Matt wasn’t as certain, and he feared that Hamilton had slipped away in a vehicle they didn’t know about, leaving the city before the storm really hit. He’d taken his laptop and left Spokane. If that were the case, they would be stuck. No one would feel truly safe until they found him, and it would take far more time.

Where the hell did he go?

Matt hated not knowing. He wasn’t as good as Catherine at getting into the criminal mind, but he was good enough. With this guy, he wasn’t certain. Catherine thought he was nearby. Matt felt he had been too smart, too methodical to sacrifice himself now just because he wanted Maddox dead.

Catherine had always told him he thought too logically in situations like this.

“You have to think like your suspect. You have to recognize they’ll have different priorities, and while self-preservation is usually important, it’s not always the most important.”

Matt arrived at the hotel at nine. His driver, a seasoned officer, was staying until midnight, meeting up with the four officers who were on duty outside the hotel. At that point he’d be on for twelve straight hours. No one wanted to take a break—not when they were now looking for a cop killer—but they had to, or someone was going to make a mistake.

He went immediately up to the war room. Ryder was there, but not Kara.

“Detective Quinn should have been here over an hour ago,” Matt said.

“She was—she went to the manager’s office about twenty minutes ago to review the security video.”

“Why?”

“The pictures you found at Hamilton’s place. Since he was here on Saturday night, she thought he might have returned.”

“Why the hell would he return knowing that the FBI is here?”

“Dr. Esteban called in and said he’s staying at the lab all night. They’re processing the evidence from the Richmond house, and the ME is performing Detective Knolls’s autopsy tonight. He said he’d sleep in the break room, and the facility is secure.”

“It is. I was there.”

“And Harris will be back by ten—the secondary crime team is nearly done with Hamilton’s residence. They’re leaving a unit behind in case he returns.”

“Have we heard anything about Eric Tolliver? He was still in surgery when I left SPD.”

“No change, but the boy who was hit this morning is stable. He has a hairline fracture on his skull, concussion, and a broken arm and rib. They’re keeping him for a couple of days to make sure there’s no swelling on the brain, but the doctors are optimistic that he’ll make a full recovery.”

“Glad we have some good news.”

“I took the liberty of reserving Detective Quinn a room for the night.”

Matt hadn’t even thought of it. And he couldn’t very well tell Ryder that she could stay in Matt’s room.

Instead, he said, “Appreciate it.” He sat down and grabbed a stack of printouts. “What am I looking for here?”