The first thing the officer saw when Tatiana Chekova opened the door was a fancy new plasma screen in the living room. Tatiana consented to a search of the rest of the apartment, and the officer found heroin in Tatiana’s nightstand drawer. It was a straightforward case, put together with a self-investigating citizen, good police work, and a bit of luck.
When Ellie was finished reading, she turned to Flann. “Tatiana gave a sister as her contact information when she was arrested a couple of years ago. The sister also lives in Bensonhurst, or at least she did back then.”
“Good. Maybe she’ll know if Tatiana was using FirstDate.”
“I’ve been thinking about that,” Ellie said. “How well did you smooth things over with Stern after I left his office yesterday?”
“He stopped talking about siccing a lawsuit on us, but he’s probably not about to invite me over to meet the missus. Why?”
“Because even in his self-righteous indignation about customer privacy, he did offer to cooperate if we had a narrower request backed by a better reason.”
“And now all we need to know is if Tatiana was a FirstDate customer,” Flann said.
“How much more specific can we be, right? It’s certainly worth a phone call.”
“Nah. I better see him in person. He might check, find out she’s in his system, and then lie about it.”
“He struck you as that evil?”
“He’s the CEO of a corporation that’s about to go public. A few taps on his keyboard might just confirm that some bedbug out there is using his customers for urban hunting.”
“Enough said.” Confirmation of three victims linked to FirstDate, two of them killed by the same gun, would send Mark Stern’s stock values plummeting. “You know what I can’t figure is why the D.A. kicked Tatiana’s case.”
“Bad search?” Flann asked.
“That’s what I assumed, but it looks textbook. She said the TV arrived in the mail, and she just assumed it was a gift. Give me a break.”
“And the drugs?”
“She gave consent to search, then admitted the horse was hers. Looks like a slam dunk.”
Flann shrugged it off. “Maybe the prosecutor didn’t think it was worth the hassle. A gullible jury might’ve bought the story of a television miraculously arriving to a working girl’s doorstep. And the heroin was a first-time drug pop.”
“But enough quantity to trigger a hefty sentence.”
“You know how judges can be about so-called consent searches. Maybe the prosecutor didn’t want to push it.”
“Too bad for Tatiana. If she’d gotten some jail time, she might not have been in the Vibrations parking lot three months later.”
Ellie was interrupted by the chirp of her cell phone. She didn’t recognize the incoming number. “Let me get rid of this. Hello?”
“Hatcher, it’s Ed Becker. I hope you don’t mind me calling your cell. They didn’t have you on the roster at Homicide for some reason, so I played the old retiree card with some friends and got this number.”
“Not a problem, Ed. Thanks again for your time this morning.” Flann threw Ellie a curious look, and Ellie shrugged.
“I’ve been thinking more about the Chekova case, and I’m not feeling good right now about how I handled it. Looking back, I might’ve missed something on that one.”
“I’m sure you did what you could. We’re just taking a fresh look in light of the new killings. You never know what could break it, right?”
“You’re a real nice girl — woman, sorry — but I’m in a better state of mind now compared to back then. I’m pretty sure I did a piss-poor job. But, hey, I’m not calling so you’ll feel sorry for me or anything. I want to help.”
“Help how?”
Flann’s look moved from curiosity to anger. He shook his head quickly at Ellie. On the other end of the line, Becker laughed.
“Don’t worry. I know the last thing you and McIlroy need is me nipping at your heels. I was just thinking about our talk yesterday. I told you we eliminated the bachelor party at the outset. In retrospect, though, I can’t remember whether we really looked at them or not. We just went with our gut—”
“And the fact that they were spilling their guts on the side of the road?”
“Exactly,” Becker said with another laugh. “Not a bad judgment in the beginning, when you’re prioritizing. But when we didn’t have any other leads, we should have gone back and taken a closer look. After what happened with my partner, well, I don’t think I ever did. You might want to check them out after all.”
“All right, we’ll do that. Thanks for the call.”
