“But I would never do that.”
“Maybe you wouldn’t, Wainwright, but plenty of people would. Especially if they didn’t get a good look at his face up close.”
“I see,” I said, still a little thrown off, because this wasn’t the way they did it on television. But I could definitely see the benefit of a sequential lineup. And I was learning a sad truth, that cop shows didn’t always portray these procedures exactly as they were done in real life.
“Let’s do this,” she said. “I want you to take a good long look at this guy.”
I stared at the first guy for another minute.
“Seen enough?” Lee asked.
I nodded.
The first man was instructed to leave by the same door he came in, and a few seconds later, the next guy walked into the same space and stared straight ahead at me.
It was Horatio.
I flinched at the sight of him. He was as huge and frightening and menacing as he’d been a week ago and I had to remind myself that he couldn’t see me.
I sucked in a breath, exhaled slowly, and then whispered, “That’s him.”
“So noted,” she said, and shot a glance at the taller man in the suit standing next to her.
A moment later, she said, “Send in the next person, please.”
I didn’t say another word as the same routine was repeated for the rest of the suspects. There were a total of five and all of them were tall and heavyset.
I looked at every one of their faces, their clothing, their height, their shoes, their hair, and the shape of their heads. Horatio was the second man in. Number two. He was the tallest and heaviest of the five, and he looked the meanest. I had recognized him the instant he walked into the room. The memory of seeing him so close made me shiver again. I still wasn’t 100 percent confident the guy couldn’t see me through that glass wall.
He had to know that I would be one of the people who would identify him. But that didn’t mean I wanted to have a face-to-face confrontation with him. I’d done that already.
“Did you recognize any of these men as the one who attacked you?” Inspector Lee asked, her voice a bit stilted and formal.
“Yes.”
“Can you give me his number, please?”
“He was number two.”
“Are you certain?”
“Yes, absolutely one hundred percent certain that’s the man who attacked me and Benny the guard at the studio last week. He’s the one who threatened to kill me and Vera Stoddard.”
“Number two,” Lee repeated.
I nodded. “Yes.”
She turned to the two men standing next to her. “You got that?”
“I got it,” the shorter one grumbled.
“Let’s go,” the other man said. He looked at me and said, “Thank you for your time.”
They walked out and I looked at Inspector Lee. “Who were those guys?”
“The unhappy one is number two’s lawyer. The other one is the ADA.”
Assistant district attorney, I thought. The prosecutor. “Cool. Just like on TV.”
“Get out of here, Wainwright. I’ve gotta go take care of number two.”
She snorted and I swallowed a laugh as we left the viewing room.
? ? ?
Before heading to the studio, I found out from Inspector Lee that Horatio’s real name was Larry Jones. But he was better known by his street name, Lug Nut.
Lug Nut. Good grief. Had his parents called him that as a baby?
I walked out of the Hall of Justice building and turned east on Bryant. My apartment was only five blocks away, so I could’ve walked here from there. But they were five long city blocks and since I knew I would have to drive directly from here to the studio, I’d come by car.
It was getting chilly and I pulled my short navy jacket closer around my waist. I’d heard the weather report predicting rain tonight, so I’d brought my new raincoat and an umbrella with me, but I’d left them both in the car. Too bad, because it looked like it would start pouring any minute.
I had parked in a lot on Boardman Street, a block south of Bryant, but I had my sights set on checking out a food truck I’d seen at the corner of Bryant and Harriet, one block past Boardman.
I had developed a dangerous affection for food-truck dining and was currently on the lookout for the perfect pupusa de queso, a yummy little fried treat made of thick cornmeal and stuffed with cheese.
I walked faster and checked over my shoulder to see if it was safe to cross the street. That’s when I noticed a man on the opposite side of the street, staring at me.
My breath hitched and I stopped in my tracks. The guy was huge and mean-looking and his mouth was set in a permanent sneer.
Horatio?
How? He was in jail. Did he have a twin? Whoever the hell this guy was, he noticed that I had seen him and he was jabbing his finger toward me in a menacing way.
“You!” he shouted. “I’m gonna make you sorry you ever went to the police.”