Page 61 of Silent Watch
"So you want to tell me what's really going on?"
Harper looked at the man she'd hired three weeks ago to provide security under false pretenses.He'd accepted the story about the ex because it was plausible and because she'd paid in cash.But Mitch DeMario was former military, sharp-eyed, and he'd been putting pieces together for weeks.
"I'm a journalist," she said."Investigative.I've been looking into some business dealings in the area.Property transactions, media connections.Things that don't add up."
Mitch's expression didn't shift, but something behind his eyes recalibrated.
"The land stuff," Quinn said from the doorway.He held up a USB drive."Got your footage.Six to midnight, rear lot camera."He tossed it to Harper, and she caught it one-handed."And yeah—the land stuff, the permits, the newspaper shutting down.People have been talking about that for years.Nobody could ever prove anything."
"I'm trying to prove it."
"And someone doesn't want you to."Mitch glanced at the brake lines again."I'm calling Sid Hoffman.He'll tow it in and go over everything.If there's secondary tampering, he'll find it."
"Good."
Mitch made the call in low tones while Quinn leaned against the doorframe and drank his coffee.Harper plugged the USB drive into her phone adapter and scrubbed through the footage on the small screen.At 8:47 a.m., a dark sedan pulled into the lot.One person got out.Baseball cap, dark jacket, head angled away from the camera.They knew where it was mounted.
The figure moved to Harper's rental car and crouched beside it for less than four minutes.Then they stood, walked back to the sedan, and drove away.No hesitation.No looking around.Four minutes from arrival to departure.
She saved the timestamp and pocketed her phone.
Sid Hoffman arrivedin a flatbed tow truck with Miracle Garage painted on the door.
He was lean, early fifties, dark hair cut short, Van Dyke beard going gray at the edges.He got out of the truck and went straight to work without small talk.
"Tubing cutter," he said after thirty seconds."Right-handed, based on the angle.Decent tool—RIDGID, probably."
"That matches what I saw on the footage.Four minutes, in and out."
Sid looked up at her."You already pulled the footage?"
"Before you got here."
Something shifted in his expression.Not surprise, exactly.Recognition."I'll check for anything else.Steering linkage, fuel lines, electrical."
"Appreciate it."
"You're the one asking questions around town."He wiped his hands on a rag."The permits.The land deals."
"Word travels."
"Small town."He met her eyes."My wife had some trouble when she first moved here.Survey discrepancies.Boundary lines that shifted on paper but not on the ground.She sorted it eventually, but it cost her."He turned back to the car."Keep asking your questions."
He loaded the rental onto the flatbed and drove away.Harper watched the truck disappear around the corner of Sunset Beach Road, then turned to Mitch.
"I need a ride."
"Where to?"
She gave him the address of Mae's Bakery on Main Street.Not the safe house—she wouldn't lead surveillance there with Mitch in the car.She'd walk the rest.
In the SUV, Mitch drove without speaking for two blocks.Then: "You've got someone else helping you.Besides me."
It wasn't a question.
"Yes."
"Good."He checked his mirrors."Because whoever did that to your car is going to know it didn't work.And they're going to try something else."
