Chapter Eighteen

**FOUR MONTHS AGO**

Matt opened his email, but he didn’t recognize the sender, he also didn’t know anyone who would send him video’s either. Curious as to what was sent, Detective Riley opened the link in the email, though he would wish he hadn’t. What he saw made his blood boil and he almost picked up the computer and threw it out his office window into the hall, but he didn’t. It was a video of his niece, no his daughter as he had just learned, Samantha. She was tied to a chair with what looked like wire and had had a gag placed over her mouth. It was Thomas O’Brien he had gone back to the crime scene and stumbled upon Sam and Officer Kent. Apparently, he had done his own digging and discovered that Sam was his daughter as well. It pained Matthew to see Sam held captive by a well-known serial killer, he knew that if he didn’t save her, she was as good as dead. He gathered the team in one of the briefing rooms and gave them the rundown as well as showed them the video that Thomas had sent. The team was just as shocked as Matthew had been, but Nick took it the worst even if he didn’t let it show. He’d been trying to work of the courage to tell Sam he loved her and now he might not even get the chance. Worst of all Matthew had to tell them that what Thomas had said was true, that Alex had confirmed it when running a blood test on the blood left in the syringe. They got to work formulating a plan to try and save Sam, they would do whatever they had to.

Thomas was high on the feeling of knowing that he held the life of Detective Riley’s daughter in his hands, and it was euphoric just knowing they had that video now as well. He went to check on Sam, she was still out cold and little pools of blood had formed at the base of the chair. You could see where it slowly crept down the arms and legs, if she kept struggling the way she did she was going to kill herself. Not that Thomas cared per se, but he would be upset if she did the dirty work for him before he got the chance. He knew what he had told the detective was a lie, there would be no saving her, he was going to kill her and make them all suffer. Still, he couldn’t help but think of how it was such a waste, she truly was a beautiful woman one of the most beautiful he had ever seen. Thomas decided he wanted to play the next card in his deck so to speak, he had managed to get the phone number for detective Riley.

“Detective Mathew Riley, how can I help you?” Mathew answered not knowing who it was that was calling.

“Well, well the famous Detective Riley, you’ve been a thorn in mine and my brother’s side these past few months.” Thomas laughed even if he did despise the detective for his annoying persistence.

“Thomas O’Brien, to what do I owe the pleasure of this call?” He asked fully aware he had a limited time to trace the call before he figured out what the CSIs were doing.

“Don’t bother tracing the call detective, I’ll be brief I just wanted to introduce myself personally to you. I wanted you to have the pleasure of hearing the voice of the person who took your daughter.” Before Matthew could say anything else true to his word Thomas ended the call, it unnerved him the way he sounded so happy.

Thomas couldn’t help but laugh as he hung up on Detective Riley, he wasn’t stupid he knew the moment he called they would attempt to trace the call. He just wanted to toy with the detective a bit, he had to pass the time until Sam came around again. If he’d known, it wasn’t a good idea to piss off the detective he wouldn’t have done it, but he was having too much fun to care. Opportunities like this had to be taken when they were given, Thomas had never been one to pass on such things. He was sure he’d prove his brother wrong and when he did he’d make William eat his words so to speak.

Matthew was furious, the bastard had called him just to toy with him, he hated not being able to do anything. Worse still Thomas knew they would try to trace the call and get a location, he knew how to make the calls just brief enough. The team knew they had limited time before Thomas would kill Sam, so they had to work fast and try to piece together what they knew about the previous victims. They were knee-deep in case files when Kassidy had a realization, while they never found much trace of Thomas or his brother, they still had traces from where the victims were being kept. The team went back through all the case files and look at the trace reports from the bodies and the clothes, they were able to narrow it down to a few of the warehouse districts. The only question that remained now was which district and which warehouse but even so they were a step closer than they had been before. No matter what it took they would rescue Sam and bring her home alive.