Page 131 of The Ripper

“Hills are formed by tectonic activity, or as a result of erosion and weathering over thousands or sometimes even millions of years, which makes each one unique in one way or another.”

“So, you’re saying that if we find that hill...” Midnight exhaled a deep breath, her mouth hanging open for a second.

“We find that house,” I pointed at the photo.

“That’s going to take a while. Even with all the search engines, we’re looking for a needle in a fucking haystack,” Hannibal approved, then got to work.

I lit a cigarette as adrenaline exploded inside my body. Klaus put an arm on my shoulder in an attempt to reassure me, but I was a long way from feeling calm.

A few hours.

I was able to wait a few hours if that meant I was going to receive a possible location. A lead, something to follow.

I took the photo from the table and put it back in the box, refusing to leave her things scattered around the place as if they weren’t important.

“Klaus?” A thin, weakened voice sounded in the garage, and all heads turned towards it.

Fleur stood at the entrance to the hallway that led to Klaus’ apartment, wearing one of his red T-shirts. But that wasn’t the strange thing about this picture, the blood that flowed down her legs and the ghostly whiteness of her face were, and my brother ran towards her as if his life depended on it.

Everyone turned their heads in their direction, watching as my brother picked her up and kissed her forehead, then whispered something to her as he walked towards his car, giving me a long look, almost as if he was begging.

I knew what he was asking, even though he didn’t say it.

“Go,” I nodded from my spot. “We’re good here.”

He nodded and carefully sat her in his car, then left, probably to a hospital, because whatever was happening to the redhead looked bad.

As soon as they were out of sight, everyone returned to their previous activities as if nothing happened, focused on the task at hand no matter how fragile Fleur’s situation seemed.

“I think I found it,” Hannibal shouted, standing up from the chair so fast it fell to the floor with a loud thud. “Those particular hills, thanks to Ripper’s knowledge about fucking geology of all things, are in La Calera,” he said as he opened a map on the biggest screen.

“La Calera?” Damiano frowned.

“Yeah, it’s a town about eleven miles from Bogotá,” the kid explained.

Damiano swore through his teeth in Italian and pulled out his phone, then walked outside as he called someone, an action which made me fucking suspicious, but I pushed my criminal instincts to the side and turned my attention back to Hannibal.

“If we measure the apparent distance and the size of the hills in the photo, that puts the house approximately five kilometers away, but I can’t figure out the angle, so we have a ten-kilometer radius to cover.”

“Can’t you do a satellite search?” Midnight asked.

“I’m good, beautiful, but not that good. Nobody fucks with those guys. It would take me weeks to hack into their system without them jumping us in the next second, and we don’t have that much time to spare.”

“Can’t you use that street-view thing?”

“If you were a cartel member, would you allow anyone to put your house on the map? Those aren’t publicly available records, just like this warehouse doesn’t appear anywhere.”

Ten kilometers. I could work with ten kilometers.

“Looks like I’m going to La Calera,” I said as I put the cigarette out under my boot.

“I’m coming with you,” Midnight nodded.

Damiano came back from outside, swearing in Italian, as he angrily threw his phone at the wall.

“What got your panties in a bunch, pretty boy?” Midnight asked.

“You said La Calera, right?” The Italian turned towards our hacker.

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