Riptide

Savich said, “If he had an apartment, I’ll find it.”

“Just you?” Adam said, an eyebrow raised.

“Didn’t Thomas tell you I was good?”

Adam snorted, watching Savich plug in MAX.

Hatch said, “More will be coming about his personal activities. But as yet, there isn’t anything out of Russia. It seems that way back when, all Krimakov’s records were purged. There’s little left. Nothing of interest. The KGB probably ordered it done, then helped him go to ground, in Crete. Again, though, they’ll continue searching and probing and questioning all their counterparts in Moscow.”

“Krimakov isn’t dead,” Adam said. And he believed it like he’d never believed anything in his life.

Having said that, Adam sat back and closed his eyes. He was getting a headache.

“Well, yeah, we have something else. I was the one who did all the legwork on this.” Hatch licked his fingers again and flipped over a couple more pages. “The Albany cops just found a witness not two hours ago who identified the car that ran down Dick McCallum. It’s a BMW, black, license number—at least the first three numbers—three-eight-five. A New York plate. I don’t have anything on that yet.”

“I’ll have it run through,” Savich said. “It’ll be quicker, more complete. I don’t want to know how you got that information so quickly.”

“I’ll just say that she loves my mustache,” Hatch said. “Please do call the Bureau, Agent Savich. I didn’t have the chance to check back with Thomas and have him do it. Oh yeah, a guy was driving. No clue if it was an old guy or a young guy or in between, really dark windows, like windows on a limo. Fairly unusual for a regular commercial car, and that’s probably why he stole that particular car.”

Savich was on his cell phone in the next ten seconds, nodded and hung up in three more minutes. “Done. We’ll have a list of possibles in about five minutes.”

Tommy the Pipe knocked lightly on the front door and came in. “We got a guy buying Exxon supreme at a gas station just eight miles west of Riptide. The attendant, a young boy about eighteen, said when the guy paid for his gas, he saw dirt and blood on the cuff of his shirt. He wouldn’t have thought a thing about it except Rollo was canvassing all the gas stations, asking questions about strangers. It’s him.”

“Oh, yeah,” Adam said and jumped to his feet. “Please say it, Tommy. Please tell us that this kid remembers what the guy looks like, that he remembers the kind of car he was driving.”

“The guy had on a green hunting hat with flaps, something like mine but with no style. He also wore very dark glasses. He doesn’t know if the guy was young or old, sorry, Adam. Hell, anyone over twenty-five would be old to that kid. But he does remember clearly that the guy spoke well, a real educated voice, all smooth and deep. The car—he thought it was a BMW, dark blue or black. Sorry, no idea about the plate. But you know what? The windows were dark-tinted. How about that?”

“Surely he wouldn’t have driven the same car up here that he used to kill Dick McCallum in Albany,” Sherlock said.

“Why not?” Savich said. “If it isn’t dented, if there isn’t blood all over it, then why not?”

Savich’s cell phone rang. He stood and walked over to the doorway. They heard him talking, saw him nodding as he listened. He hung up and said, “No go. He stole the license plates. No surprise there. He’d have been an idiot to leave on the original plates. However, those heavily tinted windows, I have everyone checking on New York cars stolen within the past two weeks with those sorts of windows.”

Savich’s cell phone rang again in eight minutes. He listened and wrote rapidly. When he hung up the phone, he said, “This is something. Like Hatch said, few commercial cars—domestic or foreign—are built with dark-tinted windows. Three have been stolen. The people are all over the state, two men and one woman.”

Becca said with no hesitation, “It’s the woman. He stole her car.”

“Possible,” Sherlock said. “Let’s find out right now.”

She called information for Ithaca, New York, and got the phone number for Mrs. Irene Bailey, 112 Huntley Avenue. The phone rang once, twice, three times, then, “Hello?”

“Mrs. Bailey? Mrs. Irene Bailey?”

Silence.

“Are you there? Mrs. Bailey?”

“That’s my mother,” a woman said. “I’m sorry, but it took me by surprise.”