"She's extremely sure, Lucas. I think we have to listen to her."
"Where's the rental at, Stan? Do we have an address?"
"It's in the sticks, north of the city, out some ways, Lucas."
"Remote?"
"Well...what's remote? It's all relative, isn't it?" Kelton's voice came over the radio loudly and evenly. "I suspect it's a drive, but I also suspect it may wed be the kill site, Lucas."
Two great scores in a matter of minutes. It sounded too good to be true, but the fly in the ointment was Frank and his G-men friends. "Stan, is she cooperating with Frank and his FBI buddies so far?"
"Not going well from the look of it. She's asked for a lawyer."
"Assholes! They've frightened hell out of her, no doubt with unnecessary threats."
Lucas placed the siren atop his unmarked police car, and they raced to close the distance between themselves and the new credible witness now refusing to cooperate. What had Frank and his pals done to turn an ady into an enemy? "Call Jana on that thing," he said to Meredyth, pointing to the radio. "Get her and her team back to HQ. If there's anything to this, we're going to need to assemble a small army whether the FBI is involved or not."
Meredyth did as asked. Jana was already on her way back to the 31st. Meredyth had to suddenly grab onto her door handle as they took the final turn into the lot.
When they entered, Kelton directed them to the witness claiming to have rented a property out to a guy fitting the description in the artist sketch.
"Her name's Robeson. She's right here," Kelton said as they worked past busy people in the squad room and to a glassed-in waiting room popularly called the Fish Bowl. "Why've you got her in with the degenerates?" Lucas asked.
"It's where Frank left her. They're using it as a tactic to get her to talk to them before her lawyer arrives. He's on his way, someone she picked outta this." He tapped the phone book on his desk. "Feds told Frank they think she's just another one getting in line for the reward money I think they took a hike."
"Really? Then we have a shot at her, don't we. Bring her down to the conference room. We'll hide her there for now, and we'll talk to her."
A few moments later, Lucas and Meredyth greeted Mrs. Robeson as Stan spirited her into the far more private and secure area. They introduced themselves and apologized for her ill treatment at the hands of the Feds and Frank. "It's not even their case, Mrs. Robeson. You did the right thing by not talking to them as you did, and when your lawyer arrives, Officer Kelton will bring him or her here."
Officer Kelton assured her of it, and left to man the front and to keep Frank at bay.
Mrs. Robeson, a Betty Crocker look a like, sat demurely in her comfortable swivel chair.
Lucas and Meredyth sat across from her, Meredyth offering to get her a cup of coffee.
"Really, one more cup of coffee and I go floating away I came down here to make a statement in person, to be taken seriously I made several calls to your hot line and got nowhere. No one is listening. Then what happens? I come all this way only to be treated like my sole purpose is to rob the city of that reward! So I played that stupid game just to get back at them."
Lucas cocked his head to one side. "Stupid game, ma'am? What stupid game is that?"
"In my shoe, right here. I pointed and took it off, and I told them I was getting voices from inside telling me where the Ripper is hiding out. About then they went beyond the rudeness to a kind of dumbfounded ignorance, taking me literally. 'Bout then I told them I wanted a lawyer, and they started arguing among themselves, the three of 'em."
"What a waste of your time," said Meredyth.
"It's worse than any waste of my time, Dr. Sanger. Lives may be at stake here."
Lucas asked, "Did they show you a photo array and ask you to pick out the man you rented your property to?"
"We never got that far."
"Would you do that for us?" he asked, spreading out six photos, five of which were look a likes of Belkvin and one authentic. He did the same with six females, one being Lauralie Bloodgett. Sallie Robeson selected both accurately, which came as no surprise since she had seen their images in the media.
"Tell us what you know about this man," Lucas said, tapping his finger against Belkvin's photo.
She studied the photo, pulling it up close to her eyes. "Yes, well, he rented the property out on the creek under the name of John D. Croombs."
Meredyth exchanged a knowing look with Lucas. "Croombs. He used the alias Croombs?"
"Yes," she replied.
Meredyth smiled and breathed deeply. "We're definitely onto them."
"Then you don't think me some sort of thief interested in any old reward! How refreshing. Aside from your Sergeant Kelton, I have found no one here I can trust, until now."
Kelton arrived with her Yellow Pages lawyer, a young woman who looked fresh out of law school who introduced herself to her client as Karen Cahill, and she insisted on huddling in private with her client, but first she wanted to know the charges.
