Mayhew walked across the hall with steady steps. After a few seconds, he stopped in front of a certain wooden door.
Before the detective knocked, he took a deep breath in.
'Let's see what mood we are working with.'
Knock.
Knock.
...
Only a few seconds passed before the sound of creaking wood was heard from inside the apartment. Then, a moment later, the door swung open and a hand reached across and pulled Mayhew by the hair before he could even attempt to speak.
"Ouch—ouch—ouch."
The detective was then promptly thrown onto the dusty couch of their apartment, and while he massaged his head from the pain of having his hair pulled, Margret quickly went back and closed the front door.
"Okay, I know I came very late, but don't you think that this is a little much?"
The blond detective did not pay his words any attention and sat down on a wooden chair, opposite the old couch.
Mayhew was about to make another casual comment about Margret pulling his hair, but as soon as he looked into the eyes of his longtime partner, he immediately realised that something was wrong.
'She's so serious. Something must have happened.'
Making a serious expression himself, the hazel-eyed detective spoke in a light tone.
"Margret, did something happen while I was away?"
For a good moment, Margret didn't respond, seemingly lost in her own thoughts and slightly beside herself.
...
Taking this moment of silence to go into his own thoughts, the detective lowered his head for a moment. He thought of everything that he had done today, and what possibly could have happened for those few hours he was separated from Margret.
Suddenly, Mayhew's eyebrows rose, and his lip twitched.
At the same time, Margret seemed to have snapped out of her deep thoughts, and was prepared to talk.
But the brown-haired detective didn't give her the chance to say anything, as he spoke in a low tone.
"You felt it too, right?"
Mayhew let out a sigh that carried a visible dose of anxiety.
"The intense feeling of someone watching you. That's what happened, right?"
Margret took a brief moment to look at Mayhew, before closing her eyes and nodding.
The detective could feel his heart sink slightly as his partner confirmed what he had hoped to have been a bad guess.
"That's... that's really not good, Meg. Someone—someone is stalking us."
Margret let out a sigh and spoke in an annoyed tone.
"Obviously it's not good, you dickhead."
She crossed her legs and let her head rest on her open palm.
"Though, in a strange way, I feel reassured now that I know that you had also felt the same feeling as me today. I was seriously beginning to think that my intuition had just been paranoia episodes all along."
Before speaking, the brown-haired detective took a moment to reach into his pocket and take a glance at a photo of him and his parents. Looking at his mother and father managed to calm him down just a bit.
'People like me need me. That is why I must continue. Right, Mom? Right, Dad?'
Putting the miniature photo back into his pocket, Mayhew spoke in a steady tone.
"So we both felt somebody watching us, but I doubt that our experiences were the exact same. Tell me what happened, Meg, then I'll tell you my own story."
Margret glanced at the door behind her, before looking back and beginning to talk.
"It happened after the sun had long gone down. I was sitting on the couch reviewing all the information we had and what I wanted to discuss after you came back to the apartment. Then it happened... I began to have this intense feeling that someone was watching. From where exactly? I honestly don't know. In almost any other situation, I would have taken this feeling very seriously, but ever since we arrived in this shitty town, my danger sense has gone bonkers. At every corner of every street, I feel my intuition rise up. It's almost impossible to rely on it anymore because every place and every person raises my intuition flag for danger."
Listening to her explanation, Mayhew was surprised at all.
As soon as they had arrived at the gates of the city, he had guessed that Margret's danger sense would go wild. And going to the park had only solidified that thought.
But it wasn't only Margret that this town's atmosphere was affecting, because the detective had also noticed some changes in himself. One of them being his newfound danger sense, or paranoia. And the second being his behaviour.
Lying to the local cops to get to the file room. It had felt slightly wrong in the moment, but not to a large degree. But now that Mayhew was a little calm and collected, he realised that his behaviour had been completely out of character.
While the hazel-eyed detective had these thoughts, Margret continued.
"So I ignored it at first, thinking that it was either eventually going to go away or at least become less prominent. But as time passed, the opposite happened. The feeling of being watched just continued to become more apparent and real to the point where it was almost impossible for me to ignore it. Before long, the feeling had already materialized into one distinct thought: 'Someone is behind the front door.' At that point, I just got ready."
Mayhew's eyebrow rose.
"Ready for what?"
The blond detective grunted in annoyance.
"To fight, what else could I possibly have gotten ready for? A first date?"
At that comment, Mayhew let out a chuckle. And seeing him do this, Margret seemed to get even more annoyed.
At face value, it would appear as if Mayhew was goofing around at the wrong time, but in reality, it was the exact opposite.
