So Teffinger and Leigh went through her missing person’s file, a thin manila folder that didn’t tell much of a story. The woman was finishing up her senior year at Berkeley, majoring in mathematics. She walked out of her apartment one evening to buy a few snacks at a convenience store two blocks down the street and never made it there.
She had no enemies.
No one saw anything.
She was never seen or heard from again.
THEY VIEWED THE BODY, ate lunch in China Town and then wandered over to Fisherman’s Wharf and watched seagulls fight each other for scraps of food. The minute one of them got something in its mouth it would fly off. Three or four others would give immediate chase, trying to steal it in mid flight.
“Survival of the fittest,” Teffinger said.
On the flight back to Denver, Teffinger told Leigh, “We need to get airline manifests from Denver to San Francisco, particularly roundtrips that include March 18th.”
She nodded. “I already have it in motion.”
He scratched his head.
“I’m confused,” he said. “Are you one step ahead of me or am I one step behind?”
Chapter Sixty-Eight
Day Thirteen - July 23
Sunday
_____________
JACKIE STAYED AWAKE ALL NIGHT looking out the front window, gun in hand, waiting for the shooter to show back up, hoping he would. He was a bad shot and she was still alive. Sitting there alone in the dark and thinking about it, she found it incredible that her entire existence hinged on such a little fact.
He didn’t show back up.
She finally fell asleep on the floor of her living room just as sunrise broke.
She woke at noon, her body achy from the hard carpet, and went to the garage to survey the Porsche by the light of day. The bullet had entered the windshield on the passenger side and exited through the back glass. The shooter must have used a handgun because it would be hard to miss with a rifle at that distance.
How long had he waited for her out there in the darkness?
A long time apparently.
Plus there’d been no assurance she would even come home, especially on a Saturday night. Obviously the guy didn’t know her very well.
She fired up the coffee machine and opened the Sunday paper. The front-page news startled her. Apparently the story about the man killed in the Blake Street parking lot on Friday night was deeper than it first appeared. Now, it seems, the police believed that the next victim had been abducted from the parking lot. The dead man, they theorized, tried to stop it and got killed in the process.
She set the paper down.
Her hands shook.
That’s the same parking lot where she parked on Friday night.
She came back to the Porsche about 9:40 to get a couple of more books of matches. The man got killed shortly after that.
Had she been followed?
Had she been the intended target?
Had someone come to get her and ended up taking the other woman by default?
SHE TOOK A CAB TO THE BUDGET ON COLFAX AVENUE, rented a Mustang and then headed over to Stepper’s place. He had a right to know about the gunshot last night.
If she was in imminent danger, then he probably was too.
Chapter Sixty-Nine
Day Thirteen - July 23
Sunday Night
_____________
AFTER DARK, WITH JANELLE PARKER safely pumped full of sleeping pills and securely chained inside the van, Wickerfield hopped in the Camry to pay a little visit to the lovely photographer’s house. If she told the truth, she had her own personal copy of the composite sketch of the driver that she helped the Nevada cops create. Also, if she told the truth, that composite sketch was folded in thirds and holding a place in a novel. That novel sat on a shelf in her bedroom, sandwiched between other books that he could care less about.
When he drove by her house he saw yellow police tape on the front door. Good. That meant the cops had already been there and wouldn’t be walking in on him.
He parked the car four streets away and doubled back on foot, dressed in all things black. From the sidewalk he snuck into the bushes at the side of the house and hung there, looking and listening.
He slipped on the latex gloves and took the knife out of the sheath, just in case.
Then he walked briskly to the back door, used her key to enter, and stepped inside.
There were no sounds or movements or lights.
He locked the door behind him, waited for over a minute while his eyes adjusted to the darkness, and then headed deeper into the house.
IN THE LIVING ROOM a copy of the woman’s book sat on the coffee table in front of the couch. Lots of loose eight-by-ten color photos were scattered on the table as well. They were nighttime desert scenes, probably taken during her Nevada shoot last month.
Then he had a neat idea.
He should take something that the cops would later recognize as gone, just to screw with them and rub their faces in the fact that he was here.
Suddenly he had an even better idea and switched the positions of a white chair and a black one. He danced in the middle of it all—a rock star on stage—as he pictured the look on their faces the next time they came in. If only he could be there to watch.
In the kitchen he found a bowl of fruit. He grabbed a few grapes and then headed over to the stairs that led to the upper level. They creaked as he walked up.
The novel was right where it was supposed to be. Inside was a piece of paper folded in thirds. He stepped into the closet, closed the door and then looked at it with a small flashlight.
Bingo.
It was a composite sketch of a woman.
She looked vaguely familiar but he couldn’t place her.
When he stepped out of the closet he heard a noise downstairs and froze.
Someone was in the house.
HE SLIPPED UNDER THE BED as quietly as he could. The fit was coffin tight with hardly any breathing room. He already knew that staying there too long would drive him nuts.
Voices came from downstairs, one of a man and the other of a woman.
He recognized the man’s voice.
Nick Teffinger.
He must have come back to have another look around.
Don’t panic.
