Too coldly.<\/p>\n
I couldn\u2019t sleep.<\/p>\n
I opened my messages with Linda.<\/p>\n
Every text looked the same.<\/p>\n
\u201cLeft your breakfast on your desk :)\u201d<\/p>\n
Like clockwork.<\/p>\n
Like a robot.<\/p>\n
Then an idea hit me.<\/p>\n
I quietly walked to the kitchen.<\/p>\n
Buried deep in the freezer under a pack of hot dogs was one burrito I\u2019d saved a few days earlier.<\/p>\n
If something was wrong with them\u2026<\/p>\n
That burrito might prove it.<\/p>\n
I went back toward the bedroom.<\/p>\n
Just as I reached the door\u2014<\/p>\n
My phone buzzed.<\/p>\n
Unknown number.<\/p>\n
I opened the message.<\/p>\n
Only one sentence appeared on the screen:<\/p>\n
\u201cDid your cat enjoy today\u2019s burrito?\u201d<\/p>\n
My stomach dropped instantly.<\/p>\n
I read the message three times.<\/p>\n
Daniel glanced over from the couch.<\/p>\n
\u201cWho\u2019s texting this late?\u201d<\/p>\n
I locked the screen immediately.<\/p>\n
\u201cWrong number.\u201d<\/p>\n
But my voice sounded shaky even to me.<\/p>\n
That night, I barely slept.<\/p>\n
Every tiny sound outside made me jump.<\/p>\n
At 3:12 a.m., I finally got out of bed and walked into the kitchen.<\/p>\n
The freezer hummed quietly.<\/p>\n
I pulled out the hidden burrito.<\/p>\n
For a second, I just stared at it sitting in my hands.<\/p>\n
Grease stains soaked through the tortilla.<\/p>\n
Normal.<\/p>\n
Ordinary.<\/p>\n
Except now it felt dangerous.<\/p>\n
The next morning, instead of going straight to work, I drove to a small independent lab across town.<\/p>\n
The woman at the counter looked confused when I handed her the foil-wrapped burrito.<\/p>\n
\u201cI need this tested,\u201d I whispered.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor what exactly?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d I admitted.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut something\u2019s wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n
She told me results would take at least twenty-four hours.<\/p>\n
Longest day of my life.<\/p>\n
At the office, Linda acted completely normal.<\/p>\n
Too normal.<\/p>\n
She smiled softly when I walked in.<\/p>\n
\u201cI brought sausage burritos today,\u201d she said cheerfully.<\/p>\n
I forced a smile.<\/p>\n
\u201cThanks.\u201d<\/p>\n
This time, I didn\u2019t touch it.<\/p>\n
Around noon, police officers returned to the building.<\/p>\n
Everybody stopped working.<\/p>\n
You could feel the tension spreading desk to desk.<\/p>\n
One officer carried evidence boxes.<\/p>\n
Another spoke quietly with our manager.<\/p>\n
Then I noticed something strange.<\/p>\n
Linda looked nervous.<\/p>\n
Not scared.<\/p>\n
Not confused.<\/p>\n
Nervous.<\/p>\n
Like someone waiting for bad news they already expected.<\/p>\n
An hour later, I got a call from the lab.<\/p>\n
I stepped outside to answer.<\/p>\n
The woman\u2019s voice sounded serious.<\/p>\n
\u201cMs. Ella\u2026 where did you get that food?\u201d<\/p>\n
My throat tightened.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThere were traces of industrial pesticide inside the meat.\u201d<\/p>\n
I stopped breathing.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cEnough to seriously poison small animals over time.\u201d<\/p>\n
The world tilted around me.<\/p>\n
The cat.<\/p>\n
Oh God.<\/p>\n
The cat.<\/p>\n
I leaned against the wall, suddenly dizzy.<\/p>\n
Then the woman added something worse.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was another substance too.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat substance?\u201d<\/p>\n
A pause.<\/p>\n
\u201cSedatives.\u201d<\/p>\n
My knees nearly buckled.<\/p>\n
I hung up and stared at the office windows above me.<\/p>\n
Linda sat at her desk inside.<\/p>\n
Completely still.<\/p>\n
Watching me.<\/p>\n
The moment our eyes met, she looked away.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s when I knew.<\/p>\n
I marched back upstairs.<\/p>\n
Straight to her desk.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy?\u201d I whispered.<\/p>\n
