What Burns Within

by Sandra Ruttan

  “What about our plans? Sailing up the coast, maybe Alaska? Can’t we try—”

  “You don’t get it. I’m past trying. No matter what I do, it’s wrong. I’m too supportive, too sympathetic, too demanding, too critical. Where’d you sleep last night, Lori? You think I just went to bed and didn’t give you a second thought?”

  She swallowed but didn’t answer.

  “You either agree to counseling, or you leave.”

  “So this is love, huh? A list of conditions, snap my fingers, get over it and move on?”

  He shook his head. “You’ve always been so damned good at manipulating me. Not this time.”

  “Vish…”

  “You’re the one who walked out that door. You walked away from me. I called everywhere I could think of, left dozens of messages on your cell and at work, and you didn’t even call back. You just waltz in here like everything is fine and it’s okay to treat me like shit. Well, it isn’t, Lori. It never was.”

  He walked away, and she heard a door shut, presumably his den door. She waited five minutes, then ten, and when he didn’t come out, she picked up the bags and walked to the front door, not bothering to brush away the tears streaming down her face.

  Tain double-checked his messages, then picked up the phone.

  “Is Greg there?”

  “Day off.”

  “Who’s in charge, then?”

  “Bobby, I guess.”

  “Get him for me.” When that was met with silence, Tain added, “Please.”

  “What do you want, Tain?” a voice said after a moment. A voice that was chomping on something as it spoke.

  “Why the hell don’t I have the results from the fire scene back yet?”

  “We’re swamped. Short staffed, under bud get, summer holidays.” More chomping.

  “I don’t give a shit. This is a multiple child-abduction and murder case. Since when doesn’t it get priority?”

  “Since a rapist sunk his claws into one of our own.”

  “You’re telling me that’s still got you backlogged?”

  “Look,” the voice said after it swallowed, “best I can do is remind Greg you need this and hope we can get it all done for you by Tuesday.”

  “We’ve got a working timeline. We expect another arson on our hands in a few days. This could make the difference between saving a kid’s life or carrying her body out of a burning building.”

  “Shit, well, cry to your bosses. I mean, I’m just following my own orders, and nobody’s going to thank me if I pull an end run around my supervisor. You might get away with that, but we aren’t all so lucky.”

  “Then I’ll do what I have to do.”

  “And I’ll warn Greg.”

  “Thanks,” Tain muttered, slamming down the phone.

  “Um um um.”

  He watched her walk up to the front door, fiddling with a collection of keys until she found the right one and disappeared inside.

  Rob leaned back and smiled. Thank God for security cameras, he thought as his fingers traced the shape of her on the photo he’d printed out.

  Yes, she’d make a fine addition.

  “Now, I just need a fire to keep her man out, and I’ll be set.”

  The house had proven perfect. They lived in a quiet neighborhood, lots of trees, plenty of concealed access to the front door or any of a number of ground-floor windows.

  This was one he thought he might like to take his time with.

  He looked up to see an elderly woman glaring at him, dawdling along with her fluffy dog in tow. Rob started the engine, folded up the map he’d had out as though he’d been lost and checking his directions, and drove away.

  A glance in his rearview mirror told him the woman was still watching. He checked again one last time before he reached the end of the block, seeing the Rodeo pull in to the drive.

  Rob swore again and drove away.

  MONDAY

  Sunlight was streaming through the windows mercilessly when Ashlyn finally admitted that it must be morning. She opened her eyes.

  The covers from Craig’s side of the bed were tossed back. She glanced at the clock, almost regretting the hours she’d lost track of as she’d continued with her research the night before, coming to bed long after Craig had already fallen asleep.

  Her stomach was grumbling, and then she realized she smelled food. She pushed her covers back and went downstairs.

  “Smells good.”

  Craig glanced at her. “Don’t you think you should get dressed?”

  She looked down at the oversized dark green shirt that hung past her hips, the plaid pajama shorts protruding below. “I’m better covered than when I’m wearing those short skirts. Did you mean to leave the door open?”

  That’s when the screen door rattled, and she heard footsteps in the hall. Craig smirked, and she turned to find herself face-to-face with Tain.

  “Are those your pajamas?” he asked.

  “What’s wrong with this?”

  “It’s completely messing with my fantasy life. You really wear that to bed?”

  “No. I sleep naked,” she said, grabbing the plates from the counter and walking into the dining room. She could imagine Craig turning his back to conceal his amusement, the look on Tain’s face, but when they joined her at the table they’d both regained what ever composure they’d lost over her comment.

