Page 268 of Sexting His Assistant

His face does not change. “We have partial camera coverage.”

“Then make it full.”

“That area has several dead zones.”

“Then wake up every dead camera in the city.”

“We are doing that.”

I step around the desk. My shoulder pulls under the stitches and I ignore it. “I’m leaving.”

Pavel looks up. “To where?”

“To the last camera point.”

“That is not advisable.”

I stop close enough that he has to tilt his head back to keep looking at me. “I have been advised enough today.”

His jaw tightens. “If she left willingly⁠—”

“She left a hospital restroom while concussed, without security, without telling me, after escaping from my house,” I say. “That is not willingly. That is panic.”

“Or she had information she did not want filtered through us,” Pavel says.

I stare at him.

Pavel lowers the tablet slightly. “I only mean she has been distrustful since the basement.”

“I know what you mean,” I say.

My phone vibrates in my hand. Everything inside me stops. I look down.

Nina.

For half a heartbeat, all I see is her name.

Then I open the message. It’s only one word.

Meredith.

I don’t answer him. I turn my head toward the glass wall outside my office, toward the line of desks beyond it.

Nina’s desk is empty, of course. It’s been empty since the hospital.

Beside it, Meredith’s temporary station is neat as always. Laptop open. Files stacked. Pen aligned parallel to the keyboard.

Her chair is pushed in.

I walk out.

Pavel follows. “Luka?”

I go straight to Meredith’s desk.

No bag. No phone. Her tea sits cold in a paper cup, untouched except for one red lipstick mark near the rim.

Her calendar notebook is closed.