that didn’t give a flying fuck about them. They were the first to me, hugging me around the neck and asking if I had anything for them.
“Of course I do,” I said with a smile on my face. “Did you think I’d come empty-handed? Since when?”
Some of the older homeless population lumbered out after the younger ones. They always let the kids have first dibs on things, which was why I did my best to make the baggies as even as possible across the board. Hands shoved their way into the totes and I felt my brother’s presence at my back, but I just looked over my shoulder and shook my head at him.
The last thing I needed was these guys thinking that my brother and Dozer were here to rough someone up.
Not like they’d do that shit to homeless people, for fuck’s sake.
But sometimes they looked like they would.
“It’s all right, it’s okay, there’s enough for everyone,” I said as I did my best to keep and hold order while handing out the bags.
“Ooooh, there’s chocolate in this one!”
“Do all of them have chocolate?”
“Mine’s got a Twix!”
“I’ve got a Snickers!”
“Twizzlers! I love licorice.”
“Oh. My. God. Shampoo. Thank fuck.”
“Can we trade? I don’t like nuts.”
