Free No Place to Die by James L. Thane

the man had been visiting someone nearby, it would have been different. But I thought it was very inconsiderate of him to leave his van in front of our house and then just walk away like that.”
    I nodded sympathetically, and she continued, a bit sheepishly. “To be honest, I was in a bad mood anyhow, because Marvin wasn’t home on time, and so I went out and wrote down the license number of the van and called the police to report it.”
    “Did you call nine-one-one or your local precinct?”
    She gave me a look as if she was questioning my sanity. “Why the local precinct, of course. I’m not silly enough to call the emergency number for something like this.”
    “No, of course not,” I agreed. “And what happened?”
    “Well, the person who took my call said that she’d refer it to the traffic division. She said that if the van was still there this morning, I should call again. But of course, it wasn’t, and so I didn’t think any more about it.”
    “I understand,” I said. “By any chance do you still have the license-plate number?”
    “Yes, it’s still on my pad in the kitchen.”
    Mrs. Fulton retrieved the plate number. I thanked her, raced back to the car, and asked Dispatch to run the plate. While they did, I drove up the street and spotted Maggie coming out of a house three doors down. I tapped the horn and waved her over.
    Just as she got into the car, the dispatcher returned to the line. “The plate belongs to a 2003 blue Volvo sedan. It’s registered to a William Desmond in Scottsdale.”
    “A Volvo sedan—you’re sure?”
    “The computer is.”
    “Well, shit,” I replied.
    The dispatcher gave me the address, and as we headed in that direction, I brought Maggie up to speed. “For the last nineteen hours, we’ve had a CIB out on that van, and all the while, the goddamn plate number’s been in the system. Some idiot at the precinct level wasn’t bright enough to make the connection between the black van that Fulton reported and the one we’re looking for in a murder/kidnapping that occurred only three blocks away?”
    “What can you say?” Maggie sighed. “As usual, the right hand is paying no fuckin’ attention to what the left one is doing.”
    “No shit,” I agreed. “It looks as though the plate that Fulton reported was almost certainly boosted from some unsuspecting citizen and doesn’t belong on the van we’re looking for. Still, it would have been nice to know that last night. We might have had a slight chance of catching this bastard. By now, he’s almost certainly ditched the stolen plate.”

Chapter Thirteen
    Carl McClain had, in fact, ditched the license plate that he had “borrowed” for the purpose of abducting Beverly Thompson, and had replaced it with the one that actually belonged on the van.
    He’d bought the van for fifteen hundred dollars, cash money, and the seller had given him a bill of sale and the title to the van. Like any good citizen, McClain had dutifully gone to the DMV and registered and licensed his new vehicle. Unlike any good citizen, however, he had done so using a name and address other than his own. A little after five thirty, he pulled the van back into the garage of his rental house.
    The insulation in the bedroom and bathroom was effective enough that Beverly failed to realize that McClain had returned until she heard his key in the dead bolt that locked the bedroom door. Sitting on the bed and leaning back against the wall, she watched as he slowly opened the door. He looked in to see her sitting there and then bent over to pick up a medium-size cardboard box. He closed the door behind him and returned the key ring to his pocket. Turning to Beverly, he said, “Dinner time, princess. Did you miss me?”
    Without waiting for a response, he carried the boxover and set it on the card table. Reaching into the box, he set out two plates, two forks, two bottles of Diet Coke, and a roll of paper towels. He arranged them on the table,