The situation explained, Lucas and the others allowed Robeson and Cahill to have the room. Outside, Lucas asked Kelton what had become of Frank and the Feds when they found Robeson gone.
"They came at me. I pleaded ignorance and suggested she walked out. They argued with one another and told Frank to call them when he had some credible information. Frank's busy filling out a complaint against me, regarding my carelessness in the matter."
"Excellent."
Attorney Cahill called them back inside. "My client wishes to cooperate with authorities in any way possible, but only if she can communicate through you two, Lieu-tenant, Doctor."
"Agreed."
"Quite acceptable."
Once all were again settled, Realtor Sallie Robeson began to relate her story in earnest. "I rented to him and the woman I took to be his young bride, and when I saw her likeness in the newspaper alongside his, I knew it was the same couple. Odd couple really."
"Odd being together, you mean, an odd fit as a couple?" asked Meredyth, anxious to understand every detail.
"She coulda been his daughter, and I worried for a moment what was going on, but she was giving all the orders, you know, making all the demands. She wanted this fixed, she wanted that redone, you know the type. For the price the old place was rented for, I told her to forget about a lot of upkeep on the part of the owners. I didn't think they'd take the place. Surprised me when they did. But him with those yelping dogs, and the big pens already on the premises, well, he was sold. But overriding all concerns, it seemed she had to be happy, or it was no good."
"She called the shots," agreed Meredyth, nodding.
"So you people already have a bead on 'em, don't you?"
"We do."
"What got me...what really struck me was when I saw his mole on the tube. I was glued to it on the screen just like I had been in life. Didn't know where to look when talking to the man. Whole time I was dealing with the man, I kept thinking to myself, 'Mr. Croombs, why not at very least clip the damn hair from your mole, so it's not so damned distracting?' You know?"
"When exactly did you rent the property to Mr. Croombs?" asked Lucas.
"Two and a half, maybe three weeks ago."
"Can you pinpoint on a county map exactly where the property is located, Mrs. Robeson?" asked Lucas, guiding her to a wall where a number of state and county maps stared down on them.
"It's in the North Country area, Bridger Falls—you know, that development that fell through when the owners went belly-up?"
"I know the general area, yes," replied Lucas. "Go on."
"Well...the old farmhouse on Hazard Creek Road belonged to the Kenyon estate. Whole thing's now in probate, but the house was placed with us to sell or rent."
She pointed it out on the map, smack in the Navasota River Canyon area. From there, they went to a computer, and typing in the search window, Lucas fed it the address and die owner's name, Kenyon. The computer quickly identified the exact location, and the
fact it bordered on Waller County.
Kelton had arrived again, this time escorting Jana North to their cozy hideaway, introducing her to Cahill and Robeson. Getting Sallie Robeson's okay to remain, Jana— having been coached by Kelton—thanked the realtor for indulging her. Seeing the jurisdictional overlap on the computer screen, she said, "We'd best notify and involve Sheriff Dennis Laird over there. He can bring his dogs to the party. Always bragging he's got the best police dogs in the state."
"All right. We can rendezvous with Laird at County Line and Canyon Road, here," Lucas said, pointing to the screen.
The Dragnet program Lucas used also pinpointed the location of every state, county, and dirt road leading in and out of the property, displaying a flashing red O around the perimeter of their destination and several bleeping red Xs at each site where a roadblock made sense. Finally, the program bleeped a blue line from the address of Precinct 31 to the farmstead, the shortest route. As with Meredyth, Jana North stared at the computer image of their target and converging lines of approach.
"Are there any barns or other structures on the property?" Lucas asked Sallie Robeson.
She plucked at something jammed tight in her Lone Star Realty purse. "Yes, a large barn and a tool shed, as well as a root cellar, used for hurricanes and tornadoes as much as for vegetables." She continued to struggle with the thing in her purse, finally tearing it free with a vial of lipstick, a half pack of Big Red gum, a wad of tissue, and a hair clip, all of which Stan Kelton rounded up from the floor.
She had pulled forth a folded Xerox map of overlapping pages held together by cellophane tape. A contented smile creasing her wrinkled face, she handed the map to Lucas. "I've got the locations of the shed and bam clearly marked, Lieutenant, case you asked, and you did."
Lucas smiled in return and asked, "Where's the root cellar?"
