Page 9 of The Shadowed Oracle (The Bonded Worlds #1)

Chapter Six

The San Bruno police station was crowded.

Handcuffed drunks, teenagers waiting on their parents to pick them up, overworked desk-deputies typing up report after report.

There was an alertness brought on by the noise, but Ingrid also felt a haze slowly haloing around her head.

Something more than exhaustion, and more than any post-traumatic fugue she’d experienced before.

“Ms. Lourdes?” The officer sitting in front of her repeated himself.

A few fragments of sentences would sneak through her addled brain, but not enough to pierce the part of her that engaged a desire to respond. She had to force herself to open her mouth.

“Sorry,” she said. “What was the question again?”

The officer sighed, remaining steadfast. He wore a blue suit with a coffee-stained checkered tie, and his eyes were beady behind thick glasses as he stared at her.

Ingrid deduced that by his age, his composure, he’d been doing this job for a long time.

Not to mention, he seemed far more competent than any of the other officers she’d spoken to since arriving three and a half hours ago—or was it four now?

She didn’t know.

“I can’t imagine what you’re going through, Ms. Lourdes,” he went on, trying to find better footing. “But every detail, no matter how small, it might be the difference in catching this guy or finding another body.”

“I understand,” she said apologetically.

No matter her prejudices, the man was trying to do his job.

To help her. To help people like her all over the state.

Judging by the way the uniformed officers treated him, he wasn’t employed at the small San Bruno station.

Even Dean seemed to be wary of him, uncomfortable and studious.

Every question he asked seemed pre-written, robotic. She answered them to the best of her knowledge, yet she couldn’t shake the feeling that he wasn’t satisfied with the information. And the more she spoke about the strange messages, the more insane they seemed.

After all she’d put up with, all she’d been through…and now this.

“Ms. Lourdes?” the detective asked. “Are you still listening?”

Hours later, Ingrid sat on her couch staring at the dark screen of her phone. Down to the spot and the method in which she lounged, it was the same scene as the previous night. Only foggier.

Time stalled. A movie she couldn’t remember choosing was on her TV, and she couldn’t think of any reason to keep it playing other than the fact she’d lost her remote.

The single police cruiser stationed outside her home was the only thing she could focus on anyway.

She wondered if the officer, Matty—or maybe Marty, she couldn’t remember—was out there paying close attention to his surroundings, intently surveying the street, or if he, well, wasn’t doing any of that.

She couldn’t help but wonder if he resented being assigned to her, tasked with the girl supposedly being stalked by a serial killer.

She’d met cops like that, years ago, in that time of her life that she didn’t think about, didn’t linger on.

It was her experience that young single women claiming that men were harassing them wasn’t something the police prioritized.

“Not a frugal use of the force’s time,” one of the uniformed officers tasked with her case had said. Like it was some kind of unwritten rule. Women would be followed, pestered, harassed—and that was unavoidable.

It had taken a very clear link to a serial killer to get them to take any kind of action.

Dean had offered to stake out her street himself, and Ingrid was so surprised, so caught off guard, she declined out of habit.

She regretted that prejudice now. For the first time in her life, she accepted the fact that she couldn’t do this alone. That she was only holding herself back.

And so, as she stared at her front door from the corner of her living room, she gave in to the urge. She let those iron walls dissolve within her, and then she reached for her phone.

Dean had given her his number right before she was escorted back to her apartment. With a shy and almost boyish mumble, he’d said, “In case you need me,” then shoved a crumpled scrap of lined yellow paper in her hand. The same hand that was now hovering over that same set of numbers.

A minute, two, then three passed before she finally pressed the button.

“You alright?” Dean asked abruptly. His voice was at once kind and commanding.

“I’m fine,” she said. “Much better. I’m sorry about how out of it I was, back at the station. Things hadn’t really settled in.”

“Totally understandable.” The relief in his voice alerted Ingrid to the fact that, just by calling him in the middle of the night, she’d likely given him a scare.

Nothing about how she’d treated him after the news report aired would’ve indicated she would call him for anything other than an emergency.

“If it makes you feel better,” Dean went on, taking a breath. “I don’t think I’ve fully adjusted to it yet either. And this shit is literally my job.”

