Total pages in book: 158
Estimated words: 146477 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 732(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 146477 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 732(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Gray pulls away, his brows furrowed as he looks back at me, his head already shaking. “I picked up a case, but it wasn’t a homicide. I attended the scene of a house fire. An old Korean couple suffered from smoke inhalation. The husband passed at the scene, but I didn’t accompany the body to the morgue.”
“No shit,” I murmur, wondering if in Harper’s panic, she named the wrong detective. “Do you know anything about the John Doe?”
He shakes his head again. “Not sure. It’s been a busy few days. I haven’t heard anything,” he tells me. “Let me get in, and I’ll ask around.”
“Thanks, man. Appreciate it.”
He simply nods and takes off, ready to start his shift, and I make my way back to my truck, feeling as though I just took a massive step back. It’s been killing me that I don’t know anything about the asshole who’s been tormenting Harper at work and leaving disfigured bodies in the form of fucked-up little messages. She doesn’t deserve that shit, and soon enough, it’s going to escalate, and when it does, I need to be there to make sure she doesn’t fall. However, there’s no denying how much easier it would be if she weren’t such a stubborn little vixen and told her boss that she can’t work the night shift anymore, but I understand her reasoning. That doesn’t mean I agree with it.
After getting in my truck and backing out of my space, I hit the gas and start heading home, more than ready to call it a night. It’s a little after four in the morning, and I’m fucking wrecked, but what’s new? That’s the risk you take when you work as a SWAT officer. It’s just part of the package deal.
I get halfway home when I’m hit with an alert from my home security app, and I pull out my phone to check my cameras. Glancing between my phone and the road, I see a familiar car pulling up on the curb outside my home.
“What the fuck?” I mutter to myself, watching as Harper-Rayn bails out of her little Honda Civic, crossing her arms tightly over her chest, and rushes to my front door. She knocks furiously and hits the doorbell a few times, despite me clearly not being home.
“Fuck,” I hear her through the cameras.
She begins pacing in front of my door, and I press the gas harder, knowing she wouldn’t show up out of the blue unless something happened. Keeping my eye on the road, I exit out of my security feed before opening the phone app, and within seconds, Harper’s voice is coming through the Bluetooth in my truck.
“Knight, I—”
“What’s wrong, Morticia? Are you okay?”
“Wait. How did you know I was—cameras. Right.”
“Answer the question, Harper. What are you doing hovering outside my door looking like you just saw a fucking ghost? And why are you shivering like that? It’s not even cold.”
“I . . . I can’t help it,” she rushes out, her teeth chattering. “I can’t get warm. I got locked in the refrigeration unit and—”
“The fuck?”
“This again?” she demands. “Are you ever going to let me finish a whole sentence before interrupting me? I mean, fuck. You’re the one asking the questions, and still you won’t let me get a word in.”
“Harper,” I warn.
“FUCK!” Harper lets out a heavy breath, and the frustration in her tone is crystal clear, but despite the way she rants at me, it’s clear I’m not the reason for her frustration.
“Start from the beginning, Morticia,” I say in a soothing tone, knowing she’ll give me exactly what I need. “I’m only a few minutes away.”
Harper sniffles, and I listen as she takes a calming breath, but the chattering of her teeth doesn’t dare stop. “Okay, so I was just doing my thing at work when I heard someone trying to get into the morgue. The access card wasn’t working, and he must have tried at least twenty times, but the automatic lock was denying him entry. He was grabbing the handle and rattling the door. It freaked me out, and with no other way out of the morgue, I had no choice but to climb into the refrigeration unit.”
“Shit, Morticia.”
“You’re telling me,” she mutters. “I thought that was it, but then he came back with a new access card, and this one let him in. At first, he was just wandering around, and I kept thinking to be as quiet as possible so he wouldn’t know where to find me, but then he walked straight over to the refrigeration unit, and as if knowing exactly which one I was in, he twisted the lock and trapped me there.”
“He has been watching you through the cameras.”
“My thoughts exactly,” she says. “It’s almost as though he was locking me in there so he could come back later and—well, I don’t know what he wants with me.”