Andy rose. “Then I say we check DMV records for a black Caddie. What model, do you think? Old covers a lot of territory.”
Quentin came back to the conference table, still frowning. “Joey’s dad was killed twenty-five years ago. As I recall, he drove a 1972 Caddie. To be on the safe side, I’d cover 1970 to at least 76.”
“Right.” Andy grimaced slightly. “There can’t be too many thirty-year-old black Caddies still on the road, surely, at least not in Seattle.”
“Let’s hope not.”
On the point of turning away, Andy said, “You look worried again.”
“Yeah. Let’s just say that Joey has all the subtlety and caution of the proverbial bull in a china shop.”
“So if he finds that Caddie-”
“He’s apt to find a hell of a lot more than he can handle,” Quentin finished grimly.
“Then we’d better find it first.” Andy left the room.
Quentin was left alone with his thoughts, and none of them was pleasant. He had no idea where Joey had been calling from and knew he had little chance of finding him before Joey quite possibly found trouble. Bad trouble. As much as Quentin wanted to find and catch the rapist, he really hoped Joey’s lead at the very least failed to point Joey in the right direction.
All Quentin’s training and experience told him that Joey’s simple cunning and brute strength would be no match for the evil he was trying to find. Bad as he was, Joey wasn’t nearly bad enough to successfully fight something he could never understand. Unless he was very, very lucky, he would lose that fight. Problem was, Joey had never been lucky.
And there were too many deaths on Quentin’s conscience as it was.
“Shit,” he said again, softly this time. He sent a restless glance toward his phone, wishing Joey would call again but certain he wouldn’t, not because of any premonition but because he knew Joey was hell-bent to find the rapist and so do something to help Quentin and repay an old debt. A debt Quentin had not hesitated to use in the ensuing years to keep Joey in line and out of trouble.
He was really beginning to wish he hadn’t done that.
Trying not to worry about what he couldn’t change, Quentin drew another file toward him and tried once again to figure out what was bugging him. But before he could get too deep into that, Andy returned to the room.
“The M.E.‘s report on Samantha Mitchell,” he told Quentin, not without satisfaction. “A few hours earlier than expected.”
“Anything we didn’t know?” Quentin asked, accepting the folder and opening it.
“Nah, not really. At least, not that I can see.”
Quentin began reading the report, and almost immediately stiffened. “Shit.”
Alarmed by the tone, Andy said, “What?”
“She died there? Samantha Mitchell died where her body was found?”
“Yeah. But we knew that.”
Quentin grabbed his cell phone and began punching in a number, saying grimly, “Not all of us knew it.”
*
John couldn’t have said why he felt uneasy. Maybe it was simply because he still had trouble even imagining what Maggie was doing, what it was like to literally feel the sensations and emotions experienced by another person days and even weeks before, simply by walking through a place where they had occurred. Maybe it was this dark, chilled, and definitely eerie building. Or maybe it was just his own increasing sensitivity to emotions. His.
And hers.
“Creepy place, even with only five senses,” he offered, more to maintain contact with Maggie than anything else.
He saw her turn her head toward him for a brief instant, but then she was gazing toward that dark doorway at the end of the hall, moving toward it.
John had the strongest impulse to stop her, to get his hands on her so that he could-could what?
His cell phone rang, and he jumped as the strident sound broke the silence. Maggie didn’t even seem to hear it, still walking toward the room, going through the doorway. He followed, though he was still behind her as he dug his phone out and opened it. And he heard even before he could get the phone to his ear.
“John? Get out of there.” Quentin’s voice was sharp, imperative.
“What? What’re you-”
“Listen to me. Get out of there. Get Maggie out. Now. She died there, John. Samantha Mitchell died there, in that room. And if Maggie gets too close-”
John heard a thud, saw Maggie’s flashlight hit the floor, and quickly pointed his own at her. He was still behind her and at first saw only the cloud of her hair, long and a little wild. But then she turned slowly, making an odd choking sound.
Her hands were at her throat, the face above them very pale, and her mouth was open as though she wanted to say something to him.
For an eternal instant, John was frozen, just staring at her. Then she took her hands from her throat, looking at them as though they belonged to someone else.
Her hands were covered with blood.
So was her throat.
Jennifer rejoined Kendra beside the car and shrugged wearily. “There are an awful lot of transients in this area, so I guess I can’t blame the uniforms for not noticing one in particular. Dammit.”
“We can check the shelters again.”
“I know. But they won’t start filling up until tonight.”
Kendra nodded. “And I noticed that a few likely people to question sort of melted away when we got here.”
“Yeah. The uniforms say everybody’s jumpy as hell around here. And, of course, some of the transients figure if we can’t find the actual rapist we’ll make do with one of them.” She sighed. “Really can’t blame them for the distrust, but it doesn’t make the job any easier.”
“No.” Slowly, Kendra added, “Didn’t your patrolman friend say Robson was picked up for creating a disturbance?”
“Yeah. According to the arrest report, he was accosting people coming out of that liquor store just down the block, babbling something about how the ghost of his old enemy was coming after him. And he kept looking toward the building over there where Hollis Templeton was found.” Jennifer shook her head, suddenly uncomfortable under the other woman’s steady, clear-eyed gaze. “At the very least, this is turning into a real wild-goose chase. I don’t know why I thought it could be a legitimate lead. Just a drunk rambling, probably.”
“There must have been something that drew your attention. Something that alerted your instincts.”
Jennifer fumbled for a toothpick and made herself say, “Maybe it was just desperation. Maybe I’m imagining leads where none exist.”
Kendra smiled faintly. “I doubt that. You’re too good a cop to imagine something like that. You trust the friend who gave you the tip, right? That was why you followed up on it initially.”
“Yeah.”
“But there was something else, wasn’t there? Maybe something you read in the arrest report?”
Jennifer almost denied it, but then as she recalled details of the report one by one, she realized what had caught her attention. And felt the rush of adrenaline she always felt when a puzzle piece fell into place. “Yeah, there was something. Most of his ramblings didn’t make sense-he’s more schizophrenic than bipolar, if you ask me-but Robson did say something that struck me.”
“What?”
“He said the ghost of his old enemy was carrying a sack over one shoulder-a sack with puppies in it. Robson was certain the ghost was going to drown the puppies, then come back for him.”
Kendra nodded slowly. “There was something alive in the sack, that’s what he saw. Something moving.”
“Yeah. That, plus the fact that this ghost of his was carrying anything at all, seemed to me just a bit too detailed to be completely delusional.”
Turning to study the building in the distance where Hollis had been found, Kendra said, “I’d guess at least a few transients use that half-demolished warehouse there on the corner for shelter when the weather’s bad. It was cold when Hollis was found, wasn’t it?”