Accidentally in Love (22 page)

Shit. He should’ve known she’d get it, too.

“You’re right,” he muttered, wishing she’d stop looking at him like that, like he’d just stomped on her heart. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s going on. It might not even have anything to do with you or Kurt.”

“But chances are…”

“Yeah. Chances are.” He nodded. “Hudak and I aren’t working any other cases together, and she should be on her four off, so something’s gotta be up.”

She was painfully quiet until they turned off the highway, into town. “Promise me you’ll be careful.”

“Course.” He smiled, but she didn’t smile back. “Safety first and all that crap.”

Before heading to the detachment, he did a walk through her house, then stood at the door for a second, feeling more awkward than he ever had in his full thirty-four years. The only thing that saved him was Ellie; he should have known.

“Go,” she said, her small smile reaching past her lips, past her eyes, and sinking right through him. Damn, he loved that smile. “Go do your Dudley Do-Right thing. I want to start going through the stuff we brought home, anyway.”

“Can I call you later?”

“Anytime.” She didn’t come close, just stayed over by the kitchen table, which was better for both of them. “I’m not going anywhere.”

He stared back at her for a long second before he finally shook his head slowly and jerked the door open. “Lock up behind me.”

Before he could do or say anything that would get him into trouble, he jumped back in the truck and drove straight to the detachment, where Hudak was waiting.

“Before you ask, Sarge already knows. He’s the one who told me to call you.”

Brett nodded. “Okay—so, what? Did you get something off those leads?”

“Not off those, but a couple other things you’re going to like. The day I spoke to our friend Kurt Neill outside Palmer’s store, he had stains on his hands.”

“So?”

“So after he left, I canvassed the other stores to see if he’d been in or what he bought. You can read the list, but the thing I thought was weird was that he’d gone into the Thrift Shop and the Buddha’s Belly looking for ink.”

“Like a Bic pen ink or a jar of ink?”

“A jar. And it had to be black. The only reason they remembered him at the Thrift Shop was because they helped him root through all that crap in the back of the store, looking for some. They found a tub of blue, but he insisted it had to be black, so they had to keep looking.”

“Who gives a shit about ink? What does that have to do with anything?”

“You can use it to dye flowers.”

“No shit? Is there any way to link him to the dye on the tulips?”

“I don’t know; we’re working on it. But that’s nothing compared to this. Ken Jeffco took a call this morning about another B&E in the area. Nothing taken, no damage, no nothing.”

“Then how did they know—”

“You’ll see. We need to find out if Palmer got any more emails first, but come have a look.” She led him back to the media room and pressed the Play button on the middle screen. “All those other messages she got, the ones we connected to the other B&Es, none of those houses had any kind of surveillance cameras.”

“Yeah, I know. So?”

“So feast your eyes on this. Video gold, my friend. Video gold.”

This wasn’t normal security footage from outside. This was inside…someone’s home office, by the looks of it.

“Nanny cam,” Hudak said. “This one’s in the spine of their dictionary—can you believe that shit? They have them all over the house, and our friend here doesn’t have a clue. Watch.”

Brett pulled up a chair and stared at the screen, waiting, waiting, until finally something appeared in the bottom corner. No, not something. Someone. Someone’s back, at least. As soon as Brett saw him, his eyes flicked over the time stamp ticking away in the top corner of the video. Saturday’s date, 01:13 hours.

“Soon as Jeffco saw this, he called Sarge.”

Dressed all in black, from his hoodie to his boots, the person walked straight into the room and sat down in front of the computer, leaning back in the big leather chair while he waited for the monitor to light up.

“Is there audio?” Brett asked, leaning closer.

“No, they never hooked that part up.”

From the angle of the camera, they could only get a partial side view of the guy at the computer, who wasted no time logging in to what Brett assumed was an email program. Time check: 01:14 hours.

Brett slowed the video speed so he could watch every single move the guy made—every time his gloved finger clicked the mouse, every time the mouse moved, how far the mouse moved, and the time stamp when he clicked the mouse the final time: 01:17 hours.

Then he backed it up and played it again before letting the video play on.

Apparently finished, the guy pushed away from the desk, set everything back the way it had been when he arrived, and headed out of the room.

“What the—” Brett held up both hands. “Please tell me there’s more.”

