“Careful, Becca,” he said as she picked through the debris. Shattered glass and sharp-edged shells were everywhere.
“I will. This is my mom’s jewelry box. Where the locket was.” She lifted the wooden box, now mostly empty. “I wonder . . .” Pulling out the bottom drawer, she reached her hand in. Something clicked, and a drawer popped out on the back. A small sheet of paper sat within. She gasped.
Nick crouched beside her.
“Oh, my God,” she said. “Charlie used to love to play with this when we were kids. He was absolutely fascinated with the hidden compartment. My mom would leave dollar bills in it for him to find.” She unfolded the small, square sheet. It read, “WCE 754374329 United Bank of Singapore 12M.” What in the world? “Those are the same letters and numbers as in the locket. It’s a bank account?”
“Looks that way. Good job, Becca. This could be a real lead.” And not just for Charlie. If that 12M stood for what he thought, it was a dollar amount. The kind one could make, say, from having a longtime hand in the heroin trade in Afghanistan. Determination settled in his gut, and a little hope, too. “We’ll get Marz on this. See what he can make of it.”
She nodded, then crossed to her closet, where she retrieved a big tote bag and dropped her treasures in, including the rubber duck. Rooting around in the loose clothes on the floor, she finally yanked a navy blue sweatshirt from the pile. She shook it and held it up. “Wonder if Jeremy would get it,” she said, turning it toward him. It read, “There are 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary, and those who don’t.”
“I don’t get it,” Nick said.
She gave a small smile. “It’s a nerd joke. Charlie gave it to me.” After adding it to the bag, she knelt and repacked a box of what looked like mostly papers and photos that had been dumped out. “I want to take these,” she said, pushing the box and tote toward him as she rose. “One more thing.” She rolled open the drawer to her nightstand. “Fuck.”
“What?” he said, a murderous storm brewing in his gut on her behalf.
“They stole my goddamned gun. I should’ve taken it that first night, but I thought I’d be back . . .” Nick peered into the mostly empty drawer just before she slammed it shut on a growl. “I am so fucking . . . mad.”
He didn’t blame her in the least. He was seething, and this hadn’t even happened to him. “I’m sorry. I’ve got a piece at home that might be good for you.”
“I don’t want your gun, I want my gun,” she said, tugging her fingers through the length of her hair. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to bite your head off. But I am . . .” Her hands clenched into fists, and she leaned her forehead against them. “I just wanna kill someone right now. Which is . . . a really fucking bad thing for a nurse to want to do.”
Rixey bit back the kernel of humor her words unleashed. Truth be told, he admired her rage. She was hurt, she was overwhelmed, and she was no doubt scared out of her mind, but she wasn’t letting it break her. Anger was good. Anger helped you fight. And, Jesus, but she was fierce and sexy when she was enraged.
He never thought he’d say it, but he had to give Frank Merritt credit for this one thing—he’d raised a strong, courageous daughter who could handle herself when the shit was hitting the fan. If Charlie was anything like her, they had a better-than-average shot at him being alive and making it out of this fubar.
She huffed and threw out her hands in a gesture of Enough, her bracelet jingling in emphasis. “There’s only one thing I want from the office, and then I’m done. Promise.” Retrieving the box and tote, he followed her into the hallway, reaching back in to douse the ceiling light. She made her way to the front room, then groaned and cursed and kicked paper around for a minute before returning with a stuffed bear in an Army uniform, complete with ID tags. “This stuff is all I have left of them, you know?”
“I get it. You don’t have to justify it to me, Becca. Anything else you can think of, quick?”
She tucked the bear into the bag and shook her head. “No, I’m done. Let’s get out of here before something else happens. Besides, this place is pissing me off.”
RIXEY PREPARED TO get his head torn off as they stepped into his building’s back door. In the midst of the scene at Becca’s house, he’d forgotten the appointment with his tattoo client. Jeremy had called as they were leaving her place, but Rixey had let it go to voice mail, wanting to keep his focus on her and making sure they weren’t being watched or tailed. He’d sent Jer a text message saying he was en route, but without question, Jeremy was going to skin him alive. It wasn’t undeserved. He was almost fifteen minutes late.
Her keepsakes filling his hands, he turned to Becca and apologized. “I forgot I have this tattoo to do. It’s gonna take an hour. Maybe two. Go ’head up with the guys and grab some dinner. I’ll be up later.”