Page 12 of The Beachside Cafe 4
He looked at Jaymee.
“And you. And your daughter. Everyone. We have to err on the side of caution.”
“Oh that is so worrisome,” Jaymee said, turning her eyes away from the documents describing what may or may not be going on in the laboratories at IDL.
“You don’t have to keep doing this, Jaymee,” Cameron said quickly. “I can take over. You and Cheyenne might be safer that way.”
Jaymee’s eyes darted to his face and she snorted. “I am about as involved as I can get, Cam. Turning away from it now wouldn’t keep me safe. It would make me vulnerable. And I can only imagine what words Cheyenne would use to tell me what she thinks of a plan like that.”
Cameron chuckled. “You’re right. You are absolutely right. I’m ashamed I even said the words.” He dropped the folder to the desk again. “So what do you want us to do now?”
“You go ahead and keep concentrating on finding clues to Doug’s whereabouts. We haven’t stopped doing that here, too,” John spoke with a reassuring tone, his eyes on Jaymee. “I know you want to find him.”
“Not for the reasons you might think,” Jaymee responded, her voice cold.
Lou laughed in response. “I think we know what your reasons are.”
“Well, I’ve talked to Councilman O’Rourke,” Cameron said, crossing his arms in front of his chest. “And she talked to Daniel Coulter. We think you can take them off your list for now or move them to the bottom with Russo and Granger. Neither one had the opportunity or really the personality to do it.”
“O’Rourke doesn’t have the time or inclination to be bothered with all this,” Jaymee added, “and Coulter is just a lump on a log with a brilliant mind for money. He’s not much of a personality, I can tell you that much.”
Lou nodded, sitting forward to pick up yet another folder from a stack in front of him. He fingered through the stack until he came to the fourth one down and pulled it out. He opened it and flipped through the various profiles there, removing Amanda’s and Dylan’s. He held them up clutching in his fingers, waving them gently.
“So these are the two suspects right now.”
“Yeah,” Jaymee answered. “It was Dylan’s number that was called from Russo’s when he was taken to that warehouse. Did you get a handwriting analysis off that paper where the address was written down?”
Lou shook his head.
“Aww, that’s too bad,” Jaymee responded before continuing. “Maybe we can find a way to get a comparison made between the handwriting and Amanda’s.”
“You think it was Amanda at Russo’s place?” Lou asked, sounding surprised. “How’s she gonna knock out a man that size and take him and string him up on a rope somewhere? She’s too small.”
“I’m sure she didn’t work alone, Lou,” John said, rebuking his partner in a teasing way.”
“There wasn’t signs of more than one more person being the attacker. It just didn’t look like two people.”
“Coulter told me Amanda asked him to help her with a job a few months ago,” Jaymee said. “He turned her down. I don’t see why she couldn’t have contacted someone we don’t even know about and got them to help her. What do you want to bet she’s slept with or is sleeping with more men than are on that list?”
“Can’t deny that,” Lou said, nodding.
The phone rang when there was a brief pause in their conversation and Lou picked it up. “Lou Monroe, 2ndprecinct… what?” His eyes flicked up to take them all in. “Yep, we’ll be right there. Leaving now, call on my cell if you need me before I get there.”
He stood up as he hung up the phone. Jaymee felt a shot of adrenaline pass through her with his sudden movements.
“What’s happened?” she asked.
“Coulter’s dead in his office. You two want to come along?”
Cameron snorted. “What do you think?”
EIGHT
Cameron and Jaymee arrived back at IDL shortly after the detectives. They both hurried across the parking lot and entered the front of the building, immediately mixing in with the crowd.
“What are all these people doing?” Jaymee asked, suddenly fearful. She pushed herself closer to Cameron, who instinctively put his arm around her shoulders. He pointed through the crowd.
“There’s Lou. Let’s go over there to him. We need to stick with him so officers don’t…”
