by C. M. Sutter
“This is nice,” I said.
“Right here is the computer you’ll use. You can pull over one of those extra chairs.” Betty pointed toward the far wall, where two side chairs sat under the west-facing window.
Kate scooted one over to the desk and set it in place. We moved aside so Betty could demonstrate the process.
“Okay, I’ll set up the surveillance feed and then show you where to set the date parameters. From that point, you just hit Play. You can push the scrubber bar ahead if you want to fast-forward the footage or backward if you need to review something.”
“Perfect. Then how do we go from the indoor footage to the parking lot camera?” I asked.
“The process is the same, but first you’d close out that file and then open the one here.” She touched the screen’s thumbnail for the outdoor camera. “Just double-click that, and the file will open. Repeat everything I just showed you and you’re good to go.”
Kate took a seat in the extra chair. “It looks easy enough.”
“If you have any questions, Detectives, just come and find me.”
“Will do, and thanks.” I mentally calculated how far back we should begin our search and waited until Betty closed the door behind her before I spoke. “We met Warren on Monday, but he killed Marvin on Sunday. He was probably here for a couple of days prior so he could figure out the lay of the land and find out where your old apartment was. He had to establish a place to stay, get settled in, and plan how he’d stalk you.”
Kate frowned. “Gee, thanks.”
“Let’s start with last Thursday. That date has no particular relevance, but it’s a beginning, and I think we can zoom through these tapes pretty fast.”
“But should we start inside the store or outside in the lot?” Kate asked.
“We have to start inside. It’ll be the only place where we’ll see his face up close. We have to establish a positive identity and then follow him to his car.”
We settled in and started the tape at eight o’clock Thursday when the store opened. I kept my index finger on the mouse and pushed the scrubber bar to the right. Every time somebody approached the counter to pay for their goods, I’d let the footage play at normal speed. It took us forty minutes to get through Thursday but with no results. We hadn’t seen anybody who remotely looked like Warren, and the tattoos on his hands would definitely have given him away.
“Why didn’t I think of this before?”
“What?” Kate gave me a puzzled look.
“We need to ask Betty if she’s seen any male customer in the last few days with tattoos all over his hands.”
“I’m on it.” Kate rose and left the office.
I continued the search as I waited. Moments later, Kate and Betty walked in together. A young woman who looked to be barely out of her teens followed them.
Betty spoke up as she allowed the young woman through. “Detective Monroe, this is Lexie, one of my cashiers. She mentioned waiting on a customer with a large number of hand tattoos just the other day. It’s odd to see somebody like that around North Bend.”
“It sure is. Have a seat, Lexie, and tell us everything you remember.”
She took a deep breath and sat next to me at the desk.
I gave her a reassuring smile. “Don’t be nervous. We’re just regular folks trying to find out if a particular man has shopped here. Okay?”
“Okay.” She folded her hands in her lap and tapped her foot.
Betty left the office to fill in for Lexie while she was being interviewed.
“So, do you remember what his tattoos looked like and when he was in the store?”
“I do. The tattoos were all black. They were a hodgepodge of different designs, none particularly interesting. They looked like they were done by an amateur.” She shrugged. “My dad has a few tattoos, but they look good, and they’re colorful. Anyway, he also had dots on the knuckles of both hands.”
“That’s really good information, Lexie.” Her description was dead-on from what Kate and I remembered seeing on Warren’s hands. “What else?”
“He was here on Sunday evening and then again Wednesday night.”
“What are your work hours?” I pulled out my notepad and began writing to establish a timeframe of when Warren had shown up, if the customer was indeed him. There could be a chance to stake out the store and watch for him.
“I work the second shift. My hours are from three o’clock until nine o’clock on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, but on Sundays, I work from two until seven because we close early.”
“Good, and do you remember what he bought?”
“I do, because I had to get Bruce. I’m not old enough to check out beer or liquor, so Bruce had to step in to clear those items.”
“And what were they?” Kate asked.
“A four-pack of Belhaven and a pint of whiskey.”
I smiled at Kate. “So we should see him on the Sunday footage and then again on Wednesday?”
“Uh-huh, you should.”
“Do you have a rough idea of what time on Sunday?”
“It was after the three o’clock football game ended. We get a rush of customers coming in at that time because we close early, and they want enough beer and snacks for the main Sunday night football game.”
“Sounds like you know a lot about football.”
“I have three brothers and a dad. I don’t have a choice.”
Kate squeezed Lexie’s shoulder. “We can relate. We’re the only female detectives at the sheriff’s office. Okay, Amber, let’s push the tape to Sunday evening at about five o’clock?” She raised her brows at Lexie. “Sound good?”
“Yeah, that’s about right.”
Kate grabbed the last chair from under the window and took a seat to my left. I passed Friday and Saturday on the footage and slowed at Sunday afternoon. I watched the time stamp in the lower right corner of the monitor. “We’re getting close. I’m going to let it play out in real time as soon as somebody comes up to the counter.”
We watched as several people checked out twelve-packs of beer and bags of chips.
Lexie pointed at the screen. “There! I think that’s him.”
I slowed the tape to normal speed and leaned in. Kate stared at the man until the camera caught him just right.
