Gated Prey (Eve Ronin #3)(29)

Duncan continued: “Colter is the assailant who led Eve on a merry chase and was shot by the security guard at the Commons. He grew up in Sherman Oaks and somehow his parents finagled him into Reseda High School, which is on the other side of the 405 from where they live.”

Eve went to Reseda High School, too, and just realized that she and Colter were students there at the same time. They might have passed each other in the hall a hundred times, never knowing that their paths would cross again on his last day alive.

“Colter barely graduated and has had a string of odd jobs ever since,” Duncan went on. “Waiting tables, phone sales, clerking at a shoe store, that kind of thing. He lived with his parents and, when he wasn’t robbing homes or watching porn, was driving for Uber and Lyft.”

Shaw dabbed at his lips with a napkin. “Have you found out how they all met or what brought them together to form this crew?”

“Nope,” Duncan said. “The lack of cooperation from their families isn’t helping, either.”

“I can’t really blame them for refusing to help us prove their sons were criminals,” Shaw said.

“They are probably busy with their lawyers trying to prove we are responsible for their sons’ deaths,” Duncan said.

“Did you get anything from their burner phones?”

“Another dead end,” Eve said. “CSU says they were just activated and no calls were made.”

“How about their guns?” Shaw asked.

Eve said, “CSU says the serial numbers were removed and they haven’t been able to raise them. The lab also test fired the weapons, ran the expelled bullets through the national ballistic database, and got no hits.”

“Okay,” Shaw said. “Did anything come up in the canvass of Vista Grande after it was locked down?”

“Nope,” Duncan said. “Deputies interviewed everyone in the community. The residents didn’t see anything unusual. Same goes for the guests, most of whom are regulars, like maids, gardeners, pool men, et cetera, who come and go every week. The rest were contractors, electricians, plumbers, painters, or delivery and utilities, like the telephone company, the electric company, United Parcel Service, Spectrum Cable, FedEx, Lightning Delivery, Sparkletts Water, and Amazon.”

Shaw frowned, his frustration beginning to show. “What about video from home security cameras? Did they catch anything?”

Eve answered. “No, sir. The majority of home security cameras in the community are motion activated. So, naturally, none of the cameras are pointed at the street or they’d be recording constantly. I didn’t get anything from them so far, but I’m still slogging through the footage, hoping to see one of the guys climbing over a backyard fence so at least we’d know how they got inside.”

“Tell me about the front gates and how the security system works,” Shaw said.

Eve did, and finished by detailing how guest passes were issued and controlled.

“Homeowners can put anybody they want on their permanent guest list and can order individual day passes by using an app or calling the guard at the front gate,” Eve said. “Either way, the guard keeps a log of every pass issued. On top of that, the license plates of every vehicle that enters the community, resident or guest, are automatically photographed by a camera and logged. I’ve checked the logs and videos. Every nonresident who came in through the Vista Grande gate yesterday also left the same way.”

Shaw thought about that for a moment. “So we don’t know how the three men got into the community or how they planned to get away.”

“That’s right,” Eve said. Not knowing that frustrated her. She was sure the answer to those questions was the key to truly solving the case.

“Have you compared the list of visitors at Vista Grande yesterday to the lists at the other gated communities on the days when they had home invasions?”

“I haven’t had a chance to do that yet, but we did it among the other communities that were hit and there was a lot of overlap. I’m sure there will be with Vista Grande, too.”

“It’s not surprising, sir,” Duncan added. “The same gardeners, pool men, delivery trucks, et cetera, serve all the adjacent communities along Parkway Calabasas. It didn’t really narrow the suspect pool down for us.”

“That’s why we did the sting house,” Eve said.

Shaw looked at Eve. “That was your idea?”

Duncan raised his hand. “It was mine. My grandfather always said, ‘You can’t catch fish with your line in the boat.’ So we put out a line.”

“He was a wise man.” Shaw got up and paced in front of the whiteboard, looking at the photos of the three men. “Where are you with warrants to track their phones?”

“The judge granted them,” Duncan said. “I emailed the warrants to the cellular providers, and now I’m just waiting for them to comply. I know the people over there and they know me. They’re usually pretty fast. We’ll get the information today.”

There was a long moment of silence as everyone digested the information and their pizza. Eve assumed they were all coming to the same conclusion—that they’d eaten too much and knew no more today about the home invasions than they did yesterday. Sherry Simms was the one person who might be able to tell them more, but she was in the wind. They hadn’t heard from her neighbor or the LAPD, which was sending patrol cars past her home on a regular basis to check for activity. Eve thought finding her should be their next move.