Part 33 (1/2)

”You're working against us,” Connell fumed.

”Bulls.h.i.+t,” said Troy. ”I'm just outlining an elementary defense. A good defense attorney will tear up everything you've got. We need one hard thing. Just one. Just get me one, and we'll take him down.”

KOOP SPENT THE first day of surveillance in his truck, driving long complicated routes around the Cities, apparently aimlessly. He stopped at Two Guy's gym, was inside for two hours, then moved on, stopping only to eat at fast-food joints, and once to get gas.

”I think he must've made us,” Del called on one of the scrambled radios as they sat stalled in traffic on I-94 between Minneapolis and St. Paul. ”Unless he's nuts.”

”We know he's nuts,” Connell said. ”The question is, what's he doing?”

”He's not scouting,” Lucas said from a third car. ”He's moving too fast to be scouting. And he never goes back. He just drives. He doesn't seem to know where he's going-he's always getting caught in those circles and dead ends.”

”Well, we gotta do something,” Del said. ” 'Cause if he hasn't made us yet, he will. He'll get us up in some of those suburban switchbacks and we'll b.u.mp into him one too many times. Where in the h.e.l.l is tech support?”

”We're here,” the tech-support guy said on the radio. ”You stop the sonofab.i.t.c.h, and we'll tag him.”

At three o'clock, Koop stopped at a Perkins restaurant and took a booth. While Lucas and Connell watched from outside, Henry Ramirez from intelligence slipped under Koop's truck and hooked up a remote-controlled battery-powered transmitter, and placed a flat, battery-powered infrared flasher in the center of the topper. If Koop climbed on top of the truck, he'd see it. Otherwise, it was invisible, and the truck could be unmistakably tracked at night, from the air.

AT NINE O'CLOCK, in the last dying light of the day, Koop wandered out of the web of roads around Lake Minnetonka and headed east toward Minneapolis. They no longer had a lead car. Leading had proven impossible. The trailing cars were all well back. The radio truck followed silently, with the tracking plane doing all the work. From the air, the spotter, using infrared gla.s.ses, said Koop was clear all the way, and tracked him street by street into the Cities.

”He's going for Jensen,” Lucas said to Connell as he followed the track on a map.

”I don't know where I am anymore.”

”We're coming up on the lakes.” Lucas called out to the others: ”We're breaking off, we'll be at Jensen's.”

He called ahead to Jensen's, but there was no answer at her phone. He called dispatch and got the number for the resident manager: ”We've got a problem and we need a little help. . . .”

THE MANAGER WAS waiting by the open door of the parking garage, the door open. Lucas pulled inside and dumped the car in a handicapped s.p.a.ce.

”What do you want me to do?” the manager asked, handing him a key to Jensen's apartment.

”Nothing,” Lucas said. ”Go on back to your apartment. We'd like you near a telephone. Just wait. Please don't go out in the hallway.”

To Connell: ”If he comes up, we've got him. If we get him inside Jensen's place, that ties him to the stalking and the Camels on the air conditioner across the street. And the knife attack ties him to the other killings and the Camel we found on Wannemaker.”

”You think he'll come up?” she asked as they hurried to the elevators.

”I hope so. Jesus, I hope so. That'd be it.” At Jensen's apartment, they let themselves in, and Lucas turned on one light, slipped his .45 out of his shoulder holster and checked it.

”WHAT'S HE DOING?” Lucas asked.

”Moving very slowly, but he's moving,” the spotter called. ”Now, now, we've lost him, he's under some trees or some s.h.i.+t, wait, I got a flash, I see him again, now he's gone. . . .”

”I see him,” Del called. ”I'm parked in the bike shop lot, and he's coming this way. He's moving faster, but he's under trees, he'll be out in a sec. . . .”

”Got him,” the spotter said. ”He's going around the block again. Slowing down . . .”

”Real slow,” Del called. ”I'm on the street, walking, he's right in front of the apartment, real slow, almost stopped. No, there he goes. . . .”

”He's outa here,” the spotter called a minute later. ”He's heading into the loop.”

”Did he see you, Del?”

”No way.”

Connell said, ”Well, s.h.i.+t. . . .”

”Yeah.” Lucas felt like a deflated balloon. He walked twice around the room. ”G.o.dd.a.m.nit,” he said. ”G.o.dd.a.m.nit. What's wrong with the guy? Why didn't he come up?”

Koop continued through downtown to a bar near the airport, where he drank three solitary beers, paid, bought a bottle at the liquor store down the street, and drove back to his house. The last light went off a few minutes after two o'clock.

Lucas went home. Weather was asleep. He patted her affectionately on the a.s.s before he went down himself.

KOOP RESUMED THE driving the next day, trailing through the suburbs east and south of St. Paul. They tracked him until one o'clock in the afternoon, when he stopped at a Wendy's. Lucas went on down the block to a McDonald's. Feeling dried out, older, bored, he got a double cheeseburger, a sack of fries, and a malt, and ambled back to the car, where Connell was eating carrot sticks out of a Tupperware box.

”George Beneteau called yesterday, while we were out,” Connell said when they'd run out of everything else to talk about.

”Oh, yeah?” She had a talent for leaving him short of words.

”He left a message on my machine. He wants to go out and get a steak, or something.”

”What'd you do?”

”Nothing.” She said it flatly. ”I can't deal with it. I guess tomorrow I'll give him a call and explain.”

Lucas shook his head and pushed fries into his face, hoping that she wouldn't start crying again.

She didn't. But a while later, as they escorted Koop across the Lake Street bridge, Connell said, ”That TV person, Jan Reed. You guys seem pretty friendly.”

”I'm friendly with a lot of media,” Lucas said uncomfortably.

”I mean friendly-friendly,” she said.

”Oh, not really.”

”Mmm,” she said.

”Mmm, what?” Lucas asked.

”I'd think a very long time. This is one of those things where, you know-I suspect you're just a suit.”

”Not quite bright,” he said.

”Took the words out of my mouth,” Connell said.

KOOP STOPPED AT a Firestone store but just sat in the truck. The surveillance van, watching him from a Best Buy store parking lot, said he seemed to be looking at a Denny's restaurant across the street.

”He ate less than an hour ago,” Lucas said. They were a block away, parked in front of a used-car lot, a bit conspicuous. ”Let's go look at some cars.”

They got out and walked into the lot, where they could watch Koop through the windows of a used Buick. After ten minutes in the Firestone lot, Koop started the truck, rolled it across the street to the Denny's and went inside.