Page 15 of Cold Vengeance

“Are we going to tell him about the picture?”

“I believe we have to,” Tony said. “The threat was leveled at us, but the picture is of him. I don’t want to make him paranoid, but this person knows about April. Now, they seem to be focused on Nathan. They must be following him for some reason.”

“If he’d been warned to drop it, he would have told us, I guess.”

Tony nodded. “I think so.” He shook his head. “I have a feeling about this case...”

“I’m glad you said that. I feel the same way. As if we’re looking at the surface, but there’s a lot more going on that we can’t see.”

Tony had been a Christian long enough to know that listening to those odd feelings was important. Besides that, their training had kicked in more than once, making them look more closely at something that might otherwise have seemed inconsequential. He just prayed that his concern for River wasn’t messing with his ability to see what was important when it came to Nathan’s case.

“Maybe after reading April’s notes and seeing what’s on her laptop we’ll be able to figure out what’s really going on here,” he said.

“If she’s not alive, why would someone send Nathan that note? And make sure we saw the photo?”

Tony shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe they killed her, and they don’t want us to find them. But that leads to another question. Why is someone following Nathan? And how would they know he was coming to this building to see us? And that it was about April?”

“Good question,” River said. “He didn’t mention telling anyone that he was planning to talk to us, but we should probably ask him about that.”

“Good point. We might be able to use that to narrow our search.” He grinned at her. “Ready?”

“Come on, Watson. The game is afoot.”

“Hey, wait a minute. Why are you Sherlock?”

River tossed her hair and laughed. He not only enjoyed the sound of her laughter, he loved it when she did that with her hair.

“I’m Sherlock because I thought of it first. Besides, you have the dog named Watson. That settles it.”

Tony sighed dramatically. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Sorry. Suck it up, my friend.”

They got out of the car and together they walked up to Nathan’s front door. River rang the doorbell and, a few seconds later, the door swung open. Nathan motioned them inside.

If Tony had been impressed by the outside of Nathan’s townhome, he was even more amazed by the inside. Tony had expected a casual, messy dorm-room type of vibe, but Nathan’s apartment was stunning. Clean and modern with real wood floors and an open-concept living room that led to a gleaming white kitchen with hanging lights and modern appliances. It confirmed Nathan’s claim that he could afford to pay them. Not that they were doing it just for the money, but Tony was relieved that if they decided to take the case, it wouldn’t be pro bono. They really needed to bring in some income if they wanted to keep their agency afloat.

“Have a seat,” Nathan said. “Can I get you something? Cup of coffee? Iced tea?”

Tony looked at River, who shook her head. “We’re good, but thanks. We have a lot of work to do tonight, so we’ll take what we came for and get going.”

“Sure.” Nathan walked over to a coffee table and picked up a tote bag with aHot Coffee and Cold Caseslogo. “Everything’s here. Remember, though, I really will need my phone and my laptop in the morning.”

“Don’t worry. We promised we’d bring it back to you,” Tony said, taking the bag. “I need to reiterate that if we find you’ve deleted anything, we can’t help you.”

“I understand,” Nathan said. “Most of what you’ll find on my laptop is from work. I’ve backed it up, but please be careful.”

“We will,” River said. She looked over at Tony, who nodded.

“April’s notebook is pretty big,” Nathan said. “It might take a while to go through it. You don’t need to return any of her things until you’re finished with them. I don’t have any use for them.” He hesitated a moment. “I added something else that might not have anything to do with her disappearance, but ... I don’t know. It’s rather disturbing.”

“What is it?” River asked.

“Ever since April was young, she’s been plagued by something. She had nightmares as a child and when she got older, she began drawing pictures of ... of what she saw in those dreams. I didn’t think to mention this when we talked earlier, but April’s mother was murdered when she was young. I think she was projecting her mother’s murder into these drawings, yet they don’t match the facts of the crime. Her mother was found in a parking lot, not far from their house. She’d been robbed and shot in the chest. April’s drawings are of a woman who was stabbed and left under a tree. The figures don’t have a face, but the hair is dark like her mother’s.”

“I read about her mother when I looked over her site,” River said. “Is it possible April saw someone else’s body under a tree when she was young?”

Nathan shrugged. “I doubt it. Her father surely would have known about it. He told her that what she saw in those dreams never happened. He thinks it’s her way of processing her mother’s death. She never saw her mother after she died. Maybe she saw something on TV or just imagined the image.”

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