Megan
Brigit gave me ample notice of Seth’s arrival at my house on Sunday, barking up a storm at the living room window and dashing to the door. I opened it before he even had a chance to knock, finding him ascending to the porch, still wearing his fatigues from reserve duty. Damn if this guy doesn’t make camouflage look sexy.
I leaned against the jamb. “Hey, soldier.”
He reached out a hand to play with a lock of my hair, which was hanging loose, the way he liked it. “I’m shipping out tomorrow,” he teased, a sly smile slinking across his face. “Want to show a poor guy one last good time?”
“Nice try,” I told him. “But we’ve got a cookout first.”
I leashed up Brigit and led her to Seth’s Nova, where we loaded her into the backseat. We drove to the grocery store and took her inside. Though I was wearing a summery dress rather than my police uniform, I’d made sure Brigit had her police vest on and that my badge was in my purse in case anyone gave us any guff about bringing her into the place.
We loaded the cart with all the fixings for a cookout, as well as a six-pack of beer and a bottle of moscato. When Brigit tugged me down the pet food aisle, we added a box of crunchy, bone-shaped dog biscuits to the basket as well. As we passed the small in-house floral shop, I grabbed a potted pink orchid. Maybe a brightly colored plant would help keep the mood bright.
Fully stocked now, we headed to the house where Seth and his mother lived with his grandfather. Their place sat in the Morningside neighborhood, a few blocks east of I-35. Like the home I’d grown up in, theirs was hardly the kind of house one would see featured in Better Homes & Gardens, unless it was the before picture in an article about a major remodel. It was a small house that comprised a patchwork of building materials, including gray siding, chipped orange brick, and mismatched shingles. The garage had been enclosed to make more living space. A large live oak shaded the front yard, rendering the space too dark for grass to grow.
We let Brigit out of the back and she hopped down onto the dirt. Seth grabbed the bags, while I rounded up the orchid. I followed Seth to the porch. The hinges gave off a creak as he pulled open the ancient screen door. He put his hand on the knob of the front door but hesitated a moment, as if mustering his strength before opening it.
We walked into a dark living room. The curtains on the front window were closed, only a sliver of sunlight sneaking into the space, illuminating a line of mottled shag carpet that should have been replaced decades ago. The walls were covered in dark wood paneling. A man who looked like a much older version of Seth sat in a threadbare corduroy recliner, clear tubes running from the oxygen tank beside him up to his nose. He glanced up from the television as we stepped inside, but issued no greeting.
With Blast leading the way, Seth’s mother, Lisa, swept into the room, coming over to welcome us. While the dogs tussled playfully at our feet, Lisa took my free hand in both of hers. “So good to see you again, Megan!”
She might have been a lousy mother, but the fact that she’d given birth to Seth at the tender age of fifteen made me cut her quite a bit of slack. She’d still been a child herself at that point. And no matter what had happened in the past, it was clear she was trying to make up for it now, if only Seth would let her. But time is said to heal all wounds, right? I hoped the old adage would prove true.
I gave her a smile. “Good to see you, too, Lisa.” I held out the orchid. “This is for you.”
Her face broke into a broad smile as she took the plant from me. “It’s beautiful! How thoughtful of you. This is the perfect thing to brighten up the room.” She placed it on a low bookshelf near the front windows and pulled the curtains open, letting more light into the space. “There. That’s better.” She turned to her father, Seth’s grandfather. “Dad, why don’t you introduce yourself?”
She was obviously trying to get the coot to show some manners, but he just as obviously didn’t give a rat’s ass whether or not he was being cordial. “Why should I introduce myself?” he snapped. “You just called me Dad. She knows who I am.”
Even though he’d been less than friendly, I stepped over to his chair and extended my hand. “Nice to meet you.”
He eyed my hand and scowled, but took it anyway and gave it one quick shake.
“What would you like me to call you?” I asked.
“My name’s Oliver,” he grumbled.
Lisa stepped closer. “His friends call him Ollie.”
Seth snorted. “What friends?”
The man’s head snapped in Seth’s direction and he skewered his grandson with a look. “I’ve got friends. Harry and Leonard from my old regiment.”
“And when’s the last time you saw them?” Seth asked. “In 2001?”
Something flashed in Oliver’s eyes, an emotion that looked like equal parts anger and pain. Painger.
Lisa waved her hands as if to dispel the tension. “What did you two pick up for dinner?”
“Burger stuff,” Seth said. “We figured we could cook out on the grill.”
Oliver’s mouth fell open. “We haven’t used the grill since—”
“2001,” Seth said again. “Last time we cooked out was two months before Grandma died. She roasted corn in the husk. Put a lot of butter and lemon pepper on it. Best corn I’ve ever tasted.”
“You don’t have to tell me how good it was!” Oliver barked, though despite his tone his expression now bore far more pain than anger. A decade and a half had passed since her death and he still grieved his wife. It was both heartwarming and heartbreaking at the same time.
“Let’s go set up,” Seth said, continuing with the bags toward the kitchen. His mother and the dogs followed him.
When Oliver turned his attention back to the TV, I said, “Come on outside with us.”
“Why should I? I always eat right here in my chair.”
“Because your son bought your favorite beer,” I said. “Just for you.”
When he made no move to get up, I grabbed the handle of his oxygen tank and began to wheel it toward the kitchen.
“Hey!” he hollered after me, grabbing at the air tubes that connected him to the oxygen. “You take that tank and I can’t breathe!”
I stopped and shot him a pointed look over my shoulder. “Then you better g-get out of that chair and come with me.”
His mouth fell open and he sputtered. “You can’t talk to me that way in my own home!”
“Quit being stubborn and I won’t have to.” I motioned for him to follow me. “C’mon. It’ll be fun.”
