Depraved Heart

by Patricia Cornwell

  “Be careful,” Lucy says. “There’s plenty to trip over. The landscapers never come in here so it’s really overgrown.”

  I follow her through the gate and then we’re in the woods. There’s no gradual transition. Her yard ends at the fence, and on the other side of it are acres dense with rhododendron, mountain laurel and old trees. Trails winding through were cleared long years ago and are mostly overgrown. I move very carefully, slowly along a vague scar of a path as Lucy leads us through ferns, birches and dogwoods. Then she stops.

  “There.” She points at a holly tree, at a white pine with motion sensor cameras and lights on them. “Several times now they’ve been activated by movement but there’s nothing there. The cameras aren’t picking up anything.”

  “I’ll ask what I have before,” I reply, and I realize why she’s brought me here. “Couldn’t an animal be to blame?”

  “I have the sensors set to react to anything moving that’s at least three feet off the ground like a deer, a bear, a bobcat,” she says as I stand very still, bearing most of my weight on my left leg. “Something that size and the cameras would pick it up. But they didn’t.”

  Lucy is putting on a show. Whatever she has in mind is the go screw yourself grand finale, and any minute now the fireworks will begin. She deliberately dressed in FBI sweats and if that wasn’t enough she’s about to do more. But it doesn’t explain the strange object I’m noticing so close to her feet she’s about to step on it. At a glance it could be a tiny raindrop on top of brown leaves beneath a mountain laurel. But it’s not raining yet.

  “Don’t move,” I say under my breath.

  I hold her stare, making sure she understands and she does. I steady myself next to a clump of sassafras trees, grabbing on to a smooth trunk. Mitten-shaped pale green leaves brush against me, and I casually comment that in another month or so they will turn yellow, coral and orange. Lucy’s property will be fiery with fall colors, I say good-naturedly for the benefit of eavesdroppers, and then the snows will come, and there can be no invisible intruders because they’ll leave tracks.

  “Unlike whoever has been here,” I say not just to Lucy but to the FBI. “And I know someone was,” I continue to announce as I dig in the pockets of my cargo pants and find a pair of fresh gloves.

  Pulling them on I steady my balance as I bend over, moving as little as possible so I don’t disturb the underbrush or leaves and lose what I’m trying to collect. The small bit of what looks like quartz sticks to my gloved index finger, and I cup my other hand under it to make sure it doesn’t fall or sail off on a gust of wind. I can’t help but think it miraculous that something no bigger than a grain of rice was plainly visible, and I suspect it hasn’t been out here long.

  “Unless you’re the source,” I say to Lucy, “then someone has been in this spot. Probably very recently.”

  The tiny flat hexagon is dull and opaque, and I hold it in my palm to show Lucy. It’s not polished and looks industrial, bringing to mind a mineral or other material used in manufacturing or engineering.

  “Do you have any idea?” I ask.

  “I didn’t notice it when I was out here looking around.” She stares as if it’s poison. “I didn’t see it until you did just now. I’m surprised it’s here.” She says it oddly. “Maybe it’s supposed to be. That’s my first thought. We’re supposed to find it.” She says it slowly, loudly, making sure the FBI doesn’t miss a word.

  “It couldn’t come from anything you own.” I move it to the palm of my hand so she can get a closer look. “You sure it’s not from you or something you’ve installed? What about your surveillance system? It was very close to several cameras.”

  “This isn’t from anything of mine. It’s certainly not from me because I wouldn’t be so careless and stupid as to leave it out here.” She’s careful not to touch it or get too close.

  But she’s not careful about much else. Lucy is glancing around at the cameras in the trees. She’s boisterous and cheerful as if we’re having a happy nature hike or a picnic.

  “It doesn’t look like anything from normal clothing.” I stay on subject. “Not from anything decorative either.”

  “It’s been micromachined into this size and shape, and there’s a tiny hole through it. Possibly something was threaded through it. She’s been here.”

  “Carrie Grethen has been,” I confirm who she means, and Lucy nods.

