Michael stomped back to his car.
Chandler craned his neck, but he couldn’t see. “What’s he doing?”
“He’s getting back in his car.”
Michael yanked the door open and jumped in. As he drove away, the van didn’t move.
Jack laid on the horn.
“Don’t beep!” Chandler clamped his hands on the sides of his head. “Michael will see us.”
“We’re losing him.”
The van driver flipped Jack off and drove away.
“Now Michael knows we’re following him!” Chandler said.
“No, he doesn’t. You need to act normal if you’re undercover. And blowing your horn at someone stopped in the road is normal.”
“Normal people cut someone slack after a crazy guy gives them a brake job then gets out of the car all psycho on them. That’s what normal people do. They don’t blast their horn.”
“Whatever. But you’re right, Michael did look psycho.”
“He sure has got a temper.”
Now that the van was nowhere to be seen, Jack followed Michael at a distance. It was past noon and the traffic was heavy as the two cars wound closer to downtown Darrington. Jack’s knuckles were white and sweat ran down his back as he tried to keep Michael’s car in sight, but not too close, while at the same time navigating through traffic.
Finally, the Toyota pulled onto a side street and stopped in a parking lot behind a white two-story colonial.
“What is this place?” Chandler asked. “A house, or a business?”
“I’ll drive around and see if there’s a sign,” Jack said.
Jack circled around the block. Sure enough, mounted on two white posts was a large green sign with gold letters that spelled out Tate, Wolfe and Rice. Experts in Civil Litigation.
Jack parked in a lot across the street, in a spot from which they could see Michael’s car. Fifteen minutes later, Michael hurried out of the law office, smiling, and got back in the Toyota.
“Did you see his face?” Chandler asked as Jack pulled out and followed Michael again. “Why did he look all happy?”
“I don’t know.”
They continued to follow the Toyota, but always keeping at least one car between them. It looked like Michael might get back on the highway, but he drove right past the on ramp.
“I guess he’s got someplace else to go,” Jack said.
When they reached the downtown business district, the Toyota pulled into a parking space by the curb. There were no open spaces around it.
“What do I do?” Jack lifted his foot off the gas.
“Just keep going,” Chandler said.
They drove past the Toyota, and Jack saw a space farther down the street.
“Do I park?” Jack asked.
“Er…”
“Do I park?”
“Ummm…”
“Do I park?” Jack nearly shouted.
“How the hell do I know?” Chandler blurted.
Jack zipped into the parking space and put the car in park. He glared at Chandler. “If I ask something, you need to answer me.”
“What if I don’t know the answer? You want me to make something up? Ask me again.”
“What?”
“Ask me again.” Chandler lifted his chin.
Jack rolled his eyes. “Do I park?”
“Blue.”
“What?”
“See. My answer makes no sense because I don’t know the answer.”
“Then tell me that,” Jack said.
“I did. I said I didn’t know if you should park.”
“You didn’t say I don’t know. You just went, ah… um… errr…”
“So what if I did?” Chandler’s finger poked the dashboard.
“Sorry. Look, I’m not trying to be a jerk, but we need to get our communication down. Pretty soon I’m not going to be asking where a parking spot is, I’m going to be asking where the guy who’s trying to shoot us is.”
“That’s a good point,” Chandler admitted.
Jack glanced in the rearview mirror. “Here he comes.”
They both looked down and scratched at their faces as Michael walked down the sidewalk and past the car.
“Where’s he going? What should we do?” Chandler asked.
Jack thought for only a moment. “We follow him.”
“You did hear my whole don’t-get-us-arrested speech, right? The guy flipped out once already. And why are we following him anyway? For all we know, this is nothing more than a wild goose chase.”
Jack ignored the question and got out of the car. “You wait here.”
“What?” Chandler said.
“You don’t blend. You’re a giant.”
“But you’re the one he’s seen already.”
“He saw you too,” Jack said.
“Not as well. I stayed in the car, remember?” Chandler pointed at himself. “I should go.”
“I don’t want you to get jammed up,” Jack said.
“Back to back. It’s settled.”
“Okay. You follow him, and I’ll follow both of you from the other side of the street. If he gets someplace and starts coming back, we’ll switch sides.”
Chandler nodded. He got out of the car and followed Michael down the sidewalk. Jack crossed the street and kept pace.
The lunchtime rush was in full swing. Businesspeople rushed down the street and darted into restaurants in the daily scramble called “lunch hour”—even though for many it was only a half hour. Like contestants on some warped game show, they had to race out of their offices, find a place to eat, order, scarf it down, and then hurry back before their time expired.
Even in the lunch crowd, because of his size, it was easy to keep an eye on Chandler as he moved down the sidewalk. Jack kept his head tipped slightly down and tried to walk casually.
Michael and Chandler passed by a busy bistro. Because of the warm weather, the outside tables were packed. Michael slowed considerably; Jack almost came to a stop.
Chandler was getting too close to Michael.
Jack was about to try to signal Chandler to slow down when Chandler knelt and tied his shoelace.
Michael picked up his pace and kept moving.
Jack almost walked straight into a pole as he continued to watch them from across the street.
