Джеймс Паттерсон - The 18th Abduction

It was getting dark, but the big white letters on our backs, spelling SFPD, were bright enough to draw attention from passersby. Drucker cast a look up the street, threw her cigarette down on the sidewalk, and stepped on it.

The last three customers came out the door, accompanied by the jingling of the bell. She stepped out of their way.

“I’ve got to go,” she said. “Jose is waiting. I have to close up the front—”

“I’ve got a better idea, Lucinda,” I said. “Let’s take a ride to the station and talk where there’s less distraction.”

“I’m cooperating . I’ve told you everything I know. ”

I said, “Do you know if Denny runs girls?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

I showed her my phone. I pulled up pictures of Carly and her friends. “Have you ever seen this woman? Or her? Or her? Is Denny pimping these women?”

“ No way . Jeez. I don’t know them. I just said I don’t ask Denny his business.”

Funny thing. I believed her and I even felt sorry for her. She showed signs of emotional abuse. She was fearful and pretty clearly lying to herself. But we weren’t done here.

I said to my partner, “Let’s serve the warrant on Mr. Martinez and get the vehicle to the lab.”

“Wait,” Lucinda Drucker said. “You have to understand. If you tell Jose that I let Denny drive the car after hours, I’m going to lose my job.”

“Look. Ms. Drucker. We don’t want you to get fired, but see it from our side. We’re investigating a homicide . A woman was killed . Two more are missing. If Denny has seen something, he has to tell us.”

I thought I saw tears in her eyes, but I turned away from her and called Dale Culver in Impound at the lab. I gave him the location, the warrant number, the description of the vehicle, and the tag number. Culver said, “It’s gonna be twenty-five to thirty minutes to get a flatbed out there.”

I was looking up Twentieth Street as I spoke with Culver, when I saw someone who might be Denny Lopez approaching on foot. He was smaller than I’d pictured him, maybe five seven, narrow shoulders. He had his hands in his pants pockets, head down, apparently deep in thought.

Lucinda saw him at the same time.

That was Denny . That was him .

I turned to Conklin, and that’s when Lucinda yelled, “Denny! Cops! Run!”

Chapter 55

Lopez looked up, saw us, and split, turning on his heel and running back the way he’d come.

I yelled, “Stop ! Police !”

He kept going. I was the law, and by running, he’d crossed a legal line right into a gray area called reasonable suspicion.

I yelled again for him to stop. He didn’t even turn his head. Conklin and I ran behind him, and then after streaking along Twentieth, he ditched down Lexington. Although Conklin had a couple of inches on me, my legs were as long as his, and I was fit from running with Joe and Martha.

But I knew we couldn’t risk Drucker or Martinez disappearing with the possible evidence inside that vehicle. I had enough air to yell to Conklin, “Rich. Here. Take the warrant and wait for the lab.”

Conklin faded back and I picked up speed.

I was fast, and on a straightaway I would have had the advantage, but Denny Lopez could pivot like a quarter horse. One minute he was pounding the asphalt ahead of me, and then he was just gone .

He seemed to have slipped into another dimension.

Did he live on this block? I thought about Susan and Adele. Where had he stashed them? Were they only yards away?

I checked out the back doors on Lexington Street. Some were gated with iron grilles, some were wood, one was a roll-up garage door. Next to that one was a pair of double doors with metal studs, and beside that was a slim metal grille with peeling green paint and a dead bolt. Behind the grille was a matching green-painted wooden door.

But the dead bolt was unlocked, the grille slightly ajar—as if someone had run through and hadn’t had time to throw the bolt.

I pulled my gun, yanked open the grille, and kicked in the wooden door.

I was expecting anything. A gun pointed at me. A room full of naked men weighing heroin, packing glassine envelopes. But it was nothing like that. I was inside a basement room lit by a bare bulb hanging from the ceiling. It looked like something between a knickknack shop and a hoarder’s lair.

I called out, “Lopez. This is the police. Come out with your hands up.”

Something stirred from behind a six-foot-tall stack of newspapers. I had a two-handed grip on my Glock, hoping like hell I wouldn’t have to use it.

A woman’s voice called out, “Helloooo, Janice?”

A weedy-looking faerie of a woman wearing a gauzy floral frock, looking between seventy and ninety years old, appeared from between the newspapers and a rickety china closet.

“Janice,” she said, looking delighted to see me. “You’re early, aren’t you? Is it time for bed?”

I lowered my gun and said, “I’m Sergeant Boxer, ma’am. Did you see a man come in here a moment ago?”

I was breathing hard, managing to speak to the elderly woman while taking in the whole room. I wasn’t sure that Lopez was here. He could have gone through any door and out the other side. I pictured him fleeing on Eighteenth, circling back for his girlfriend, who might still be standing outside the Taqueria del Lobo.

I tapped the radio on my shoulder mike and called Conklin, gave him my location, and told him to call for backup.

And then a lamp toppled and crashed at the back of the jumbled room. I yelled, “Hands in the air !”

A slight man of about thirty, with regular features and wearing a pullover, worn jeans, and run-down sneakers, stood up and showed me his palms.

This was the guy from the ATM photo. I was positive.

I said, “Denny Lopez, put your hands on the top of your head and turn around.”

“You have the wrong guy. You have the totally wrong guy.”

“You’re not Denny Lopez?”

“I’m Denny Lopez, but I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Are you carrying a weapon?”

“No,” he said. “I have a ballpoint pen in my shirt pocket.”

I said, “Running from the police is breaking the law. I’m bringing you in on reasonable suspicion of committing or about to commit a crime.”

“Bullshit !” he shouted.

“Don’t make this hard on yourself, Denny. Do not move, or I’ll add resisting arrest to the charges.”

I patted him down; found the pen, keys, phone, wallet. I put the wallet on a wobbly end table, pulled Lopez’s hands behind his back, and cuffed him for my safety.

I opened the wallet. Bank card. Credit card. Driver’s license. All in the name of Dennis L. Lopez.

When he spoke again, his tone was conciliatory. He said, “Believe me, Officer. I’ve done nothing wrong. Nothing.”

And I was suddenly filled with doubt.

I could say with some certainty that he was Carly’s pimp, that he’d been seen near the scene of the murder. But had he killed Carly? Had he kidnapped and maybe killed the two other women? Had this puny guy done all of that?

He’d run from me.

Reasonable suspicion was a gray area, and that’s how the courts had ruled. Sometimes yes. Sometimes reasonable suspicion was an excuse for a bad cop to fire on an innocent person.

I weighed it all—quickly.

Was Denny Lopez’s flight from police cause enough to bring him in? Or was I grasping at the only available straw?

Chapter 56

Joe was at his desk that evening with all the lights on, going over photos while he waited for Anna to arrive for their meeting.