“This guy probably just wants some attention. Nobody’s gonna talk about a crime before they commit it.” He tilted his head as if in thought. A slow smile pulled at his lips. “Of course, we could run with this tonight and see if the mysterious e-mailer will call in to talk.”
C.J. backed away from him, her head shaking back and forth. “Don’t you even suggest it, Harley. I’m not about to encourage people like this.”
“Aw, C.J. C’mon. It could be…”
“No!”
“But…”
She grabbed her purse from the desk. “I’ll be out of here in two minutes if you don’t go along with me on this.”
Harley was a head shorter than she was, but his determination could make her resolve slip. He’d done it before. But not this time. Her phone rang, breaking the silence between them. She straightened her shoulders and ignored it, her gaze never wavering from his.
Finally, he grinned and stuck his hands in his pockets. “Okay, have it your way. But I think it’s a mistake.”
She didn’t say anything, and after a few moments he headed toward the door. When he’d disappeared down the hall, she sank down in her desk chair and read the message again. Was somebody really about to die?
If this was the kind of people who were tuning in to her program, maybe the talk show wasn’t worth it. But then that would mean that Mitch had been right all along. With a groan she closed the e-mail program and sat there, staring at the blank screen.
The words, no longer visible on the screen, appeared in her mind as if they’d been seared into her innermost thoughts. She crossed her arms and hugged her body to stop the trembling that swept through her. If the message was to be believed, four people were walking around Oxford unaware that death was stalking them. She had no idea who they were or why she had been chosen to rescue them from the evil they were about to encounter.
“If only I could warn them,” she whispered.
Mitch didn’t know what made him take the long route to work and then turn down the street where C.J. lived. He knew he wouldn’t see her. By this time of morning, she’d already been at the radio station for hours. Maybe it was a leftover habit from picking her up to go out, or it could be that he just wanted to feel close to her again. At times during the last month he’d thought he would go out of his mind from wanting to see her, talk to her or just sit quietly and hold her hand.
He could still envision her as she was two years ago when she’d interviewed him about a murder in Oxford. He’d been surprised when she informed him that she remembered him from college. He had no recollection of her, but in later weeks he couldn’t understand how he’d missed out on someone so special.
For him no other woman would ever measure up to C.J. She was beautiful with her long, brown hair and hazel eyes, but that was only part of the attraction he felt toward her. Behind her flashing eyes was an intelligence he felt he could never quite match. And because she never tried to appear superior to anyone, it only increased the magnetism she radiated.
When she broke the engagement, it had caught him completely off guard. He’d known she was under a lot of stress getting the new show started. They’d disagreed about her doing it, just as they had disagreed about her refusal to acknowledge any need for God in her life. The arguments had never gotten heated, or at least he hadn’t thought so.
Patrolling the streets of Oxford for several years before being promoted to detective had taught him how dangerous situations could become in the blink of an eye. It had also reinforced his belief that he couldn’t get through the day without the peace that came from knowing God watched over him. He wanted C.J. to know that love, too.
Mitch drove down the street and pulled to a stop in front of C.J.’s house. He sat there thinking about all the times she’d come running out to meet him. Her eyes would light up, and his heart would beat a little faster at how right it felt for them to be together. All that changed when she gave the ring back.
A tap at the window startled him, and he jumped in surprise. He turned to see Mary Warren, C.J.’s next-door neighbor, standing beside him. He smiled and rolled the window down. “Good morning, Mary. I didn’t see you.”
The elderly lady smiled. “I’ve been walking Otto and saw your car. I wanted to say hello.”
At the mention of her schnauzer, the dog jumped up on the side of the car. Mary pulled on the leash and took a step back. “Otto, get down.”
Otto’s paws slid downward, and Mitch cringed at the sound of Otto’s nails scraping on metal. He dreaded seeing the scratch on his new paint job. Mary pulled Otto back, but he tugged hard on the leash to reach the car. C.J. and Mitch had often laughed that Otto had Mary trained well.
Mitch opened the door and stepped out in an effort to distract Otto from jumping up again. He knelt down and patted the dog. “How are you today, boy?”
Mary beamed at Mitch as he rose. “Otto has always liked you.”
Mitch smiled. “How have you been?”
Mary’s faded blue eyes stared at Mitch. The jogging suit she wore swallowed her small body. She’d lost weight in the last few weeks. Every time he saw Mary, he wondered how much longer she could live alone. Her mind wasn’t as sharp as it had been a year ago, but that didn’t distract from what she saw as her mission in life.
Ever since Mary’s husband had died, she’d been obsessed with what she saw as the rising crime rate in Oxford. She’d become so concerned that she had appointed herself as a neighborhood watchdog to keep an eye out for danger. Every time he saw Mary, she had another incident to report to him.
Mary glanced over her shoulder toward the street. “All right, I guess. But I wanted to tell you about the woman I saw this morning sitting across the street in a strange car.”
“Maybe she was visiting someone.” Mitch wondered how many times Mary had approached him with her worries.
Mary shook her head. “I don’t think so. She was sitting there when I left for my walk with Otto, and she hadn’t left forty-five minutes later when we came back. I watched her after I went in the house. She drove off about fifteen minutes later when C.J. did. In fact, she followed C.J.”
An uneasy feeling welled up in Mitch. “What did the car look like, Mary?”
She reached in her pocket and pulled out a small notebook. “I don’t know anything about cars. All I know is that it was big and black. But I wrote down the license plate number.” She tore the paper from the pad and held it out to him. “You know I never go anywhere without my notebook.”
Mitch smiled, took the paper and put his arm around Mary’s shoulders. “I’m sure it was very innocent. But if it’ll make you feel better, I’ll check on it. Now you go on home, and don’t worry.”
She patted his arm and stared at him for a moment. “You’re a good boy, Mitch.”
He climbed back in his car as Mary shuffled toward her house with Otto in tow. Mitch stared at the number in Mary’s shaky handwriting before he pulled his cell phone from his pocket and speed-dialed the police department’s number.
With the first ring, the dispatcher answered. “Oxford Police Department.”
“Jennie, this is Mitch Harmon. I need you to run a license plate for me.”
“Sure, Mitch.”
He read the numbers and waited for her computer search. Within seconds she was back on the phone.
“Got it, Mitch.”
“Who’s the car registered to?”
“None other than Jimmy Carpenter.”
The words hit Mitch like a punch in the stomach.