Cami was amazed at the offer, and at Connor's vision for her. This felt as if her life was opening up, and a direction she had never believed would be possible now existed.

  "I'm so happy that you'd like to have me on board," she said. "And I'd love to think about that. Can you give me a few days?"

  "Of course. No rush. Remember we've got you for a year in any case," Connor said, with wry humor, as Cami grinned reluctantly. She felt a happy warmth that she was needed, and it gave her even more determination to get over what she was facing now.

  In a few days, she might have more answers.

  In fact, maybe even sooner than that. When she got home, she might discover more about what Bill Oertel was up to and what his role in all of this was.

  ***

  An hour later, the apartment smelled deliciously of cooking food. Cami had the chicken in the oven and the rice ready to steam. And now, with the cooking prep out of the way, she was ready to see where her email research had led.

  She checked the time, feeling a pang of nerves as she opened her computer. Kieran had messaged to say he was on his way home. She had a window of time alone now, where she could delve into this deeply, and look through all the emails. The deleted ones that she’d managed to recover, and the ones that were still archived.

  Sitting down, taking a deep breath, Cami began the search.

  Bill Oertel was a brief emailer. He didn't waste time or words. That, Cami realized immediately as she began searching through. His work emails were extremely concise. One-liners, mostly.

  At least that meant they were fast to read.

  She skimmed through, looking for what she needed. Communication between Oertel and someone else. Who had instructed that the case get dropped? Was it Oertel's idea? Or had he received instructions from above?

  Where was the smoking gun she suspected was hidden here?

  Cami let out a frustrated breath. Her search was getting nowhere.

  She couldn't find the incriminating content she knew she was looking for. And Bill Oertel had worked with Liam Treverton. She'd found enough evidence of that. He must have been involved in this. Liam's boss would surely be involved in this if he'd told him to drop the case.

  Think, she urged herself.

  If this was highly illegal and so secret that people were prepared to kill to protect it, then there was no way she'd find it in an ordinary search, in an ordinary email chain.

  This was going to be carefully hidden, and now Cami acknowledged that she was going to find no easy answers. She needed to be more clever and more cunning. She needed to look beyond the obvious. The dots would have to be joined another way.

  Of course, Oertel wouldn't have sent an email to someone about this. But he might have made a phone call.

  He might have set up an appointment for a face-to-face meeting to discuss it. And traces of that might be possible to find.

  Cami quickly jumped up and put the rice in the steamer, and checked the chicken. She couldn't afford to burn dinner while she did her research.

  Then, with intent filling her mind, she went back and searched.

  "Don't look for the action," she told herself. "Look for the traces of it, and the shadow it casts."

  The emails linked her to a lot of other sources of information where she could look. She could see Bill Oertel's daily appointments and meetings. She could see some of his private emails that he'd sent to himself as a backup. She could see his phone accounts because they got emailed through with itemized billing. She had a program that could analyze those, faster than what she could do herself.

  Cami worked furiously. This time looking for the shadows. Intent on her research, fully focused, determined to find what there was to find. From time to time, she quickly made a note on her phone before turning back.

  And then, she saw it. Finally, the evidence added up. She stared in shock at the screen, her gaze flickering between windows, her mind reeling as she realized what this must mean.

  The rattle of the front door made her jump out of her skin.

  Kieran was home.

  "Hello," he said. "The apartment smells wonderful!" Then he looked at her more closely.

  "Is everything okay?" he asked. And then, in different tones. "I can see it's not okay. What's happened? What have you found?"

  Cami looked up, her mind whirling from what she'd just discovered.

  "You won't believe what I've found," she said slowly.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Cami moved over on the couch to make room for Kieran, and then, item by item, she opened up what she'd found in Bill Oertel’s records. Her heart was pounding. This represented a serious breakthrough.

  "Look here. This is going back five years. This is the day before Jenna disappeared." Her voice wobbled.

  "Okay?" Kieran said. He reached out his hand and put it on her shoulder, squeezing gently. The touch was comforting.

  "You can see here, there was a meeting, with P. I don't know who P. is, but I do think it's strange that an FBI agent would note down a meeting with someone who only goes by an initial."

  "It does sound strange," Kieran said.

  "On its own, maybe it wouldn't mean much. But now, look here. This is Oertel’s phone bill. It's an itemized bill, and it gets emailed through to him, so I looked at it. And over that timeframe, you can see there are a number of calls to a particular cellphone number. One call in the morning, and two other calls in the afternoon, after the meeting."

  "Yes. I see those," he said.

  "Now, we go to the day when Jenna disappeared. And look. Two more calls to that number."

  "It might mean something," Kieran said, nodding. "It could also be a coincidence, though. I mean, maybe this is just a work colleague."

  "It might be. But look here."

  Cami pulled up the calendar, and the call log again, side by side.

  "No other calls to that number for a while. But then, Liam starts investigating Jenna's case. I checked the date that investigation kicked off. And look. Now, suddenly, Oertel and this mystery number are in communication again. Two calls, two more calls, and then the case is dropped. Liam is emailed and told it will be moved to another department and reassigned. But it isn't. It's just left to go cold. Then there's another meeting with P."