He frowned and muttered a few choice words under his breath, but he seemed to realize I wouldn’t take no for an answer. He pushed himself up out of the chair and trailed along behind me.
We made our way through a bright orange kitchen that would’ve felt right at home on the set of The Brady Bunch, and exited a sliding glass door onto the back patio. Seth and Lisa looked over, seemingly surprised to see Oliver coming along with me.
Seth’s grandfather plopped himself down in a rusty aluminum lawn chair. “Can I have my air back now? Or is that too much to ask?”
I rolled the tank over and positioned it next to him. “There you go.”
He cast me a scathing look and turned to Seth. “Your girl is bossy.”
“I know,” Seth agreed, sending a discreet grin my way. “But at least she’s a looker.”
Oliver didn’t say much more while Seth fired up the grill and cooked the burgers and Lisa and I prepared plates with heaping helpings of sides. The dogs chased each other around and wrangled in the dry grass of the backyard, occasionally circling by to check on the progress of the burgers and drool in anticipation. When everything was ready, Lisa handed a plate to Oliver and she, Seth, and I took our seats.
We dug into the food. While the three of them seemed content to eat in silence, a quiet family meal was absolutely foreign to me. The table at the Luz home might be noisy, but it was a healthy noise. This silence was straight-up dysfunctional.
Looks like it’s up to me to keep the conversation going.
I stuck with light topics. The weather. Texas Rangers baseball. The Lollipop Bandit. Oliver said little, but at least he was no longer being nasty. The dogs made the rounds among us, begging for scraps with a woof or a paw on the knee. I noticed Oliver was generous with Blast and Brigit, sharing at least half of his burger with them. He couldn’t be all bad then, could he?
After we ate, Lisa and I carried the dishes inside to the sink and stored the leftovers in the fridge, while Seth scraped the grill and his grandfather sat outside, finishing his bottle of beer.
Lisa put the plug in the sink and began to fill it with hot water, adding a squeeze of dish soap. As the sink filled and the bubbles rose, she glanced out the window that overlooked the backyard, her gaze taking in her father and her son. “I can’t believe you got my father to come outside. He lives in that recliner, even sleeps in it some nights.” She turned and looked at me now, her eyes misty. “You’ve been really good for Seth, Megan. You might be good for all of us.”
I found myself too choked up to respond. Before I would have been able to anyway, the dogs came to the glass door and barked, wanting in. I slid the door open and they aimed right for the water bowl, lapping up water like they’d never get enough.
When it was time for Seth to take me and Brigit home, I gave Lisa a hug. “It was great to see you again.”
She hugged me tight. “You, too.”
I stepped over to the recliner, where Oliver had once again planted himself.
He looked up at me. “I’m not a hugger.”
I held up my hands in surrender. “I won’t force one on you.” No sense pushing too hard too fast. I reached out and gave his arm a soft squeeze. Oliver tensed at my touch, going rigid as steel, as if it had been a long time since he’d received any physical affection. He’d be a tough nut to crack, but I was determined to do whatever I could to break through his shell.
I released him and stepped back. “I hope to see you again soon.”
He didn’t return the sentiment, but he didn’t scold me for touching him, either. I’d take that as progress.
* * *
More than two weeks passed without incident. Not a single call had come in from Ryan or Adriana. The security patrolman phoned me once to say he’d seen a blond woman leave Ryan’s unit at a very late hour, but it could very well have been Danielle. I swung by but saw nothing suspicious. Ryan’s car and work truck were both in the parking lot, and the lights were out in his apartment.
Yep, like the Lollipop Bandit, the two seemed to be lying low. Maybe whichever one of them was pulling the stupid stunts had got everything out of their system and decided to turn their attention elsewhere. A big part of me hoped that would be the case. Another part of me wondered whether I’d ever feel a sense of closure if the stalking simply stopped and no arrest was ever made. When a serial killer hasn’t murdered anyone in a while, law enforcement never knew what it meant. Had the killer died? Moved away? Suffered a debilitating injury or health condition that prevented the killer from committing another murder? Or was he or she working behind the scenes, plotting and planning an even more heinous crime?
Not knowing was unsettling.
It was near the end of August now, and I was working the swing shift this week. Swing shift wasn’t so bad. It started at 4 P.M. and ran until 1 A.M. That gave me the daytime to run errands, do chores at the house, or train with Brigit. I’d done errands and chores yesterday, so today I chose training.
K-9s had critical skills for certain situations and were a vital tool in law enforcement. Nonetheless, those skills were not put to constant use, which made training important to keep the K-9 team up to speed when the need arose. Today, Brigit and I were at Forest Park, playing hide-and-seek with a bag of weed I’d checked out of evidence. Seth had the day off, so he and Blast had come along with us. While having another dog in the midst was a distraction for Brigit, it was also helpful. Police K-9s had to learn to work and focus despite distractions.
The sky was overcast today, but you’d get no complaints from us. The clouds kept the sun at bay, and the temperature was a bearable 86 degrees rather than the usual upper nineties or low one hundreds.
While Seth held on to Brigit’s leash, I ventured into the wooded area, looking for a place to hide the dope. My stomach involuntarily clenched as I walked past the spot where I’d found a dead body a few months ago. To say the man’s face had been pulverized would be an understatement. The image was the type of thing nightmares were made of, and would be forever seared into my memory.
Forcing myself to move on, I found a tree with a low branch and used it to hoist myself higher up. I tucked the bag of weed into a crook about nine feet high and dropped back to the ground. Lest Brigit simply track my steps to this spot, I hurriedly ran back and forth and round and round in the general area to mix things up before exiting the woods farther down and circling back to Seth and the dogs.
“You’re up, girl!” I told her. I issued the order for her to scent for drugs.