“There’s more.” Hudak pointed to another monitor and clicked Play. The screen immediately lit up with the same hoodie-wearing guy, but this time the camera angle got him walking straight toward it.

“No. Fucking. Way.” Even before Kurt’s face showed up on the screen, Brett knew it was him. They had him.

Hudak pointed toward the monitor, where she’d frozen the video so all they saw was a close-up of Kurt’s face. “That camera’s inside the chain they have on the front door.”

“So where is he? Do we have him? Is there more?”

“Simmer down.” Hudak grinned. “Right now we have him on a single B&E, which won’t get him anything more than an overnight stay with us. But if that
was
an email, and if it did go to Palmer, we’ve got him on all those, too.”

Brett was already out of his chair, but Hudak blocked the doorway.

“What are you doing?” he barked. “Let’s do this!”

She didn’t budge.

“Take it down a notch. If you go off half-cocked here, something’s going to get screwed up, and while you might not give a shit about that, since you’re outta here in a couple days, I do. So calm the fuck down.”

He really hated it when she was right. Taking a deep breath, he nodded slowly and waited for her to continue.

“You go gear up, and I’ll go see if Palmer’s sent anything else. If she hasn’t, we’ll give her a call. Got it?”

“Yeah. Got it. Uh-huh.”

As soon as Hudak stepped back, he took off like a shot up to the locker room, where he messed up his combination twice before getting the damn thing open. Uniform on in record time, firearm checked and holstered, and he was gone again, right back to Hudak’s desk.

“We got him.”

There on her computer monitor was a new message from Ellie, one she’d forwarded from the fake-Maya account. The date on the original email was Saturday morning at 01:17 hours, and in it was a photo of her getting into Carter’s truck on Friday morning with a single line of text:

I’ll be waiting.

“Son of a bitch.” Brett hadn’t taken his eyes off the screen. “Fuckin’ little shit.”

“Hale!” Grabbing the folder, Hudak smashed him on the side of the head with it. “Focus! I’m serious—you either get it together or I’ll throw your ass in a cell and keep you there till this is over. Got it?”

All he could do was nod. He wasn’t going to do anything to screw this up. Not this. Which was why he didn’t argue when Hudak sent him to do the rounds of the hotels again while she did a drive-by at Ellie’s.

He was halfway between the detachment and the strip mall when a call came over the radio from dispatch for any available member. A call had come in to 911, but there wasn’t anyone on the other end, just an open line. Brett didn’t pay it any attention, because people butt-dialed 911 on a regular basis. One of the B Watch members would get it; it was their usual shift, anyway.

And then he heard the address: 2652 Graemsay Road. Not Ellie’s house but too damn close for his liking. In a blink, he lit the car up and cranked a U-turn in the middle of the next intersection.

“Dispatch, Alpha 3, 10-17.” Ellie would have been proud to see how hard he hit that damn gas pedal.

A second later the radio crackled with another voice: “Dispatch, Bravo 1, 10-17.” Sounded like Harj Grewal. Good.

Dispatch had no other information, Brett was a good two minutes out, and he had no idea where Bravo 1 was coming from, so it was a huge relief when Hudak coded in almost right away.

“Dispatch, Charlie 2, 10-23 at 2-6-5-2 Graemsay Road.”

She was on the scene: good. But by herself. Not good. Whose house was 2652? As he wheeled the cruiser off the highway and toward downtown, he mentally calculated out Ellie’s road. She was 2649, the McLarens were 2651, and right across from them was who?

Dickie Garner.

By the time he’d turned down Winnipeg Street, heading in a straight shot to Graemsay, Brett had refocused. Ellie might be in trouble, that was true, but what help was he going to be if he was losing his mind?

None.

Focus. If it was her, if something was wrong, if Kurt was there…fuck…Brett would do whatever it took to end it. But he couldn’t—he
wouldn’t
—let his feelings for her get in the way. No. He needed to be calm. Focused. Aware.

And he was all those things as he wheeled the car around the corner onto Graemsay.

“Dispatch, Alpha 3, 10-23 at 2-6-5-2 Graemsay Road.”

Training automatically kicked in, and he started taking in as much information as he could, all at the same time.

