She strode towards the cash desk. The till sat gaping open. It looked like all the takings had been pilfered but Evie knew that there had never been any takings to begin with. No one in Riverview could afford a dress that cost more than their monthly paycheck. She pulled out the drawer beneath the till and her pulse quickened. There was a stash of papers inside. She snatched them and ducked quickly down behind the counter just as a car’s headlights swept like a searchlight beam through the store.
She scanned the papers quickly, using the light from her phone: bills, junk mail, an old copy of The New Yorker still in its cellophane wrapper, and at the very bottom of the pile an envelope with an LA postmark on it. Evie ripped it open. Inside was some kind of rental agreement with Victor’s name stamped across the top.
And there, at the very bottom in fine print, was an address.
Chapter 7
It was a Saturday, which meant no school, and which also meant she had two whole days ahead of her when she wasn’t the focal point of 282 teenagers and 38 faculty members.
It also meant she had two whole days in which to figure out her next move.
The Riverview library was small and, Evie guessed, not a priority for funding if the three ancient, yellowing computers were anything to go by. She pulled out a chair and switched one computer on and, while she waited for it to boot up, she rummaged in her bag for the papers she’d stolen from Victor’s store. Five minutes later she was staring at the website of a business in LA. It looked like the kind of place people used to redirect their mail or as a front for an office.
Evie sighed back into her chair. She had been hoping the address would lead straight to Victor. But it was a start. She would just have to go there and see if she could find any more information on him. It didn’t matter if it took her the rest of her life – she was going to find Victor. And then she was going to do what she should have done two months ago.
While she was waiting for the map to print she rested her hands on the keyboard and stared at the blinking cursor. She thought about it for a few seconds and then, before she could lose her nerve, she typed the words Bradbury Building Fire into the search bar.
Over four million hits came up. She hovered the cursor over the first one. It was a newspaper article. She clicked on it.
Historic Landmark Engulfed by Fire
Evie scanned the article. It quoted a fire investigator laying the blame for the blaze on arsonists. There was a mention of the two policemen who’d died, though no details of exactly how – nothing that hinted at how their dismembered bodies had been discovered lying in a swamp of their own blood in an elevator, nor that their throats had been ripped out by Thirsters.
There was no mention either of the explosion in the basement or of the piles of ash the police must have found down there, and not a word about the arrows sunk into the lobby walls where Vero had nailed three Thirsters. The article wrapped up by saying that the building was closed for the foreseeable future while repairs were being carried out. The final line mentioned that no arrests had yet been made.
‘Why are you looking that up?’
Evie spun around in her chair. Kaitlyn Rivers – Tom’s new girlfriend – and another girl who she recognised from the year below her in school, were standing behind her. She had been so engrossed in the story she hadn’t felt them sneak up.
Her fingers clicked the header bar. ‘No reason,’ Evie said as the home page loaded.
‘Ooh, have you heard about that?’ Kaitlyn asked, pointing suddenly at the screen.
Evie turned back to the computer. The front page of the paper had appeared. A headline running in bold print across the top screamed:
Serial killer strikes again.
Evie felt a funny spasm in her gut, like a knife that had been sticking in there since Lucas died had just been given a further twist. She scanned the piece.
Police fear more than one killer at work
‘It’s like so totally scary,’ Kaitlyn was saying to her friend. ‘What if they come here?’
‘To Riverview?’ her friend asked drolly. ‘Really?’