  Kieran looked from one to the other. "I'm getting cold shivers," he said.

  Cami jumped up. "The food! The food!"

  She had been so absorbed in her research she'd nearly forgotten all about the cooking food. Dinner had been minutes away from burning. Quickly, Cami took the rice off the heat and got the chicken out of the oven. She needed to get this right - after all, it was her responsibility tonight.

  Then, she rushed back to the living room and the laptop.

  "If you thought that was giving you cold shivers, wait until you see this," she said.

  It was giving her shivers all over again. Goose bumps prickled her arms as she opened up the next stage of her research.

  "See here. Does that mean anything to you?"

  "What's this date?" Kieran asked, and then he nodded slowly. "I remember, I think. It was around that time that Ethan got shot at when we were out on the street."

  "There was a meeting with P. in the morning. There was a call to that same number an hour earlier. And look here."

  "I'm not sure I want to see," Kieran said. Now he was sounding wobbly, and Cami put her arm around him.

  "This is the night we went out to try to get the information I needed off Liam's computer. We went to that dodgy bar to try to get a voice recording from him, and that's when the gunman followed us.” She took a shaky breath.

  "Two calls in the early evening? And another call just before midnight?"

  "It is no coincidence!" Cami turned to him, intent flaring inside her. "Somehow, Bill Oertel is involved with all of this."

  "He must be," Kieran said.

  "He's a corrupt agent. He has to be."

  "So who's he been speaking to?" Kieran asked.

  "That's the million-dollar question," Cami said. "And I'm going to find out the answer."

  She closed the laptop lid, feeling as if she was trembling all over. This was so much bigger than she'd thought. And Bill Oertel was in constant communication with the owner of this cellphone, who so far she was sure must be the mysterious P.

  "There have been a few other calls between them over the months. A couple of other meetings. But it just seems so strange to me that all those calls and all those meetings should have been on the exact same days as things happened."

  She got up, needing time to process all of this. It was the smoking gun she’d been looking for, and she knew that she needed to act on it, but not without careful thought.

  "Let's have dinner," she said. "And I'd like to hear about your day. I was called on a case, and I can tell you all about that, too."

  Walking to the kitchen again, she appreciated some time away from staring at the screen and thinking thoughts that ranged from anger, to dismay, to fury.

  Bill Oertel might not know it, but she was getting close.

  And if he was involved in this, which Cami now strongly suspected, she promised herself she was going to take him down.

  ***

  Cami had just finished eating when her phone rang.

  It was Jacenta calling, the FBI agent who'd been assigned as her parole officer. Cami had been expecting the sharp-minded, dark-haired woman's call - for two reasons. Firstly, Jacinta always checked in with her on cases to make sure she was okay and that she was handling things.

  But there was another reason, too, and that was because Cami had promised to tell her what was happening with her investigation into Jenna, and Liam Treverton, and ultimately, Ethan's death.

  She'd almost told her the last time they'd met. But she'd held back, saying that she needed to do more research. She’d wanted to dig into Bill Oertel's emails before she talked to Jacenta.

  Jacinta had messaged her a few times, asking when they could meet and what was causing the delay. And Cami had replied, saying she needed more time.

  Now, her research was almost done, and she had most of the evidence she needed. It couldn't be delayed any longer, and she'd need to sit down with Jacenta and tell her everything.

  "Cami Lark," Jacenta greeted her. "How's everything going there with you? I understand you've got another case on the go?"

  "Yes," Cami said, getting up from the couch and hurrying through to the bedroom so she didn’t disturb Kieran, who had his computer open and was doing some work. "As of today. It's a very weird serial case. I think I'm coping okay with it, but as yet, we haven't worked out who the killer is. The problem is that there really are no common threads between the victims. One of them only moved here two weeks ago and has no history or connections in the area."

  "That makes it complicated," Jacenta said. "You'll need to use other routes to get there."

  “Yes, this case is taking us in a very different direction. There’s a chain of evidence we’re following, and I'll be going into a prison tomorrow. That'll be my first time," Cami said.

  "Probably not the last, especially if you consider a career in the FBI in the future," Jacenta said. The words jolted Cami. A career? It seemed that everyone was encouraging her to sign up for an FBI career.

  And she had to admit, she was feeling more and more ready. A shock turnaround if she considered how she'd felt about the FBI when she'd first been confronted by Connor after having hacked their site.

  "Now, that's not the only thing I called you about," Jacenta said, inexorably guiding Cami to the next step of the conversation. "I also need to know when you're going to be ready to resume the chat we had two weeks ago. It's been a long time. Longer than I expected this to take."

  "I'm sorry," Cami said. It had taken too long. That was her fault, because she'd had to be stealthy in researching Bill Oertel. But she knew she couldn't delay it for more time. "As soon as this case is over, I'll meet with you. And then I'll be ready to show you everything."

  "I think I might have heard that before?" There was a dubious note in Jacenta's voice.