She lifted her snout into the air and worked her nose, her nostrils twitching. Sniff-sniff. With the rest of us following along, she set off, sometimes stopping and lifting her nose again, then taking off in a slightly different direction. She ventured into the woods, her nose continuing to quiver. With her head lifted high, she appeared to be prancing as she trotted along. But while she might look as if she were playing around, she was actually hard at work.
She sped up as the scent grew stronger. She sniffed and sniffed and eventually circled the tree where I’d planted the weed, rising up on one leg on the trunk to verify that, yep, the drugs were up the tree. With one final sniff she plunked her butt down on the ground and looked up into the tree, issuing her passive alert.
I grabbed the limb and pulled myself up, snagging the bag of weed. “Good girl!” I told Brigit, giving her an energetic scratch and a couple of liver treats. Though he’d done nothing to earn it, other than being a sweetie, Blast got a liver treat, too.
A trio of teenage boys wandered by, throwing sticks and rocks. One of them looked at the bag in my hand, “Is that weed?”
I was dressed in civilian clothes, but I could make an arrest if needed. “You looking to score?”
He looked me up and down, then glanced over at Brigit, apparently putting two and two together and realizing I could be a cop. Any offer to buy the drug from me would land his butt in booking. He was smarter than he looked. “No, man!” he said. “I’m not trying to make a buy. I was just curious, that’s all.”
I gave him a pointed look and a suspicious mm-hm. “You sure about that?”
The boys muttered among themselves and hurried on.
Once they were gone, Seth chuckled. “I think you scared ’em.”
“I hope I scared them. They’ve got no business with weed.”
After having Brigit find the drugs two more times, we moved on to tracking exercises. Seth hid on the far side of the swimming pool. Brigit got on his trail and found him in no time. Next he hid at the far end of the zoo’s parking lot. She found him there, too. The three boys came around again to watch. If they were dabbling in drugs, maybe seeing how interesting police work could be would turn them around, entice them to be on the right side of law enforcement. “Want to join in?” I asked them.
“Hell, yeah!” their leader cried.
“Okay,” I told him. “You’ve got two minutes to go somewhere and hide. My dog will come find you.”
Seth gave them an “on your mark, get set, go!” The boys took off running into the woods. I watched the timer app on my phone. When the two minutes were up and the alert sounded, I gave Brigit the command to trail the disturbance.
I followed along after her as she tracked the boys, her nose to the ground. She snuffled around, at one point sniffing around the base of a tree and putting a paw up on it as she sniffed the air around its lower limbs. I’d bet dollars to doughnuts the boys had climbed the tree in an attempt to throw her off. She lowered her head and found their trail again, trotting along at a good clip with me trotting after her.
She found the boys hunkered down behind a berm on the bank of the Trinity River. When she found them, she looked up at me as if to say, Treat me, Megan.
“You got one smart dog, lady!” one of the boys said.
“Thanks,” I replied on Brigit’s behalf, giving her another liver treat.
The boys asked if they could give her a treat, too. I handed each of them one treat. They tossed them into the air, laughing as she rose onto her hind legs to catch them and gobble them down.
After we’d trained for a couple of hours, we were hot and sweaty and sunbaked and nearly done for. Brigit’s and Blast’s ears perked up and they looked to the parking lot. It was another few seconds before my inferior human ears heard tinny music. A white truck with a snow cone painted on the side pulled to the curb. People streamed over to get a cold treat.
“I could go for a snow cone,” Seth said. “How about you?”
I sure could. Hot as I was, I wouldn’t mind a couple scoops of ice to stick in my bra, as well.
We walked over to the truck and read over the numerous flavor options listed on the menu. When it was our turn, I stepped up to the window. “Blue raspberry, please.”
The server at the window turned to Seth. “What about you?”
“Give me a cherry snow cone,” Seth said. “I like the classics.”
When the man noticed the dogs wagging their tails down below, he threw in two plain balls of ice for free. The dogs had fun rolling the balls around with their noses and crunching them up with their teeth.
Brigit and I parted ways with Seth and Blast around 3 P.M. That gave me just enough time to shower and dress for my shift.
* * *
My fluffy partner and I cruised around W1, circling through the Mistletoe Heights neighborhood, rolling on through Berkeley Place, continuing on to University Park. We slowly cruised the medical district, keeping a keen eye out for a man in scrubs armed with a grape Tootsie Roll Pop. Nothing. Had the Lollipop Bandit given up his life of crime? Or had he simply been more careful when he snagged the suckers and thus avoided being spotted committing his crimes?
Around five, rush hour began and the streets got busier. A fender-bender on Berry took up half an hour, as I wrote a report and directed oncoming traffic around the cars. A driver checking out the accident inadvertently swerved too close and nearly sideswiped me.
“Watch it!” I yelled after him.
Once the tow trucks had hauled off the cars, Brigit and I set back out on the streets. While Texas Christian University had its own police department, I decided to take a cruise through the campus and revisit some of the spots from a recent undercover drug case I’d worked there. Over there was the dorm I’d lived in. Beyond that was the library where I’d pretended to study while actually spying on the students I suspected could be dealing Molly. Another turn and I was driving past the common area where the students had snagged free nachos after Essie Espinoza, an aspiring senatorial candidate, had given a rousing speech. Good times.
I pulled into a spot reserved for law enforcement so Brigit could take a potty break in one of the grassy areas. After she’d relieved herself, a group of students came over to say hello. Brigit wagged her tail as they approached.
“Are you two the cops who broke up the Molly ring?” asked a boy in a ball cap featuring the university’s horned frog mascot.
“Yep,” I said. “That’s us.” Living legends.
“Can I get a picture with you?”
“Sure.”
He handed his phone to one of the other students to take the pic. I stepped into place next to him and ordered Brigit to sit at our feet.
Click.
“Can I get one, too?” another student asked.
“Of c-course.”
