“I wouldn’t be at all surprised.”
“I wonder if he just picks old deserted buildings every time,” she wondered.
“That brings you back to case number one.”
“I know,” she admitted. “Case number one, the one that’s also important.”
Simon pulled into a parking spot. “We’re one floor down from the top. I don’t think we should go up any higher.”
“I got this,” she whispered, as she slid out.
“I’m coming with you.” She immediately turned to protest, but he held up a hand. “Stop. I’m coming.”
She frowned. “You have to stay behind me.”
“I got that,” he whispered, “I promise I’ll do everything you say, but you are not going up there alone.”
She just glared at him.
He shook his head. “It’s either that or I’ll make noise right now,” he threatened.
“And he’ll kill her,” she murmured. “There’s no place up there for him to go.”
“But this building connects to the one beside it,” he explained. “That’s the purpose of the parkade. It was for this big complex that was here. It’s an old apartment building, and it had the parkade because a lot of other businesses were around here too. So a door here connects to the building that’s nearby, and it’s deserted as well.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I looked at it at one point, but they were asking way the hell too much money.”
“Of course they were,” she muttered. “Everybody’s hoping to make a buck.”
“In this case they wanted to make millions, like a couple dozen.”
She stared at him in shock, and then she gave a quick shake of her head. “Come on. We have to go.”
Closing the door ever-so-quietly and leaving it unlocked so the locks being engaged didn’t actuallybeep, she raced around to the front end, where the ramp was slightly lit up one way. Climbing up higher and higher, she watched carefully—as soon as they could see over the top of the concrete partitions, to see if there was any sign of anybody. She heard footsteps up ahead. She followed carefully, keeping a respectful distance behind while trying to keep quiet. No sound came from Simon either. She turned to look, and he was walking as smoothly and as quietly as anybody could, yet he didn’t have runners on. That suggested a level of expertise that they definitely needed to talk about.
When she thought about that for a moment, she realized it was probably better if they didn’t. There were only so many lines she could cross when it came to her work. Something was between them, and she wasn’t quite ready to break up yet. Maybe never. But that wasn’t something she was even prepared to look at right now.
When she heard a door open and saw a light shining up ahead, she broke into a run. Still no way to tell who the suspect was. A baseball cap was on his head—or hers for that matter. As Kate raced quietly forward, she came to the door and stopped. She looked over at Simon and whispered, “Do you know what’s on the other side of this door?”
He nodded. “A long hallway and then it opens into offices.”
“Are the walls still here?”
“Some,” he whispered, “but not very many.”
She nodded and opened the door, but light from the parkade shone into the hallway, and she winced at that. With her handgun out, she couldn’t find anybody ahead of her, as she stepped inside. With Simon right behind her, staying close, they quietly raced down the hallway and came up to the first of the offices. She immediately flattened against the wall, and he followed suit. She stared at him.
Quietly she whispered, “Can you think of any place here where they would likely keep her?”
He nodded grimly. “Yeah, I have a damn good idea now.” And, with that, he said, “I’ll lead.”
Not giving her a chance to argue, he bolted ahead, staying close to the wall, until he came to a corner. She was right behind him, as he held back a hand in warning. She waited to see what he would say, when she heard a voice, an angry voice.
“Fucking bitch,” he snapped. “Why couldn’t you have died yet? Jesus Christ, the last one died in two seconds. I didn’t even get a chance to have any fun with her, and you? Jesus, you just won’t quit. Do you actually think somebody will come and save you or something?”
Kate barely recognized the voice, but, in her heart of hearts, she knew who it was.