Page 38 of Coordinates of Death

“Are you leaving the cooler here?”

“Yes, it’s safer under lock and key.” She placed the cooler into the refrigerator. “Let’s meet in the lobby at six. That okay?”

“Sounds good.” Kordell opened the door. “After you.”

Aurora exited and locked it behind her. “I’m exhausted after such a grueling day. Hopefully we don’t dream of hands floating in the lake.” She trudged up the stairs.

Fifteen minutes later, she stuck her weapon under her pillow, then pulled the comforter up to her neck and scrolled through her messages from the day. There were multiple texts that she had missed from her sergeant, asking for updates. Thankfully, Hill would update Wheeler. Aurora was too tired to handle that man. One text caught her attention. Dirk. She hovered her thumb over the message, debating whether to open it. Because her ex-fiancé only contacted her about work since he’d betrayed Aurora for her friend, she clicked on the text.

Don’t trust that watcher. Can’t find out anything about the man before he joined CWS.

Aurora straightened and tapped out a reply.

Stop. I trust Kord.

She huffed and tossed the phone on the nightstand, hating her foul mood. But how dare he interfere after everything he’d done.

Aurora closed her eyes, pushing thoughts of Dirk, SBK, childhood dolls, and fishing for severed hands out of her head—willing herself to sleep.

Creak!

Aurora jerked out of her slumber. She stilled, attempting to figure out what had woken her. She waited.

Creak!

Someone was outside her room.

Aurora whipped off the comforter and withdrew her Glock from under the pillow, sprinting toward the entrance. She raised the weapon and thrust open the door, glancing left and right.

But only darkness greeted her. She tiptoed down the hallway to ensure she was alone. Total silence.

You’re hearing things, girl. She reentered her room and shut the door, locking it. Aurora set her gun on the dresser and sauntered past the small rocking chair. She stopped. Wait—she had left her coat hanging on the hook by the door, not on the rocker. Hadn’t she?

You’re not only hearing things, but now you’re imagining them too.

She snatched her coat to move it back and drew in a ragged breath.

A small bunny sat on the chair. The same one Anna had taken to the park the day of her abduction. A picture lay propped against the rabbit’s tummy.

The hairs on her arms prickled.

Aurora flipped the light on, blinking to adjust to the sudden brightness, and peered closer. It was the picture Aurora had taken of Anna and her bunny minutes before her sister’s kidnapping.

The same picture that Aurora’s parents had used to plead with the public to find their daughter. Not only had someone been in Aurora’s room but they knew about her past. A past she had hoped to remain buried. It had brought too many tragic memories and unanswered questions.

And led her to a place from which there was no return.

Aurora refused to go there.

Never again.

I chuckled to myself and disappeared out the chalet’s rear door, skulking back into the freezing night air. A place I love. A place she had sent me many times to simmer down. Like she had to teach me how to behave.

It was you who had to simmer down.

Most people would hate the cold if they had experienced what I had. Abuse from the woman who taught me how to hate. How to manipulate. And how to get what I wanted from everyone around me.

Especially from him.