The girl who’d been found on the beach was a young blonde who had apparently been raped and beaten to death before she’d been dumped into the Gulf. Larry and Tony hadn’t spent much time at the site where she’d washed up; there was little evidence there to collect. Instead, they spent the afternoon talking to her shocked family members and friends. Her best friend, Lisa, who had run away with her and still hadn’t been located, had been known to abuse drugs with her. The coroner said that the girl may have been dead for two weeks.
The trail of her killer was cold, and Larry suspected that it would take them out of their jurisdiction. She had probably been thrown in from a boat somewhere out at sea, and it had probably taken several days for her to wash up. They had already spent entire days searching for leads on the girls’ whereabouts, and Larry suspected that they would have just as much trouble piecing together the facts surrounding her death.
Since they had no leads, and little information about what had happened to the girls since their disappearance, Tony agreed to ride with Larry that night.
They followed Pendergrast home from work, then ate their own cold burgers in the car, waiting for him to come back out. “I thought of going into the mall and finding her,” Larry said. “Telling her to be on her guard.”
“That would be a mistake at this point, Larry. You can’t alert every girl Pendergrast looks at. The man has never been convicted of anything. If you start going around telling people to look out for this guy because he’s a rapist and he’s after them, you’ll wind up losing your job.”
The door to Pendergrast’s apartment opened, and he came out into the darkness and headed quietly down the steps.
“He’s going to the Toyota,” Larry said quietly. “He thinks he’s covering his tracks with his Cherokee parked at home.”
He cranked the engine, and pulled out without turning on the lights. Across the parking lot, they saw the lights come on in the gray Toyota, and Pendergrast pulled out.
“What do you think?” Larry asked, pulling into traffic several cars behind him. “You want to go to the mall?”
Tony was silent as they followed. “Isn’t it a little early? The mall doesn’t close for another hour.”
“I don’t know. Let’s see.”
“He’s turning.”
“Going to the mall,” Larry said victoriously.
They followed him down the streets that would take them to the mall, and Larry pointed to the Dillards store. “He’ll go there,” he said. “Watch him.”
They watched as he pulled into a parking space not far from the Dillards entrance. Larry and Tony pulled in several aisles over.
“Now what?” Tony asked. “Does he just sit there?”
“Did last night. Just sat there watching and waiting.”
Tony absorbed it for a moment. “Maybe it’s not just her he’s after. Maybe he’s just waiting for anybody who looks vulnerable.”
“Maybe,” Larry said. “He was taking pictures. Looked like he had some kind of night lens on his camera.”
“He took pictures of her?”
Larry nodded.
“Hmmm.” The light came on in Pendergrast’s car, and Tony leaned forward. “Is he getting out?”
“Looks like it.” Larry grabbed the handle of his car door. “He’s going in. I’ll follow him. You stay here in case I lose him and he comes back out.”
Tony nodded, and Larry got out and quietly mashed the door shut behind him. He walked several yards behind Pendergrast, several rows over, and waited to let him get inside before he made it to the door.
The lights of the department store assaulted him as he stepped inside, and he looked around to find Pendergrast. He was up ahead, walking through the cosmetics section.
Larry skirted the area, then rode the escalator upstairs. As soon as he got off, he went around to the rail that looked down on the cosmetics area in the center of the store. From here he had a perfect view, and Pendergrast wasn’t likely to look up and see him.
He watched as Pendergrast seemed to be studying the men’s cologne. After a moment, the girl he’d followed home last night finished with her customer and waited on him.
She was pretty, Larry thought, and younger than she’d seemed last night. She looked just the way Pendergrast liked them: blonde, small, delicate—like Melissa and Sandy.
Larry’s stomach tightened into a knot as Pendergrast leaned on the counter, with that charming, drop-your-guard grin that was so deceiving. She was enjoying him, he thought. She was laughing at his flirtations.
After a moment, he paid for the cologne and, with one last comment that made her laugh again, he sauntered away.
What is he doing? Larry asked himself as he watched Pendergrast head back out the door. Did he ask her out? Was this whole thing nothing more than a man getting interested in a woman and pursuing her?
He waited until Pendergrast was gone, then rode the escalator back down and went to the same counter. He saw the display of men’s cologne that Pendergrast had purchased and picked up a bottle, himself.
“May I help you?”
He knew by the information in the computer about her, based on her car registration, that she was only twenty. She looked even younger. “Yeah, I was just trying to decide if I wanted this. That guy who was here a minute ago, he bought some, didn’t he?”
She smiled. “Yeah. He did.”
“Is he a regular customer?”
She shrugged. “I’ve never seen him before, but he said the scent caught his attention. I tried to interest him in the bath products and shaving cream, too. I’ll bet he comes back.”
“Why?”
“They usually do. They get one product and they fall in love with it. Or they get such a response from their girlfriends that they can’t help wanting all the rest.”
Larry smiled. “Do you get many of them hassling you for dates?”
She giggled. “Occupational hazard when you sell men’s cosmetics. Here, you want to try some?”
