Page 62 of The Naturals
The sentence cut off there. Frantically, I ran my finger over the wall, sorting through text, looking for that handwriting to pick up again.
CALL 567-3524. GUARANTEED
A phone number. My heart skipped a beat, but I forced myself to keep going: up and down the walls of the bathroom, looking for another line.
Another clue.
I found it near the mirror.
PLUS ONE. KOLA AND THORN.
Kola and Thorn? The more I read, the more the UNSUB’s message sounded like gibberish.
“Cassie?” Agent Locke cleared her throat. I ignored her. There had to be more. I started at the top and went through all of the graffiti again. Once I was sure there was nothing else, I walked out of the bathroom to get some air. Locke, Dean, and Sloane had been joined by Agent Briggs.
“We need you to make another appearance outside, Cassie.” Agent Briggs clearly considered that an order.
“The UNSUB’s not there,” I told them.
The FBI thought that by bringing me here, they’d been laying a trap for my killer, but they were wrong. The UNSUB was the one laying a trap for us.
“I need a pen,” I said.
After several seconds, Briggs gave me a pen.
“Paper?”
He removed a notebook from his lapel pocket and handed it to me.
“The UNSUB left us a message,” I said, but what I really meant was that he’d left me a message.
I scrawled the words onto the page, then handed it to Briggs.
“For a good time, call 567-3524. Guaranteed plus one. Kola and Thorn.” Briggs lifted his eyes from the page to meet mine. “You’re sure this is from the UNSUB?”
“It matches the cards,” I told him. The way my name had looked in the killer’s script was burned into my mind. “I’m sure.”
To them, the cards were evidence. But to me, they were personal. Without even thinking about it, I reached for my cell phone.
“What are you doing?” Dean asked me.
I pressed my lips into a firm line. “Calling the number.”
Nobody stopped me.
“I’m sorry, the number you have dialed is not in service. Please try your call again later.”
I hung up, looked down at the floor, then shook my head.
“No area code,” Sloane said. “Are we thinking DC? Virginia? Maryland? That’s eleven possible area codes within a hundred-mile radius.”
“Starmans.” Agent Briggs was on his cell phone immediately. “I’m going to read you a telephone number. I need you to try it with every area code within a three-hour driving distance of this location.”
“Can I see your phone, Cassie?” Sloane’s request distracted me from Briggs’s conversation. Unsure why she wanted it, I handed her my phone. She stared at it for a minute, her lips moving rapidly, but no sounds coming out. Finally she looked up. “It’s not a phone number—or at least, not one you’re supposed to call.”
I waited for an explanation. She obliged.
“567-3524. On a telephone, five, six, three, two, and four each correspond to three letters on the keypad. Seven is a four-letter number: P, Q, R, and S. That’s two thousand nine hundred and sixteen possible seven-letter combinations for 567-3524.”