  Tain whistled. “You know, Craig, you’re really outdoing yourself. I almost feel guilty enough to take you out to dinner.”

  “As long as you don’t want to cook for me.” Craig passed the toast to Ashlyn. “The department is paying for all of this right now anyway.”

  “Yes, but it was still nice of you to cook,” Ashlyn said.

  “Well, it was clear you weren’t going to. I was beginning to think you expected breakfast in bed.”

  “Some of us were working late.”

  “Some of us are working two jobs,” he responded.

  There was a moment of silence at the table until Tain spoke. “Find anything?” he asked Ashlyn.

  She nodded. “I have your probable cause for a search warrant for Alex Wilson’s place.”

  Tain’s lip curled. “Sick bastard.”

  “Shame he doesn’t fit for the peeper at the recreation center,” she said as she went into the hall and retrieved the file she’d set out for him.

  Tain snapped his fingers. “Actually, you know that kid who was working at the fitness center, the one who’d come in on call? Doug Fisher. I figured out where you knew his name from.”

  He pulled the file from the stack he’d brought with him and passed it to her as she walked back to her chair. She opened it, starting skimming and whistled.

  “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” she asked.

  “I checked. He never worked a shift when the church group came in, not at the front desk. But he was a customer every Sunday night, theoretically working out in the weight room.”

  “You planning to pull his photo and see if Marvin can ID him?”

  Tain nodded. “And I’m going to bring him in for a chat, regardless.”

  “Good thinking. Anything else?”

  “A possible lead on the guy who took Taylor.”

  She stared at him. “And you were just going to casually mention that when? On your way out the door?”

  “It’s too soon to be certain. I’ve got one more potential witness I can talk to before I track this guy down.”

  “Will that be possible?”

  “It seems he was kicked out of the fairgrounds repeatedly for scaring kids with his religious dogma. The security department is bound to have a record on him.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure,” Craig said. “A lot of the security staff is hired in specifically for summer events. University and college students.”

  Tain shook his head. “There still has to be a supervisor I can track down. And I thought you guys had some leads.”

  “We have a few, but so far no hits on the police che
cks,” Ashlyn told him.

  “How old are these guys? Early-to mid-thirties?”

  Ashlyn shook her head. “Younger. Twenties.”

  “Then you might not find anything in the system, even if they’ve been in trouble.”

  “Juvenile offenders who’ve managed to keep themselves clean for a couple of years,” Craig said sourly. “When are we going to get rid of this ridiculous idea that a sixteen-year-old can’t form intent?” He looked at Ashlyn. “Tain’s right. You might need to look in the newspapers for any leads on local teenagers being sentenced as young offenders in the past five years or so.”

  She nodded. “I did. And I have a reporter to talk to. There’s one case that I found particularly interesting. It happened in Cloverdale. Boy grabbed a girl, forced her into a barn, lit a lantern, pinned her down, and she resisted. The hay caught fire, but he didn’t stop. The fire brought people to the scene pretty quick. The girl cried rape, there were signs of a struggle, and he finally admitted enough to get slapped with a minor charge. Sixteen, so he got his time in a juvenile facility and wasn’t labeled a sex offender. He was also charged with arson.”

  “That does sound promising,” Craig said. “But how are you going to find out who it was?”

  “What I’m going to do today is compile a list of our most likely suspects, and then I’m going to beg, bribe or threaten this reporter until he tells me if our teen is on the list.”

  “You’re assuming he knows,” Tain said.

  “He has to. Those kids go in and out of court and get seen, even if their names aren’t printed. Think about the Taber shooter. Identity protected until he disappeared from a halfway house. Suddenly pictures taken of him years earlier are on the front page of newspapers from coast to coast.”

  Craig nodded. “She’s right. This reporter, if he covered this case, he’ll know.”

  Tain’s cell phone rang, and he answered it. His face stiffened as he listened to what was said and then curtly replied before hanging up.

  “Women’s intuition strikes again.”

  Ashlyn frowned at him.

  “A family just came forward. Their daughter has been missing since July eighteenth.” He grabbed another piece of toast. “I’ll talk to you later.”

  Craig also stood.

  “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “To have a shower. I cooked; you clean.”

  Daly looked up at the sharp knock on his open door.

  “What is it, Sims?”

  “Sir, I thought I should bring this to you. DNA results from Nitara Sandhu’s murder and Lori Price’s rape.” Sims set the files down on the desk but didn’t move.

  “What is it?”

  “Lori was trying to sign for these when the lab sent them over.”

