In the Dark Read Free Page A

large enough to afford its own police force, so the Duluth police stretched its enforcement coverage all the way along the river’s twisty shore.
     
“You know what it’s like down in the river towns,” Maggie said. “People leave their shades up and their windows open. For a peeper, it’s like a cat with a goldfish bowl. Lots to look at.”
     
“Do we have any leads on an ID?” Stride asked.
     
“Nothing yet. We have no description and no idea how old he is. We’re working our way through the sex offender list, but no one looks like an obvious suspect.”
     
“How about a car?”
     
“We’ve had reports of a small SUV—something like a CRV or a RAV4—near three of the peeping locations. Maybe silver, maybe gray or sand. No one in the area would claim it. That’s as close as I’ve got to a lead.”
     
“What about the victims?” Stride asked. “How does this guy find them?”
     
“The girls range in age from fourteen to nineteen,” Maggie said. “They go to different schools, and I haven’t found any overlap in their social lives. They’re all blondes, though. I don’t think this guy is just going from house to house, trying to get lucky. We’d have caught him by now if he was simply trolling through backyards. When he hits a house, he already knows there’s a girl there with the right look.”
     
“Has he made any attempts to get inside?” Serena asked.
     
Serena wasn’t a member of the Duluth police, but she was a former homicide detective from Las Vegas, in addition to being his lover. Stride considered her one of the sharpest investigators he had ever worked with. He and Maggie consulted her unofficially on most of their cases.
     
“No, he just watches,” Maggie said. “The girl’s window was open in several of the incidents, but he stayed outside.”
     
Serena stole another fry from Maggie’s plate. “Yeah, but he might be getting his courage up. Along with other things. Peeping’s a threshold crime.”
     
“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Maggie said. “I want to catch this guy beforefore he moves on to bigger things.” She glanced at the opposite side of the restaurant patio and added, “By the way, boss, you’re about to understand why women adopted that five-second rule.”
     
“What do you mean?” Stride asked.
     
Then he looked up and understood.
     
The woman in the fringed leather jacket, the one who reminded him of his late wife, Cindy, was coming over.
     
     
 
     
“You’re Jonathan Stride, aren’t you?” she asked.
     
Stride pushed his chair back and stood up. He was over six feet tall, and when he looked down at the top of her head, he saw silver roots creeping into her blond hair. He took her offered hand and shook it. Her long nails dug into his palm. “Yes, that’s right.”
     
“I’m sure you don’t remember me, but we were in high school together. I graduated a year before you and Cindy did. My name is Tish Verdure.”
     
Her voice had a seductive, breathless rumble. Her clothes smelled of violet perfume covering cigarette smoke. She was perfectly made up, but under the foundation, age and nicotine had carved winding paths into the skin around her brown eyes and above her forehead. Even so, she was very pretty, with a tiny, tapered nose, a pale pink oval at her lips, and a pointed chin.
     
Stride remembered her name but nothing else, but it explained why she had looked familiar to him. “It’s been a long time,” he said in an apologetic tone.
     
“Don’t worry, I knew Cindy before the two of you ever met.”
     
“I don’t recall Cindy ever mentioning you,” he said.
     
“Well, back then, I was Laura’s best friend.”
     
At the sound of Laura’s name, Stride felt a rush of memories storm his mind. Himself and Cindy, naked in the water, making love. Ray Wallace checking his gun. The huge black man, Dada, escaping on a train car. Most of all, the whooshing sound of a baseball bat in Peter Stanhope’s hands. It might as well have been 1977 again.
     
Serena cleared her throat loudly. Stride burst