Cause to Kill (An Avery Black Mystery—Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page B

the
indecipherable motion of various shades of black. As the scene continued, the
tree shapes took on their original form. The girl never reappeared.
    “Shit,” Avery whispered.
    She unclipped a sleek, modern walkie-talkie from the back of her
belt.
    “Ramirez,” she said. “Where are you?”
    “Who is this?” came a crackling voice.
    “You know who this is. Your new partner.”
    “I’m still at Lederman. Almost finished here. They just took away
the body.”
    “I need you down here, now,” she said and gave him the location.
“I think I know where Cindy Jenkins was abducted.”
     
    * * *
     
    An hour later, Avery had the alleyway blocked off on both sides by
yellow tape. On Brattle Street, a police car and the forensics van were pulled
up onto the sidewalk. One officer had been stationed to discourage visitors.
    The alley opened into a wide, darkened street about halfway into
the block. One side of the street housed a glass real estate building and a
loading dock. On the other side were housing complexes. There was a parking lot
that could support four cars. Another police car, along with more yellow tape,
was at the end of the alley.
    Avery stood in front of the loading dock.
    “There,” she said and pointed to a high camera. “We need that
footage. It probably belongs to the real estate company. Let’s get in there and
see what we can find.”
    Ramirez shook his head.
    “You’re crazy,” he said. “That tape didn’t show shit.”
    “Cindy Jenkins had no reason to walk down this alley,” Avery said.
“Her boyfriend lives in the opposite direction.”
    “Maybe she wanted to go for a walk,” he argued. “All I’m saying
is, this is a lot of manpower for a hunch.”
    “It’s no hunch. You saw the tape.”
    “I saw a bunch of black blurs I couldn’t understand!” He fought.
“Why would the killer attack here? There are cameras everywhere. He’d have to
be a complete idiot.”
    “Let’s go find out,” she said.
    Top Real Estate Company owned the glass building and the loading
dock.
    After a brief discussion with front desk security, Avery and
Ramirez were told to wait on the plush leather couches for someone of higher
authority to arrive. Ten minutes later, the head of security and the president
of the company appeared.
    Avery flashed her best smile and shook hands.
    “Thanks for seeing us,” she said. “We’d like to access the camera
right above your loading dock. We don’t have a warrant,” she frowned, “but what
we do have is a dead girl that was abducted on Saturday night, most likely
right outside your back door. Unless something comes up, we should be in and
out in twenty minutes.”
    “And if something comes up?” the president asked.
    “Then you made the right choice to assist the police in an
extremely timely and delicate matter. A warrant could take an entire day. The
body of that girl has already been dead for two days. She can’t talk anymore.
She can’t help us. But you can. Please help. Every second we waste, the trail
gets cold.”
    The president nodded to himself and turned to his guard.
    “Davis,” he said, “show them up. Give them whatever they need. If
there are any problems,” he said to Avery, “please come and find me.”
    When they were on their way, Ramirez whistled to himself.
    “What a charmer,” he said.
    “Whatever it takes,” Avery whispered.
    The security office at Top Real Estate was a buzzing room filled
with over twenty television screens. The guard sat down at the black table and
keyboard.
    “OK,” he said. “Time and place?”
    “Loading dock. About two fifty-two and then let’s move forward.”
    Ramirez shook his head.
    “We’re not going to find nothing.”
    The real estate cameras were of a much higher quality than the
smoke shop, and in color. Most of the viewing screens were of a similar size,
but one in particular was large. The guard put the loading-dock camera on the
larger screen and then spun the image