Page 35 of Simon Says… Fight (Kate Morgan Thrillers #11)

With that cleared, she headed downtown, to the same warehouse building where the bodies had been found.

She didn’t know why this warehouse was so important, but it was where they had found two people so far.

Chances are, it still called out to him for some reason.

When she finally got there, she parked off to the side and called him again, still getting nothing.

When she headed to the main entrance of the warehouse, she heard Simon calling out to her.

She turned, the relief evident on her face.

He looked at her. “I wasn’t expecting to see you here.”

She frowned as she eyed him intently. “Are you okay?”

He nodded. “I’m okay,” he replied, an odd look on his face. “Is there a reason why I wouldn’t be?”

“You haven’t been answering your phone for one thing,” she stated angrily. “Then I got this horrible feeling.”

His eyebrows shot up, and he nodded. “Did you pick up on something about forty minutes ago? If so, it would be fair enough.”

“It was about forty minutes,” she agreed, as she checked her watch, “but it takes time in traffic to get here.”

“It does,” he noted, as he gave her half a smile. “So, either you’re really getting in sync with me or you’re getting psychic yourself.”

“No fucking way,” she exclaimed, staring at him in horror. “And joking or not, why would you even say such a thing?”

He burst out laughing. “It can’t be that bad.”

“Oh, yes,… it can be,” she declared, frowning at him. “So, what’s the deal then? Are you fine?” She pushed back her hair and glared at him. “I tore out of my office and came racing down here.”

“Yeah, but why here?” he asked, studying her with interest.

She turned around and frowned. “Because,” she relented, “because this building calls to you in some way, and whatever is calling out to you, it felt wrong.”

“I don’t know about wrong,” he clarified, “but definitely that same voice is talking to me. He called himself Jay, and I had thought it was his body that we found, but he says it’s not.”

She stared at him in shock, too stunned to say anything right away. She swallowed. “Please don’t tell me that you think another body is on this property?”

“But I do think there’s another body,” he stated, “or at least Jay thinks he’s in here… somewhere.”

“And do you have a name other than Jay? That nickname could work for all kinds of given names, even last names. Any clue as to who he is?”

Simon shook his head. “No, I don’t have anything on him. I just know that, because of him, I came here and found Arnie and Elsie, you found Sonny, and then we found the skeleton,” he pointed out.

She looked up at the building. “And have you just been inside?” she turned, frowning at him.

“Yes. I wasn’t sure if it was cleared from the police or not, but, as the new owner,” he declared, with a wry look at her, “I figured I should probably go in and take a look. I was just taking a look around the perimeter when you arrived.”

She stared at him for a long moment and then sighed. “You bought the building?” He nodded. She didn’t even know what to think about that. “Why this one? I thought you worked with buildings that needed saving.”

“I do,” he confirmed, “but I feel this building is crying out to be demolished.”

“Demolished?” she repeated, her eyebrows shooting up. “I didn’t think that was something you did.”

“Neither did I,” he admitted. “But I’ve got to tell you, this one’s different.”

“Oh, I hear you, but there’s always been derelict buildings with bodies found in them,” she noted, “whether it’s drug addicts or something else entirely.”

“I know,” he muttered, “but what can I tell you?” He shrugged. “I just needed to buy it.”

“I won’t question your financial decisions,” she said, holding up a hand. “That’s definitely an area of expertise I do not have, but this person, this voice—”

“I know,” he replied. “You don’t like the voice.”

“What’s to like about the voice?” she asked. “And the fact is, it has already brought you here to find Arnie, and Rodney and me to find a man who was very badly injured, and then to someone else’s skeleton, who was here for a very long time.”

“I know,” he agreed, “and I don’t know what to tell you, but Jay says that wasn’t him.”

“And is he expecting you to find him?”

He winced and nodded. “I would say that’s a given.”

“That’s nice,” she muttered, glaring at him. “What if you can’t?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted, shaking his head. “I haven’t got to that part yet.”

She noticed the plans that he had in his hands. “What are those?”

He unrolled the papers. “These are the plans for this building, per City Hall,” he shared. “One of my men pulled them for me.”

She frowned and asked him, “You’re looking for Jay, aren’t you?”

“I don’t know what else I’m supposed to do,” he bit off. “If another body is here, I feel as if I need to find it, and if there isn’t?… Well, maybe Jay will leave me alone… and in peace.”

