“Okay, let’s see what we have.” Quarles pushed up the sleeves of his white shirt, rolled closer to Brit’s desk and opened the envelope with the jewelry-heist photos.
Brit leaned back. Not as far back as he’d needed to do before. Quarles’ presence seemed less intrusive. Not that Brit liked him, but he could almost tolerate him. But why Quarles tolerated Brit’s pissy mood was a mystery. Even Brit had to admit, he’d been a pain in the ass.
And speaking of pain, Brit twisted his neck to release the nagging tension. He’d managed to get about three hours of sleep. If you could call it sleep. He woke up about every half hour, his brain actively working on Keith’s case.
Still, this evening he felt somehow more together. Maybe it was the lead on Keith’s case; maybe it was seeing Susan. Nothing like having his big sis fuss over him. She’d even gone to the store and left him a sandwich waiting in a plastic baggy. Yup, Susan won the Sister-of-the-Year award.
Brit’s gaze shifted to the sweater hanging on a hook behind his office door. Maybe his mood had something to do with looking forward to seeing a sexy blonde with big blue eyes. No. He raked a hand through his hair. Tomorrow he would return her sweater and collect his jacket. Maybe remind her to stay away from no-good men. Nothing else.
“Here.” Quarles laid out the images on the desk as if they were cards and they were about to play a game. “I thought I’d run by a few pawn shops tomorrow. Show a few pictures around. See if anything has surfaced.”
“Yeah.” Brit said. “I’ll take some too and hit a few on the north side while you go south. I was going to comb the gang hangouts in that area tomorrow anyway.”
Rotating his shoulders, his gaze caught on one of the photographs Quarles tossed down. A bracelet—a bracelet with diamonds set in small flower-shaped settings.
“I’ve seen one like this.” Pushing his hand over his face, he searched his mind. With him running on only a few hours of half-ass sleep, the search took longer than it should have.
“Not like this.” Quarles placed the other images out on the desk. “Most of these are pretty rare. The old man bought good stuff. Sold a lot to the rich folks.”
Brit read the back of the photo. The bracelet wasn’t an original, but information printed claimed it to be one of only ten. And it was valued at forty-eight thousand bucks. Then he remembered. “She was wearing it. That’s the bracelet Cali McKay was wearing.”
Chapter Ten
“Who?” Quarles’ green eyes tightened in puzzlement.
“Cali McKay, the woman with the domestic situation we backed up. She had a bracelet just like this.”
“Really.” Quarles flipped the card and read the back. “It just looked like it. There were only ten of these made.”
“No. I remember because I helped her get it off.”
Quarles leaned forward. “You think she’s in on this?”
Brit crossed his arms over his chest and considered it. He got a visual of her eyes, big blue orbs of innocence. All her pleases and thank yous. “No. But her boyfriend...” The word “boyfriend” tasted sour on his lips. “But Stan Humphrey, yeah.”
“Did they ever find the guy?”
“No. But I don’t think they looked too hard.”
“Is she back at her apartment?”
“She better not be. She said she was staying with a friend.” A bad feeling bumped around Brit’s chest. What if she hadn’t listened to him? Damn, this guy could be a murderer.
He fumbled through some scrap papers on his desk until he found her number. He punched it in. Her answering machine caught the call, and he hung up. Leaning back, he drummed his fingers on his desk then stood.
“Where are you going?” Quarles asked.
“To pull the file Jones wrote up on her today. Maybe he got an address where she’s staying.”
“You thinking about looking her up now? At this hour?”
“If this guy is involved with the jewelry store robbery, he’s wanted for murder. So yeah, I’m looking her up.” Brit walked out.
A few minutes later, he sat back down at his desk with both Jones’ file and Anderson’s file in his hand.
“Got anything?” Quarles asked, edging closer.
“Not in this one. But Anderson mentioned he had several numbers.” Frustrated, he snatched up Anderson’s file and started leafing through it. “Pay dirt. Anderson said he thought it was her mother’s number. Maybe she knows where her daughter is staying.” Leaning against the edge of his desk, he punched in the number. An answering machine picked up. “Hi, this is Loren McKay….”
“Damn.” Brit hung up, collapsing back in the chair. He picked up the file and started reading.
“Ahh, listen to this.” Brit looked at Quarles. “Stan plays in a band and travels a lot. Guess where she thought Stan was supposed to be the night he shot at her.”
“Where?” Quarles asked.
“Austin. Isn’t that where one of the robberies happened?”
Quarles eyes lit up. “Yeah. Interesting.”