Honor (37 page)

“It shouldn’t take two visits. I’m sorry.”

He smiled. “Don’t be. And please sit down.” He handed her a bottle of water. “Which chair would you like?”

“That one.” She pointed and he moved it closer to the monitor.

“I understand you saw him again. Up close.”

She nodded. The memory made her gut tighten. “He had on a hooded parka with a high collar. It was zipped up over his mouth. But I did see his eyes. Very clearly.”

Harry Cowles nodded. “You gave me a good general idea of what you saw through the window.” He sat down in front of the monitor.

She forced herself to look at the drawing on the screen. It seemed flat and lifeless. The man could be anybody.

Harry used a trackpad and a thing like a pen to highlight the contours of the face in the half-completed drawing from the first session.

“Does that still look right to you?”

“I—I can’t be sure. I only saw him for a few seconds that time.”

“Let’s go with it for now. We can always make changes.”

She knew that. And she trusted Harry to do his best. It wasn’t his fault that the image of the man was so hard to pin down.

The coordinates linked to an address. She was at the police station. Not for the first time, either. It didn’t matter. He had covered his tracks and his face. He was fairly sure they wouldn’t figure out who he was until he’d left the country.

There was nothing they could charge him with. Connecting him to the accident was next to impossible. And, tempting as Kenzie was, he hadn’t done anything to her.

Yet.

It wasn’t as if she had full-time police protection. And her boyfriend wasn’t always with her.

He assumed that Linc Bannon had found the first bug under her car and removed it. The others were still there.

He’d had to remote-activate the second bug sooner than he’d expected. There were several others left. Someone would have to crawl under the car to find them one by one.

That didn’t matter either. He’d found the right place for the prototype device a business associate had given him. Microchips got smaller every year. The circuitry in the device was impossibly small, but it worked. It excited him to know exactly where she was twenty-four hours a day, in or out of a car.

Kenzie was not always careful. She’d handed him his chance the same day he’d sent the roses, from Kenzie to Chrissie.

He had still been physically following her at that point, had parked near her at a convenience store by the hospital. The tears she’d cried privately in the car left gleaming traces on her cheeks that he found very satisfying.

Too upset to remember to push the button that rolled up the window, she’d even left her purse on the front seat of her rental car, grabbing only her wallet.

He hadn’t waited. No one noticed him. The other drivers in the lot were screaming at kids to shut up or digging for change in the cup holder.

Her purse held a jumble of necessary things and odd items. No cosmetics case. She didn’t wear much makeup.

But he’d found something—a small compact with a magnifying mirror and a regular one. He’d popped out both and added a few improvements underneath, then put the compact right back into the purse.

He’d watched her come out of the convenience store and drive away, giving him a chance to test the mike.

The sad song on the radio came through fine. She didn’t talk to herself as she drove. After that, he picked up Linc Bannon’s voice and her replies now and then.

Funny that he’d never seen the guy. He sounded young—younger than he was, anyway. Army but not old school army. Some kind of hotshot in CyberCommand.

Lucky that Linc hadn’t found the beacon, which was a cut above the bugs. Precise coordinates in real time, jiggleproof.

The camera came on when she opened the compact. Kenzie used it only to put on lip gloss, never a full face. He loved the way she looked with her lips parted. Smacking them to spread the gloss. Trying out a pout. Running her tongue over them for extra shine.

She didn’t use it often. Which meant that every time she did—and snapped the compact shut—the desire to hurt her was unbearably strong.

Linc headed for the Ridgewood police station. The front desk cop buzzed Mike Warren’s office and waited for an affirmative reply, then waved him in.

“You said you would call me back and you didn’t. She hasn’t checked in.” Linc pushed open the unlocked door. “Last I heard she was coming here.”

“Settle down. She’s still here. With Harry Cowles.” Mike Warren looked tired.

“Why? It’s past seven.”

“Harry’s the kind of cop who stays late when he thinks it’s necessary. And you don’t get to interrupt her.” Mike pointed to a chair. “Sit. And shut up. You already explained what happened, and I took notes. My turn to talk.”

