“I got the licence plate of the van and the car that hit us. Maybe that will turn something up.” Fletcher had her notepad out and was writing down the numbers so she wouldn’t forget them even as she spoke, following me across the street.
“You need an ambulance, MacBain?” Dunnel asked, eyeing the way I was walking.
I glared over my shoulder at him. “No.”
Our attackers were gone when we arrived. My car was still there, driver’s side smashed like a crisp under the hand, half the front bumper scraping the pavement, but the white delivery van and SUV had disappeared, shards of glass from the SUV’s headlamps and a few burnt rubber tire tracks on the cobblestones the only evidence that they’d ever been there.
Fletcher took Dunnel over to my car to explain more of what happened and what we learned from Finn’s friends, and while everyone was distracted, I quickly dropped to my stomach and fished my gun out from under the dumpster. As I stood, Fletcher glanced over her shoulder and winked at me, and I nodded back in thanks before I tucked the gun away and walked over to join them. She handed me my phone, scooped up off the ground near my car, the screen miraculously unbroken.
“I’m sorry I dismissed Mr Sato earlier,” Dunnel said. “It’s just that we get a lot of people coming to the station to claim that they’re being stalked, and it’s usually nothing. I guess this is that one in a thousand time when it’s actually true.”
“Can you send an officer to the Highland Archive Centre?” I asked, suddenly afraid that our stalkers would double back and go after Haruto. “Mr Sato is still there. Have the officer bring him to the station for his own safety until we can come up with a plan.”
Dunnel snapped his fingers and summoned one of the nearby constables, quickly relaying my orders to him. “Be on the lookout. He might be in danger.”
The constable saluted and ran off down the alley towards the cars. Dunnel turned his attention back to us. “Update me on the Wair case.”
“We’re looking into the father right now, but there’s not much on him.” I touched my cheek and winced, finding a hefty scrape there. “I think maybe it’s some kind of weird bid for custody, though that doesn’t really fit with what we do know about him.”
“Abducting his kid isn’t going to help his case,” Fletcher pointed out.
“True.” There had to be a second side to the story that we hadn’t seen yet. If we could just find and talk to Richard Smith, maybe we could figure it out.
“Head back to the station. Get yourselves cleaned up.” Dunnel tossed his keys at my chest, and I caught them one-handed. “See if the lab can scrounge anything up on those plates and the perps’ descriptions. We’ll get the scene processed and cleaned up.”
“And my car?” I asked. It may have been a rather plain sedan, but it was still my car, and I was very attached to it.
“I’ll see that it gets to the shop,” Dunnel promised.
After we left the scene and crossed the street to the marked police cars, I reluctantly held the keys out to Fletcher. She looked at me with wide, only slightly mocking eyes and fought to keep the grin off her face.
“I get to drive? Really?”
“Don’t get used to it,” I said gruffly. “This is only because my entire leg is one big bruise.”
She swiped the keys from my hand as if she thought I was going to change my mind, and I climbed painfully into the passenger’s seat. The motorists along the road slowed down, attracted by the police cars still spewing red and blue light, craning their necks to see what was going on down the street as one of the constables came forward with yellow police tape and began to block everything off. The civilians all yielded to us as Fletcher signalled and pulled into the lane, and then she flicked the lights off, and we cruised back towards the station.
I rooted around in the glove compartment to see if there was any paracetamol, but I came up empty and sat back with a groan. I could feel my entire body beginning to stiffen up. It was going to make for a pleasant couple of days.
We made it to the station without incident, though I was constantly casting my eyes up each and every street, searching for an attack, muscles tense even as they protested. Fletcher pulled smoothly into the parking lot and took a spot near the front of the station. I let out a long groan as I heaved myself out of the car. Fletcher was at least smart enough not to make any old man jokes or offer me a hand, and we walked through the doors in silence. Then she headed off to give the plate numbers and suspect descriptions to the lab while I went hunting down some much-needed painkillers. I took three, washing them down with old coffee from the break room. I dropped into my chair while I waited for Fletcher to return, wishing its worn-out seat was softer against my aching bones.
The constable arrived with Haruto in tow just as Fletcher returned from the lab. The young man looked absolutely flabbergasted, mouth hung slightly open as he struggled to understand that his fears actually held water. He had a leather satchel clasped protectively to his chest, and it looked like it was the only thing holding him together.
I waved them over, and Fletcher pulled up an empty chair. “Sit before you fall over,” I said to Haruto, and he sank rather bonelessly into the seat.
He noticed the red scrape across my cheek almost immediately and then took in the way I leaned gingerly in my chair, and his eyes widened
