A Ruthless Victim by Nadia Siddiqui (best novels to read for students .txt) 📗

face. A patchy growth of facial hair spreads down his neck to the unruly mess of chest hair hardly covered by the robe that the man is wearing pulled over sweatpants at least; that’s a small comfort. It is obvious that this man has given up. Bradley Kramer is a man who is waiting for death; there is no way around it. No doubt he’s a man that feels suicide is a coward’s way out; perhaps he’s drinking so much so that he doesn’t have so many qualms about being cowardly. Nathan wonders for a moment if he’s ever loved anything this much in his life.

He doesn’t think so.

“Go away, I’m not buying,” Bradley slurs as he leans heavily against the door frame. He must have forgotten that he has agreed to meet with him today. Well, not Nathan so much. He’s agreed to meet with Chase Shaffer, internal investigations with Audi automotive company. As far as the instructions that Nathan has received goes, he’s supposed to be conducting yet another search into the deaths in an effort to shine some light on the subject and hopefully provide Bradley with some long awaited answers. The company informed him that whenever they arranged this meeting, Bradley had sobbed into the phone for twenty minutes out of gratitude.

“Good morning, Mr. Kramer, I’m not selling; you agreed to meet with me?”

“Oh,” a light flickers on above Mr. Kramer’s head, his face a concentrated furrow as he attempts to piece together whatever he might have agreed to. “From the car company?”

Nathan nods, “Mr. Shaffer, yes, you spoke with my team on the phone.” Nathan doesn’t extend a hand; he doesn’t really want to question as to where Mr. Kramer might have been lately, but he certainly doesn’t seem like he would know what a shower even was.

“Do I need to have my lawyer present? I’ll go call him…” Bradley attempts to lean off of the doorjamb and stumbles backward a foot before catching himself.

“That won’t be necessary, Mr. Kramer; we have the same goals in mind. I’m here independent of the fact that you’re attempting to sue the parent company. I’ve been working closely with the local police force in an effort to get your case closed. Certainly, if I do a good job, and we are successful, then the lawyers will take it from there. My personal background is in private investigation; it’s really a wonder that a job like mine even exists really,” Nathan is talking a lot. This is perhaps his least favorite of all of his false personas. The persona of Chase Shaffer has a bit of a stick up his ass and tends to be a bit of a know it all. However, Nathan is the consummate actor while he’s assigned to a particular role like this one. Work is the most important here.

“Right. Well. Let me change.” Bradley seems to struggle with the effort of removing his robe. Though once he drops it off of his torso, and it pools around his feet, Nathan can see the puckered skin covering his hands and forearms. That must have hurt quite a bit.

“Was trying to pull them out…”

Nathan must have been staring at the scarred, burned flesh that covered his arms now.

“They were late coming home, and her car has tracking so I went to meet them...figured she must have let her phone die yet again...but the car was,” Bradley chokes up, clearly the image is still fresh in his mind. “There was no noise...I went to pull Emma free first...that’s my daughter.” Bradley picks up a picture frame off of the kitchen counter and brings it closer to Nathan, holding it out for his inspection. “I tried, but it was too hot...they don’t hurt so much now, but the skin does hurt like a bitch when it gets too hot out…”

Nathan doesn’t know what to say. “I’m so sorry,” he replies honestly while reaching for the picture frame, shocked whenever he recognizes the figures in the picture. It’s Bradley Kramer and his wife pushing their little girl on a swing. Only, they didn’t die in a fire; they were kidnapped. Nathan knows this because he lived it.

That isn’t something that was in the file from the company. He needs to report this change, and clearly, Kramer doesn’t know the specifics about what happened. Were they kidnapped and then put back into the car afterward? Were the bodies in the car even them? “Do you have water?” Really, Nathan wants coffee, but he doesn't want to sound too pushy.

“Water...tea...coffee...whatever you like, the kitchen is through there,” he gestures, clearly making an effort to keep himself upright and to quickly sober himself so that he can have this conversation with Nathan.

Without waiting for further invitation, Nathan goes into the kitchen and starts making himself comfortable, finding the coffee grounds and starting to make what’s going to be a very strong pot of coffee in the cheap coffee pot. There isn’t a single dish in the sink. When Nathan goes to pull the milk from the fridge, he finds it empty. However the trash can is nearly full of takeout containers. Clearly, he doesn’t spend his time cooking. No doubt, Mr. Kramer was once a very well formed, handsome individual who just stopped caring about the world or wanting to have anything to do with it. Nathan doesn’t suppose he can blame him. There’s a feeling in his gut that won’t leave; something else is off about this case, and he needs to get to the bottom of it.

“They were identified with dental records, weren’t they?”

“Shouldn’t you know that?”

Nathan forces a good natured chuckle. “I only know what’s on the reports. I’m fairly new to your case. I prefer to hear what they told you and work backward that way. The more details that you can provide me with, the better.

“Their identities were