“That’s Warren.” She pointed at his pockets. “That’s the coat he had on at Tap and Tavern.”
“Yep, I see the red zipper tabs.”
He placed the Belhaven and whiskey on the counter and mouthed a few words to Lexie as he reached in his back pocket for his wallet.
“I had to call Bruce over the loudspeaker. We aren’t allowed to leave the register when a customer is standing there.”
“Understood,” I said. I watched the screen as Bruce showed up and cleared the liquor items. Lexie went on to take the cash from Warren and give him change. I paused the footage when he reached across the counter and handed her the money. “You can definitely see the tattoos on his hands. Too bad we couldn’t get a close-up of his driver’s license when he opened his wallet.”
Kate smirked. “That’s assuming he even has a license.”
I understood what she meant. After being incarcerated for the last eight years, Warren probably didn’t carry anything in his wallet that contained current information. I wrote down the time he was at the counter and closed that footage. If we had to go back and check Wednesday’s tape too, we’d do it later. What was most important was finding out what kind of vehicle he climbed into.
I double-clicked on the outdoor camera thumbnail on the monitor’s desktop and entered Sunday as the date. I pushed the scrubber bar to the right until we reached 5:49 p.m. The camera feed covered the immediate exit and about one hundred feet of the parking lot. After that, the clarity was severely compromised. We watched the exit as Warren walked out and crossed the parking lot.
“Come on. Just get into the first car nearest the door,” Kate said.
He continued walking for another fif
ty feet, rounded a parked truck, and climbed into whatever was on the other side of it.
“You have to be kidding,” I said. “That was deliberate.” I didn’t want to voice my frustration too much in front of a young woman who was only there to do her job. I held my tongue. We watched as his headlights went on and an unidentifiable vehicle drove away. All we could see were the taillights.
Kate let out a long sigh. “Okay, I guess we need to check out Wednesday after all. Maybe we’ll get lucky if he parked closer to the building.”
We went back and viewed the counter footage for Wednesday, and we found Warren checking out at 7:29 p.m. Since night fell early in the winter months, we might not be able to identify his vehicle this time either. In January, darkness took over by five thirty, which would make it difficult to identify the color and make of the vehicle he climbed into. We switched over to the outdoor footage and watched again as he left the building. By that time, we had given Lexie our cards and thanked her for her help. She had returned to the cash register to resume her duties.
“Come on. Cut us a break here,” Kate said.
We watched the screen as Warren walked out of the store and headed to a lone vehicle parked about twenty spaces out. Kate grabbed my arm and almost punctured my skin with her fingernails. I pried her hand away.
“Oh, sorry, I can’t help myself. We’re so close to nailing him.”
We continued to stare at the screen as the headlights flashed and Warren circled to the driver’s side of the car and climbed in. I paused the footage.
“Can you see anything identifiable on that car? A dent, a badge, a bumper sticker—anything?” I looked at Kate hopefully.
“No, only that it’s a dark-colored four-door.”
I wrote that down. It was something, and all we had at the moment. We watched as the car exited the parking lot and turned left onto Washington Street.
“Okay, so he’s heading farther west. Other than the hole he’s staying in, there’s no other place that he would need to go at nearly eight o’clock at night. We need to ask Betty how to send this file to the tech department. Maybe Todd or Billy can identify the car by the taillights.”
Kate stood and pulled out her cell. “I’ll update Jack while you talk to Betty.”
Chapter 52
We were back at the sheriff’s office by four o’clock. Kate and I sat downstairs with Todd and Billy while they reviewed the parking lot footage from Upton’s.
“The car is either navy, charcoal, or black. That much, I’m sure of,” Billy said. “By its shape, I’d judge it to be around ten to fifteen years old. Now all we have to do is get a match to those taillights.” He gave me an apologetic smile that said, ‘Sorry, it’s going to take some time.’ “We’ll know more tomorrow.”
I added the color and estimated age of the car to my notes about it being a sedan and sighed in discouragement. “Everything takes so damn long.”
“I could just call Warren and say I want to meet for dinner. We can swoop in and arrest him,” Kate said.
“Right, and without any evidence of wrongdoing, he’ll walk, disappear, and we’ll lose him and the Lynch involvement for conspiracy to commit murder. Jack would never agree to it.”
We thanked the guys and returned to the bull pen.
“Get anything?” Jack asked as he stepped out of his office and leaned against the doorframe.
“Sorry, boss. Not enough yet. We have a black, navy, or charcoal sedan that’s between ten and fifteen years old. That’s it for now. The guys are hoping to identify it by the taillights, but it takes time.”
“Which we don’t have a lot of,” Clayton said. “He’s been quiet for a few days. That in itself is nerve-wracking. What’s his next plan of attack?”
Jack tipped his head toward the door. “Let’s keep listening to these transcripts in the conference room and hope for a break in the case.” He checked the time. “Horbeck and Jamison can take over in an hour.”
Chapter 53
Warren crept out of the woods and scurried to the side of the house where the gas meter was located. Since darkness hadn’t fallen yet, the motion sensor night-lights wouldn’t react to his movement. He had about fifteen minutes to check what needed to be done. In his research at the library earlier that week, he had learned how a gas leak could happen right at the meter.
