A cry for help, p.18
A CRY FOR HELP, page 18
The realization pressed down on her chest like a physical weight, making each breath an effort as she moved between tables with mechanical efficiency, her mind racing with terrifying questions: What would he do next? How far would he go? And would anyone believe her before it was too late?
Ann's hands shook as she lined up salt shakers on the service counter, her motions mechanical while her attention remained fixed on table eight. Officer Ramirez stood, leaning slightly toward Marcus to murmur something Ann couldn't hear before gesturing toward the restroom hallway. Marcus nodded, his posture shifting subtly as his colleague walked away, leaving him momentarily alone. Without Ramirez's presence as a social buffer, something in his demeanor changed—a predator no longer needing to maintain the appearance of casualness. He straightened in his chair, his gaze sweeping the restaurant with new intensity before he reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone.
Ann's fingers froze on a half-filled shaker as Marcus lifted the device, not to his ear as if making a call, but out in front of him. He angled it first toward the main entrance, then in a slow, methodical sweep across the dining room. His movements had a practiced precision, the deliberate documentation of someone building a visual record rather than a customer taking casual photos of their meal.
The salt granules scattered across the counter as Ann's grip faltered. She watched, breath caught in her throat, as Marcus turned slightly in his chair, directing his phone toward the kitchen doors, capturing their location, the staff who moved through them. He paused, adjusted his position, then aimed the camera toward the employee entrance, the side exit leading to the parking lot, and the narrow hallway housing the restrooms.
He was mapping the restaurant, documenting its layout and points of egress and entry, and creating a tactical assessment of her workplace.
When he swiveled again, pointing his phone toward the service station where Ann stood, she ducked instinctively, her body responding before her conscious mind processed the threat. Salt crystals crunched under her palms as she pressed herself against the counter, momentarily hidden from his direct line of sight. The realization of what she'd just witnessed crashed over her like ice water—Marcus wasn't just watching her. He was documenting her environment, preparing for something more.
Ann's chest tightened, each breath becoming a conscious effort as the implications unfurled in her mind. A police officer photographing a restaurant wouldn't raise suspicions. If questioned, he could claim official business, a security assessment, or any number of plausible explanations that would satisfy casual observers. But Ann knew better. Those photos weren't for any police file; they were for his personal documentation of her movements, her routines, her escape routes.
She abandoned the salt shakers, wiping her trembling hands on her apron as she scanned the restaurant with growing desperation. Lena was in the kitchen. Chef Cho was focused on the lunch rush. Tom was nowhere to be seen. Her eyes settled on Daniel Reed, seated at his usual spot at the counter, legal papers spread before him as he ate his solitary lunch.
Daniel had been coming to Granger's for years and was respected in the community as an attorney with connections throughout the local justice system. If anyone might understand the legal implications of what she'd just witnessed, might have the authority to be taken seriously, it would be him.
Ann approached his spot at the counter, her steps quickening as she saw Marcus lower his phone, checking the images he'd captured. Daniel glanced up at her approach, his usual polite smile fading as he registered the tension in her face.
"Everything alright, Ann?" he asked, setting down his fork. "You look a bit pale."
"Daniel," she whispered, leaning close to avoid being overheard, acutely aware of Marcus's presence across the restaurant. "That police officer over there—I think he's stalking me."
Daniel's eyebrows rose slightly, his gaze shifting toward table eight, where Marcus now appeared absorbed in his phone.
"The one who comes in for coffee during his lunch break most days?" he asked, his tone careful, neutral.
"Yes." Ann's voice caught, the word emerging as barely more than a breath. "He's been following me for weeks now. Driving past my apartment at night. Pulling me over for traffic violations that didn't happen." Her words tumbled out in a desperate rush. "And now—just now—he was taking pictures of the restaurant. All the exits. The staff areas. Where I work."
Daniel studied her face for a long moment, his expression shifting from concern to something that looked uncomfortably like condescension.
"That's Officer Hale, isn't it?" he said finally, his voice lowering to match her whispered tone, though the gravity she'd hoped for was missing. "Marcus Hale?"
Ann nodded, hope flaring briefly that Daniel recognized the name and might know something about him that could help her case.
"Sounds like you've got yourself an admirer, Ann," Daniel said, his lips curving into a dismissive smile that extinguished her hope like fingers pinching out a candle flame. "Most women would be flattered by attention from a man in uniform."
The familiar refrain—the same dismissive response Tom had given her, that so many others had offered when she'd tried to explain her fears—hit Ann like a physical blow. Her mouth opened to protest, to explain the difference between admiration and obsession, between attention and surveillance, but the words died in her throat as she registered the look in Daniel's eyes. He wasn't taking her seriously. Wouldn't take her seriously.
"It's not—" she began, desperate to make him understand.
"He's just doing his job, Ann," Daniel interrupted, his tone gentle but patronizing, as if explaining something simple to a child. "Police officers maintain awareness of their environments. It's their training." He gestured vaguely toward where Marcus sat. "He's probably just security-conscious. Checking exits, entry points. It becomes a habit for them."
