Survival Clause, стр. 31

“She,” I said.

Rehman nodded. “—if she didn’t cross in front of the police station before parking, it isn’t likely we have her on camera.”

No, it wasn’t. It was most likely she’d come from outside downtown up to the police station, rather than going around City Hall and down the street past the police station before parking. Most people tend to avoid driving straight through the town square if they can avoid it.

“Just see if there’s anything helpful,” I told Rehman. “Anything would help. We have no idea who this person is, other than that she keeps hanging around and filming my husband. And since he has a habit of attracting nutcases, it’s concerning.”

“He’s the one who got shot last month,” Rehman said, eyes on the screen, “right?”

I nodded. “It wasn’t bad. The bullet lodged in his vest and only broke a couple of ribs, so it could have been worse. But it isn’t the first time it’s happened, and it probably won’t be the last. And I don’t like psychos after my husband.”

“Here’s something.” Rehman stopped the video that was scrolling and rewound it. “This is the two of you… um…”

Kissing. I nodded.

“This is the camera above the front door.”

He switched screens. “This is the one on the left corner of the building. Right hand from where we’re sitting now.”

I nodded. The angle of the picture was different. Rafe and I were much farther away, off on the edge of the screen, and the rest of the shot was taken up by the street in front of the police station, the sidewalk across the street, the bottom halves of the buildings over there, and some parked cars.

“This car—” Rehman pointed to one of them, “pulled up during the minute or two you were inside. Here you are—”

He scrolled farther back, and showed me myself chugging up the hill and parking in front of the police station, then grabbing Carrie from the backseat and hauling her and her carrier up the steps to the front door and through. No sooner had I disappeared inside—the door hadn’t completely closed behind me yet—before a small, light-colored compact came into view on the other side of the screen. It zipped into a parking space on the other side of the street, and stopped. I kept watching, but nothing happened. Nobody opened the door and got out. Whoever was inside stayed in their seat—or perhaps moved around the interior of the car—but didn’t leave the vehicle.

My eyes narrowed. “That’s suspicious.”

Rehman didn’t answer, just kept watching.

The next thing that happened, other than that a car or two passed by, slowly, was that the front door of the police station opened again. I came through, followed by Rafe. He walked me to the Volvo and put the car seat with Carrie into the rear of the car. Then he kissed me.

“Keep your eye on the other car,” Rehman said softly. This time he didn’t blush. I guess repeated exposure to the clip had boosted his immunity, or maybe he was just too focused on what he was doing. He rewound again, to where Rafe was coming out the door. “Look.” He pointed to the other car. “The window’s going down.”

It was. Lowering smoothly. I could see the outline of a phone appearing in the gap.

“Can you zoom in on that?”

“I can try,” Rehman said, “but it’s going to pixelate badly.”

He tried, and it pixelated badly, the image going more and more grainy the closer he got to it. “I can play with it,” he said, dark eyes fastened on the screen. “See if I can clean it up a little. But it’s dark in there.”

It was dark inside the car. The windows were tinted—I was pretty sure this was the same car I had followed out of downtown earlier; the driver must have circled around, back to the police station. Very cunning behavior. Quick thinking, too.

And it had certainly resulted in a memorable video.

At any rate, even if Rehman could sharpen the image enough, there were no guarantees that we’d be able to see whoever was inside the car. Not with the dark windows, and the way they kept the light from penetrating the interior.

“Keep the video running, please. The car has to pull out eventually. When that happens, maybe we can see the license plate.”

Rehman hit the button and let the video scroll. On the tiny screen, Rafe finished kissing me, and bounded up the steps to the police station again. The Volvo stayed still while I gathered myself. So did the little compact. The Volvo pulled out, presenting a nice, clear view of the rear license plate to the camera, and rolled off down the hill, past the compact. The car window was closed again now, I saw.

The Volvo disappeared out of the frame. The compact stayed for another minute—the seconds ticked by as Rehman and I both stared at it, unblinking—before it also moved. But instead of following me, it came toward the camera.

“I’m pretty sure that’s the same car I followed this morning,” I said, as it rolled past the police station. “If you switch to the camera on the other side, we might get lucky and see the license plate.”

Rehman manipulated the buttons. As the compact disappeared out of sight on one side of the screen, it jumped back, disconcertingly, on the other. The license plate was visible, but hard to read. It was some sort of specialty plate, with a landscape of colored sky and dark hills, and the black silhouette of some kind of animal on one side. The black numbers of the plate were difficult to make out against the darkness of the bottom half of the plate.

“That’s a three,” I said, “or an eight, or a nine…”

“Maybe an O.”

Could be an O. Or a Q. Or anything else with a round top. Like an S or even a C or G.

“I’ll play with it,” Rehman said again, as the compact zoomed out of