All he had to do was loosen a few pipes and fittings that fed directly into the gas appliance lines inside the house. He wanted to make sure he knew how to do everything in advance. He simply needed to make the women groggy enough to sleep through the attack he had planned. He would cut the alarm wires and enter the house, where he’d kill them while they slept. Once back in the safety of the woods, he’d fire a single gunshot into the home and watch it explode. A faulty gas line would be blamed. The coup de grâce would occur tomorrow night, and he’d slip out of town as quietly as he’d slipped in.
With the wrench and screwdriver in hand, Warren loosened the pipes just enough to hear a slow hiss, then he tightened them again. Saturday night, he’d creep into the shadows with his back pressed against the walls, where the cameras wouldn’t catch him. He’d open the pipes fully and allow the gas to spread throughout the house. The women would sleep while the poison filled their lungs. Warren would sneak in and finish them off once and for all.
He ran back into the woods just as darkness fell and the headlights of an approaching car lit the cul-de-sac. Warren watched from behind the cover of pine trees as the Prius pulled into the driveway and disappeared into the garage. He smirked in satisfaction as he walked back to his car.
One way or another, you’ll all be dead before I leave town.
Chapter 54
That madman had been in North Bend for nearly a week, and we were still unable to locate his hiding place and vehicle. We regrouped Saturday morning even though that normally would have been a weekend off.
Kate and I arrived at work to find everyone gathered in the bull pen. Jamison and Horbeck were still there, and Mary and Mitch had just walked in ahead of us. Clayton and Billings had taken their seats, and Jack took up residence in Clayton’s guest chair.
I took off my coat and placed it on a wooden hanger in the closet. “We haven’t missed anything, have we?”
Jack rolled his shoulders and cracked his neck. “Not yet, but it’s time to dig in our heels. I want to get through these transcripts today. We’re going to find that connection between the Lynch family and Warren Ricks, and the transcripts seem to be the only thing that’s going to give it to us. We need evidence against the Lynches and Ricks to work this case effectively. They’ll turn on each other if we have enough against all of them. We’ve struck out with identifying the person who picked up Warren, and Todd and Billy are still trying to identify the car that Warren is using in North Bend. We haven’t found where he’s staying either, although there’s a good chance it’s somewhere west of town.”
I turned to Horbeck. “Did you guys hear anything hopeful on the transcripts last night?”
Horbeck opened a spiral notebook and ran his finger down the page. “We have several conversations that sounded interesting, but of course they’re speaking in code.”
I knew full well what that meant. I remembered the stories Jade had told me of how Darryl and Max Sims would communicate in code over the prison phone lines. Nobody could make heads or tails of their conversations.
“Was it detailed, or did they just replace one word with another?” I asked.
“They aren’t smart enough to get too detailed. They’d just substitute names.” Horbeck fisted his tired-looking eyes. “Tony would say something to Lea like, ‘Are you still babysitting that kid from down the street, and is he learning anything?’ Then she’d respond with something like, ‘Oh yeah, he’s a quick study. I’ve even given him some special treats to take on the family road trip.”’
“Wow, if that isn’t a clue, I don’t know what is.”
Jack let out a puff of air. “That’s true, Amber, but
Warren’s name isn’t mentioned.” Jack’s desk phone rang as we were about to head into the conference room. We stopped and waited while he spoke to the caller. I saw him jot down something on a slip of paper before he hung up. He walked out of his office wearing a half smile. “We finally have a little bit to work with.”
“What is it?” Kate asked.
“Todd figured out the car by the taillights. It’s a 2005 to 2007 Nissan Altima. I’m going to put out an alert to our deputies and tell Chief Sanders to have his patrol units keep their eyes peeled for any Altima in that age range that’s black, charcoal, or navy. Chances are, it’ll have plates from a different state on it too unless he’s swapped them out with Wisconsin plates already. No matter what, we don’t want them to apprehend the driver, just observe him. If we’re lucky, we’ll find out where he’s staying and search the place while he’s out and about. All we need is one shred of evidence and his goose will be cooked.”
I heard the subtle vibration of Kate’s phone in her pocket. I gave her a glance as she pulled it out.
“Oh my God, I just received a text from Warren.”
“It’s about damn time that worm wiggled back out of the woodwork,” Jack said. “Let’s hear it.”
Kate’s hand shook as she tapped the text message. “Okay, he asked if I would have lunch with him today. He wants to meet up at Shooters at twelve sharp.”
“Interesting choice of places to meet,” I said. “That’s another location west of town.”
Jack tipped his head toward Billings. “And you checked every hotel and motel in that direction?”
“Yep. We covered the entire county.”
“Did you check into rooms for rent on the free weekly newspaper?”
“We haven’t investigated that avenue yet, boss.”
“Okay, get on it. Kate, I want you to respond that you’d love to meet him for lunch and you’re looking forward to it. Mitch and Mary, you’ll play the couple at the bar, sort of like you did last year. You’ll have Kate’s back as long as she’s in the building with him. One wrong move and you take him down.”