The lieutenant gave him a friendly smile and folded his hands on top of the paperwork on his desk. Linc glanced and took in the words
Double Homicide.
Mike had mentioned that. He swallowed what he was going to say.

The lieutenant didn’t seem to notice that. “Unfortunately, we still don’t know who the stalker is. Even if we ID him, we can’t charge him with anything—”

“Not even breaking and entering?”

“No,” Mike said. “Can you prove the man she saw made the impression on the bed? We took lots of pictures, for what they’re worth. Someone lay down on a fuzzy blankie. That’s all we know about that.”

“How about forcing Christine off the road? Any progress there?”

“The tire treads we found in the mud north of the scene and the tire treads on the car in the accident footage do match. Which proves ... not a lot, without the car. And let’s hope those tires are still on the car when we find it. If we find it.”

Linc knew the lieutenant was doing what he could with scant evidence and no manpower. That didn’t keep him from seething inwardly.

“By the way,” Mike continued, “both you and Kenzie should stop in at the night clerk’s and get inked, so we can sort out the prints we picked up inside the apartment. The roof, nothing. The scaffolding, forget it. Painters were swarming up it by the time we were finished with the roof.”

“I forgot to tell them to take the day off.”

“Don’t be a smart-ass.”

“Sorry.”

“This is a priority.” Mike picked up the homicide paperwork on his desk and waved it at Linc.

“I understand that.”

“Look, I want to protect Kenzie and Christine just as much as you do. But there are limits.”

“What are you saying? That he has to hurt her first?”

“As far as Kenzie is concerned, he has to take it up a notch. Staring in the window is a peeping-tom offense. A wrist slap from the judge, one night in jail for a naughty boy.”

“If I catch him, I’ll—”

“I can imagine. Maybe you should line up a good lawyer in advance.”

Linc leaned forward. “What’s the plan?”

“Besides you and me winging it, there isn’t one. Kenzie doesn’t qualify for police protection.”

“Mike, he’s out there. Getting closer. He may be focusing on Kenzie right now, but that could be a way to throw us off the track so he can get to Christine. Can’t we protect her?”

“Maybe.” Mike looked thoughtful. “There are rookies the chief wants out of his hair. As in assigned to easy duty. One is the son of a state representative and the other is a reporter’s daughter.”

“I’m not following you.”

“Add two more patrolmen to babysit them, and we can station unmarked cars at the front and back entrance of the rehab center. No further incidents involving Christine since the roses, right?”

Linc shook his head. “Nothing. Kenzie would have told me. She goes to see Christine a lot.”

Mike raised an eyebrow. “You should go with her.”

“I will. She’s going to get sick of looking at me. Get back to the unmarkeds.”

“Hypothetically speaking, the officers would be there at night, not during the day.”

“Okay. Do what you can.”

“Everyone will be briefed on the stalker.” He paused to think. “Too bad Harry hasn’t finished the drawing yet. But we know he’s white, we have a build and a height for him, and a few other visual facts. Wears black clothes and a mask when he goes window-shopping for victims, has been spotted in a parka zipped up over most of his face. Not much to go on, but it’s something.”

“My guess would be that he’s ordinary otherwise.”

Mike nodded. “You’re probably right. Which is not a crime. Keep in mind that we can’t stop everyone.”

Linc would take what he could get. “Just get your officers there. It’s not like there’s a lot of people hanging around a neuro rehab center at night. Anyone walking by is going to stand out.”

“I promise you they’ll do their best.”

“Too bad you can’t send big guys with guns.”

“The rookies have guns. And the ponytail is actually a crack shot.”

Ponytail. Linc sighed inwardly. Slang for a female cop, back in the day. Mike Warren’s day, not his.

A knock on the open door got their attention. It was Kenzie. She had a file folder in her hand. “Hi, guys. We’re done. Harry printed some out for me.”

“I’d like a copy,” Mike said.

She extracted one and handed it to him.

The lieutenant glanced at it and then laid it flat on his desk.

“Look familiar, Linc?”

“I never saw the guy.” But he studied the copy of the drawing. The eyes were intense. The face had the flat look and pieced-together quality of most police sketches. “What do you think, Kenzie?”

