FADE TO BLACK - Thrilling Romantic Suspense - Book 1 of the BLACK CATS Series (36 page)

“I’ve been watching the tapes and I found something. Please just come.”

“God, what else?” she asked as she got in the car and drove. Had it really been just seven or eight hours since she’d left his place and come straight here, convinced she was about to find Winnie dead on her own floor?

Life. It was so precarious. So damned unpredictable. In big cities, big colleges, and here.

She shoved that realization away to deal with later.

When she arrived at her father’s house, she saw him waiting for her on the porch. He’d stepped out as soon as she’d pulled up, obviously having watched for her.

“Saw your headlights coming up the drive,” he called.

Stacey got out, tilting her head from side to side to stretch her aching neck. It was only after she’d reached the front steps and walked into the pool of light thrown off by the fixture by the door that she realized she had Stan’s blood on her uniform. Her father looked at it, blanched a little, then beckoned her in.

“What is it?”

He led her into the kitchen. The laptop still sat there. Beside it was a half-eaten plate of spaghetti. Next to that, a nearly empty glass of whiskey.

Dad very rarely drank. And never alone. Fear making her voice rise, she asked again, “What is going on?”

He didn’t say anything. Instead, he sat down, turned the computer so the screen faced her, and clicked the play button on the video player. “Watch.”

She watched. The scene was like many others she’d witnessed in the hours of surveillance footage. A steady stream of people made their way through the mall, a woman stopping for a hot pretzel in the lower corner of the frame, a couple peering into the window of a jewelry shop on the top.

Then he came into view.

“Oh, my God.”

“You see.”

She saw.

“It doesn’t mean anything. Just that he was there. You can’t think he …”

No. She didn’t. She couldn’t even begin to fathom that he’d had anything to do with the kidnapping and murder of that teenage salesclerk.

But her brother was on that tape. He had been in that mall, a few doors down from the store where the victim worked, only days before the last murder.

“Have you called him?”

Her father shook his head, though the agony in his eyes revealed just how much that had cost him. He loved his son. It must have taken every bit of willpower he had to remain the lawman and not the father.

“I need to call Dean.”

“No!”

“Dad, look, neither of us believes for one minute that Tim had anything to do with this. And I am sure we can prove it. There’s a lot you don’t know about the case. A whole lot. One short search of his apartment and they’ll see that he doesn’t even own a computer.” She hesitated. “Right?”

He shook his head. “Not while he lived here, and not as of the last time I visited him at his place a few weeks ago.” More proof that would help her brother. Because whoever the Reaper was, he had a whole lot of Internet knowledge and the time and equipment to use it. Her brother didn’t fit that description.

“What’s a computer got to do with anything?” her father asked.

“It doesn’t matter. The point is, he’s not techno-savvy. He’s not the man they’re looking for. But his being at that mall might mean something, and the FBI needs to know about it. Maybe someone sent him there.” She swallowed. “A friend. Maybe someone told him about this girl and asked him to look in on her. It could be just about anything, but we have to find out.”

Her father’s eyes filled. She’d only ever seen him really cry twice, once when telling Stacey how much she looked like her late mother, then when they’d first visited Tim at the vet hospital after he’d been shipped back from Afghanistan. Now he was crying again. “Please. Just wait. Give your brother a day to figure out what this means before you bring in the FBI.”

“You don’t understand,” she said as gently as she could, her own heart breaking as she realized what she had to do. “There’s a little boy’s life at stake. A child is going to die this weekend if this perpetrator isn’t found.”

He fell back into his chair, his gnarled hands rising to his face, wiping away his tears. “All right.”

Stacey took his hand in hers carefully, lovingly. “He didn’t do this. I have no doubt about it. Which makes it a lot easier for me to pick up that phone and call someone who is a very good agent. And a very good, decent man.”

Dad looked up, hope in his expression. “You trust him?”

She nodded. “I do. Completely.”

Maybe that was nuts, but it was true. She hadn’t known Dean long, but she had already opened herself up to him more than she’d ever opened up to another person in her life. She hadn’t regretted it for one moment.

