if you moved in with a friend instead of living in that house where Petrović can get to you at any time. He can simply cut through a few backyards.”
“You think he’s going to come after me?” Anna asked him. “He couldn’t care less about me, Joe. He’s had me. Many times. He could have killed me, many times. Petrović isn’t afraid of me. And he has no reason to fear, because if he doesn’t lay a hand on me now, I can’t touch him. He got a pass for all of his old crimes.”
“I’ve told you what I think,” Joe said. “He’s a criminal in search of a target, and you make a pretty good one.”
“It’s my birthday, Joe. Forty today.”
“Oh. Well. Happy birthday. Did your coworkers give you a cake?”
“Yes. And cards. And this,” she said, showing him a chain with a little sparkly pendant. “It’s my birthstone. But I haven’t had lunch. How about taking me out for something, Joe? I haven’t had steak in a long time.”
“You’re joking.”
“Small joke. Not steak. Pasta maybe.”
“Sorry, Anna. I’ve got work to do here at the office.”
She tried to hide her disappointment, but her face colored. She picked up her handbag.
“I apologize for being … inappropriate. I’ll be going now.”
Joe said, “Don’t worry, Anna. Really. It’s okay.”
He knew she was lonely. That he was a large figure in her life. He walked Anna to the elevator and told her, as he always did, that he would be in touch if he learned anything useful and she should do the same.
Later that afternoon, Joe checked in with his teams and their night shift replacements. Petrović’s car was still parked in his spot in front of Tony’s Place. All was quiet.
Joe turned it all over in his mind as he drove toward Lake Street. Was Petrović up to something? Or was he on his best behavior, taking part in the American dream?
He thought about Lindsay and hoped she’d be waiting for him when he opened the front door.
He longed for a regular evening at home with Lindsay.
CHAPTER 81
It was Friday morning, eleven days since the schoolteachers had been abducted—two of them subsequently murdered—and we were clueless in the truest sense of the word.
I stared down at the mess of papers on my desk while I was on the phone with Clapper, thanking him for getting back to me so fast on Adele Saran.
He said, “I think you mean, ‘Thanks for nothing.’”
“No. I mean one door closes, another opens—if I can only find that other one.”
Clapper chuckled, said, “You’ll find it, Boxer. I’ve got faith.”
I put down the receiver and threw a category-five sigh, blowing a pile of message slips across my desk onto Conklin’s.
Conklin said, “Tell me. I can take it.”
“Okay. Welcome back to square one, partner. The only DNA on Adele’s body was hers. Nothing under her nails. No trace or prints on the wire used to bind and hang her. No prints on the throwing stars, and the only evidence in the woods was scuffled leaves from hither to thither, starting and ending at Hicks Road. Oh. On the other hand, there were hundreds, if not thousands, of prints on the tacomobile.”
Conklin leaned back in his chair, ran both hands through his hair, and sighed, “Oh, happy day.”
I went on.
“Carly’s prints were on the door handles and the dashboard—corroborating what Denny Lopez told us. He drove Carly to the motel a few times. Most of the other prints were his and his girlfriend’s—remember her? Three days ago seems like a year. Lucinda Drucker. But there was a match to a Barbara Fines, a prostitute, goes by the name of Daisy.”
Conklin said, “Corroborating Denny’s story again.”
I said, “Clapper will release the taco truck to its owner, or he’ll hold on to it if we want to jerk Denny around a little more.”
“He’s all we’ve got. Let’s do it,” said my partner. “Maybe we’ll shake something loose.”
I called Lopez with a burner phone so that my name didn’t come up on his screen, and he picked up. He was mad about my little trick but said that he was at a bar called Bud’s on Twenty-Second and Mission. I told him to hang tight, then Conklin and I were on our way in a cruiser.
Conklin pointed to Lopez, standing on the corner outside the bar. He was unkempt, with dirty hair and clothes, clearly out of work—our fault—since we’d taken the SUV away.
Lopez looked pained as we double-parked the black-and-white, and even