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46
Heart pounding,Liv fast-walked up the sidewalk leading to her open front door, a testament to the number of law enforcement officials coming in and out of her home in the past two hours.
Minutes before dawn, she’d untangled herself from Zeke’s warm body to pad down the hall to her own bathroom. She used her phone to light the way, and it was a good thing. No sooner than she finished her business, she received a call from her alarm service, letting her know they had dispatched the police to check on a tripped alarm.
Instinct told her this wasn’t a false one. A quick look at her weather app confirmed there had been no thunderstorms in the area last night, no power outages, nothing that would easily explain why the alarm went off.
Thank goodness Callie was still staying with friends. Although she didn’t need one more thing on her plate, she could deal with replacing a few stolen electronics.
By the time she rinsed off Zeke’s scent and shrugged on fresh clothes, the expected phone call came in.
Home invasion.
What the reporting officer told her chilled her bones.
After writing Zeke a note, she crossed the hallway to rouse Brodie from his warm bed. While he used the restroom and dressed, she finished packing their belongings.
The whole sequence had taken less than ten minutes, but every second that ticked by felt like a year of her life falling away.
She didn’t want to leave, had even contemplated staying a few more days. But this morning’s phone call had changed everything.
While she’d waited in the hallway for Brodie to emerge from his room, she stared at Zeke’s bedroom door. She ached to slip inside and kiss him goodbye, but she couldn’t, for so many reasons. Mostly because she didn’t trust herself enough not to climb back into bed beside him and let him kiss away her fears.
After droppingBrodie off at her parents’ house, she’d driven across town in record time. Even though the R/O had given her the skinny on the damage, Liv still couldn’t believe her eyes when she found the family room and kitchen still intact.
No hint of the intruder’s passage through these rooms. No forewarning of the utter destruction she found within the ten-by-ten space, first door to the left.
Brodie’s bedroom.
Standing in the doorframe of her son’s room, she tried to mentally process the chaos inside.
Smashed toys covered every inch of the floor like shattered crystal and only ragged strips remained of the super hero posters dotting the walls. Mattress padding bulged from dozens of twelve-inch slashes across the surface and the new computer and gaming devices on the desk now looked like roadkill. Every stitch of clothing in the closet lay in a shredded heap on the floor.
Liv’s breath seemed stuck inside her chest. Every shallow inhalation hurt with the effort to fill her lungs. But what froze the blood in her veins and caused her heart to flame out were the words carved deep into the drywall above Brodie’s bed.
A Loss 4 A Loss.
This was no random burglary.
Whoever destroyed her son’s room and belongings had done so with calculation and malice.
But why? What loss was the intruder referring to? And why did her son pay the cost?
Two evidence technicians worked the room, taking pictures and dusting for prints. It was doubtful they’d find anything, given how methodical the intruder was in their messaging. But no crime was perfect, and Liv prayed the techs got lucky.
“How are you doing?” a low feminine voice asked.
Liv looked up to find Detective Marissa Schuler of the Asheville Police Department at her elbow. She’d had the pleasure of coordinating with the detective two years ago on a case involving the theft of a rare Japanese print. It had taken them five days to track down and recover the asset.
Schuler was solid, and Liv was glad to have her working this B&E.
“Detective,” Liv said, “I’d like to say it’s good to see you again.” Her gaze raked over her son’s destroyed possessions. “But I can’t quite pull off sincerity right now.”
“Don’t even try. If this was my son’s room, I’d either be babbling in an inconsolable heap on the floor or booking passage to some remote, faraway island with a state-of-the-art security system.”
“A faraway island has some appeal at the moment.” Anything to nuke the threat to her son.
But the longer Liv stared at the violence, the more pissed off and determined she grew. Tracking down the coward who’d decided to terrorize her through violating her son’s bedroom would be an absolute pleasure.