“I’m going to make the call. Then you and I are going to back up and watch every second of every camera angle in that mall. There’s more to find. Now let’s try to find it.”

With Stacey unavailable,
Dean had hooked back up with Stokes and Mulrooney, who’d been unable to reach Randy Covey. The late afternoon and evening had proved frustratingly futile. They had gone down the list of registered trucks, cross-referencing it with men who’d been at the club, any who had a violent history, any who’d known Lisa.

The list had still been too damned long.

Despite knowing Stacey didn’t want them to, they tried to see Warren Lee. They’d pulled up to the gate at the end of his long driveway and had been greeted by the man’s voice through a call box. He’d refused to let them enter. He’d refused to come out. They could do nothing more without a warrant, unless Stacey could talk the man into town, as she’d suggested.

By the end of the day, the frustration was wearing on all of them. He, Stokes, and Mulrooney shared that frustration equally and didn’t take it out on one another. There were no egos here; he saw no competition, like he’d sometimes experienced in other agencies. They were completely united in their desire to save some unknown child’s life.

Maybe they really were becoming a tight-knit team—something he hadn’t been sure would happen when he’d first met his new coworkers a month and a half ago and had realized just how different they all were.

Even the CATs who weren’t in town remained active in the investigation. Wyatt had been in constant contact. Lily had apparently discovered something about the way the money was moved and felt sure she’d have new information when the banks opened in the morning.

Unfortunately, they didn’t even know that they had until morning.

There was one more interesting development involving Stacey’s brother’s friend, Mr. Covey. Not hard evidence, but something to keep in mind. Dean was anxious to share it with her. So when he got her call asking him to come alone to her father’s house right away, he wasted no time.

She answered the door immediately. “We’ve got something.”

Her voice sounded different. On the phone twenty minutes ago, she’d sounded exhausted, resigned even. Now, despite the paleness of her face and the circles under her eyes, she looked energetic. Keyed up. Like whatever she had, it was big.

“Come in here.” She dashed down the short hallway into her father’s kitchen, beckoning him to the laptop. Mr. Rhodes stood by the counter, nodding in welcome but saying nothing.

“You’ve spotted someone on the surveillance video?”

“It’s my brother,” Stacey explained.

She said it so matter-of-factly, he didn’t really have time to process it at first. When the words did hit his brain and sink in, he felt an explosion of emotion. Elation that they might have found their unsub. Desolation at what this could mean for Stacey.

Stacey was clicking the keyboard. “See? There he is. He was in the mall, but he wasn’t stalking her.”

“Stacey, I know he’s your brother …”

She threw a hand up, stopping him from speaking. “No, listen, please. Tim told me something a few days ago that explains this.” She clicked a window on the surveillance video, splitting the screen to show two camera views. “We’d been looking at the interior, the closest entrance, and the parking lot. We weren’t looking behind the store.” She tapped the tip of her finger on one side of the screen. “Watch!”

He watched. A semi truck was backed up to a loading ramp, two young men wheeling big, TV-size boxes up it. While they made their second trip, a man rounded the cab from the passenger side.

It was Tim, the brother of the woman he’d come to care so much about. “I see.”

“Shh.”

Tim, easily identifiable because of his scars, walked to the driver’s-side door and waited for the driver to hop down.

That driver was Randy Covey.

“Tim told me he’d been doing a couple of ride-alongs with Randy lately. That’s why he was in that mall. He was just a passenger with no say in the destination.”

She cued the video ahead a minute, fast-forwarding through the two men having a brief conversation, then Randy pointing toward the mall entrance. Tim went in, appearing a few moments later on the other side of the screen: the interior camera. Wandering to the food court, he ordered something from a fast-food shop. He appeared completely oblivious to everything except grabbing some takeout.

Dean focused on the other half of the screen.

While Tim conducted the errand Randy had sent him on, his good buddy watched the workers finish unloading. When they were done, he shoved a clipboard over to be signed, then waved at them as they disappeared inside. Once the rolling door was closed, he quietly stalked the rear parking lot, peeking into Dumpsters, easing closer to the back employees-only entrances of the stores closest to his rig.