We spent the next couple of minutes taking pictures with the students. While I certainly didn’t go into police work to become some type of celebrity, I had to admit it was nice to feel appreciated. Of course I knew the students would have been unlikely to recognize me without Brigit by my side and that she was the true star of the show. But I was fine with being her human sidekick.
We bade good-bye to the kids and headed back to our cruiser. On the way, a familiar voice called our names. “Megan! Brigit!”
We turned to see a boy with dark curls, his hand raised in greeting. Hunter. He lived in the same dorm where Brigit and I had lived when working undercover on the drug case. If I’d been five years younger and unattached, I could’ve had a huge crush on the kid. He was cute, sweet, and smart, not to mention a dog lover. Everything a girl could want in a boyfriend.
I gave him a smile as he approached, while Brigit greeted him with a wagging tail and a happy woof! “How’s it going, Hunter?”
He returned my smile and shrugged. “Can’t complain. A little less exciting without you two around, though.”
Aww. Darn if I didn’t feel my cheeks heat up. “Everyone behaving themselves at the dorm?”
“Heck, yeah,” he said. “There are rumors that another undercover cop is living there. Nobody knows who it might be.” He arched a brow. “Care to share any inside information?”
I knew there was nobody from Fort Worth PD currently working undercover at TCU, but might as well let the students think it anyway. Anything that kept them from doing stupid, dangerous things, right? “Sorry, Hunter. My lips are sealed.”
At the mention of my lips, his gaze flickered to my mouth before returning to my eyes. “I better run,” he said. “I’ve got a study session for an exam. It was great seeing you.”
“Right back at ya.”
As he turned and walked away, my inner twenty-year-old coed heaved a sappy sigh.
Having stretched our legs, Brigit and I returned to the cruiser. As we exited the TCU campus, my cell phone rang. It was Adriana.
“Ryan’s following me!” she shrieked.
“Where are you?”
“In my car,” she said. “I’m heading north on McCart, almost to Park Hill.”
I punched the gas but didn’t turn on my lights or siren. The siren and lights would only warn Ryan I was coming, give him a chance to perform an evasive maneuver. So far, I hadn’t been able to catch either Adriana or Ryan in the act of committing a crime, which was the primary reason I’d been unable to make an arrest. There hadn’t been enough concrete evidence against either of them to prove which one was the stalker. Now, I had the chance to catch Ryan red-handed. I’d always suspected he was the guilty party. That is, when I wasn’t suspecting it was Adriana.
“Is he in his work truck or the Camaro?” I asked.
“His work truck.”
“Is he right behind you?”
“No, he’s two or three cars back,” she said. “I think he’s trying not to be noticed.”
“I’m on my way. Stay on the line and tell me each move you make.”
“Okay. I’m turning left on Park Hill now.”
“Where are you headed?” I asked.
“I was on my way to the grocery store, but now I’m afraid to stop. I don’t know what he might do if I get out of my car.”
I didn’t know, either. She was much safer if she kept moving until I arrived on the scene. “Just keep driving. I’ll get him.”
I sped east on McPherson, hooked a left to go north on Green Avenue, and intercepted the two there. Adriana’s beige Accent rolled by just as I reached the corner. She turned her head my way and raised her fingers from the steering wheel to let me know she’d seen me, but she kept driving. Not ten seconds later, Ryan drove past in his truck. He was so focused on the road ahead he failed to notice me. Dumbass.
I pulled out behind him and turned on my lights. Do you see me now?
His head angled upward as he checked his rearview mirror and spotted me behind him. His brake lights came on and he slowed, pulling over to the right and coming to a stop.
“I’m pulling him over,” I told Adriana as I eased to the curb behind his truck. “You go on. I’ll call you back later.”
I left Brigit in the car with the windows down as I exited and strolled up to Ryan’s window.
“Hey, Officer Luz,” he said. “Was I speeding or something?”
I gave him a pointed look. “You know exactly what you were doing, Ryan. And so do I.”
He looked away before turning back to me, his face hard. “So you know I was going to meet Adriana?”
Meet? “That’s not exactly how I’d put it. You were following her.”
“She’s up there somewhere?”
“Yes,” I said. “You followed her on three different turns.”
He raised his hands off the steering wheel in innocence. “I don’t know what to tell you. I didn’t realize she was ahead of me. All I know is she went to Toby’s day camp today and told him to tell me that if I wanted my Wonder Woman #1 comic book I should meet her at a Mexican restaurant we used to go to.”
“Is that true?” I asked. “Or are you just making up a story because I caught you here?”
“It’s true!” He frowned, fuming, his face turning red with rage. “That comic’s worth a shitload of money, and you police have done jack shit about getting it back for me! I didn’t want to see that crazy bitch ever again, but I want my comic book! You can’t blame me for agreeing to meet her.”
Once again I couldn’t prove the guy was lying to me. Heck, I didn’t even know if he was, in fact, lying. Maybe he was telling the truth. This case is really chapping my ass.
I pulled out my cell phone. “What’s your brother’s number? I want to talk to Toby. See if he backs up your story.”
Ryan smirked. “He will.”
As Ryan rattled off his brother’s cell number, I dialed it on my phone. When an adult male answered, I identified myself and said, “May I speak with Toby, please?”
“He’s playing in his room. Give me a second.”
I waited for a brief moment before Toby came on the line. “Hello?”
“Hi, Toby,” I said, trying to sound as pleasant as possible. “This is Megan Luz. I’m the police officer who came to your uncle’s door with my dog a while back. Remember us?”
“Mm-hm. Your dog is fluffy.”
“She sure is. Hey, can you tell me what happened at day camp today?”
“It was fun!” he said brightly. “We did scooter races in the gym and they gave us Popsicles.”
While I was glad he’d had a good time, this information was not exactly what I’d been looking for. “Did anyone come to see you at camp?”
“No.”