Michael got to the next corner. The crosswalk light was red, so he stopped. Then, suddenly, he turned around.
Jack’s breath caught in his throat. Chandler was still walking, and he was heading straight toward Michael.
Damn. If he recognizes Chandler…
Michael stood with his hands at his sides, staring back down the sidewalk. Chandler walked right up beside him, as casual as could be, and waited for the crosswalk light to change. Jack stood on the other side of the road, holding his breath.
Michael started to walk again—back the way he had come.
The crosswalk signal turned green, and the herd of people who had bunched up on the corners began walking, including Chandler and Jack. When they passed each other in the middle of the crosswalk, Chandler wiggled his eyebrows. “That was close,” he muttered.
Jack nodded and continued across the intersection.
Michael was already a good distance away, moving back toward his car. As Jack followed, Michael approached the bistro again. He slowed down and kept his head turned toward the tables. It seemed to Jack like he was looking for someone, scanning the crowd. Most of the diners were chatting away. Some typed on their phones, while others wolfed down their food like they were in an eating contest.
As Jack watched, Michael focused in on one table. Two women sat there—a blonde and a brunette. The brunette was talking animatedly, her back to Michael. But as Michael walked past, the blonde glanced in his direction.
Michael’s pace slowed. He stared back at the blonde until he passed them, and then his head swiveled forward and his pace picked back up.
Jack hustled down the street after him.
; When Jack reached his car, he hopped in and started the engine, waiting for Chandler. In his rearview mirror he saw the Toyota pulling out. He ducked his head as it drove past. A few seconds later, Chandler jumped in.
“Go,” Chandler panted.
Just as Jack was about to pull out, a car rolled up beside him and stopped, blocking them in.
“What the hell?” Jack said. He honked his horn.
The woman driving scowled and pointed to the parking space behind Jack.
“She’s parallel parking behind us,” Chandler said.
“You’ve got to be kidding me. Move, lady.”
As soon as the woman backed up enough for Jack to squeeze through, he did.
“Michael’s car is stopped at the light,” Chandler said, craning his neck out the window. “It’s only three cars ahead of us. But there are three cars ahead of him. I hope it’s not a quick light.”
But it was a quick light. When it changed to green, only four cars got through before it changed back to red. Michael got through, and Jack and Chandler were stuck.
Jack laid on the horn. “Damn.” He let fly with a steady stream of swears.
“Now you sound like Aunt Haddie,” Chandler joked.
“Shut up.” Jack stuck his head out the window, searching the cars and traffic ahead. “We’ll never find him now.” Jack rubbed both hands down his face. “This sucks. The first time I tail a car, and I lose him. Damn.”
“Maybe he’s going back to Fairfield?”
“No. The highway’s to the left. He went straight.”
When they finally made it through the intersection, they drove straight, peering down the side roads, but the silver Toyota was nowhere in sight. Jack rolled to a stop at another light.
“Well, where to now?” Chandler asked.
The light turned green, and Jack hesitated. The car behind him beeped.
“You gonna go?” Chandler said.
Jack stomped on the gas and banged a U-turn. Horns blared all around.
Chandler grabbed the dashboard. “Hey! What are you doing?”
“Did you notice anything when you followed Michael?”
Chandler took off his hat and wiped his brow. “No.”
Jack headed back the way they’d come. “I bet he’s sleeping with the blonde.”
“What? What blonde?”
“There was a woman at the bistro. The way she looked at him as he passed. And he looked at her. They know each other but didn’t acknowledge it. Not a wave or anything.”
“Then how do you know they know each other?”
“Remember when we got kicked out of the Charlie Horse?”
“Because of you,” Chandler said.
“Yes, but… before the act began, I told you that the hypnotist and the guy in the red shirt were in cahoots.”
“And you were right. The whole thing was a setup. The guy in the red shirt was a plant.”
“Yeah. Well, that wasn’t a lucky guess on my part. The hypnotist was mingling around the club, remember? I watched him. Him and that guy—they exchanged a look. Just like Michael and the blonde. They know each other.”
“A look?” Chandler leaned up against the door. “You think Michael’s having an affair because of a look?”
“Not just the look. Think about it. Michael drives all the way from Fairfield, gets out of his car, walks down the sidewalk, turns around and walks back, then just leaves? Why?”
“It is kinda weird.”
“He has to know her. She was what he wanted to see. It fits. It’s why I wanted to follow Michael in the first place.”
“How could you know Michael was having an affair?”
“I didn’t. It was just a hunch.”
“I don’t know, Jack. This seems sort of weak. Even if he is having an affair, that doesn’t make him a killer.”
“Statistically, seventy-eight percent of the time, when a woman is killed it’s by someone she knows. Michael would be the prime suspect if they hadn’t lost focus and arrested Jay.”
“That doesn’t mean Michael killed her.”
Jack paused. “No. But right now, we just need to get the cops to look at other suspects—to actually get back to investigating instead of locking in on Jay. If Michael’s having an affair, then he has a motive for killing his wife. We bring the cops proof of an affair, and they have to look more closely at Michael.”
Chandler raised an eyebrow.
