Jen looked at Will. He shrugged, indicating the decision was hers. She looked at Sue Carpenter, debating how much to tell her.
“May I sit down?” she said.
She told Sue everything, starting with her theory about how the killer picked his victims and ending with the figure in the bushes. The woman listened calmly. When Jen finished, Sue sat for a moment, thinking.
“This is wild,” she said finally. “There’s just one favor I’d like to ask you.”
“What’s that?”
“I’d like you to stick around while I get dressed and pack some things. Then I’d like you to follow me to my parents’ house. They live in Eastgate Heights.”
“That’s not really necessary. We plan to have someone watch your house the rest of the night.”
“Detective Dillon, I’m not trying to cast aspersions on your department’s ability, but you said yourself there was someone outside my house, and he got away in spite of your best efforts. If you don’t mind, I think I’d feel safer at my parents. There’s my mother and father, five brothers and sisters, and one crotchety old aunt living there. Not to mention, a yappy little dog. If he can get in and kill me there, then I must be meant to die.”
“I see your point,” Jen said, “and I guess I don’t blame you. Get your things. We’ll wait, and then I’ll have a cruiser escort you to your parents’ house.”
She and Will waited in the living room. Will looked angry, and Jen couldn’t blame him. She was angry herself. Somewhere out there, a killer walked loose, probably laughing at them for not having caught him when they had the chance. Not only that, but their presence here tonight had tipped him off that they were on to his method of operation.
Jen knew now that her theory was likely right. Of course, the figure in the bushes really could have been a prowler, but she didn’t believe that any more than Sue Carpenter had. It had been the killer, and now he was on the alert.
Sue returned carrying a large suitcase and several garments on a hanger. Will helped her carry her things to her car. Vic and the deputy volunteered to follow her to her parents, then relieve Will and Don as a roving unit.
“We can sleep in,” Vic argued when Will declined the offer. “You guys need to be back in to coordinate things and deal with the brass and press. Besides, we’re both used to working nights. We couldn’t sleep anyway if we went home.”
Will finally agreed. Jen was relieved he’d be going home with her when she finished the paperwork involved with the arrests. The incident at Carpenter’s had spooked her, and she didn’t relish the thought of returning to a dark, empty apartment alone.
CHAPTER 44
The man who used to be Arthur Kelty lay still for a long time after they’d gone. He strained his ears, listening for the slightest indication that they had left a trap for him, but all he heard were the now familiar night sounds. His prey was gone. It wouldn’t make sense that they would stay all night guarding an empty house. He finally summoned his courage and eased forward quietly from beneath Sue Carpenter’s front porch.
As he crept along the silent streets to his car, he thought about how close it had been. He hadn’t suspected anything when he arrived at her house. He’d concealed himself in the bushes only minutes before she pulled to the curb. Now he remembered a car passing seconds later and knew that must have been them.
He shivered. He’d toyed with the idea of jumping her at the front door the way he had the cop but had rejected the idea in favor of the tried and true method of waiting until the prey was asleep. If he had made his move at the front door, it would all be over now.
His car was where he’d left it. He started the engine and drove off through the quiet streets, his mind replaying the events of the past hours. He’d been waiting for his prey to settle in when he’d heard the sound that didn’t belong in the night and seen the man creeping behind a tree across the street. The identity of the sound came to him then. It was the rasping noise a two-way radio makes as the mike is keyed. He had known the man was a cop as surely as a hunted animal knows its predator.
His first instinct had been to run for the rear of the house, but he had stopped himself. Naturally they would have posted someone there. For a second, he had panicked, feeling trapped, but then he had seen the hole. There was a lattice grating around the front porch, reaching from the porch floor to the ground. Old and not well maintained, there was a small hole in the side nearest the bushes. He’d dropped to the ground and inched through, catching his clothing and feeling cobwebs sticking to his face and hair.
He’d lain motionless, the smell of damp, foul earth in his nostrils, invisible insects scampering across his outstretched hands, listening while the man who’d trapped his father and the bitch he was rutting with walked and talked above him. He’d heard the chatter from the radios carried by the officers still outside the house, and when he heard the order to stop cars leaving the area, he knew he’d be in his hole for a while. He could wait them out. In a sense, it was no different than waiting in a hunting blind for four-legged prey to pass within range, and he’d had plenty of experience with that when Father started his training years ago. The only difference now was that he was the prey. The thought made his head start to ache, at first just a
