Mad, Bad, and Dangerous to Know

XV Are You Ignoring Me?

"This is the fourth package in six days," I informed Andrea as I placed the unopened box on her desk. After Lina's accident, I stopped opening them and even though I'd rather just not open them at all and throw them all in the garbage, I needed to collect them all for evidence.

"I'll add it to the pile," she told me. "Anything other than the packages?"

I shook my head at her. "No, just these. Has there been anything that I should know in the letters?"

"Not if you don't want to know," she said with a shrug. "No threats, no mention of planning to meet up with you at all."

"Okay, good. I can't stay, I have a show tonight," I told her before thanking her for her hard work on my case and I left the station. It was getting exhausting to have to drive to the police station every time I got a strange package, but I knew that I had to. If he sent me another threat like the one about Lina, I'd want to know about it right away.

As I found a good parking spot on the street by The Jackroller, I was feeling good. I felt like I was taking control of the situation by working with Andrea to find out who this person was. They weren't able to find any leads to find out who drove Lina off the road, and I felt like it was pushing me forward to use the packages and any other clues I could get to figure out who Mrs. Lamb was so that I could get justice for Lina.

I felt like I finally had some hope, knowing that each package he sent me was being analyzed by a team of detectives, and he had to slip up eventually. Not only that, but I installed security cameras inside of my apartment that faced the front door so that I would be alerted if there was any movement in the apartment while I wasn't home.

Once inside the bar, I wanted to talk to Sev. I got to the bar early just to talk to him about what happened on Saturday. After leaving my guitar on the stage, I felt a little bit disappointed when I didn't see him behind the bar.

Henri was the only bartender working the nearly empty bar, so I approached her instead.

"Hey, you're here early," she observed with a smile. "You want your drink now?"

"Um, no I'll wait. Is Sev working?"

She gave me a suspicious look and a wide smile slowly started to spread across her face. "Why are you looking for Sev? Did he reel you in?"

"No," I said quickly, crossing my arms over my chest. "I just have to talk to him about something."

She continued to smile, obviously not believing me as she nudged toward the back hallway and said, "He's in the stock closet."

"Oh, okay," I responded in a quiet, dumb voice. Before last weekend, I wouldn't have had a problem going to talk to him in the stock closet, but there was a paranoid voice in the back of my head telling me to keep our conversations public. That was probably a good rule of thumb for me in any scenario right now, with any person. I didn't know where, or who, Mrs. Lamb was. I wasn't safe with anybody around me in a private setting.

"That closet doesn't have a lock," she warned me with a cackling laugh. I ignored her and began to patiently wait for his return.

Sev appeared from the closet just a few minutes after I arrived and I politely waved when he saw me at the bar.

"Hi," I greeted him with an awkward smile when he approached from the other side of the bar. Henri was having a conversation with a regular further away, paying no attention to me or Sev.

"Hey," he smiled back at me, grabbing some dirty glasses off the counter to place them near the sink to get washed. "You're early. What's up?"

"I actually wanted to thank you for Saturday," I said quickly.