Watcher in the Woods (Rockton #4)(113)

I look around, making sure we’re alone. “Did you tell anyone that you met Garcia when he arrived? That he took you captive?”

“No. Geez, Casey. How many times do I need to say it? I didn’t tell anyone. You asked me not to, and I wouldn’t have anyway. No one needed to know that.”

“Good,” I say. “Then I think it’s time to let them know.”

*

Diana and I are in line at the bakery. It’s just past one, still early for afternoon coffee, but with the longer days, everything shifts, and by now there’s a lineup, as I hoped.

“I need to know what he told you,” I say, keeping my voice artificially low, a harsh stage whisper that everyone nearby could hear.

“I told you, Case, Garcia never said anything.”

“Bullshit, you were alone with him for fifteen minutes. He talked to you. I know he did.”

“He told me to shut up and behave or he’d shoot me. If you call that a conversation then yes, we talked.”

“He was a U.S. Marshal. He wasn’t going to shoot you. When I got back with Eric, you were talking about who he came for. He gave you a hint. I know he did.”

“He didn’t—”

“He said to ask you. Those were his last words. I wanted to know who he came here for, and he said to ask my friend, the one he held hostage, the one with the pink hair.” I cast a pointed look at her fading pink tips. “Don’t tell me he meant someone else.”

“That was his final screw-you. With his dying breath, he tells you to speak to me . . . except he never told me anything. Ha-ha. Joke’s on you. He was an asshole. Trust me. I’m the one who had to sit with him for fifteen minutes as he held a gun to my head.”

I look around, as if making sure no one has heard us. Everyone glances away quickly, feigning sudden interest in their fingernails or the menu board or the lovely June sun overhead. My gaze crosses Paul, two people behind us. He’s with Anders, who I asked to drop in on Paul . . . and suggest they grab a coffee.

Anders smiles and shoots me a subtle thumb’s up. Diana and I step to the front of the line and place our order.

*

After that, I catch up with Dalton and then tell him my theory at the station. I’d rather have done that before I set my plan in motion, but it hasn’t proceeded far enough that I can’t stop if he points out some critical flaw in my reasoning.

“Paul?” he says, when I tell him who I suspect. “Yeah, he does have a Federal warrant, but we’re reasonably sure Garcia wasn’t here on official business.”

“I screwed up.”

Dalton sits on the edge of the desk. “Okay . . .”

“I mistakenly ID’d our Paul as the guy in those protest photos. Just yesterday, I was thinking that Sebastian didn’t need to worry about being recognized because he has a very average white boy face. So does Paul.”

Dalton’s brows rise. “Average white boy face?”

“They look like a million other white guys their age. No distinguishing features, just a very normal face, pleasant enough but nothing that stands out, nothing you’d notice or remember.”

“That doesn’t sound . . . flattering. Dare I ask if I have . . . ?”

“No,” I lean over and kiss his cheek. “Now, if your fragile ego can allow me to continue.”

“My ego is not—”

“Totally can be. And this is not the time for it. So Paul has a very average face. Very ordinary. He also has a beard, which he didn’t have in the photo. I’m guessing he had that beard when he arrived?”

Dalton thinks. “Maybe? Yeah, I have no idea.”

“Because he isn’t memorable, right? But I bet he did. It hides half his face, so when I looked at the photo online, it seemed to be him. Brown hair. Brown eyes. Same facial shape. It looked like Paul, and I didn’t study the photo closely, because I expected it to be Paul. I can’t say for absolute certain that it wasn’t, but I’m no longer sure it was.”

“Okay.”

“Then there’s the suicide attempt. Petra made a comment about that, in another context, how it wasn’t serious, just a cry for help. She’s right. He took enough to pass out, knowing we’d come looking for him because of his shift. Given how easily he recovered, he didn’t take enough to kill himself. I figured he just didn’t know the dose—no one does. But he had more pills there, scattered on the bed, as if he dropped them when he passed out. If you’re serious about killing yourself, you take all you have at once, before the sedative kicks in. Still, that only means he wasn’t serious. It happens.”

“Okay.”

“Then I ask Diana about Paul hitting on her, whether he’s hinted why he’s here. Turns out he’s bragged to her about having money, enough to suggest he’s one of our white collar criminals. Still, yes, he could be puffing himself up, trying to get her attention.”

He’s quiet for a moment. “None of it says ‘I killed Agent Garcia,’ but yeah, he makes a helluva good suspect.”

“Also, Paul had time and opportunity to shoot Garcia. After Phil pulled his gun on us with Wallace, Paul was the one who walked back home. He knew Phil had the gun, and he probably saw where he kept it. I can confirm that with Phil, but I don’t want to toss the council a suspect. He could easily have taken it while we were tracking Garcia. Then he offers to man the radio. He did offer—Will confirmed that. Paul offered to take the radio and to watch Roy.”