She did.
And there she found it.
"I see streaks of color. Blue. Bits of white too. On the hair and skin. Oh, hell, Rhyme. It's paint! He's a painting contractor. And there're about twenty construction workers on the grounds."
"The line on the neck," Rhyme continued. "The Dancer pulled off his necklace ID."
"But the picture'd be different."
"Hell, the ID's probably covered with paint or he faked it somehow. He's on the field somewhere, Sachs. Get Percey and Hale down on the floor. Put a guard on 'em and get everybody else out, looking for the Dancer. SWAT's on its way."
Problems.
He was watching the red-haired cop in the back of the ambulance. Through the Redfield telescope he couldn't see clearly what she was doing. But he suddenly felt uneasy.
He felt she was doing something to him. Something to expose him, to tie him down.
The worms were getting closer. The face at the window, the wormy face, was looking for him.
Stephen shuddered.
She jumped out of the ambulance, looking around the field.
Something's happening, Soldier.
Sir, I am aware of that, sir.
The redhead began shouting orders to other cops. Most of them looked at her, took her news grimly, then looked around. One ran to his car, then a second.
He saw the redhead's pretty face and her wormy eyes scanning the airport grounds. He rested the reticles on her perfect chin. What had she found? What was she looking for?
She paused and he saw her talking to herself.
No, not herself. She was talking into a headset. The way she'd listen, then nod, it seemed that she was taking orders from someone.
Who? he wondered.
Someone who'd figured out that I'm here, Stephen thought.
Someone looking for me.
Someone who can watch me through windows and disappear instantly. Who can move through walls and holes and tiny cracks to sneak up and find me.
A chill down his back--he actually shivered--and for a moment the reticles of the telescope danced away from the redheaded cop and he lost acquisition of a target completely.
What the fuck was that, Soldier?
Sir, I don't know, sir.
When he reacquired the redhead he saw how bad things were. She was pointing right at the painting contractor's van he'd just stolen. It was parked about two hundred feet from him, in a small parking lot reserved for construction trucks.
Whoever the redhead was talking to had found the painter's body and discovered how he'd gotten onto the airport grounds.
The worm moved closer. He felt its shadow, its cold slime.
The cringey feeling. Worms crawling up his legs . . . worms crawling down his neck . . .
What should I do? he wondered.