26. Nick
26
NICK
T he car bumped along the road. I was running late, which wasn't something normal for me. Scarlett and Ethan—and Ethan's friend Ryan—were waiting for me. Our campsite had been booked for Labor Day and all I needed was the jacket I just bought for the trip. I'd left it draped over the back of my chair at the office by accident and now I was racing to get there and get back to pick up my family.
When I pulled into the office parking lot, I thought this would be a very fast in and out. I got out of the car; left it running even, and raced to the building with my key in hand, but I never got my key in the lock. The back door had been jimmied, the lock broken. It stood ajar and the metal around the lock mechanism was bent and mangled. I looked through the crack for a second, but my gut told me not to enter.
Instead, I dialed 911 and backed away from the building. Whatever was going on had me a bit rattled. Throughout the entire time that scandal was going on years ago I never once had to worry about someone breaking into my house or office. A few people painted horrible words on my garage door, but no one had tried to steal from me.
"911, what's your emergency?"
"Uh, yeah, I need to report a break-in. I'm at my office…" I spat out the details to the dispatcher and in less than ten minutes, I heard sirens in the distance. She asked if I wanted to stay on the line with her, but I let her go. I didn't feel like I was in any immediate danger. I didn't hear any noises inside, and I had my car right here, which I shut off.
When the police arrived, they went into the building with their guns at the ready. I hovered by my car and waited, and when they came back out with guns holstered, I breathed a sigh of relief.
"Dr. Edwards, there is no one inside. We need you to go through things and see if anything is missing or tampered with." One officer, who according to his nameplate was Sergeant Jetty, shook my hand and nodded at the building.
At this point I was on autopilot. I didn't know who would want to break into my office for any reason. We didn't keep any drugs here except samples of new heart medications. It wasn't like addicts should even target the building. We had no narcotics.
"Sure … I'll walk through."
I sighed, realizing I wasn't going to get to Scarlett on time now, and I sent her a quick text saying I'd be late. Then I walked into the office and turned on the lights. I knew if Emily was here, or my receptionist for that matter, either one of them would be able to tell me if something was out of place. I looked around the office and nothing appeared to be missing. I checked the drug safe, and it was locked. I opened it, but our samples were all there.
I looked through each exam room too, noting that nothing was missing. And last, I went to my personal office and grabbed my jacket off my chair. Even in here nothing seemed to be out of place, not even a scrap of paper moved. It baffled me that someone had gone to the trouble of breaking the lock on the office door to get into my office but hadn't taken anything.
I carried my jacket back out the door and into the parking lot. One of the officers was there waiting. He had a pen and paper ready to make notes, but I had nothing to tell him.
"Nothing looks to be missing. I don't even see a piece of paper out of place." I shrugged my shoulders and looked back at the busted door. I'd have to hire a crew to come fix that. "Is there something we can do about the door? I have to head out of town."
"No, sir, I'm sorry. You'll have to handle that. We just make the report and find the bad guys…" He jotted something on his paper and looked up at the building. "I see security cameras. Do you have a recording box for those? Maybe we can lift an image."
"Uh, yeah…" I took the pen and paper from him and scribbled down the website he had to visit to see the cloud storage. Then I wrote the username and password down. When I had them installed it was only as a means to make my staff feel a bit safer. Now I was glad Emily had freaked out and insisted I do something after her papers were moved.
"We'll get right on this. In the meantime, if anything else happens or you find anything missing, let us know."
I thanked the officers and they left. I was stuck waiting for a full hour for a handyman to get here with a sheet of plywood and some nails to board up the broken door. Emily would freak out, but hopefully it would be after I was already back from this camping trip and here before the team arrived Tuesday morning. Then I'd have to get someone to install a new door and new locks.
By the time I got to Scarlett and Ethan, it was almost dark. She was patiently waiting, but Ethan and his friend were grumpy. We piled into my car and headed out, and they sang camp songs and talked about all the fun things we'd do this weekend. Our hour-long drive grew quiet about forty minutes in when the boys both dozed off, and Scarlett laced her fingers through mine.
"Why were you so late?" she asked, and I tensed. I didn't want her to be scared or alarmed, but she had to know. She'd find out through rumors around town. And if something happened to her bakery and I didn't tell her about my office, she'd be upset.
"Someone broke into the office. I only found out because I left my jacket there and I stopped by to pick it up before coming to get you guys. The door was busted, but nothing seemed to be missing."
I felt her grasp on my hand tighten as I spoke. I could tell she was afraid. With everything that had happened this year so far, all we both wanted was peace. We couldn't enjoy dinner out without people whispering about us, and this weekend was supposed to be about getting away and relaxing. Now a dark cloud hung over it, casting anxious tension between us.
"What do you think they wanted? Who do you think it was?" Her questions should've been the first ones on my mind too, and one of them was. What did they want? But I didn't stop to think about who it was. In my mind it wasn't related to the rumors or gossip, or even the scandal. I chalked it up to a random break-in.
But Scarlett raised a good question. If this was the work of some gossiping no-good loser, they could be getting information for Marjorie. She wasn't beneath paying people to sniff out dirt on people, but what we were talking about here wasn't just a misdemeanor break-in. It was a felony. My office held people's private medical records. Tampering with them or stealing them was a federal offense. Whoever got into my office could be looking at a major jail sentence if not thousands of dollars of fines.
"I'm not sure. I hadn't even stopped to ask myself that." I scowled and noticed my headlights flip on automatically. "If this was Marjorie or one of her lackies, we're going to have words." I gripped the steering wheel more tightly and felt my shoulders tense.
"Alright, well there isn't anything we can do about it now. We're safe; we're not at home. We're out on the highway headed toward our camping weekend and we're going to have a good time." Scarlett's hand moved from my hand to my thigh and she squeezed. "And we brought our own tent…"
I sensed the hint of playfulness in her tone and let my mood lighten a bit. Maybe she wasn't so worried about this, but I knew it wasn't good news. The town had escalated from talking about us to breaking and entering. If it continued, I could see assault or theft, or worse…And now that I knew Ethan was my son, and one day I hoped Scarlett would be my wife, I had to protect them.
I had to put a stop to this. It was just impossible to fight my enemy if I couldn't see them or know who they were.