Night Prey

"Co

Co

"Let's go," Lucas said.

They cruised past Koop's house, a notably unexceptional place in a subdivision of carefully differentiated houses. They parked two blocks away and slightly above it. The lawn was neat but not perfect, with an artificially green look that suggested a lawn service. There was a single-door, two-car garage. The windows were covered with wooden blinds. There was no newspaper, either on the lawn or porch.

Lucas parked the truck and crawled between seats into the back, where there were two captain's chairs, an empty cooler, and a radio they wouldn't use. Co

"It looks awful normal," she said.

"He's not go

"I remember that," Co

"He needed it," Lucas said.

"How do you think you would've done in court? I mean, if he hadn't gotten shot?"

Lucas gri

"Was he obsessed by her?"

"No, I think he was just pissed off. At me, actually. We were watching him, and somehow he figured it out, slipped the surveillance and went after her. It was almost… sarcastic. He was crazier than a shithouse mouse."

"We don't have that good a case on Koop."

"That's an understatement," Lucas said. "I've been worried about it."

They talked for a while, slowly ran down. Nothing happened. After two hours, they drove around the block, traded vehicles with Sloan and O'Brien, and walked up to the restaurant and sat with Del and Greave.

"We're talking about going to the movies," Del said. "We all got beepers."

"I think we should stay put," Co

"Say that after you've had fifteen cups of coffee," Greave said. "I'm getting tired of peeing."

Del and Greave took the next shift, then Lucas and Co

Del and Greave were back on when Koop started to move. Their beepers went off simultaneously, and everybody in the restaurant looked at them. "Doctors' convention," Sloan said to an openmouthed suburbanite as they left.

"What do you got, Del?" Lucas called.

"We got the garage door up," Del said. "Okay, we got the truck, a red-and-white Chevy…"

They first saw Koop when he got out of his truck at a De

"No beard," Co

"There's been a lot of publicity since Hart," Lucas said. "He would've shaved. Two of the Miller witnesses said he was clean-shaven."

Koop parked in the lot behind the restaurant and walked inside. He walked with a spring, as though he were coiled. He was wearing jeans and T-shirt. He had a body like a rock.

"He's a lifter," Lucas said. "He's a goddamned gorilla."

"I can see him, he's in a front booth," Sloan said. "You want me inside?"

"Let me go in," Co

"Hang on a minute," Lucas said. He called back to Sloan. "Is he by himself?"

"Yeah."

"Don't go in unless somebody hooks up with him. Otherwise, stand off." To Co

"Okay." She nodded.

Lucas went back to the radio. "Sloan, can he see his truck from where he's at?"

"No."

"We're go

Co

"Jesus," he said.

"What?" She was puzzled. "Aren't you go

"There's a pack of Camels on the dashboard."

"What?" Like she didn't understand.

"Unfiltered Camels," he said.

Co

Lucas went to the radio. "Sloan, everybody, listen up. We sorta have a confirmation on this guy. Stay cool but stay back. We're go

CHAPTER

28

They tracked Koop while they talked at police headquarters, laying out the case. Thomas Troy, of the county attorney's criminal division, declared that there wasn't enough, yet, to pick him up.

He and Co

– The woman killed in Iowa told a friend that her date was a cop. But Koop never was, said Troy.

– Hillerod saw him in Madison, said Koop recognized his prison tattoo, Co

– He was seen dumping a body by two witnesses, Co

– Camels, said Co

– Shape was right for the man who attacked Evan Hart-big and muscular. Tall, big, and muscular, is what the witnesses said, Troy replied. Koop is distinctly short. Besides, the attack on Hart isn't necessarily related to the attacks on the women. The man who attacked Hart had a beard and wore glasses. Koop is clean-shaven, shows no glasses requirement on his driver's license, and wasn't wearing glasses that morning. The witnesses hadn't been able to pick his photo out of a display.

"You're working against us," Co

"Bullshit," 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 Mi

"We know he's nuts," Co

"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 bump into him one too many times. Where in the hell is tech support?"