“Me, too,” Jenny said.
After last night, no doubts lingered about her decision to let him stay with her. For all his concern, Parker hadn’t been there when her ex-husband showed up.
But Zahad wasn’t here now. Uneasily, Jenny glanced toward the street, checking for unfamiliar parked cars. She couldn’t afford to let down her guard, not even on a quiet Sunday afternoon when the sun peeked through the clouds and Beth swung alongside her.
When they neared Ray and Ellen’s house, Jenny heard the clink of china from inside. Although it was nearly two o’clock, they must be eating. She hesitated, but Beth raced ahead.
“Honey!”
Too late. Beth rang the doorbell and was hopping up and down with excitement. Reluctantly, Jenny joined her.
The door opened and Cindy’s little face, surrounded by russet hair like her mother’s and grandmother’s, poked out. “It’th you!” she cried. “Bethy!” The two girls hugged. They were so cute that Jenny wished she had a camera with her.
“Cinders, you’re not supposed to answer the door by yourself.” Ray ambled into view. “Oh, hi, Jenny, good to see you.” He gave her a lazy, welcoming smile. When she’d first met him, she’d thought he was flirting, but although he came over to help with repairs sometimes, he’d never so much as hinted at anything improper. She’d decided that he simply liked women.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt,” she said. “Your phone was busy and Beth got antsy.”
“Sorry. I called my mom.” He stood back to let her in. “Come join the neighbors.”
Jenny felt a moment’s trepidation as she caught sight of the group around the table that occupied one end of the front room. In addition to Dolly, Bill and Ellen, Al and Tish Garroway were drinking coffee and sampling muffins from a basket.
The look on Tish’s face appeared far from welcoming. Ellen wore the same guarded expression she’d assumed around Jenny for the past few months.
“Tish brought over these delicious muffins,” Dolly said. “Please join us.” She, at least, seemed friendly.
“Just for a minute.” Fleeing would only make the situation more awkward. Besides, she remembered, she had news for them. “I wanted to let you know that my ex-husband broke into my house last night, carrying a gun. Parker has him in custody.”
A flurry of questions erupted. Over coffee and a muffin, Jenny answered them as concisely as possible. Ellen seemed very relieved to hear that the killer had apparently been apprehended.
“It’s a good thing the sheikh was there,” Ray replied.
Jenny remembered something Zahad had told her. “I’m glad you encouraged him to stay with me. Parker was giving him a lot of flak.”
“You suggested he stay?” Ellen regarded her husband in surprise.
“It seemed like a good idea, with everything that’s happened,” Ray said.
“I don’t like him snooping through the neighborhood.” Al scratched beneath his scraggly beard. The ski instructor wouldn’t be bad-looking without that ratty facial hair, Jenny mused, but perhaps Tish liked it. “Did you ever think that the sheikh might be hanging around to cover his tracks?”
“You sound like one of them gorillas that don’t want no competition,” Bill said. “One look at that sheikh fella and you started beating on your chest and howling.”
Dolly’s jaw dropped in dismay. “Oh, Bill!”
Although amused, Jenny couldn’t let Al’s remark pass. “Zahad’s a security expert. In fact, he found a piece of evidence the police missed.”
Heads turned. As everyone started talking at once, Jenny felt a pang of doubt. Maybe she shouldn’t have revealed so much.
“I’d like to hear what it is,” Al said.
“Maybe he planted it himself,” Tish put in.
“Did it have anything to do with Grant?” Ellen asked.
Dolly waited attentively. While she focused on Jenny, Bill quietly slathered butter on a lemon muffin he’d sneaked past his wife, who tried to keep them both on a healthy diet.
Too late to back down now. “He moved a wastebasket that the killer must have walked by and found a scrap of paper.” Remembering Tish’s remark, Jenny added, “He’d just arrived at the house, so he couldn’t have planted it.”
“Was anything written on it?” Dolly asked.
