Page 41 of Ruthless Riches
“I saw you leave the Atrium,” she replied. “Not the whole building. So I didn’t see you get attacked.”
“When did we leave?”
“A little after one. I know because I spotted you guys walking out, and it made me wonder how late it was, so I looked at my watch.”
“Will that help the police with the case?” Laurel asked, tilting her head.
Ruby nodded. “I think so. They said they’re going to look at traffic cam footage from all the roads leading away from the Devil’s Playhouse. Now that they have an approximate time, it should help them narrow things down,” she said. “I guess we just have to hope the Butcher didn’t cover his license plates.”
I frowned and drummed my fingertips on the counter. Something Ruby said a moment ago was needling at my guts. When I finally realized what it was, I sat up straight. “Holy fuck. The watch.”
“What?”
“Alexis has a Fitbit watch. I bought it for her ages ago, and she was wearing it last night,” I said. “It’s one of those ones that looks like a normal watch, so I totally forgot about it.”
“Is it GPS-enabled?” Laurel asked.
“Yes.” I grabbed my phone and opened the connected app. My stomach sank with disappointment as I stared at the screen. “Fuck, it says the GPS is off. She must’ve messed with the settings.”
Ruby slapped a hand on the counter. “Shit. We could’ve used that to find her.”
“We still might be able to use the other data from the app,” Laurel said, forehead creasing. “Can you show it to me?”
I handed her my phone. She clicked on a few things and nodded slowly. “Okay, that’s what I thought,” she said. “Even when the GPS isn’t enabled, it still tracks heart rate, speed, and distance traveled. It just doesn’t tell you where you traveled.”
“How does that help us?” Ruby asked.
“I don’t know yet.” Laurel frowned and clicked something else on the screen. “Okay, look here,” she said, pointing to a graph. “Alexis’s heart rate was normal for a long time, and she was walking at a steady pace. Then, at 1:09, her heart rate suddenly spiked to 122 beats per minute. See?”
I nodded. “That must be when she saw the Butcher.”
“I’d say so, yes, because we know from Ruby that you guys left the club around that time,” Laurel said. She pointed to a low point on the graph. “Now look at this bit. At 1:10, her heart rate fell all the way down to here. That must be when she was drugged.”
“So we know the exact time she was taken now,” Ruby said, eyes widening.
“Not just that. Look at the rest of the data,” Laurel said. “We can see that Alexis’s heart rate remained steady for nine minutes, and the distance traveled in that time is six miles.”
“So she was in a car.”
“Yes. The Butcher couldn’t have carried her six miles in just nine minutes.”
I frowned. “So we know she traveled six miles from the Devil’s Playhouse,” I said. “How does that help, though? She could’ve gone in any direction.”
Ruby’s shoulders drooped. “Oh. Yeah.”
“Not necessarily,” Laurel said slowly, scratching her chin. “Look at the speed.”
“It looks pretty normal to me. Forty miles an hour.”
“Yes, but the car remained at the exact same speed for the whole six mile journey.” Laurel raised a brow. “Think about what usually happens when you drive.”
I nodded slowly as I realized what she was getting at. “You don’t stay at the same speed the whole time. Not if you have to stop at traffic lights or stop signs.”
“You have to slow down when you make turns, too,” Laurel said. She paused and opened Google Maps on her phone. “Most of the roads leading away from the Playhouse have a lot of turns. So that means there’s only one possible road the Butcher could’ve been driving on.” She tapped on the screen. “This one right here. It’s a straight six miles up to Avalon City, without any stop signs, and it ends right at the traffic lights at the south end of Seewald Avenue.”
“You were right, Nate,” Ruby said, turning to look to me again. “He took her to Central Park.”
“I fucking knew it,” I muttered, clenching my jaw.
Laurel patted my hand. “We need to tell those detectives,” she said. “Maybe they’ll actually take you seriously now.”
I swallowed hard and nodded. I felt vindicated, but beyond that, I didn’t feel any better. Alexis was still missing. Still in terrible danger.
“What does this part mean?” Ruby asked, squinting at the Fitbit app on my phone. “Where the data ends.”
I picked up the phone. Sickness rose in my throat as I peered at the screen. It showed Alexis’s heart rate at 60 beats per minute for the six mile journey, and then the graph flatlined.
“It looks like…” I stopped abruptly and took a deep breath, hands balling by my sides. “Her heart stopped.”
