Page 97 of The Last Close Call

“Slow. No sightings.”

He caught the tension in Jack’s voice and guessed that he was rethinking his insistence on prioritizing this address. The Honda owner at this location was a woman. But she was thirty-eight—close enough to Anderson’s age to be a potential girlfriend.

The real kicker, though, was that her car had previously been registered in Bozeman, Montana.

Coincidence?

Jack didn’t think so. He’d been so pumped about the link to one of Anderson’s last known locations that he’d insisted on staking this address out himself.

“Here,” Jack said, unlooping the binoculars from his neck. “Take a look.”

Bryan adjusted the lenses and peered through the windshield at the small duplex two doors down. Sheryl Mason’s black sedan was parked in the driveway. It did, in fact, look like the car Bryan had seen near Evie’s apartment in the grainy surveillance video.

But that wasn’t exactly conclusive without the plate to compare them.

“What do we have on her so far?” Bryan asked, knowing Jack had spent part of his long shift here in the van digging up background on this woman.

“She’s thirty-eight, divorced, no kids.” Jack consulted a spiral notebook perched on another cooler that served as a table for his notebook computer. “Grew up in Montana. Moved here fourteen months ago.”

“Fourteen months?”

“Yep.”

Bryan studied the duplex through the binoculars. The place was a dump. The neighboring driveway had an ancient Pontiac up on blocks, and both yards were surrounded by a chain-link fence.

“If we assumed they moved down from Montana together, then he was here a full year before starting up again.” Bryan lowered the binoculars. “What do you think that’s about?”

“Hell if I know. Maybe something triggered him, like Skinner said. He could have gotten fired. Rejected by a woman. Maybe he’s having trouble getting it up.”

Bryan lifted the binoculars and studied the house again.

“What’s she do for a living?”

“No idea. No one’s left the house since I’ve been watching.”

“And we’re sure there’s someone in there with her?”

“No. But there are two TVs on.”

Bryan looked at Jack.

“I did a walk-by two hours ago,” Jack said.

“If he sees you, we’re screwed.”

“No one saw me. What I’d really like to do is get a look in the windows.”

Bryan lifted the binoculars again. “They have a dog?”

“A Rottweiler.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope.”

Bryan sighed, lowering the binoculars. Approaching the windows was out. A dog like that would go apeshit.

“We have to wait for someone to leave,” Bryan said.

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