Chapter 54
“THEY won’t, Connor…” Maria said. “Trust me. I’ll be safe…”
Euclid clenched his jaw as he heard Maria say it. He’s staring at the CCTV monitor of David showing what’s happening now inside Maria’s house. Maria also has admitted to Connor that they had a relationship, but Euclid noted that Maria left some of the details unsaid. Like how her mother sold her to their governor, who was connected to a human trafficking syndicate, and about the day that she waited for him at Balesin Island.
Euclid doesn’t like to see how calm and soft Maria talked to the doctor, unlike the way she spoke to him. It was as if she hated him so much that she can’t take to seeing him around. But that is not what he felt when they made love last night. Her responses said otherwise, far from how she treated him.
“She looked so certain that the Decagon won’t look for her,” Fred commented with a smirk. “Look how relaxed she is. That’s suspicious.”
“Her reactions confirmed our suspicions that she’s still communicating with them,” David agreed. “The person that she contacted using Wendy’s phone might be working at the Decagon, or perhaps the Decagon’s boss.”
“What do you think, Euclid?” Fred asked him. “Your woman is lying to us despite her sworn statement.”
“Let her be,” Euclid said. “I want to see where she will lead us—”
“She might be leading us to our grave,” Fred countered and pointed to his computer screen. “This footage was just last night, remember that, Euclid. A few hours after we released her.”
Euclid looked at Fred with a knotted forehead. “Since you’ll replace me in my assignment, why don’t you use your profiling skills at her?”
“That’s what I am going to do when I go there,” he said. “And, I promise that I won’t let my guard down,” he added sarcastically.
Euclid ignored his partner. He had enough today, and he won’t let his bad mood take over him. Otherwise, he’ll end up drunk again. He focused his eyes on the monitor, Wendy has arrived home and was currently talking to Maria and Connor.
“She looked so calm for a woman under a police watch,” David commented.
Euclid is starting to get annoyed with David’s remarks. He wanted to contradict everything he said about Maria, but he knew it won’t help. He’ll just look like a school kid having outbursts again.
He sighed. ‘They’re just doing their job, dude,’ he told himself.
“Check this out,” David called their attention and increased the volume.
“I don’t remember sending you a text message after a call…” Wendy said to Connor.
“Look at Maria’s expression,” David zoomed in on the camera and Maria’s beautiful face was focused. “She doesn’t look surprised that Wendy couldn’t recall sending a message to the doctor.”
“It’s because she knew that Wendy is forgetful,” Euclid explained. “That’s what she said too.”
“It’s not right, Euclid,” Fred said. “Based on her reaction, it was as if she’s expecting it to happen.”
Euclid raised from his seat. “Those were just baseless assumptions—”
“What do you think are we doing here?” Fred asked. “Euclid, can you set aside your feelings first? I know, you love her, and you wanted to get her out of this danger. But, how will you save her if you’ll keep on contradicting our speculations even it was clear that she’s doing something wrong here?”
Euclid raked his fingers through his hair. “I know that she might be up to something, but do not treat her as the suspect. She swore to be our state witness, and I know that she’ll do it.”
“We can’t be so sure, Euclid,” Fred smirked. “It came to you that Maria wasn’t the woman that you used to know.”
“People change,” David added, eyes still focused on the monitor.
Euclid was about to speak again, but he was cut by the doctor’s explanation about the IP address.
“Really?” Wendy asked, becoming more confused. “Then what it has to do with us?”
They all looked at Maria and waited for her answer. “Nothing…” she said. “Nothing that will harm us.”
“Bull’s eye,” David said and hit ctrl + s to the keyboard.
“She knew that we’re tracking her phone calls,” Fred said. “How clever.”
“But, again she doesn’t look worried,” David said. “I’m curious what are her plans and why she’s eager to work at the restaurant owned by the doctor’s sister.”
“Where was it located?” Euclid asked, suddenly becoming interested.
Euclid’s grip on the armrest tightened. He has to do something to know Maria’s plans so he can learn to play her games. He has accepted that he can’t do that while he’s on her side, then he’ll make his own move to keep up with her whether she likes it or not.
“It’s located at Arquiza Street, in front of Paragon Hotel,” David answered. “The restaurant’s name is Charmant Delicacies, owned by Claire Dela Torre.”
“The doctor’s sister is still single,” Fred commented and looked at him. “Euclid, do you want to delay our switching places?”
“Practice what you preach, Frederick,” he said and went to the door, but Timo, who was busy extracting the information that they need from Wendy’s network provider, suddenly spoke.
“I’ve got the audio frequencies,” he announced. “But, only partially. Some parts were corrupted and can’t be retrieved. It’s odd, it was as if malware penetrated their database and partially corrupted the file.”
“Is that possible?” Euclid asked with a knotted forehead. IT skills weren’t his expertise.
“Everything is possible if you’re an IT monster,” Fred said and shook his head. “But it can be just an accident. It happens always.”
“The tech team of the network confirmed that there were other corrupted files,” Timo said. “We can assume that it was an accident.”
“A very timely accident,” David said with a shake of his said. “Should I call Kristoff now to check if he can retrieve the corrupted audio?”
“Let’s hear what’s left first,” Euclid said and signaled Agent Timo to play the audio.
A cold and masculine male’s voice filled their IT room. “That’s what I like about you, my dear Magdalene…” the man said slowly.
Euclid’s brows furrowed. That voice is familiar to him…
***