Ann's hands clenched at her sides, nails digging half-moons into her palms. Another person who couldn't—or wouldn't—see what was happening right in front of them. Another potential ally lost to the plausible deniability that Marcus so carefully maintained.
"But—" she tried again, only to be cut off by a sharp tapping sound from the corner of the restaurant.
Mrs. Mendez sat at her usual table, teaspoon clicking deliberately against her coffee cup as she stared directly at Ann. The elderly woman's eyes were keen and knowing, her mouth set in a firm line as she gestured imperiously for service.
"Your regular in the corner seems to need something," Daniel said, clearly relieved by the interruption. He turned back to his legal papers, effectively dismissing Ann and her concerns in one practiced movement. "Maybe bring me the check when you have a moment?"
Ann stood frozen for a second longer, the weight of Daniel's dismissal settling heavily across her shoulders. Even here, surrounded by people, she was alone with her fear. Isolated by the very plausibility of Marcus's behavior, by the respectability his uniform provided, by the natural inclination of others to believe there must be a rational explanation for what she was experiencing.
The tapping grew more insistent. Ann turned away from Daniel, blinking rapidly to dispel the burn of frustrated tears that threatened to form. As she moved toward the corner table, she felt Marcus's gaze tracking her, knew without looking that he'd observed her conversation with Daniel, and was likely assessing whether this interaction posed a threat to his surveillance.
Her isolation had never felt more complete, more terrifying.
Chapter 32
The footsteps stopped. Three heartbeats of silence followed, heavy and expectant. Matt and I exchanged a glance in the near-darkness, years of partnership allowing us to communicate without words. We both knew who might have found us—Sarah, the police, or someone else entirely. None of those possibilities promised anything but danger.
The latch rattled again, more insistently this time. Matt moved silently to position himself behind the door, his back against the wall, while I crouched behind an overturned fishing crate, ignoring the protest from my still-tender wound.
A gust of wind howled around the boathouse, the sound nearly masking the metallic snap of the lock giving way. Nearly, but not quite. The door flew open with a splintering crack that echoed across the water.
Moonlight spilled through the doorway, silhouetting a massive figure that filled the frame. I recognized him instantly—Victor Reeves, "The Collector." The man who'd watched us escape from the motel days ago, the volatile ex-security contractor with the silver ring that left distinctive marks on his victims.
My heart hammered against my ribs as I assessed the tactical situation with cold precision. Victor blocked our only obvious exit. His size and known combat experience made physical confrontation a last resort. The boathouse windows were too small for a quick escape, and the water beneath offered minimal cover for a retreat. In the dim light, I could make out the bulk of his shoulders, the military stance, the slight forward lean that suggested readiness to lunge.
Matt shifted his weight imperceptibly, angling his body to create a barrier between Victor and me despite the obvious disadvantage he faced. The slight sound drew Victor's attention, his head turning toward Matt's position. I seized that split-second of distraction, rising from behind the crate, standing behind him with a metal pipe pushed against his spine, a make-believe gun.
"Don't move," I commanded, my voice steady despite the adrenaline coursing through my system.
Victor froze, his features becoming clearer as my eyes adjusted. His breathing was controlled, but rapid, nostrils flaring slightly with each exhale. His hands—capable of inflicting the devastating damage I'd seen in crime scene photos—hung at his sides.
Then, to my astonishment, he slowly raised them in a gesture of surrender.
"I'm not here to hurt you," he said, his voice a gravelly rumble that seemed to vibrate through the floorboards beneath my feet. "I’m here to warn you. She's coming for you next."
The statement hung in the air between us, unexpected enough to momentarily disrupt my focus. Matt had emerged from his position, moving to stand slightly. I felt rather than saw his protective stance, his body angled to absorb any potential attack.
"Who's coming?" Matt demanded, though I suspected we both knew the answer.
"Sarah Winters," Victor replied, his hands still raised, palms forward.
"Why should we believe you?" I kept my fake weapon trained on him, unwavering. "Your own history with violence doesn't exactly inspire trust."
"I'm not asking you to trust me, Agent Thomas. I'm warning you." His silver ring caught the light again as he slowly lowered his hands to waist level. "Sarah Winters is not who you think she is."
"We know exactly who she is," Matt said, his voice taut with suspicion. "What we don't know is why you're really here."
Another gust of wind buffeted the boathouse, sending ripples across the water beneath us. The moonlight filtering through the broken windows cast long, distorted shadows across the warped wooden floor, giving Victor's substantial form an even more menacing appearance. Yet something in his demeanor had shifted—a subtle change in posture that suggested vulnerability rather than threat.
"I've been watching you," he admitted, confirming what I'd already known. "But not for the reasons you think."
"Enlighten us," I said, ignoring the growing ache in my arm as I maintained my aim. "Quickly."
“Could you lower your weapon, please?” he said.
I lowered the pipe and put it in the pocket of my jacket. “No funny business.”
Matt tensed beside me, ready to intercept any sudden movement. Water dripped steadily from a leak in the roof, marking time in the tense silence.
"Sarah hired me months ago," Victor explained, his voice dropping lower. "Said she needed security, protection from a stalker. But that wasn't the whole truth." He looked directly at me. "She wanted me to watch someone for her. Richard Collins."
