Page 18 of Her Last Warning
The staircase presented its own challenge.Rachel placed each foot with deliberate care, knowing exactly which boards would betray her with a groan.Fifteen steps down, each one a potential alarm bell in the quiet house.The darkness felt thick here, almost palpable, broken only by the faint blue glow of the microwave clock in the kitchen beyond.
The kitchen tile sent a fresh chill through her feet as she crossed the threshold.Every movement seemed to echo in the silence – the soft click of the coffee maker's power button, the quiet scrape of the coffee scoop against the bag, the whisper of water filling the reservoir.Rachel found herself holding her breath as she pressed the brew button, wincing at the initial gurgle.But she’d been doing this long enough and knew that none of these sounds carried deep enough into the house to cause anyone to wake up.
While the coffee maker did its work, she retrieved a packet of instant oatmeal from the pantry, her movements slow and measured.The microwave door, despite her best efforts, released a small squeak as she opened it.The buttons seemed unnecessarily loud as she input the time, each beep an intrusion into the sacred quiet of the sleeping house.
The scent of coffee began to permeate the kitchen as Rachel settled at her laptop, the screen's glow casting strange shadows on the walls.The coffee maker's final sputter coincided with her phone's sudden vibration against the counter, causing her to start slightly.4:54 AM – a text from Novak.She grinned.Apparently, she wasn’t the only one who’d been kept awake by this case.
Rachel's eyes skimmed the message, noting its unusual length for her typically terse partner.Sleep had certainly eluded him as well, his mind caught in the same investigative web as hers.She had to really focus on the words as her brain was still spent and her eyes still bleary.In the text, he confirmed that he’d not slept yet…and that he had taken her social media theory a step further and had potentially found something useful.He ended the text by asking her to call him whenever she woke up.
With a small spark of excitement helping to wake her up, she grabbed a blanket from the living room couch and wrapped it around her shoulders.She then made her way to the back porch, the coffee mug warming her hands.The predawn air bit at her exposed face and ankles, a sharp reminder of just how cold January nights in Virginia could get.The porch boards protested softly beneath her feet as she settled onto the glider, its gentle creak seeming to echo across the silent yard.It was as if even the glider knew it was too damned early to be out here.
Her backyard stretched out before her like a monochrome painting.The maple tree's bare branches created intricate patterns against the navy sky, while Paige’s forgotten soccer ball sat like a pale ghost near the fence.The neighbor's motion-sensor light flickered briefly as a cat slunk along the property line, its silver-tipped tail disappearing into the shadows of the hedge.
The streetlights cast long fingers of amber light through the fence slats, creating alternating bands of light and shadow across her lawn.In the distance, a single car's headlights swept across the sky like searching beacons, but even that seemed muffled by the heavy quiet that blanketed the neighborhood.The air held that peculiar stillness unique to the hours before dawn, when even the birds hadn't yet stirred to life.
Her phone's screen seemed harsh in the darkness as she dialed Novak's number.He answered on the second ring, his voice carrying the slightly rough edge of someone who'd been awake far too long.
"I didn’t think you’d call this early," he said.“Did my text wake you?”
“Nope.I didn’t sleep particularly well.So…what do you think you found?”
"Your social media angle – it opened up something interesting.I looked to their posts where they talked about their recoveries."
Rachel pulled the blanket tighter around her shoulders as a cold breeze came parading across her deck."I went through the comments earlier, but nothing jumped out at me.Did I miss something?"
"Ontheirposts, no," Novak replied, the sound of typing accompanying his words."But then I started thinking – Marcy and Michelle had actually tagged a few of their doctors and the facilities they visited in their posts.So, I followed up by going tothosepages to have a look around.I started digging through the social media feeds of the specialists and facilities that Michelle and Marcy had tagged.Most of it was the usual stuff – congratulations, well-wishes, that sort of thing.But then I found these comments on one of Marcy's cardiologist's pages.They were...different."
Rachel heard papers shuffling in the background.The glider's gentle motion helped ward off the morning chill as she waited for Novak to continue.
"Different how?"
"They were from a man named James Barret.Really angry stuff, Rachel.The kind of bitter that makes your skin crawl.He was commenting on success story posts, including Marcy’s.He was basically attacking patients for surviving when his wife didn't.She had the same type of cancer as Marcy Connors."
“How do you know that?”
“Because he was very vocal about it in a few of his comments.”
The wind picked up slightly.A neighbor's wind chimes tinkled softly in the distance, the sound somehow ominous in the predawn darkness.
"That's not all," Novak continued, his voice taking on an edge of urgency."I ran his name through the system.Six years ago, he was arrested for attacking someone at a baseball game.With a knife."
Rachel straightened on the glider, her fingers tightening around her coffee mug."Do you have an address?"
"Better than that.I've got his current workplace, vehicle registration, and a pretty good idea of his regular haunts based on his social media activity.Guy's not exactly subtle about his movements."
It was the best lead they’d had so far, and it got Rachel to her feet, ready to race back inside and get the day started before the sun was even out.The quiet suddenly felt oppressive rather than peaceful.
"Want to meet me at the field office at 6:30?"Novak asked."I can have everything ready for review by then."
Rachel glanced through her kitchen window at the soft light spilling down the hallway.Soon, Jack would be up, starting his morning routine.Paige would stumble down for breakfast, barely awake but already checking her phone.Another morning of family life she'd miss, sacrificed to the demands of the job.
"I'll be there," she said, pushing down the familiar guilt."Good work on this, Novak.Really good work."
The call ended, and Rachel sat for a moment longer in the darkness.The neighborhood remained stubbornly quiet, but her mind was all of a sudden quite noisy.As she headed back inside, the motion sensor light flickered on again.This time, there was no cat to trigger it.Rachel scanned the yard carefully, but the shadows remained still and silent.The light clicked off after its programmed thirty seconds, plunging the yard back into darkness.
She’d be leaving before anyone else woke up…and all she could do was leave a note.She was stoked to have a lead, but it was so easy to slip into momentary lapses where she allowed herself a moment to hate her job…even though she really loved it.The job always took.It was a truth she'd learned to live with, even if she'd never quite made peace with it.But as she headed upstairs to quickly change and gather her things (hopefully without waking Jack), Rachel was determined to wrap this case before another victim was added to the list.Not just for the sake of a case, but of a weekend with her family, fully focused on them.
Of course, she also knew there was a Jack of Hearts in her laptop bag that made her wonder if she’d ever have a peaceful weekend again.
