Page 50 of Being Lost

“Not a lot, those discs aren’t capable of holding much shit, a few kilobytes each is all. Just given it to Prez now.”

Demon’s voice comes back on the line. “There’s some shit we need to get our heads around, two plans which we’re trying to decipher. Fuck knows what they are right now. The other is a scanned newspaper article, referring to the disappearance of a group of women. Could be Phil suspected, or knew, Alder had a hand in that. Cad needs to dig into the old records to put the pieces together.”

My headache recedes as my brain kicks into gear. “You reckon he wants that shit, that’s why he’s after Patsy? So she can give him the contents of that envelope? Phil’s insurance policy?”

“Could be just that. Might mean nothing to us, but, yeah, might to him.”

“You think it would get him off her back if she just handed it over?” Is there a simple way to get her free and clear?

Another pause. “Wish it were that easy, Brother. Beef and I have been discussing it. If Alder thinks that she’s been moved under WitSec, then he might think she’s already given it to the feds.”

“In which case it wouldn’t matter whether or not he found her.” I’m trying to join dots, which isn’t easy with my whisky befuddled head, so Demon gets there a bit quicker.

“What if it’s not just what was in the box, but something she has in her head? What if she knows something which Alder doesn’t want her spilling?”

That’s the most likely, but what could she know? From what I’ve seen of her, if she’d come across evidence of wrongdoing, she’d have gone straight to the police. She’d left her husband at the first sniff he’d done something criminal.How could I have blamed her for that?

“Who were the women who disappeared?” I ask. “Any evidence of trafficking?”

“A group of students out on a hike. This is an initial report about them. Not even sure whether they were ever found, but if not, yeah, that’s my bet.”

“Okay.” I try to switch into business mode. “I’ll speak to Patsy. If she knows anything, she doesn’t know she does, if that makes sense. But it’s worth picking her brain. You take any precautions opening that box up?”

Another voice enters the conversation. “Yeah,” comes from Ink. “We took photos of before, after and during. Don’t know if it would stand up in court, but the time stamps are all there. We did what we could to avoid accusations of evidence tampering.”

I nod, as Demon says, “Ahead of you, Lost. Right now we don’t know if this is worth anything, but there might come a time when Patsy needs to testify when Foster put the information in there. Ask Patsy about anything that happened around that time, jog her memory. If she watched the news, she might recall something about those girls going missing.”

She might. If she’ll even give me the time of day after what I said to her yesterday. Will she trust a man who set out to seduce her and ended up blaming her for something another woman did?

“I’ll talk to her.” Or get Dart to if she gives me the cold shoulder. “Can you send what you’ve got to Token? I’ll get him working on it as well.”

“Already done,” Cad replies.

“We need to explore both avenues,” Demon states. “These plans must mean something, otherwise, why leave them there? And those girls… there’s something we’re missing. In the meantime, how do we keep Patsy safe? My gut feel is that we relocate her.”

Exactly what I don’t want to do. Surprisingly, I have back up.

“Not a good option,” Ink’s voice sounds down the line. “Beth’s about to talk to her. I won’t bother asking her to keep her news a secret. Even if she tries, I reckon Patsy will guess. It was different when she wasn’t able to speak to her mother, but when she calls her, Beth won’t be able to stop telling her mom that we’re having a baby.”

There’s no point arguing about it. Once Patsy knows she’s going to be a grandmother as an actual fact and not a hypothetical possibility somewhere off in the future, she’s going to want to be there for her daughter. And Beth will need her mom for support. Even if they’re not living in the same place, they’ll want to be able to pick up the phone and talk.

“Beth doesn’t know what we found,” Ink reassures me.

“On that line, it’s up to you how much you tell Patsy,” Demon suggests. “We need to know if she’s got info that can shed light on this shit, so you may need to come clean to her.”

There’s a murmuring of voices in the background.

“I’ll leave this with you for now, Lost. You take a moment to think how to play it from your end, and we’ll catch up soon.”

“Lost?” Demon’s voice is replaced by another.

“Yeah, Ink?”

“Beth’s outside and I know she’s hopping with impatience right now wanting to talk to her mother. You got Patsy ready on your end?”

“I think she’s just as eager. You get Beth in, and I’ll get Patsy.”

Dart points to himself, then to the door, indicating he’ll go get her. I nod as he stands—probably the best idea. She may not be talking to me.

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