Page 48 of Unnatural
He lay back on the pillows, grimacing as his body adjusted and his wounds pulled. But despite his physical aches and all the reasons he had to feel worried and upset, his lips tipped into a small smile. He washere, under the same roof with his precious Autumn, and he had no idea how it had happened, but it was real, and it was true. And he found he was thankful he’d put off the final mission. Because although he hadn’t been able to save those teachers, he’d been givensome time withher—however long it lasted—some time in heaven before the lights blinked out.
Chapter Twenty-One
Mark opened the door to a smiling delivery girl. “Agent Mark Gallagher?”
“Yes,” he said, taking the package she was holding out to him and signing for it on her digital pad. “Thank you,” he said, handing her a tip.
“Thanks! Have a great day.” She turned, heading back down the hall of the building where his temporary apartment was. It was small and cramped and smelled like new paint and old carpet, but it did the job.
He couldn’t wait to get home to his wife and his dog and his house that smelled more like the former than the latter, thank heavens. He couldn’t wait to get back to Jak and Harper and little Eddie, the family that had adopted them—or maybe it’d been Mark and Laurie who had adopted Jak, Harper, and Eddie. And now they would soon add a fourth to their little family. Or maybe they’d all collectively gathered each other and become a unit who had all lost and then gained and understood each other in ways others never could.
And he might get his wish in the next day or so, because so far, there had been no break in the case. The newsdriveled on and on about what had happened at Deercroft Academy, doing more to divide than anything, each “side” using the loss of life to further their own agenda long before the bodies had even been placed in the ground. Screeching and blaming and generally getting nowhere helpful. Typical.
He brought the package to the writing desk near the window that overlooked an alley and pushed his laptop aside. Inside the envelope were a few thumb drives that had the camera footage from all surveillance in the area of Deercroft Academy from the two hours before and after the shooting. He’d already looked through some of it, and the computer forensics team at the NYPD had looked at more than that, but so far, they hadn’t come up with anything on the white-haired man or the woman in the coral sweater.
They had, however, found the shooter on video and had been able to track him from one of the subway stations to the school. They’d attempted to map his travel to the subway station as well but had lost him. Of course, they didn’t really need to map him considering they had already identified the man and knew where he lived, but Mark would have liked to have had that information anyway, more for his own reasons than anything.
He chose one of the thumb drives based on the time frame—directly after the shooting had occurred—and inserted it into the side of his computer. The drive contained a list of videos, and Mark began going through them again, this time more closely.
He’d gone through half of the footage by noon. Mark rubbed his eyes and got up to make a second pot of coffee in the tiny kitchen. Again, he sat, poring over the images that moved from this angle to that one, disorienting sometimes. Often, he had to pause and figure out where he was looking,only to realize he was looking at the same spot he’d stared at a moment before but this time from a different vantage point. He was almost ready to throw in the towel for the time being and seek out some lunch when he paused, his hand on the mouse, about to click to the next video.
There.He leaned in slightly. A tall head above the crowd, wearing a baseball cap with a few wisps of silvery hair barely showing at the nape of his neck. There for a second and then gone. The man wasn’t just tall, he was markedly tall. Just like Ms. Maples’s description. Mark clicked back through the videos right before and after. He thought he got a glimpse of the man here and there, but it was as if…as if he was walking down the street in a way that would evade the cameras.
Interesting.
Unfortunately, once the streets that led to the academy became more residential, the cameras all but disappeared. If the manwasevading city street cameras, he wouldn’t have had to once he turned off the main drag.
Mark sat back, considering for a moment, and then he put a different thumb drive in, this time from directly after the shooting.
There again.
Only this time, the very tall man in the ball cap appeared to be walking with a woman.
Mark clicked through a few images, his heart giving a small jump. It had to be.
The woman wasn’t wearing a sweater, but…she might have taken it off. The couple were leaning into each other as if they were having an intimate conversation.
Or as if she was supporting him.
He clicked through the rest, this time with more focus and excitement, the feeling that he’d found something thatmight lead somewhere else boosting his energy.
Unfortunately, that hope crashed when the couple turned a corner onto a street that, as far as he knew, had no available footage.
Damn.
But before they turned, Mark saw the man trip slightly, a small stagger that made the woman stumble too before they both righted themselves and continued on.
“Who are you?” Mark muttered.
He clicked through a few more cameras on different streets, moving through time, but the couple didn’t appear on any other footage.
Double damn.
He sat there for a minute, drumming his fingers on the desk. He felt as if he’d just discovered something that had changed the case. He just needed to figure out how to move it forward even more.
The girl. He had more information about what she looked like now. Or…mostly. She had dark, wavy hair that was half clipped back. About five foot five he’d estimate, average weight. It was more than he’d had to work with until right that minute.
It took him about thirty minutes to find the same girl on the footage in the time frame before the shooting. And this time, she was wearing a bulky, coral-colored sweater. He used the videos to follow along behind her, much more easily than he’d followed the tall man in the ball cap. But it appeared…it appeared almost as if she was following that man. He rewound and rewatched until he was almost certain that was what she’d been doing. Sheknewhim. But they hadn’t arrived together. And whether the man realized he was being followed, Mark couldn’t say.