  “This is from something she’s doing. I’m not sure what but I have an idea what this relates to,” Lucy says. “Carrie was always chasing after invisibility.”

  LUCY SUSPECTS that what I’ve found is a metamaterial possibly used in creating objects that bend and diffuse light.

  “Let’s see what it is after the labs do their thing but I’m guessing it’s laser-quality quartz, in other words calcite,” Lucy says.

  “Then you’ve seen something similar before.”

  “I’m well aware of what’s out there. She’s always been obsessed with invisibility technology, what’s known as augmented reality or optical camouflage.” Lucy looks around, as if she’s talking to the trees. “These idiots are so hell-bent on going after me they aren’t paying any attention to the real danger. Carrie may have figured out how to cloak herself with the goal in mind that she can take out anyone she wants. I mean anyone. And she’s a damn terrorist so that could concern the damn FBI.” Lucy has no concern about being even moderately discreet.

  In fact she’s not really talking to me anymore. She’s talking to them. She’s talking to Erin Loria.

  “This is where the motion sensors went off yesterday about four A.M. and then again this morning at the same time.” She projects her voice, and her tone is peppered with mockery and beneath that is rage. “When the sun was up I did a walk around. Everything looked normal.”

  “Could she have been here in this spot and you didn’t see her?”

  “She could have been. Especially if she’s rigged up something Harry Potterish. But it’s not fantasy. They’re engineering all sorts of materials these days that can change reality as we know it.”

  “I think reality’s already been changed.” I don’t have my scene case with me so I improvise. “Possibly for good.”

  Finding another clean glove, I drop the metamaterial inside and shake it down into one of the fingers. I tightly roll up the purple nitrile and tuck it into my pocket, noticing that directly ahead through the fence are the south windows of Lucy’s master suite. If someone had binoculars with night vision capabilities it could be a problem.

  “Is that the way they usually are?” I point at her bedroom and what I’m asking is if she always keeps the shades down.

  “It doesn’t matter. A scope with ultrasonic sensors can basically see through walls,” she replies in the same stage voice. “The purpose of a system like that is to continue to track targets after they duck behind cover …”

  “Who would have such a thing?” I interrupt her as I feel a wave of impatience.

  I’m tempted to tell her to keep her voice down but I won’t. It’s unwise for me to give any sign that I suspect the FBI is watching and listening. I know better than to behave as if I feel guilty and have things to hide so I continue to talk thoughtfully, what sounds like openly and comfortably. But I’m careful and deliberate and Lucy isn’t. She doesn’t have a flight switch only a fight one, and that’s what I’m witnessing and can’t begin to control.

  “She’s been here. I can promise you that.” She says it with certainty and audacity, and I see the aggression in her intense green eyes. “Somehow she’s been right here using some sort of technology for a specific reason. Maybe to spy. I don’t know but it’s not the Feds. They aren’t that smart. It’s Carrie. She might be somewhere out here right this minute but they’ll never believe it. Maybe no one believes it’s her because why would anyone want to? Even my own partner isn’t sure.”

  I understand how painful this must be for Janet but I don’t say it out loud. It’s not necessary for me to remin
d Lucy of her history with Carrie, of all the years that have passed with us feeling safe because we were certain she wasn’t a danger to us or anyone anymore.

  “We need to go.” Lucy looks up at storm clouds that have rolled in like a charcoal tarp, hanging low with tatters reaching down, a total gloom descending. “Okay we’re leaving,” she says loudly and not to me but to whoever is listening.

  We head back carefully, not talking now. The wind gusts harder and the smell of rain is so strong I can taste it as I think about everything I need to do. I’ll get the metamaterial to my labs later today. At the very least I’ll confirm what it’s made of but already there are problems. I didn’t collect evidence according to my own unforgiving protocols. My DNA might be on the metamaterial or possibly Lucy’s could be. If nothing else a competent defense attorney will claim that what I just collected is contaminated because it was improperly handled. The jury won’t trust it or me.

