As I sat in my car later, I still couldn’t believe what Fraza had asked me. The breakfast had tasted better than ever. We had argued a little over me finishing this case, but it was worth it; Fraza had proposed to me, something I had never expected to happen. I was sure we would be together for a long time, but marrying her hadn’t occurred to me.
I still felt bad leaving the house that morning; part of me wanted to spend more time with her, the other part of me wanted to solve this case, had to solve this case. The city felt more threatening now that Fraza had told me her concerns. She was afraid I might die, and it was easy to feel the same way as the city loomed over me and the pale buildings turned into many-eyed faces that stared threateningly at me. It wasn’t just because of what Fraza had said, but also because of the case; each and every window could lead to the girl. I was on my way to Hud to see if she had come up with anything; the name of a missing girl would be the best, but I wasn’t expecting that much luck.
I rang the bell and Hud opened the door and greeted me. “Not having the computer open it today?” I asked her. She shrugged and gestured for me to follow her; she looked a little pale, like she hadn’t slept in some time.
“You okay?”
She sat down and yawned. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just haven’t been sleeping much; work’s keeping me up most of the time,” she replied. “Coffee?”
I nodded. I could use some coffee. I had smoked pepper leaf in the car and a lot of it; I did not want the voices to hurt me like that again, and coffee would work wonders on my groggy brain. Hud returned with a steaming cup of the most foulsmelling brew I had ever smelled in my life.
“You are here to see if I can tell you any names or info, aren’t you?” she asked.
I took a sip from what was supposed to be coffee; the taste was as bad as the smell. “Yes I am, Hud. So have you got anything for me?”
She shook her head. “No, I’ve got nothing. No missing girls with the name of a gemstone, and nothing in the information buzz around town. I’m sorry that I cannot help you any more than giving you coffee,” she said sadly.
I shrugged. “It doesn’t matter, Hud. You tried and looked; that’s all the help I could ask for.” I sipped the horrible coffee slowly as I looked around her weird house. “So how is the broker business going?” I asked.
She smiled. “It’s booming. I can see why Mikhail Fox wanted to keep it so badly.” She stopped sipping her coffee and lowered her mug. “There is one thing that I noticed: all the girls that were kidnapped seem to have been taken one minute past seven p.m.”
I looked at her. “That is something. All the clocks in his house were set to that exact time, and a paper with that date got dropped off,” I told her
She nodded. “Interesting indeed. There might be something noteworthy about that time, want me to check it out?” she asked.
“Yes, see if anything significant ever happened at one minute past seven, or on the human date nineteen zero one,” I said. Hud got up and walked to her terminal. “Leave it to me. If there is anything up with that date or time I will find it,” she assured me.
I thanked her for the coffee and got up. I wanted to go see Victor and Petra, find out if they had come up with anything that could be related to an hourglass, and also let them know I was doing alright after last night.  

Next Chapter: Petra