Page 9 of Pure Killers

When Dirk doesn't respond, I turn back. He's rubbing something between his fingers. "What is it?" I ask.

"There's sand," he says, frowning down.

Stepping over, I kneel too, looking at the small pale grains in his palm. "Hard to imagine these guys at the beach."

"It’s hard to imagine anyone at the beach here." Thunder rolls outside. The rain somehow gets heavier, like it’s determined to take out the roof. Dirk is frowning at the grains on his thumb.

"What is it?" I ask.

“I don't know… I feel like it’s a bit familiar. And I don't like the beach.” Shaking off his hand, Dirk peers at me. The kind of look that is more inward than outward. "That building we always pass on the way here, the tall one with all the arched windows. Wasn't that a glass factory?"

I frown. I know the one he means, but… surely it can't be that easy. "Maybe. You think…"

“I think we're grasping at straws. But this is the best we've got. Either Strangler or our Needler brought sand in here with them. And that’s the nearest place that might have it.”

“Alright. Let’s check it out.”

***

It’s past midnight by the time we spot any movement at all. And it’s not even me who sees it. Dirk straightens, leaning towards the windscreen. “There was someone at the corner there.”

Coming out of the daydream I was in, one where I was far from this cold car and this dead stakeout, I straighten up in my seat. “I can’t see anything.” I reach for the car radio, connecting us to the other three teams in their cars on this all-nighter. “Hey, anyone spot anything?”

The first answer comes slightly delayed. Probably they’d dozed off. “Nothing, yet.”

Dirk opens his door, letting in a wash of fresh, cold air. “I’m gonna check it out.”

“No one saw anything. Just stay.”

“I won’t be long. I’m just gonna follow them for a bit.”

“Dirk…”

“Keep the doors locked. I’ll be back.”

Before I can protest again, he’s gone, and I watch him walk ahead, his hands in the pockets of his jacket, until he disappears into the gloom ahead, around the corner. I sigh, trying to relax into the car seat, but my butt is numb.

Up until this point in the night, the rain has eased off, but some minutes after Dirk takes off, it starts again, growing progressively heavier, along with my anxiety, over the next hour as Dirk continues to be absent.

With no better way to vent my concerns, I check for the fourth time on the radio. “Anyone heard from Dirk?”

Again, negatives.

“Might just be waiting out the rain, El.”

“Hm.” I wriggle in my seat.

Another hour later, the sight of dawn’s glow on the horizon decides me, even as it sinks what hope I'd managed to hold onto through the night of seeing something genuinely useful. I’m reaching for my door handle, about to go out in the direction he went, in some vain hope of somehow tracking him, when the passenger door swings open and Dirk bundles himself back into the seat, his skin slightly damp, dark sleeves darker with wet.

“Hey, sorry. I got caught out in the downpour; I was waiting for it to ease a bit.”

“Dirk, Jesus! You were gone half the night.”

“Come on, closer to two hours.” He shifts in the seat, clearly chilled. “Besides, did anything happen?”

“No,” I say. “That’s not the point. How about with you? Did you see anybody?”

Shaking his head, Dirk starts to shrug out of his wet jacket. “No, turned out to be just some kid looking to meet the locals and buy drugs.”

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