Crosscut

by Meg Gardiner

  “My mother told me something. After the explosion, parents were asked to sign waivers allowing the Office of Advanced Research to access our medical records.”

  “You think they’re using that? That Coyote has access to our records? Today?”

  “I think he has a source. Somebody’s feeding him information.”

  “Targeting information.”

  “Tommy, I don’t think this is a coverup. I think it’s a cleansing operation.”

  “So he’s wiping us out ’cause, what—we’re the dirt they left behind?” He was wound up now. “Do you think that’s why he killed Ryan O’Keefe?”

  “I do. I’m really afraid Coyote’s killing women who are having kids.”

  “Shit.”

  “I need to talk to Dr. Cantwell,” I said. “He would have been involved with the medical waivers. And he kept tabs on half the families in town.”

  “You think he’s the source?”

  “Stranger things have happened. And I’ve called his office six times but haven’t heard back. I think he’s avoiding me.”

  “This isn’t the kind of thing you should discuss on the phone.”

  “Damn straight. I want to go with you to talk to him.”

  He almost said something, but just let the air hang. I held back the reason I wanted to see Dr. Cantwell. My own doctor couldn’t tell me if my baby was in danger. Maybe Cantwell could.

  “Good. That’s just what I was going to suggest, because the China Lake News is going to run your piece today. I want you to add one item before you submit it. Kelly’s funeral is tomorrow morning. Holy Cross, ten a.m. You should come. There’ll be photographers and news crews. If we’re going to draw Coyote out, we want to pull out the stops.”

  I was in my bedroom zipping my suitcase when I heard someone knock and open the front door.

  “Kit?”

  I hauled my suitcase off the bed and out to the living room. Dad was standing by the door, Abraham Lincoln cap in hand, his white hair bristling in the sun. I hugged him and pulled him toward the couch.

  “I’ve been trying to get you. I’m going to China Lake,” I said.

  We approached the sofa. Carefully, Valerie sat up.

  “Dad, do you remember Val Skinner?”

  She was shrunken inside her black sweatshirt. “Mr. Delaney, it’s been a long time.”

  “It certainly has.”

  He held out his hand but she merely crossed her arms. His posture was slide-rule straight, his mouth tense. He looked disconcerted. He looked, in fact, horrified at the sight of her.

  I returned to my suitcase, fighting to close the zipper. “We’re on the three-thirty flight. Want to come?”

  He didn’t answer. He was watching me, his expression disconsolate.

  “What’s wrong?” I said.

  Valerie stood up. “I’m going to go sit outside in the shade. Let me know when you’re ready to go.”

  When the door closed behind her, he said, “My Lord. She looks like one of those little dried-apple dolls.”

  “She has it.”

  “God almighty.” He kneaded his hat in his hands. “It’s like Dana West.”

  “I know.” I tugged at the zipper of the suitcase. “I took the video and Dana’s MRI to my doctor. She agrees; it’s what they call a TSE. Transmissible spongiform encephalopathy.”

  “Your doctor?” he said.

  I straightened. “Is this what’s got you so worried?”

  Unexpectedly he swooped me into his arms and hugged me tight. “How am I going to keep you safe?”

  A bright silver fear ran across me. My father might occasionally admit to worry, in a cool and distant way, but he never showed dread like this. I held on to him.

  “Dad, I’m going to be secure. Tommy’s picking me up in China Lake and I’ll have police protection the entire time. And Jesse’s driving up tonight.” I rested my face against his chest, smelling Old Spice, the scent I associated with him from earliest memory. “Please don’t make me more scared than I already am. I have to do this. If there’s any way I can help bring this to an end, I have to do it.”

  “It’s more than that. This is something I never thought I’d have to face, and now . . .”

  I looked up, and felt myself wilting. He was gazing at me in a way I hadn’t seen in forever. As if he saw me eight years old in a white dress and veil, processing to the altar to receive my First Holy Communion.

