For a moment, it seemed as if Wooderson had left, and Jericho cursed himself. He’d had his chance, and he’d blown it. He was a soldier, a grunt, not a fucking intel officer. Not a spy. He should have stayed a beat cop because he couldn’t cut it as a real detective. He was out of his league, and he shouldn’t have fooled himself into thinking otherwise.
Then Wooderson stepped out of the doorway just down the street, his gaze fixed on Jericho.
“What were you saying about me not having any balls?” the man demanded.
For a beautiful, glorious moment, Jericho thought Wooderson might pull a gun. It would be so simple if he did. Jericho was a fast draw and a good shot. If Wooderson’s hand moved, if it went out of sight, Jericho would pull and aim, and if he saw the glint of metal, he’d fire and this would all be over. Fernandez’s case would be closed for real, no one else would get hurt, and Jericho would find enough evidence, one way or another, to get Will out of trouble. It would all be so much easier.
But the bastard didn’t go along with Jericho’s plan. He just stalked forward, eyes too bright, too fixed, too focused on Jericho’s face. “What were you saying?” he demanded again, his voice shriller with every word.
“To you?” Jericho said. “I don’t think I was saying anything to you. Why would I bother?”
“You’re trying to wind me up,” Wooderson said. “Trying to get me to say something I shouldn’t.”
So the guy wasn’t completely clueless. But Jericho channeled his best Wade-Granger disdain and said, “Yeah, that’s it exactly. So you should shut the fuck up—that’d really teach me a lesson.”
Wooderson’s face turned red, and he leaned forward, his stare ferocious. Strangely, the aggressiveness made Jericho feel safer; if this bastard had a weapon, he’d have already drawn it, and there was no way he’d be a threat hand-to-hand.
“You don’t know who you’re dealing with,” Wooderson hissed.
“Sure, tough guy.” Jericho leaned nonchalantly against the hardware store window. “So go for it. Tell me who I’m dealing with. Impress me.”
For a moment, Jericho truly believed it was going to work. Wooderson’s snarl, his tense body, his wild eyes, they all spoke of someone on the edge of control. Jericho snorted dismissively, then waited for the explosion.
But Wooderson pulled himself back. “I don’t need to prove myself to you.”
“Why do you hate them?” Jericho asked. “People like Will. What’s the issue there? Is it just that you have to think you’re better thansomeone, and you’re so pathetic yourself that you need to find a person who’s really struggling in order to compete? Or is it something else? Maybe your brother. Did your brother touch you in a bad place, Keith? Are you angry at him and taking it out on people like him?”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Yeah, I do. You kill prostitutes because they’re easy victims, you frame disabled people because they’re easy victims—you’re fucking weak. Pathetic.”
Wooderson’s smile showed too many teeth to be a gesture of goodwill. “If you had a single drop of evidence for any of that, we’d be having this conversation at the police station, not on the sidewalk.”
“We’ll see you at the station soon enough,” Jericho said. “Enjoy your last little bit of freedom. And know that you failed, this time. Will isn’t going to be punished for this; we’re working on cutting him loose right now. It’s clear he didn’t hurt Lorraine. You went to a lot of trouble for nothing.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Wooderson’s body was more relaxed now—the opportunity was gone. “But, certainly, if you’d like to discuss it further, you can contact my lawyer. We’ll see how he feels about your threats.”
And with that, he turned and strode jauntily along the sidewalk. He’d been shaken for a moment, but that was all.
Jericho, on the other hand, felt as if he’d been kicked in the gut. Wooderson was right: there was no evidence. For all his certainty, Jericho had no damn proof of the man’s involvement, and no real idea of how togetany proof.
Maybe the FBI would do better, but he wasn’t sure there was even enough evidence to convince them to look into the case. Or if they did, they’d take their time, adding it to a long list of cases to be investigated when they had space in their schedule.
That was when Jericho stopped worrying about justice for Lorraine and Will. It wasn’t that he didn’t think they deserved it, but standing there on the sidewalk, watching Wooderson practically strut down the street away from him, he realized that they couldn’t be the priority anymore. Instead, he, like Angela Fernandez, had to worry about thenextpeople Wooderson would target. The bastard had skipped out of Akron when Fernandez caught on to him, and she hadn’t been able to track him. He’d known enough to stay off the grid: hadn’t updated his license at the DMV, hadn’t told the kids’ school where he was going, hadn’t left a forwarding address for his mail, or changed his address with anyone. He’d just dropped off the planet.
He could do it again. Hewoulddo it again. And Jericho would watch for reports of prostitutes apparently murdered by intellectually disabled men and get in touch with the investigators when he saw a similar case. That would help the men, maybe, would shorten their time as suspects, but it wouldn’t protect the women. It wasn’t good enough to wait for the next time; Jericho needed topreventthe next time.
He went back inside the store and arranged for Mr. Appleby to email him the video from his phone; it wouldn’t be much use, but it could be added to the case file, at least, along with Jericho’s audio recording. Maybe the combination would be enough to convince the FBI that Wooderson was unbalanced. Maybe.
Then he climbed into his cruiser and called Kay. “He knows we’re on to him,” he said after explaining what had happened. “There’s no point being subtle anymore.”
“And subtlety’s never been your strong suit, after all.”
“I didn’t make this happen, Kay. I wasn’t trying to blow the case open, I promise. The school tipped him off, and he just knew.”
“I know,” she said. “But this was not the plan. It’s more cowboy bullshit, whether you meant for it to happen or not. I’ve made calls to the FBI, and I’m waiting for someone to get back to me. I’d rather not drag the ones in our office into it, since they’re not the right division, but maybe I’ll talk to them and see if they can hurry their colleagues up.”
She was talking about asking for a favor from the men who were prosecuting her father and investigating her. But Jericho couldn’t think of a better option.