“No?” I glanced over at Ryan, raising accusatory brows. “So nobody said anything to you about your uncle Ryan and his comic book?”
“A girl did.”
My accusatory brows fell back into place. “A girl? But she didn’t come to see you at camp?”
“She was across the street,” he said, which evidently to his young mind meant she had not come to camp. Interrogating kids is hard!
Rather than ask Toby more questions he might misinterpret, I decided to let him take the lead. “Tell me what happened with this girl.”
“Okay,” he said. “When it’s pickup time we get to go out and play on the playground until our parents come to get us. There was a girl across the street and she called my name. I went to the fence and she said for me to tell my uncle Ryan she had his comic book and to meet her at their taco place at seven o’clock. She made me say it back to her three times to make sure I got it right. When my dad picked me up I told him, and then my dad called Uncle Ryan and told him, too.”
Either the kid was telling the truth, or Ryan’s brother had been pulled into this mess, along with his son. Children would say just about anything their parents told them to. I’d learned that pretty early on. Child: Daddy’s not home. Me: So that’s not his foot sticking out from under your bed? Poor kids, caught in the middle, trying to do what was right but not knowing what that was. But would Ryan go so far as to implicate his brother and nephew in a stalking scheme? It seemed a little far-fetched.
“What did the girl look like?” I asked Toby.
“She had long yellow hair,” he said.
Had it been Adriana in a wig? The same wig she might have used to try to gain access to Ryan’s apartment? “What kind of clothes was she wearing?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Anything else you can tell me about her? Did you see her car, maybe? Or where she went after she talked to you?”
“I don’t ’member anything else,” he said.
“Okay. Thanks, Toby. Bye-bye, sweetie.” I ended the call and turned to Ryan. “I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and let you go for now, but I’m going to talk to the people at the Southside Rec Center, check their security cameras, see if they back up your story.”
Ryan’s eyes narrowed. “How’d you know where Toby went to day camp?”
“You shared a picture of him on your Facebook page.”
Ryan’s brows rose. “You looked at my Facebook page?”
“I did what any competent investigator would do,” I said. “You made your posts public.” In other words, you’ve got nobody to blame but yourself if you feel like your privacy has been violated.
He shook his head, but he seemed to be shaking it at himself. “I should’ve realized Adriana would look at my page, too. That must’ve been how she figured out where Toby would be.”
“Change your settings,” I suggested. “In the meantime, go on home and stay put for the night.”
He scowled. “You gonna tell Adriana the same thing?”
“I will. But don’t you even think about going to her place to try to get that comic book. She may not even have it.”
He turned red with rage again and huffed. “This is ridiculous! You keep acting like I’m the bad guy when it’s her! She’s the one who tried to choke me, remember? I’m the one with the protective order.”
I raised a conciliatory palm. “Look, all I want is for you to be careful, okay? The two of you are toxic to each other. Maybe you should think about moving to another part of town, avoiding the places you two used to go.”
“That’s not a bad idea,” he said on an exhale, resignation in his voice. “My rent’s going up anyway.”
Good. Maybe he’d move farther away and the two of them would never cross paths again.
I returned to my cruiser and drove to the Southside Recreation Center. I let Brigit take a quick tinkle and sniff around the grounds while my eyes scanned the building for outdoor security cameras. Aha! One was discreetly mounted under the eaves and was aimed out over the playground area. Good. Maybe I’d finally get some irrefutable evidence of wrongdoing here and get to put this case to rest once and for all. Of course, with the way my luck had been going lately, the camera would be another phony like the one at the party supply store.
I led Brigit inside and checked in with the receptionist, who paged the evening supervisor. When he stepped up to the desk, I introduced myself and my partner. “Could we take a look at the security camera footage from this afternoon? There was an alleged incident on the playground that I’m looking into.”
He looked taken aback. “I haven’t heard about any incident. Did a child get hurt?”
“No. It’s nothing that would bring liability on the center. One of the day campers told me a woman spoke to him when he was on the playground at the end of the day. She’s a person of interest in one of my cases. I want to see if the camera picked her up.”
He looked relieved, but only slightly. Surely it was disconcerting to know a potential criminal suspect had been lurking about the center he was responsible for. “Come back to my office and we can take a look.”
A few minutes later, Brigit was sniffing around the baseboards in the man’s office while he and I huddled behind his desk, forwarding through video footage. As I watched, a group of about fifteen children from the day camp program streamed out onto the playground, each heading for their favorite play equipment. While two other kids elbowed each other as both tried to be first on the monkey bars, Toby ran for the swings. Watching him swing back and forth at six times speed was dizzying. When he’d had his fill of the swing, he leaped off and climbed onto the playscape, zipping down the slide headfirst at warp speed.
The man frowned. “The counselors are supposed to make sure they don’t do that. They could get a concussion.”
The two counselors, both of whom were girls who appeared to be in their teens, sat at a picnic table, absorbed in their cell phones, paying little attention to their charges.
The man grunted. “Those two will be watching this footage tomorrow.”
A moment later, Toby turned his head to look at something off screen.
I flapped my hand at the screen. “There! Can you slow it down now?”
The man grabbed his mouse and clicked on the icon that controlled the speed, slowing it down to actual time. As we watched, Toby walked over to the edge of the playground and stopped at the plastic edging that ran around it, holding in the wood chips used to soften the ground in the event a child fell. He stood there for a moment, staring through the wrought-iron fence at something off camera and saying nothing. A few seconds later, his lips began to move. Though I didn’t read lips and couldn’t tell exactly what he was saying, it appeared from the shape of his mouth that he’d repeated the same thing three times, exactly like he’d told me the woman had instructed him to do. As this exchange took place, the counselors never once looked up. They’d be useless in helping me identify the woman.
“Are there any cameras that would show who the boy is speaking with?”
