Charlie tried yelling at him again but couldn’t. Her tongue was suddenly much too heavy, and as much as she fought against it, she could no longer keep her eyes open.
As the blackness consumed her, she thought about Derek and prayed he was out there somewhere, looking for her.
****
“Where the fuck didhe take her?”
With the laptop resting on Jake’s hood, Derek’s fingers flew across the keyboard in search of some clue as to where Caleb would go.
After finding Charlie’s locket, they’d pulled off onto a gravel road and regrouped.
Though it went against her innate need to protect the law, York shocked the hell out of Derek when she called in a favor with a friend in the NYPD homicide division.
Even more surprising was when the straight-laced detective talked the guy into getting Caleb’s personal laptop out of evidence so Derek could access it remotely.
At first, the other detective had argued, saying they needed a warrant, but York assured him they were only going to use what they found to help them find Charlie.
Fortunately, hearing about everything Porter had done up to this point and that an innocent woman’s life was at stake had been enough to convince him.
After only a handful of tries, Derek figured out Caleb’s password—Charlie’s name and numerical birthdate—and was in. He began with a search of the files saved to his desktop before moving on to his other documents.
“There are some files here that are encrypted,” Derek muttered to no one in particular. “Fucker’s a lot smarter than I gave him credit for.”
From somewhere behind him, Mac snorted. “His files are encrypted, but he uses his ex-wife’s name and birthdate as his password? Doesn’t seem very smart to me.”
“It’s been changed recently,” Derek explained. “My guess is the password before this one was much more secure.”
“It’s like the guy just snapped,” Coop commented. “You think the divorce was the trigger?”
Guilt had Derek clenching his jaw. “Most likely.”
Picking up on his mood, Trevor reminded him, “She wanted the divorce, D. You need to remember that.”
He pictured her on the beach that day, sobbing in his arms from the overwhelming relief that she was no longer married to the shithead.
“I know.” He continued his search. “I just can’t help but think there could’ve been a better way to go about it. I thought my threat to go public with what we’d found would be enough to make him back off for good. Instead, it sent him over the edge, and now we don’t even know if she’s alive or...”
A hand squeezed his shoulder. “Focus,” Eric ordered sternly. “Porter wants to control Charlie. Not kill her.”
Drawing in a deep breath through his nose, Derek prayed his brother was right and kept going. Finally, after nearly an hour of skimming through the numerous files, he finally got a hit.
“I think I found something!” he announced excitedly. The others gathered around him.
“What’s that?” York asked.
“A contract and deed to some farmland here in Texas. The listed buyer is a corporation, but I’m willin’ to bet it’s fake.”
His expert eyes flew over the details, focusing on only the important parts.
“According to this, the property includes a house that sits on several acres surrounded by woods. It was recently acquired, too.” Derek thought about the date and looked up at his boss. “It was purchased the day before my car was busted up.”
“Makes sense.” Jake nodded. “He secures a place nearby where he can hold her, at least temporarily, then starts his attacks against you.”
“Where’s it located?” Mac asked anxiously.
Derek quickly searched the address on the deed, the hope he thought he’d lost rushing back in one giant wave.
“It’s two hours north of here.”
