Fear and Loathing

by Hilary Norman

  ‘I think it has to be considered,’ Sam said.

  ‘And for Joshua’s sake, I get that, but where would you have us go? We’re not going to endanger any other members of our family, and if you’re going to suggest France again, I meant what I said about not spoiling things for Cathy.’

  ‘I could talk to the captain,’ Sam said. ‘See if the chief regards this as a credible threat, in which case—’

  ‘What? A safe house?’ Grace challenged. ‘And where would that be? In Miami-Dade or Broward or maybe the Gulf coast, or why stop there, why not move us interstate?’

  ‘Hey,’ Sam said gently. ‘Don’t get mad.’

  ‘I’m not mad at you,’ she said wearily. ‘But am I supposed to drop all my patients again?’

  ‘Only two options left then,’ Sam said. ‘I drop the case or—’

  ‘Would that even guarantee our safety?’

  ‘Only if we leave.’

  ‘Second option?’ Grace asked.

  ‘I go on working with the team until we nail them, and meantime, we make this house even more secure and—’

  ‘We already have the alarm.’

  ‘Which we forget to switch on half the time,’ Sam said. ‘I’d have our own guys come in, upgrade the system, put in panic buttons.’

  ‘Turn our home into a fortress,’ Grace said, dismayed.

  ‘Exactly,’ Sam said emphatically. ‘And I’m going to try for surveillance twenty-four-seven – not just a patrol car making the rounds, because this might not just be about protecting us; this might possibly be one way of catching these people.’

  ‘Sam, now you’re starting to scare me.’

  ‘Then I’ll walk and we’ll go away.’

  ‘Give me a minute. I need to think.’

  ‘Take all night if you need it.’

  ‘I hate the idea of surveillance.’ Grace took a breath. ‘But if it’s going to keep Joshua safe …’

  ‘I’ll talk to Kennedy in the morning,’ Sam said. ‘If the department can’t do this, then we’ll pay a private firm.’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Grace felt the situation getting away from her, and sometimes she just hated his job …

  Part of him, for better or worse.

  ‘I want you to feel in control,’ he said.

  ‘But I’m not – we’re not. The author of those messages to you is the one in control.’

  ‘Not if I have any say in it,’ Sam said.

  Grace sighed. ‘Speak to Tom Kennedy tomorrow, see what he has to say.’

  ‘So you’re not asking me to drop the case?’

  She saw his troubled face, knew that if she did ask that of him, he’d probably do it.

  Tempting.

  And then she thought of the seven victims and of that poor child, her world shattered, of their families. And of the two windshield messages addressed to Sam, bizarrely implying some kind of responsibility – because they had fallen in love and married, brought their own child into the world.

  And part of that made her want to ask him to leave, keep them safe until it was over. But a greater part filled her with rage against the killer, the writer of messages who had laid this at their door.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m not asking you to do that.’

  June 8

  On Saturday, Nic came to the staff lunch to tell them about the publicity plans he was setting up which would necessitate Le Rêve being at a pinnacle of perfection.

  ‘Jeanne and I have been working on a new menu to be launched just under a month from now, which will coincide with press and TV interviews happening here and in the kitchen. It’ll be tough, and it won’t always be pretty, because it’s going to be real, a kind of pris sur le vif documentary—’ He grinned at Cathy. ‘That’s French for “fly on the wall”, even though they’re not welcome at Le Rêve.’

  ‘Better than roaches,’ Cathy said, then flushed, knowing the subject was taboo.

  ‘It’s OK.’ Nic moved along. ‘So chances are you’re going to be on FR3 Côte d’Azur, and – if all goes well, and it must – we’ll be the lead piece on Bouche, a major new food website, and there’ll be photographers in and out before then, and they’ll get in our way, but we’ll all keep our focus, and the food – from prep to table – will look and taste superb. Ça va, mes amis?’

  ‘Ça va, chef!’ they said in unison.

  ‘OK, so the launch date is July the fourth, so Cathy’ – Nic turned to her – ‘I’m thinking you and I should toss around a few American ideas that could mesh with our style.’

