Page 33 of Complicated Past

Clara motioned for Linc to join them.

“Give the detectives a minute with the patient,” the surgeon instructed the post-op nurse inside the recovery room as he removed the tape from Malloy’s eyes.

Please let this work.Linc pressed Malloy’s finger to the screen. The home screen appeared. “Thank you,” he whispered, then swapped phones with Clara and accessed the second.

“We need to get these to the tech.”

“Why not check them here?”

“We can’t risk losing information or breaking the chain of custody.”

He exhaled through clenched teeth and checked that they were sufficiently charged. Without the passcode or supplies to clone Malloy’s fingerprint, the last thing he needed was for them to die or time out. Not when he needed every minute.

“You drive.” He handed the keys to Kendra in the waiting room so he could manage to keep both phones active on the drive to the police station.

After they were passed off to a tech, they went back to waiting mode. Fortunately, it wasn’t but half an hour before the tech called them into his workspace.

“He was smart enough to delete messages, but he didn’t delete the cache, so I could retrieve everything from the past week. Based on the voicemail and text messages, they kept the phones turned off most of the time. I noted the time and length of the phone calls. They were only between four numbers, and one of those was a local Chinese restaurant.”

“That tracks with the delivery cartons found on scene,” Clara said.

“I cloned the sim card in his phone. This will get any calls or texts to his numbers, but you won’t need a passcode to access it.” He handed Clara a cell phone and a printout. “I put the texts and voicemails in chronological order. Start with the first recorded message. You’ll be able to follow what’s going on quite clearly.” His tone added more weight to Linc’s shoulders.

Clara played the message. Linc recognized the woman’s voice as the one interrupting Bri when she called him.

“We have a problem. Somehow, she got wise to the switch on the suitcase. I offered to pay her for carrying. I’ve locked her passport in the safe and even showed her the picture of her kid, but she’snotcooperating. Bitch lifted my phone. She called her grandmother and warned her. You need to stake out Bri’s apartment and get them before she can get the kid and disappear.”

“Malloy texted back a half hour later.” The tech pointed to the string of text messages.

You want me to snatch her grandma and the kid

Are you nuts?

She’ll cooperate if we have them.

That’s a lot of risk I’m not getting paid to take

Think about the alternative if we don’t deliver or lose a shipment this size

Unfortunately, they knew better than to mention who they worked for in the texts. It would have given them some information to work with.

Her Grams drives the bright blue Toyota SUV with Georgia plates

You need to go now

“That was the end of their conversation. Next were those text messages.” The tech referenced the sheet.

I got the old lady.

What about the kid?

“Then there’s a four-minute phone call between these same numbers. Since it was live, I don’t have info on that,” the tech stated.

“Probably the call Mrs. Feldman mentioned overhearing.” Linc imagined Tawnya giving him hell for grabbing Regina before picking up Jalen. Thank God for that miracle.

“She sent the next text a few hours later.”

Did you get the kid?

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