SEEING NO BODY, Joe had returned to the shadows beneath the Mercedes, where he at last picked up Lindsey's scent trail, carefully sorting it out from Ryder's and Ray's scents and from the aromas of the many officers. Ducking behind wheels and pillars, he had tracked Lindsey until he lost her at the curb, where her trail vanished abruptly. He sniffed the curb and sidewalk for a long time, trying to find her again among the scents of hundreds of pedestrians, and sidestepping those caring folk who were sure he had escaped from his cat carrier and should be bound for the hold of some unknown flight, who wanted to pick him up and take him to security.
Had he simply lost her scent? Had she made it to another level of the parking complex, or maybe inside the terminal? Or had she gotten into a car at the curb? Had Ray Gibbs doubled back after shooting Ryder, found Lindsey trying to get away, and forced her in at gunpoint? And had taken her where in the stolen Audi?
From behind a pillar, Joe watched Mike and Dallas and the other officers searching for Lindsey, watched Dallas place a number of calls and talk with various officers and airport personnel, trying to get a line on what might have happened to her. The two men joined a search of the airport, which, in Joe's opinion, was like trying to catch a fly in a whirlwind. He could see them inside talking with airline and airport employees. They were gone a long time, the tomcat was growing hungry and sleepy again, feeling lost again, when they returned, Mike looking pale and despondent. They were talking with the SJPD sergeant once more when Mike's cell phone rang.
"Flannery." Mike listened, looked up only to signal Dallas. As Dallas joined him, Mike found a slip of paper in his pocket and hastily jotted something.
"We're on our way," he said. "Be careful, stay out of sight. Get out of there, now. Out the back, there has to be a back entrance. Stay out of his way until the law gets there."
Clicking off, Mike stood grinning at Dallas, looking so relieved that Joe's own heart pumped harder. "She's in the city, at the wharf. Gibbs just checked into the Argonaut, or seems to have. Unless he made her and has given her the slip. She called the PD. You better call them."
"How did she…?"
"She followed him in a cab," Mike said. "The fare took most of her cash. She's convinced he didn't see her. Said there were several yellow cabs on the freeway, and her driver kept well back.
"Said that when Gibbs drove around to Fisherman's Wharf, her driver followed on the next street. Said Gibbs was driving really carefully, taking his time. Saw him go in the hotel. She's across the street in a restaurant, thinks he took a room at the front, saw a curtain pulled back and said it looked like Gibbs at the window."
Dallas accessed his phone list, hit the number for SFPD, and made sure there were officers on the way. Then he called San Francisco's detective division and got a detective he knew. As he laid out the scenario, setting in place some backup to the street patrol, Joe Grey moved fast for Dallas's Blazer. He wasn't going to be left behind on this one. Not in this godforsaken airport, forty miles from home.
34
AS DALLAS AND Mike ran for the Blazer, Joe raced to its far side and leaped at the door handle, pawing awkwardly, trying to flip it up and open. Blazer handles were not made for cat paws. Had Dallas locked the vehicle? In his frantic assault, would he set off the alarm? He'd had enough of that. As he flew at the latch, the two men came pounding-and just as he'd feared, the horn blasted suddenly in a heart-stopping cacophony that sent him flying for cover under the adjacent cars.
Dallas halted and circled the car, ready to move on a foolish burglar. Finding no one, he shoved his key in the door, swung in, and started the engine, silencing the din. As Mike opened the passenger door, Joe slipped behind him, crouching to bolt inside.
Mike was too fast, slamming the door as the tomcat leaped clear. Better left behind than crushed like an insect. Slinking away defeated, under the line of concealing vehicles, he watched the Blazer back out and move away through the parking lot, heading for San Francisco.
He was alone. In the vast, unfriendly airport. Alone in a strange city. Crouched on the cold, hard concrete trying to think what to do.
MOST OF THE San Jose officers had left. Two forensics officers were working the scene, photographing Lindsey's car inside and out, lifting prints. They had already walked a large grid through the parking area, and despite the contamination of other officers, had looked for anything dropped, had photographed visible footprints, and, around the car, had used a spray chemical to pick up unseen shoe marks. Now, working the inside of the Mercedes, Joe watched them vacuum, then use a sticky roller to pick up trace evidence. Slipping away behind the officers, Joe steered clear of the few law enforcement cars that were still heading out. None of them was from MPPD, they were all strangers. Taking shelter in the shadows beneath a red Honda Civic, he tried not to panic.
Clyde didn't know where he was. Nor did Dulcie. And Kit was too involved with mooning and sulking over Sage to think of much else. He was alone. Stuck in an unfamiliar and unfriendly airport. He didn't know whether he was more scared or more angry.
How do I get out of this one? How the hell do I get home? He was almost tempted to slip into one of the remaining patrol units, hitch a ride to San Jose PD.
Oh, right. Just his luck to link up with a cop who, finding a presumably stray cat crouched in the back of his unit, would take him straight to the pound.
He listened to the casual exchanges between the two forensics officers. He licked his sweating paws. He tried to ignore the chill in his belly that was fast turning into panic. This was the way an abandoned pet would feel when it was coldly dropped on some unfamiliar street miles from home. Torn away from home and hearth, from its humans and its blanket and food bowl. Set adrift, expected to survive among strangers in a heartless world. And he was filled with the same panic he'd known as a homeless, starving kitten in San Francisco alleys.
Except, now he was far more familiar with the cruelties a cat could encounter in the human world.
But only for a few moments did the tomcat indulge himself in his dramatic bout of self-pity before he remembered the old, horse-scented pickup truck with Ryder's cell phone hidden behind the crates.
He took off running under the rows of parked cars, almost forgetting to listen and look for moving vehicles, praying the pickup with the cell phone was still there, that some disembarking passenger hadn't thrown his bag in the back and taken off for a far-flung farm.
He smelled the truck before he saw it. The sweet scent of horses that made him nostalgic for the Harper ranch. The truck was still there, and the driver wasn't, and he leaped into the metal bed scrabbling for the phone. Half expecting it to be gone, half expecting that Ray had somehow found and retrieved it. He hadn't seen him do that, Ray hadn't had time; but for a moment Joe let his imagination run wild, he envisioned Ray finding another phone hidden in the Audi, imagined Ray slipping back to cruise the parking lot, windows down, calling Ryder's phone and following the familiar ring tone to its source in the pickup.
But of course nothing like that had happened. The phone was where he'd left it. He pawed it free of the crates and dialed Clyde's cell number.
He listened to it ringing. Tried not to think about what would happen later if the cops investigated Ryder's phone bills, checked out the numbers called on this date and wanted to know why Ryder had called Clyde.