“No, but there was a crystal watermark in the paper,” she replied.
Al shrugged. Tish looked puzzled. Ellen bit her lip.
“Wow,” Ray said. “That sounds like the documents at my bank.”
“I know.” Jenny wished she could read their reactions more clearly, but no one’s response stood out as unusual. “Maybe part of a deposit slip.”
“Were there fingerprints?” Dolly queried.
“Not as far as I know, but I’m sure Parker will check.”
Ray smacked his forehead. “So that’s why he was there!”
“Excuse me?” Al said.
“The sheikh. He dropped by the bank the other day,” Ray explained. “I guess he wanted to check it out. Not that he could have learned anything just walking into the lobby.”
Zahad hadn’t mentioned stopping at the bank. Jenny wondered what he’d hoped to find. Perhaps he’d simply wanted to look around.
“I can’t see what good a scrap of paper is unless it has a fingerprint on it,” Ellen commented. “Lots of us use that bank.”
“We don’t,” Tish countered.
“It might have stuck to somebody’s clothing and dropped off anytime,” Jenny said. “Weeks ago, even.”
“You never know.” Belatedly, Dolly noticed her husband stuffing the muffin into his mouth, but she let it go. “If the police start to focus on a suspect, it might prompt them to look into his account.”
“For what?” Al asked.
Ray brightened. He loved watching TV cop shows and had often recounted the plot twists to Jenny. “Suppose there was a hired killer and he put his blood money in an account. I mean, the police might notice that he’d made a large deposit. If it was a check, they could trace it to whoever hired him.”
“The police can’t look into an account without a subpoena, can they?” Al said.
“That’s right,” Dolly agreed. “They’d have to have reasonable suspicion.”
“Yeah, but I’m not a cop,” Ray said. “I could take a quick look at a few people’s records, the ones that know Jenny. I wouldn’t violate anybody’s privacy or anything.”
“How would you nose around people’s bank accounts without violating their privacy?” Ellen asked.
He shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“In any case, I hope we’re done with those awful men coming by,” Ellen added. “I’ve posted warnings all over the Internet.”
“Thanks. I appreciate it,” Jenny said.
The phone in her pocket rang. After excusing herself, she moved to the far side of the room and answered, her spirits lifting at the possibility that it might be Zahad.
It was Parker, and she heard a tired edginess in his voice. “I want to alert you that we’re going to release Grant on bail.”
“What?” Jenny nearly dropped the phone. “How can you do that?”
“He gave us permission to check his house, his office and his storage locker, so we didn’t have to wait for warrants. He gave us his computer passwords.”
“You mean for his home in Missouri?”
“Correct. St. Louis P.D. got right on it. So far, we haven’t found one bit of evidence tying him to the murder or the cyber-stalking. We had to set bail and his wife’s flying out to pay it. Actually, I think she left as soon as she heard he was in jail.”
Jenny shivered. “I don’t like the idea of him walking around free.”
“It isn’t up to me. I agree he might be dangerous. Speaking of dangerous people, is the sheikh with you?”
“No.”
“Where is he?”
“In L.A.” She refused to reveal anything else. In her opinion, Parker wasn’t rational about Zahad.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake!” Jenny’s sympathy for the overworked detective evaporated. “I’m the one whose life is in danger, and I’m glad he’s doing it.”
“Jenny, you don’t understand these matters. The more I look into this, the more suspicious that man becomes.”
“Only to you,” she snapped. “I’m coming down to the station to find out what’s what. I’m not going to sit around my house waiting for Grant to show up.”
“I wouldn’t advise confronting him. However, I’ll be glad to issue you a temporary restraining order. If he does approach you, we’ll arrest him again and this time he won’t get out so fast.”
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. Thanks for letting me know.” After hanging up, she explained to the others what had happened and asked if she could leave Beth there.
