Page 22 of Velvet Vaughn

“It happened. Then four other things transpired. It got buried.” He didn’t try to make it sound better than it was, which she appreciated, even as she filed the lapse away under things to watch for later. Civilians compartmentalized under stress. It was a gap, and gaps were how people got hurt.

She pressed play.

The muffled drone of a television came first, followed by Vic’s voice. She listened to the whole recording without moving, then played it again, and this time she closed her eyes.

The message cut off mid-syllable into dead air.

She opened her eyes and set the phone down gently.

“It cuts off.”

“Yes. He was interrupted. There was television chatter throughout the recording, and then a slight gasp before it just stopped. It was as if somebody had taken the phone out of his hand.”

Her thoughts too. She picked up the printout and unfolded it, lining the transcription up beside the phone, a dead man’s testimony rendered twice, once in his own ragged voice and once in Leo’s block print.

“He told you there’s more than what’s on the drive.”

“Yeah.”

“And he was about to tell you where it was.”

“Yeah.”

She looked up at him. “I want this audio backed up tonight, off your cell and onto something my office controls. It can’t disappear from three places simultaneously. Phones get lost or taken or end up in evidence lockers you can’t access for six months. Humor me.”

“Copy that.” He flashed her a faint, tired smile and forwarded the message to her.

“Someone took that phone out of his hand, Leo, and if they saw who he was talking to, then you are most definitely on their radar.”

Leo grimaced, and she instantly regretted saying it aloud.

“Now show me the envelope.”

Leo walked to the wall oven and pulled the door open. He lifted a padded mailer off the rack and set it down between them. Anja pulled a pair of nitrile gloves from her bag, snapped them on, and picked up the mailer.

“Uh, Anja? Fair warning. My fingerprints will be all over everything since it didn’t occur to me not to touch the items.”

“That’s okay. If needed, we can eliminate them.”

It was a standard padded shipping envelope, roughly letter size, sealed with its own adhesive strip. The return address was handwritten in blue ballpoint in a slanting, rushed hand. Victor Shaw. No street address. The destination was Leo’s office at Pinnacle, and the postmark stamp read Kansas City, Missouri, with yesterday’s date.

She turned it over in her hands. The envelope itself was generic, sold in boxes of fifty at any office supply store. Nothing that shouldn’t have been there.

“Who opened it?”

“I did. Letter opener, clean slit along the top.”

“I’m going to look inside now. If anything falls out of it, don’t touch it. Let me handle it.”

“Understood.”

She tilted the mailer and emptied the contents onto the counter. A folded sheet of paper slid out first, followed by a generic silver thumb drive and a cheap black flip phone, powered off.

She picked up the note first. It was written on hotel stationery from a mid-range chain, usually found in the desk drawer beside the Bible. The writing on the page was the same slanted script, pressed hard on the downstrokes and shaky at the transitions. She read it once, then again, more slowly, letting the specific word choices register.

Don’t take it to your own people.

She set the note down and looked up at Leo. He was watching her and waiting for a verdict.