“Sorry,” the man said. “Looks like she was across the street. The cameras only show the rec center property. People don’t like it when security cameras record anything on their private property, especially if the cameras are operated by a government facility. Big Brother and all that.”
I thanked the man and led Brigit outside and across the street, aiming for the point where it appeared Toby had been looking. Two kids, one on a skateboard and another on a bike, sped past on the sidewalk, while a woman with a baby in a stroller approached from down the block. There was no telling how many people might have gone down this sidewalk since Toby had spoken with the blonde hours earlier. Still, it was worth a try.
I issued Brigit the order for her to trail. She sniffed around for a moment, looked up at me as if to say there was no fresh disturbance, and tried again. Eventually she began to walk slowly in one direction, as if she’d found a weak scent. She led me down a residential side street before stopping and plunking herself down on her hindquarters. If she’d been tracking the blonde, and I wasn’t entirely sure she had been, this must have been the point where the woman got into her car. I looked around. Unfortunately, there were no security cameras in sight.
None of the windows on the two closest houses faced this direction, but I decided to try them anyway. I spoke to the occupants, but none recalled having seen a blond woman on the street or a car parked along the curb where I pointed.
“I keep all the blinds closed in summer,” one of the women told me. “Otherwise I can hardly afford my air-conditioning bill.”
Sighing, I led Brigit back to the cruiser and opened her enclosure. She hopped in, plopped down, and began mouthing a chew toy. I climbed into the driver’s seat and drove to Adriana’s house, not at all looking forward to what was sure to be another frustrating conversation for both of us.
I left Brigit in the squad car as I went up to Adriana’s door and knocked. I told her what Ryan and Toby had told me, and told her about the security-camera footage at the rec center. “The kid talked to someone. Ryan is convinced it was you.”
She gasped. “So you believe him? Instead of me?”
I fought the urge to scream I don’t know who or what to believe! It was all I could do not to grab her by the shoulders and try to shake the truth out of her. “What I believe, Miss Valdez, is that both of you need to do your best to steer clear of each other.”
She harrumphed. “Thanks a lot.”
How the hell did I end up in the middle of this lovers’ squabble? “Look,” I said. “I’m glad you called me tonight and I’ll do what I can to keep you safe. But you’ve got to help me help you, okay? Avoid anyplace you two used to go, anywhere he might be. Do everything you can to stay away from the guy.”
She sighed but said, “Okay. I will.”
Finally, someone being reasonable. Hallelujah!
* * *
Thursday night, I cruised W1, making several rounds by Adriana’s house and Ryan’s apartment. While Adriana’s car was parked in her driveway, both Ryan’s Camaro and work truck had been gone all evening. Where was he? Was he out on a date with Danielle? Maybe another woman? Out with the guys watching a sports game somewhere? And if he was driving one of his vehicles, who was driving the other?
My mind continued to mull over the possibilities. Ryan could be behind everything that had happened. Statistically speaking, he was the more likely culprit. He didn’t seem to have a good sense of boundaries when it came to personal interactions and relationships. The blonde at his apartment and the one at the rec center could have been someone he hired in an attempt to frame Adriana. On the other hand, Adriana could just as easily be the guilty one. She was an odd duck, difficult to read. She didn’t seem to have many people in her life, so the loss of a relationship might have hit her especially hard. Either way, these stunts seemed like a lot of trouble to go to just to goad someone into a conversation or get back at them. But obsessive people were willing to go to great lengths to achieve their aims.
It was half past midnight when Adriana phoned me again, her voice frantic. “Ryan’s following me again! He’s right behind me this time!”
“Where are you?”
“Rosedale, heading east. I just passed Jerome Street.”
“Stay on the line,” I told her as I jammed on the gas. “I’ll be there in under a minute.”
Given that it was late on a weeknight, there were few cars on the road. I sped up Eighth Avenue and was approaching from the other direction when I saw headlights ahead. Their movement indicated that the car in the inner lane was trying to force the one in the outer lane over. Holy shit! Is he trying to run her off the road?
I turned on my lights and siren and was on them in an instant. I pulled into the oncoming lane, angling my car to force them both to a stop, and grabbed the mic for my public address system. “Get out of your car with your hands up! Now!”
He did as he was told, though he made a point of revving his engine first. VROOOOOM!
Sheesh. Grow up, you arrogant imbecile.
He climbed out of his car, leaving the engine running and the driver’s door open. Is he going to try to get back in and take off? Maybe run me over in the process? No way would I get out of my cruiser until another officer was on the scene to help me.
I grabbed my radio to call dispatch. “Backup needed.” I gave my location. Picking my cell phone back up, I said, “Stay in your car, Adriana.” Keeping a close eye on Ryan, I sat back to wait.
Squinting into my headlights, Ryan turned his raised hands palms up. “Is that you, Officer Luz?” he called.
I pressed the button on the mic. “Yes.”
With his hands still raised, he pointed the right one in the direction of Adriana’s car. “She followed me! She was trying to run me off the road! I was only trying to defend myself!”
I hadn’t seen the entire interaction between the two of them, but nonetheless, I wasn’t buying it. Even if she’d been the one following him, he could’ve turned left to evade her or made a U-turn to get away.
In less than a minute, Officer Spalding pulled up behind the two cars. Now that my backup was here, I climbed out of my car.
As I walked up to Ryan, he began to lower his arms.
“Keep ’em up!” I barked.
“But it’s starting to hurt!”
“Try bending your elbows a little.”
After turning off the Camaro and removing the keys from the ignition, I stepped aside and, in a lowered voice, gave Spalding a quick update. “You remember when I called you a few weeks ago about the brick incident? These two were the ones involved. There have been multiple incidents since then. Detective Bustamente and I have been working the case, but we can’t tell who’s at fault, or whether one of them might be trying to frame the other. It’s a huge mess. This is the second time Ms. Valdez has called me this week about being followed by Mr. Downey. I don’t know how the whole thing started, but I saw him swerve and try to force her off the road.”
