Baltimore 03 - Did You Miss Me?

wanted her, he’d have a front row seat.
    Tuesday, December 3, 8.05 P.M.
    Joseph stood behind Daphne’s chair, his hands on her shoulders.
    Brodie focused her attention on Daphne. ‘I wanted to know if you’d seen this before.’ She put the watch they’d found in Odum’s basement on the table in front of Daphne. Sealed in an evidence bag, the watch was stained with blood.
    When Daphne flinched, Joseph had to control the urge to shake his old mentor.
    ‘Sit down, Joseph,’ Brodie said mildly, but with an undercurrent of sharp command. He took the chair next to Daphne and he could have sworn Brodie rolled her eyes before turning to Daphne, her expression gentling. ‘Have you seen it before?’
    ‘Yes,’ Daphne said faintly. ‘It’s Ford’s. His grandmother Elkhart gave it to him for his eighteenth birthday. It’s a tradition. Elkhart men wear Rolexes.’ Her mouth tightened. ‘He hates that thing.’
    ‘Why does he hate it?’ Brodie asked.
    ‘He doesn’t have the best relationship with his father’s family.’
    ‘Tell me, does Ford wear this watch often?’
    Daphne was speaking of Ford in the present tense, Joseph noted. Common in these situations. But Brodie was too, and that wasn’t common. Guilt slid through his gut as he waited for Daphne’s reply.
    He’d compounded his momentary lapse in front of the Timonium house by rushing off to do the right thing, to make it right. His intentions had been pure but his logic completely clouded. He drew a breath and let it out slowly. I fucked up . Big time .
    Daphne was still frowning at the watch. ‘No, he rarely wears a watch at all and if he did it wouldn’t be that one. So why did he have it last night?’ She looked up at Joseph. ‘And why did whoever did this leave it behind? It’s worth fifteen thousand dollars. Why didn’t they take it?’
    Damn good questions. I should have asked them myself . He met Brodie’s eyes, telegraphing his apology, saw it was accepted. ‘Tell her, Fiona,’ he murmured.
    ‘Tell me what?’ Daphne demanded.
    ‘Daphne, I found two types of blood in Odum’s basement. Neither matched the blood found in the alley where the abduction took place.’
    Daphne gasped. ‘What? You mean that wasn’t Ford’s blood?’
    ‘Do you know his blood type?’ Brodie asked.
    ‘Yes, of course. O negative, like mine.’
    ‘Type O neg was what I found in the first alley, but I found Type B on the wall and Type A on the floor in Odum’s basement. There wasn’t enough B blood to have caused death. But there was plenty of Type A.’
    Daphne closed her eyes. ‘Oh God. It’s not Ford.’ She pressed the heel of her hand between her breasts. ‘My head is spinning.’
    Joseph picked up the evidence bag containing the Rolex. On the back of the watch ‘Elkhart’ was engraved in a spidery script. ‘What about this? Is it real?’
    ‘It’s real,’ Brodie said. ‘I imagine whoever did this planned to come back for it, Daphne. Especially given what else we found in that room.’
    Daphne looked up at Joseph. ‘What?’
    ‘Guns,’ Joseph said. ‘The neighbors thought the Millhouses were moving drugs through that house, but it’s weapons. Crates of assault rifles, just like the ones we found in Bill Millhouse’s trunk this morning.’
    ‘They’re dealing?’
    ‘Either that or arming one hell of a militia,’ he said. ‘If they had a fifteen-thousand-dollar Rolex, they’d sell it and buy more guns.’
    Daphne took the watch from his hand. ‘Why? Why go to all the trouble of making us think they’d killed Ford in Odum’s basement? Why the charade? They had to have known the first thing you’d do is test the blood. We’d know it wasn’t Ford’s.’
    Dammit . Joseph wanted to kick his own ass, because she was right. I played right into their hands . He walked over to the white board and studied the text history from George’s phone. ‘George didn’t call you from the alley using Ford’s phone.’
    ‘We figured he couldn’t have. It must have been Doug,’ Daphne said.
    ‘When you read the text from Ford’s phone you felt hope, like this was a mistake.’
    ‘Yes. And when I realized it wasn’t Ford texting, I was devastated.’
    ‘And just now?’
    ‘Just now, I was devastated, and now I have hope.’ She sat back in her chair. ‘You’re saying that they’re playing with me?’
    ‘Yes,’ he said tightly. And I helped . ‘ Doug has been seen at the Timonium house.’ And the black delivery van was