“No problem. I mean it, if there’s anything I can do, let me know. Hell, I know I can’t be much help anymore, but it’s just eating at me. Promise me you’ll let me know if I missed something—”
“Stop assuming that. It’s just a new set of eyes is all. And of course I’ll call you if we get anywhere.”
Flann threw her another cross look.
“I’ll be here waiting. I’m just sitting up here in Westchester getting old.”
When Ellie flipped her phone shut, an obviously unhappy Flann pressed her for every detail.
“He can find out the results of our investigation when we publicly announce an arrest. We’re not about to partner up with Ed Becker.”
“Nobody’s talking about partnering up.”
“Sharing information, talking about the old days, whatever. I don’t care what he says, but that phone call’s about covering his ass. I’m not getting involved, and, trust me, you shouldn’t either.” Flann stood and started to pull his coat on.
“I don’t get it, Flann. What is it with you and Becker? He’s being a hell of a lot nicer than most retired detectives would be about someone working an old case, and you find something wrong with every step he makes.”
“That’s because with a guy like Ed Becker, nice always comes with a price. Now, I’m going down to FirstDate to see Stern. You coming?”
“No, after yesterday’s fireworks between me and Stern, you should go alone. Besides,” she said, looking at her watch, “we’re supposed to go see that computer guy. Just meet me at his office when you’re done with Stern.” Jason Upton, the former FirstDate programmer, had agreed to meet with her at two o’clock at his office.
Once Flann was gone, Ellie checked her FirstDate account. Eleven new messages, not including flirts. She had a message from Mr. Right. He was the one she thought of as dirty birdy, who’d used such subtle sexual innuendo with Amy Davis. He was nice enough to leave a phone number. She also had a message from Taylor, the one she’d mentally dubbed as stalker-guy. He was interested in meeting for a drink. Still no word from bachelor number three, Enoch.
She pulled up the message from Taylor, hit Reply, and typed, Taylor, How about a phone call first? Give me a number where I can call you?” Twenty seconds later, she received a message from Taylor with a telephone number, complete with the desperate comment that he had plenty of free minutes on his new CellularOne plan. That was the nice thing about stalkers. They were good about returning messages.
Then she found herself reading another message, this one from one of the “keepers” to whom Jess had sent a flirt on her behalf. Hey. It’s pretty funny they call hitting a little button on their Web page flirting . Doesn’t flirting usually involve lingering glances across a crowded room, a gentle graze of the forearm after a subtle joke, deliberately placed lips on a wine glass…. Whoops, sorry, got a little carried away there. Wow, is it hot in here? Anyway, thanks for flirting with me. If you get a chance, tell me a little bit about yourself. How’s this for an ice-breaker? My name’s Peter. Hey, don’t laugh. My name really is Peter. Seriously.
The message was enough to make Ellie laugh — twice — so she clicked on Peter’s profile, amazed that she was even remotely curious about a man her brother had selected. She read the brief introduction he’d written about himself. It’s official. I’m a hypocrite. I shake my angry fist at the pub
lishing industry that fails to recognize my manuscripts as the future classics of American fiction, and yet I have no idea what to say about myself in this little box. I have a salaried writing job by day but dream of making it to the walls of Chumley’s. I guess that makes me a writer manqué. I consider my self a non-British, much better-looking version of Nick Hornby, so prepare yourself for endless conversations involving randomly inserted allusions to culturally significant popular icons such as the Clash, the Simpsons, John Waters, so-bad-it’s-good reality TV, and on and on till the break of dawn. Sounds fun, right?
Ellie smiled, then found herself typing a response. Peter, Thanks for the note. About that mental digression of yours, I hope I was good. Manqué? I looked up that fancy SAT word in the dictionary and it sounds a little bit like a wannabe. You shouldn’t be so hard on yourself. She paused, knowing that she should say at least something about herself. I’m not a writer but I do like to read. I overheard a woman in a bookstore the other day tell her friend she really loved books, “but not the reading kind.” Besides reading and eaves-
dropping on strangers in stores, I like kickboxing and watching my brother’s band play. Wow. That made me sound really butch and boring. Hopefully I’m neither. If I had to pick one, though, I guess I’d go with the former.