Jack leaned over the steering wheel and stared out over the hood. “Or maybe I’m just getting desperate.”
He pulled into a parking space across from the bistro. “Good, the blonde’s still here,” he said, pointing her out to Chandler. “I want to see where she goes.” He shut off the engine. “Same deal as before? I’ll start behind them, you cover this side of the street?”
“Okay.” Chandler held out his hand and they knuckle-bumped.
“We’ve got good timing. They’re paying the check now.”
As the two women left the bistro, Jack casually followed them down the block. They were just chatting away, completely unaware of Jack. The brunette’s hands flew in all directions, and once in a while, Jack heard her loud laugh.
They took a left at the corner and headed toward a building set back from the road. It was a glass and steel building crafted into a mix of modern art and office space. Floor-to-ceiling windows looked out on the trees that surrounded the building on three sides.
As the women went inside, Jack turned back and met up with Chandler. “Let’s go get the car.”
“Don’t you want to check out the building?” Chandler asked. “From a distance,” he added quickly.
Jack grinned. “Yeah, but we can do that from the car.”
A few minutes later they were parked in the building’s lot. The big windows meant they had a direct view into the interior—which was a typical cubicle farm.
“Look at the girl at the front desk,” Chandler said.
Jack looked. “That’s the chatty brunette.”
Chandler’s hand shot out. “And there’s the blonde. See, she’s walking near the big fake plant on the left?”
Jack leaned against the steering wheel. The blonde sat down at a cubicle near the end of the building and disappeared from view.
Jack rolled down his window, and Chandler followed suit. A cool breeze blew through the open windows, bringing with it the smell of freshly cut grass and the scent of lilacs from the bushes behind them.
Chandler played with the rubber seal around the window. “Why didn’t Michael talk to the blonde?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he wants to lie low. Everyone knows that the cops always look at the husband. Put yourself in Michael’s shoes now. Would you want to get caught with another woman and have the cops look harder at you?”
Chandler nodded, considering.
“And what if he did do it? What do people do after they commit a crime?”
Chandler made a face. “A crime like killing your wife? That’s a mindset I can’t understand.”
“You have to try. Remember when I stole that case of soda?”
“Yeah, I remember.” Chandler frowned. “I got grounded for a week because I was there.”
“Sorry. Again,” Jack added. “I was seven, by the way.”
“It was still stupid. I told you it belonged to the store. Who just leaves a case of soda on the sidewalk?”
Jack waved his hand. “Whatever—that doesn’t matter. The point is, I knew it was wrong. So I hid the case in the shed, and then I couldn’t sleep all night. I kept thinking that Aunt Haddie knew I’d stolen the soda. I thought the store owner and the police were watching me. I went out to the shed to check if it was still there three times that night. And finally I confessed. The guilt and fear of getting caught drives you crazy.”
“Like ‘The Tell-Tale Heart,’” Chandler said.
“Poe, right?”
“Yeah. But this all makes sense only if Michael is guilty. And we don’t know that yet. You’re jumping to
a lot of conclusions.”
“Maybe,” Jack said. “But consider how Michael reacted to that van. He thought the van was following him. He’s acting suspicious, just like I did when I felt guilty. And if he really thinks he’s being watched, he’s not going to run around with his mistress out in public. He’d keep a low profile.”
“I still don’t know, Jack. If he’s feeling guilty about something, it’s probably the fact that he’s having an affair. Maybe she’s married.”
Jack made a face.
Chandler’s fingers drummed the dashboard. “And why drive all the way up here just to walk by her?”
“Because he’s too paranoid to stay away from her. Cheaters think everyone else cheats, too. So Michael may worry that she’s stepping out on him. You add that to paranoia from his wife’s murder, and it’s a recipe for crazy.”
“You know what?” Chandler crossed his arms. “I agree with almost everything you think, but that doesn’t give us any proof of anything. Right now, even the affair itself is pure guesswork. All you have to go by is a look.”
Jack’s hands balled into fists. “I can’t think of any way to prove it.”
“Betcha the brunette knows.” Chandler nodded in the direction of the receptionist.
“Probably. Girls talk.”
“Hey!” Chandler turned in his seat to look at Jack. “Go to that detective and have them get a wiretap.”
Jack laughed. “On what grounds? As you pointed out, all I can say right now is that Michael and that woman looked at each other. I’ll sound like an idiot.”
Chandler exhaled.
Jack closed his eyes. The sweet scent from some nearby lilac bushes drifted through the open window.
Chandler cleared his throat. “Are you taking a power nap? What are you doing?”
“Thinking.” Jack sniffed, then opened his eyes. “That just gave me an idea.” He started the car.
“What idea? The wiretaps?”
“Nope.” Jack grinned. “But I think I can prove they’re having an affair.”
Chandler looked doubtful. “You can prove it from a distance, right?”
Jack didn’t answer.
26
Delivery
Forty-five minutes later, Jack pulled the car into the parking lot again—but this time a half dozen balloons floated in the back seat. One drifted forward, and Chandler shoved it back, annoyed.
And Then She Was GONE: A riveting new suspense novel that keeps you guessing until the end Page 23