Running on Empty. Michelle Celmer
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and even worse, to keep holding it?
Okay, it’s not like he didn’t have a distant history of this, of letting himself get sucked in emotionally. He had to keep reminding himself, she could be married. Never in a million years would he consciously consider touching another man’s wife.
Never again. But it hadn’t been a conscious decision then, either, had it?
“I’ll wait while you get dressed,” Mitch said, when the nurse was gone. He walked over to the window, leaving a reasonable distance between them. He looked down at the already crowded parking lot. The rising sun cast a golden glow over the city streets, warming his face through the glass. It would be a beautiful weekend, a weekend he would much rather spend fishing, or working on his yard. And sleeping. God knows he could use a few more hours of uninterrupted sleep.
“Detective?” Ms. Doe said softly.
He turned. She was standing in the bathroom doorway, the clothes stacked in her arms.
“I just wanted to say thanks, you know, for everything. You’ve been really sweet.”
Sweet? He nearly cringed. “I’m only doing my job.”
She smiled. She seemed to know as well as he did, he’d gone far above the call of duty.
It wouldn’t be the first time.
Mitch watched the video monitor with a deep sense of unease as the man in the hooded jacket stalked Ms. Doe through the store. He carried a basket, taking items from the shelves every so often to appear less suspicious, never getting close enough to be discovered, yet always keeping her in his line of sight. “He keeps his head down, so the camera never gets a shot of his face.”
“He knows what he’s doing,” Marco, the video tech, said.
This was no crime of opportunity. As Mitch had suspected, this had been a cold and calculated attack. But why? “How long does he follow her?”
“About twenty minutes. I spliced the tapes together so we could track their movements.” Marco fast-forwarded the tape. “When she leaves the grocery area, he’s right behind her. When he’s getting ready to strike, he puts the basket down in the middle of the aisle.”
“Because he knows we’ll eventually be watching the tape, and if he stashes it on a shelf somewhere we’ll find it.”
“So why not wear gloves? Then he wouldn’t have to worry about leaving prints.”
“Why attack her in a well-lit store when he could have done it in a dark parking lot? He’s arrogant. He’s showing us how cunning he is. He knows that if he puts the stuff in plain sight, some employee will probably see it, pick it up and put the stuff back on the shelves, thus removing any fingerprint evidence.”
“And one did. But I’ll get to that in a minute. First we have our victim walking down the toy aisle, our suspect is right behind her. Now look, see what he pulls out of his jacket?”
The fluorescent lights glinted off the object in his hand, making its shape clear for several seconds. Mitch mumbled a curse under his breath. “A gun.”
He watched as Ms. Doe stopped to pick up a toy. With her back turned, she didn’t see the suspect behind her. In a flash of movement, the man coldcocked her in the back of the head, sending her reeling forward. With swift efficiency, he checked her back pockets, then rolled her over to search her jacket. Within seconds, he’d searched her, shoved her small purse in his jacket, and disappeared through a stockroom door.
This was no robbery. He was looking for something specific. And something about the way he searched her disturbed Mitch. Something he couldn’t quite put his finger on.
“This isn’t good news.” He rubbed at a kink in the back of his neck. This was going to be a really long weekend.
“It’s about to get worse. Remember your basket theory?” Marco turned to a different monitor, running a second tape. “Here’s your basket, sitting there minding its own business, and here’s your reliable employee picking it up.”
“Tell me she takes it and drops it on a shelf somewhere where we can find it and get prints.”
“She drops it all right. Along with any evidence you might have had.”
Chapter 4
Mitch watched the monitor as the store employee carried the basket by the toy section, stopped dead in her tracks at the doll aisle, and seconds later dropped the basket on the floor. To the right of the screen he could see his own cart, and himself where he knelt beside Jane Doe.
Aw, hell, the basket she’d dropped had belonged to the suspect. Not half an hour later he’d told Greene it wasn’t part of the crime scene, which meant someone had probably picked it up and put all the evidence back on the shelves. “Son of a—”
“There’s more.”
Mitch sunk lower in his chair. “Great.”
“He was following her—” Marco paused as he stuck in a different tape “—and she was following you.”
Mitch leaned forward, watching himself enter the store, then Ms. Doe only minutes behind him. So it wasn’t a coincidence. But what had she wanted from him? What connection could he have to a woman he’d never seen?
“A couple of times she looked like she might approach you, then backed off at the last minute. When you went by the greeting cards, she broke off and went by the toys.”
Hell of a detective he was. He hadn’t even known he was being followed. He’d been so blasted tired at the time, he could think of nothing but getting home and climbing into bed.
“Kinda weird you ended up on the same aisle as her,” Marco said. It wasn’t a blatant accusation, but Mitch didn’t miss the implication.
“I was looking for a present for Jessica, Darren’s little girl. Her fourth birthday party is next weekend.”
“Party’s been postponed,” someone said from behind him. Mitch turned to see Darren Waite, his best friend and fellow detective, leaning casually in the doorway nursing a diet soda. “Heard you caught a case last night.”
“She was bashed in the back of the head with a piece by an unknown assailant. And not only can she not ID her attacker, she can’t ID herself. She has amnesia.”
Darren gestured down the hall. “Was that her in the squad room looking at mugs?”
“Yeah, I’m hoping something might trigger a memory. After I’m finished here, I’m taking her back to the scene.”
“I thought this was your weekend off.”
“Yeah,” he grumbled, “so did I.”
“So pass this off to someone else.”
“She was following me. She had my name in her pocket. I’m involved somehow and I need to know why.”
Darren didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. His wary expression said it all.
To circumvent the inevitable lecture he knew was coming, Mitch asked, “So why has the party been postponed?”
“My mother-in-law had a mild heart attack last night. Diane took the girls and flew to Seattle to help out, until she’s back on her feet.”
“Man, I’m sorry. How long will she be gone?”
“A week or two. Maybe less.” Darren downed the last of the soda and tossed the plastic bottle into the trash. “I taped the Tigers game. If you’re not busy later, why don’t you come by?”
“Honestly, this case is probably going to keep me tied up most of the weekend.” Mitch glanced at his watch. It was already close to 11:00 a.m. He had to get back to the store and pick up that stuff for Lisa and his mom, before Lisa had a cow.
“I