  ‘I’ll try to think of some,’ Cathy said, already panicking.

  ‘Do more than try, please.’

  ‘Yes, chef,’ she said.

  And thought she felt, abruptly, a frisson of hostility in the air, glanced swiftly up and down the table, but couldn’t tell who it was coming from.

  Imagination, she told herself.

  She’d begun mulling over ideas – perhaps a Provençal take on an antipasto-cum-American amuse-bouche of tiny wild boar burgers and Toulouse sausage hot dogs – when, leaving at the rear to run an errand for Aniela, she turned to check that the door had fully closed.

  And saw it.

  Impossible to miss.

  Sprayed on the pale ocher stone wall beside the door in red large letters.

  YANKEE GO HOME!

  Hardly original. But still, Nic wouldn’t like it.

  Assuming it was directed at him. Which it probably was.

  Yet knowing it had to have been recently done, that sudden sense of hostility at lunchtime came back to her. Someone at that table disliked her, she’d felt, had maybe not liked Nic singling her out because of the Fourth of July – though surely no one at Le Rêve could be especially anti-American, since as far as Cathy could tell they were all devoted to Nic …

  Or maybe it was another nasty trick.

  She checked her watch, remembering her errand and decided that Jeanne would want to know about the graffiti immediately. About to enter her code into the digital entry keypad, she fished for her iPhone, rapidly photographed the message and went back inside.

  June 10

  The Monday morning task force meeting brought nothing but frustration.

  All leads going nowhere, no breaks in the case. Nothing noteworthy yet on Mo Li Burton’s uncle, James Lin, or his associates. Nothing further on Sean Reardon – and even if Sam and Martinez had almost ruled him out, they were still looking. They’d spent time on Saturday with employees at GG Fitness, had been asked not to approach members, though Nick Gibson had provided a list of individuals whose memberships had been terminated for various reasons. Everyone on that list checking out to date; no one with a rap sheet or significant history.

  It seemed increasingly possible that ‘Virginia’ might have trawled the Internet for examples of her-his-their obsession. Luisa Gomez’s book was out there on the Web, and Gary Burton’s health club had scored some results when Googled – all of them advertorial in nature, no personal details mentioned other than that Burton had been ‘married’. Likewise, James Lin’s air freight company: all hits commercial, though in a piece in a newsletter of the CCSF – Chinese Community of South Florida – Mo Li had been mentioned as Lin’s right-hand woman. Nothing about her husband or any other personal information: strictly business, probably irrelevant. As were Lin’s areas of specialty: cheap Chinese jade jewelry imports and cosmetics exports, both trades apparently highly regulated, and no strikes against Lin’s company found to date.

  On the personal front, the Beckets’ increased security measures were in hand. No twenty-four-seven surveillance deemed necessary yet – prevailing logic being that if the risk was that great, then Sam should remove himself from the case and his family from danger. Budgets being what they were, Sam was not overly surprised, and he guessed that the security upgrade ought to give them peace of mind, at least for the time being.

  At around eleven, three things happened.

  First, Nick Gibson called to say he thought he
might have something for them.

  ‘What kind of something?’ Sam asked.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ Gibson said. ‘But it might be construed as a threat against Gary.’

  Sam said they’d be at his office within the hour.

  Two minutes later, another call: from a Moira Lombardi, part-time clerk at the Santa Barbara Police Department, who knew that Miami Beach PD had accessed an old accident report last week, and who’d just come across something that had become separated from the file.

  ‘Knowing a little about your investigation,’ she told Sam, ‘particularly that one of your victims was the daughter of the deceased couple in our accident – Zhu and Meihui Lin – I figured you’d probably want to know that someone else tried to access that old file one month before your first homicide.’

  ‘You figured right,’ Sam said.

  ‘OK.’ Moira Lombardi sounded young and vigorous. ‘I’ll scan the application letter and email it across.’ She paused. ‘The application was refused, as you’ll see, but I thought that coming nine years after the accident, it seemed a stretch to call it a coincidence.’

  ‘Right again,’ Sam said, and thanked her.

