12. Veronica

Chapter 12

Veronica

I pulled up to the address, parked along the street, and checked my reflection in the mirror.

“You can do this.”

It wasn’t the smartest thing I’d ever done. The property wasn’t what I expected. I’d thought it’d be some beat-up house with overgrown weeds spilling onto the walkway. This wasn’t some rough neighborhood but a clean warehouse district with offices. My chest tightened again, but it wasn’t an issue with my lungs this time. It was a feeling of dread that I was walking into something I wasn’t prepared for.

Suddenly, I wished that Luca was with me. The last time I pulled something like this, I’d waited in the car and sent him in to investigate. I took a deep breath and stepped out of the Rover. No turning back now.

The leased address in Victor’s name was dark, but the one directly to the right looked occupied. Opening the door gingerly, I jumped when it dinged loudly.

An older man appeared in the doorway dressed in casual work office attire. “Can I help you?” he asked, his voice gruff.

“Yeah, hi. I’m Veronica. I was looking for information about the tenant next door,” I said, my voice steady. “Victor? Did you ever meet him?”

His eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Why would a tiny thing like you be interested in that guy?”

I shrugged, thinking fast, trying not to be annoyed that he commented on how little I was. That was uncalled for, I thought grumpily, even if it was true. It wasn’t my fault my growth was stunted.

“We used to know each other. Foster care when we were little. I thought I’d look him up. Connect to someone.” Maxim always said if you were lying, you should inject some truth into it. “You know, since we didn’t have any family. Just looking for someone from my childhood.” I tried to look at least a little pathetic, like I was sad that I might not see a childhood friend .

The man squinted at me but seemed to sense something, at least in my story, that was the truth. I tried not to look gleeful. “I guess,” he finally said. “That guy was bad news.” He gave me a stern look. “He wasn’t much for talking, but I heard things. A guy was here looking for him to set up a fight. I think that was what he was involved in.” He nodded at me knowledgeably. “That underground scene, you know? Illegal.”

“Fighting?” My heart skipped with excitement. That tracked with the membership to the boxing gym that I found.

“Yeah. Real brutal stuff. There were some flyers sent here by mistake. I sealed them up real quick and made sure he couldn’t tell the box was opened. That guy was scary. I wouldn’t want anything to do with him if I were you. He didn’t grow up to be a good man.” The man tidied up his counter space as he spoke and tried to look casual. I couldn’t even imagine him standing and talking to Victor. I’m sure it wouldn’t have gone well. “Don’t know much beyond that.”

This guy had no idea how right he was that Victor wasn’t a good man. Victor Litkin was an actual psychopath, no doubt about it. He was the serial killer who brutally murdered three people in Morinrock a few months ago. Granted, they were all pedophiles, so I didn’t necessarily have a problem with the fact that he murdered them.

“So he’s gone?” I tried to let my shoulders slump like I was bummed out. “You haven’t seen him? It looks empty.”

“No. Not for a while now. Listen to me, sugar. You’re better off,” he said sagely, like he was suddenly an expert.

“Huh, ok … well, thanks for talking to me.” I sniffled and wiped my nose with the back of my hand. “I was just hoping maybe.” I trailed off as if I’d lost the plot, letting my eyes bounce around the room, waiting for him to say something.

“Well,” he looked over at me, finally giving in. “I know Marv in unit three is the backup supervisor, and he has a set of keys to the complex. He could probably let you in since you’re really family. Right? Maybe you could find something to give you an idea if he went somewhere else.” He gave me a skeptical look.

“Really?” I inject a little hope into my voice. “Thanks, I appreciate it.”

Marv turned out to be a distracted architect who wasn’t interested in questions or minding who looked at empty units. He handed the key over without any qualms and didn’t even look up from his draft table. Victor would have gutted him for even thinking about turning over the key to his unit, so Marv was lucky that Victor couldn’t come back from the dead.

“It’s just over on that hook over there,” he said, waving a hand towards the peg board where keys hung in neat rows beneath equally neat labels.

“Thanks. I’ll bring it back when I’m done.” Marv didn’t look up from his table, so I slipped the key off the hook and left him to his rulers and pencils.

