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stalking up the driveway.
    Lena couldn’t help but feel sorry for Brad. She thought about reaching up and patting him on the shoulder, but he tilted his bright pink umbrella the wrong way and ended up sending a sheet of rain down on her head.
    “Oh,” Brad breathed. “Gosh, I’m sorry, Lena.”
    She pressed down some expletives that wanted to come and walked ahead of him, joining Frank.
    Sixteen and a half Taylor Drive was a one-story garage that was slightly deeper than a minivan and twice as wide. “Converted” was aloose term, because the structure had not been altered well on the outside. The roll-up metal door was still in place, black construction paper covering the windows. Because of the overcast day, the lights inside the apartment showed through the cracks in the aluminum siding. Tufts of pink fiberglass insulation were matted down by rain. The tin roof was rusted red, a blue tarp covering the back corner.
    Lena stared at the structure, wondering why any woman in her right mind would live here.
    “Scooter,” Frank noted. There was a purple Vespa parked by the garage. A bike chain attached the back wheel to an eyebolt screwed into the concrete drive. He asked, “Same chain as what was on the girl?”
    She saw a flash of bright yellow under the wheel. “Looks like the same padlock.”
    Lena glanced toward the main house, a split ranch with a sloping gable on the front. The windows were dark. There was no car by the house or on the street. They would have to find the landlord for permission to go into the garage. She flipped open her cell phone to call Marla Simms, the station’s elderly secretary. Between Marla and her best friend, Myrna, they represented a combined Rolodex of every person in town.
    Brad pressed his face up to one of the windows in the garage door. He squinted, trying to see past a rip in the construction paper. “Jeesh,” he whispered, backing up so quickly that he almost tripped over his feet. He drew his gun and went into a crouch.
    Lena’s Glock was in her hand before she thought about putting it there. Her heart had jumped into her throat. Adrenaline made her senses sharpen. A quick look over her shoulder showed Frank had drawn his weapon, too. They all stood there, guns pointed toward the closed garage door.
    Lena motioned for Brad to move back. She kept a low crouch as she walked up to the garage window. The tear in the construction paper seemed larger now, more like a target she was about to put her face in front of. Quickly, she glanced inside. There was a manstanding at a folding table. He was wearing a black mask. He looked up as if he heard a noise, and Lena ducked down again, her heart racing. She stood still, counting off the seconds as her ears strained to hear footsteps, a gun loading. There was nothing, and she slowly let out the breath she’d been holding.
    She held up one finger to Frank: one person. She mouthed the word “mask,” and saw his eyes widen in surprise. Frank indicated his gun and she shrugged as she shook her head. She hadn’t been able to see whether or not the man was holding a weapon.
    Without being told, Brad walked toward the side of the building. He went around the back, obviously checking for exits. Lena counted the seconds, reaching twenty-six by the time he showed up on the other side of the building. Brad shook his head. No back door. No windows. Lena indicated that he should go down the driveway and serve as backup. Let her and Frank handle this. Brad started to protest, but she cut him with a look. Finally, he hung his head in surrender. She waited until he was at least fifteen feet away before nodding to Frank that she was ready to go.
    Frank walked toward the garage and leaned down, wrapping his hand around the steel handle at the base of the roll-up door. He checked with Lena, then yanked up on the handle hard and fast.
    The man inside was startled, his eyes going wide behind the black ski mask covering his face. He had a knife in his