  "This time, I really am. I've done the checks I've needed to."

  “Cami, we can’t carry on like this,” Jacenta said sternly. “This is now going over the acceptable time limit that I put on this matter. And I can’t keep delaying it for much longer. You need to tell me and I’m going to give you a deadline. Three more days once the case is wrapped up. That’s all you have.”

  Her voice was harsh.

  Cami felt she was teetering at the precipice but knew she could track every step of the journey there. This hadn’t come as a surprise. Now, though, she had to take her courage in her hands.

  “Okay,” she squeaked out the word.

  Jacenta's voice softened. "Cami, you know you can trust me. We'll sort this out. Together. Okay?"

  "Okay," Cami said.

  She hung up, feeling extremely anxious. Three more days was all she had. And what if it was so big it blew everything out of the water, and the people who were involved in it decided to act by putting Cami down?

  Don’t think about it, she told herself. Just do the right thing. There’s no reason for Bill Oertel to suspect you’re onto him.

  First, get through this case and find the killer.

  And then, be brave enough to act the way you need to.

  ***

  "Now, when we go into a prison," Connor said, "it doesn't always go according to the script."

  "I can imagine," Cami said, feeling nervous.

  It was the next morning, at seven a.m., and Cami had just scrambled into Connor’s car. She was wrapped up in a scarf and gloves in addition to her FBI jacket and hat. It was freezing, and a chilly wind was gusting, scudding loose snow down the sidewalk.

  It was time to get her thoughts away from Bill Oertel, and onto the suspect who had used the black Ford, and Nealon Browne, to dump the bodies of these two women.

  This was the killer who needed to be stopped. Today, if they could possibly do it, Cami resolved they would catch him.

  Connor was looking preoccupied and stressed, as if he, too, was under pressure to solve this case, as he swung onto the road, heading for Boston Maximum Security prison. Cami hoped that things would be calmer there today and that there wouldn't be a repeat of yesterday's violence.

  "Especially after there's been trouble, it's possible that the inmates will say things, shout things, make remarks that are designed to try to get a reaction from you. It's best not to react,” he warned.

  "I'll try my best," Cami promised, not feeling any less nervous after that cautionary.

  Connor headed down the main road. Traffic was dense going into town, but they were going the other way, out to the prison, which was on the edge of town. It was only a few miles away, and a quick drive, but thinking of Connor's words, she got more and more expectant as they neared it. She hoped that things would remain calm and sane once they were inside the gates.

  Cami had lived in Boston for all her life, but she'd never been past this particular prison, which now loomed in front of them. Its stark, functional buildings, its high chain link fence, and the presence of cameras and guards made it an intimidating-looking place, and yet again, she imagined what it would be like to come here in the back of a prison van and be locked inside.

  Connor showed his ID at the gate.

  "We've come in for a few meetings with convicts. It's been organized by the head warden," he said.

  "Right. Should be possible today," the guard said. "No trouble inside since last night. Park in the lot on the right, and then go in the main door."

  Connor parked in the lot on the right, where a couple of delivery vehicles were waiting, and then he headed to the main door. They walked in, went through security, and then the guard - silent and unsmiling - led them down a corridor. It was cold in here. Cami's feet sounded loud as they trod down the brightly lit passage.

  The guard opened a door at the end. It led through to a small interview room. The room was divided into two halves by a low wall and a sturdy steel grille above it. There were two chairs on their side. One chair on the other side.

  "From time to time, it can work well to go down to the cells and speak to the prisoners together," Connor muttered as they sat. "But with what we need to find out, this isn't one of those times. We need to make sure each of these men gives us their own version, and to do that, we need to talk to them one by one."

  At that moment, the guard on their side called Connor out of the room.

  He left, quickly, leaving Cami alone. She hoped she wouldn't be on her own here for too much longer as she perched nervously on the edge of her seat.

  It felt like an age, but was probably no more than a couple of minutes, before Connor strode back in.

  "Now, this is interesting,” he muttered to her. The warden called me out to tell me that the man who's coming in first, Dave Booth, spent last night in solitary. For his own safety." He paused. "He was a close contact of Nealon Browne's, shared a cell with him before he was paroled. He was the reason for the flare-up. Last night, somebody tried to kill him."

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Somebody tried to kill Dave Booth, the prisoner they were about to speak to? Was that a coincidence? Did this man know something important?

  Thoughts were whirling through Cami's mind as the door clanged open, and the orange-suited man was led in by a guard. He was tall, gangly, and tan-skinned, with dark, wavy hair.

  He looked morose and angry. He also looked injured, Cami saw, feeling her stomach twist as she saw the dressing on his neck. Below the white, there was a stain of dried blood. Had someone tried to stab him in the neck, or what had happened?

  "We'll be okay in here," Connor told the guard. "You can wait outside."

  He waited until the guard had gone. It didn't seem to Cami that this convict could do anything harmful, even without a guard to watch his movements.

  His hands were cuffed together. His legs were not shackled, though, and he moved over to the chair and sat down. She could see a guard watching closely from behind the two-way glass.

 

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