Free Raven's Peak by Lincoln Cole Page B

illegal.”
    “That doesn’t matter,” she said. “It’s why they were after you in the alley.”
    He felt a chill run down his spine. “What do you mean?”
    “They’re planning to kill you and make it look like I discovered that you were tailing me.”
    “What? Why?”
    “They want to frame me for two murders and hopefully, have me arrested. You’re just a piece of the puzzle. When the police find out you are dead they will search your laptop, and then they’ll find the pictures you took of me and come looking.”
    She took a piece of bacon from his plate and popped it in her mouth. Haatim stared blankly, trying to work his way through what she had just said.
    “You really should eat,” she said. “After earlier you need something in your stomach. It’ll help steady you.”
    “I’m not hungry.”
    “Is this Applewood? I  love  Applewood bacon!”
    “Why are you here, then?”
    She was silent, studying him. “I had been watching George for two weeks, trying to be obvious about it. This morning, I got the order to take him out.”
    “By who?”
    “Doesn’t matter. I’m here now because I need to delete those pictures and make sure you aren’t planning to do anything stupid, like go to the police.”
    “Never,” Haatim agreed immediately. It seemed like the safest thing to say.
    “The only thing is: I didn’t realize they had the same idea and would come looking for you. That means you’re valuable to them, and I don’t want them to get their hands on you.”
    “So you’re protecting me from them?”
    “You could say that,” she said. “But I’m also protecting myself from the cops finding those pictures. I need for you to delete everything on your computer and on your cloud backups, I’m heading out of town tonight, and I can’t afford to leave any loose ends.”
    “Loose ends?”
    “You are my loose end,” she said. “But you won’t be any danger once I’ve destroyed the images and taken the computer. If you aren’t holding evidence against me then you won’t be worth anything to them. There won’t be any more reason for them to kill you.”
    “So you’re stealing my computer?”
    “And your phone,” she said. “After you delete all mention of me.”
    “Do I have a choice?”
    She shrugged. “You always have a choice; but, in this case, there is a correct way for things to go.”
    Haatim stared at her for a second and then went over to grab his laptop. “All right. It’s only a few files and the document I was writing.”
    “I know,” she said. “You should stick with that blog, just not as a crime journalist. You have some real talent, and that other stuff you write about God and forgiveness is really interesting.”
    He sighed. “Thanks. I think.”
    He opened the laptop and logged in. He hated to delete all of the pictures he’d collected over the last few days, but he didn’t have much choice. It was just frustrating because he’d worked so hard gathering them to begin with.
    Of course, even with that at stake, he found himself believing what Abigail had told him. The men in the alley hadn’t seemed interested in chatting with him, and he hadn’t trusted George by the end. The idea that he might have been part of a set-up was terrifying but not nearly as far-fetched as he would have liked.
    “This is a really nice place,” she said after a few minutes. “You know, that reminds me of something I’ve been wondering: how do you afford a place like this?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “You don’t seem to have a full-time job, and you just graduated from college with a very expensive degree, yet you are living in a ritzy upscale neighborhood on one of its nicer floors. How the hell do you pay for it?”
    He shrugged. “My parents help.”
    “That’s what I assumed, but when I looked into them there weren’t many details,” she said. “I couldn’t find any information about your father.”
    “He doesn’t like the Internet,” Haatim