37. Jude
JUDE
T he bell above the shop door rings as I hold it open for Freya.
My other arm is still in a sling and it’s bugging the hell out of me.
My hand itches to flip the stones in my pocket.
It’s hard to move them from one pocket to the other with only one good arm and I keep forgetting things I’d usually use the stones to remember.
Freya trails her fingers across my abs as she passes and my annoyance scatters.
She’s slept in my bed practically every night since I came back from the hospital.
I may be forgetful but the memory of her telling me she loves me, that she’s loved me since the day I saw her scars, is permanently etched into my mind.
She’s made a habit of saying those three words to me of late and each and every time lives rent free in my head.
She looks back and smiles up at me and I wonder if she knows that I’m thinking of my mouth buried between her legs while she screams ‘I love you’ over and over.
Maybe I can do that later, after our plans for this evening.
Freya doesn’t know we have plans yet but I’ve been plotting this night for weeks now.
The glint in her eye has me wanting to play but her smile is tired.
This is the fourth shop we’ve visited, all of them scattered around the county.
We didn’t shut Zach’s access down because we want to use his bank card to draw him out.
The next time he spends any money on it we’ll get alerted but until then we’ve been tracking down his past purchases to try and find a lead on his location.
He's been smart so far, choosing stores seemingly at random and far from each other. We’ve been to a paint shop, a grocery store, a hardware store and now a place that sells furniture and homeware.
I follow Freya past a set of wicker chairs and shelves filled with cushions. River, Eli, and Oz join us as we head to the counter at the end of the large store.
A teenage cashier with blonde hair in a ponytail looks up as I flip my badge. “Whoa,” she murmurs, her eyes darting between the five of us.
“Can we speak to your manager?” I ask.
She nods. “Sure, give me a sec.”
I watch Freya as we wait. So far, she’s treating this day like it’s any other and I’m determined to prove to her it’s not. I bet Eli a tenner that she wouldn’t tell us what today is but part of me wants to lose. I want her to tell us, to trust us.
“Why are you looking at me?” Freya’s eyes slit.
“Because you’re beautiful.” The words come without thought, their truth as undeniable as the need to breathe.
Freya’s cheeks flush pink as the cashier returns with an older woman in tow.
The woman crosses her tan arms over a heavy chest and takes us in. “What do the cops want with a homeware store?”
River flips his badge. “FBI, actually. We need to see your security footage from November second.”
The manager kisses her lips together. “No can do. All the footage gets deleted after a month to make space.”
“Of course it does.” Oz is standing behind me, but I know he’s rolling his eyes, probably ranting internally about how shopkeepers constantly do this.
“In which case we need to look at your sales records,” River says.
The woman sighs but half an hour later we’re in her office sifting through a list of purchases attributed to Zach’s bank card.
“A couch, paintings, bedding. Rather eclectic,” Freya comments as Oz clicks through each item.
I turn to the manager who’s staring over our shoulders like our existence is the last in a long list of inconveniences. “Did he use the delivery service you offer?”
The woman hefts out a breath and takes the mouse from Oz.
She scrolls down the screen and shakes her head.
“Nope.” Her deep thick eyebrows pull together.
“I remember this guy actually. It was strange because he’d ordered a couch, but he insisted on taking it with him on the day.
Pulled the sections apart and put it in the back of some van. ”
“Do you remember what model the van was?”
She stares up at me. “Do I look like a car dealer?”
I probably shouldn’t find her amusing, but I bite the inside of my cheek to stop from smiling. “No, Ma’am.”
“Go back to that photo,” Freya says, leaning over Oz’s shoulder.
He moves the mouse and clicks on the screen till a black and white photo appears. Freya grips onto the back of the office chair and the edge of the desk as she squints at the image of a woman spinning around, her blonde hair swirling in the air.
“What is it?” Eli asks.
