Page 46 of You Found Me

For once, Della didn’t protest.

Ward put his hand softly on her back as he escorted her to the security room. He wanted her to remember she wasn’t alone. Anchoring her in the here and now would help her process what she’d just experienced.

He paused at the living room where the night shift waited for interrogation and eyed the team lead, Bob. He was an ex-football lineman built like two tanks shoved together. Ward had been evaluating him for possible future gigs before he’d found him and most of the night crew guarding a pizza instead of the damn property.

“Lock the house down and sweep the grounds in pairs,” Ward said. “I want every shadow checked. Report back when you’ve made damn sure there’s nobody on the grounds.”

They scattered at his command with satisfying speed, but it was a little like shutting the barn door after the horses had taken off for the neighbor’s grass.

The stalker probably hadn’t stuck around, but Ward’s team wouldn’t stop for so much as a piss break until they verified that for a stone-cold fact.

When they reached his temporary base at the front of the house, Ward pointed at the small couch. “Please. Have a seat.”

Della sank onto the cushions and wrapped her arms around her torso like she desperately needed a hug.

She was in shock. No question. He’d seen it often enough.

He eyed her for a few seconds, then took out his phone and dialed Spencer.

Spencer picked up on the second ring. “Heya. Teardown went fine?—”

“I need you both at the house. Now,” Ward interrupted. “There’s been a breach. Bring your kit. And get me a status update on pool boy Scott Baldwin. Start with the hospitals.”

He bit down on “Then check the morgue” before he uttered it out loud.

“Oh-kay.” Spencer put a paragraph of meaning into the two syllables. “We’ll be there in fifteen.”

“Make it ten.” Ward hung up.

With the way Spencer usually drove, it would probably take twenty, but when he and Annie got here, they’d at least know if the stalker had followed through on the implied threat.

With plans set in motion, he checked on his principal. She’d dropped the self-hug in favor of clasping her hands in her lap so tight her knuckles were white. Her body shook like she’d just stepped out of a freezer, but there was a sheen of sweat on her forehead.

He’d seen people react to stress and fear in all sorts of ways. The fight-or-flight response could push someone to run away, or it could drive them back inside their own head and they’d freeze, unable to cope.

Neither would help the situation.

“Hey, it’s okay.” He pulled a throw blanket off the back of the couch and held it out to her.

When she didn’t so much as glance at it, he knelt in front of her to get into her line of sight.

“Ms. Bellamy.”

She didn’t even flinch.

He tried again, keeping his tone gentle. “Della.”

She finally looked at him, but he wasn’t sure if she’d joined him in the here and now or if she’d simply reacted to her name.

“I’ve got you. You’re safe, and you’re going to stay that way.” He unfolded the blanket and started to put it around her shivering shoulders, but she took it from him and hugged it like a teddy bear instead.

“Do you think Scott’s okay?” She sounded so lost his heart slid sideways. She didn’t deserve this. No woman did.

“We’re checking on him now. Stay positive.”

His gut told him Scott was probablynotokay. He didn’t think the stalker had broken through all the security around the house to leave empty threats, but he couldn’t bring himself to point that out to her when she looked so stricken.

Ward rubbed at the knots of tension building in his neck.

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