  ‘Oh, and by the way, I’m sure you’ll probably realize it anyway, but the letterhead’s definitely not Fairmont’s, and so far as confidentiality allowed me to check, there’s no student of that name at the university.’

  The email and attachment arrived within minutes.

  What had started as a buzz of anticipation of that elusive something, spun, in less than ten seconds, straight into flashing anger.

  Fairmont University of Santa Barbara

  City of Santa Barbara Police Department, Police Records Bureau.

  May 3, 2013

  To Whom It May Concern:

  I am a law student at the above university, and require, for research purposes, the case files relating to the accidental deaths of Zhu and Meihui Lin on August 22, 2004.

  I enclose twenty-five dollars, which I am told is the fee payable, and will, of course, pay any additional copying fee on collection.

  I will attend in person in one week’s time, in the hope that the files will be available.

  Yours sincerely,

  Joshua Becket

  The name – that name.

  ‘What the fuck?’ Sam said.

  ‘Who the fuck?’ Martinez said.

  Sam and Grace’s little boy, as beloved to him as if he were his nephew.

  No one messed with Joshua, not even with his name.

  ‘OK,’ Sam said. ‘Couple of deep breaths.’

  They examined their printout.

  As the clerk had said, the letterhead was fake, probably created with a free letter graphic straight off the Internet, the kind utilized by an incalculable number of people.

  ‘Smart woman,’ Sam said, appreciative of Moira Lombardi. ‘Even if this had stayed with the file, there’s no guarantee anyone would have realized its full significance to our case. Certainly not its significance to me personally.’

  ‘The letter doesn’t seem to me like it was written by any law student,’ Martinez said.

  ‘Did you notice the font?’

  Martinez nodded. ‘Same as the windshield messages.’

  ‘So a link, unquestionably. And as good as addressed to me.’

  ‘Except if it weren’t for this Moira, we’d never have known it existed.’ Martinez paused. ‘You think there’s any chance this is down to James Lin?’

  ‘Makes no sense. It was sent before Mo Li and the others were killed, and I honestly don’t believe that Lin had his niece murdered.’ Sam paused. ‘Unless he’s a total fruitcake and maybe had some obsession about her being to blame for his brother’s death.’

  ‘She was what back then, twenty-one?’

  ‘Still studying for her CPA license.’ Sam shrugged. ‘Nothing’s impossible, but I don’t buy it. Everything we’ve heard about Molly Burton has her grounded, sane, decent.’

  ‘So no reason we can think of for Lin faking this letter,’ Martinez said. ‘But three reasons for thinking it was written by our killer. Mo Li’s parents. Baskerville font. And the signature.’ He paused. ‘What now?’

  ‘I’ll give Duval a heads-up, ask him to get the FBI field office in Santa Barbara to double-check that there really is no Joshua Becket at Fairmont, while we go see Gibson about this “threat” against Gary Burton.’

  ‘Then what? Do we fly west?’

  Sam leaned back in his chair. ‘Even if the whole letter was fake, the name could still be a coincidence. Even if there’s no such student, the writer could have plucked it out of the air – maybe he’s a Dodgers fan.’

  Martinez frowned. ‘That’s Josh – not Joshua – and Beckett with two Ts. And we don’t buy coincidences, do we?’

  Sam shrugged again. ‘Then I’m guessing that whenever and however “Virginia” chose the Burtons, they researched the whole family and figured we’d go back and check out the accident.’

  ‘Unless it wasn’t an accident.’

  ‘That doesn’t work for me,’ Sam said. ‘Zhu and Meihui Lin – Joe and May – were both Chinese. And they died before Mo Li even met Gary Burton, so if we’re accepting mixed race as the motive for the Miami Beach killings, that rules the parents out as victims.’

  ‘Maybe the killer was just racist, period, back then,’ Martinez said.

  Sam tapped the letter on his desk. ‘The accident happened almost nine years ago. Let’s check for other fatal accidents at that location. This could be some campaigner wanting to get the bridge fixed or closed – even a journalist wanting to write a “Ten Years On” piece.’

