Crimes of Memory (A Detective Jackson Mystery) (24 page)

“You can have one.” The pack was still in his hand, and he shook out a cigarette and lit it for her. Dallas inhaled a little.
Disgusting
. She didn’t smoke, except when the job called for it. “Thanks. I’m Fiona Ingram.”

“Russell Crowder.” He had a narrow face with scraggly chin hair, and his eyes burned with the intensity of someone on stimulants.

Dallas tucked the name into her permanent memory. “We can hardly smoke in public anymore. Next, they’ll start fining us.” Whining about misguided government regulation was another popular theme with this crowd.

“No kidding.” He shook his head. “Their priorities are really messed up sometimes.”

“You mean government or voters? Oregon seems pretty progressive to me.”

“We used to be progressive, but not anymore.” Russell sized her up. “You’re new here?”

“Just a couple months.” Dallas took another small drag and tried not to cough. “What do you do for fun, Russell?”

He made a face and a scoffing sound. “Not enough. But I don’t have time right now. I have some important things to accomplish.”

A little shimmer ran up her spine. “Yeah? Like what?” She smiled, all charm.

“Personal stuff. Coming to terms with my past while making a difference in the world.”

“Sounds good.” She wanted to know more but didn’t want to press too hard. “I’m a grant writer for charities and NGOs, so I like to think my time is well spent too.”

“That’s cool. Might as well spend taxpayer money on something besides war.”

“Agreed. What are your priorities?”

His eyes shifted and Dallas worried she’d overstepped. But he responded, “I’m with a group that’s trying to get plastic bags banned in the state, but I want to go after plastic bottles because they’re more of a problem.”

Now all her neurons were firing. “I know what you mean. I don’t buy anything in plastic anymore.”

Russell was suddenly agitated. “You know what’s happening? Homeless people are buying loads of bottled water with food stamps, then dumping the water behind the store and turning in the bottles for the deposit cash.”

The waste of taxpayer dollars pissed her off, but Dallas focused on the environmental issue. “At least the bottles are being recycled.”

“I suppose.” He took a long drag, then flicked his cigarette into the yard.

Hypocrite.
Dallas looked around for a place to discard hers. “You’re going back in?”

“No. I have to leave. I have to prepare for a big day tomorrow.”

Dallas’ brain kicked into processing mode. Should she try to tag along with him or tail him? Follow, she decided. He and Adam were friends, and it could blow her cover to get cozy with both. “Okay. See you around.”

“Nice talking to you.”

She watched him walk to a small car parked down the street. It looked like a Subaru, but it was too dark to tell. Maybe blue or dark green. Dallas pulled out her Eugene phone and keyed in a
text to Adam:
Sorry. But I have to take off. The cramps are making me crazy. See you in a day or so?
She waited to push send and hoped she hadn’t blown it with him. But Adam wasn’t the arsonist, so she had to go with her gut. Russell was so young, if they busted him, he might turn on the group to cut a deal.

As soon as his car turned around in the street, Dallas trotted down the walkway and headed for her own car. Inside, she sent the text to Adam and took off. No other cars were moving around the quiet neighborhood, so she held back and hoped to spot Russell’s car before he turned on the main drag. She popped in her earpiece and called Agent River on her work phone.

Her supervisor picked up. “What have you got, Dallas?”

“I just ID’d the young mohawk guy from Tony’s Tavern. Russell Crowder.”

“Good work. I’ll see what I can dig up.”

“Get back to me if you get intel on his car. I’m following him because he says he has a things to accomplish tomorrow.” In the distance, Russell’s car turned left at Franklin. He was headed for Eugene. “He’s gung ho on banning plastic water bottles, so I think he might be our perp. And I think he has something planned.”

“Can you get a sample of his writing? I’d like to have it compared to the letter Ted Rockman received.”

“I’ll do what I can.”

“I can take a shift if you need relief following Crowder.”

“I’ll let you know.

“Be safe.”

Dallas hung up and pulled out on the main road. She wished she knew the make and color of Russell’s car. But traffic was light and she managed to stay with him until they were in downtown Eugene. At Pearl Street, he ran a yellow light, and she was too far back to make the same move. She pulled into a bank parking lot, gunned it across the empty side street into another parking lot,
and got back on West Eleventh—a move that could have earned her a ticket. If Russell had been watching his rearview mirror, he might have seen it. Her best guess told her he wasn’t that careful. He seemed like a preoccupied man.

She followed him to a large older home just west of downtown. Her first thought was that he still lived with his parents, then she worried that he shared the place with a posse of roommates. From across the street, she watched him head to the side of the house and disappear down a path into the backyard.

Dallas rummaged through the bag of extra clothes she kept in her car, grabbed a knit cap, and tucked her hair up into it. The jeans and black sweater would serve her well. She slipped out of her car and jogged across the street, glad to be wearing the ugly but silent shoes. Heart pounding, she ran along the grass next to the driveway, noting that Russell’s vehicle was an old, dark green Subaru. She slipped behind a tree near the fence, then peeked around it and stared down the side of the house. A light at the far corner illuminated the area enough so she could see a small mother-in-law house in the backyard. Russell was just stepping inside.

Rounding the tree, Dallas kept her back to the fence and moved sideways in the dark until she came to another tree in the backyard. The light on the corner of the house was out of reach for her five-seven frame, or she would have unscrewed the bulb. Now what? She burned with the need to know what he had planned for the next day, but the idea of sneaking into his house while he slept seemed too risky. She couldn’t think of a rational middle-of-the-night ruse to get him out of there. She didn’t even know Russell’s phone number. Nor did she have anything solid on his intentions. His “important stuff” could turn out to be laundry or a trip to the doctor. Until River got back to her, Dallas decided
not to make any moves. She would sleep in her car and tail him again tomorrow.