"Under the kitchen, a door going down from the kitchen."
Lucas nodded. "Did you ever see any improvements made to the house that Croombs or Mrs. Croombs made?"
"The pens the dogs're kept in were already there. Old chicken coops with high fencing, well maintained. Made a good run for the animals."
"I mean to the house...or perhaps to the barn? Any equipment brought in?"
"I'm not sure I follow you."
"We believe the couple meant to turn the property into a veterinary surgery," explained Meredyth, a bit of a lie to draw the woman out.
"Ahhh... explains a lot. I never knew that." Then Sallie sat biting her lip and staring off into space, her features a mask of uncertainty.
Lucas cautiously prompted her. "We're trying to locate a table, a stainless-steel table like you would see in a veterinary office. It's very important to our investigation."
"My, but I feel I'm inside a Nancy Drew mystery novel."
"Any medical materials or supplies at all that you saw?" pressed Lucas, a tinge of frustration filtering into his voice.
"'Fraid not, no. Saw their two dogs. Healthy, beautiful dogs. Greyhounds he said he saved from a gassing. He seemed a kind man."
Lucas keyed a few strokes and began printing a copy of the electronic map off the computer. "I've got them pinpointed," he said as the printer came to life.
"We'll need a SWAT team going in, hit the out- structures simultaneously, but first we have to brief everyone on the geography and layout while a warrant is being secured, unless Harry tells us the existing two warrants cover any rental property Belkvin entered into."
"Not likely," said Jana North, holding up the warrant she had used at the home. "This one's quite specific to the home, garage, any cars in his name on the premises. If you read the fine print on the one you used at his practice, it's likely also to be specific to that location only. They're just not interchangeable."
The realtor, Sallie, chimed in again. "The woman was in heat to get the electrical and the water up and running, but they never asked about the closest place to shop, which I thought odd."
Everyone strained to hear the words of the matronly realtor's tale as she had begun to whisper. "Said they had a lot more animals than those two dogs to care for, and that's why the need for plenty of space to run the animals, that sort of talk, but again, they didn't seem interested in knowing where the nearest feed store was, you know, for these phantom animals."
"Phantom animals?" asked Jana.
"They talked like they were going to fill the bam and the pastures with animals. Least he did. Talked on and on about it. Friendly in a nonstop talkative way," she said. "You think that's 'cause he might've been, you know, nervous?"
"Quite possibly," Meredyth said, nodding.
"You say you only saw the two dogs? Are these the two you saw?" asked Jana, holding up the photo of Belkvin and his greyhounds.
"That's them, the lovely things...so graceful and well behaved."
"They spoke of other animals on the way?" asked Meredyth.
"They...I mean he...Mr. Croombs, he made some remark that the animals were in transport from Amarillo. When I asked if it was horses, she changed the subject, asked me to walk off the property lines with her."
"And did you?" asked Lucas.
"Oh, no! Heavens. It'd have taken a day to walk those boundary lines, so I showed her how she and Mr. Croombs could step off the lines themselves. Left them a map I'd brought out with me, just like the one I made up for you."
"How many acres is the property?" asked Lucas.
"Fifty-nine, and some odd shape it is; follows along a creek that's one of those ghost streams, you know... comes and goes depending on the time of year. Folks around Navasota call it Old Hazard Creek... runs smack through the property, and some parts of the section they rented cross the creek, and some don't."
"Creek is running flush now, I bet," said Lucas, "given last month's rains from those two passing hurricanes."
"It's full over its banks, yes."
"Jana, you know Judge Henry Lowell fairly well, right?" asked Lucas.
"I'll get you your warrant, Lucas."
'Tell Lowell what we have, plenty of probable cause on the photo and sketch IDs alone. Here's the location." He handed her a copy of the electronic map. "And we need the warrant to extend to any garages, outbuildings, and vehicles owned or rented by the suspects using the names Lauralie and John Croombs, Lauralie Blodgett, or a Dr. Arthur Belkvin."
"Just tell him it's to do with the Post-it Ripper case and he'll want in," said Kelton. "It's coming on election time."
"We'll need to call out another SWAT unit. Hope they don't think we're running on empty again," said Lucas to Stan.
"I'm on top of it, Lucas."
