I already knew Singh wasn't in the house. The car still wasn't in the driveway. And besides, I was pretty sure he was dead. Still, I asked anyway.
“Is Samuel Singh here?” I asked Susan Lu.
“He isn't,” Lu said. “He went out first thing this morning for a pack of cigarettes for me and he hasn't returned. He should have been back hours ago. And he isn't answering his cell phone. Men are such shits. Listen, I'd like to chat, but I have to get ready for work and I'm not feeling all that social without my goddamn cigarettes.”
The dog was barking now. Yap yap yap. And every time it yapped its little front paws would come off the ground.
“Is that Samuel's dog?”
“Yeah, I don't know what's wrong with it. Usually the little turd just mopes in the corner. I've never seen it trying to get out like this.”
Lula took a step back and nervously shifted foot to foot. God only knows what she had in her purse. Suckling pig, two dozen hamburgers, a twenty-?pound turkey.
“Sammy brought the dog with him just to piss off some awful old woman and her daughter. He was boarding with them and he said the old woman was something out of a horror movie. He wanted to take a picture of himself with the dog and send it back to them, but he hasn't gotten around to it. After he gets his picture the dog's going to the pound. Nasty beast.”
I gave Susan Lu my card. “Tell Samuel to call me when he comes in.”
“Sure.”
Lula, Connie, and I left Lu, got into the car, and I backed out of the driveway. I drove around the block and parked three doors down from Lu, behind a van so we could watch the house.
“You think Singh's gonna show up?” Lula wanted to know.
“Nope.”
“Me, neither.”
“You parking here so you can keep an eye on Lu?”
“Yep.”
“You're waiting for her to leave and then you're gonna snatch the dog, aren't you?”
“Yep.”
Connie was in the backseat, probably reviewing in her mind which of the local bondsmen she'd use to bail us out after we were arrested for breaking and entering.
After fifteen minutes of no air-?conditioning, the car started to bake under the desert sun. Lula immediately fell asleep in the heat. She was head back, mouth open. And she was snoring. Loud.
“Holy mother,” Connie said, “I've never heard anyone snore like this. It's like being locked in a car with a jet engine.”
I gave Lula a shove. “Wake up. You're snoring.”
“The hell I am,” Lula said. “I don't snore.” And she went back to snoring.
“I can't take it,” Connie said. “I've got to get out of the car.”
I joined her and we walked down the street. We were wearing baseball hats and dark glasses but no sunblock and I could feel the sun scorching the exposed skin on my arm.
“Let me run through this,” Connie said. “Lillian Paressi, Howie at McDonalds, Carl Rosen, and possibly Samuel Singh are all tied to the same serial killer. And now he's targeted you.”
“I don't know about Howie, Carl, or Samuel, but Lillian Paressi received red roses and white carnations and a note just before she was killed.”
“Like the flowers and notes you've been getting.”
“Yeah. So I'm guessing he likes to taunt his victims. Likes to get them afraid before he strikes. Some kind of game for him.”
“Are you sure it's a him?”