3:10 PM
As Eloise Han pulled into Ashley's driveway, Sanger noticed several residents milling about at the edge of the street, looking confused and worried as officers swarmed around their homes. He stepped out of the car, and one of the patrol sergeants, Doug Rudisill, jogged across the lawn, wearing civilian clothes.
"What are you doing here, Doug?" he questioned. "I thought you were supposed to be on vacation."
"Yeah, I am. But Tad knew I was gonna be at my in-laws today, and they only live a couple of blocks from here, so he called and asked me to do a pass in my personal car to see if I could spot anybody. I drove around the block, and then pulled into the driveway next door. I called Tad and let him know I hadn't seen anything, and I stayed here in my car to watch the door while they got into position, since I don't have my gear."
"Where's Tad right now, do you know?"
Rudisill gestured past Sanger's shoulder, and he and Han turned to see Tad Baldwin approaching them, and the frustrated expression he wore told them that they most likely didn't want to hear what he was going to say. "We missed the bastard, dammit!" he growled, confirming their suspicions. "Some way or another he managed to sneak out right under our damn noses! Forensics just got started inside, but I can tell you that the security system was disabled, and the sliding door to the back deck was standing wide open when we made entry."
He turned back toward the house, and the two detectives fell in behind him. As they neared the porch, they observed one of the forensic technicians, who was crouching by the front door, wave to a uniformed officer holding a camera. Quickening his pace, Sanger approached them, inquiring, "What have we got here?"
The tech shone her flashlight on the doorknob and pointed, saying, "Toolmarks on the lock, but very small, I almost missed them. This guy is good with a pick."
Stepping around the tech, Sanger and Han walked into the house. There were several officers milling around, snapping pictures, searching closets, and dusting nearly every available surface with fingerprint powder. The two detectives walked through the residence, inspecting each room and quizzing the patrol officers and technicians about their finds, which resulted in frustration, since, as usual, their quarry was careful not to leave evidence. They eventually returned to the living room and walked out through the sliding doors onto the deck. As they stepped outside, Doug Rudisill rounded the corner, spotted them, and raced up the stairs from the backyard.
"We found out how he got away!" he announced. "Cominski found a loose board on the fence over there, and we went around to check the next yard. And fortunately, the homeowner is having some work done on his pipes, so we've got footprints in the loose dirt. I'm gonna go grab a tech to see if they can do a cast." He dashed inside, while Sanger leapt down the stairs and jogged toward the fence, with Eloise Han close behind.
They made their way around to the next yard, finding a cluster of officers in the back of the home, one of them snapping a series of photos while another wound crime-scene tape around a number of small wooden stakes which had been planted in the dirt. Moving closer, they were able to see the clear outline of an athletic shoe in a mound of freshly-dug earth near the fence separating this house from the next. Barely a minute after their arrival, a member of the forensics team trotted through the grass and loose dirt, carrying a small case in one hand.
"I don't know how much help this is gonna be," Sanger grunted. "Everybody and their fourth cousin wears athletic shoes around here, when they're not running up the beach barefoot, so it's not exactly a distinguishing feature. Too bad the sonofabitch couldn't find it in his pustulent little heart to leave us something like a fingerprint, or some DNA."
"You're making the assumption that he actually has one, pustulent or otherwise," Han retorted, as they watched the technician mix the plaster and carefully pour it into the print. "And this may not be the case-breaker, but anything we get can be helpful, you know that. At the very least, it can help with eliminations when we finally get a suspect, if they're not the right size, or don't have the same incidental characteristics."
"Yeah, I know you're right, El," he sighed. "But I just wish we could come up with something to get this prick off the street. Because he's not just sticking to his preferred victims anymore, which was bad enough, he's basically killing indiscriminately. Which makes him an inherent danger to anybody , if he thinks they might be getting in his way. And because I'm not looking forward to what I have to do when I get back to the office."
She merely nodded at his words, and Sanger stepped away to speak to Sergeant Baldwin, insisting that any evidence found go immediately to the forensics lab, and that he be given a full report as soon as possible. Once this was done, the two detectives returned to the car, and as Eloise Han backed out of the drive, Sanger pulled out his phone and dialed a number. When the call was answered, she heard him say, "Hello, sir, it's Sanger. The bastard gave us the slip, so I'm afraid we're going to have to do what we discussed before Thanksgiving." After a brief pause, he stated, apparently in reply to a question, "Yes, I'm on my way back to headquarters now to make the arrangements. It'll be done before the end of the day. We're out of options now."
***************************************************************
4:05 PM
As Briar stepped out of the small conference room, followed by Detective LaMarr Pike, she encountered Ashley exiting the door directly across the hall, accompanied by a thin, hawk-nosed blond man, who introduced himself as Detective Soderstrom. As he blew a lock of hair out of his face, Ashley turned to Briar and said, "Don't take this the wrong way, but you look about as wiped as I feel."