She sprayed the cologne on his arm, rubbed it in, then offered him the back of his wrist to smell.
He nodded. “I like it. But I don’t generally wear cologne.”
“Your girl will like it.”
His grin faded slightly. “She likes me without it.”
“Then buy her some. I sell women’s cologne, too. Over here. You can try some of it—”
He held up his hand to stem her sales pitch, and leaned on the counter. “No, I don’t need any today. But just tell me one thing. That guy who was here. Did he ask you out?”
She looked confused at the question. “No. Why?”
“I was just curious. He looked a little old for you.”
She was irritated now. “I really don’t think that is any of your business. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m a little busy.”
As she walked to the other side of the counter, he thought about telling her that the man who’d just bought cologne from her was a known rapist, that he was stalking her, trying to build trust, but that she couldn’t trust him. The phone rang, and as she answered it, Tony’s cautions raced through his mind. He couldn’t panic her now. Not without more cause.
Sighing, he headed for a different entrance from the one he’d used coming in, and circled through the dark parking lot back to the car, praying Pendergrast would be watching the doors he was closest to and not see him.
The light didn’t come on when he opened the door. The mechanics at the precinct had long ago wired his car to keep that from happening. He slid into the driver’s seat.
“Where have you been, man?” Tony asked. “He came out ten minutes ago.”
“Talking to the girl.”
“Oh, no. You didn’t.”
“He bought something from her. Didn’t ask her out, though. He’s still sitting there?”
“Yeah. Getting close to closing time. Larry, you didn’t tell her who you are, or who he is, did you?”
“Nope.”
Tony breathed a sigh of reli
ef.
“We just have to watch,” Larry said. “Get a little more to go on. He’s trying to establish her trust. Maybe so she’ll go with him later.”
“But that isn’t his normal MO, is it? I mean, he didn’t attack women who knew him. He uses the element of surprise, breaks into their homes—”
“Those are just the ones we know about. Besides, they identified him, didn’t they? Maybe they had seen him before.”
Tony grew quiet.
Customers began leaving, going to their cars, as a security car patrolled the parking lot.
They waited quietly for the employees to scatter.
“Here she comes,” Larry said as the young woman came out of the building, along with several other women and a security guard. “Funny how they all have such a sense of security being with that guard, but the minute they pull out of the parking lot they’re on their own.”
“She has us,” Tony said.
“Yeah. Tonight she does.”
They watched her car start up, and just as Larry had expected, Pendergrast’s lights came on, too. “Time to go,” Larry said.
Keeping his lights off, Larry waited until she had pulled to the parking lot’s exit. Pendergrast followed.
As they drove down the deserted street, Tony shook his head. “Unfortunate route home.”
“Tell me about it. ’Course it depends on your perspective. From his, it’s the perfect route.”
After a few minutes, they reached the end of the road and she turned into her parking lot. Pendergrast followed, but Larry didn’t pull in. This time, he stayed way back, on the side of the street, watching.
Tony brought his infrared binoculars to his eyes and watched her trot up to her apartment. Pendergrast stayed in his car, watching.
Her light was on for several minutes when Pendergrast pulled out of the parking lot and headed back the way he had come.
Larry’s heart sank.
“Guess he’s not doing anything tonight,” Tony said.
“No. He’s not ready yet. But I don’t think he’ll wait a whole lot longer.”
Larry started the car but headed in the opposite direction from Pendergrast.
“Where we going?” Tony asked.
“Home,” Larry said. “That was the deal. After the mall closes, I take you home.”
Tony was quiet for a moment. “You’re coming back, aren’t you?”
Larry didn’t answer.
“Larry, are you gonna stay up all night again watching him?”
“What do you want me to do, Tony? He raped Sandy at three A.M. What if I go home and get some sleep in my nice warm bed, and tomorrow morning the headline in the paper is that a nice, young, innocent blonde woman was raped by an unknown assailant during the night.”
“Larry, you can’t stay up all night and work all day.”
“Then back me up on this,” Larry said. “Tell the captain we need to be on this case for a while—then we can just work nights. Tell him what we saw tonight. Tell him I’m not crazy.”
Tony sighed. “I’ll try. But with this other case—”
“There’s no case more important than this one,” he said. “Not to me. There’s a rapist walking the streets of St. Clair. You tell me what’s more important.”
Tony didn’t answer.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
The captain didn’t come in the next day; he had meetings with the mayor all day long. Larry found himself torn between hurrying through his other cases to get back to Pendergrast and haunting City Hall, hoping to run into the captain. Giving up, he resolved to sacrifice another night’s sleep to follow Pendergrast, just in case. Tony, afraid that Larry was about to reach the point of exhaustion, agreed to keep watch with him.
Pendergrast was getting bolder. Tonight, as Larry and Tony watched from across the dark mall parking lot, Pendergrast went into Dillards again. This time they both followed, watching him from two separate vantage points in the department store.
Pendergrast didn’t go near the young blonde woman; instead, he watched her from a distance across the store. His fascination with her was clear. He watched her wait on customers, watched her clean the counter, watched her restock merchandise.