She zoomed in until one sign was legible.

“That’s the store where the vic worked,” Dean snapped.

“I know.”

He reached for his phone, wanting Covey picked up now, but she put a hand on his arm. “One more second.”

Covey knocked on a door. A young guy opened it. He and Randy exchanged a few words, both looking around furtively. Cash exchanged hands. Then Covey beckoned the man over to the still-unlocked truck. Pulling a large box from it, he shoved it at the younger man, who dashed toward his store. A minute later, Tim walked out carrying a large fast-food bag. The two of them got into the truck and drove away.

The story the video told was perfectly clear. Randy Covey was stealing from his employer. Skimming off the top, selling electronics to some punk kid looking to pick up a stereo on the cheap. The kid had looked very familiar with the process; it hadn’t been the first time.

“You saw, right? Tim was clueless about any of this. At least, as of then. I’m wondering if Randy tried to drag him into it, and that’s what bothered him enough to come to my door the other night.”

“Could be. And it adds one more piece to the puzzle. Randy could have been doing his side business and staking out his future victims at the same time. Amber might even have bought something off him before she died.” It all made sense, especially with what he’d learned today. “Stokes and Mulrooney were able to get a look at the driving logs Covey has turned over to his employers,” he told her. “He was on overnight runs on many of the nights the murders occurred, including the last one.”

“I still can’t believe it,” Stacey admitted, “but everything you said the other night about the perpetrator, and what we’ve learned since, points to him as the Reaper. His background, his job, his history of abandonment, and his mommy issues. He delivers electronics, for heaven’s sake. How hard would it be for him to swipe the latest computer or video equipment for his own use?”

From the other side of the kitchen, he heard Mr. Rhodes sigh deeply. “I’ve known him since he was a boy. He’s not violent, sure isn’t a genius. I never imagined him doing something like this.”

Dean rubbed his jaw, feeling the rough stubble. It seemed like an eternity had passed since he’d shaved at his apartment this morning. Thank God this would be over soon.

Unable to take his eyes off the paused surveillance footage, Dean suddenly wondered about something. “He knew about the cameras,” he murmured.

“What?”

“He obviously knew there was a camera positioned to cover that loading dock area and the back door of the store. It was shot out the night Amber was taken.”

She followed. “So why would he conduct his side business in view of it?”

Good question. It made no sense.

Maybe Randy hadn’t thought anybody would pay attention to him poking around near the Dumpsters, especially if no crime had been reported. But anybody would know the video would be examined after the last murder.

It was the only reason he could think of for Randy’s initial carelessness. He still wasn’t one hundred percent convinced, but it was at least possible. They’d know a lot more when they brought the man in for questioning.

“His house is only two miles away,” Stacey said.

Dean reached for his phone again. “I want backup.” He punched in Mulrooney’s number, gave him the information and Covey’s address, and told him to bring Stokes and meet them there in fifteen minutes.

Stacey, meanwhile, had made a call of her own. “Mitch and two other deputies who will keep their heads will be en route shortly.”

Good. If Randy Covey really was the Reaper, and he realized they were onto him, he could turn ruthlessly violent. With nothing left to lose, he’d have no reason not to.

A few minutes passed, and they both checked their weapons to make sure they were loaded. The tension in the Rhodes house was thick enough to swim in, but Stacey was about as calm and cool as he’d ever seen her. As if now that the end of the nightmare was in sight, she could stop worrying and just take care of business.

Finally, when it was time, they left the house and, by silent agreement, got into Stacey’s squad car. They reached the main road and began to pull out onto it when Stacey’s ancient, wheezing old radio came to life.

“Sheriff, if you’re there, please respond. Over.”

They exchanged a glance. “Mitch,” she explained before answering.

Mitch said only a few words. But they were disappointing ones. “Randy Covey’s not at his house. Over.”

She barked a quick response. “Where is he?”

“Somebody called in a few minutes ago. A neighbor of Randy’s saw a story on the news and wanted to see if we knew anything about it. I just got off the phone with the state police and they confirmed. Randy was involved in a serious wreck just before dawn somewhere down near Richmond. Over.”