Page 58 of Justice for JoElla

“Oh? How?”

“I don’t know. Just kinda like, ‘You’d better be careful or I’ll make a phone call and you’ll be sorry.” Maybe he thought he was mafia or something. I have no idea. Nut job.”

“Is there anything else you can tell us?” Quint asked.

“I can’t think of anything. Got a card? If I do, I’ll give you a call.”

JoElla handed him one. “We’d appreciate that.”

“What’s he done?”

“He’s just under investigation. Nothing more. So please, call us if you think of anything.”

“Will do. And if you ever need a mobile home, you just come on back and I’ll give you a good deal,” he said as they started away.

“Yes, sir. Will do.” Once they were in the car, she sighed and dropped her forehead to the steering wheel. “Dear god. Just one little snippet of info. If I could just get one from some of these people…”

“Well, it’s interesting that he was alluding to someone he could call. Wonder who it was?” Quint chuckled. “Need a mobile home?”

“Honestly, it would be better than the shit hole I live in. How many more places are on that list?”

“About eight.”

“Something had better come from this. I hope Mick’s having better luck than we are.” Her phone rang, and she glanced at the screen before she answered. “Tompkins.”

“You guys need to come back to the station. They’ve found Warmuth,” Roy announced.

“When? Where?” JoElla spun the car around in the middle of the street and roared toward the station house.

“About twenty minutes ago. He stopped at the convenience store out there at forty-four and River Road. Clerk recognized him from a TV report and called the office. Three units responded and he fired on one of them. They returned fire and he’s at the hospital.”

“And the deputies?”

“Fucking city responded. I can see right now that Margolis and I are going to butt heads. But I want somebody at that hospital questioning him.”

“And the woman?” There was silence, and she could feel a huge ball of dread filling her stomach. “Roy? You there?”

“Yeah.” She waited, blood pounding in her temples. “Her body was in the back. He shot her at some time during the pursuit and she bled out before they caught him.”

All the air seemed to evacuate JoElla’s lungs, and her vision turned spotty. “Hey, pull over!” Quint barked.

It took everything she had to pull over to the curb and slam the car into park. In a split second, she was out, running toward the curb, and what little she had left in her stomach hit the concrete. As she heaved great lungfuls of air in, she felt a hand on her back. “JoElla, sit down. On the curb. Put your head between your knees. Now. Do it.” Instead of arguing, she just did as Quint said. In a minute, her vision stopped swimming and her stomach wasn’t churning. “You better?”

“No. I failed her. We weren’t quick enough. She’d been with him way too long. I knew he’d kill her and I did nothing.”

“You’ve been looking for her, JoElla. Nobody can fault you on that. You and Mick, that’s all you’ve done.”

“We still didn’t find her. What are we missing here, Quint? There’s something we’re missing, and I can’t figure it out.”

“I think we need to get to the hospital and talk to this guy. I never got a chance to talk to him in SanAntonio before he managed to escape. So I want a chunk out of his ass too. Come on. Let’s go. I’m driving. You can tell me where to turn.”

JoElla couldn’t imagine what had gone through Josie’s mind. She’d probably figured out he was going to kill her. She’d watched her son murdered right in front of her eyes. Had she wanted to die? Maybe. But that didn’t excuse the fact that they should’ve gotten to him far sooner. At least if he’d done the same to her as he had to Derek, she wouldn’t have suffered all that time, locked in that vehicle and terrified. By the time they got to the hospital, something else had taken over JoElla’s body.

Rage. She was furious?with herself, with Mick, with Roy, with Quint. She was furious with Lance and all the ball-busting posturing his officers were ordered to exhibit. She was furious with the EMTs who couldn’t save Josie. God help Brandon if he’d been on that call. One look at her watch told her he wasn’t on shift yet. At least he got a pass.

They burst into the hospital and started asking questions. When they were directed to the third floor, they took the stairs. She didn’t think she could wait long enough to ride the elevator. The stairwell door opened to a busy floor, and she could see uniforms down toward the end. She’d almost made it there when a large figure stepped into her line of vision, and she was relieved. But only a little.

Roy was almost bellowing. “My detectives are?”

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