I nodded, already focused on the search results loading on the small screen. "I need to find out more about Richard Collins. There has to be a reason his body was in my trunk specifically."
"I'll make a supply run," Matt said after a moment of watching me work. "We need water, food, and first aid supplies. That cut on your side needs proper cleaning."
I'd almost forgotten the injury from our escape through the motel bathroom window. The adrenaline had masked the pain, but now that Matt mentioned it, I could feel the sting along my ribs where the jagged edge had caught me.
"Be careful," I said, meeting his eyes. "One hour. If you're not back?—"
"I'll be back," he interrupted, his tone leaving no room for doubt. He leaned in, his lips brushing my forehead—a gesture so normal, so incongruous with our current situation that it almost broke my composure. Then he was gone, slipping out the side entrance as quietly as he'd entered.
Alone in the vast space, I returned to the phone, running searches on Richard Collins while keeping my ears attuned to every sound in the warehouse. Water dripped somewhere to my left, a steady plinking against metal that marked time like an arrhythmic clock. Rats scurried in the dark corners, their tiny claws scratching against concrete. The distant hum of traffic filtered through the broken skylights, reminding me of the world continuing outside our temporary refuge.
After twenty minutes of searching through public records, I found something—a court filing from six months ago. Richard Collins had requested a restraining order against someone. The details were sealed, but the timing caught my attention.
I dug deeper. The restraining order had been granted, but the subject's name remained hidden behind legal barriers I couldn't breach with a burner phone and limited time.
The warehouse seemed to grow more cavernous around me as I contemplated the implications. Collins hadn't been a random victim. He'd been chosen specifically, placed in my trunk specifically, to create a narrative of my guilt. But why? What had he known or seen that made him both valuable and dangerous to someone?
I closed my eyes, not to sleep but to think, to let my trained mind make connections my conscious thoughts might miss. The dripping water. The scratching rats. The whisper of wind through broken windows. Each sound was registered and categorized, background noise to the greater puzzle I was trying to solve.
Someone had gone to elaborate lengths to destroy my life—someone with resources, knowledge, and a specific grudge. The answer was out there in the growing daylight, while I sat in shadows, a fugitive from the very system I'd served for twenty years.
When Matt returned, I would share what I'd found. Together, we would build a case, piece by scattered piece. Not just for my freedom, but for justice—the principle I'd devoted my life to and refused to abandon now, even when it had abandoned me.
Chapter 17
Matt's returnannounced itself by the subtle change in air pressure as the side door opened and closed. When his familiar silhouette appeared in the dim light, I exhaled slowly. He carried our black backpack, bulging with supplies. His sneakers squeaked against the concrete as he crossed the space between us, each footfall a scream in the warehouse's cavernous silence.
"Anyone follow you?" I asked, the question automatic after days of constant vigilance.
Matt shook his head, setting the backpack down carefully. He glanced at the phone on the floor beside me. "Find anything?"
"Collins filed a restraining order six months ago. Details are sealed, but it’s something that could be interesting." I slid the phone into my pocket and stood, wincing as the movement pulled at the cut along my ribs.
Matt noticed, his eyes narrowing with concern. "Let's take care of that first." He unzipped the backpack, revealing a surprisingly comprehensive collection of supplies—bottled water, energy bars, and a first aid kit.
He gestured toward my side. "Let me see."
I lifted the edge of my shirt, revealing the angry red line thatcurved along my ribs. Not deep enough to need stitches, but the edges were inflamed, and dirt from the motel window was embedded in the wound.
Matt cleaned it with gentle efficiency, his touch clinical yet intimate in a way that spoke to our years together. As he applied antibiotic ointment and a clean bandage, I studied his face—the lines of exhaustion around his eyes, the stubble darkening his jaw, the absolute focus he gave to the task at hand. Even now, hunted and desperate, he remained solid and dependable—my anchor in a storm that threatened to drown us both.
"Thanks," I said simply when he finished, pulling my shirt back down.
He then reached into his bag for his laptop and dragged an overturned wooden crate to serve as a makeshift desk. He positioned another crate beside it as a seat, then opened the laptop. The screen's blue glow illuminated his face from below as he typed in passwords and connected to a network through multiple VPN layers.
"I’m downloading recent Tampa Bay newspaper archives," he explained. "I’m focusing on unsolved homicides from the past year. I thought there might be a connection to what's happening now."
I moved my crate closer, shoulder pressed against his as we hunched over the screen. The contact grounded me, a physical reminder that despite everything, I wasn't facing this alone. Matt opened the first article—a three-month-old report about a corporate lawyer found strangled in his downtown office. Nothing about the case resonated with our current situation.
We moved through the files methodically, examining crime scene photos when available, analyzing police statements, and reading between the lines of carefully worded press releases. My trained eye picked up details the reporters had missed—blood spatter patterns that contradicted official theories, body positioning that suggested staging rather than natural falling, wound patterns that told stories about the killers' emotional states during the attacks.
The fifth file stopped me cold. A man in his fifties was found beaten in his home six weeks ago. The official report cited robberyas the motive, but the crime scene photos showed something different. The violence had been excessive, frenzied. Yet the unconscious body had been carefully arranged afterward, hands folded across the chest, face cleaned of blood. The man had survived, but barely. He claimed he didn’t see his attacker, that he didn’t remember anything from the attack.
"That's Reeves," I said, tapping the screen. "Victor Reeves' signature."
Matt zoomed in on a particular photo showing the victim's bedroom. "Excessive violence followed by carefully arranging the beaten-up victim. You're right." His fingers moved across the keyboard, opening another file. "And there's something else you should see."
The new document was a prison release record dated four months ago. Victor Reeves was released on parole after serving three years of a five-year sentence for aggravated assault—current address listed in Tampa.