Spalding, being a man of muscles and not words, lifted his chin in acknowledgment.
“Would you keep an eye on him while I speak with Ms. Valdez and search his car?”
He replied with another chin lift and stepped into position a few feet away from Ryan, his hands near his belt, sending the clear message Try anything and I’ll put a bullet in your kneecap.
I circled around to Adriana’s car. Her driver’s side fender was less than two inches from Ryan’s cockeyed Camaro. It was a miracle the two hadn’t collided. With so little space between the cars, I had to move to the passenger window to get close enough to speak with her.
She rolled the glass down when she saw me peering in. She was dressed in a pair of khaki shorts, an off-white T-shirt, and white flip-flops. The woman seemed to have a serious aversion to color. She wore no makeup and, though her hair was brushed, it was clear it had not been recently styled. Her face was tight with anxiety, her eyes filled with unshed tears, her lips quivery. Her hands gripped her steering wheel as if hanging on for dear life. I noticed her shoulders trembling, too. Needless to say, she was terrified. I also noticed that the inside of her car was immaculate. No loose change, hair bands, or crumpled fast-food napkins in the console. No travel mug or water bottle forgotten in the cup holder. No leftover parking receipts on the dash. Adriana was the queen of the neatniks.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Ryan tried to kill me!” She broke down into an all-out cry, covering her face with her hands and sobbing into them.
I gave her some time to get her emotions out. When she seemed to have calmed a bit, I asked, “Can you tell me how you two ended up out here?”
She sniffled and grabbed a tissue from her purse, which was beige, of course.
“I woke up about an hour ago not feeling well.” She sniffled and dabbed at her nose. “I have a horrible migraine. I get them every once in a while. I didn’t realize until I looked in my bathroom drawer that I was out of Excedrin. There’s no way I’d be able to sleep without it, so I threw on some clothes and left to go to the twenty-four-hour pharmacy. I was on my way when I realized Ryan was following me again.”
“So he followed you from your house?”
“I don’t think so. I didn’t see any headlights behind me until I’d been driving for a couple of minutes. He pulled up beside me at a light and honked his horn to get my attention. When I looked over, he was—” She spewed another quick sob before finishing her sentence. “He was pointing a gun at me!”
Holy shit.
I’d been afraid things would escalate, and they certainly had. Knowing Ryan had a gun made me glad I’d called for backup and hadn’t gotten out of my car until Spalding arrived. If I’d done otherwise, I might have been smoked.
“Stay in your car,” I told her. “I’m going to talk to him.”
I went back around the cars and stood in front of Ryan. “Got a weapon on you?”
“No.”
I looked him up and down but saw no suspicious bulges. “Adriana said you pointed a gun at her when you were stopped at a traffic light.”
At that, Spalding arched a brow and unsnapped his police holster, giving himself easier access to his weapon should he need it.
“Adriana’s a fucking liar!” Ryan cried. “Besides, how could she even see into my car? It’s got tinted windows.”
I glanced over at his car. The windows were dark, probably the darkest legal shade a person could have on their vehicle. But that didn’t mean anything. “She could have seen into your car if you had the window down.”
“I didn’t!” he insisted. “My windows were up!”
While Spalding watched, I patted Ryan down. He was clean. “You can put your arms down now,” I told him.
He lowered them and rubbed first one shoulder, then the other.
“Tell me what was happening out here.”
“Adriana came after me,” he said. “I took Danielle out to a movie tonight, and after I dropped her off at her place I realized I was being followed. I’m pretty sure Adriana has followed us before but I could never be sure. Every time I slowed down to see if it was her she’d turn off. Tonight, she pulled up next to me at a light and unrolled her window and started screaming that I was a cheater and a liar and didn’t deserve to live. When the light turned green and I tried to drive away from her, she kept swerving over like she was trying to hit me.”
I gave him a pointed look. “Looked to me like that’s what you were doing to her.”
“Well, yeah!” he scoffed. “In self-defense!”
Self-defense? “You weren’t blocked in by the curb. You could’ve peeled off.”
He said nothing for a second or two before responding with, “I guess I didn’t think of that.”
Spalding and I exchanged glances that said neither of us was buying Ryan’s story. Still, people who were in a panic often did things that weren’t reasonable. It was impossible to think straight when your pulse rate had skyrocketed. This could be a real problem for officers in high-stress situations. For that reason, we’d been taught tactical combat breathing at the police academy. Seth had learned the same techniques in the army.
“I’m going to search your car,” I told Ryan.
“You can’t do that!” He took a step toward me but Spalding put a hand on his chest to stop him.
“I’ve got probable cause,” I told him. “Anything you want to tell me about?”
He said nothing, but the fiery glare in his eyes was so hot it was a wonder it didn’t melt me on the spot.
I climbed into the driver’s seat and lowered the visor. Nothing there. A plastic bottle of Dr Pepper rested in the cup holder, twenty-seven cents in the ashtray. The glove compartment contained the usual registration and insurance papers, as well as the Camaro’s owner’s manual and a tire gauge. Nothing under either of the front floor mats. I opened the hinged top of the console.
Bingo!
Inside was a small black handgun. It was loaded with a full magazine. I left the gun in the console and climbed back out of the car. “What’s the handgun for?”
“Protection!” he yelped. He jerked his head to indicate Adriana. “She keeps trying to get me in trouble. I don’t know what that crazy bitch is going to do next!”
Adriana had rolled down her window and heard Ryan’s words. “I’m not crazy, you bastard!” she shrieked. “You’re the one who’s crazy!” She threw her door open to try to get out but with only inches between her car and Ryan’s all she succeeded in doing was bashing her door into the side of Ryan’s Camaro. Bam!