Mayhew and Margret had dealt with hundreds of cases together over a period of many years. And through those experiences, both of them knew each other very well. Considering the fact that both of them didn't have a lot of friends, one could even say that they knew each other best in the whole wide world.
And at this moment, Mayhew knew that his partner needed some humour to keep her composure.
To the average person, Margret might seem like a nutshell that didn't crack open no matter how much pressure was put under it. However, Mayhew knew better, and he knew that Margret wasn't as tough as she acted.
Unlike Mayhew, Margret didn't keep a photo of her parents to calm herself down. So Mayhew took the role of being that person for her.
A father or a big brother.
Margret scoffed.
"Well, are you going to tell me about what happened to you or nah?"
The detective kept a small smile on his face from his previous chuckle and continued in a natural tone.
"It happened while I was walking around Park Słonecznej Polany. Though even before that, there was a slight feeling of dread following me everywhere. But that spike just before I went out of the park, it was... it was as if someone was right behind me—breathing right on my ear."
After he was done saying his part of the story, both detectives took a pause to think.
After doing so, Margret was the one to break the silence first.
"So who do you think it could be?"
Mayhew replied quickly, as he had already thought of what he would say.
"There are a lot of options. It could be one of the gangs that run wild in this town. They might have taken interest in us due to us being the only tourists here. It could also be the Nazi group back in Kamienica. They could have found out that we found one of their own and followed us here to silence us. It could also just be a creep that just lives here."
Hearing the options, Margret didn't seem satisfied.
"The Nazis wouldn't dare step foot in this town, as that would lead to a war with the local gangs. And as for the gangs, why would they stalk two tourists that pose no threat to them?"
The brown-haired detective took her words into consideration and thought for a good amount of time. Once he was ready, he spoke.
"I do agree that the Nazi option is unlikely. But the gangs actually have quite a few good reasons to keep watch of us. Remember our driver, Józef? Well, I overheard him when he was talking with that police officer at the entrance of the city, and from what I could tell, Józef seemed to have had some connections with some powerful people in this town."
A frown formed on Margret's face.
"Have had?"
Mayhew nodded.
"Yes. From what I heard, it seemed that he had broken those connections some time ago. So imagine this as a gang member now: 'Two British tourists arrive in a town that usually gets none, in the van of a person that broke connections with your squad in an unfriendly manner. Then these supposed tourists start going around police stations and accessing their file rooms.' Sounds pretty suspicious, right? And if the police here really do work with the gangs, then the gangs would also know that we are not just some tourists but detectives."
The blond detective raised an eyebrow.
"Okay, but if they know all of this, then why haven't they confronted us yet, or just made us disappear?"
The hazel-eyed detective replied without hesitation.
"Because of what happened with Deven Smith. They have already seen how much that case caused outrage and put Pustków city on the map, which is the exact opposite of what they want. They want this town to be irrelevant and ignored so they can continue to traffic drugs without worry. Killing us would be exposing their base to the attention of the whole wide world—if not that, then at least all of Europe. I suspect that the gangs would try to avoid killing people at all costs, which means..."
...
Margret tilted her head slightly.
"Which means?"
Mayhew's voice turned serious.
"Which means that the eight people that have gone missing for the last 10 years are the work of a serial killer. And I heavily suspect that the same serial killer set up Deven Smith's supposed suicide and killing of that Polish girl. And I think that this person that killed all of these people managed to find out about me and you being detectives, which is also why I believe that he is the same person that is stalking us. He is watching what we do, and making a plan to set us up just like he did Deven. It's just a theory with no evidence behind it, but for some reason, my gut is telling me that I'm right."
Mayhew let out a dry cough.
"He could be behind our door right now as we speak, listening in on what we know."
Both of them glanced toward the now ominous-looking wooden door before returning to each other's faces.
"So what I got from all of that is that we really have no idea."
Mayhew shrugged.
"Pretty much."
She grunted in frustration.
"Well, this sucks. Now that we know someone is stalking us, that pretty much means that we will have to stick by each other at all times."
The detective scratched his chin.
"Not necessarily. Daytime should be safe unless you're deep in the forest or in some empty alleyway. Though at night, I do agree that staying together would be the way to go. Because even if this person doesn't advance on one of us, the sheer pressure of feeling like we are being watched while alone would drive either of us crazy, especially over time."
Margret scoffed.
"Speak for yourself, wuss. Gun or no gun, I'll beat this mystery person into submission."
Mayhew smiled at her comment.
"Well, now that we have discussed the scariest part of today's investigation, shall we get to talking about the information we were going to share before this stalker decided to make himself known?"
Beside this mystery person, there was so much more to talk about. The drunk woman, the feminine fellow he met downstairs, the information they got from the missing person reports. And Mayhew was sure that Margret had plenty to say herself.
It was going to be a long night.