She bit her lip as she studied him. “Okay,” she conceded finally. “Did you see anywhere in this mausoleum of a property where a body could be hidden?”

He hesitated and then shrugged. “Not today, no, but I did just get the plans.”

“Okay.” She brushed the hair off her face. “In that case, where do we start?”

*

Simon looked over at Kate, the woman who continuously surprised him in a never-ending way. From being terrified, to being supportive, and then sometimes back to being terrified, she always stood by him, even if it made her uncomfortable.

“You don’t have to go with me,” he offered.

She raised her eyebrows. “If another body is in here, I need to know, and I need to know if it’s connected to my current cases.” He shook his head. She frowned. “That was pretty fast.”

“I see that,” he muttered, staring off in the distance, “but I don’t know why.”

“And, if you don’t know why, you also may not know the answer.”

He smiled. “You could be right. I’m not saying that I know everything, and I sure as hell don’t know anything when it comes to this,” he muttered. “I’m just trying to follow the bread crumbs.”

She nodded ever so slowly. “In that case, where are these breadcrumbs leading you right now?”

“You don’t have to stay with me, you know?” he repeated. “This search could be completely fruitless.” But she stayed, just staring at him intently. He frowned. “Is there some other reason you’re here?”

“Sure,” she replied, with a negligent shrug. “To confirm you’re okay.”

Something bloomed deep inside him, and he realized she had literally just dropped everything to confirm he was okay. “You know, some people would say that puts us in a very unique relationship.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “I don’t know anybody who would disagree with you in terms of our being a unique couple,” she noted.

“However, I do not make a habit of discussing our relationship with anybody, and I generally refrain from getting into it. All questions regarding my relationship will get an answer leading the conversation in a completely different direction.”

His lips twitched. “Particularly when it comes to me and my weird habits.”

“Everybody always wants answers on various things with our cases,” she explained, “but we don’t get answers that way. If they come, then I will put them to good use. If they don’t come, I won’t sit here and cry about it,” she declared in a defiant way.

He looked at her and nodded. “I can live with that.”

Her shoulders sagged, as if she thought he might have had a problem with it.

“You know, Kate, I’m totally okay to accept you as you are.”

“Good,” she replied, “and I’m working on accepting you as you are.”

He burst out laughing at that because he knew it to be true. Kate was nothing if not absolutely honest, sometimes to a fault. But he could always count on what she told him would be the truth as she knew it. “I can live with that too,” he added comfortably. “So, shall we go explore?”

“But it’s just an open cavernous room here, with stairs on the side, and floor after floor of open warehouse,” she noted, not sure where to start. “What is it you’re looking for?”

He pointed at the docs in his hand. “That’s why I had the building plans brought in.”

“Okay, meaning?”

“Meaning, this building has to have utility rooms, furnace rooms, electrical panels, all of that,” he noted. “So somewhere—”

“Oh, right,” she interrupted, as she looked around, frowning at the huge cavernous walls. “We never saw anything like that, did we?”

“No,” he agreed, “but generally they’re down, not up.”

Immediately her gaze dropped. “Is there a basement, another floor below this?”

“There should be at least some kind of an electrical room,” he stated, skimming the drawings. “This warehouse is a huge building, and there’s got to be accessible power somewhere.”

“Good enough.” She waved him forward. “Lead on.”

“I haven’t figured out where we can get to it yet.”

“No elevators,” she muttered, as she glanced around, “so check for stairs.”

“Not seeing any stairs that go down.”

She frowned. “Outside access?”

“Now that makes sense. They would still be stairs, but likely hidden somehow. But the only way to hide stairs would be with a storefront or something, as the stairs would be unsightly. Which is why it’ll be…” He paused, looking at her, one eyebrow raised.

“At the back of the building,” she pointed out, “where nobody will see it, and they can keep all the ugly stuff hidden.”

He laughed. “You know, a good electrician takes pride in making sure there is no ugly stuff , as you put it.”

She rolled her eyes. “Maybe, but the truth of the matter is, that stuff can get pretty ugly looking very quickly.”

“It sure can,” he acknowledged with a smile, then led the way to the back of the building.

It was still a hugely open and spacious warehouse.

Yet, with the busted-out windows and open ceiling in various places, where some of the metals had been ripped off, and nothing but garbage strewn around on the floors, it had such a desolate, empty look.