Drained (Edgars Family #6) - Suzanne Ferrell Page 0,111

be two groups familiar with the details of the case searching both sites. He just wished they’d managed to pinpoint his actual killing lair.

“On three, people,” the leader of the warrant squad said and majority of the group headed to the breach the main entrance to the lab, while a small group went around back to secure the rear from any attempt of their suspect to flee that way. Following the guys used to bringing down suspects on a daily basis, Jaylon and Matt brought up the rear for safety sake.

“Do you think they’ll catch him?” Paula asked.

She sat snuggled on the leather sofa beneath a soft knitted afghan Kirk F had delivered from his Nana after dropping her off at her Sunday night bible study. He loved his Nana, not just because she was his grandmother and the woman who raised him, but because despite her stern disposition, strict rules and unfiltered opinions, she loved unconditionally. She loved him. She loved her neighbors and friends. She loved those who needed it most. Paula may not know it yet, but she’d been adopted by Nana that first night in the hospital and she was going to be loved for the rest of her days by that wonderful woman.

“If he’s at his house or the blood bank, they’ll catch him,” Katie said, sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of the coffee table. “The problem is will he come peacefully?”

On the overstuffed chair across from them, Kirk F looked up from the laptop page he’d been studying. “You think he’ll be stupid enough to take on a SWAT team? I mean, how stupid could he be?”

“In my life I’ve known desperate people to do stupid things.” Katie gave a little shrug as she laid a nine-millimeter Glock on the table in front of her.

“Whoa!” Kirk F said, holding up his hands and pulling his laptop closer as if to protect him if she decided to fire the gun. “Where’d you get that?”

“Oh, my…God!” Paula wheezed out.

“Easy.” Katie held up her empty hands. “Both of you just relax. This is my weapon. You do know Matt and I are here for security, right?”

“I thought you was a nurse and Matt was the hired gun,” Kirk F said.

“Yeah, me too.” Paula coughed, then slowly relaxed.

“I am a nurse, but I’m also capable of putting a hole in a man if the need should arise.” Katie opened the bag on the floor beside her and took out two rags and a little bottle. “But my husband just went into possible harm’s way and I’m not going to lie to you. It makes me anxious. When I’m anxious I have to do something that calms me down. My sister-in-law Sami loves to bake when she worries. I clean guns.”

“I think I like your sister-in-law’s way of worrying a whole lot better,” Kirk F said as he watched her take out the gun clip and remove the bullet in the chamber. Knowing the weapon was unloaded now and definitely in expert hands, he relaxed.

“Me, too. What does she bake?” Paula asked, picking Stanley up off the floor and snuggling him in with her.

Katie began disassembling the gun into pieces. “Depends on how much worrying she’s doing. If she were here and knew her brother Matt was out trying to bring in a serial killer, we’d probably rate muffins or brownies.”

Kirk F listened to them chat about baking and family and even Katie’s little boy as he searched the files he’d downloaded to his laptop earlier. Aaron had asked him to see if he could locate a building with high electricity use that was supposed to be abandoned. He’d tried searching for old warehouses but came up with nothing. Since he now had the killer’s name, he’d done a cross-search for property and utility accounts under Armbruster. He was just waiting for results.

His computer flashed him a notification icon.

Hot damn!

There were two places under Armbruster’s name. One was the address on his driver’s license he’d seen earlier. He eliminated that.

Opening a tab for the map of Cleveland, he typed in the other address on Scranton Road.

Why did that sound familiar?

Oh yeah, an old stockyard company was located on Scranton Road back in the eighteen-nineties. He’d done a report on it in middle school as part of his history class. Nana said her great grandfather worked in the meat packing business back when he came north from the cottonfields of Mississippi when the Ku Klux Klan was strong