thing by questioning the witness, by keeping her talking.
He’d seen the self-doubt in her eyes, seen what the interview had taken out of her.
They passed a small, intimate waiting area that was painted in soothing blues and golds. The psych specialist, Maya, sat there with Lizzie’s mother, father and brother, all of whom looked exhausted and haggard but happier than he’d seen them in the weeks since the kidnapping.
Tucker nodded as the family stood and filtered back toward the hospital room on Maya’s heels, all save for Lizzie’s father, a shaved-bald patriarch who stank of the cigarettes he’d chain-smoked while they waited for news.
Reginald Walsh stopped near Alissa and said in a low voice, “I don’t care what it takes. I want you to get the bastard. Find him.”
A few of the officers had reported having problems with Walsh, who operated used-car lots around the city and seemed to think money should be enough to buy his daughter home. The morning after her kidnapping, he’d thrown a chair through the front window of his house when one of the officers had suggested Lizzie might have run away.
Knowing this, Tucker stepped between Walsh and Alissa. “We’re working on it. You take care of your daughter and your family. We’ll take care of finding and punishing her kidnapper.”
He kept his voice low but stared the guy in his bloodshot eyes. The last thing they needed right now was a vigilante out for justice.
Walsh glared. “I don’t give a damn about punishing the bastard right now. Not yet. That’ll come later. Right now, I just care about finding those girls for their families.” His voice went strangled. “For God’s sake, they’re just kids.”
He pushed past Tucker, who felt a punch of shame at having misjudged the man. On the heels of shame came fatigue. He’d been up nearly thirty hours without a break, and the last few had been a hell of a ride.
“Hey, Tucker. You okay?” Alissa asked, concern darkening her blue eyes. A wisp of hair slipped from its twist and brushed across her forehead, making her look soft and vulnerable.
Her use of his first name echoed back to that night, when they’d been Alissa and Tucker, and they’d danced close enough that they might have been inside each other’s skins. Ever since they’d been reintroduced through the BCCPD, he’d been McDermott and she’d been Wyatt.
It shouldn’t have made a difference. But because it did, and because he was tired and feeling a little mean, he turned away and headed for the exit. “I’m fine. Come on, let’s get out of here.”
He didn’t need to look to know that she had his back. He could feel her presence like a slow-burning fire in his nerve endings, one that reminded him of his transfer request. He’d be gone as soon as this case was wrapped up, and she’d be staying in her roomy, family-friendly house. The house alone should be enough to make him back off.
So how come every time he meant to back off, he seemed to take a step closer?
IT WAS COMPLETELY DARK when Alissa and Tucker made it back to the PD, but most of the task-force members were there, looking tired, haggard, and run-down by too many questions and not enough answers.
Maya hadn’t returned from the hospital yet, but Cassie had saved their seats, as usual. Alissa felt a small pang, as though she was abandoning Tucker when he took his customary position against the back wall. He’d been broody and curt during the ride from the hospital, but his mood seemed to have gained a layer of desperation that made her nervous.
It was as though he was reaching the end of his endurance in some way, though she didn’t think it was physical. It was more like he was pushing himself to a mental brink.
On a professional level, she didn’t think it was good for the case. On a personal level, she wished she could help but knew she didn’t have the right to press. He’d made that perfectly clear when he’d bailed out of her car that night at the club. Tucker was a no-relationships kind of guy.
Heck, at least he’d been honest about it.
She tried to convince herself she was grateful as she took her seat. One look at Cassie turned her thoughts in an entirely new direction. “What’s wrong?”
Her first unsettling thought was that there’d been a breach in the chain of evidence. But the anger in Cass’s sky-blue eyes seemed more personal than that, the scowl on her face more directed when she said, “Trouper is threatening to bring in a new guy, an evidence tech from the FBI, to help me.” She stressed the word as if it was poison. “I don’t need help. I’m already doing everything that can be done.”
Alissa tried to shift her brain into this new gear, tried to sympathize with Cass, who could be territorial when it came to her lab. “Well…does this guy have access to equipment you don’t? Can he get you into the federal databanks more quickly?” She took a breath, thought about the blond pixie in the hospital bed and exhaled. “I don’t think we can let this be about a power struggle. It’s about finding the other girls and catching the kidnapper.”
Cassie winced and looked faintly ashamed. “You’re right. I know you’re right, it’s just…this whole thing has me unsettled. I talked to the new guy, Seth Varitek, on the phone, and I already don’t like him. He’s pushy. He…crowds me. And besides, I hate that it feels like us versus them on this case. If I’m protecting my back from the good guys, then who’s going to be looking for the bad guy?”
“It’s not that bad,” Alissa said, thinking Cassie was overreacting and wondering whether there was more to the story. But before she could ask, Maya slipped in through the back door and Chief Parry stepped to the front of the room, ready to start the meeting.
“Good work today, people.” Parry looked to the back of the room, where Alissa could feel Tucker’s presence like a disturbance in the air. Then the chief’s eyes moved to her and on to the others. “Elizabeth Walsh is safe and sound, and has already been through a round of interviews. However—” he sobered, his eyes going hard “—both the victim and Officer Wyatt were nearly killed today by an explosive device we presume was set by the kidnapper. We were led to the site by a note addressed to Detective McDermott.”
Though the twenty or so cops on the task force already knew the details, a rumbling murmur ran through the room. A slick-haired veteran named Piedmont, who always found reasons to avoid greeting Alissa in the hallway, glanced over at her with less than the usual dose of venom in his glare. “He’s playing with us.”
“Yeah. He’s playing with us.” Chief Parry let the silence linger a beat too long before he said, “So let’s end the game. Let’s find him.” He gestured to Alissa. “Wyatt will start us off with her report.”
She felt twenty-plus pairs of eyes on her, felt the bruises on her cheek and chin throb, and forced herself to stand tall. Always before, she’d given her report to a sea of glowers or studied disinterest. This time the room felt slightly different. A hair less hostile. Maybe even a little bit ashamed.
A bubble of irony lodged in her throat. Either Chief Parry had succeeded with his plan to partner her with McDermott, or else the best way to catch a break with her new coworkers was to nearly get herself killed on the job.
Whatever. Resolved to follow her own advice to Cassie and focus on the case rather than office politics, Alissa squared her shoulders and made her report. “Pendelton is copying a sketch for me. Elizabeth said—” she fumbled slightly as the memory of the girl’s sobs tore through her “—Lizzie was able to give me a partial description of the suspect and the place where she was held. He kept her in a small, single room made of wood. She thought it was one of those prefab sheds, the kind you can get at a garden store.”
She could almost feel a collective indrawn breath at the new information. Chief Parry pointed to a pair of homicide detectives. “Piedmont. You and Mendoza follow up on that. Get me lists of the local distributors and their customers, especially multiple orders. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”
It would