The back door of the house banged open, startling her. Dallas spun toward the sound. A halide light came on over the deck as an older woman crossed it.
Fuck!
The woman was coming into the yard. Silently, Dallas stepped back against the fence and sidestepped her way to the front. She turned at the sidewalk and jogged down the street, in case the woman had seen her and followed. Dallas didn’t want the woman to see her get into her car. No sounds came from behind her and no one called out.

After a jog around the block, Dallas made her way to her car and slipped into the backseat. She locked the doors and lay on her side so she wouldn’t be seen. She texted River to update her, then read on her tablet until she got sleepy enough to nod off. As uncomfortable as she was, she wouldn’t have traded this assignment for anything.

CHAPTER 23

Friday, March 15, 5:35 a.m.

She was driving down the highway, catching glimpses of a swollen river through the trees. Worried about reaching her destination on time, she pressed the gas. Out of nowhere, a semi smashed into her car, sending her through the guardrail. Frantic, River hit the brakes and glanced out the side window at the muddy water.

Suddenly awake, River sat up and stared out her bedroom window.

It was open.

River grabbed her weapon. Groggy, she swung the Glock toward the intruder—a dark shape in a dark room—but he was already right there and her hand slammed into his elbow. In a quick twist, he knocked her gun to the floor and grabbed her by the throat with a huge hand.

No!
In her sitting position on the bed, she was almost helpless. All she could do was bring her hands up and try to dislodge
the fingers crushing her windpipe. River heard the click of a switchblade open.

“A gift from Gabriel Barstow.” His voice was soft and cruel.

No!

She sucked in her breath, then heaved herself sideways.

As she did, she heard a loud
thunk
. The fingers on her throat loosened and her attacker collapsed to the floor with a muted moan. River scrambled to find her weapon and turn on a lamp.

Jared stood there in his underwear, wielding a large cast-iron frying pan.

“He’s not dead,” her handyman said, his voice oddly calm. “I think we should truss him before we worry about what we’re wearing.”

Ninety minutes later, the last police officer and agent walked out her door, and River finally had a chance to sit at her kitchen table and decompress. A convict named Darien Ozlo had almost killed her, thanks to her fucked-up father. She touched her throat again. If not for Jared…

The handyman was looking in the refrigerator and turned to her. “You don’t have much in here, but I can make eggs and toast.”

“Thanks, but I can’t eat right now.” River stood and struggled to find the right words. “Saying thank you isn’t enough. I’d like to offer you a place to stay, at least while you’re working on the house. You can move into the guest room.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

She stepped toward him. “I want to. I was thinking about it anyway.”

“You’re a good woman.”

He opened his arms and she stepped in and hugged him. The joy of his warm body pressed against hers was almost overwhelming. How long had it been? River breathed in the smell
of his flannel shirt and the light scent of sweat on the back of his neck. She remembered him standing in her bedroom in his underwear and she stepped back. She didn’t want him to think the hug was anything other than mutual gratitude.

“I have to get to work.” River realized she hadn’t even checked her cell phone for messages yet.

“I think you’re entitled to the day off.”

“Not today. We have an arsonist to catch.” She grabbed her briefcase and hurried from the house, experiencing a mix of emotions that made her thoughts jump from one thing to another. She glanced up her driveway and saw a tow truck getting ready to drive away with a black Suburban. The vehicle she’d seen following her the other night. Ozlo had parked at the end of the driveway and walked down. River planned to have Jared install a fan in the bedroom, because she might never sleep with her window open again.

Be master of mind rather than mastered by mind
. River repeated one of her mantras until she felt focused. She climbed into her car and checked her phone. A text from Dallas from late last night:
I’m parked outside Crowder’s house, 2040 W. 12. Will stay on him. I still think he’s our guy. May need relief later.

River texted back:
I’ll ask for more people. Nothing on Crowder yet.

She was still a little skeptical that someone so young had targeted the bottled water factory, both with a firebomb and a letter to its owner. Young men set fires all the time, but most were true arsonists who often stayed to watch the building burn. Their perp was passionate about environmentalism and resorted to criminal damage only as a means to further his cause.

River listened to her phone messages. The Quantico profiler wanted to know if he should e-mail his report or if she wanted to videoconference with him. River called and set up a conference
at ten fifteen. On the drive into town, she called both Quince and Fouts and asked them to meet with her at ten. She was eager to see if the profile matched up with either Russell Crowder or Rick Arbuckle. River felt strangely disappointed to accept that Chris Noonaz hadn’t been involved in either the sabotage at the pharma company or the firebomb at Rock Spring. She’d really wanted to bust him as the ringleader. River reminded herself that Noonaz’s girlfriend, Melody, may have lied about the JB Pharma incident.

“River, I need to see you for a minute.” Her supervisor called to her from the office next door.

Worry filled her stomach and she willed herself to be calm. She didn’t want to be forced to take a leave of absence because of the attack. Not now. Maybe he just wanted to discuss the bureau bringing federal charges against Darien Ozlo.

River stepped out into the hall and through the open door next to hers. Ames Hartman, a heavyset man who hadn’t been out in the field in years, looked up. “How are you? That must have been quite an ordeal.”

“It happened so quickly, I didn’t have time to be scared. And it’s over now.”

“I think you should take some time off.”

“I’m fine. Really. This case I’m handling is coming to a head. The next few days are critical.”

“Fouts can handle it.”

“I have an undercover agent out there following an eco-terrorist. She texts me in the middle of the night, often needing intel. I can’t just abandon her to another agent.”