Al and Lonnie were leaning against a counter in the kitchen. Lonnie looked tired and sick. Al looked up, and his eyes locked on Jen’s. She stared back for a moment, reading his mind, before turning away.
Lonnie filled them in on what they knew so far. Jen had been right about the other half of the duplex being vacant. A neighbor had been awakened by a woman screaming a little after four and had called the police. The neighbor hadn’t been able to tell dispatch where the scream came from. A squad car had been dispatched, but when they arrived, the neighborhood was quiet. They had cruised for a while, then left, writing it off as a domestic disturbance that had calmed down.
Reyna’s mother had found her. She lived nearby and had a key to her daughter’s place. The two of them attended church together every Sunday, and she had come to pick her daughter up as usual. The woman had managed to give a statement and had then been taken off by relatives.
The morning was spent going over the inside and outside of the crime scene, carefully looking for anything that might tell them more than the little they already knew about the killer. But they found nothing more than they had before—a wet towel and a few strands of hair. It was as if he had come out of thin air just as it had seemed the night before at Sue Carpenter’s house that he had vanished into it.
When they got to the building a little after noon, Buchan’s car was in the garage, and Lonnie had a message instructing him to report to the chief’s office. Will asked to accompany him.
Al waited until Lonnie’s office door shut behind the two men before turning to Jen.
“What happened last night?” The tone of his voice bordered on accusatory.
“What do you mean, what happened?” Jen felt her anger start to rise. “We didn’t get him, that’s what happened. He gave us the slip.”
She slammed her purse down on the desk.
“Where do you get off asking me what happened in that tone of voice? The way you sound, you’d think we let him get away on purpose.”
Al looked at her, his eyes blazing, and then turned away. His shoulders slumped, and Jen was suddenly sorry she had unloaded on him. The strain was getting to all of them, but that was no reason to take it out on each other.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to make it sound like I thought you all didn’t do your job. I just hoped…”
He stopped and took a deep breath.
“When I heard the radio traffic last night, I started hoping that it would all be over. That I wouldn’t have to think about it anymore.”
Jen crossed the small office and put her arms around Al’s neck, hugging him close.
“I’m the one who should be sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped at you like that.”
She pulled back, her hands still on his arms, and looked him in the eyes.
“Last night I kept thinking about the things you said. I don’t want them to come true, Al. If we’d gotten him, they wouldn’t have. They still don’t have to, but it scares me to think what you’ll do if you get the chance.”
“It scares me, too.” He pulled away and walked to Lonnie’s file cabinet. He pulled several sheets of paper from a drawer. “We’d better get started on this last list before they get back. There’s over forty names here to check.”
Looks like this discussion is over, Jen thought. She started to say more, to push Al, but she stopped. She could see from his face that he was done talking about what he might do if he came face to face with the killer.
Lonnie and Will weren’t gone long. The chief was shifting operations into even higher gear. It was only a matter of time until the word got out that the killer had almost been caught before this last murder, but the police had let him slip through their fingers. Chief Buchan couldn’t afford to let such stories circulate for long. It wasn’t good for his image. He’d promised them all the manpower they needed to cover every name on every list. Whatever his personal motives, Jen was thankful for that.
“Why not tell the women they’re in danger?” Al said. “Some of them would probably go stay with other people, and that would make covering the rest a little easier.”
“For now, we’re not telling them anything,” Lonnie said. “If we did, somebody would be bound to talk about it, and he’d know we had it figured out.”
“Don’t you think he does anyway after last night?” Jen said.
“Maybe, maybe not,” Will cut in. “It could be he just thinks we figured it out about the one list. Or for all he knows, we could have been there on a routine prowler complaint. I don’t doubt that he’ll be more careful now, but I don’t think he’ll stop. I don’t think he can.”
Jen knew they were right. Still, she couldn’t help but feel sorry for the women. It seemed immoral to not tell them they were being stalked.
“So how do we cover all these targets?”
“The chief has authorized all the overtime we need,” Lonnie said. “So has the sheriff. Both departments are also getting hold of the reserve captains. There’s close to forty reserve officers between the county and us. They can team up with a regular officer to work surveillance, or they can fill in on the street to free up our people.”
The reserve units were made up of volunteer law officers. They received basic police training and had uniforms and weapons furnished; in exchange, they committed themselves to working a minimum of eight hours a month for
