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So why couldn’t he relax? He paced the length of the room, his mind going back over the shooting incident. Then he abruptly stopped.
What if the shooting wasn’t random?
He quickly crossed the room to listen at the connecting doors. Hearing the TV, he pushed her side open a bit. “Elly? Are you decent?”
“Yes, I’m dressed.” She lowered the sound on the TV.
He edged into the room. She was propped up against the headboard, pillows piled behind her back. “I have a few questions. How much time passed between the time you saw this guy and he started shooting?”
She frowned. “I bumped into him roughly fifteen minutes before the parade started. The marching band was playing ‘Frosty the Snowman,’ but they didn’t come into view right away. Maybe ten minutes passed before they made it to our section of the street. I was watching the ice skaters. One minute they were spinning around the small patch of ice, the next they were lying on the truck bed covered in blood.”
He moved closer, then dropped down onto the edge of the bed. “Do you think he shot the ice skaters first?”
Her brow furrowed as she searched her memory. “Yes. I think the ice skaters were his first victims. I didn’t realize what happened, I was so shocked. But then the gunfire continued, and people began to scream and cry out as they fell to the ground.”
The ice skaters. He pulled out his phone and searched for their names. They were local, he knew that much. And they’d been winning skating events over the past few months, which had garnered media attention.
“Gabrielle St. John and Henry Watkins.” He lifted his gaze to hers. “The woman died at the scene, right? Gabrielle?”
“Yes.” Her eyes widened. “You think the shooter killed her on purpose?”
“It’s possible.” It didn’t make sense that the gunman would kill Gabrielle and injure Henry along with so many others.
Unless he wanted them to believe the event was a random shooting, much like the other shooting events that took place across the country.
“That’s sick,” Elly whispered.
“Yeah.” Or creepily smart. He wanted to call Rhy but settled for sending an email to him and Assistant Chief Michaels instead. Rhy was on vacation, taking well deserved time off to care for his wife and newborn baby daughter. The information may or may not be as helpful as he’d hoped. But maybe once they got an ID on the guy, they’d learn his true motive. “Thanks, I appreciate the insight.”
She reached out to touch his shoulder. “I want to help, Joe. Please. I keep thinking back to the moment I bumped into him. How I instantly got a bad vibe from him. Maybe if I’d have said something, this wouldn’t have happened.”
“Even if you had mentioned brief interaction to me, there would have been nothing I could do,” he hastened to reassure her. “There wouldn’t have been probable cause to search him for a weapon. Not unless he’d done something to break the law.”
“I guess.” Her arm dropped back to her side. He forced himself to stand, to stay out of reach. “But I still want to help.”
He nodded. “We should know more tomorrow. Good night.”
“Good night.” She lifted the remote and turned the TV off.
Safe in his own room, far from temptation, he stretched out on the bed, pondering the possibility of Gabrielle being the actual target. But even that didn’t explain why the shooter had come after Elly. If he wanted this to be viewed as a random shooting event, targeting a witness only brought more scrutiny to the rampage.
He checked his phone, but there was no response yet from Rhy or Michaels.
Setting the device near his pillow so that he would hear if Gary called, he stared up at the ceiling.
He hadn’t intended to fall asleep. Not after promising Rhy he’d watch over Elly. But somehow, he did.
He woke slowly, blinking in the darkness. There was nothing but silence surrounding him. A noise hadn’t woken him. Reaching for his phone, he stared at the screen. A wave of relief hit hard when there were no missed calls from Gary.
Swinging into a sitting position, he straightened his MPD sweatshirt. Sleeping fully dressed was far from comfortable.
He stood and stretched. Before he took more than two steps, the loud crack of gunfire followed by shattering glass had him diving toward the connecting door.
“Elly!” Her name was a hoarse croak as he pushed her door open and crawled through the opening. Raking his gaze over the bed, he quickly noted she wasn’t there.
Where was she?
“Elly!” he shouted now, panicked as he continued crawling through the room, braced for the next round of gunfire. It came barely two seconds later. The bullet hit the center of the mattress. Briefly, he understood the shooter must be higher than their second-floor rooms.