Just stay calm.
You can take him in a fight.
Plus you’ll have the element of surprise.
He could make out their conversation now. Hey, what are you doing?—we’re here on business. Maybe you are. Stop that. I’m going to be a bad girl tonight. Oh, really, how bad? You’ll see. Why, what are you going to do? You’ll see, just be ready for it. And don’t let me down. Have I ever? Don’t even go there. Name one time I ever let you down. Am I in the Mile High Club? Hah! Gotcha! Yeah, well, there wasn’t any place to do it anyway. Leigh would have closed her eyes. Hell, she might have even joined in. Would that have bothered you? I don’t know, maybe yes, maybe no. What are those? What do they look like? They look like scarves. There you go, five scarves. What are they for? Let me put it this way, only one is for a blindfold. Are you getting kinky on me? I told you, I’m going to be a bad girl tonight, and don’t disappoint me.
A few minutes later they walked into the bedroom.
“Leave the lights off,” the woman said.
They kissed.
The woman’s clothes dropped to the floor one garment at a time. Then she sat on the bed, raised her feet off the floor and fussed with something. When her feet came back down she had scarves tied around her ankles. Then more fussing, and Wickerfield pictured her tying scarves on her wrists.
She got on the bed.
“Okay, fasten me down,” she said.
Teffinger swallowed.
“This is nuts. You are being bad, aren’t you?”
“Totally. Blindfold me too.”
There was lots of motion on the bed, then Teffinger said, “Okay you bad girl. Try to escape.”
&nb
sp; The bed wiggled.
“I can’t.”
“Such a predicament,” Teffinger said. “I think I’ve created a monster.”
“Yes you have.”
“Let’s see how much I can turn this monster on using just one finger.”
WICKERFIELD LAY THERE, UNDER THE BED, as quiet as he could, while Teffinger slowly worked on the woman’s body above him, not more than two feet away. He could actually sense the woman moving to increasingly deeper levels of arousal.
They didn’t talk.
Their breathing filled the room.
Wickerfield hung on every sound.
In his pants a raging hard-on sprung to life.
Then Teffinger said, “Ah, crap. I left my wallet in the car.”
“So?”
“So that’s where the condom is, sweetie. You want a happy ending, right?” He hopped off the bed and headed out of the room. “Be back in a jiffy,” he said. “Don’t do anything without me.”
“Real funny.”
Wickerfield slid out from under the bed and stood up, quieter than a cemetery. He tiptoed to the corner, unplugged a small lamp and took off the shade. When Teffinger walked back into the room, Wickerfield hit him so hard on the back of the head that he fell to the ground before he could even say anything, and then lay there motionless.
Wickerfield sat on the edge of the bed and studied the panicked woman, who was now talking a mile a minute and pulling at her bonds. He put the knife to her throat and said, “Shhhhhh.” Then it was time to let the fun begin. He played with her nipples and ran his hands up and down her body, in every sensitive nook and cranny, until he had her memorized.
He was her new lover, her rock star lover.
If he had a bigger cock, this is when he’d stick it in.
Instead he used his fingers.
Chapter Seventy
Day Fourteen - July 24
Monday Morning
_____________
FOLLOWING A TANGLED SUCCESSION of bizarre dreams, Teffinger woke, realized the room was still pitch-black, and shifted around to see what time it was. With any luck he still had a full night of sleep ahead of him. The familiar red digital numbers of his alarm clock said 4:32.
Ordinarily, this is where he would turn to the other side and go back to sleep. But the events of last night wouldn’t leave him alone and, after ten minutes of tossing under the covers, he climbed out. The cut on the back of his head must have opened last night because his hair was matted with dried blood. He showered on the lower level, so as to not wake Rain, popped three Tylenol for the headache and then started the coffee machine and watched it gurgle.
An animalistic desire to kill gripped him.
He wondered, if the opportunity arose, whether he’d have the strength to not give in to it.
He poured skim milk directly into the coffee pot, stirred it with a spoon until it was a solid cream color, then poured a cup into his favorite mug and sat outside on the front steps in the dark.
Crickets chirped, lots of ’em, and the pine trees in his yard filled the air with scent.
Suddenly the door opened behind him.
Rain sat down and put her arm around his shoulders.
He kissed her.
“I’m thinking I could kill this guy,” he admitted. “I want to see his eyes roll back into his head and feel his heart stop pumping.”
“Don’t.”
“I’m not sure it’s my choice.”
She looked at him. “Something like that is always a choice. He’s not worth screwing your life up for.”
“Yeah, but . . .”
She cut him off. “Enough,” she said. “I’m okay. It wasn’t that big a deal.”
“What he did is rape,” Teffinger said. “Any kind of penetration qualifies.”
“Like I said, I’m okay. Just forget about it. And remember, I can’t have the cops involved.”
He raked his hair back.
“I’m a cop,” he reminded her.
“You know what I mean.”
He did indeed. Last night, she talked him out of filing a report. She couldn’t be involved in any official police business. She couldn’t be fingerprinted. She couldn’t have her DNA taken.
