“Do you practice Wicca?”
“What does this have to do with anything?”
“Gathering facts.”
“The triquetra symbol represents life, death, and rebirth—and protection.”
“It also represents the Wiccan Triple Goddess and the interconnected parts of human existence, as practiced in witchcraft.”
She narrowed her eyes in a way that reminded me of the moment after I tackled her in the park.
I smiled. “Just looking out for that Chevy. Love to take it for a spin sometime.”
“I’ll bet you would. Good day, Detective.”
I turned, her obedient soldiers watching my every step.
24
JAGG
The rest of the morning was spent visiting used car dealerships inquiring about blue, four-door sedans, leaving three more voicemails with Briana Morgan of Harold and Associates, leaving two with Arlo Harper, who was also avoiding my calls, and then working my other cases I’d let drop over the last twenty-four hours. This last fact emphasized by the nineteen voicemails I had when I finally got back to the station, at three in the afternoon. The temperature had hit a sweltering ninety-five by noon, and the feels-like temp well past one-hundred. As suspected, air conditioners were breaking all over town, causing a spike in nine-one-one calls and two fist fights at the local HVAC company. Tempers were running short.
I yanked at my wrinkled collar as I slid behind my desk. Ignoring the phone, I pulled out the black and white images I had of the Black Bandit, then checked Griggs’ height and weight from his case file. Then, I pulled up a few full-length images and videos of him from social media. I went back and forth between both sets of pictures for what felt like afull ten minutes. The weight was undoubtedly different. The Bandit was leaner than Griggs, narrower shoulders. The way they walked, moved, all different. There was also no sign of a limp on Griggs’ left hip. I’d asked the ME to confirm this as well during the autopsy. Combining all this with the fact that his truck had been parked at the trailhead while Sunny had spotted the blue sedan across the street confirmed that Julian Griggs was definitely not the Black Bandit.
I ran my hands through my hair and leaned back, feeling a headache brewing along with the ache in my back.
I was mid-reach for my pain pills when a rap of knuckles sounded at the door.
I grunted.
“Hot as balls out there, ain’t it?” Lieutenant Colson sauntered in and Sunny’s remark about the male obsession with nuts ran through my head.
“You get the AC fixed in your Jeep?” He asked.
“Not yet.”
“You can use the station’s loner if you need to.” He grinned.
The Gray Ghost was a fifteen year old black Impala with shoddy wheel alignment, a cracked windshield, and a pair of stains in the backseat that no one claimed to know how they got there.
“I’ll pass.”
He sank into the seat across from me.
“How’s the wife?” I asked, noticing the bags under his eyes.
“Insomnia.Pregnancy insomnia,”he emphasized each word as if pronouncing the rarest disease known to man.
“Can’t you sleep on the couch?”
“She walks. Paces. Circles. Hums sometimes. Through theentire house.Last night she hummed Sweet Caroline while pacing the kitchen for two hours. Guess that’s going to be the name. Anyway, I woke up this morning to an empty jar of peanut butter in the oven, a jug of milk in the pantry, and three guns disassembled on the kitchen table.”
I grinned. Lieutenant Colson was hell on wheels in the office, but it was no secret that when it came to his wife, all bets were off. Bobbi wore the pants in the relationship. Very stretchy pants.
“How much longer do you have to go?”
“Three weeks.”
