Page 129 of Out for Blood
Lines of code snake across one screen while surveillance feeds and documents fill the others.
Tyler doesn’t even register my presence. His attention is entirely on whatever has captured it in front of him.
The clicking of keys fills the room as his fingers work at an intensive pace. The muscle in his jaw is ticking relentlessly; a telltale sign he’s found something that’s far from good.
I brace my shoulder against the doorframe, crossing one ankle over the other as my gaze sweeps the rest of the room. Not wanting to ask but knowing it’s inevitable.
“What did you find?”
The typing stops instantly. Tyler looks up. His eyes lock onto mine, and something in his expression drives a spike of weariness straight through me. Whatever he sees on the screen has turned his expression grim.
“A lot.”
My smile evaporates the moment I enter the room, moving beside Tyler.
“A lot of what?”
Tyler scrubs a hand across his face before rotating one of the monitors in my direction.
Images blanket the screen. Dozens of photographs of young women, their professional headshots, modeling portfolios, social media pictures. Every face staring back at me wears a smile, full of hope.
The sight makes my stomach plummet.
“Missing women, victims.”
The single word seems to rob the room of oxygen.
I bend closer to the monitor, studying the photographs one by one as cold, creeping revulsion winds its way through me.
“What happened to them?”
Tyler blows out a slow breath and rubs a hand over his jaw.
“The username we pried from the trafficker.”
A bead of perspiration forms at my hairline, and my heartbeat kicks into overdrive.
“PrettyLittleDolls00?” The name falls from my lips in a hoarse whisper.
His expression shifts into something severe, all warmth gone.
“Yeah.”
A sense of foreboding coils low in my gut because I already know what Tyler has uncovered is going to be vile.
Tyler clicks open another file.
Two photographs appear side by side.
The first photograph shows a man in an expensive suit, well-polished, dark hair slicked back with pearly white teeth on display.
The type of man people trust without thinking twice, it’s the distinguished look about him.
The second photograph is of a man that triggers a visceral sense to get as far away as possible.
He wears a gray suit with a white coat over it, oval wire glasses, thin frame and vacant eyes. A doctor.
“PrettyLittleDolls00isn’t one trafficker.”