She shrugged. “It’s okay. We had to guess at a lot of things. Better than nothing, right?”

There was no way to answer that forlorn question, so Linc didn’t. He put an arm around her shoulders.

“Let’s go home,” he said quietly.

“Two cars?” She asked the question without thinking first.

Mike Warren looked up. “You can’t leave one here.”

“Two cars,” Linc said. “But I’m staying at Hamill’s. I don’t care if I have to sleep on the floor.”

It was too late to explain the latest developments to Norm or Carol. The lights in their part of the building were off. Kenzie led the way up the staircase, with Linc and Beebee behind her.

“He usually sleeps in the yard. His doghouse is heated. But tonight I want him closer than that.”

Linc patted him on the head. “Beebee, you rock.”

There wasn’t much space on the landing for the three of them. Kenzie unlocked the door and they sort of tumbled in.

The dog went to his accustomed spot on the floor of the kitchen area. Linc stood there, looking around. He was prepared to sleep sitting up if the floor was taken.

Kenzie seemed to have read his mind.

“Oh, just get in the bed,” she told him. “There’s plenty of room for both of us. Just don’t—”

“I wouldn’t.”

Kenzie seemed okay with that short answer. “All right, then. I’m beat. Let’s turn in.”

She touched the wall switch and they undressed in the dark. There was a faint glow in the room from the perimeter lights that Norm kept on at night.

He didn’t look her way, just got down to his T-shirt and underwear, slinging jeans and shirt over a chair. She slipped in first, disappearing into the big bed.

Then he realized that she was holding the covers back for him. Linc eased his tired body down on real cotton sheets and under a comforter that hadn’t been used by ten thousand truckers.

The bed smelled like her. Sweet woman.

She turned and stretched out of reach. Linc saw that she was wearing a tank top. Or maybe it was a cami. Could be a touch of lace on it.

He caught a pungent whiff of sulfur. Kenzie had struck a match. She touched the flame to the wick of a large candle.

“Just for a little while,” she said.

The candle’s flickering light cast a golden line over her shoulder. More than anything he wanted to trace that line with his lips, caress the sleek softness of her skin.

She kept her back turned to him, curling up halfway. Her long hair streamed over her pillow.

Just don’t
. He wasn’t going to. He knew what she meant.

But they could still cuddle.

He moved closer. She didn’t pull away and she didn’t look over her shoulder. Linc stopped. One inch closer and the position would definitely count as a cuddle. He went the extra inch. Then he put a protective arm around her.

Kenzie stiffened.

“I’m not trying anything,” he said softly. “Seemed to me you could use some holding, that’s all.”

Some of the tension eased from her body. He wouldn’t go so far as to call it relaxation.

He was surprised when Kenzie’s hand slipped over his. “You’re right about that.”

That she trusted him to get next to her was a revelation. To be this close to her was bliss. And torture.

She turned in his easy embrace. The change in position meant their bodies were no longer touching, but to be able to look in her eyes and simply lie next to her was all he wanted.

Without thinking, he reached up and stroked her cheek. She accepted the intimate gesture without flinching away.

“So when do I get my life back?” Kenzie murmured.

“I’m working on that,” Linc replied.

“Is it okay to just hide? Right now I don’t care if I ever look out a window again.”

She could hide in his arms for as long as she wanted to. Knowing her, that wouldn’t last.

“Every time I open a door, I imagine him on the other side.”

“He’s not here, Kenzie. You have me and Beebee for tonight.”

“I won’t sleep, Linc.”

“The trick is not to try to.”

She fell silent. In the candlelight, her eyes were large and dark.

“If I could move away from here, I would,” she sighed.

Linc didn’t comment. It wasn’t a solution unless she really went into hiding.

“I can’t leave Christine,” she said softly. “Mrs. Corelli wanted to thank Mike for all his help, by the way.”

“I’ll pass that on.”

“How long can he have the unmarked cars out there at night?”

“I’m not sure.” Linc stroked her hair and lifted a wayward lock away from her face. Then he put his hand back at his side. Kenzie smiled at him. “Mike will do his best. Just like all of us.”