Lutz barked out orders. “Mills, find out everything you can on Alister Griffin. Get some squad cars to his residence now!”
“Boss, his ID shows he lives in Beaufort, South Carolina.”
“Son of a bitch! So either he’s here on a weeklong vendetta against every police officer in Chicago, or the ID is bullshit. Find out, and Henry, give him a hand!”
“Yes, Commander.” Frank and Henry turned down the hallway that had an arrow pointing to the business center. They’d start making calls and using the laptops to find out more on Alister Griffin.
Moments later, the rest of the detectives appeared from the hallway where the elevators were located. Jennison jerked his chin. “Has every male guest in rooms facing Michigan Avenue been checked out?”
Morish responded. “All the rooms and guests have been cleared, sir. Room 2001 was the only one in question.”
I glanced to my left, and a man entered the building from a side door. He walked at a quickened pace and zeroed in on the registration counter. He exchanged words with Roger, then they turned toward us.
“That’s got to be the head of security,” I said.
Lutz took over the conversation when Roger introduced the man as Charles Greyson, the chief security technician. “Good to meet you, sir.” Lutz tipped his head toward the hallway leading to the Employees Only area. “Let’s get to it, then. We need to see the footage when the guest from room 2001 arrived and checked in.”
Before Roger returned to the registration counter, he told us the time the man showed up and what counter he stood at. “That guest reserved the room at one fifteen and checked in with Corrine. She works at the third registration station.”
“Got it.” Charles led the way to the security room with Lutz, Jennison, Lewis, and me taking up the rear. “Catching that man on camera shouldn’t be a problem.”
I recalled checking out the camera locations when I scanned the lobby. It looked like a total of three black dome cameras were above the registration counter, and two corner-mounted cameras were in the lobby. I hadn’t looked anywhere else at that time.
Mr. Greyson unlocked a door that had Security stamped on a plaque and fastened at eye-level on the door. Inside was a bank of five computers lining the wall, each with split-screen monitors showing live footage of everything happening indoors and outdoors. He took a seat at the first computer and tapped some keys, and the registration counter popped up.
“According to Roger, the guest checked in at station three, so I’ll bring up that camera.”
I glanced at my watch—one forty-five a.m., and now officially Saturday—as he made small talk and pulled up camera three’s footage from yesterday.
“We have four employees that work in here full-time, and most of what they do is review the video recordings. I oversee everything that goes on, and if there’s questionable footage that needs further investigation, I take charge of that.”
“How long do you keep the footage?” Jennison asked.
“If everything appears normal, we record over it on a weekly basis. Our recordings clear every Sunday at eleven fifty-nine p.m. and start over a minute later on Monday morning.”
Jennison nodded. “Okay, let’s see what shows up for the time that guest checked in.”
“Here we go,” Greyson said as we crowded at his back. “This is counter camera three, and I’m beginning the footage at ten after one.” He pointed. “There’s a half dozen people standing in line, waiting their turn to be called forward.”
A family of four had just completed their check-in and was given tickets for their luggage. The reservations agent nodded to a bellman and had him take their luggage to a room behind the counter.
I pointed. “So we’ll be able to see if the man in question checked his luggage, too, right?”
“Yes, it ought to show up on the recording like the guests who just checked in. Okay, this must be him walking up to the counter now.”
Lutz squeezed his hands into fists. I glanced in his direction and knew he was fuming. The man who had just approached the counter wore a plain tan ball cap. From the way he presented himself, he was well aware of every camera location.
A few choice curse words were exchanged between the commanders when they realized the man’s face was totally hidden by the hat’s brim.
“We’ll need to see all the footage prior to him approaching the counter. Maybe something earlier will show us more. He may have put on that disguise just before checking in,” Lewis said.
“Sure thing,” Greyson said. “I can run it in reverse until we see him enter the building.”
Commander Lewis nodded. “Go for it.”
Greyson ran the footage in reverse until we saw the man enter the turnstile at 12:37 p.m.
“There!” I said. “That’s him coming in, and the son of a bitch is already wearing the cap and a pair of tinted glasses. His clothing is unremarkable and no different than what thousands of other men wear.” I raked my hands through my hair. Frustration and the lack of sleep had all of us on edge.
We watched for anything that would help us form an accurate description of the man. As he walked around, we saw from the back that his hair color was light brown. That didn’t give us much to work with. His face was clean-shaven, as were those of thousands of other people in Chicago. Unless Tech took over the footage to give us a comparable as far as height and weight, the description would be vague. The man had no definitive facial features, no visible eye color, and since he was wearing long sleeves, we had nothing as far as possible tattoos. The only thing we knew for sure was that he was Caucasian.
“Take us back to when he checked in. I want to know without a shadow of a doubt that he is the man that reserved room number 2001,” Lutz said.
As the commanders watched the footage for the second time, I thought about the thirty-eight minutes the killer was in the building prior to stepping up to the registration counter. I had noticed a bar-and-lounge entrance at the end of the lobby, and a restaurant was supposed to be on the second floor. Those venues were closed, but I was sure Mr. Greyson could check the footage from yesterday for those rooms as well. If our man showed up in either place, then the bartender, hostess, or waitstaff would need to be interviewed tomorrow too.
Henry and Frank saw us as they passed the security room’s open door on the way to the lobby. They turned back and entered.
“Hey, Boss”—Frank looked at Lutz—“we have an update on Alister Griffin from the Beaufort, South Carolina PD. According to them, the only Alister Griffin from that neck of the woods resides at 867 Restful Road.”
“Good, and?”
Henry shook his head. “Not so good after all. That address belongs to the local cemetery, and Mr. Griffin has been a resident there for sixteen years.”
Lutz ground his fingertips into his temples. He looked like his head was going to explode. As I was about to tell him to take a breath, my cell phone buzzed—a text had come in from Roger.
“Looks like Forensics just arrived. Want me to take care of that?”
Lutz jerked his head toward the door. “Yeah, and tell Roger to bring me some aspirin.”