  The first drops of rain smack the trees as we emerge from them back onto the grass. In the distance, building thunderheads flash with lightning, flickering purplish-black like something shorting out, like something wounded. I smell ozone and feel the dropping barometric pressure pressing down heavily, and I’m startled by what I don’t understand at first. Music explodes out of the audio surveillance microphones all over the property. Hozier’s “Take Me to Church” is as loud as an air raid in the woods, around the house, over the water.

  I look at Lucy and she’s smiling as if we’re out on a happy stroll. She doesn’t have her phone. She’s not at the controls anymore. Janet must be responsible, and I step up my pace as the music rocks fifty acres of conservation land. Pain screams in my leg and I accept that I’m going to get soaked. I tell Lucy to run ahead out of the downpour but she mimics my pace.

  She stays with me and in a matter of seconds the bottom of the universe seems to burst in an explosion of thunder that sounds like gunfire. Rain pours down in the blasting wind. The temperature has dropped at least ten degrees, and Hozier is all around us as if God is enjoying a concert at the FBI’s expense.

  We were born sick, you heard them say it …

  “I’m not the only one they have to worry about.” Lucy raises her voice over the music throbbing in the rain, in the trees. “Don’t fuck with us!” she shouts up to a rabid sky, and I imagine the FBI agents inside her house where Hozier must be deafening.

  I was born sick, but I love it …

  Then Lucy’s palatial timber home instantly goes dark. I can’t see a single light on. Her smart house is computerized. There are no switches in the walls. The FBI isn’t controlling the audio system. Or the lights. Janet is. Of that I have no doubt, and Lucy is laughing in the hammering rain and music as if this is the funniest day of her life.

  Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen …

  “Tell Marino to meet me at the truck.” I head toward the driveway, my wet shirt coldly plastered to my back. “You can’t stay here. For a lot of reasons you, Janet and Desi absolutely can’t.” I talk over splashing water and Hozier worshipping like a dog at the shrine of your lies. “You need to move in with us for a while,” I yell back at Lucy. “I don’t want to argue about it.”

  CHAPTER 28

  RAIN POUNDS THE METAL ROOF AS IF A MAD DRUMMER is on top of us. The early afternoon is dark. It feels like dawn or dusk. It feels like the world is about to end.

  I’m coming out of my skin. Something is sliding, rolling around in the back of my big white truck as I drive in the monsoon. The object is hard and metallic. It moves a short distance, hits something then stops and rolls again depending on which way I turn or if I slow down or speed up. I can hear it clearly through the partition that separates the cab from the boxy body, and there was no such noise this morning before I parked by Lucy’s gate. It started minutes ago as we lumbered around a hairpin curve.

  CLANK CLANK CLANK.

  “We need to see what the hell that is.” Marino has said this several times but there’s nothing I can do.

  There was no place to pull over earlier and we’re on Route 2 now in heavy rain and Friday traffic. The visibility is abysmal. Everybody has their lights on as if it’s night, and even if I wanted to detour there’s nothing here. Just the highway and a big mud hole of a construction site on my right and three lanes of cars and trucks on my left. I’m mindful of the day slipping away. I seem to have very little control over anything including my time.

  “I can’t pull over right now.” I tell Marino the same thing I did when he first suggested it.

  “It sounds like rebar rolling around.”

  “It can’t be.”

  “Maybe a tool like a screwdriver or something that rolls around, gets caught on something, then rolls around some more.”

  “I don’t see how,” I reply and the noise suddenly stops again.

  “Well it’s giving me a creepy feeling and fraying my last nerve.”

  He cracks open his window to smoke, to calm his creepy feeling and soothe his fraying last nerve, and water spatters the inside of the door and the dash. I tell him I don’t mind his cigarettes but I don’t want the windows fogging up. I adjust the fan and that helps some but I can take only so much frigid air, and Marino complains about that too. He’s hot and sweating and I don’t want to get chilled. I’m keeping the temperature barely above tepid. I make constant adjustments, clearing the glass and getting cold, then warming up and unable to see.