  Daly pursed his lips. Damn Hawkins. If he wouldn’t deal with her…He looked up at Sims and nodded. “Thank you for telling me. And thanks for intercepting these.”

  “Do you want me to take them to Craig’s house?”

  “No, I’ll handle it.”

  Sims nodded and left.

  Daly sighed as he pulled open the first file and started reading. Within a moment, he’d gotten up, file still in hand, closed the door and sat down.

  Once he was finished reading, he leaned back and whistled. Then he reached for a Tylenol.

  “What the hell am I going to do about this?”

  Sims met Tain in the hallway outside an interview room. “They’re waiting for you. I got them some tea.”

  “Thanks.” Tain paused midstep. “You want to sit in on this, or do you want to follow up on something else?”

  He could see the conflict on Sims’s face, half wanting to be on the front lines of the abduction case, half wanting to be on the street.

  “Likely makes more sense for me to chase down leads. More efficient.”

  Tain suppressed the smile. “Remember our friend Alex Wilson? Check this out. Ashlyn found our probable cause for a warrant on his place.” He passed Sims the file. “With everything happening, I never made it to his old employer. Go sweet talk him into telling you why Alex left his job and then get the warrants. We want to arrest him.”

  Sims nodded. “Should I…I mean…”

  “Get everything ready, then come and find me. We’ll go get him together.” Tain started to walk away and then turned around. He passed Sims another file. “And if I’m really held up, pick up this guy. You can tell him we’re questioning recreation center employees, just eliminating staff and people from our fingerprint hits.”

  “But?”

  “We think he’s the one who’s been peeping at boys in the change room. He’s got history.”

  Sims nodded again and walked away.

  Tain opened the door to the room where Mr. and Mrs. Sanchez were waiting.

  “I’m Constable Tain.”

  “You’re the one who can help us?” Mrs. Sanchez looked up, dark eyes filled with tears, her black hair pinned back from her face.

  “I’m going to try,” he told her. “I understand your daughter went missing July eighteenth?”

  She nodded. “Maria. I’ve brought a picture.” She pulled it out of her bag and passed it to him.

  Long dark hair, dark eyes, a sweet smile…Pretty girl. Tain looked at Mr. Sanchez. “Can you tell me why you didn’t report this until now?”

  His whole face fell. “God help us, we were illegal. We…” He shrugged as Mrs. Sanchez started to sob. “We’re legal now. Now we can leave the church. We came straight here.”

  “You’ve been living in a church?”

  Mr. Sanchez nodded. “Holy Redeemer.”

  “Catholic?”

  Mr. Sanchez nodded again.

  Are all of these girls Catholic? Lindsay, yes. Isabella was. Julie went to Holy Cross and Taylor …

  “I need to know how long you’ve been there and the names of everyone who had contact with you at the church, at least for the month of July.”

  “You cannot think it is someone from the church. They have been wonderful to us,” Mr. Sanchez said, gaping at him.

  “Well, somebody took her, and if you haven’t left the church building until now…”

  The Sanchezs looked at each other and then started to tell their story, while Tain wrote everything down.

  Ashlyn opened the door.

  “I’m Bob.”

  “Ashlyn. Thanks for coming over.” She glanced at her watch. “Wow, that was fast.”

  “No problem. I do a lot of business for the guys on the department. Kinda get viewed as a part of the team, you know?”

  “Kitchen’s this way.” She glanced at her watch. Craig would be furious.

  Bob started to work on the dishwasher as the phone rang.

  “Hi. Oh, yeah?” she said, glancing over her shoulder. Bob didn’t seem to be paying much attention to her, but she still moved farther down the hall.

  Daly filled her in on the rape kits. “There weren’t any DNA matches at Michelle Bohner’s house because she’d done a pretty thorough cleanup.”

  “Oh? And what about a physical checkup? Do you think that’s necessary?”

  Daly hesitated. “Who’s there?”

  “Guess it doesn’t hurt to check things out.”

  “Potential suspect?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Where’s Craig?”

  “Out.”

  “Ashlyn—”

  “Sorry, I think I missed what you said. The physical exam…”

  “She declined to have one. So no DNA there either. But we did get prints, surprisingly enough not hers or her husband’s, almost as though she’d cleaned the place from top to bottom just before the alleged rape occurred.”

  “So what turned up?”

  “Prints for a guy named Bob Gliddon. He’s in the system for an assault charge, and he did a stretch on a rape charge when he was nineteen. He’s also done some contract work for the fire department.”

  “Yes, I know.” She could feel her heart pummelin
g against her chest, and then she heard the door open and let out her breath. “He’s here now.”