Spalding arched another brow, this time a discreet one aimed at Adriana that said You sure you’re not crazy?
Ryan’s face exploded in rage. “Watch my car, you stupid bitch!” He tried to take another step, but Spalding put a splayed hand on Ryan’s chest and held him back again.
Adriana shoved the door into Ryan’s car again. Bam!
“Cut it out right now!” I advised Adriana. “Or you’ll be in trouble here, too.”
We’d have to call another car for transport if we ended up having to take both of them in. If we put the two in the back of Spalding’s car together, they were likely to kill each other.
She let loose another sob. “Sorry!” she cried. “I’m just very upset!”
“Take a deep breath,” I told her. “Like you do in Pilates.”
She nodded, closed both her door and her eyes, and inhaled a long breath.
I turned my attention back to Ryan and his gun. It wasn’t illegal for him to own a gun, and under the Texas Motorist Protection Act, a person could carry a loaded handgun in their vehicle, even without a concealed-carry permit, so long as the weapon was out of sight and the person was not engaged in criminal activity. So, my next question was, Is Ryan engaged in criminal activity here? In other words, was he stalking Adriana? And if he wasn’t, if he was innocent here, why hadn’t he told me about the gun?
I turned back to the car and leaned the driver’s seat forward. There was nothing in the floorboard behind the seat. Behind the passenger seat, however, there was a plastic bag with the bright orange Home Depot logo on it. I grabbed the bag and pulled it out of the car, setting it on the hood to take a look inside.
My gut clenched and I gasped.
Whoa.
Inside the bag were a roll of duct tape, a package of zip ties, a box cutter, and a bandana, all the necessary tools for an abduction. Heck, someone could package these items together and sell it as a Kidnapper Combo Pack.
“Spalding. Check this out.” I pulled out my flashlight and shined it about the items on the hood so my fellow officer could get a better look.
After he took a look at the bag’s contents, my coworker’s gaze went from the hood to Ryan. He issued a derisive snort. “A person could do some evil shit with that stuff.”
I turned back to Ryan. “Want to tell me what you were planning to do with these things?” Some of that aforementioned evil shit, perhaps?
“It’s for work,” he said. “I use the zip ties and duct tape to keep all the cords gathered and out of the way.”
I had expected him to stammer and hesitate and give himself away. I hadn’t expected a quick and plausible explanation. Still, while his explanation was plausible, was it an honest explanation, too? Or was it a bold-faced lie? Maybe he’d had the foresight to have a reasonable excuse locked and loaded. “What about the bandana?”
“They come in handy,” he said. “For cleaning up and setting my tools on and stuff.”
Again, plausible. Still, that gun had thrown me for a loop. I mean, I carried one every day on the job, and sometimes I even took it with me when I was off duty. But when I’d been a civilian I’d never felt the need to own one. Then again, I’d never been involved in a tumultuous relationship. All of my breakups had been relatively clean, involving only a few margaritas or a decadent bar of dark chocolate to get me through. And, hell. Here in Texas guns were nearly as common as cell phones. Seemed almost everyone had one.
“When did you buy the gun?” I asked Ryan. If he’d had it a while, I’d be less suspicious. If he’d bought it recently, it could indicate he’d been planning to take Adriana out tonight.
“Yesterday.”
Hmm. “Do you own other guns?” I asked.
“No.”
“If you didn’t point it at Adriana, then how would she know you had it with you?”
He raised his shoulders nearly to his ears. “Hell if I know! Maybe she followed me to the gun store last night.”
That explanation was much more doubtful than his earlier ones. I spoke to Spalding now. “I’m going to have Brigit take a look. See if we missed anything.” Of course my partner “looked” with her nose.
Ryan pierced me with his gaze. “If you’re talking about drugs, she’s not going to find anything. I don’t mess with that kind of shit.”
“That’s a wise decision.” If it’s true. His aggressive behavior could be the result of any number of drugs for which aggression was a side effect. Meth. Crack. Spice, which was a synthetic form of marijuana. Ryan certainly had the skinny build of a drug user. Then again, his behavior tonight could just be anger. His eyes didn’t look glazed or dilated, and his speech, though kazoolike, wasn’t unusually slow or slurred. Still, better make sure I’d covered all the angles.
I retrieved Brigit from the cruiser and led her over to the Camaro, instructing her to search for drugs. She sniffed around the exterior, paying close attention to the wheel wells, but gave no alert. Inside, she sniffed the floor mats and seats, paying an unusual amount of attention to the gear shift. But in the end she found nothing. “Good job, girl.” I gave her a liver treat and a quick scratch under the chin as compensation and returned her to the car.
“Told you she wouldn’t find anything,” Ryan snapped, his face and voice smug.
I twisted everything around in my head, turning the facts inside out and backward, trying to look at things from every direction. At worst, Ryan had planned to abduct and possibly kill Adriana tonight. At best, he’d driven recklessly, endangering her and others on the road. But maybe she had followed him, maybe she’d tried to run him off the road first, like he’d said. Maybe she was the one at fault here.
Blurgh. I couldn’t make up my damn mind! And since I couldn’t make up my mind, I decided to consult my second-best decision-making organ. My gut.
My gut said to book him. I hoped my gut wasn’t only saying this because it was tired of all the indecision.
I turned to Spalding. He cocked his head in question.
I took a deep breath, hoping I wasn’t making the wrong call here, arresting an innocent man who’d been tormented by his crazy ex-girlfriend. I was tempted to mentally run through eenie, meenie, minie, mo, or challenge him to a game of rock-paper-scissors. C’mon, Megan. Be decisive! Your gut said book him, so book him! I gave Spalding a nod. “Take him in.”
Spalding gave me a chin lift in return. “Good call, Luz.”