  This is stressful and uncomfortable, and it’s almost impossible not to be edgy and rather frantic. My clothes are wet. I’m sticky and wilted. My leg aches miserably. I feel sick about Lucy, sick about the secrets I keep, and the debate inside me rages nonstop. Should I tell Marino about the Depraved Heart videos? I honestly don’t know what to do, and as we drive farther away from Concord past flooded road construction and soupy woods shrouded in mist I force myself to concentrate on my new rule:

  Pay attention even when you think you already are.

  It’s a new rule that used to be an old one but I got lax. I got lulled into a false sense of safety, and as I try to retrace my steps I see the pattern. I see it plainly, and a part of me is unforgiving while another part understands how it happened. No one can be vigilant every minute of every day. Time passes and some things get harder. I’m relentless about keeping up my scan for enemies but the ones from the past are the most treacherous. We know too much about them. We start re-creating them in our own image, assigning attributes and motivations they don’t have. We form relationships with them. We delude ourselves into believing they don’t want to kill us.

  The same thought continues to nag at me. If I hadn’t assumed that Carrie Grethen was no longer on this planet would I have stopped looking for her anyway? I worry that I might have. It’s the path of least resistance to relegate nightmarish people to a cold file, to tuck them so far back in your mind that you don’t think about them. You expect nothing from them. You don’t fear them or anticipate or predict or worry. I dismissed Carrie long ago. I didn’t do it simply because I was convinced she’d died in a helicopter crash. I couldn’t stand to live with her anymore.

  For years she’d invaded my psyche. She was a shadow cast by something I couldn’t see, an inexplicable shift of air, a sound that made no sense. I lived with the constant expectation that my phone was going to ring and I’d get the next bad news. I waited for her to torture and murder someone else, to partner with another deviant and go on another spree. I constantly looked for her when I was with Lucy and when I wasn’t. Then I stopped.

  “You want a hit?” Marino offers me his cigarette. “You look like you sure as hell could use it, Doc.”

  “No thanks.”

  “I wonder if the music’s still playing and what the Feds are doing about it because you can bet they aren’t laughing.” He inhales a lungful of smoke and blows it out the side of his mouth.

  “Lucy and Janet didn’t blast music and turn off the lights because they wanted to amuse anyone except themselves,” I reply.

&nbs
p; Lakes and forests spread out on either side of us as we pass the town of Lexington now.

  “You sure it was them who did it?” Marino asks.

  “Well it wasn’t Desi.”

  “You’d be surprised what little kids can do with computers. It wasn’t all that long ago that one hacked into the FBI database. I think the kid was like four or something.”

  “Desi had nothing to do with what we just witnessed. It probably was Lucy’s idea. It’s the sort of thing she’d find funny.” Even as I say this I think of video links I’m supposed to believe were sent by her ICE number.

  I’m convinced Carrie is spoofing Lucy’s phone. There’s no telling what else Carrie may have hijacked, broken into and appropriated as if our lives are hers to manipulate, trifle with, damage and destroy. I’m reminded of how skilled she is at creating implosions, internal failures, strife and catastrophes. If she can cause us to self-destruct what could be more gratifying to her than that?

  She’s trying to script our behavior, and that’s how it starts.

  “I’ll never get over them hiring her.” Marino is talking about Carrie with no prompting from me. “When you really think about it the Feds created Carrie Grethen like Frankenstein,” he adds and he’s right in a sense.

  In some ways she was conceived, nurtured and transformed into an amoral monster by our own government. Then she decided to turn on what took care of her, to demolish any fairness and safety she’d been entrusted to ensure in this world. She’ll take any side that suits her at any given time because she has no loyalty or love for anything or anyone except herself.

  “A computer engineer for the Department of Justice,” Marino is saying, “assigned to Quantico? And the FBI had no clue they’d placed a friggin’ psychopath in charge of their computer and case management overhaul?”