13
8:00 a.m.
Hailey stood in the center of Miles’s bedroom and stared at all the blood. So much for warning him about the fed asking questions.
Motherfucker!
What kind of crazy bitch did he bring home with him? His naked body was stretched out on the bed, hands tied to the iron headboard. He’d been stabbed or halfway gutted, something. She groaned and put her hand over her mouth. There was blood all over the rug by the bed. She hadn’t seen any in the hall but there could be traces there. She’d watched enough cop shows to know there was likely evidence all over the goddamned apartment.
“Holy shit.”
She walked around the apartment. Checked the other bedroom. She shook her head when she saw the computer monitors. “You stupid fuck.”
If he had been videotaping the work they did together he was in seriously deep shit.
She laughed out loud. He was dead. How much deeper could the shit get?
“Holy fuck.” She dug in her bag for a pair of latex gloves. She had learned a long time ago that a pair of gloves to cover her tracks was the most important accessory she could carry in her purse. When she’d tugged them on she awakened the monitors. After several log-in attempts she threw up her hands.
Okay, what was the worst that could happen? The police would decide that Miles had abducted the women he’d videotaped. She doubted she was in any of the videos. The chances that he would have mentioned names was highly unlikely. This was, after all, his own little side venture.
She shook her head. But she couldn’t trust that he hadn’t named names any more than she could trust him not to fuck anything that would hold still long enough. The man was obviously a stupider fuck than she’d known.
Wait, wait—there was that one time. Shit. Shit. Shit. She’d walked in and he’d been recording. He’d promised to destroy all the videos. Obviously he hadn’t done that any more than he’d stopped his side business.
“Idiot.” There had to be a way to resolve this quickly. Every minute she was in this apartment was another one she risked being remembered by a neighbor or a passerby. She would be damned if she would go down with this worthless piece of shit.
Okay. Think. She drew her cell from her bag and went to Google. A couple of minutes later, she had a plan. She went to the bathroom and set the water to running in the tub. The traces of blood there told her whoever had taken the knife to him had showered before leaving the apartment.
She was damned glad she had a gun with her. The crazy bitch could come back.
Water was running. Now she needed something without a ground fault interrupter. A hair dryer wouldn’t work. She hurried to the kitchen and searched the cabinets. Nothing. She moved around the junk on top of the washing machine and found an iron.
“Perfect.” According to Google, an appliance that heated up—the hotter the better—was best. She placed the iron on the vanity in the bathroom.
Taking care to avoid the blood on the floor as she moved back down the hall, she left her bag next to the door of the bedroom with all the computers. One by one she unhooked the hard drives and carried them to the bathroom. On the second trip she shut off the water. She sure as hell didn’t want it to get high enough to splash onto the floor. When all the hard drives were in the bathroom, she immersed each one in the tub of water, holding it down until it stayed submerged.
She needed to hurry. The smell of blood and shit was making her heave. She dried her gloved hands on her skirt, checked again to ensure there was no water on the floor or on her shoes. Then she plugged in the iron. Wait, the outlet in the bathroom would be a ground fault, too.
“Fuck.”
It took her a few minutes but she found an extension cord. She plugged it into an outlet in the hall, and then plugged the iron into it.
She took a breath. “You get one shot at this.”
Backing as far away from the tub as she dared, she turned on the iron and waited for it to heat up. A minute later when it was hot to the touch, she tossed it into the tub.
The explosion or flash of fire she’d expected didn’t happen but she wasn’t getting any closer to check and see if her plan had worked. On the way out she grabbed her purse and his cell. On second thought, she executed a quick search of the place. She moved carefully from room to room, watching where she stepped.
She found no photos or stacks of DVDs as she’d feared. Whatever he’d done, he’d kept it on his computer or he had some other storage facility.
She glanced at him once last time. “Dumb ass.”
Once she’d ensured none of the neighbors were on the landing outside, she tucked on her sunglasses and got the hell out. It wasn’t until she was on the street headed away from the scene that she made the necessary call.
Her partner was not going to be happy.