When she took a break and walked out into the mall, Pendergrast followed her, with Larry not far behind. She went to the food court and bought some French fries and a drink, then joined some friends at one of the tables. Pendergrast blended into the crowd at one of the vendors, continuing to watch her.
Tonight, Larry thought. He’s going to do something tonight.
One by one, her friends left to go back to their jobs, leaving the woman alone at the table, and Larry held his breath, waiting, wondering if Pendergrast would approach her now. But he didn’t. It wasn’t his style. He had shown himself to her only once, so that he would be familiar to her, but not recognizable. He probably didn’t want to be identified later.
Two women had identified him already. He had probably learned from those mistakes.
Finally, she threw away her bags and her drink and headed into the ladies’ rest room.
Pendergrast followed.
The long hall leading to the rest rooms was dimly lit. Larry had long been aware of it because so many crimes had happened right there, and he had once tried to convince the management to either put an armed guard there or else to close the facility altogether and put a rest room out near the mainstream of mall traffic. But so far they hadn’t listened.
Now, he felt helpless as Pendergrast gave her a head start to reach the ladies’ room around the corner of the long hall, then started down it himself. Larry couldn’t follow without being seen. All he could do was wait, and listen, and pray.
Five minutes later, he saw the woman coming back up the hall. Breathing a sigh of relief, Larry backed into the crowd, becoming invisible. After a few seconds, Pendergrast came back up the hall, his eyes intense as he followed her all the way back to her store. When she was behind her counter again, he headed back to his car.
Tony was already in the car when Larry made his way back. “See anything?” Tony asked.
Larry reached for his infrared binoculars. “He followed her to the bathroom. I thought he was going to act then, but he didn’t.”
“He’s getting hungry,” Tony said. “No question. Something’s about to happen.”
“Poor girl is walking right into this.” Larry watched as Pendergrast settled back in his seat, watching the door. “So what did you see?”
Tony shrugged. “Same thing you did. When I saw you following them out of the store, though, I figured you had it under control. So I took the opportunity to take a look in that car of his. The door wasn’t locked.”
Larry dropped the binoculars and looked at him. “Find anything?”
“Nothing in the front. But when I clicked the release on the trunk, it came open. I found a shovel and a jumbo-sized garbage bag.”
Larry’s face went pale.
“Doesn’t mean anything,” Tony went on. “He could have been taking them to clean up a construction site or something. Just because it was big enough to put a body in—”
“You think he’s a killer?” Larry asked.
Tony shook his head. “I didn’t say that. We can’t jump to conclusions.”
But Larry already had. “Tony, we know that he’s got an obsession. We know he’s raped twice before, and my bet is that he’s done it more than that. We don’t know how many times, or how bad. He almost killed Melissa’s sister. Could be that he’s stopped someone from talking before.” He brought the binoculars back to his eyes. “He broke into Melissa’s apartment, wrote on her mirror, hid in her attic. He was probably going to kill her, too.”
Tony peered toward the man sitting so inconspicuously in his car. “Yeah, well, you should probably be glad she’s locked up. She’s probably in the only place she could be safe from him. Hey, if somebody set me up for something I didn’t do, I’d want to get even. Put that revenge in the mind of a man who’s a ma
niac already, and you don’t know what he’s capable of.”
“Then you’re admitting it,” Larry said. “He’s a maniac.”
Tony didn’t answer, but he didn’t need to. Larry knew Tony was convinced.
“As it stands,” Larry whispered, “he’s just going along with business as usual. Setting up his target, moving in for the kill . . .”
“Well, if you’re right, he won’t get away with it this time.” Tony looked at his watch. “Mall closes in an hour.”
They waited, watching, as Pendergrast waited, watching.
An hour later, when the employees began to come out, they saw Karen Anderson among them. This time, however, she wasn’t alone as she separated from the group and headed for her car. There was a man with her. They watched as she got into her car, and the man got in on the other side.
“She’s giving this guy a ride home,” Tony said, cranking the car but leaving the lights off. “What’s Pendergrast doing?”
“He’s cranking up,” Larry said, watching him through the binoculars. “He’s going to follow, anyway.”
They followed quietly as she took her usual route home. Pendergrast drove about a quarter of a mile behind her, and Larry and Tony, with their lights still off, followed a good distance behind him. When they reached her apartments, they parked on the street again. The man got out with her, and the two of them headed up to her apartment.
Pendergrast didn’t wait. As if angry, he sped back out of the parking lot and headed back up the way they had come, past the construction sites. Larry and Tony struggled to keep him in their view as they turned the car around and followed. Halfway up Highland Drive, Pendergrast turned onto a dirt road and disappeared among the trees. Tony stepped on the brakes.
“Where’s he going? Should I follow him?”
“No. We don’t know where that road goes. Besides, there’s only room for one car. If he turns around and comes back, he’ll see us. Let’s just wait.”
So they waited, holding their breath, for Pendergrast to return. After about twenty minutes, he did.