Scream For Him ~ Watty Winner 2012

Chapter Twenty Seven

Miles walked quietly through the station. A few officers gave him odd looks but said nothing as he passed them by without really seeing any of them. He knew he looked like complete hell. His five o'clock shadow had expanded to a a short beard, and he couldn't remember the last time he'd actually combed his hair.

It wasn't until he reached the offices they were supposed to occupy that he was approached by Chief Rodriguez. "Agent Miles! What are you doing here?"

The agent stopped short, quickly disguising the look of confusion on his face. "What do you mean? I'm meeting Agent Morris here."

The chief shook his head as he sipped from a cup of coffee. "Director Monroe called me this morning. They had a bunch of people here packing everything up, saying they had to move to a different location."

"Thanks," Miles responded, completely dumbfounded. He waited until he was out of the building before reaching into his pocket and yanking out his cell phone.

Morris' line went straight to voicemail. "It's Miles, call me back." Clicking the button to end the call, he swore under his breath, making his way to his car. He knew he was being played; there was no reason to leave unless Jenna Cieres had been located, and as of the night before, they were still searching for signs of her.

Miles had a tough choice to make. He could either continue to stay there and try to finish the case, or he could go home and try to find his family, to which he had heard nothing further. The local police were investigating their disappearances, but he already knew that everything was linked, and right now, it seemed to be in his location.

Leaving made no sense, staying made no sense. His family was at stake, and so was the life of a young woman he'd sworn to protect. His conscience was eating at him with every moment of indecision. He needed his case information, which was suddenly gone.

With little else left to do, Miles pulled his phone out and dialed the line to Director Monroe. He picked up after one ring with a gruff greeting.

"Director Monroe, good morning, it's Terry Miles."

"What news do you have?"

Miles cleared his throat before continuing. "Well, Sir, I think we need to consider that this case is much larger than we ever anticipated, even for a serial murderer. I hate to say it, but I think we need to involve Internal Affairs at this point."

"What? Why?"

"Because Chief Rodriguez just informed me that you called him this morning and pulled the plug. He also said that people came in and packed it all up."

"What?" The director screamed, his voice pitching much higher than he had ever heard.

"That's kinda what I thought," Miles said with a sigh. "Look, I don't know exactly what is going on, but I need copies of the archived case files or else I'm never going to be able to get anywhere with this."

"Agent, we need to follow protocol. I mean, you're not even supposed to be down there right now - not with the conflict of interest in your family issues. However, if what you're saying is true, we need to be more careful. Even if we send IA down there, they're going to muddy themselves in everything anyway. Who can you trust?"

"At this point, I'm it. I can't locate Morris on his cell, and we were supposed to meet this morning at the station. Now, I'm not sure if he is a concern or not, but I'm not taking any chances."

"Okay. Here's what I'm going to do. I'm not going to throw your ass in the ringer for staying down there. But I'm going to have this documentation over-nighted to you. That way by the time AI gets there and locks down all information, you'll have what you need."

"Thank you, Sir."

"Agent Miles?"

"Yes, Sir?"

"You better close this down pretty fast. If the media gets wind of all of this, it's going to be a shit storm and you're going to end up taking a fall."

"Yes, Sir."

- - - - - - - -

"Didn't I tell you not to overdo it?"

Dina didn't falter as she quipped back, "Your idea of overdoing and mine must not be the same. But she deserved every one of those cuts she got."

The Master was running out of patience with the woman. She constantly tried to assert her authority, and in most cases, he let her run things, but he had made it abundantly clear that Jenna would be his pet, not hers. "I don't want her dying on me."

She scoffed. "Dying? No, no, of course not. You want to keep her for forever. But you seem to think that at some point, she's just going to be a good little girl and you won't need to keep her locked up." Her tone turned even more condescending. "News flash, William - she doesn't fucking want you! You're going to have to kill her eventually, or did you not realize that?"