As Jana North and Stan Kelton rushed for the nearby telephones, Lucas stepped away from Mrs. Robeson and Cahill, allowing them to confer. Meredyth followed Lucas. He'd gone back to the large wall map, and now he jabbed a pin into each location on the city and county map where Dr. Arthur Belkvin might be at this moment, including the old farmhouse. Lucas quietly said, "We've got multiple people now all claiming our sketch is of a man they encountered, one a John Croombs, the other a Dr. Arthur Belkvin."
"He's using her mother's name now?" asked Jana.
"Mere, I think you ought to hang back here...let the rest of us handle this out at Kenyon's."
"No way, Lucas. I've earned a right to be there. I want an end to this as much or more than anyone."
"It could be another dead end, you realize? For all we know, they've left the state, gone to Baja or Mexico City."
"No, not her. Him maybe, but not her."
"Okay, you can come along, but you're to hang back. I don't want to give this nutcase a shot at you," he told her.
"Me, what about you? She knows that I love you, and she knows that killing or maiming you would destroy me. You need to hang back as much as I do."
"You love me? That's something I thought I'd never hear after you let it slip that once." Their eyes met and they shared a smile. "All right, agreed. We let the SWAT team storm the place and take them down before we
enter. We have Jana directing a separate team from relative safety against the barn, and Stan's earned a right to lead storm troopers against any additional outbuildings."
"We ought to bring Lincoln in on the raid too, Lucas."
"Yeah, Captain Lincoln's definitely going to want to be in on the capture. Election's coming up!" he quipped. "He's also going to want to know about Frank's blunderbuss attempt to make off with our witness and our case."
"I hear Gordon may be running for commissioner if Clarkson keeps his promise to the voters and bows out," Meredyth replied. "A collar like this could get Gordo elected."
"Call him at home," Lucas suggested.
Meredyth got on her cell phone and made the call, explaining to Lincoln the new developments. "Everything's on a snowball's course downhill now, Captain. We've got the bastards in our sights. We're seeing bear tracks."
"Bear tracks?"
"Lucas's word for good signs, good omen, sir."
"He teaching you Cherokee? Never mind. I just hope you two have better results from this information than you did with Belkvin's office and home."
"You've heard all about it then, I take it." She wondered how he had gotten the news, and from whom, and in what way it had been shaded. She also wondered if he had knowledge of Frank's bid to take over the interrogation of a witness with FBI in the room.
An awkward silence telegraphed his real message: I hope you and Lucas know what you 're doing this time.
"We've got them, I tell you," she insisted.
"I certainly hope so. I don't care to continue to look the fool, Doctor. You might want to convey this to Lieutenant Stonecoat. So where is ground zero?"
She easily read the frustration in his voice. She gave him the coordinates from the map, saying they were getting warrants and involving Waller County authorities.
"I've got my radio car. Keep me informed at all times. And Doctor, tell that damned Injun detective of mine I'll meet him at the Interstate along County Line Road out there in Waller County."
He hung up, giving her no chance to respond.
CHAPTER 17
A LONG PARADE of police vehicles of every size and type rode the Interstate for the Canyon Park Road exit north of Houston. They had long since left the lights of the city for the deepening rural darkness of back-country roads, sagebrush, jack pine, and Texas juniper when the order was given to cut the strobe lights, and next the headlights. Running silent, the motorcade looked like a nighttime funeral procession, but for the reflective glow in the dark HPD logos, the SWAT logos, and the Waller County Sheriff's logos. Bringing up the rear, a pair of Houston ambulance and rescue vehicles followed Chang's CSI van. News crews followed at a respectful distance like camp followers, having gotten word of the raid, their satellite vans like so many pachyderms shouldering their way forward as in an elephant walk. At least this is how it all appeared from overhead in the HPD chopper where Meredyth and Lucas had set up their communication and command post. A second police helicopter impatiently held off as well. While Lincoln insisted on leading the main force through the front door of the farmstead, he had also insisted that Lucas and Meredyth remain at a safe distance and altitude until the suspect house and outbuildings were deemed all secure by the captain of the SWAT team, Elliot Andrews. "I mean to insure the successful conclusion of this horror personally," Lincoln had said, "and if that means locking you two up, Stonecoat, I'll do it. It's for your own safety and the safety of every officer going in. Detective North has told me how this madwoman has targeted you for death. Well, we're not going to bait her using you as a target, nor have you rush in there and set off some sort of deadly booby trap either. Understood?"
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