Chapter 46 Ch. 29.1
"More interesting..." She repeated after her boss. "Right?"
"Go," he said, shooing her away. "I've sent the details to your email."
"I'll check," she replied, forcing a polite smile when really, she wanted to shove a pen up his bumhole. "I'd better still get my own podcast," she mumbled to herself.
She went back to her desk, her computer casting a bluish haze on her tired face. She opened her email and then downloaded the report that had been sent to her then scrolled through it briefly, before stopping to rub her eyes.
She drummed her nails against the desk, wondering where to even begin. Murder cases were messy enough, but this one had the kind of details that stuck to her brain. A person was drained of blood, no wounds, no evidence. It didn’t read like a homicide; it read like a horror story.
Hell, even if she probably had some heart defect and the blood stopped pumping through her veins... How would the blood dry up? That fast.
Her phone buzzed against the desk. A text from Dylan lit the screen: You’ve been quite busy, darling. Forgot I exist?
Ivanna stared at it for a moment, her shoulders sagging. She hadn’t meant to ignore him.
Work just ate her alive sometimes... More like her boss did.
Nothing’s up. I’ve been buried in work, she typed back.
Almost instantly: Can I take you to dinner tonight? Or are you going to ghost me again?
Her lips twitched a bit.
Dylan wasn’t wrong because she had been distant. Still, the thought of dinner and pretending to be normal when her head was filled with bloodless corpses felt impossible.
Not sure. I might still be busy, she replied.
Three dots bubbled, disappeared, then returned: Don’t be so distant. It’s dinner. Just let me see you for an hour.
Ivanna exhaled, her thumb hovering over her phone. She didn’t want to push him away completely. Fine, dinner. But by nine o'clock. I've got a ton of work to do.
A heart emoji appeared on her screen. She locked her phone and shoved it aside.
After a few more hours of sleuthing and trying to bribe her cop friend to give her a little information, she finally got the name that had been hidden from every press because the hotel wanted privacy.
Riverbend Inn
It was the least place she expected something like that to happen. She probably thought it had to be one of those high-end hotels exclusive to only celebrities or whoever had enough money, or maybe one of those extremely cheap motels known for hiding preposition rings and drug deals.
Riverbend was neither of them.
Her boss was two desks over, barking into a phone. When he hung up, she swiveled her chair toward him.
“I’m heading out,” she said. “Riverbend Inn. That's where it likely happened. I’ll check it out, see what I can dig up from the staff there."
She said the word likely on purpose.
Her editor pinched the bridge of his nose. “Fine. Just don’t spook the cops. They’re already touchy about any media covering this.”
“Spooking is not in my skill set,” Ivanna muttered dryly, grabbing her bag.
"And how did you get the name?"
"Just a little more investigation than others," she shrugged.
Her boss gave her a look, but she was definitely not rating out her cop friend.
"I... Just narrowed it down, really... It's not that hard. It happened in this district... I mean, the police department covering it. So it has to be one of the fourteen hotels closest to here... And um... The uh... Information in the report... Made me... Narrow it down..."
"What are you not telling me Iv," her boss asked, crossing his arms.
"Chill out. Her first name was in the report... Yes, everything was vague and the stations that covered it didn't provide tangible information... But like... It's child's play... Just... Sent a few messages to those who might know her and uh... Social media comment sections," she said, as the thought crossed her mind. She had suddenly remembered Rita from Reddit. "Someone there said she knew the victim. Really... Reporters these days don't do enough research to know where to look."
"You're rambling, but okay," her boss said.
She heaved a sigh of relief.