homegrown to control any vulnerability. Since they built this app themselves, they can update it anytime they please, and they can patch it indefinitely,” I said. “The trade-off is that they had to start with an audience of zero users. But they’ve obviously made some headway.” I pointed at the database open on my laptop. “There are over twenty thousand names in there, with contact info.”
I saw Keats holding back a little smile. “Not that you’ve given it any thought,” he said.
I shrugged. “It’s what I do.”
“Let’s get Eve Abajian on the line,” Keats said. Obaje took out his phone. I gave him the number to Eve’s personal cell and he dialed.
“Voice mail,” he said several seconds later.
“On the first ring?” I asked.
He shook his head no. He said it had rung four times first. That meant her phone was definitely on.
“Let me try from my cell,” I said. “She’ll pick up.”
“I’ll call,” Keats said, taking my phone off the table before I could do it. Something told me I wasn’t getting that phone back, either.
He put it on speaker and dialed. It rang four times again, went to voice mail, and I heard the usual spiel.
“You’ve reached Eve. Please leave a message or text me. Thanks. Ciao.”
“Eve, it’s Billy Keats calling from Angela’s phone,” he said. “Give me a call back if you get this, ASAP. We’re on our way over to you. I assume you’ll know what this is about. It’s urgent, obviously.”
It wasn’t until Billy hung up that I started to worry. Marlena was always awake by now. Maybe Eve was giving her a bottle, but she never kept her phone out of reach. She would have seen those calls coming back-to-back and known something was up.
“We should go,” I said. “Like, now.”
“We’re going,” Keats said. Everyone was already packing up. “Miller, get BPD on the line and send a cruiser over there right away.”
“On it.”
I gritted my teeth as I threw on my shoes. I could only hope my imagination was getting the best of me. Because the alternative was too grim to think about.
All I knew for sure was that suddenly it felt like we couldn’t get over to Eve’s place fast enough.
CHAPTER 55
BY THE TIME we pulled onto Eve’s street, I was fighting panic. I’ve never been the worrying type, but it was creeping up my neck like a rash. When I saw the cruiser parked in front of her town house, I nearly jumped out of the moving car.
As soon as we came to a stop, I did jump out. I wasn’t waiting for any invitations.
“She’s not answering,” one of the two cops said over his shoulder to Billy.
“I’ve got this!” I yelled, and pushed my way to the front. Maybe it wasn’t appropriate “intern” behavior, but screw that. I needed to know if Eve was okay.
I put in the code for her front door, threw it open, and let them go ahead. The cops went first, along with Billy and Obaje. And because nobody said otherwise, I followed right behind.
The foyer was empty, with no indication of a break-in. But that didn’t mean anything.
“Eve?” I called out. Billy was yelling for her, too, as we ran up to the second floor.
“All clear here,” one of the cops was saying.
“What about the third floor?” I said. “The nursery and bedroom are up there.”
“Wait here,” Keats told me, and I sweated it out while they checked the other rooms. With every ticking second, I got a worse feeling about this. One cop stayed with me while Keats and Obaje hit the third floor, and the second officer stationed himself down by the open front door.
“I don’t see her!” I heard Obaje say a minute later.
“Nothing over here!” Keats’s voice came from somewhere farther away.
They were both on their way back down when I heard the cop at the front door.
“Excuse me, ma’am, you can’t come in here.”
And then, with a rush of relief, I heard Eve’s voice right on top of that.
“Who in the blue hell are you, and what are you doing in my house?”
I hurried over to look down to where she was pushing her way past the cop through her own front door, folded-up stroller in one arm and Marlena in the other.
“Eve!” I said, and she gave me a steaming look. I knew right away how angry she’d be about whatever misunderstanding had just gone down. Coming into her place with strangers, much less uninvited, was beyond a cardinal sin