The name of the murdered accountant sent a chill through me that had nothing to do with the damp night air.
"And now she's hired me again," Victor continued, urgency threading through his words. "To find you. To finish what she started."
I narrowed my eyes, searching for the lie in his statement. But what I saw instead was fear—genuine fear in the eyes of a man whose file described him as pathologically incapable of remorse or empathy.
"She killed that second woman," Victor said. "She told me about how she shot her in the back of the head. She placed the body downtown at night in a parking lot where it would be easy to find. She left your name on the body in a letter confirming your guilt and remorse, having you ask to be stopped, that you know you’re out of control. And she's not finished."
The boathouse creaked around us, timbers protesting against the strengthening wind. I was weighing his words against everything we'd discovered about Sarah Winters—her obsessive wall of news clippings about me, her secret connection to Collins, her carefully constructed façade of normality hiding something deeply disturbed beneath.
"How do we know you're not working with her?" Matt challenged, still positioned protectively between us.
Victor's scarred face hardened. "You can’t," he answered simply. "But I’m here, aren’t I?"
The wind howled louder, rattling the loose boards of our shelter. In that moment, I had to make a choice—trust the violent man with a history of threats against me, or dismiss his warning and potentially miss crucial information about the woman who was systematically destroying my life.
Chapter 33
"If I wanted to hurt you, I wouldn't have announced myself. I would have come in with my weapon pulled."
In my experience, trust had to be earned, especially from a man whose file contained three years for assault, several restraining orders, and a history of explosive violence. But something in Victor's eyes—a haunted quality I recognized from interviewing witnesses who'd seen things they wished they hadn't—made me curious enough to listen, if not to lower my guard.
"Keep talking," I instructed, "but stay where you are."
Victor nodded once, accepting my terms. "Sarah Winters contacted me when I got out four months ago. Said she needed security work—discreet surveillance, no questions asked." His fingers brushed against his silver ring, turning it absently as he spoke. "She claimed Collins was obsessed with her, that he was following her, texting her, leaving notes at her bookstore. I thought it would be easy money."
Matt shifted beside me, his prosthetic leg making a barely audible adjustment on the warped floorboards. "And you believed her?"
"She paid well," Victor replied with a shrug that conveyed both defensiveness and shame. "And she had evidence—photographs of him that she said were taken outside of her home, copies of emails he'd supposedly sent. It looked legitimate enough."
I studied Victor's body language as he spoke. The slight downward cast of his eyes when mentioning the evidence suggested embarrassment—not at lying now, but at having been fooled then.
"What kind of surveillance did she want?" I asked, keeping my voice neutral despite the growing knot of tension in my stomach.
"Standard stuff at first. Where he went, who he met with. She said she needed documentation for a restraining order." Victor's face hardened. "Then things got weird. She wanted me to plant things in his apartment—receipts, movie tickets, even women's underwear."
My mind immediately connected this to the emails we'd found in Collins' account—the ones from an apparent stalker claiming to know intimate details about his life, his habits. "She was creating evidence that he was the stalker," I murmured, more to myself than to the men in the room.
Victor nodded. "It escalated fast. She started asking me to take photos of him sleeping." His expression turned grim. "That's when I knew something wasn't right."
Matt and I exchanged glances, both recognizing the pattern. Sarah had been manufacturing evidence against Collins the same way she was now framing me—meticulously, obsessively, leaving a trail of breadcrumbs for investigators to follow toward her preferred conclusion.
"Did you do it?" Matt's question carried an edge of judgment.
Victor's jaw tightened. "Some of it. Not the photos while he was sleeping—even I have standards." He shifted his weight, his massive frame casting a longer shadow across the floor as the moon moved behind a cloud. "By then, I was getting uncomfortable with the whole arrangement. I told her I was done."
"How did she react?" I asked, recognizing the critical moment in the narrative.
"She doubled my fee." Victor's laugh held no humor. "Said she just needed a few more weeks of surveillance. Then she started asking questions about you."
The revelation sent a chill through me despite the fact that I'd half-expected it. "What kind of questions?"
"At first, just professional stuff. Your investigation methods and cases you'd worked on. Said she was researching for a true crime book." Victor's expression darkened. "Then she wanted details about your personal life: where you lived, your relationship with Miller here."
"When did you realize what she was really doing?"
"The night Collins died." Victor's voice dropped lower, his eyes taking on that haunted quality again. "She called me, hysterical, saying Collins had attacked her. Asked me to come to her house right away." He rubbed his scarred jaw, the memory clearly disturbing him. "When I got there, she was perfectly calm. She had a drink waiting for me. Collins was already dead in her garage. She told me she had gone to his house for dinner, then shot him in the back and took him with her back home."
Matt stepped forward, his disbelief evident. "And you what—helped her dispose of the body? Did you put it in Eva Rae’s trunk?"
"No." Victor's denial came sharp and immediate. "I walked out. Told her I wasn't getting involved in murder."
"Why are you telling us this now?" I demanded, needing to understand his motivation before I could trust anything he said.
