Page 85 of Stolen Kisses
I needed to find the 2008 files. That was all I was interested in except maybe a year or so prior to that and possibly the year after. I planned to grab as much as I could depending on how the files were stored.
I made my way down the line of cabinets until I found the one for 2008. I opened it and frowned when I saw that the thing was fucking empty, the whole thing. There were four drawers, each with trays for memory sticks that should have held the recordings.
I decided to look in the cabinet next to it for 2007, however that was empty too. I must have gotten to 2003 before I stopped and got a bad feeling, because fuck 2003 had all the video memory sticks. Following that feeling I went to 2009 and found that cabinet to be the same.
2003 and 2009 had files. All the years in between however had nothing. All empty.
What the fuck did it mean?
Gio came around to me, face contorted into a frown.
“There’s no files. No books from 2004 to 2008,” he said, and that confirmed the nagging feeling I’d gotten.
I balled my fists and punched out at the air. “They’ve been removed. Damn it, they’ve been removed Gio.” I stared at him as the feeling in my gut deepened. Shit. I didn’t fucking believe in coincidences, particularly the ones like this. No one could tell me this was just some random occurrence that the files we happened to be looking for were missing. No one could convince me of shit like that. Someone knew we might come here.How?Did we have a rat in our house again? No it wasn’t that. Wasn’t that. “They’ve been moved on purpose Gio.” I nodded.
“I think so too.” Gio scowled. “Let’s get out of here. If they knew we could come here, they’ll be on the lookout. Claudius and Marcus up there will confirm it.”
I tapped my microphone to speak to Alex. “Alex get them out now. We’ll meet back at the office. There’s nothing here.”
“Nothing at all?” Alex asked.
“Nothing.”
* * *
We got back to the office, meeting there as a team.
Claudius and Marcus were the last to arrive. Claudius looked seriously pissed.
“Dante, how the fuck could there be nothing?” he asked.
“The years 2004-2008 were all gone; every single record book and video. There was nothing there at all. Everything else was there though, but we needed 2008.”
Claudius looked at Marcus.
“They were being careful, someone was taking precautions.” Marcus surmised.
“How’d they know we’d go there?” Alex huffed sitting forward in his chair. “Crowthorne isn’t a place we would normally go to.”
“They thought it would be though,” Gio stated.
I nodded in complete agreement. “They absolutely fucking did. Whether it was a just in case or a direct attempt to take the evidence away, someone had thought we’d visit and look around at Crowthorne.”
“So maybe they know you’re looking into Christina’s murder,” Claudius added. “Wouldn’t take much to figure out if you knew there was some kind of a link.Yesterday…” his voice trailed off as he smiled.
I was already there, at that thought. I’d told them what had happened yesterday with that creepy guy.
“Claudius that guy from yesterday. He’s the only person that I’ve seen in both those places; the charity and Crowthorne.”
“That fucker was practically running.” Gio added.
“He was the driver of the car that took Christina to Crowthorne with Donny Manello. He was in her office arguing about something when I saw them.” I thought deeper to the questions I’d asked Jerry Chase. “Maybe he spoke to Jerry Chase, the manager at Help The Homeless. I’d asked if Christina got the chance to work on any government events.”
“I’ll bet he did speak to Jerry.” Gio frowned. “From just the sight of us he’d know who you were, and the fact that you mentioned the government events could have hinted at the real reason why we were there.”
Fuck, it had to be that.
“Maybe it’s him,” Alex stated. “Maybe he’s the killer.”