Ellie paused again. You need to sign an e-mail, don’t you? She typed DB990, then erased it. Ally. Close enough. She hit send. Your message has been sent to Unpublished. Too late to back out now.
She checked her watch. Jason Upton was expecting her in forty minutes. She’d have to wait to learn more about Peter, but she had just enough time to do a little research into the men who called themselves Taylor and Mr. Right.
16
ELLIE WAITED FOR JASON UPTON ON A SQUAT, SHINY BLACK leather sofa in the Midtown lobby of the law firm of Larkin, Baker & Howry. She took in a Jasper Johns silkscreen on the wall across from her as she sipped a coffee fetched for her by the receptionist.
“Detective Hatcher? I’m Jason Upton.”
The man who offered his hand did not fit the stereotype of a computer geek or tech-head. He was probably in his midthirties and dressed fashionably in a pair of loose khaki pants and a striped open-collar shirt. His frame was full but fit. His dark hair managed to be simultaneously neat but tousled. His accent was northeastern and uniquely moneyed.
“Thanks for making time for me. My partner should be here shortly, but we can start without him.”
Jason asked the receptionist to bring McIlroy to them when he arrived, and then led the way to a more modest office two floors down.
“Big change in scenery,” she commented.
“Welcome to the fifty-seventh floor, land of word processing, printing, and I.T. No clients means no interior decorators. Just cubicles, copy machines, and lots of computers. I’m lucky to have walls.”
“I think I prefer the art in here,” Ellie said, gesturing to a framed poster from Pulp Fiction as she took a seat in Jason’s sole guest chair. She got straight to the point, first covering the possible link between two murder victims and FirstDate, then moving on to the effort to determine the true identities behind all of the user names. “We started an account ourselves and are trying to get ID’s on a few of the men by contacting them directly, but it would be a lot easier if someone with access to the company’s computers would just hand over the names.”
“The police department has an online dating profile?” he asked, laughing.
“I meant more like a royal we, as in me.”
“Usually I have this spiel I give my female friends before they try the online dating thing, but I assume this is strictly for investigative purposes?”
“All business, I’m afraid.” A thought of Peter the wannabe writer flashed through her mind. “Go ahead and give me the spiel anyway.”
“Don’t get me wrong. I wouldn’t have worked to start the company if I didn’t think it could serve a good purpose. Love’s a beautiful thing, right? Mark and I really believed that the Internet held the potential to transform the way a couple interacts when they first ‘meet,’ so to speak. People open up on e-mail in a more honest way than when they’re face-to-face with someone they’re trying to impress. Then, by the time you see each other in person, there’s already a connection there. A bad outfit, or the beginning of baldness, or a few extra pounds — those physical imperfections that might have been deal killers if you met in a bar — they become something you get past.”
“You make it sound so—” Ellie wanted to say sickening but instead she opted for “pure.”
“Well, those upsides were what we had in mind when we started. But we also knew there could be downsides. We did our best to warn customers up front so they could be smart, but, frankly, not everyone’s so smart.”
“I see a lot of that in my job.”
“So you can imagine what I’m talking about. People handed over their real names and phone numbers to total strangers. They met for first dates at their homes. One guy said he lived in Arizona and needed money to move up to New York to pursue the relationship. Of course, he lived in Hoboken and gave the same story to twenty different women. Really stupid stuff. I left when our customer base was relatively small, but we were already getting a ton of complaints about unwanted e-mails, phone calls, whatever.”
Ellie was reminded of Amy Davis’s problems with Taylor, the man who couldn’t take no for an answer. “That’s why you’ve got that Block function, right?”
“We programmed that in after the first few weeks online. We had that many problems. It’s a quick fix, but only for customers who are smart enough to stay anonymous — no names, phone numbers, any of that.”
