Melissa lowered her phone.
“I can’t get hold of Wilson. Maybe the police have him. Can we check?”
“We can go down to the station first thing in the morning. Let the dust settle for now. We should stay off the streets.”
“But he might be hurt.”
“In which case he’ll be in the hospital. I’ll make some enquiries first thing and we can go find him. It’s been a very long day, Melissa, and we should both get some sleep. I have a spare room you’re welcome to use. I’ll put out a towel and some blankets. My ex left some clothes behind so I put them in the closet in the spare room. I should really have thrown them out but never gotten around to it. Help yourself to anything.”
Melissa nodded, grateful. Tim was glad she felt comfortable enough to stay here. It was the least he could do for her. She never asked the police to shoot her boyfriend, for her to be arrested, to be kidnapped and tied up in someone’s basement, to be tear gassed. Most other people would be a bawling wreck by now.
Tim’s phone buzzed. He pulled it out and unlocked it with his fingerprint.
We need to talk.
He frowned. The message was from the same number as the warning to return home when Melissa was tied up in the basement.
I can meet you in the morning.
Now.
Tim sighed. He could tell this person to go away, but they had saved his career with that tip off.
“What’s up?” Melissa asked.
“I have to go meet someone. It’s the mystery person who tipped me off about you in my basement. If it weren’t for them, I’d have come home after your kidnapper left and the police would have arrested me.”
“And you want to find out who it is?”
“Of course. They want to meet right now. Will you be okay here?”
Melissa put down her nearly empty glass and stood up.
“I’m coming with you.”
“No, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Why not? I don’t really want to be on my own. I feel a lot safer with you, even out on the streets.”
“I’m flattered but really, it’s…”
“Shush. Where are we going?”
The café was deserted, partly because it was late but mostly because the earlier violence meant there were few people on the streets voluntarily. Tim wondered if this was such a good idea. He was quietly glad Melissa had insisted on going with him because he didn’t fancy being there alone. The only other person in the place was a solitary waitress, who delivered them coffee all the while keeping an eye on the door. She’d clearly seen or heard about the violence and wanted no part of it.
“How long is your shift?” Tim asked her as sympathetically as he could.
“Another hour, then we close,” she replied.
“Are you here alone?”
“Kitchen closed an hour ago, so yeah.”
“Would you like us to stay until you close?”
She smiled at him, her eyes tired.
“Yeah that would be nice. Thanks.”
“No problem.”
She moved off behind the counter, busying herself with cleaning up.
“If I was her I’d lock up early and go home,” Melissa said.
“If she did that she’d probably get fired. No shortage of people waiting to take her job.”
“Ain’t that the truth? You have any idea who we’re meeting?”
Tim glanced at the entrance again. “No idea.”
At that moment the door opened and in walked a small, white woman in a leather jacket, silk scarf and thigh high boots, carrying a briefcase. She made a beeline for Tim and Melissa, holding a hand out as she approached. She was in her late thirties, early forties and had a face that smiled easily.
“Senator Barns, Miss Jones, so good to meet you.”
Tim stood and shook her hand. Melissa did likewise.
“Please, sit down,” Tim said. “And you are?”
The woman slid into the bench opposite them and gave that cheery smile again, her blue eyes sparkling behind brown framed glasses.
“My name is Kirsty Frank. I write for darkmice.com, have you heard of it?” Tim and Melissa shook their heads. “Well that’s not surprising,” she continued. “We’re not exactly mainstream. In fact, we have proof that the government is deliberately throttling access to our servers and keeping our hit rates artificially low.”
Tim blinked at her. A horrible feeling was forming in the pit of his stomach. The waitress came over and took her coffee order, while suspicions crowded into Tim’s head.
“What sort of things do you write about?” he asked Kirsty, dreading her answer.
“Oh you know, we take a deep dive into issues the regular media likes to pretend aren’t real.”
“You mean conspiracies.” Tim wasn’t asking a question.
“Sometimes, yes, I suppose you could call them that.”
“Oh shit,” Melissa said. “Not all that 9/11-was-an-inside-job stuff ?”
Kirsty smiled again and shook her head. “Oh no, we would never say anything like that. Although there are some questions about that day that have yet to receive satisfactory answers.”
Tim stood up. “I think we’ve heard enough,” he said.
“Wait wait!” she implored them, raising her hands to motion them to sit. “Don’t you want to hear how I was able to tip you off about Melissa being tied up in your basement?”
Reluctantly, Tim sat down. Melissa followed suit, though she looked just as uncomfortable as he felt.
“We’re listening,” said Tim.
“We’ve been tracking Mr. Granger for quite some time,” she explained. “I know you met with him recently and I also know he tried to get you to shelve most of the platform that got you elected.”
“How do you know that?” Tim asked.
“Who is Granger?” Melissa interjected.
Tim turned to her. “Lionel Granger. Successful business leader in Virginia who financed my campaign and then tried to control what I did after my election. I was in the process of severing ties with him when you ended up in my basement.”
“So you know who kidnapped me?” Melissa appeared outraged. Tim held up a hand.
“I suspected. I don’t have any evidence and even if I did, what could I do with it?”
Kirsty nodded. “Granger has people everywhere. It’s almost impossible to investigate him without someone noticing and tipping him off. Then his lawyers get involved. He certainly keeps them busy. Sometimes, as in your case, it’s not a legal issue, so he uses other means to get his way.”
“Like kidnapping?”
Kirsty opened her briefcase and pulled out two documents. Both were missing person reports.
“These two women had affairs with Granger in the 90s. We know that because they both filed police reports saying he forced himself