First to Die

Chapter 113

AROUND FOUR, I saw Jill pushing her way through the crowd buzzing outside my office. She looked ready to kill somebody, probably me. "I'm glad you're here," I said grabbing her. "Trust me, please, Jill." "Cindy's downstairs," she said. "Let's go talk." We sneaked out and were able to find Cindy amid a throng of reporters clawing at anyone who came down from the third floor. We called Claire, and in five minutes we were sitting around a table at a coffee shop just down the block. Jenks's escape had thrown all of my speculations into disarray. "You still believe he's innocent?" Jill pressed the issue immediately. "That depends on where he turns up next." I informed them that I had stationed a couple of men around the homes of Greg Marks and Joanna Wade. "Even now?" Jill shook her head and looked close to blowing. "Innocent men don't run from police custody, Find say." "Innocent people might," I said. "If they don't believe the justice system is being just!" Claire looked around with a nervous swallow. "Ladies, it strikes me we're entering into very sensitive territory here, all right? We've got a manhunt trying to locate Jenks -he could be shot on sight- and at the same time, we're talking about trying to firm up a case against someone else. If this comes out, heads will roll. I'm looking at some of those pretty heads right now." "If you really believe this, Lindsay, you need to take it to someone," Jill lectured me. "Roth. Mercer." "Mercer's away. And right now, everybody's focused on locating Jenks. Anyway, who the hell would believe this? As you say, all I have is a bunch of hypotheticals." "Have you told Raleigh?" asked Claire. I nodded. "What does he think?" "Right now, he can't get past the hair. Jenks's escape didn't help my case." "I knew there was something I liked about that guy." Jill finally smiled thinly. I looked at Claire for support. "It's hard to argue your side of things, Lindsay," she said with a sigh. "That said, your instincts are usually good." "So then bust in on Joanna, like Lindsay proposed," said Cindy. The more I was around her, the more I loved her. Things had suddenly gotten very sticky in the way of accountability. I turned to Claire. "Is there anything we might have missed that could implicate Joanna?" She shook her head. "We've been through all that. All the evidence points the finger directly at Nicholas Jenks." "Claire, I'm talking about something that was there, right in front of us, that we just didn't see." "I want to be with you on this, Lindsay," Claire said, "but we've been through it. Everything." "There's got to be something. Something that could tell us if the killer is male or female. If Joanna did it, she's no different from any killer I've tracked down. She left something. We just haven't seen it. Jenks did- or someone did for him- and we found him." "And we ought to be out looking for him now," urged Jill, "before we end up with couple number four." I felt alone, but I just couldn't surrender. It wouldn't be right. "Please," I begged Claire, "go through everything on? more time. I think we've got the wrong man."