“They’ll stay back, just keep him in sight. In case this plan doesn’t work, we need a backup.”
She nodded and began typing again. “Okay, I’m asking him if he’s noticed a problem with the box. Telling him that I almost missed it and that he needs to double-check as soon as possible.”
She stopped typing and stared at the screen.
“Do you think he bought it?”
“Honestly, I’m not sure. I dropped my message and left. I figured it looked less suspicious if I wanted to talk even less than him. If the roles were reversed it would reassure me a little.”
He squeezed her hand. “Smart.”
“Okay, he’s dropped out of the private chat. This is good. We need to be ready to go. Hopefully he’s going to get back on in a few minutes to say that his box did not have the same problem as mine. And when he does that, we’ll have a location of the victim.”
Now it was a waiting game.
Penelope walked over to them a few minutes later. “Bad news. The address was empty by the time Leon and Whitaker got there.”
“Then this is our only shot,” Bree said.
Tanner nodded. “It’s going to work.”
She didn’t have to say anything for him to know she wasn’t so sure about that. But just because it wouldn’t trick her didn’t mean it wouldn’t fool damn near everybody else on the planet.
“It’s going to work,” he said again. “Let’s be ready to go.”
Bree nodded. “I’ll come with you, if he gets back in the chat room. Just in case we need to reel him in further. Or if not, I’ll be working remotely on the other two.”
The silence fell heavy over the room for nearly twenty minutes.
Bree finally slammed her hand on the desk. “Yes!” she shouted. “He just logged in and said he checked the water box. That should mean he’s at the location.”
She rattled off an address.
This time Penelope didn’t look confused. “That’s on the outskirts of town. A lot of abandoned buildings. If I was going to try to keep a kidnapping quiet, that’s where I would do it. Let’s go. We’ll have Leon and Whitaker meet us there.”
Bree grabbed her laptop and was right behind Tanner as he followed Penelope to the car. As soon as Bree got into the back seat she began typing away again.
“I’m working on the other two,” she said. “If they are open for the same sort of trick we used with this guy then this could be easier than I thought.”
Penelope was on the phone with Whitaker, working out details. The building was an abandoned motel and SWAT was meeting them there. It was too big for the four of them to canvass on their own.
They were reaching the edge of town, only a couple of miles from their location, when Bree spoke again.
“According to GPS, there’s a coffee shop at the corner of the next block. You should leave me there. You don’t want to have to worry about me as you’re doing your bad-guy stuff, and the coffee shop will have Wi-Fi, which will allow me to work faster.”
Penelope glanced over at Tanner and he gave a nod. He wanted Bree kept clear of all this.
“Fine, but we have to keep moving.” Penelope responded.
Tanner turned and shot Bree a concerned look in the back seat. He’d rather get her settled himself.
Bree just rolled her eyes. “I’m more than capable of walking myself into a coffeehouse without getting into any trouble. Go do what you need to do.”
Sure enough, when Penelope stopped the car a block later Bree was out the door with a quick “Good luck.”
The door had barely shut behind her before Penelope was taking off again.
“We’re dealing with a much bigger area than we were with Elliot, and we don’t have any details,” she said. “We’ll have SWAT, but the guy may kill the victim outright if he gets spooked.”
