Parker didn’t know about the hot but she wouldn’t object to the hues. They were more visible at night and in bad weather.
She also knew that those two colors were more often targeted by the police than any other. A thought that led to Jon and chilled some of the joy.
It was 6:24, according to her new phone. They would stop soon, a small non-chain motel. She’d pay cash. She could have driven on to her final destination tonight — another two hours. But her plan was to make sure that her ex didn’t guess where she might be headed.
If after two days, Jon hadn’t shown up, they’d continue north, to what she was thinking of as her “safe house.”
If he hadn’t been rearrested by then.
Where was he now?
What did he happen to be thinking at this moment?
How drunk was he?
How furious was he that he hadn’t caught her at the rental house?
Don’t. Think. About. It.
And as if that were a magic incantation, an image of the seahorse appeared.
So did a taste-memory, metallic, from the blood in her mouth.
Her sobbing.
Why are you doing this to me?
The impact of the pistol cracking her cheekbone.
The—
“What?” Hannah asked.
Parker turned to her.
“You got all weird looking.”
“Nothing. Just thinking where we’ll stop for the night.”
Hannah continued to gaze at her for a moment.
The deceptions had been coming more frequently lately. Small, but a lie is a lie...
On either side of the road were forests of black trees and fields of dying grass and of corn and wheat stubble. The mile markers appeared and vanished. She thought of calculus, whose name came from the Latin word for “little pebble,” and referred to the practice in ancient Rome of using small stones to measure distances. Of all the mathematical disciplines, Allison Parker loved this one the most and she used it daily in her job.
Hannah was less animated now; she would have sensed her mother’s mood. Parker accelerated slightly along the deserted two-lane highway. The sun was gone. Clouds were low in the fragrant autumn evening and moved fast, a continuous blanket. Wind tugged leaves from branches and swirled them downward, where they swirled yet again in the vehicle’s turbulent wake.
“It’s spooky,” the girl said.
It was.
“I’m tired. How much farther?”
Allison Parker didn’t have an answer for that. All she knew was that every mile she put between the two of them and Jon Merritt felt like a gift.
23
The detective was young, with short-cut hair that clung close to his scalp, not unlike Shaw’s, though brown. He wore black slacks and a blue shirt, and a red and black tie hung down from the open collar, a look that Shaw never understood.
Dunfry Kemp’s physique was triangular and his muscled arms tested the cotton of his shirt. He’d been a wrestler, Shaw’s sport in college.
Presently on the phone, he glanced up with a blink as Shaw sat down in the only free chair. The other two were filled with paperwork. His nod of greeting was a burdened one.
Kemp’s office was on the Ferrington Police Department’s second floor, along a lengthy corridor devoted, signs explained, to Investigations and to Administration. The cubicle, though, might have been a storeroom. Stacked on his desk and against the green walls and on the brown carpet and on two-thirds of the chairs were battered folders, manila and brown accordions. Must have been two hundred. Piles of loose papers too. A whiteboard was on the wall — it was a flowchart about the investigation into the Street Cleaner serial killer, the faces of the victims.
Kemp disconnected and asked, “And it’s...?”
A woman in a blue uniform brought in two more folders. Kemp eyed them with dismay.
“Colter Shaw.”
“You work for Marty Harmon. Security?”
It was close enough.
“That’s right.”
“And this’s about...?”
Another bee buzzed into the office and deposited yet more folders. No wonder the kid was having trouble finishing sentences. A whisper: “Oh, man.”
Shaw picked up the narrative. “I’m trying to locate Jon Merritt’s wife and daughter. I understand you caught the case.”
Kemp looked at Shaw out of the corner of his eye. Nothing deceptive about this. It seemed to be just his natural angle of gaze. “Fact is, being honest, I normally wouldn’t talk to a civilian, but the captain said it’s for Mr. Harmon. And I don’t know if you know but he’s sort of saving the city.”
“The water.”
“Yessir. But fact is there is no case really. Jon just talked about hurting her.”
“Killing her,” Shaw corrected and noted that the detective had used Merritt’s given name.
“But he was lawfully discharged and didn’t commit any overt acts. That’s the key word. Overt.”
“Then you don’t know about violating the restraining order. He was at her house.”
Tapping his large fingers on a large file, he gave a tempered frown. “I heard that from her lawyer, Mr. Stein. But he couldn’t say for sure Jon was within a thousand feet of the house. And she wasn’t home.”
“So there’s no warrant?”
“No. And we don’t really do anything about violations like that. Not even sure the order’s enforceable if she wasn’t home.”
“It is,” Shaw said. He couldn’t stop himself from saying: “Is this because it’s Jon Merritt?”
His silence was a yes. But his expressed answer was to gaze around the room, inviting Shaw to join him. “Like you can see, sir. We’ve got to prioritize. I’ve got rapes and homicides and drug cases I’m running. I’ve caught part of a cold serial killer case. And an arson.”
“All accounts, Detective, he’s a sociopath. Like your serial killer. One of the cons said he talked about a murder-suicide. I hope you understand how at risk they could be.”
“I do, sir.”
Shaw said, “I called the prison. I wanted to talk to his therapist. No one’s gotten back to me.”
Kemp said, “So, they’re stonewalling because they didn’t investigate him good enough before the discharge.” He then stopped speaking, thinking he might not want to share this aloud, obvious though it was.
The huge shoulders rose and fell. “Fact is, psychiatrists won’t talk anyway. The privilege, you know.”
Shaw said, “Doctor-patient privilege fails if the patient tells the doctor he intends to hurt someone.”
“Well, I guess he hasn’t. Or we would’ve heard and that’d be in the file. Which it isn’t.”
“Would you call County?”
Kemp hesitated a moment and said he would.
Shaw wondered why he felt the urge to thank a law enforcer for merely doing his job.
“And you’ll put in paperwork for a restraining order violation warrant?”
“I’ll get to it.”
Someone approached in the corridor and Kemp looked toward his doorway with a grimace. But the officer passed on, without a look.
“And get Allison’s and Hannah’s names on a missing persons bulletin?”
Another sideways glance. “Well. How long they been missing?”
“Officer...” Shaw said nothing for a moment. “I’m trying to keep Allison and Hannah safe.”
Personalizing them by using their names. A trick he used in the reward business when speaking to reluctant witnesses.
“And I guarantee Merritt will try to kill them.”
Kemp looked at the wall of files. “Fact is, a missing persons report wouldn’t raise an eyebrow. Nobody looks at it. But one thing I could do...” A nod to himself. “Put it out as flight of material witnesses.” No sideways glance now. He looked straight into Shaw’s eyes. “That’ll get some attention. Maybe. Can’t say for sure.”