Spirit (Blackwood Security, #10.5) - Elise Noble Page 0,13

between us. Black’s Cayenne had a dashcam, but the angle had been wrong to catch the Honda’s licence plate.

I couldn’t make out the words on the other end of the phone, but there was no mistaking the tone. High-pitched. Panicked. Yes, we’d made the right call. I eased closer to our quarry as Dan tried to calm her contact down.

“Yeah, we’re following. No, no, hold off on calling the cops. We can do that.” Sure we could, but we wouldn’t. “Don’t worry, everything’ll be fine. What’s her name?” A pause. “Valerie? Okay. And the kid?” One of the cars in front of us turned off, and I maintained the distance. Not too close, not too far. We were heading through Meredith Creek now, five miles an hour over the speed limit between traffic lights. “Shay? C-H? Chay? Got it. I’ll call you back.”

“Well?”

“Mother and son. Valerie and Chay Jenest. A volunteer drove them to see the physician, and when they got back, a white male accosted them in the parking lot. The volunteer’s in pieces. The guy got right in her face, yelling at her to butt out of other people’s business.”

“The ex?”

“Sure sounds like it.”

“And Valerie? V?”

“I mean, she’s definitely not safe, so I’d say that’s a good possibility.”

That was the answer I’d been afraid of.

“Care to take a guess where the hell we’re going?”

“I have no fucking clue. Pull closer so I can get the licence number, and I’ll call Mack.”

Ten minutes and some funky manoeuvring later, we got our first clue. The Honda was registered to one Carol Halliwell of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Carol. It was as if the whole of Christmas was laughing at me.

Carol obviously wasn’t the driver of the car, but she could be a friend or a relative. Possibly an employer. Or even just some poor schmuck who’d sold the vehicle without transferring the title. Who knew? But if the car came from Cedar Rapids, there was a reasonable chance the driver did too, and Cedar Rapids was a fifteen-hour drive away.

“I’m not going to Iowa. We’re meant to be hunting down a twisted firebug this evening, or have you forgotten that? Was the kid wearing a seat belt?”

The woman was. I’d snapshotted her in my mind. And if she’d belted up herself in such a pressured situation, then chances were that she was safety conscious enough to have fastened her kid in too. How about the driver?

“You’re not shooting out the tyres. Who do you think you are? Carmen?”

Dammit.

“It was just a thought.”

Because we had to act quickly. We were rapidly closing in on I-64, and if our culprit managed to get on the interstate, who knew when he’d stop? And did I mention I needed to pee? That grande latte had gone straight through me.

Fuck my damn life.

We trailed our target through the streets downtown, past stores with twinkling window displays, costumed performers on the sidewalks, a life-sized model of Santa’s sleigh, and—because it was a Saturday—far too many excited children. Far too many witnesses to do anything drastic as well.

The car in front of us pulled into a parking bay, and we found ourselves behind the Honda again. Dan pulled her bobble hat down over her ears and sank lower in her seat as we all slowed for yet another traffic light. Then it hit me. I might not have known who the man in the driver’s seat was, but I knew what he was. An abuser. A control freak. A dickless wonder who thought he was entitled to get his own way and screw everyone else. And when challenged, men like that always reacted in the same way: with anger.

So I drove into the back of him.

Not fast enough to deploy the airbags, but I gave him a good jolt. Black’s Porsche was going to need a trip to the body shop, but wasn’t that why they called them bumpers?

“What the hell was that for?” Dan asked. “I could have driven after all.”

As predicted, our target was already out of the Honda, striding towards me with a face like thunder. I got my first good look at him. Five ten, a hundred and ninety pounds but soft around the middle. Neat light-brown hair slicked back from a face that could have been handsome if not for the sneer.

“Get the woman and the kid,” I murmured to Dan as I reached for the door handle.

I didn’t have to tell her twice. She might have been a few seconds behind my