Rain St. Croix wasn’t her real name.
“Should I just walk down the street and get out of your life?” she asked.
“No. Absolutely not.”
HE GOT TO WORK BEFORE EVERYONE ELSE and tapped into every system he could think of to find out if Rain was wanted and what for. Whatever it was it wouldn’t make a difference. But he wanted to know.
He got one dead end after another.
The FBI profiler, Dr. Leigh Sandt, walked into the room shortly before seven in an expensive outfit, looked around, saw only Teffinger and headed over to the coffee machine.
Teffinger met her there to refill.
“Where is everyone?” she asked.
“They think they have lives,” he said.
She smiled.
“Having a life just gets in your way.”
“Yeah,” he agreed. “Lives are overrated.”
They ended up at his desk. He almost propped his feet up out of habit but caught himself at the last moment. Leigh opened a tan leather briefcase and pushed a stack of papers across the desk.
“Airline manifests,” she said. “Between Denver and San Francisco.”
Teffinger was impressed.
“That was quick.”
“I called in some favors and now officially owe three blowjobs,” she said. “I was wondering last night why our guy—assuming he lives in Denver—would fly out to California to kill someone.”
Teffinger cocked his head. “He probably didn’t want to pee in his own backyard—same thing regarding the woman in Santa Fe, assuming they’re all connected.”
“Maybe,” Leigh said. “I mean, he’s peeing in his own backyard now, big time. So why not in March? That’s only four months ago.”
Teffinger shrugged.
“He’s mutating,” he said. “You know how these guys are. Now that he has a few notches on his belt he’s suddenly bulletproof. The dumb-ass cops will never catch him, so why waste all the time and money traveling? Plus, you can’t create a media frenzy if you spread yourself thin.”
She nodded.
“Maybe.”
Teffinger looked at her. “You keep saying that.”
She sipped coffee.
“Or maybe the out-of-state women were specifically on his radar screen,” she said. “People he had a grudge against for some reason or another. We need to take a closer look at whether they had any enemies. I’m also wondering if it would make any sense to see if the Santa Fe woman and the San Francisco woman have anything or anyone in common.”
Teffinger shrugged. He didn’t see it as a priority, but had to agree that it wouldn’t hurt. “Yeah. Maybe they both dated the guy.”
He studied the airline manifests.
There were pages and pages of names, from several airlines.
“Do we know who any of these people are?” he asked.
“Not yet. That’s why we got up early.”
“And I thought it was to drink coffee.”
Chapter Seventy-One
Day Fourteen - July 24
Monday Morning
_____________
YESTERDAY, SUNDAY, JACKIE RESOLVED once and for all to get out of the case. Stepper had fired her anyway and wouldn’t ever change his mind. So there was no gratitude or money coming her way. Plus, whoever it was she was chasing tried to kill her Saturday night. Her sister was right. It was time to get her ass back to lawyering and out of the sleuth business.
That was yesterday.
Today she saw it differently.
The problem being, however, she didn’t have much to go on. About the only thing she hadn’t run to ground, to the extent that she wanted, was the phone call to Stepper from the Texaco station on May 5th at 10:42. According to her notes, two gas purchases were made in tha
t approximate timeframe, one by John S. Martin and another by someone using the card of a company called Seven Circles. Maybe one of those people placed the call to Stephen when they stopped for gas.
According to Google, though, John S. Martin was sixty-five and the president of a local chapter of a model railroad club. Not exactly the kind of guy to send chills up your spine.
Claudia walked in just as Jackie lit her first match of the day.
“What are you doing here?” she asked. “Did your hearing get cancelled?”
She froze.
That’s right.
She was supposed to be in Denver District Court for a motions hearing at nine. Her watch said 8:51. She ran to the closet and got dressed in the middle of the room while Claudia poured her first cup of coffee and watched with amusement.
As she ran for the door Claudia said, “Third time this year.”
“Call ’em and tell ’em I’m on the way!”
“Lucky for you I have them on speed dial.”
“Not funny.”
THAT NIGHT AFTER DARK SHE DROVE THE MUSTANG to County Road 6 in the heart of farmland, parked on the side of the road in the gravel and killed the engine while a cloud of dust kicked up.
She got out, locked the door and—dressed in black—headed up the road with a queasy feeling in her gut and the gun holstered under her sweatshirt. Binoculars hung from her neck and a medium-sized flashlight was wedged in her back pants pocket. Crickets sang in droves but other than that the night lie still and quiet.
She swallowed.
According to the continuing research conducted earlier today, Seven Circles was a Colorado Corporation. It was also a limited partner in a Colorado Limited Partnership called Dusty Dirt, L.P. Public records indicated that Dusty Dirt owned 350 acres of land with a mailing address known as 9861 County Road 6. That property, in turn, wasn’t too far from Bob’s gas station, the place where Bob gave Jackie’s business card to the driver of a van.
Someone with a Seven Circles credit card bought gas from the Texaco station in Westminster on May 5th, about the same time the mysterious Northwest phoned Stepper from the station’s phone.
Bad Client (Nick Teffinger Thriller) Page 23