Every Move You Make by M. William Phelps Read Free Book Online Page B

say anything to the police about Gary Evans…. He is dangerous.”
    Moore and Sully wondered why she hadn’t offered the information weeks ago.
    Continuing, she said, “Tim said that if anything ever happened to him, I should change our last name and move away.”
    Considering what had happened the past few weeks, Caroline perhaps realized for the first time that Evans had likely had a hand in her husband’s disappearance. She said she now believed it was Evans, using the alias “Lou,” who had called her the weekend Tim disappeared. Tim was scared of Evans, she added, and had probably gone with him reluctantly because Evans had threatened Tim with Sean’s safety.
    It was one of the last conversations she’d had with Tim that really scared her, she admitted. The night before Tim disappeared, a Thursday, she said they had a fight and talked about getting a divorce. “‘I love you…but if you want a divorce,’” she said Tim wrote in a note to her that night, “‘I will give you money for the divorce.’”
    Later in the note, after he apologized for being “moody” lately and even “mean” at times, as if he had a premonition of what was to come, Tim wrote of his concern for Caroline and Sean’s safety, should he ever not return home. He speculated that Evans would harm her and Sean and was worried about not being around to protect them.

CHAPTER 10
    Lisa Morris lived a life of solitude in a modest apartment that was, by sheer luck, only about two miles from Jim Horton’s home in Latham. Stopping by Lisa’s apartment and badgering her, Horton knew, was going to be the conduit to making contact with Evans.
    The first few times Horton popped in, Lisa was passive, unfriendly, and perhaps a little scared. During a Bureau briefing one morning after Lisa’s name had been discovered, Horton told his investigators he had recognized her name as someone Evans had mentioned to him from time to time.
    “Gary told me more than once that, in his words, Lisa was simply ‘someone he stopped by to fuck’ every once in a while. I had no reason not to believe him. Gary had a lot of those women in his life.”
    The first thing Horton noticed when he knocked on Lisa’s door on October 15 was how homely her apartment, from the outside, looked. It wasn’t run-down, but, as Horton peered through the window, he could tell she hadn’t kept it up perhaps the way she could have. A cop is always studying people and places: body language, vocal characteristics, clothes, how someone walks, eye movement, the appearance of a home, car. Lisa spoke with a smoker’s raspy voice. She wore plain clothes and little makeup. She hadn’t really held down a full-time job, but would work occasionally as a process server, delivering subpoenas to people in civil cases.
    It was obvious to Horton by just looking at her that first time that she liked to drink—a lot. She had bags under both eyes and loose, pale skin. She appeared lethargic, as if it had taken all of her energy just to answer the door.
    “Paperboy,” Horton said as Lisa opened the door. He was holding a day-old newspaper he’d picked up on her front steps.
    Without Horton saying anything more, the initial look Lisa held told him she knew exactly who he was and why he was there. Although Horton never openly wore a shield or flipped it out like television cops, he had a look about him that screamed law enforcement. It was something most cops couldn’t hide. They looked the part. What was more, he kept his handcuffs hanging not from his waist, but from the emergency brake lever in his cruiser, and hardly ever carried his weapon.
    “I never wore those stupid tie tags—like a miniature silver or gold set of handcuffs, announcing that I was a cop,” Horton said later. “But it was written all over my face…and, of course, the blue suit. I certainly wasn’t a vacuum cleaner salesman.”
    As Lisa invited Horton in and began to talk, he realized the connection she’d had with