  Inside, my joy and gratitude and fear for the baby turned momentarily to shame. My throat tightened. He might, eventually, think my pregnancy a blessing. But he would never think it had come about the right way. I couldn’t imagine telling him, not without begging his forgiveness and understanding.

  Easing out of his embrace, I turned to the suitcase and wrestled with the zipper.

  “Let me,” he said.

  He reached for the zipper and his gaze froze. He was looking at the ring.

  “Evan, is that what I think it is?”

  Shoot.

  He lifted my hand. “Jesse gave this to you?”

  My face felt tight. I knew my cheeks were candy-apple red. “Yesterday, after we got back from Los Angeles.”

  “That helps explain the truck full of roses.” He held on to my hand. “Have you told your mom?”

  “Not yet. Jesse and I wanted to tell you together.”

  He looked worn and worried. My stomach was aching.

  “Dad, I’m happy.”

  “You don’t look happy.”

  “Because I didn’t want you to find out this way.”

  And because he looked miserable.

  Jesse and I had gotten halfway to the altar once, before seeing that we weren’t ready for it. When we called off the wedding it took me a week to tell my father, because I knew what I would hear in his voice, no matter how sympathetic he tried to sound: relief.

  The heat in my face leached down my cheeks. I pulled away from him.

  “I love him like nobody’s business. That’s what counts.”

  “Evan, please don’t.”

  Turning to the desk, I slammed my computer shut. “Don’t what? Don’t say I love the man I’m going to marry? Why don’t you say what’s really on your mind?”

  “You’re jumping to conclusions here. I just . . . you took me by surprise just now, that’s all.”

  “Let’s figure this out. What’s got your goat? Jesse’s honest and brave and trustworthy and . . . he’s kind to children and small animals.” I jammed my computer into its case. “And he loves me. None of that’s the problem. So what is?”

  “Stop.”

  My face was hot and my heart was thumping. This couldn’t be good for me, but I couldn’t seem to help myself.

  “Stop what? Talking about the real issue?” I said.

  In the bathroom, Mr. Martinez turned up his mariachi station. Dad lowered his voice.

  “Fathers find talking about their daughters’ love lives painful.” He wrung his hat in his hands. “Excruciating, truth be told.”

  “Say it, Dad. Why don’t you want me to marry him?”

  God in heaven, sometimes I am the most moronic woman on the face of the planet. As a lawyer, I know never to ask a hostile witness the “why” question. No way, baby. It’s cross-ex hell, the opening of Pandora’s box.

  He stilled. “Because I don’t think you’ve thought through what your life will be like.”

  “I’ve been living this life day in and day out. You’re the one who doesn’t know what it’s like.”

  “Marriage is a far different endeavor from dating, Evan.”

  “What a shock.”

  “Today everything seems exciting, the right decision, even if it’s impulsive. You’re thirty-three, it’s a stressful time, and he’s here for you. I’m talking about what happens ten or twenty years from now.”

  I felt sick, not physically but spiritually. “No. Oh, God. You think I’m settling.”

  His dark eyes pinned me. I knew I was right.

 
On the television, the caption Reunion Killer appeared behind the news anchor. I grabbed the remote and turned up the volume, tearing away from Dad’s gaze.

  “. . . authorities are seeking to question a former soldier attached to the Naval Air Warfare Center in China Lake. Described as white, of slight build, and approximately forty years old, he may be going by the name Kai Torrance. Anybody with information about this person is asked to contact the LAPD or FBI,” the anchor said. “The security guard attacked at a Westwood office building remains in guarded condition this afternoon at UCLA Medical Center.”

  I watched the TV to avoid looking at Dad. “Let’s hope this leads somewhere.”

  “Indeed.”

  Heart still drumming, I gathered my things. Dad put on his hat.

  “I’ll give you a lift to the airport,” he said.

  The ride was tense, spattered with superficial chitchat. When we pulled up to the curb, he helped Valerie and me get our things out and wheeled her small suitcase inside to the check-in counter.

  “Sure you won’t go with us?” I said.

  “I have some things I need to take care of here.”

