Page 87 of Den of Iniquity

“Why?” I asked. “What’s going on?”

“Jeremy just called me in tears. He says Caroline told him that the baby isn’t his. She’s leaving him to go live somewhere in Arizona with her aunt, and he says it’s all your fault. I thought I told you to stay out of our business—that I had things handled.”

I was in no mood for being read the riot act by my daughter.

“You and Jeremy aren’t the only people involved here,” I reminded her. “Kyle is, too, and he’s the one who asked me to look into the situation. If you think I’m going to apologize for that, you’re dead wrong. And if getting to the bottom of it means having Caroline admit that the child she’s carrying is someone’s other than Jeremy’s, wouldn’t he be better off finding that out sooner than later, as in before he marries her rather than after?”

Kelly seemed dismayed when I growled back at her like that, but having her come after me because her cheating husband’s girlfriend had taken off on him got on my last nerve.

“But Kyle...” she began.

“But Kyle nothing,” I snapped. “There were red flags showing up in Jeremy and Caroline’s household well before Kyle took off. In fact, they’re the reason he did take off. That’s why he came to Bellingham—to get away from what he considered to be a toxic situation.”

“What red flags?” Kelly wanted to know.

“You’ll have to ask him,” I answered. “He told me about those in confidence. When I accepted his case, I did so as his private investigator, not as his grandfather. As far as I’m concerned, those red flags fall under the heading of client privilege. The same holds true for any information I uncovered about Caroline Richards. If Jeremy has discussed some of her history or issues with you, that’sup to him, but telling you about them is not my responsibility. Neither is the fact that the child she’s carrying isn’t his.”

That’s the exact moment when I heard a car door slam shut somewhere on that level of the parking garage. I raised the seat far enough to see out and cracked open my window in time to hear a car engine turn over somewhere off to my left. Then a pair of backup lights came on. Moments later, I spotted the red Prius heading down the ramp that led to the exit. At that point I made no effort to hit the starter button. With Sandra Sechrest’s AirTag hard at work I wouldn’t need to keep Constance’s vehicle in sight to follow its every move.

Holding Sandra’s phone in my hand, I watched the red dot leave the garage and turn onto Lenora. That’s when I heard Kelly say, “Dad, are you even listening to me?”

I wasn’t. She had me dead to rights on that score.

“Kelly, I can’t talk right now. I’ll call you back later so we can finish this conversation, but now I have to go.”

“Figures,” she said and hung up.

By then the red dot on Sandra’s phone was turning right onto Boren. That probably meant that Constance was headed for I-5, but I wouldn’t be able to tell which direction until she turned either onto Howell or Olive—Howell to go south or Olive to go north. When she chose door number two, so did I.

Seattle’s weather is nothing if not changeable. By the time I merged onto northbound I-5 it was raining hard enough that the spray thrown up by passing vehicles was almost blinding, even with the wipers running at full speed, but since the red dot was moving steadily ahead of me, I knew I was on the right track. I thought maybe Constance would turn off at Northgate. If the search warrant team was still at the call center, she might try to beat them to herhouse. But no, when she reached the Northgate exit, the red dot went straight past without slowing down, and I did the same.

Where the hell is she going?I wondered.Is she making a run for the Canadian border?

North of Seattle, she could have turned off toward the Edmonds Ferry Terminal, but she didn’t. Instead, she stayed on I-5 as it passed Mountlake Terrace and curved around to the right, passing under the south end of Lynnwood. When the intersection with 405 also went by without incident, it seemed likely that she was opting for Canada. A quick check of the gas gauge told me I was down to less than a quarter of a tank—not enough to make it that far.

That’s when Scotty called. “We’re at the house and starting to process the ADU,” he said. “Where are you?”

“I’m northbound on I-5 south of Everett,” I told him. “If she heads for Canada, I’ll have to stop for gas.”

“Should we send another chase vehicle?” Scott asked.

“You could,” I replied, “but I’m the only one with a tracker, remember? I’ve got a quarter of a tank now. If it looks like I need to stop, I’ll run up the flag.”

And just that fast, on the outskirts of Everett, things began to go south as brake lights lit up all over the roadway ahead of me. Traffic slowed first to a crawl and then to a full stop. Clearly Constance had somehow dodged the backup because the red dot was still moving at a steady pace.

I inched along for another few minutes or so in what was now down to one lane of traffic before I finally reached the exit to State Route 526 where a box truck had zigged when it should have zagged, taking out another vehicle in the process. That one was up against a guardrail on the median while the truck lay on its side with wreckage blocking both the exit lane and the two right lanesof the freeway. The accident had occurred recently enough that I was able to thread my way past it before emergency responders arrived on the scene. At that point the red dot was still northbound on I-5. That’s when Scott called again. “Where are you now?” he asked.

“In Everett,” I said. “There was a traffic tie-up that slowed me down. Constance’s Prius is still moving north. How are things on your end?”

“A search of the ADU turned up nothing,” he said. “As for the house itself? The place looks like a hoarder’s paradise. We’re leaving a team of CSIs to deal with that. If there’s any incriminating evidence to be found in addition to the devices, it’s probably wherever she left the van, which is where she’s most likely going. Sandy, Ben, and I are coming your way, and we’re heading out now.”

“There’s a big accident in Everett,” I warned him. “That’s going to slow you down.”

“Lights and sirens can move mountains,” he replied. “Constance is a dangerous woman, and I don’t want you coming up against her without backup.”

“That makes two of us,” I agreed.

Once I regained speed, I accelerated until I was going a good ten miles over the posted limit. Just as I seemed to be closing the distance between me and the red dot, I realized it was veering onto an exit ramp. I’ve driven this stretch of highway often enough that I know it by heart. I didn’t need a road sign or a GPS to tell me it was Exit 206—the one that leads to Smokey Point on the right and the North Lakewood neighborhood on the left.

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