Devoted in Death (In Death #41)(76)

“Mad, didn’t I tell you that was bound to happen? How many times did I tell you we should take a limo to the airport?”

“All right, Elsie, all right.”

“I’m sorry, sir, but I’d like to know when you parked your vehicle.”

“January four, at eight a.m.”

“Thank you, you’ve been very helpful. Someone will contact you with more details.”

“Do we need to come back?”

“No, there’s no need to interrupt your vacation. Thank you.”

She clicked off as the female voice began to rag on Hornesby again.

“We got the vehicle. Peabody, APB – now. If sighted, do not approach. Contact me, do not approach, follow only at a distance.”

She pushed up. “How come the Bahamas gets to have the same time we do? It doesn’t seem right.”

And setting that puzzle aside, she went for another hit of coffee.

Things were breaking.

16

Eve started a deeper run on the nephew while Peabody confirmed the all-points on the stolen van.

“Banner, Hanks has a nephew, Hanks, Curtis Monroe, age twenty-eight, rancher. Sending his contact to your PPC now. Play the good-old boy again. Confirm his whereabouts, get a feel for him. He doesn’t play for me, but let’s nail him down.”

“Got it. What’s he drive?”

“Drive?”

“Say we had a hit-and-run in Silby’s Pond, and his vehicle matches the description.”

“Okay, I got that. It’s a… ’56 Toro pickup, forest-green exterior, OK plate 572 Echo-Papa-Alpha. Second vehicle, motorcycle, ’60 Hawker Midnight Rider, color gunmetal, personalized OK plate: BOOM. That’s Beta, Omega —”

“Got it. I’ll go with the cycle.”

When he walked out, Eve rose to update her board. “Peabody, write up where we are – all the details – send an update to Whitney, Mira, Carmichael and Santiago. Fold in Baxter and Trueheart, too. If they’re clear, I want them starting on Banner’s list of shops and restaurants.”

“Trueheart’s got the exam today. He’d be starting in about an hour.”

“Right.” Shit. Shit, f*ck, damn. “Right. Okay, fold in Baxter. He and Banner can work the sector together with the best image McNab can pull out of the vid feed. Let Baxter know we’ll be at Central with Banner within the hour.”

She studied the board as she added data, shifted data.

Hanks = truck dumped by unsubs at Jansen kill site.

That took the unsubs back to Oklahoma. And damn it, it connected them, somehow, with Hanks. Why didn’t he report a theft, if there had been one? More likely he sold, under the table, or lent the truck.

Selling more likely as who lends a truck to anybody for months?

But the damn thing was still registered in his name. Wouldn’t he have fixed that for a sale?

She studied the nephew’s photo again. Just didn’t feel right. But if there was a nephew, there might be cousins, uncles, aunts, whatever. Good buddies, or just someone he owed a major solid to.

Younger, she thought as she circled the board. Not a contemporary. Someone young enough to be his son or daughter.

Girlfriend? Maybe he went for the young ones, and she’d sexed him into giving her the truck. Or maybe he had a girlfriend with a son or daughter who —

“Nephew Hanks is on the ranch,” Banner announced. “Seemed like a nice guy, and upstanding come to that. Got upset about the hit-and-run, wanted to know if anybody was hurt. Cooperated straight down. I gave him the night Campbell was snatched, and he says he had a poker party that night, went till about one in the morning. Gave me a dozen names to verify, and said I could come on out and test his cycle.”

“Cross him off. We’re not going to move much there until my people grill Hanks.” Not move there, she thought, but time to move in other directions. “Wrap it up, Peabody. We’re heading downtown. Banner, I’m going to hook you up with Detective Baxter. You can start canvassing those shops and restaurants on your list with the best image we have of the male unsub. You add in the couple, the age range profiled, the accent. Maybe we hit. When we get their names, faces – and we damn well will – we’ll send them to you.”

“Ready when you are, Lieutenant.”

“Meet you downstairs. I’m going to go by the comp lab first.”

She found her three favorite geeks in a huddle, with one screen running face recognition, another working on enhancing the loading-dock feed.

Roarke turned to her first. “The feed’s complete rubbish. We can push at it for hours, but we’re just not going to do much better. You can’t enhance what isn’t there.”

“I’ll take what you’ve got. McNab, send it to Banner, to Baxter. Might as well make the sweep and send it to all parties. Hanks is the link, and we’ll pull the data out of him one way or the other. I’m going in.”

“You want my take?” Feeney asked her.

“Yeah, I do.”

“Your guy here?” He gestured to the screen and the grainy shadow of an image. “He hasn’t seen thirty yet, or if he has, he’s barely had a glimpse. We figure he’s about six feet, maybe six-one, lean with it. Coat adds some bulk, but not much. He wanted to be able to move fast. He’s white. Low probability on mixed race from what we can figure.”