She and Will split surveillance duties for two reasons. Lonnie wanted them split up so one or the other would always be able to report in for day shift to continue the routine part of the investigation, but the other reason was personal. Will had suggested one of them be with Brandon as much as possible when he wasn’t in school, and Jen was touched by his concern for her child.
Friday morning of the second week of surveillance found Jen, Will, Al, and Lonnie sitting glumly around the desk in Lonnie’s office. Will and Al had pulled surveillance together the evening before but had turned it over to other officers at midnight so they could be in the office at a reasonable hour the next day.The four of them had been there for an hour, drinking coffee and trying to decide on a course of action.
“The coverage is going to have to stay,” Lonnie said. “The chief is getting antsy, and the sheriff will probably have to pull some of his people before many more days go by, but I don’t see any other choice. The minute we pull off, he’s bound to go after one of them.”
“You think he’s trying to wait us out?” Al said.
“Probably. He’s not stupid. He knows as well as we do that economics won’t allow surveillance indefinitely.
“There’s a couple of things in our favor,” Will said. “For one, the list hasn’t grown any longer.”
Chief Buchan and the sheriff had met with the two men who owned and published The Eye. When the situation was explained to them, the men had readily agreed to hold publication of all divorce announcements until after the killer was caught. Jen wondered if the men had realized that might mean they’d never publish them again.
“And the other?” Al said.
“Something is driving him to kill. He won’t be able to wait forever. He killed three women in one week, one almost every other night. Now he’s gone for nearly two weeks without killing any. He won’t be able to last much longer. He’ll make a move, and we’ll be there.”
“He may have moved on,” Jen pointed out. “Like his father—if he is Arthur Kelty.”
“If he has, we’ll know it eventually.” Will shrugged. “Until we do, we need to operate as if he’s still out there.”
“Can you convince Buchan to keep the coverage?” Al asked Lonnie.
“I don’t think it will be too difficult. After all, it’s only been a couple of weeks. We’d look pretty bad if we pulled off that quickly and something happened.”
“Sorry I’m late.” Don Hawkins entered the room. “Did I miss anything?”
“Just a lot of bitching and moaning,” Al said.
“I just came from the office. Some of our background checks are in.” Don waved a folder at them. “So far Cochran checks out. Our agents showed photos of him to former employers and landlords, and he’s who he says he is.”
“How far back did they go?” Jen said.
“Ten years. They’re still checking, but it’s going slower the further back they go, so they sent us what they’ve got. If he’s Kelty, he assumed the Cochran identity longer ago than that.”
“What about the others?” Will said.
“Larry Adams checks out for the last six years. It’s going slow because he’s moved around more. Holiday checks out for the last fourteen years, so it looks like our mailman is who he says he is.”
Jen smiled, relieved that her only witness to the hit-and-run was clean.
“So the check on him is complete?
“We’ll take it back another year or two, just to be on the safe side, but essentially, yeah, I’d say it’s done.”
“The Bureau really moved on the checks,” Lonnie said. “It’s been less than two weeks.”
“Sometimes Uncle Sam comes in handy, doesn’t he?” Don grinned, and everybody laughed.
“So what are we doing today, boss?” Jen said.
“I’ve arranged for repeat interviews with everybody connected with the case.” A chorus of groans met his words. “I know, I know, it’s not as glamorous as on TV, but if anybody’s got a better idea, I’d love to hear it.”
No one did.
CHAPTER 48
He slept well and woke refreshed. Stretching languidly, he rolled over. The pictures were on the nightstand where he had laid them weeks ago. Now he held them up and relaxed against the pillows. The eyes of the man who had caused his father’s death looked with lust at the woman next to him in the newspaper photo, confident and unaware that by dawn tomorrow, they would both be dead.
He had spent most of the last two weeks learning their routines by heart. He’d already known quite a bit about Dillon, but he needed more details now that the federal agent was in her life. It had been simple to start a conversation with the boy while he rode his skateboard in front of their apartment building. Children were so trusting.
He nearly cried when the boy told him how he hoped his mother and Anderson would marry one day, knowing the futility of the boy’s dream. It saddened him to know that the boy actually thought it would be a good thing if Anderson stayed in his life. He would free the child from both of them. He’d toyed with the idea of taking the boy with him when he moved on. It would be fitting that he passed on his own father’s lessons to someone who could continue the family legacy, but he had reluctantly dismissed the idea. If the boy was younger, it might work, but at his age, he was already ruined.
The child had provided some useful information. He’d told him about the old lady named Ada who watched him when his mother neglected him. It was a valuable piece of information of which he’d not been aware. One weekday while the boy was at school and his tramp mother and Anderson were
