The Outlaw Prince's Captive - Holly Rayner Page 0,2

watched as a black sports car rounded the corner. “That’s the car,” Francesca said, pointing at the screen. “It matches the description on file.”

“Good shot of the plates,” Matt noted. “So we know it’s definitely Lindström’s vehicle.”

“He’s not driving that fast,” Francesca observed.

“Yeah, but it’s night,” Matt said. “And look, he’s weaving in the lane. I think he might be drunk.”

Francesca frowned. Driving while intoxicated would definitely explain why someone would drive away after hitting a pedestrian. The ramifications for causing an accident like that while drunk would be worse than if the driver had been sober.

She forced herself not to turn away as the pedestrian stepped into the street. The car still had plenty of time to stop, she observed, but it didn’t even slow down. If anything, it was accelerating.

There was no sound, but she could clearly imagine the noise the impact would have made. She bit her lip and fought to keep her face from showing any emotion. She didn’t want Laird to see that this was affecting her, or he might suggest that he be the one to watch and then tell her what he had seen.

He’d be trying to do me a favor—but I don’t need that kind of help.

The car came to a stop, and the driver rolled down the window and looked out. Francesca could see the streetlight shining off a shock of white-blond hair. She also made note of the sharp angle of the driver’s jawbone. She would compare it later to photos of Lindström.

He pulled his head back in through the car window, rolled it up, and drove away.

Laird let out a low whistle as the video came to an end. “I know the guy’s royalty,” he said, “but does he really think he’s above the law?”

“Maybe,” Francesca said. “But that might not be why he left the scene.”

“What other reason could there be?”

“Well, he might have been afraid,” Francesca said. “He knew he was guilty of involuntary manslaughter, and he knew the repercussions for that would be severe. Maybe he panicked and drove off because he was too afraid to face it.”

Laird shook his head. “You always want to think the best of people, don’t you, Frannie?”

“Sometimes I do,” she said. “But that’s not what this is. I just think it’s important to consider all the possibilities. We can’t assume that he’s just an entitled prince who ran away because he doesn’t think he has to answer for his crimes.”

“What difference does it make?” Laird asked. “It’s not our job to assign motive anyway.”

“But if we can figure out what he was thinking, we might be able to figure out what he did next,” Francesca said. “And that might lead us to figuring out where he is. The file says he wasn’t at his Manhattan residence when the police went to question him.”

“Fair enough,” Laird said. “Let’s start with a little research. We can do facial matching and a search of his name and see if we can pinpoint any locations he might have been to since the time of the accident.”

“How about you take the visual search,” Francesca said.

“Yes, ma’am.” Laird began typing on his computer.

Francesca knew he was looking for decent photos of Lindström so he could then search the online camera network for a match.

She decided to begin her own search in the easiest possible place—by looking for hits on his credit cards. It was likely that he would have been too smart to use them, of course, if he was on the run from the law. But if her theory was correct, if he had simply panicked after the accident, it was possible that he wouldn’t have thought things through that far.

And Francesca got lucky. Because on the very first search, she found a match. An expenditure on one of his credit cards.

A plane ticket.

“Matt,” she said. “I got a hit. Come and look at this.”

He came around the table and leaned over her shoulder. “A plane ticket. Did Lindström buy that?”

She nodded. “Look at the date.”

“This was purchased the morning after the accident.”

“He probably hadn’t even been to sleep,” she said. “He practically went straight from the scene of the crime to the airport.”

“I can’t believe he was stupid enough to use his credit card,” Laird marveled.

“Unusual for sure. But it makes sense if you think of it as a response to blind panic,” Francesca said. “I’m sure he wasn’t thinking clearly. He was probably still just trying to get away from what he had