Page 120 of Protecting Peyton

“Are you helping him?”

“You mean Jordy? Yeah, I’m connected,” she said. “But there isn’t much to do yet.”

“Thanks,” Yates answered. “Keep at it.”

“Sure thing, boss. Bye now.”

“She seems competent,” I said after the line disconnected.

“She’s top-notch,” he assured me. “Very top-notch.”

I offered him a French fry from the Burger King order I’d walked over to get not long ago.

“No thanks.”

That left more for me.

Biting into a fry, I chewed slowly, savoring the saltiness and making the food last. Yes, I was so bored that making a single fry last thirty seconds was imperative.

“Another miss,” Jordy said over comms.

I swallowed my fry and held off grabbing the next.

“Another miss,” I repeated for Yates’s benefit.

He nodded.

“That makes thirteen,” Terry pointed out. “I’m getting bored. I want to at least drive to check these guys out.”

“No,” Lucas was emphatic. “That could put you out of position for the one that counts.”

There was no arguing with his logic.

“Copy that, boss,” Terry answered after a pause.

“Winston, notice anything yet?” Lucas asked.

Winston was at the office, reading the case notes O’Connor had brought. “Still going through it. This is one sick fuck. This Boston group kept a lot of things from the public. Like, there’s an email from the mayor directing them to not disclose that the victims got flowers because he didn’t want to ruin the flower business. He said if it got out, every woman in town would be calling the cops on her boyfriend. It would be pandemonium.”

“I can see the logic,” Duke answered.

“It’s stupid, is what it is. They’re putting the next potential victim in more danger,” Winston argued. “Without warning signs to be careful of, it makes it easier for the perp to collect his next victim. Give the public as much warning as you can.”

I stayed out of the dispute as a few seconds of static signaled them both transmitting at the same time. That was the problem with these tiny earpieces. Not stepping on each other’s transmissions required discipline.

“Enough,” Lucas scolded. “Anything else?”

“Yeah,” Winston answered. “We’re missing the autopsy reports. The cases only include short summaries of the findings.”

“I’ll check with O’Connor on that,” Lucas confirmed.

Jordy’s weak voice came over comms a second later. “Help, I can’t…”

Then, I heard Pete say something unintelligible.

Military protocols instantly clicked into place, and we all stayed off the channel until Lucas said otherwise.

Lucas transmitted instantly. “Jordy, say again.” Lucas’s voice was calmer than I would have been.