Page 166 of The Case of the Missing Love Stone

Scarlet’s head tips back against Wes’s stomach. He threads his fingers through her hair. The motion is careful, almost reverent. She closes her eyes. I watch Wes’s shoulders lower one degree at a time as he combs through the ends with his fingers. He doesn’t seem aware he is doing it. Scarlet is. Her hand rises and covers one of his where it rests near her collar.

The technician breaks the moment. “I recovered part of the deleted queue.”

Three files appear: a photograph of Scarlet’s cottage, a one-use access code for the preservation shed, and a scan labeled Route Correction.

Wes’s hands stop moving.

Scarlet leans forward.

The file opens as a damaged thumbnail. A narrow green border frames the missing vellum. The brown line of the release path continues beyond the old access point before dissolving into corrupted pixels.

Scarlet’s breath catches. “That’s my grandmother’s correction.”

Tom moves closer. “You’re certain?”

“She used green backing when the town’s records changed her routes.”

I rest my hand at the base of her neck. “They scanned it before removing it.”

Scarlet nods. “Whoever took it wanted the route.”

The technician enlarges the thumbnail until the image breaks apart. Cypress shapes darken the far edge. A rectangular mark sits south of the public path, beside lettering too damaged to read.

“Can you recover the original?” Wes asks.

“I may get fragments, nothing complete.”

Scarlet studies the ruined image. The fear from the cottage moves beneath her scent.

I slide my fingers through hers. “You don’t have to understand it all right now, love.”

“I need to understand enough.”

Wes resumes stroking her hair. “You will.”

Tom leads us through the rear corridor after the technicians finish documenting the office.

The preservation shed connects to the boarding house by a covered walkway. Humidity thickens the air outside. Standing water glints beyond the fence, and dried magnolia leaves gather beneath the ramp.

Scarlet tires halfway across but doesn’t say anything.

Wes sees it anyway. His hand moves from her back to her waist, taking part of her weight. I keep hold of her hand. The adjustment happens without us stopping. We’re pack now, even if there is no bite bond yet.

The shed smells of floral foam, glue, dust, and flowers left too long without water. Metal shelves hold archival tissue, ribbons, empty crates, display frames, and stacks of festival signs.

Rusk’s document-transfer box sits beneath a counter near the rear door.

A technician kneels beside it and lifts a thin green fiber from the hinge. “Visual match to the backing paper recovered from Magnolia’s storage. The lab will have to confirm.”

Scarlet remains outside the evidence markers. “That only proves the same supply order passed through here.”

Tom nods. “Correct.”

I remind myself to stop thinking like an investigator for one second and to think like someone hiding something in plain sight. I survey the room again. Dust lies thick beneath the lower shelves, except for one narrow line ending short of the wall. “This shelf has been moved.”

The technician photographs the area and shifts a stack of framed maps. Behind them sits a plastic bin labeled Preservation Waste. The lid sticks before lifting. Inside are clipped vellum threads, scraps of green backing, disposable gloves, and the torn corner of a printed route sheet.

Scarlet’s fingers tighten around mine. The fragment shows Old County Nine and a handwritten notation beside a pickup date: S. Mercer.