“We gotta go,” I said to Carlos.

I pointed at the press. “You mind returning that to Ed in Evidence?”

“Mean-ass Ed?” Carlos asked.

“The same.” Remy smiled.

“Oh yeah, he loves Mexican guys with long hair. My pleasure, P.T.”

28

Remy and I hustled to the parking lot across from the precinct, and I told her I’d drive.

“What’s the place?”

“Homewood Suites. Out on 909.”

I knew this hotel. It was one of two that was put up in about six months’ time, a few miles west of my father-in-law’s house.

We left the city and drove toward Bergamot, passing County Records. Ten minutes later we pulled off 909 and found the hotel about two blocks from the highway.

The place was made of prefabricated concrete that had been trucked into Mason Falls at night in sheets eight inches thick and twenty feet wide.

A blue-suiter named Ingram met us out front. He was waiting by his cruiser, parked in the turnaround.

“Jesus, Clint,” I said to Officer Ingram as we pulled up, staring at the patrolman’s facial hair. He was midthirties, with a baby face and a brown moustache that looked like a caterpillar.

“Is it Movember already?” Remy asked him.

“No, I just—” Ingram touched the tiny fur ball above his mouth. “I thought it looked good.”

“That’s what matters.” Remy patted him on the shoulder. “What you think.”

“What’ve we got here?” I asked him.

“The manager rented a room five days ago to a Stanley Creiss.” Ingram held up the sketch of the old guy that was composited from five accounts of him at Tandy’s.

“Is he a hundred percent sure it’s our old guy?”

“A hundred and ten percent were his words,” Ingram said. “But there’s no one in the room, P.T. Plus, the I.D. and credit card are stolen. Stanley Creiss is actually eighty-six and lives in the West Cobb area of Atlanta. Retired helicopter pilot.”

Ingram walked us inside then, introducing Remy and me to the manager, who was five foot three, with tiny arms that emerged from a short-sleeved dress shirt. His eyes were closer together than an earthworm’s, and his name was Robert Riggs.

“Like Bobby Riggs, the tennis player?” I asked.

This drove my partner crazy. That I always found a famous name to compare to the person we were interviewing.

“Robert,” he said, adjusting his glasses. “Not Bobby.”

“Did you personally rent the room to Mr. Creiss?” Remy asked the manager.

“I did,” Riggs said. “One week. Flat rate. He asked specifically not to bother him. No maid or towel service either.”

Officer Ingram led us up a flight of stairs, and we entered the second floor. As we approached Room 203, we saw Ingram’s partner, Officer Glenda Yantsy, standing at an open door.

“This is the room Creiss was in,” Ingram said. “Or whatever his real name is.”

Remy and I moved past Yantsy and stood just inside the door.

We took a beat, studying the place. The old guy had killed four people in the last few days, one of them a cop’s son. The scene was not to be treated lightly.