  I hugged him good-bye, but when he turned to go I felt wrong about the argument hanging between us. I caught him on his way out of the terminal.

  “I don’t want to fight,” I said.

  He put his hands on my arms. “We’re not fighting.”

  “No?”

  “I know not to engage in a battle I can’t win.”

  I sighed. He hugged me again.

  “Stay safe, and don’t do anything rash.”

  “Like get married.”

  He kissed me and got back in the car.

  An hour later, taxiing to the runway in the tin-can airplane, Valerie leaned back and turned her head toward me.

  “You and your dad seem close.”

  Outside the windows, scrubland rolled by. “Yes.”

  She was quiet a long moment. “Back in school, I never really knew you.”

  “Even though you stole my journal and read it cover to cover?”

  “Even though.”

  I made a heh sound. Twenty years I’d wanted that confession, and now vindication felt flat.

  “What you wrote was sweet and funny. You really liked your parents and your brother.”

  “Are you saying you actually thought I was okay?”

  “No. You were a hopeless dork.” Traces of a smile. “But then, I was an asshole.” Her voice faded. “Thank you for all that you’re doing today.”

  She closed her eyes.

  The plane turned, held at the end of the runway, and powered into its takeoff roll. As we lifted off the tarmac, I glanced down. The ground swooped past. At the end of the runway beyond the chain-link fence, I saw Dad leaning against the hood of his rental car. He raised a hand and waved. I put my own hand to the window and pressed my face close to the glass, watching him as long as I could.

  Only when he passed from view did it cross my mind. What did he have to take care of in Santa Barbara?

  22

  Climbing down the narrow steps to the tarmac, I pulled out my earplugs. The plane glinted in the sun like a silver mirror. Valerie eased her way down the stairs and we walked slowly to the terminal. Heat swarmed off the concrete. I glanced up at the endless blue sky and down again, overcome by its brilliance.

  Tommy was waiting. He had on shades, his porkpie hat, and an aloha shirt, and was chewing gum behind lips drawn tighter than a guitar string.

  “You look worn-out,” I said.

  “Ditto.”

  “At least you’re not smoking.”

  He pulled open the collar of his shirt. A dozen patches clung to his chest like leeches. He smiled at my expression, revealing a wad of gum the size of a golf ball.

  “Nicorette.” He took Valerie’s suitcase and handed me the China Lake News. “Page one.”

  Once he had pulled out onto the highway in the unmarked department car, I unfurled the paper.

  GONE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN

  By Evan Delaney Special to the News

  Crappy headline, but I didn’t have a say over that.

  Saturday night Ceci Lezak stood before a memorial display at Bassett High’s reunion and told me, “We don’t need to add any more names to the list.”

  Those were the last words she spoke to me. Twelve hours later she was dead.

  “Is this in their online edition?” I said.

  “Yeah.”

  “Good. I put in as many key words as I could. Figure Coyote’s trawling the Web for news of himself.”

  The wind gusted and sand danced across the road. Tommy accelerated, revving the car up to seventy.

  “Forensics has come up with some strange stuff.”

  I looked up from the paper. “On Coyote?”

  “Both murder scenes were wildly clean. No fingerprints, no hairs, no skin under the victims’ fingernails, no bodily fluids.”

  “So you’re saying this is a careful cat. We already knew that.”

  “We got a partial boot print from the Colfax scene. Size ten, but our techs say the depth of the print indicates the killer may have been wearing extra-large boots to make himself appear taller and heavier than he is. The one other interesting thing we’ve picked up is a hair from a wig.”

  “Whose wig? Coyote’s?”

  “Blond, two inches long. Short hair, maybe a man’s wig.”

  “He had blond hair when I saw him in L.A.,” I said. “Any more information about Kai Torrance?”

  “We’re waiting for military records to come back to us. It’s a tedious process even for law enforcement.” He glanced at me. “And in this case it seems that the records clerks are always out to lunch. Nobody really wants to dig this stuff up.”

