“Your boss, Margo here, confirmed that Heather was forwarding her work calls to her personal phone so she could work remotely,” Detective Maddox chimes in. “Which is what tipped us off to your CMA line’s number in the first place. We saw the number several times on Heather’s phone.”
I lick my lips and blow out a breath, steadying myself with a hand on my stomach as I try to wade through a million and one racing thoughts.
“Do you need to sit down?” Detective Dunn asks, and I shake my head, knowing if I move even an inch, my knees are going to give out.
“I ... I’m just trying to figure out how I fit into all of this. I ... of course, this is terrible news, and I’m so sorry to hear about Heather. But ... I just started working here. What does this have to do with me?”
Somehow, Margo has already finished her first cig and lights up another before hopping out of her chair to flip through the filing cabinet Detective Maddox is standing beside. Every once in a while, she hands a new file to him. By and large, she’s staying out of the conversation, and I have to wonder if it’s because she doesn’t want to say something she regrets. I mean, one of her employees wasmurderedwhile working remotely for CMA.
No wonder she was a freaking no-show! She’sdead.
What on earth have I gotten myself into?
The detectives share a glance, and then Detective Dunn smiles softly at me as he explains, “The Ruby line is ... of particular interest. We need to monitor the calls on it for a while, see if we can get a feel for the tone of some of the regular callers and compare those numbers with the ones Heather was taking. Unfortunately, Ms. Mavis informed us that none of the previous calls were recorded, so we’re going to have to work with the line now.”
“You ... you need to monitor the line?” I ask, tilting my head to the side in confusion. “So ... I ... wouldn’t work on the line anymore?”
His smile softens even further. “Actually, we need the operation of the line to continue as normally as possible, so we’d still have youoperating it. We’d just be using technology on our end to listen and record while we investigate.”
“Wait ...” My head jerks back in surprise. “You’d be ... listening ... to me. Take sex calls?”
He nods. “Correct.”
Is this some kind of sick joke?
“Um ... when would that start?”Please say never.
“As soon as we can get our equipment up and running, so realistically ...” He looks to Shane in question.
“Monday,” Shane replies good-naturedly.
Ha. And I thought this week was bad.
“Oh, great,” I answer, and I can’t hide the sarcasm.
“Hannah, I know this is a lot. I really do.” Detective Dunn has the audacity to look at me with sympathy in his eyes. “So, if you think of any questions or concerns, don’t hesitate to reach out to me. You still have my card, right?”
“Yeah.”
“If you have any questions ...”
I nod, cutting him off.Yeah, yeah. Call me anytime.
8
Dominic
10:00 p.m.
“Bottoms up, boys!” I shout over the bar chatter and the music from the live band onstage.
Shane tosses back his drink after clinking his bottle with mine, James’s, and Crew’s. I lift mine to my lips with a smile, and James hollers with excitement before doing the same.
Cutting loose tonight feels hard earned, and I’m ready to enjoy the night accordingly. Crew and James are two of my closest buddies from Vanderbilt, and some of the only ones from our college group who still live in Nashville. We make a habit of getting together at least once a month, and usually those are the nights when I let myself get a little wild.
Crew and James have seen me at my craziest—parties, bars, clubs, and lots of coeds. You name it, and I did it while I was at Vandy.
Technically, all of us did back then.
