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Mortified by her wayward thoughts, she tore her gaze away. She hadn’t recalled those moments in too many years to count. What would elicit themnow?
But she knew the answer to that. It was this place. Ethan’s proximity. Both of which made a lie out of her assurances to Raiker that there were no memories here to trip her up. At least, she hadn’t thoughtso.
“Ifwe’re right and the UNSUB is this Anis Tera that Fornier mentioned. Andifhe hasn’t dumped the van and is still in the province—” Ethan broke off to order a pizza at the takeout place that answered. Through charm and intimidation, he managed to convince them to have the driver pick up the coffee, as well. Alexa’s lips quirked. His powers of persuasion had always been legendary. How else had he talked her into a relationship that moved outside the library walls and into his world? One that had been utterly foreign to her, but with Ethan as her guide, so completelyirresistible.
When he hung up, he picked up the conversation where he’d left off. “Fornier said Simard arrived here on Sunday. We know the offender’s time frame—the last New Brunswick victim was two weeks ago. The chance of the highway and toll-road cameras still having images from that long ago is minimal, but we do have a request in for those images.” He scrubbed both hands over his face for a moment before dropping them to regard them again. “Nextmoves?”
“I’ve been pulling names of owners of vans like the kids described this morning.” Nyle shoved the list he’d been making toward Ethan. “I assume you have someone from the team in New Brunswick doing thesame?”
He nodded, picked up the sheaf of papers and studied them. “McManus. But until we get a clearer connection that it is the UNSUB in that vehicle, chasing down all these owners isn’t the best use of ourtime.”
“My priority is a safety check on Jeanette Lawler,” Alexa said. She couldn’t put aside the nagging concern that had been growing inside her since they’d talked to Fornier earlier. “How long ago did you speak to the VancouverRCMP?”
Ethan glanced at the clock on the wall. “You heard me calling them in the car. That was…what? A half hourago?”
His words did nothing to allay her anxiety. Vance was an unwitting player in the ruse to draw Simard here. It was possible that Lawler was, too. But she wanted to be certain. “Do we still have the manifests we were looking at earliertoday?”
Nyle jerked his head to a box near the door. “I packaged them up to be sent downtown. Ethan said Lieutenant Martin would assign a couple of his men to them. Should go a lot faster now that they no longer have to look for names associated with Simard. They just need to cross-check the incoming New Brunswick and Nova Scotia passenger lists for names of people who entered both provinces in the window we’vedefined.”
“So it shouldn’t take long at all for us to look only at the airline manifests for the last week or so and examine them for Jeanette Lawler’sname.”
The glint in Ethan’s eyes told her he wasn’t keen on the idea. But after a moment, he sighed. “Fine. We’ll check them over pizza. And hope that we get a call before we’re through, informing us that Jeanette Lawler is safe and sound in her ownprovince.”
It was Nyle who made the discovery. Still on his first coffee, but midway through his third slice of meat-lover’s pizza, he paused, the slice halfway to his mouth. “Jeanette Lawler.Dammit.”
The food she’d consumed turned to a cold brick in Alexa’s stomach. “She flewin?”
Ethan’s chair scraped as he pushed it back and bounded out of it to round the table to peer at the manifest in front of Nyle. “Monday afternoon.” His mouth flattening, he whirled on his heel, grabbing for the phone in his pocket. “Keep looking,” he snapped over his shoulder. “Make sure she hasn’t left the provinceagain.”
Alexa flipped to the beginning of the pile in front of her and skimmed the pages for today. Yesterday. A frigid finger of ice traced down her spine as she quickly scanned the pages. Nothing in the offender profile she’d shared with the task force this morning had offered specifics on the reason for his escalation. After meeting Fornier, she could guess what had triggered the UNSUB. But she still had no idea if he’d selected morevictims.
Or whether he had Jeanette Lawler in hissights.
* * *
“How didyou even discover the hotel where we’re staying?” Parker Bixby, the tall emaciated looking cameraman ofExposélooked more annoyed than concerned when he made his eventual descent to the Piedmont Hotel lobby a couple of hours later. “No one is supposed to give that information out. There’ll be a big kerfuffle over this, I promiseyou.”
“Jeanette Lawler,” Ethan interrupted. “Where isshe?”
“Who did you say you worked foragain?”
Ethan studied the man. Whatever he’d been imbibing in his room was likely illegal in this country. His pupils were dilated and his speech overly enunciated. “Royal Mounted Canadian Police,” he repeated slowly. “We have reason to believe Lawler may be targeted by someone wishing to do herharm.”
“Oh, dear.” A vacant smile tilted the man’s lips. “Those numbers are myriad, I’mafraid.”
Ethan took a step closer and tamped down an urge to grab the man by his shiny purple shirt. “Callher.”
The woman hadn’t responded to their messages or those from the administrative assistant who’d finally been tracked down by Vancouver RCMP officers and persuaded to give up her boss’s number. The reluctant assistant had eventually shared the name of the hotel where the crew was staying, but Lawler wasn’t answering the phone in her room, either. Nor had she responded to repeated knocks on herdoor.
“Me?” The man trilled a laugh, throwing his head back to show a protruding Adam’s apple. “She isn’t likely to answer a call from me, either.” Still chuckling, he lowered his voice conspiratorially. “She’s got her party panties on by this time, and her colleagues are the last ones she wants to talkto.”
When Ethan only looked at him, the man gave a theatrical sigh. “Fine.” He made a show of drawing his cell out of the back pocket of his tight black jeans and languidly punching in a number. Ethan could feel the impatience rolling off Alexa and Nyle at his side. It mirrored his. It was like a giant clock had lodged in his head, and he was watching the minutes tick off while waiting on the self-important idiot beforehim.
“See?” Bixby held up the phone so Ethan could hear the voice mail message. Then he disconnected and wedged the phone back into his pocket. “She’s been working like a madwoman for the last few days finalizing the interview we came to this godforsaken province for. Then it got postponed today. Jeanette was pissed. Beyond pissed, actually. Thinks the guest is disrespecting her, which is a dangerous game to play with the host ofExposé. She’s going to be out for blood when we shoottomorrow.”
“The guest is ArmandVance?”
He abruptly sobered. “How’d you know that? Did Cindy give out that information, too? Oh, that girl is sofired….”