  ‘And this campaigner or journo just happens to be called Joshua Becket – with one T – but decides to pretend he’s a law student, or fakes his identity by misspelling the Dodgers pitcher’s name. And he happens to like the same font as “Virginia”.’

  ‘Still no purpose in flying to Santa Barbara,’ Sam said. ‘Let’s ask Duval to get the letter tested locally, though who knows how many people have handled it since it was sent.’ He paused. ‘We have no envelope, no postmark. If this is a real link, it could have been sent from Florida. Or if it was mailed from California, even from the university, that’s not exactly hard for “Virginia” to have arranged.’

  The third thing happened just as Sam ended his call to Duval.

  His cell phone rang. David Becket calling.

  ‘Mildred might have something for you, son.’

  Sam and his dad had spoken yesterday, and having heard about the Gomez tragedy, David had enquired about the bereaved twelve-year-old, and Sam had mentioned Luisa Gomez’s book.

  ‘What kind of something?’

  Before his stepmother had become a beloved member of their family, she had been Mildred Bleeker, a homeless person respected by a number of Miami Beach cops, Sam most particularly. If Mildred – having good reason to hate illegal drugs – saw or heard anything she felt might help get pushers off the streets, it had always been Sam she wanted to share the information with.

  Bottom line, even now: if Mildred said she had something for him, he’d listen.

  ‘Luisa Gomez’s story struck a chord,’ David said. ‘In the old days, she says she read newspapers people left lying around, but what she really enjoyed were the free newspapers, in particular a free monthly called The Beach. She’s almost sure that’s where she saw an article about Luisa Gomez.’ He paused. ‘Here she is now.’

  ‘Samuel, I found it.’ Mildred sounded triumphant. ‘I thought I’d kept it, because the story was remarkable, and the interviewer asked good questions. So I looked in my box of keepsakes and sure enough, there it was – October issue, 2007 – and I wondered if it might be of help?’

  ‘It might. The Beach, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘How often would you say you read it?’

  ‘Most months.’

  Sam searched the title, followed it with ‘Miami monthly’ and got a bunch of junk about hotels and
parking, nothing about a newspaper.

  ‘It was a good paper,’ Mildred said, ‘but I think it must have shut down.’

  ‘Was this the only back issue you kept?’

  ‘No. I looked, in case you asked, and I do have a few more, if you want them.’

  ‘If you don’t mind, I’ll pick them up later today,’ Sam said.

  ‘They’ll be waiting,’ Mildred said.

  They asked Joe Sheldon to search for past issues of The Beach featuring interviews with any of the other victims, or maybe pieces dealing with mixed race marriages, and to locate the editor and journalist responsible for the Gomez interview, and then they headed over to GG Fitness to see Nick Gibson.

  He looked tired, the impact and nature of his loss perhaps still dawning.

  ‘You mentioned a threat,’ Sam said.

  ‘It’s more than that,’ Gibson said. ‘At least, I think it might be.’

  It lay on his desk, a small black rectangular object with a handwritten label.

  A microcassette.

  ‘I found it in our office safe,’ Gibson said. ‘I took a quick look after it happened, because of the robbery at Gary’s house, but our stuff was all there – five hundred bucks, for emergencies, legal papers, our lease, that kind of thing. And then yesterday I was looking for some keys and thought they might be in there, so I fished around at the back, and that’s where I found it.’

  Martinez leaned in, looked at the little cassette, read its label.

  ‘February 7, 2007,’ he said.

  ‘That’s Gary’s writing,’ Gibson continued. ‘Those cassettes used to fit in an old recorder we hadn’t used for years, and I don’t have anything now that I could play it on. So I looked around for the recorder for a while, and then the day got away from me. But last night it was bugging me, and I remembered our junk store out back – part unclaimed lost property, part things we’re not quite ready to throw out, you know?’

  ‘And you found it.’ Sam cut to it.

  ‘I did.’ Gibson opened a drawer, pulled out a small black recording device, inserted the cassette. ‘It’s a phone message. It’s obvious why Gary kept it, but I’m guessing it made him so mad he didn’t want to talk about it, even to me.’