The Darkness of Evil (Karen Vail #7)(78)

“We can do it later,” Vail said. “It’s not urgent.”

Hurdle chewed on his lip. “Nah, let’s do it now while we’ve got everyone here. Double time it.”

“Be back in thirty seconds.”

VAIL STEPPED OUTSIDE and jogged over to her car, which was two rows away in the Mason District Station parking lot, pulling out the key fob as she approached.

She opened the back door, retrieved the file, and chirped the remote. As she turned back toward the command post, her eye caught sight of the ’64 Buick parked just ahead of her, about twenty yards away.

That’s the second time I’ve seen that car.

She tucked the folder beneath her arm and advanced on the sedan, which had been backed into a row of spots that fronted a stand of trees.

Has the driver been following me? An undercover? For what reason?

As she wondered if it was in any way related to the covert work she had done for the Pentagon—something she would not dismiss out of hand—she got a better view of the vehicle and could see that it was vacant.

Vail noted the plate and pulled out her phone to ask for a registration check.

She peeked in through the window, cupping her face against the glass to cut the glare, when something sharp and hard struck her in the back of the head, slamming her cheek into the doorframe.

Vail tried to turn toward her attacker but he kept her face and body pinned tightly against the car. She tried to grab her Glock but could not get her hand up to the holster. She writhed and twisted, trying to dislodge the man’s grip on her.

C’mon, Karen! Fight!

The car keys and file folder hit the ground and her handcuffs slipped off her belt as she again tried to wriggle out of his grasp—

Until he grabbed her hair and slammed her face one last time into the car window.





39


She’s not answering.” Hurdle lowered the phone from his ear and checked his watch. “This is the longest thirty seconds I’ve ever lived through. Curtis, do me a favor and go see what’s keeping her. Otherwise we’ll just do it tonight. Or tomorrow.”

“On it.” Curtis pushed open the command center door and walked down the two steps to the asphalt pavement, then glanced around. Vail was not in sight. He went over to where they parked, circled her car, looked in the backseat and did not see the folder.

“So she already got it.” He swung his gaze left and right. “Then where the hell did she go?”

He pulled out his cell and called her. It rang three times and—he stopped and looked to his right. Listened. Thought he heard something, but it stopped. The call went to voice mail.

He tried her number again, moving in the direction of what he thought sounded like a ringing phone. Straight ahead and a bit to the left. It was very faint, which made sense: Vail kept her volume turned down most of the time.

Again, voice mail clicked on.

He hit “redial” and started walking faster. About ten yards away he saw Vail’s Samsung lying on the ground alongside a set of handcuffs, a manila folder, and a stack of stapled papers riffling in the breeze.

He knelt down and looked it over, then swiveled on his heels and checked for blood or other signs of a struggle. But there was nothing.

Curtis dialed Hurdle and swung his head in all directions while he waited for the call to connect.

Hurdle answered on the third ring. “Look, I’ve gotta get going. Just forg—”

“You’re not going anywhere. Get everyone outside. We got a big f*cking problem.”





40


The team huddled in the area where Curtis found Vail’s phone. Curtis’s cell was pressed to his ear as he requested that Crime Scene be immediately dispatched to their location. The only good news was that the forensic technicians were not far off. While there was a local unit in the Police Department’s Mason District station, they did not handle complex violent crime–related cases. However, they would only need twenty minutes to make the drive from the Massey Building headquarters—adjacent to the records room where Vail and Curtis retrieved the PD-42 regarding the Marcks’s teen shooting.

“This is exactly how I found it,” Curtis said as he snapped some pictures with his iPhone. “That folder there is the one she came out for.”

Hurdle put both hands on his hips. “So she got it from her car, which is what, about twenty, twenty-five yards away?”

Tarkoff, who was walking along the stand of trees, stopped suddenly. “If she had the folder, why wouldn’t she just come right back to the RV? She knew you didn’t have a lot of time.”

“She saw something that intrigued her,” Hurdle said. “Or someone called her over and she thought it was important enough to stop. Maybe somebody in distress?”

“Or pretending to be in distress.” Curtis turned in place and looked at the large brown, sand, and turquoise single-story building behind him. “The police department has cameras. Wait here for Crime Scene, I’m gonna go grab a look.”

“I’m with you,” Hurdle said.

They jogged into the station’s lobby and up to the large bulletproof glass-enclosed half-moon front desk where two PCAs, or Police Citizens Assistants, were seated.

“Richie’s here,” Curtis said to Hurdle as they approached. “He’s a cop, on light duty after blowing out his ankle.” Curtis stepped up to the speaker by the pass-through slot. “Yo, Richie!”