Catch Me

Detective D. D. Warren had framed certificates on the wall. Apparently she had a degree in criminal justice and lots of advanced training in various firearms and forensic courses. The frames were slightly askew, so I straightened them up. They were dusty as well, so I took a napkin and polished them up.

What I needed was Windex to polish the glass. Without thinking, I turned to ask, and found two sets of eyes staring at me. The detectives’ gazes went from the straightened frames to me to the straightened frames again.

“Neat freak much?” Detective Warren drawled.

“Only when I’m nervous.”

“How often are you nervous?”

“Every day of the past year.”

The detectives exchanged glances.

“You went to a public school?” Detective Warren prodded.

“Yes.”

“Who has neater handwriting? You, Jackie, or Randi?”

“I don’t know. Randi had a thing for drawing little hearts over her i’s. Does that count?”

“What about print?”

“Me probably.” I shrugged. “But only because Randi preferred cursive, and Jackie had terrible handwriting, all cramped and rushed. It didn’t do any good to pass notes with her in class-we could never read what she wrote.”

“Wrote like a doctor,” D.D. said amiably.

“Exactly.”

“Do you listen to the police scanner when you’re off duty?” she asked abruptly.

The change in topic confused me. “What? Sometimes. Why?”

“Just thinking, in your line of work, you must like to keep your finger on the pulse of the city. And the things you must hear, the things you must know, being police dispatch and all.”

“You’re dispatch?” Detective O spoke up, finally sounding impressed. She looked me up and down, as if reassessing. “Tough job. I got a friend who does it. Kids are the toughest calls, she says. So much shit going on out there, and so little you can do to help them.”

“True.”

“Does it make you mad?” she continued conversationally. “Because I’m a sex crimes detective and it makes me furious. I mean, the number of perverts out there, and the things they can get away with, and there’s nothing we can do about it. Most kids are too terrified to come forward, and even if they do, system puts them through the wringer. You must hate that. Taking those calls while already knowing that even if the officer shows up and an arrest is made, it’s still gonna end badly for the kid. Just the way it is.”

“It’s best not to get personally involved,” I said. I had stepped away from both of them. I wondered if they had noticed; figured they had. I found it interesting that while their bad cop routine had rattled me, the good cop routine had me genuinely fearful and ready to exit stage left.

“Look,” D.D. said briskly, waving her hand toward the computer monitor and their pile of notes. “This is a lot of information we’re plowing through in a short time. Why don’t you write down any other names we should consider, no matter how inconsequential, then you can head out. We’ll be in touch if we have any more questions.”

She handed me a sheet of paper, a pen. Then she picked up a stack of files, clearing a space on top of a gunmetal gray filing cabinet for me to use. “There you go. And while you’re at it, write down the full names of your parents and your aunt.”

“Why my parents?”

“Basic background.”

“My mother’s dead. My father’s not part of my life. Don’t think it’s relevant.”

The good detective wasn’t going to let me off that easy. “Didn’t you come to me for help?”

I looked at her.

“You were standing outside my crime scene,” she continued, and this time there was an edge of challenge in her voice. “You said you were there because you Googled me. Though, now that I think about it, you never approached me. You were walking away. I ran you down.”

“I wasn’t going to approach you.”

“But you said-”

“I just wanted to see you. I wasn’t, I didn’t,” I waved my hand around her office defensively. “I never expected any of this. You’re my precaution built into a precaution. I figured I’d write you a letter, provide details on my own case. That way, if I didn’t get it done on the twenty-first, you’d have a better shot at finally catching the guy on the twenty-second. You’d provide justice for my aunt, closure for Randi and Jackie’s families. I wasn’t researching you for me. I was studying you for them.”

D.D. narrowed her eyes. “Two of your friends have been murdered,” she stated bluntly. “You believe you will be the third.”

“Yes.”

“So you’ve left behind your home, the people who know you. You’re hiding out in the big city, no registered phone or utilities. You have no computer, no e-mail, no Internet footprint to trace. But you’ve kept your name.”

I had my chin up. “Can’t change everything.”

“You’re training, boxing, running, shooting. Preparing to make your last stand. But you’re going to send the dog away.”

“Yes.”

“And maybe you looked me up, but it was never with the mind-set of asking for help before the twenty-first. Not to mention, you’re a woman with a target on your back who hasn’t asked her own officers for assistance.”

I didn’t say anything, just returned her steely blue stare.

“Can’t figure you out, Charlene,” she drawled at last. “You trying to live January twenty-one? Or are you trying to die?”

“I don’t want to die.”

“But do you want to live?”

I remained silent. D.D.’s gaze dropped to my scarred hand, and in those fine white lines, I figured she read the answer.

Earlier today, Tess had said that adults could change, that children grew up. But some things in life were very hard to transform. For example, taking the little girl who’d once stood there passively while her mother ironed her fingertips and training her how to throw a punch. Or taking the same little girl, who’d willfully chewed and swallowed a shattered lightbulb, and teaching her how to pull the trigger.

I was trying to move forward. Some days were certainly better than others. But in the end, I’d only had 363 days as a fighter. I’d experienced far more as the victim, the child who did whatever her mother wanted her to do, because that was the price of love, and that little girl had lived too little and loved too hard and lost too much.

“Names please,” Detective Warren said, and gestured to the blank piece of paper.

I took my time, mostly because my hands were shaking. I formed each letter carefully, wanting the result to be neat and legible. I wrote two names, following an instinct I couldn’t explain, but that felt right.

I took one last moment, to study my carefully printed letters.

Then, I handed over the piece of paper.

I collected my dog.

I collected my gun.

Three P.M. Thursday afternoon. Fifty-three hours and counting.

Tulip and I headed out into the city’s stark, snow-frosted landscape.

Chapter 22

DETECTIVE O WAITED until Charlene had exited the homicide unit, then she returned to D.D.’s office, closed