“Really?” Ingrid asked lowly, almost embarrassed.

“Absolutely.”

“That makes me feel a little better, actually.” She managed a laugh, though something in her chest twisted slightly. “Makes me feel better about what I’m about to ask, too.”

A barely audible “Fuck” came from Dean’s side of the phone.

“Don’t knock it until you hear my plan,” Ingrid groaned.

“Plan? What plan?”

“The plan that I’m letting you in on.” She said it like she was doing him a favor. “I was going to do it alone. But now that the universe or fate or whatever it was brought us together…”

“I’m not going to like this, am I?”

“Hear me out.”

His response levelled out to a low monotone. “That’s what I’m actively doing.”

“Right,” she said sheepishly. “So, as you know, I want to catch this asshole as soon as possible.” She paused, waiting for an objection, but got none.

“What I was thinking is, I’ll send a message.

Tell him I want to meet. That I’m grateful for what he did to Kyle for me.

You know, play into his game. Then I get him to meet me in a public place. ”

Another extended beat of silence before Dean responded. “Wait, slow down. I don’t know you well enough to tell if you’re being serious or not.”

“I’m dead serious. I want this over. Whatever I have to do, I’ll do.”

“Ingrid,” Dean started, but obviously couldn’t come up with anything else to say to someone so eager to risk their life.

“What?” Ingrid pushed.

“It’s not possible.”

“What do you mean?”

“That man you spoke to today, he was FBI. The FBI don’t use civilians as bait.

They follow protocol. They process evidence.

And they do all of that very, very quietly.

We haven’t even gotten the results from the book he left at your front door.

They’ll wait for that before doing anything else.

Trust me, it’s not happening. No matter what you’ve seen in those brain-dead movies. ”

A familiar rage bubbled in her like an old friend as she said, “I know it’s unorthodox. But don’t talk to me like I’m stupid.”

Dean was too flummoxed to respond at first, giving Ingrid a moment to cool down. “Just a phrase,” he replied finally. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be.” Ingrid was glad he’d spoken first. “I get what you’re saying.”

Something thick and heavy hovered over the space between them like static on the airwaves. It felt like they were back to how they’d been when Dean had first come into her bar. Immediately contentious. Wary. A little argumentative.

“For the record,” Dean’s voice drifted into a soft whisper. “I don’t think you’re braindead.”

“That means a lot,” she said with a huff. “Coming from the guy that can’t even tell when I’m being serious.”

“Fair enough,” he said. “Then let’s change that. Let’s get to know each other. I was going to ask you back at the station, but you had a lot going on. What was the book he gave you? You said it was a sequel to something you were reading?”

“Really?” Ingrid asked dryly.

“Yes, really. We’re getting to know each other. Why not start with hobbies?”

Ingrid considered it. “I don’t mind small talk. But I think you just want to change the subject.”

“Fine!” Dean’s voice rose an octave. “I’m trying to change the subject.

But I’m also interested in what you like to read.

So just tell me about the—or no, actually, I’ll go first.” He named the title and author currently resting on his bedside table, then pushed again for Ingrid to share. “Now you go.”

Ingrid hesitated. Recalling the last time she’d shared her tastes with Franky, she almost avoided the question entirely. “I mostly read history books,” she said it so reluctantly that Dean had to ask again.

“History books. War,” she repeated, and winced as the word left her mouth. She’d had enough experience to know this answer either bred skepticism from men, or created an image of her as some contrarian eager to prove she was different.

She added, “But I like all Non-fiction. My one stipulation is that the events have to be from way before I was born. Otherwise, my imagination feels… limited.”

“So partly a history buff, partly a nostalgia reader.”

“I guess, yeah,” Ingrid said. “It’s comforting.

When people lived so simply. When reading or going to a play or an opera house was the only entertainment.

Everything was slower. More isolated. Whatever little corner you inhabited, it felt like the most important place in the world. And I think that’s beautiful.”

There was a pause, followed by a crinkling sound, like Dean was adjusting the phone to his other ear. “I get that. My mom always said that humanity advanced too quickly. That they got too big for their own good.”

“I think I’d like your mom,” Ingrid mused.

“Don’t jump to any conclusions,” he chuckled. “That’s how we got started on this sidetrack in the first place.”