"Ditto," she replied. "I'm just ready to get somebody to take us back to my car, or drop us off at home if they're not done fooling with it."
They heard Sanger's voice from the end of the hall, announcing, "Sorry, kids, but we can't do that just yet. Actually, we have some things we need to discuss before you leave."
"Did you catch the fucker?" Ashley demanded.
"I prefer not to discuss details where anyone who is not privy to the investigation might overhear," another voice interjected, and they looked around to see the police chief standing behind Sanger. "So why don't we take this conversation to my office?"
They fell in behind the two men, walking to the elevator and stepping inside. As Briar slumped against the wall, Chief MacDevitt eyed her sympathetically and said, "As soon as we get to my office, I'll have my receptionist send out to get you both something to drink, and some food, if you like."
"Do you really think it's going to take that long?" Ashley inquired.
"Quite probably, yes," Sanger responded, drawing a deep sigh from Briar.
"Whatever they've got to say, I'm already pretty damn sure we're not gonna like it," she muttered.
They exited the elevator into the waiting room of MacDevitt's office, where they made their selections from the menu of a nearby sub shop, and the receptionist called in the order as they were ushered into the office.
Once everyone was seated, Ashley turned his head to level a stare at Sanger. "So...?"
"He took off before officers actually reached your house," the detective regretfully replied. "Something apparently spooked him, and he booked through a loose board in your fence."
"Fuck!" Ashley growled. "But how did he get inside in the first place?! I got the best security system I could find, and I don't leave keys laying around, so what's the deal?"
"Your security system was disabled," Sanger informed him, earning a startled look. "He did the same thing at Lena's, so I was half expecting to find that. And he made entry by picking the lock on your front door. So he's either very confident in his ability to avoid notice, or desperate enough to risk it."
The detective then proceeded to walk them through the details of what they had found, with a brief interruption caused by the arrival of their meals. Once he had finished, Briar swallowed a mouthful of her chicken carbonara sandwich and stated, "Okay then, let's see if I'm following you here. In a nutshell, you're sitting here telling us that this worthless piece of sewage can, for all intents and purposes, come after us any-fucking-where we go. Which means that the only way we might have a chance is if we invest in a Pope-mobile and keep a platoon of bodyguards with us twenty-four seven. In other words, not possible."
Ashley looked up from his turkey wrap and added, "Yeah, that's pretty much what I'm hearing, too."
"No, that's not precisely what Lieutenant Sanger is trying to say," MacDevitt replied. "Yes, the two of you are in a precarious situation, which I obviously don't need to tell you. But we do have at least a temporary solution, which I recommend that you strongly consider."
"Which is?" Ashley countered.
"Protective custody," Sanger responded. "We'll put the two of you in a safehouse while we continue to process the evidence that we have, and that will keep you out of his reach."
"For how long?" Briar quizzed the detective. "It's not like we can stay there forever, and I think we all know that Witness Protection is pretty much impossible, at least for Ashley. He's too recognizable to be able to just change his name and expect nobody to notice."
"I understand that, but it's really the safest option right now," Sanger calmly replied. "If you just go back to your normal routines right now, I can't make any guarantees on your safety. If Mr. Duffy hadn't stumbled onto him tampering with the car, and if Ashley's friend hadn't seen that curtain move, you both more than likely would have been added to the list of victims today. Along with whoever else might have gotten caught in the blast when the car blew. Is it an ideal solution? No, but right now I think it's the best one."
Briar opened her mouth to speak, but before she could, Ashley said, "I don't particularly care for the idea myself, Tink, but he's right. At this point the murdering bastard has us all in a corner, and maybe this will at least buy them some time to find him without having to deplete their manpower following us around. I'm willing to try it at least for awhile, and if nothing happens in a couple of weeks or so, then we can decide where to go from there."
The three men gazed silently at Briar until she sighed, put down her sandwich, and said, "Okay, you win. What do we need to do?"
"First of all, finish your dinner," Chief MacDevitt rejoined. "After that, some of our officers will drive you to your homes, so you can collect some clothes and necessary personal items. They'll then bring you back here, you'll contact anyone who might raise an alarm if you simply drop out of sight, or who you need to take care of business or financial matters for you. You will not, however, tell them exactly where you're going. And when this is done, you'll leave your phones here with us, so they can't be tracked, and we will transport you to the safehouse."
Glancing at the remains of her sandwich, she ruefully said, "I can't speak for anybody else, but I'm not really hungry anymore. If you wanna get your officers together, I'd rather just get this over with."
At Ashley's nod of agreement, the commissioner picked up the phone, and mere minutes later two squad cars pulled away from the building, in opposite directions, with their unsettled passengers in the backseat, doing their best to mentally prepare themselves to let go of the everyday details of their lives and disappear.