“What the fuck is this?” a man’s voice echoed. “I was taking a piss, okay? You try getting to the bathroom in there.”
There, partway down, two cops had a guy spread-eagled against the wall. He was beefy, with a crew cut, no older than me, wearing a rented ill-fitting tux.
“You guys had better explain to my date why I’m not in there, ’cause if she thinks I cut out on her, after I blew five hundred bucks…”
One of the officers saw me watching and gave a “move along” wave.
“Fuck,” Jack muttered as we continued past. “You see another route?”
“No, and I’ll bet you Mr. Silver Hair didn’t get stopped by the cops. Too old to fit their damned profile.”
Jack stopped and exhaled, pretending to watch traffic for a break to cross.
“Maybe if we walked back and took the same alley he did. It’s not the safest move, but we need to go after-” I stopped as I turned in the direction of the alley. “Or maybe not.”
There was the silver-haired man, jogging across the road, a cashmere cardigan in his hand. His wife, waiting on the other side, took it and pecked his cheek. Then they headed into the opera.
“Fuck.”
I took a deep breath, working past the sharp disappointment. “I second that. So should we-?”
The intermission buzzer sounded.
“Head back in,” Jack said. “Try afterward.”
Our postshow plan was to get outside ahead of the crowd and watch for any middle-aged men exiting alone. Sounded great. Failed miserably. We even split up, and each of the four of us followed a lone man over forty-five…only to discover he was just bringing the car around for his wife or girlfriend.
Chances were that the killer wouldn’t walk back alone to his car. He’d follow someone as far as he could. So when our first idea failed, we tried hanging out in the main lot, looking for men veering off from a group. Again, abject failure.
Finally, as the last of the opera-goers dispersed and we started looking obvious standing around, we admitted defeat and headed back to the motel.
THIRTY-FIVE
Earlier this evening I’d envisioned two possible scenarios. One, the killer would see he had no chance at success, and cut his losses. Two, he’d try, fail and be caught. Even when I’d considered the possibility that he’d kill someone, I’d been certain he’d be caught before he could escape. To succeed, and so easily, without a single apparent slip…I’m an optimist, but there’s a point at which realism and optimism collide, and we’d reached it. Tonight only proved that we were in over our heads and it was starting to seem that nothing short of handing over two hundred million would stop the killings.
I didn’t remember the trip to the motel or the walk to the room. The next thing I knew I was sitting on the edge of the bed, staring at myself in the mirror. I’d run my hands through my hair so many times I must have looked like Medusa-all snaky curls and jutting bobby pins. I’d caught my dress in the car door and dragged the hem over ten miles of wet road. I looked like bedraggled alley cat. And I didn’t care.
Fixing my wig and my dress wasn’t going to change what had happened tonight and would happen tomorrow and every day after that because all our running around solving the puzzle was for nothing if we couldn’t stop this bastard. I’d been right there, less than a hundred feet away when he’d killed that man, and there hadn’t been a damn thing I could do about it.
Failure. Complete, abject failure.
A rustle across the room. Then a cigarette package appeared, hovering over my lap. I shook my head and it vanished.
“You want a drink?” Jack asked.
I wanted to say no, but I knew he was trying to be considerate, so I nodded. I thought he’d meant he’d grab something from the minibar-assuming there was one. When the door clicked and I turned to see him leaving, my mouth opened to say “Please don’t go.” But before I could get the first word out, he’d left. And the room got very, very quiet.
Just me. Alone with my thoughts when I so desperately didn’t want to be.
Someone rapped at the door. I didn’t even check the peephole, just yanked it open, thinking Jack had forgotten something. Heart tripping with relief that he’d returned.
Quinn stood there, deep lines etched between his brows.
“I thought you’d left,” I said.
“I have a bit of a drive and I’m…not ready to make it. I circled back, and I saw Jack leaving as I was pulling in. I thought maybe you could-we could-use some company.”
“Yes.” The word flew out before I could think about it. When I did, I considered my options, and the risks of each. “Let’s head out, but I’ll need to leave a note for Jack and stay close.”
He stepped in, but left the door cracked open.
“Is Felix in the car?” I asked as I found paper.
He shook his head. “I dropped him off at a motel. We don’t…I stay somewhere else.”
“Makes sense. Safer, I suppose.”
“Nah, that’s not it. Well, I suspect Felix is happier splitting up, but I-with my job-I can’t just take off for parts unknown even when I’m on vacation. I need a base. Any one checks up on me, I need an alibi, even if it’s just a hotel clerk saying he saw me that morning.”
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.”
A small smile. “You didn’t. I explained of my own free will. Not exactly top secret.” He leaned back against the wall. “I don’t usually have this problem. My jobs, I keep them closer to home, work around my schedule. This?” He shook his head as I finished the note. “Major finagling. When Jack called, I’d finished a big case, hadn’t really started anything new, and had vacation time banked so I was able to take off on short notice.”
He went quiet then, gaze moving away, fingers tapping the dresser.
“I’m going to guess it’s not an open-ended vacation,” I said. “How much time do you have left?”
“Not enough.” He exhaled softly. “That’s one reason I was really counting on…”
“Finishing this tonight.”
He nodded. “A few more days and I’m out of here. And once I’m gone, I don’t know how much help I can be, even with information.”
Without Quinn’s FBI sources-and Quinn himself-our investigation would be in trouble. I put the note where Jack would see it, then followed Quinn out.
Beside the parking lot was a pool. The sign said Closed for the Season, but judging by the moss-lined cracks in the concrete walls, it had been closed for a lot of seasons. Of the surrounding security lights, three were dead and two were flickering with their last breaths, but the last still held on. I walked under that one. Close enough for Jack to find me easily, and the angle let us keep an eye on the parking lot and anyone approaching.
I lowered myself to the cement, legs dangling over the pool’s edge. Quinn sat beside me.
For a minute, we just gazed at the pool and the layer of trash that blanketed the bottom. Pizza boxes, pop bottles, beer cans, a running shoe…whatever people or the wind had dumped inside.
Quinn pointed at the sneaker. “Whenever I see that, I always wonder how the shoe got there. A pair, I can see. Maybe you take them off to swim or go barefoot and forget where you left them. But how do you lose one shoe? Wouldn’t you notice?”
Using my toes, I worked the strap off the back of my opposite heel, and let my left shoe fall into the darkness below. Quinn gave a soft laugh, and tugged his off. It hit the bottom with a squishy thump.
“One high heel and two unmatched sneakers,” he said. “Now that’s a mystery.”
I managed a smile and glanced over at him. His gaze met mine, and I saw something in it that sent a slow burn through me. I was suddenly aware of how close he was sitting, almost brushing me, close enough to feel the heat from his body, and I remembered sitting in that opera house, Jack beside me, my body telling me the perfect substitute for a thwarted hunt. A way to chase the shadows from tonight and still the thoughts pinging through my brain. Something I could cling to, a warm body and a dip into the mindlessly physical.