“Of course.” Ellen sounded friendlier than in a long time. “Cindy’s missed her terribly. Don’t worry about a thing. I’ll even let them play with some of my makeup samples, if you don’t mind.” She sold cosmetics as a side business.
“Thanks,” Jenny said. “I’ll be at the police station.” Her neighbors had her cell-phone number if they needed her.
Dolly, Ray and Al wished her luck. Bill slipped a blueberry muffin into his napkin and smiled at her like a Cheshire cat.
ZAHAD HAD VISITED his brother’s apartment when he first arrived in the area. He’d flown into Los Angeles instead of directly to Mountain Lake so he could examine the premises, which the police had already searched, and ship home his brother’s effects. The two-story white-stucco building where Ronald Wang lived lay about two blocks away, tucked into a side street near UCLA.
A two-hour drive—for which he had removed his tire chains—brought him to a different world. Here, palm trees replaced the pines of the mountain village, and instead of snow and a sharp wind, the city basked in filtered sunshine. Zahad parked on the street, fed a meter and headed for the building.
Casually clothed young people ambled past him, some carrying shopping bags. They had the open, comfortable look of Californians for whom a public street was merely an extension of their private space.
He reviewed what he’d learned about Ronald Wang from Amy and an Internet background check. At twenty-seven, he was slightly older than Fario and came from a middle-class family. A graduate of UCLA, he’d worked as a junior insurance executive for a couple of years before returning to get an MBA.
His family appeared to be of Chinese or Taiwanese descent, but the young man himself had been born here. The company with which Zahad contracted to run checks on employees had turned up a misdemeanor arrest years earlier for marijuana possession. Wang had avoided prison by undergoing counseling.
There’d been no mention of him in the initial police report. Amy had learned of his existence from one of Hashim’s friends in London. Apparently Ronald had taken Fario and Hashim nightclubbing.
If Hashim had hired a hit man, it might have been this fellow or some connection of his. He was, after all, one of the few contacts Hashim could have made while he was here.
At the front of the building, Zahad found the name Wang and pressed the buzzer. Seconds ticked by and then a voice over the speaker said, “Wazzup?”
“I wish to speak with Ronald Wang.”
“That’s me. And the way you sound, this had better be—what’s your name? Zad, Zan, Zach?—or I’m not letting you in.”
“I am Zahad Adran.” He hadn’t realized that his slight accent and formal manner of address gave away so much, let alone that Fario had discussed him with his friend.
“Just for verification purposes…”
“Why do you require verification?”
“A—You sound foreign. B—Somebody killed Fario, who was my buddy, and the consensus on the Internet is that it had to be political, which means one of those wackos might come after me because I know something that I don’t know I know. If you watch spy movies, you’ll understand.”
“I understand.” Zahad wondered if Ronald Wang normally carried on such lengthy conversations over the intercom.
“I’m not finished. Let’s see, oh, yeah, we’re up to C. This isn’t exactly in your favor but according to chatter on the Internet, the cops think you did it, only I don’t. So, for verification purposes, tell me what Fario liked to drink.”
“Champagne. His favorite nonalcoholic beverage was goat’s milk mixed with Mountain Dew.” Zahad considered the concoction disgusting, but his brother had enjoyed it.
“Okay, I’m buzzing you in.”
Inside, Zahad had no difficulty finding apartment 2C. An Asian-American man of medium height answered the door.
“Man, I gotta shake hands with you.” He proceeded to do so. “Fario told me a lot about you.”
“Did he?” The sheikh had assumed his brother rarely gave him a thought.
“He made you sound like James Bond.” Ronald stepped back to let him inside.
The sunny front room was furnished with a white wicker couch and chairs. The other contents included an array of audiovisual equipment, a desk crammed with a computer and printer, and shelves loaded with video games and DVDs. Zahad noted a couple of textbooks, as well.
“Has anyone else come by to talk about Fario?” he asked.
“No.”
“Where did you hear about his death?”