“And not everyone’s smart.”
“Exactly. Then of course you’ve got all the same problems you have out there with good old-fashioned dating. One guy I worked with was juggling five different women in any given week. Each of them thought their boyfriend was working so hard he could only see them once a week on date night. Now, in the old-fashioned world, a guy like that would eventually get caught juggling women in his building, or from work, or who were friends of friends — the girls might put the pieces together. And if he did get caught, there’d be the embarrassment factor if he had to keep running into them. But FirstDate introduces people who share absolutely no preexisting links. As a result, there’s no accountability if someone gets caught being a dog.”
“This dog from work — he doesn’t happen to be Mark Stern?”
Jason laughed. “Mark? No, definitely not. Very happily married.”
“So it’s not just a marketing image? I thought maybe he hired someone to pose for that perfect wedding picture on his desk.”
“You’re a very cynical woman, so I’m sorry to disappoint you. He’s actually as happy as he appears to be.”
“Just not fair,” Ellie said dryly.
Knuckles rapped against the office door frame.
“Hi. Flann McIlroy.” Ellie noticed that her partner was carrying a pair of brown sheepskin gloves and a laptop that looked a lot like Amy Davis’s. He laid the gloves on Jason’s desk and shifted the computer into his left hand as he offered Jason the other. “The woman upstairs said it was all right to come down.”
“The more the merrier,” Jason said, making room to roll a stool from the hallway into his small office.
“Did you get what you wanted downtown?” Ellie asked. She was eager to know what Flann had learned from Mark Stern. If Tatiana also had an account, they’d have a stronger argument for getting a court order giving them access to FirstDate’s records, and they wouldn’t even need Jason Upton.
“I got an answer to the question, but it wasn’t the one we wanted.” Flann did his best to make it sound innocuous, but Ellie could tell he was disappointed. So was she. Chekova was killed by the same gun as Caroline Hunter but wasn’t using FirstDate. Maybe they were hurtling down an entirely wrong track.
“I WAS JUST about to ask Jason why he left the company,” Ellie said.
“For all of this,” Jason said, holding his arms out wide. “Money, prestige, power.”
“We have all the same rewards in our job.”
“I left because Mark was more ambitious than I was. I liked the work we were doing, the freedom of self-employment, breaking new ground. I had a trust fund, though, and Mark didn’t. He was a few years older. He was the entrepreneur, the one with the M.B.A. and the big plans. Honestly, I wasn’t willing to do the corporate side of the work. I mean, come on. I was a computer science major, archaeology minor at Tufts. What do I know about business? Maybe if I’d pulled myself up by the bootstraps, I’d be more like him, but what can I say? Dot-com’s were all going bust so I got out. Mark had the cojones to stick with it.”
“You left on good terms?”
“Oh yeah. Mark’s a little uptight, but we always got along real well. He was nice enough to act heartbroken when I left, but he was probably happy to be able to take the company in his own direction. We worked out a nice little deal for both of us. I got to move on to other things. Mark kept his stock and got to live his dream.”
“He strikes us as more than just a little uptight,” Ellie said. “He pretty much threw us out of his office when we asked him to give us some customer names, then threatened to sue us if the story leaked. And he’s apparently got all of his employees too scared to help us behind his back.”
“Like I said, he was always more corporate than I was.”
“Feel like taking your old job back, just for a few days?” Ellie asked.
“Sorry. I hope that’s not your reason for being here.”
“Actually, I was hoping you might at least be able to point us in the right direction. Do you know someone at FirstDate who could pull the information we need?”
Jason shook his head. “I don’t know most of the people there now. The company’s grown, and we always had a lot of turnover. You’ve got to understand. It’s not like there’s this public file in the network at FirstDate that links customer names to their profiles. Very few people have access to that. Otherwise, you get one bad employee, and every married man hooking up online would get blackmailed. Only a few people are likely to have access, but I’ve got to be honest — my guess is they’ll toe the party line if Mark has put his foot down on this one.”
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