Chapter 10 #2
“Tell me what happened.”
“I couldn’t concentrate at the lab.” Her voice stayed barely above a whisper, rough like she’d been crying before I arrived.
“Too many people. Too many distractions. Too many questions. Every time I’d get close to fixing a problem, someone would need something or there’d be noise or…
” She clutched the lunch box tighter, her knuckles somehow getting even whiter.
“I needed quiet. Real quiet. So I took everything home with me.”
Oh fuck. “Charlotte—”
“I know I’m not supposed to. I know it’s against protocol.
That’s why I didn’t tell you or Alex.” The words tumbled out faster now, desperate.
“Some vehicle came from nowhere, hit my car. And then when I was trying to get out, trying to breathe, this man appeared. He seemed like he wanted to help, but then he just… He took my computer bag and just left.”
Jesus Fucking Christ. If someone had Charlotte’s work, if they had the stabilizer code… The implications spun through my mind—security breaches, Charlotte’s career destroyed, the Cascade Protocol deployed with no countermeasure.
“Charlotte.” I kept my voice steady, even as my mind raced through contingencies. I needed to work the huge goddamn problem. “What exactly was on that computer? Is the countermeasure lost?”
She shifted, loosening her death grip on the lunch box just enough to pop it open. Inside, with some papers and pens, sat a computer drive. Dull, black, unremarkable. The kind of thing you’d find in any office supply store.
“No, the actual stabilizer code is here. I got frantic at work and accidentally put my work in my lunch box and my sandwich container in my computer bag.” She touched the drive with one finger, like she needed to make sure it was real. “What they took… My laptop is useless without this drive.”
Relief hit hard enough that I had to take a breath. But relief shifted quickly back to concern. The sabotage last week. Now this. Someone definitely wanted Charlotte to fail, and they were escalating. Getting desperate, maybe. Which made them dangerous.
A knock interrupted my thoughts. Two uniformed officers entered, their expressions professionally neutral. The older one had the weathered look of someone who’d seen too much, the younger one still had that eager rookie energy.
“Ms. Gifford?” the younger one said. “I’m Officer Morris. This is Officer Santos. We’re here to take your statement about the accident.”
Santos looked at me with the kind of assessment that came from years on the job. “Sir, we’ll need to speak with Ms. Gifford privately.”
“No.” I didn’t move from my position. “She’s under federal protection. I’m not leaving.”
“Sir, it’s standard procedure—”
“She’s my responsibility.” I let steel enter my voice, the kind that had backed down bigger men than Santos. “I stay.”
Charlotte’s hand found my arm, her fingers barely touching my sleeve.
When I looked at her, gratitude flickered across her face, mixed with something else.
Relief, maybe. Like she’d been dreading facing this alone.
The touch was so light I barely felt it through my jacket, but somehow it anchored me in place.
“It’s okay,” she told the officers. “I want him here.”
Santos exchanged a look with his partner, then pulled out his notebook with the resignation of someone who knew when to pick his battles. “All right. Can you walk us through what happened?”
Charlotte straightened, pulling in a breath that shuddered slightly.
“I was driving home from work. I was driving down Maple, approaching the four-way stop at Third, when a vehicle appeared out of nowhere and hit me. I think it was a truck or maybe an SUV. Definitely bigger than a car. It must have run the stop sign.”
“So, truck or SUV. Do you know what color? Make? Model?”
“Dark blue. Maybe black. I’m not sure about the other. It happened so fast.” Her fingers tightened on my arm, nails pressing through the fabric. “The airbag went off, and I couldn’t… I couldn’t see for a second. Couldn’t breathe. There was powder everywhere, and the smell…”
Her voice started to shake. Without thinking, I shifted my hand to her shoulder, let the weight of it rest there. She closed her eyes, drew in another breath that was steadier this time.
“Then someone approached my passenger side. I thought they were coming to help.” She opened her eyes, focusing on the officers with visible effort.
“But they just opened the passenger door and grabbed my computer bag. I tried to say something, but I was still dazed from the airbag. The man had a baseball cap low and sunglasses. I couldn’t see his face well. ”
“But you’re sure it was a male?”
She nodded.
“Can you describe anything else about him?”
“Tall, I think. But I was sitting down, still strapped in, so it’s hard to say.” Her fingers tightened on my arm again. “He didn’t say anything. Just took the bag and left.”
“Just like that?” Santos looked skeptical, his pen pausing over his notepad. “No demands? No weapon?”
“Nothing. He just grabbed it and disappeared. I tried to call out, but I couldn’t… My voice wouldn’t work.”
The younger officer, still scribbling notes, glanced up. “Probably just some opportunist. Saw the accident, figured you’d be too shaken to stop him.”
“Yeah.” Santos closed his notebook with a snap. “We see it sometimes. Lowlifes taking advantage of people’s worst moments. We’ll canvass for security cameras, see if we can get a better description, but honestly, ma’am, these cases rarely go anywhere. And it’s odd that he didn’t take your purse.”
Charlotte met my eyes. We both knew the guy hadn’t taken her purse because, unlike what the officers thought—if they believed her at all—this hadn’t been a random robbery.
They asked a few more routine questions—insurance information, whether she needed a copy of the report, had she been drinking, was she on any medications.
Through it all, I kept my hand on her shoulder, felt the tension in her muscles, the way she fought to keep her voice steady.
Every question seemed to drain more energy from her.
After they left, Charlotte slumped forward, exhaustion replacing adrenaline. She looked smaller somehow, like the weight of everything was physically crushing her.
“I messed up,” she whispered. “I thought I was doing what was best.”
“It’s going to be okay. I’m going to use my resources to see what I can find out. We have the drive—that’s what counts.”
“Yes. Could it have been a random robbery like the police officers said?”
“Possible. But doubtful.”
“So, what now?”
“Let’s get you out of here, then we’ll worry about the rest. It’s going to be okay, Charlotte. Trust me.”
She glanced up at me and, after a moment, nodded briefly. “I do.”
And I was going to make sure that trust wasn’t misplaced.