She purses her lips and shakes her head. “I don’t know, I just… that photo, it feels familiar. Like I’ve seen it before, but I can’t place where.”
The manager looks at the clock and taps her foot. “How much longer do you all need to be here? You’re not the only one with a job to do.”
River flashes her a charming smile. “No time at all. Oz, you know the drill.”
“Already printing.”
The printer whirs as Oz gets copies of all the purchases Zach made like he’s done for every other store we’ve visited today. Maybe once we have the whole picture, we can make sense of what he’s bought. And if we’re lucky, there’ll be something that gives us a clue as to his location.
“Do I get compensated for the ink and paper?” the manager calls after us as we leave her office.
“Well, she’s just the belle of the ball, isn’t she?” I whisper to Freya who laughs under her breath.
I tuck the sound away under my ribcage, feeling its warmth spread over me. Making Freya laugh is one of my new favorite hobbies, right below making her come.
She goes all serious again though the second we get back to the Lair.
The five of us set up at the table in the middle of the open office area and pour over the records we’ve collected, analyzing all the purchases Zach has made over the past two months.
They’ve died down of late, most of the spending having taken place in late September and early November, just after Freya left us.
“He was careful to never get anything delivered so we don’t have an address,” Oz says.
Freya braces her hands against the edge of the round conference table as she scans the papers spread across it. “Paintings, bedding, a microwave. It’s like he’s furnishing an entire house. Can we look up real estate purchases in the last few months?”
Oz drags over his laptop. “We can but there’ll be a lot.” He taps away for a minute or so before closing the lid. “I need my office set up. I’ll see if I can narrow the search down with some more parameters.”
Freya goes with him and two hours later both of them are still sequestered away in Oz’s office.
It’s eight o’clock and we’ve been up since six this morning. I spin in my chair and catch River’s attention. “I’m calling it.”
He checks his watch and nods. “Yeah, alright. Let’s go.”
“You owe me a tenner,” I say to Eli as I stroll past his desk on my way to Oz’s office.
“She could still tell us,” he calls back, grabbing his hat.
I spin so I’m walking backwards and shoot him a look of disbelief.
He sighs and hands me a crisp ten-dollar bill when he catches up with me.
I push open the door to Oz’s office and walk in. “Time to go home my babies.”
Oz throws an empty M&M packet at me, but Freya doesn’t even look up from the papers she’s studying.
“Freya, come on.”
“We haven’t got anything from his bank records yet,” she murmurs, lost in her work.
“So, we’ll try again tomorrow.”
Locks of hair that have fallen loose from her ponytail hang around her face as she shakes her head. “There are too many house purchases and that’s assuming he bought it in the last few months and not before then or that he even bought it at all.”
“You think Jeremiah might have given it to him?”
She chews her lip. “If he did, he won’t tell us. He’s already spoken to Carmen, we don’t have any leverage anymore.”
“Did Carmen ever say what Jeremiah wanted with her?” I ask.
Freya shakes her head. “No, she’s refusing to talk to me about it.”
I hate seeing her like this, all stressed and lost in her mind. I rest my hands on her shoulders and brush my thumbs up the curve of her neck. “Come on, let’s go home.”
“But—”
“It’s okay, Freya,” Oz cuts her off. “It’s not a total loss. We’ve still got access to his bank and as soon as he uses his card, I’ll get an alert. We can track him in seconds.”
Freya sighs and tips back her head against the leather chair.
I dip down and press a kiss to her forehead. “We’ll get him, Angel, but there’s nothing more we can do right now. Let us take you home.”
She relents but she spends the whole ride back to the house lost in her head.
It’s not till River opens the front door and I usher her inside that she stops thinking about Zach.
I know that, because the second she sees what we’ve done with the place, she gasps.
My hands loop around her waist as she takes in the banners and balloons decorating the living area. I lean down to whisper in her ear. “You’re with four FBI agents, Angel. Did you really think we wouldn’t figure out it’s your birthday?”