“It was all over campus,” Wang said.
“The police haven’t talked to you?”
A sideways shake of the head. Well, Zahad was certain the sergeant would consider this visit interfering with a police investigation, but if it weren’t for him, the witness would never have been questioned at all.
“I’m really sorry about Fario,” Wang said. “He was a great guy.”
“Thank you.” Zahad rather liked this young man. However, appearances could deceive. “Did he have enemies? Perhaps a rival for a woman?”
“The only woman he ever talked about was that one he met on the Internet. Can I get you a Coke or something?”
Zahad declined. He prowled the room, looking for anything out of place while asking Wang how Fario had come to “meet” Jenny.
“I used to date a woman I met in a chat room,” the young man explained. “I’m afraid I encouraged him. I knew it could be dangerous for women but I never heard of a guy getting hurt.”
“You met his cousin Hashim?”
“Sure. A wild man.” He grinned. “You Alqedarians or whatever you call yourselves sure know how to have a good time. Well, not you personally, I guess. Fario said you were kind of serious.”
“When did Hashim leave?” Zahad asked.
“Saturday.”
That would be two days before Fario’s murder. “You are certain?”
“Fario drove him to the airport,” Ronald said. “I went along for the ride ’cause he has such a cool car. I mean, had. What happened to it, anyway?”
“It is in police custody.” Zahad would arrange for a buyer when the vehicle was released. “Is there anything else, however insignificant, that you could tell me?”
“Well, there is one thing.” From a desk drawer, Wang removed a stack of papers. When he handed them over, Zahad saw that they were printed-out conversations from a chat room.
“I was mad about my friend getting killed, so I figured I’d get the goods on that woman,” Ron explained. “I went online to see if I could find her. I wasn’t going to try to meet her, just learn as much as I could.”
“Jenny is not the murderer,” Zahad said.
“If you say so. Anyway, look at those papers. Go on.”
He flipped through the sheets. The ones on top contained chats between Jenny S and a writer called TheWiz. The ones on the bottom were between Jenny S and Arabprince. “Some are your conversations and some are my brother’s,” he guessed.
“Yeah. He made me copies because they were so sexy. Look at the way she wrote to me and the way she wrote to him.”
One di
screpancy struck Zahad immediately. “There are more misspellings in the newer ones.” They included “lushous” instead of “luscious” and “freind” instead of “friend.”
“The writing’s cruder, too,” Ronald said. “Shorter sentences and more four-letter words. These were posted by two different women.”
Despite his fluency in English, Zahad doubted he would have caught that distinction. Now that it had been pointed out, however, he could see that Wang was right.
“A copycat,” he said. It might be someone playing a cruel prank. It might also mean that the original stalker had stopped and someone else had decided to continue the harassment.
“This could be useful,” he told Wang. “May I keep these?”
“I’ll make you copies.” The young man ran them through the printer-copier. “What do you think it means?”
“I do not know.”
“Do you have any suspects?”
“My stepmother has proposed Hashim as the next governor of our province,” Zahad said. “He stands to gain a great deal by my brother’s death.”
“Hashim? The killer?”
“It is one possibility.”
Ron shook his head. “He warned Fario not to go. He said this Jenny person probably had an incurable disease or was some kind of criminal.”
This was a point in Hashim’s favor. It didn’t necessarily clear him in Zahad’s eyes, however.
“For what it’s worth, I don’t believe you did it, either,” Wang added.
“Why not?” Zahad asked.
The young man grinned. “Fario said you were hard-nosed. Man, he was right.”
“Hard-nosed?”
“Tough. He was always bragging about you. How brave you were. How smart. Like you were some hero.”
“Perhaps you misunderstood,” Zahad replied. “My father was his hero.”
“Not really.” Wang fed more papers into the copier. “He said his dad always took the easy way out, like going into exile, and that you’re the only one in the family with guts.”
Sheikh Surrender Page 12