But Not For Lust by BJ Bourg (comprehension books .txt) 📕

“I heard that part,” I said. “It’s the rest I didn’t catch.”

Melvin was studying me curiously. Susan must’ve noticed something significant was happening, because she walked over to stand staring at me, too.

“Okay, remember how I told you I entered the prints from the doorknobs into AFIS?”

“Yeah. You didn’t get a hit on either of them.”

“Correct.”

“That means the people who left those prints have never been arrested and printed before.”

“Correct on the first part, but not on the second.” She paused to take a breath. “The person who touched the inside doorknob of the shed has never been arrested, but he has been fingerprinted before.”

“It’s a he?” I asked. “We know it’s a male?”

“I know more than that,” she said triumphantly. “I know his name.”

“Well?” I asked impatiently. “Are you gonna tell me or do I have to send Susan up there to beat the information out of you?”

This really piqued Susan’s interest, but Tracy was undeterred.

“Do you know how people have to be fingerprinted in order to obtain professional licenses?”

“Yeah,” I said, realizing she was not going to make this easy for me. “We have school teachers, nurses, and lawyers coming into the office all the time to get fingerprinted. We use the applicant cards, though, not the criminal cards.”

“Right!” she said, sounding like a school teacher herself. “Well, people working in certain occupations—like, around sensitive materials or dangerous chemicals—have to undergo extensive background checks, and this includes being fingerprinted. Usually, this only happens when they’re first employed, but when these types of businesses change hands, the new owners usually start the hiring process all over again. Even the employees who are carried over from the previous company have to fill out an application and undergo a background check all over again.”

“But, Tracy,” I interrupted. “We don’t have access to those records.”

“You’re correct.”

I grunted in frustration, which caused Susan to cock her head to the side and study me intently. I could tell she wanted to know what the hell was going on.

“Did you hack their system?” I asked. “And if you did, I don’t care. I just want his name.”

“No, silly, I didn’t hack their system,” she said with a laugh. “That would be illegal. No, what happened was that this chemical plant on the river was bought out by a larger company. They’ve been processing applications and having all of the former employees fingerprinted again. The FBI takes these fingerprint cards and shoots them through AFIS and—”

“No shit!” I exclaimed. “We got a hit through the backdoor!”

“Yup!” Tracy said. “When an applicant’s fingerprints are entered into AFIS, not only are they compared to the fingerprints of all known criminals, but they’re also checked against fingerprints that have been lifted from crime scenes—and this includes your fingerprints that I entered on Monday morning.”

“Well, who is it?” I asked again, walking back and forth in the grass alongside Cypress Highway. “Who’d it come back to?”

“Oh, just some guy I’ve never heard of before,” Tracy said flatly. “But I thought it was cool how we developed the name.”

I was about to cut loose with a string of profanities when she blurted out the name. I stopped dead in my tracks.

“No way!” I said. “Are you sure?”

Tracy assured me that she was correct and that the person’s fingerprints matched to the print I’d recovered from the doorknob inside the shed.

“What is it?” asked Susan and Melvin in perfect unison when they saw the shocked expression on my face. Even Achilles cocked his head to the side as he stared up at me.

  CHAPTER 31

It was noon now, and Susan and I were still sitting across the street from the suspect’s house. There had been no movement since we’d arrived here several hours ago, after first taking Achilles back home. Melvin and Baylor were leading the search efforts on the east side of town and, so far, there had been no signs of Ty. In fact, there had been no signs of anyone ever having passed through that area.

“What if he’s inside?” Susan asked. “What if we’ve been sitting here all morning wasting our time?”

“His truck’s not here,” I countered.

“What if he was driving home and his left, rear tire blew out five miles outside of town and he didn’t have a jack, so he had to walk all the way back home?” She lifted an eyebrow. “That’s a long walk. He could’ve gone inside to take a nap before heading back to fix the tire, but slept too long and woke up to realize it’s lunchtime. Now, he’s sitting inside eating a big, juicy steak with an oversized baked potato fully loaded—”

“I get it,” I said with a laugh. “You’re hungry.”

“No,” she corrected. “I was hungry two hours ago. I’m starving now.”

I opened the armrest between us and checked the large compartment inside. I usually had a bag of chips or a chocolate bar lying around, but I didn’t see any.

“I must’ve eaten the last bag of chips,” I muttered. “Want me to call someone and ask them to bring us a couple of bowls of jambalaya?”

She didn’t hesitate for a second. “Yes!”

I called Lindsey and asked if anyone was free to bring some food out to our surveillance location.

“I’d gladly bring it,” she said wistfully, “if it’d get me out of this office.”

I shrugged. “I don’t care.”

“No, the chief wouldn’t be happy if I left my work station.” She hummed to herself. “Oh, I see Regan in the hallway. I’ll get her to bring some of the jambalaya that Mr. Beard’s cooking. It smells so good!”

I thanked her and we continued to wait and watch. Fifteen minutes later, Regan drove up in her marked squad car. She was five-foot-five and—thanks to my truck having