Linda blinked slowly.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know what you mean.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe burritos.\u201d<\/p>\n
A few nearby coworkers looked up nervously.<\/p>\n
Linda\u2019s face went pale.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou tested them?\u201d<\/p>\n
Before I could answer, two detectives walked into the office.<\/p>\n
Directly toward us.<\/p>\n
\u201cLinda Morales?\u201d<\/p>\n
She stood slowly.<\/p>\n
The entire office went silent.<\/p>\n
One detective opened a folder.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need you to come with us.\u201d<\/p>\n
People gasped.<\/p>\n
Linda looked at me with trembling eyes.<\/p>\n
Then suddenly she started crying.<\/p>\n
Not loud.<\/p>\n
Not dramatic.<\/p>\n
Just exhausted tears.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt wasn\u2019t supposed to happen like this,\u201d she whispered.<\/p>\n
The detective gently took her arm.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat wasn\u2019t?\u201d<\/p>\n
Linda looked down at the floor.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy uncle buried him there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Every sound in the office disappeared.<\/p>\n
I felt cold all over.<\/p>\n
The detectives exchanged looks.<\/p>\n
\u201cBuried who?\u201d<\/p>\n
Linda\u2019s lips shook violently.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy stepfather.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nobody moved.<\/p>\n
Nobody even breathed.<\/p>\n
According to police, Linda\u2019s uncle had killed the man months earlier after years of violence inside the family.<\/p>\n
The body had been secretly buried beneath the median construction area before landscaping was finished.<\/p>\n
But decomposition had started affecting the soil.<\/p>\n
The dead plants drew attention.<\/p>\n
And Linda\u2026<\/p>\n
Linda had been terrified the stray cat would dig near the spot.<\/p>\n
So every day, she mixed chemicals into the burritos hoping to keep animals away from the area.<\/p>\n
She never expected anyone else to feed them to the cat.<\/p>\n
When police found animal remains near the buried body, they began reviewing cameras.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s when they saw me.<\/p>\n
And every burrito.<\/p>\n
I couldn\u2019t stop crying after hearing the truth.<\/p>\n
Not for the body.<\/p>\n
Not even for Linda.<\/p>\n
For the cat.<\/p>\n
Three days later, animal control finally found him alive behind an abandoned garage two blocks away.<\/p>\n
Weak.<\/p>\n
Sick.<\/p>\n
But alive.<\/p>\n
The vet said if he\u2019d eaten those burritos much longer, he wouldn\u2019t have survived.<\/p>\n
I adopted him the same week.<\/p>\n
Daniel didn\u2019t complain.<\/p>\n
Honestly, after everything, he barely spoke at all anymore.<\/p>\n
The police arrested Linda\u2019s uncle two days later.<\/p>\n
And Linda?<\/p>\n
She took a plea deal after cooperating fully.<\/p>\n
Before leaving court, she looked at me one last time.<\/p>\n
\u201cI never hated the cat,\u201d she said quietly.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was just scared.\u201d<\/p>\n
I didn\u2019t answer.<\/p>\n
Because sometimes fear turns people into strangers.<\/p>\n
And sometimes\u2026<\/p>\n
The smallest hungry animal ends up exposing the darkest secret of all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Too coldly. I couldn\u2019t sleep. I opened my messages with Linda. Every text looked the same. \u201cLeft your breakfast on your desk :)\u201d Like clockwork. Like a robot. Then an idea hit me. I quietly walked to the kitchen. Buried deep in the freezer under a pack of hot dogs was one burrito I\u2019d saved […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5186,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5739"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5739\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5740,"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5739\/revisions\/5740"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tappyli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}