  We sped along the highway in the dazzling sunshine. On one side of the road trees struggled in the wind and a trailer park hunkered under the heat. On the other, cyclone fencing and razor wire scrolled past, interspersed with warnings to keep out. Beyond the wire, the base unrolled across fifty miles of sand and rocks and bruised mountains that chewed the horizon.

  “There is one piece of potential luck. They found a dental implement outside Wally Hankins’s office called a scaler. We sent it to the Kern County crime lab over in Bakersfield.”

  “What are they hoping to find? DNA?” I said.

  “DNA, his blood, Ceci’s blood, anything helps. We also sent the bodies and evidence to Bakersfield. But that lab’s underfunded. They’re backlogged even for a high-profile case like this. And after you told us this might be a prion disease, the doctors went apeshit. They had to lock down the lab where the autopsies were performed and institute strict decontamination protocols. They freaked but good.”

  From the backseat, Valerie said, “Welcome to my world.”

  He looked in the mirror. “Is it cooling down back there?”

  She gave him thumbs-up. He turned up the volume on the police radio and focused on the road. Whatever else he wanted to tell me, he didn’t want Valerie to hear.

  “Where we going, Val?” he said.

  “The Sierra View Motel.”

  “Not your mom’s house?”

  “She works at the motel.”

  We pulled in a few minutes later. Tommy got Val’s suitcase out of the trunk, and I got out to tell her good-bye. I was extremely relieved at getting her off my hands, but seeing the expression on her face made me feel guilty. She stared at the motel looking stoic, almost hopeful.

  “Will you be okay?” I said.

  “Fine. If it doesn’t work out, I’ll get a room. Order champagne and whatever passes for caviar in this town, trash the place like a rock star.”

  “Good luck.”

  Tommy said, “Kelly’s funeral is tomorrow morning. Do you want us to pick you up?”

  “No.” She looked rueful. “I’m only going to attend one more funeral. You know me, the diva. If I’m not the star, I ain’t going.”

  She walked toward the office. Tommy
waved good-bye, looking sympathetic, but he couldn’t peel out of the parking lot fast enough.

  “What didn’t you want her to hear?” I said.

  “Kelly had this same neuro thing Valerie has. Her brain was eaten up with holes.”

  “Ceci?”

  “Early stage.” He grimaced at the road, chewing his giant wad of gum.

  “He’s killing people who were exposed to the pain vaccine,” I said. “It’s more than an obsession. It’s a cull.”

  He nodded, grim. Fumbling in his shirt pocket, he pulled out a pack of Nicorette and shook two more pieces of gum into his mouth.

  “You know how hard it is to get rid of prions? At a forensic laboratory? Places like that reek of formaldehyde. It kills most infectious agents, but it only makes prions stronger.” He shook his head. “This is fucking scary.”

  “Does heat destroy them?”

  “If it’s real hot.”

  “Like the fire that killed Dana West.” I waited for him to look at me. “Or the explosion we witnessed at Renegade Canyon.”

  “Which is why we’re going to see Dr. Cantwell right now.”

  Frowning, he reached over, popped the glove compartment, and fished out a pack of cigarettes. “Excuse me.” Rolling down the window, he hawked his gum across the road.

  “I know, littering’s a five-hundred-dollar fine. You can turn me in for the reward when Coyote’s under arrest.”

  He shook a cigarette out of the pack and punched the lighter. “Guess I picked the wrong day to stop sniffing glue.”

  Dr. Tully Cantwell’s office was bright and dreary. The receptionist looked as though she spent her time tut-tutting about the maladies patients brought upon themselves and then dragged into her waiting room. She was the doctor’s chief of staff, and she didn’t want Himself to be disturbed.

  Tommy flashed his badge.

  “No appointment?” she said.

  I leaned on the counter. “He’s been waiting for us for twenty years.”

  An office door opened. Dr. C nodded us in.

  His white coat hung limply on him. His belly slurped over the waistband of his slacks, his tie riding the swell. He slumped into his desk chair and smoothed his combover.