Vera surveyed the sparse, echoing space. It was a single-family ranch house in the quiet suburbs of Blackwood, owned by a shell corporation with no listed contact. Their warrant was for a missing person, a low-level accountant named Julian Thorne, whose last known ping had been traced to this address late Tuesday night.
She walked through the hallway toward the staircase. “Miller, check the shed out back, please. I’m taking the second floor.”
The stairs creaked ominously. Upstairs, the rooms were equally sterile. An empty bedroom, a dusty study, a bathroom with no toothbrush in the holder. It was clean, too clean—the kind of clean that signaled a property maintained by absentee owners, not lived in.
Vera radioed in her status to the team lead stationed outside. “Lead, this place is professionally vacant. No personal effects, no food in the fridge, not even a junk mail pile.”
“Copy, Chen. But the warrant is solid. Thorne’s phone placed him inside for over an hour before going dark. He didn’t come out. Keep looking.”
She moved into the master bedroom. It was the only room with any character, mainly because it had a built-in closet stretching the length of one wall. She yanked the door open. Inside, it was lined with thick, soundproofing foam. And in the center of the floor, a single, expensive leather satchel—Julian Thorne’s—lay open and empty.
Vera crouched down, her heart rate accelerating. This wasn’t a robbery gone wrong; the bag was left, not discarded. She noticed a faint scuff mark on the wall behind the satchel, lower down, almost hidden by the carpet fringe. She pushed the carpet aside. A hairline seam marked a shallow, built-in panel.
She pressed on the seam. It clicked, and a small, narrow door swung inward to reveal a cramped, dark alcove. It was too small for a person, but perfectly sized for a briefcase. The alcove, too, was empty.