laughter, Olivia locked the Explorer and crossed the street to the iron doors of the Tile Works.
The steel padlock didn’t immediately budge for Gabe, but with an extra oomph of muscle and a screeching surrender, the rusted bolts holding the hasp in place snapped in two. Olivia pulled at the outer door, but ended up having to put her shoulder into it and accept Gabe’s help there, as well. The iron door itself was heavy, the hinges were rusty, and with the slight caving of the exterior wall, the tendency for it to swing shut again made it feel like pushing a dead car up a hill.
“I bet that hasn’t been opened in six years.” Olivia brushed the grime and dust off her hands and jacket before stepping inside the cavernous interior and turning on her flashlight. The sudden beam of light chased a band of small rodents and big bugs back into the shadows. “I love what they’ve done with the place.”
“Wait. Unless you’re going to arrest me for vandalism?” Olivia shook her head as Gabe pried off a piece of the framing from the inside of the door. It snapped off easily, indicating the wood was dry and rotten. “I don’t think I’d lean against anything,” Gabe warned, wedging the one-by-one between the door and the frame to prop it open. “I doubt it would hold up.” Then he stood beside her, pulling back the front of his tweed jacket and propping his hands on his hips, heedless of the transfer of dirt and rust to his jeans. “Talk about a needle in a haystack. How do we find something the size of my little finger in here?”
“You mean the flash drive?” She swung her light up to the cobwebs hanging like Spanish moss from the second-story catwalk and stair railings, and the triangular ceiling joists holding up most of the roof. “I’m not sure what we’re looking for. Hopefully, something here will tell us why the killer came in. Or better yet, who the killer is.”
Gabe nodded beside her. “So where do we start?”
Windows on both levels had been boarded up. Some of the glass was intact, some had been broken by vandals using them for target practice, some had receded from their desiccated putty and fallen from their frames to shatter into dusty bits of shine on the concrete floor. The weight of a giant iron hook and heavy chains hanging from a winch near the dockside doors had pulled support timbers from the roof and peeled open several holes in the corrugated metal overhead. The openings in the roof let in enough sunlight to reflect off the dust motes floating through the stale air, and cast the interior in dim shadows. Olivia swung her light around at ground level, the extra illumination transforming hulking blobs in the corners into piles of wood pallets and cube-shaped stacks of old boxes.
“We start closest to the door. If our perp came in here to hide, he’d be looking for the first spot he could find.” They went to the first pallet, where several rows of dust-shrouded cardboard boxes were stacked like bricks.
Gabe wiped off the top layer of dust to reveal the faded blue logo of Morton & Sons Tile. He lifted a box from the top to get a closer look, but the cardboard collapsed in his hands. He held it away from his body as sand and chips of broken tiles poured out onto the floor, sending a fresh plume of dust into the air that they both had to turn their eyes and noses from. Once the box was empty, he tossed it onto the pile of tile and grit. “Looks like old stock left over from when Morton & Sons went out of business. Age and moisture have turned the clay back to dust.”
“Gabe.” Olivia’s attention had already moved on to the next pallet. Although the second stack of tiles was as perfectly cube shaped as the first one, something was out of place. “Look at that. Everything else is symmetrical here. Why is there an extra box sitting on top?”
Reaching over the top of the stack beside her, Gabe touched his fingers to a depression there. “This looks like a sinkhole. The boxes
The steel padlock didn’t immediately budge for Gabe, but with an extra oomph of muscle and a screeching surrender, the rusted bolts holding the hasp in place snapped in two. Olivia pulled at the outer door, but ended up having to put her shoulder into it and accept Gabe’s help there, as well. The iron door itself was heavy, the hinges were rusty, and with the slight caving of the exterior wall, the tendency for it to swing shut again made it feel like pushing a dead car up a hill.
“I bet that hasn’t been opened in six years.” Olivia brushed the grime and dust off her hands and jacket before stepping inside the cavernous interior and turning on her flashlight. The sudden beam of light chased a band of small rodents and big bugs back into the shadows. “I love what they’ve done with the place.”
“Wait. Unless you’re going to arrest me for vandalism?” Olivia shook her head as Gabe pried off a piece of the framing from the inside of the door. It snapped off easily, indicating the wood was dry and rotten. “I don’t think I’d lean against anything,” Gabe warned, wedging the one-by-one between the door and the frame to prop it open. “I doubt it would hold up.” Then he stood beside her, pulling back the front of his tweed jacket and propping his hands on his hips, heedless of the transfer of dirt and rust to his jeans. “Talk about a needle in a haystack. How do we find something the size of my little finger in here?”
“You mean the flash drive?” She swung her light up to the cobwebs hanging like Spanish moss from the second-story catwalk and stair railings, and the triangular ceiling joists holding up most of the roof. “I’m not sure what we’re looking for. Hopefully, something here will tell us why the killer came in. Or better yet, who the killer is.”
Gabe nodded beside her. “So where do we start?”
Windows on both levels had been boarded up. Some of the glass was intact, some had been broken by vandals using them for target practice, some had receded from their desiccated putty and fallen from their frames to shatter into dusty bits of shine on the concrete floor. The weight of a giant iron hook and heavy chains hanging from a winch near the dockside doors had pulled support timbers from the roof and peeled open several holes in the corrugated metal overhead. The openings in the roof let in enough sunlight to reflect off the dust motes floating through the stale air, and cast the interior in dim shadows. Olivia swung her light around at ground level, the extra illumination transforming hulking blobs in the corners into piles of wood pallets and cube-shaped stacks of old boxes.
“We start closest to the door. If our perp came in here to hide, he’d be looking for the first spot he could find.” They went to the first pallet, where several rows of dust-shrouded cardboard boxes were stacked like bricks.
Gabe wiped off the top layer of dust to reveal the faded blue logo of Morton & Sons Tile. He lifted a box from the top to get a closer look, but the cardboard collapsed in his hands. He held it away from his body as sand and chips of broken tiles poured out onto the floor, sending a fresh plume of dust into the air that they both had to turn their eyes and noses from. Once the box was empty, he tossed it onto the pile of tile and grit. “Looks like old stock left over from when Morton & Sons went out of business. Age and moisture have turned the clay back to dust.”
“Gabe.” Olivia’s attention had already moved on to the next pallet. Although the second stack of tiles was as perfectly cube shaped as the first one, something was out of place. “Look at that. Everything else is symmetrical here. Why is there an extra box sitting on top?”
Reaching over the top of the stack beside her, Gabe touched his fingers to a depression there. “This looks like a sinkhole. The boxes
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