Page 66 of Still Afraid

“Does it have any battery life?”

Buck clicked the side button. “It does.” He swiped the unlock. “No passcode. We’re in luck.”

Josh stood beside Buck, looking over his shoulder.

“There isn’t much on here. And it appears to be a burner phone. We’ll know more once I get it to the tech guys.”

“Any calls or texts?”

“Calls are all from the same number. Oh, there’s a text conversation with that same number.”

Buck scrolled too fast for Josh to catch most of the conversation, but at the bottom Buck stayed on the most recent text.

Did you get it?

Not yet, but I will.

Get it taken care of, or I’ll take care of her.

I will.

What on earth?

Josh swallowed. “Please tell me her is not Chloe.”

“I could say that, but my suspicion is Chloe is exactly who they were talking about. The history of texts is very vague information. A few addresses, but there’s a lingo I can’t even begin to understand. It’ll take some more digging to figure out.”

“In the meantime, where’s my fiancée?” The sick feeling in Josh’s gut grew.

Chloe and Poirot walked back into the neighborhood to avoid being on the main road. Thanks to an easier way to cut through to her neighborhood from here, they wouldn’t have to traipse through the woods again.

A car veered down the street behind Chloe and drove toward her and Poirot.

She gripped his leash. “Let’s pick up the pace, boy.”

They needed to go down the next road, but if the person behind them held ill-intent, she wasn’t sure she wanted to head down that road where there were very few houses. But there wasn’t much choice. If she didn’t go there, she’d either have to walk through the woods again or take an even longer route.

She kept hoping she would walk near someone in their driveway or yard, but no one seemed to be out and about. Unsure what other options she had, she turned down an empty street that connected the two neighborhoods.

The car turned too.

She started running.

“Chloe!” a voice called from the car.

The person who had confronted her yesterday had known her name too. What was she going to do? How could she get away?

“Chloe, stop.” The car pulled up beside her.

She glanced at it. Martinez? She stopped but didn’t approach. He wasn’t the person who cornered her, was he?

“Josh and Buck sent me to get you. Since you don’t have your phone.”

That sounded legit. Trust was, she didn’t have her phone since it had been lost in the tornado. She had no reason not to trust Martinez.

“I can give you a ride.”

“Thank you.” She led Poirot to the car and let him in the backseat before she climbed into the front. “I appreciate this.”