The Night Stalker_ A Novel of Suspense - James Swain [72]
“Don’t speak about her like she’s a criminal.”
“Exactly. Tell them she’s a confused woman, and that police psychologists will be dealing with her. I wouldn’t mention the charges she’s facing, or that she might do hard time.”
“What about her husband pulling the gun on us?”
“I wouldn’t mention that, either.”
“Keep it upbeat, huh?”
“Happy time,” I said.
I pulled into the hospital’s emergency entrance in the back of the building, and threw the Mustang into park. Getting out, I walked around and opened Burrell’s door. She smiled at me with her eyes as she climbed out with the baby.
“One more thing,” I said.
“What’s that?” she said.
Burrell’s detective’s badge was still clipped to her purse. I removed it, shined it on my sleeve, then pinned it on her chest so it was in plain sight.
“Just so everyone knows who’s in charge,” I said.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
I parked and went inside the hospital. There was a pharmacy on the first floor, and I strapped myself into the free blood pressure machine to check my blood pressure and pulse. I’d had guns pointed in my face before, and I knew how it affected me.
My blood pressure and pulse were both sky high. I went to my car, popped James Taylor’s greatest hits into my tape deck, and started petting my dog. After a while, I started to feel better. Then my cell phone rang.
“I just wrapped up my news conference,” Burrell said. “You should come inside. The Wakefields want to thank you.”
“Tell them I’ll take a rain check,” I said.
“What’s wrong?”
“There’s another little boy who needs to be rescued.”
“I’ll be out in five minutes.”
I drove Burrell to the Village Inn to retrieve my car, and neither of us spoke a word. Then I followed her to police department headquarters on Andrews Avenue. Finding a parking space, I rolled down the windows for my dog.
“I’ve had every detective from Missing Persons tracking down the Armwood hotels in Fort Lauderdale,” Burrell said as we crossed the lot. “I didn’t forget our deal.”
“I know you didn’t,” I said.
Burrell had me cleared at the reception desk, and we headed upstairs to the War Room on the top floor. The War Room was used as a communications center during emergencies like hurricanes and wildfires, and was outfitted with a bank of telephones and a wall of high-resolution TVs. It also had a panoramic view of the county. Although the building was smoke-free, people still occasionally smoked in the War Room, and a recent cigarette lingered in the air as we entered. Standing around an oval table were the six detectives from my old unit.
“Good afternoon,” Burrell said.
They broke out of their huddle. A detective named Tom Manning was holding a remote. He pressed a button, and on every TV appeared a clip of Burrell from the news conference. The detectives broke into applause.
“Thank you very much,” Burrell said. “Now, I’d like to hear what progress you’ve made tracking down Armwood hotels.”
A sunburned detective named Bob Smith stepped forward. Smith was the first detective I’d ever hired, and he knew how to get things done. He pointed at the map of south Florida spread across the oval table. The map was covered in red thumbtacks, and there were a lot of them.
“We were in the process of identifying all the Armwood Guest Suite Hotels in south Florida when you walked in,” he said.
“How many have you found?” I asked.
“Ninety,” Smith replied.
The number gave me pause. Tim Small had indicated there were forty Armwood hotels in south Florida. Searching forty hotels for a kidnapped child was manageable; searching ninety wasn’t.
“I was told there were less,” I said.
“It’s an inflated number,” Smith said.
“What do you mean, inflated?” Burrell asked.
“At one time, Armwood owned forty hotels in south Florida,” Smith explained. “Then their parent company bought another chain of hotels called Leisure Inns, which were quite big. When Armwood got sold, the Armwood properties and Leisure Inns were listed on the bill of sale under the Armwood name. We’re working off the bill of sale,