Dickie on his porch, in the far corner by the window, his back to Hudak, one hand up, one out of sight, head down like he was looking at something. Hudak on the front walk, her right hand resting on the butt of her still-holstered firearm, her left hand raised in the air. The McLarens’ dog losing its mind in the yard across the street. A couple lookie-loos at the far end of the street.

No Ellie.

“Mr. Garner, I’ll ask you again: please step back.” Calm and even: that was Hudak.

“An’ I’ll tell you again,” Dickie said, his voice gruff but equally calm. “I ain’t moving till you let him up here.”

With his hand still in the air, he thumbed over his shoulder at Brett, but Hudak didn’t so much as blink his way.

“I’m going to come up there now, Mr. Garner, and by the time I get to the top step, I expect you to be off him or I’ll be forced to use whatever means necessary to
get
you off him. Do you understand?”

Brett had stopped walking a good six feet behind Hudak, his stance looking relaxed, but his senses on high alert. Where the hell was Ellie?

“Mr. Garner,” Hudak repeated. “Do you understand?”

“Come on, Dickie,” Brett said. “I’ve seen her take down guys a hell of a lot bigger than you, and it’s not pretty, so just do what she says.”

For every slow step Hudak took, Brett followed. He had no doubt Hudak could take down Dickie or whoever he had cornered, but she’d have a tough time taking down both, if it came to that. They were almost to the top step before she spoke again; this time, her words were directed at Brett. She didn’t turn, she didn’t even call him by name, but there was no doubt who she was talking to.

“I got this.”

And then he saw why.

Crushed between Dickie’s huge frame and the corner of the porch was Kurt, the side of his face pressed against the wood siding, both arms pinned behind him by the one-handed grasp of Dickie’s meaty fist.

Grewal arrived on the scene as Hudak took the final step up onto the porch. “Mr. Garner, please step away slowly.”

This time Dickie responded to Hudak’s voice. He released Kurt’s arms, then immediately lifted his hand up next to the one already in the air, but the bulk of his body remained shoved up against Kurt as Hudak worked her cuffs around Kurt’s wrists.

“Mr. Neill, I am arresting you on charges of break and enter. You have the right to retain and instruct counsel without delay.”

“I seen him over at Ellie’s again,” Dickie said, taking a step toward Brett and leaving Hudak to deal with Kurt. “Round back there after you dropped her off.”

“You also have the right—”

Kurt jerked, trying to get out of Hudak’s hold, but she didn’t give him a chance. With one swift and precise kick, she swept his feet out from under him, knocking him to his knees, never once faltering as she explained his rights to him.

With his focus split between Hudak and Dickie, Brett couldn’t see Grewal, but he could hear him coming.

“Grewal? You got this?”

“Yeah, I—”

Brett didn’t hear another word. Dickie was yelling something, but Grewal must’ve stepped up, because Dickie didn’t follow Brett; he just kept yelling.

Brett cleared Ellie’s yard in about three steps, hurtled the stairs, and slammed straight into the door. Locked. Damn it! Banging on the door and yelling at the same time, he paused only long enough to press his ear up against the wood.

Nothing. He wasn’t going to think the worst. He wasn’t. Then why was every horrible scenario he could imagine exploding inside his head at the same time? She was going to go through all that shit she’d brought home—that’s what she’d said. So where the hell was she?

Phone out, he punched in her number as he raced around back. He tripped over her bike, which she hadn’t locked up like she said she would, but somehow managed to catch his footing before wiping out. Back door: locked. Phone rang three times, then went to voice mail. Where the hell was she?

“Ellie!” More banging—still no answer. Fuck that. Elbow bent, through the flimsy square window, flip the lock, and in. He hadn’t even opened the door before the alarm started screaming.

“Ellie!” He burst through the kitchen, frantic for any sign of her. Papers and business cards strewn all over the table and…wait…was that…yup, running water. “Ell!”

Why wasn’t she answering him? Taking the stairs three at a time, he almost ripped the knob right off the bathroom door. Locked.

There was a bang, a squeal, and something came crashing down hard.

“Ellie! Are you okay?” He had no idea whose voice it was that came out of him, but it was too loud, too hard, and way too angry to be his.

“Brett?!” Freaked out, but it was her voice. Thank God. “Christ almighty—what are you doing?”