T he office was surprising—not the grimy and dirty warehouse I had expected, but weirdly clean. Victor had died over a month ago, and everything was still in its place. It looked too tidy. Even the air smelled sterile, a faint scent of cleaning chemicals lingering in the space. The stark contrast between what this place appeared to be and the man who leased it unsettled me. I don’t know what I expected. A rusty warehouse with old blood spatters? A drain in the floor? I scolded myself for being so dramatic.

The layout of the building was an office in the front and a larger cavernous warehouse space in the back, similar to Marv’s architectural space. I’d seen the lease agreement, and that’s what it showed anyway. I hoped to find some other clues — although the trip had already yielded a juicy piece of information. Underground fighting was rolling around in my head. The gym membership had been when he was nineteen, and I’d run into a dead end on that, but I had never thought to look at the underground fight scene. That was its own niche that I could delve into.

I stepped inside, closed the door, and flicked on the light, my footsteps making a weird hollow sound against the polished floor. It just didn’t feel like the kind of place Victor would have kept. He was a psycho and a loner, but maybe he had been smarter than I gave him credit for—hiding in plain sight, running things from some random office that looked unsuspecting. That would be smart. I’d been expecting something grimy and full of cobwebs. This was the opposite of what I’d imagined. Of course, I needed to remember that the bodies were initially wiped of evidence. If Eli hadn’t tipped Pike off, the killer never would have been found. So maybe this all fit…

The furniture was modern, sleek even—a large desk in the center of the room, shelves lined with neatly organized binders, file folders, and fake plants that seemed too carefully placed. It was a total front. I sighed as I ran my hand over the desk’s smooth surface, feeling the slight coating of dust beneath my fingertips.

I scanned the shelves, looking for anything that seemed out of place. My fingers grazed over the spines of the binders, labeled in precise handwriting: financial records, contracts, receipts. I flipped through a few, but they all looked like they could have belonged to any legitimate business—no apparent signs of any underground operations I was positive were tied to this place. I scanned the office again. No electronics anywhere. No computer or printer. Not even a copier or fax machine. I spun around as I looked again at the binder I’d laid out on the desk. Not even a telephone.

I moved toward a small filing cabinet in the corner, pulling open the drawers. More paperwork, but this time, I found something that made my pulse quicken—leases for the warehouse, signed by Victor himself. The dates matched what I had already suspected, but another signature was beneath his on several documents. An alias? I squinted at it, trying to make sense of the unfamiliar name. Maybe it was connected to Eli. It was a long shot, but I had to follow it .

Luther Booth.

My heart leapt at the knowledge that now I had two leads to track down regarding Victor, which might lead me toward my prey: underground fighting and now this person, Luther.

Then that feeling crept over me, the hairs on my neck standing up. It was subtle, like the air had shifted, letting me know I wasn’t as alone as I had thought. I paused, listening. There was no sound—just the hum of the air conditioning system—but the sensation of being watched didn’t fade. My stomach pitched with unease as I twisted this way and that.

I glanced behind me toward the large, floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the empty parking lot. The blinds were drawn, but the faint light from outside cast long shadows against the floor. For a moment, I thought I saw movement in the reflection—something quick, just out of the corner of my eye. I turned, heart racing, but there was nothing. The large space in the back beckoned, and I felt a shiver of fear.

Get a grip, Ronnie .

I forced myself to breathe, steadying my nerves. It was an empty building. No one knew I was here. No one cared about this place anymore, right? Marv may have decided to come to check up on me. Or that other guy … who never told me his name. I bit my lip.

Still, I couldn’t shake the feeling. I returned to the desk, my mind racing. There had to be something more here, something Victor left behind that could lead me to Eli. He was the key to all of this.

I rifled through more files, scanning for anything that mentioned fighters, payments, or event locations. The idea of Victor running fights in a place this clean seemed laughable, but he’d taken measures to keep things hidden.

As I worked, the sensation of being watched grew stronger, gnawing at the edges of my focus. My heartbeat thudded in my chest, and my breath came out in shallow, uneasy bursts. I still needed to check the other area in the back, but I didn’t dare look around again.

Instead, I packed up what I had found—the leases, a few notes with strange symbols and times listed, and the file with Luther Booth’s signature. I shoved it all into my bag, zipping it up quickly .

I still had the back to search, and I wouldn’t skip it even though I felt like I was running along a cliff at full speed. Taking a puff of my inhaler, I went through the doorway into the dark space beyond.