She approached with caution and nudged the office door open with a foot.
A man wearing a black reefer stood in the middle of the floor with Tiffany in one arm. Scattered about him, a maelstrom of books, magazines, and clothes – nearly every inch of the Persian carpet was covered.
Behind the man, Sky spotted the contents of her desk drawers spread out along the sofa cushions – letters, school papers, old homicide files, a blue carton of Tampax.
Thoroughly sacked. Like Professor Fisk’s lab.
The man whispered something in Tiffany’s ear and looked up.
“Hello, Doctor Stone. I have been waiting for you. Please, come in.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
Sky stood in her office doorway and gaped in recognition.
Standing in the middle of her office, holding her dog, was the figure she’d seen ducking into the Four Season’s garage the night of Carnivale.
Tiffany’s pink tongue darted at the stranger’s chin and Sky studied his face.
There was an ageless quality about him, he could’ve been anywhere from thirty to sixty, and in every physical respect he was unremarkable. Lank brown hair brushed his shoulders, sharp features with pale lips. His English was nearly perfect, but Sky detected a subtle exaggeration of vowels. Russian, possibly Czech.
“Who are you?”
“That is not important. I mean you no harm. Come in,” he repeated. “It is in your best interests to do as I ask.”
The stranger was at once reassuring and threatening. Something in his manner told Sky it was useless to run.
Besides, he had Tiffany.
Sky stepped into the office and the stranger leaned past her and pushed the door shut.
“Skylar Stone,” he said with a flat delivery, “heiress to the Winthrop fortune. Raised variously in Iowa, South Dakota, Boston. Home schooled by anthropologist mother, secondary education punctuated by brief but unsuccessful term in Gstaad boarding school. Does not play well with others.” He scratched the abbreviated bridge of Tiffany’s nose with an index finger. “Doctorate by age twenty-four. First author on a dozen published articles. Adjunct professor, Boston University. Forensic consultant to local homicide.” He paused. “Abducted at two years of age for three million dollar ransom. Recovered unharmed, perpetrators disappeared.” This last remark was accompanied by a skeptic’s shrug. “Talented equestrian –”
“Abducted?” Sky broke in. “Where did you get that information? I was never abducted.”
“You didn’t know?” His eyes rounded in surprise. “Well, so young – and your family managed to keep it out of the newspapers.” He offered a benign smile. “Every family has its secrets. But you are here, safe and sound. Let me see, where was I? Ah, yes. Accomplished equestrian, dressage saddle preferred but comfortable bareback. One hundred pounds, barefoot. Literary taste runs to Murdock and Durrell. Has weakness for the song Perfidia – the Alberto Dominguez version, naturally. Signature scent, Fracas. Sustained late-term miscarriage, the result of a car accident. Most recent address, Brant Point, Nantucket Island. Until four days ago –”
“I get it,” Sky interrupted. “You know who I am. So what?”
“You broke into a laboratory at Boston University on Tuesday. You also visited Nicolette Mercer’s apartment. I believe you may have taken something that belongs to me.” His tone turned crisp. “I want it back.”
“If it’s the lab data, you’re too late. Professor Fisk has a copy. It’s no secret.”
The stranger’s eyes lingered on Sky’s face for some seconds. “The item in question looks like this.” He slipped a hand inside the breast pocket of the reefer and pulled out a small black object an inch wide and two inches long.
“A thumb drive,” Sky said. “Big deal. I have three myself.”
“To be precise, a Sony one gigabyte USB thumb drive. I was scheduled to retrieve my property on Monday afternoon. Miss Mercer missed the drop.”
Sky glanced around the office a second time and sensed a curious order in the mess: clothes in a wide pile, jean and jacket pockets turned inside out; books and magazines stacked in front of their respective shelves, she even spotted the tip of Aunt Olivia’s letter jutting out next to the intact Wanli-period pot. Whip’s chess board sat untouched in the corner.
“So what are you?” Sky said. “Interpol? Ex-KGB? Don’t bother denying it. Although I have to give you credit, I only spotted you once. At the Four Seasons.”
The thumb drive slipped from the stranger’s hand and he stooped to pick it up. He didn’t speak, but a peculiar look flashed across his eyes.
“What?” she demanded.
“You looked so much like Monk, just now.” He gave an embarrassed laugh. “To be frank, it was a bit unsettling.”
“You knew my father?”
“In another life. You spotted me, it’s true. In my own defense? You presented a rare vision, Doctor. White gown, black fur, floating through a sea of snow?” He shrugged. “Exceptional beauty carries its own power. I am not immune. But I digress. Where is my thumb drive?”
“Probably in Evidence. The detectives went through Nicolette’s room before I did.”
“The thumb drive is not in Evidence. And you, Doctor? Well, I’ve been watching you. You tend to collect things.” He gestured to the bulletin board. “You have a good eye. Investigators often miss books. Women love to hide things in books, I wonder why.” He jabbed backwards with a thumb. “I found the lab pages. And the rubber rat. The Smith & Wesson was something of a surprise, as you do not care for firearms. I did not find my thumb drive. Not in Professor Fisk’s laboratory, or Miss Mercer’s apartment, or Zach Rosario’s hell hole. It was not in Templeton’s townhouse and it is not in your Jeep.” He deposited Tiffany on the pile of clothes. “I am afraid I must search you.”
“I don’t have your thumb drive,” she insisted. “Maybe Porter Manville has it.”
“I do not think so.” He held out a hand. “Give me the bag and coat.”
“Knock yourself out, asshole.” Sky slipped off her coat and backpack in a single motion and threw them to the floor.
“I love America,” he said, emptying each pocket of the bag. “You have such colorful expressions.” He extracted Sky’s cell from the trench coat and handed it to her before giving the lining a methodical pat. “Now take off your boots.”
Sky pulled off the red cowboy boots and stood glaring at him in her stocking feet.
“Turn around and put your hands on your head,” he ordered. “And spread your legs.”
Sky faced the door, trying to gauge her chances of escape. An elbow to the man’s eye, grab Tiffany and get to the hallway.
“Do not even think about it.” The stranger seemed to read her thoughts. “I have people at both doors. It is so much easier this way.” He stood behind her with a foot between hers. The hem of his black chinos crumpled over black sneakers.
Black on black. Like a ninja.
Sky felt hands move down both sides of her body.
The stranger pulled and pinched the white cashmere at regular intervals. He ran his hands over her breasts and arms and said, “Nice sweater, by the way.” With a firmly professional touch, he slipped a finger along the waistband of her jeans.
Nice sweater, by the way. Sky silently repeated the phrase because something rang familiar.
Tiffany jumped up against Sky’s calf as though it were all a game.
“The Shih Tzu is an ancient breed, were you aware? Genetically quite close to wolves,” the stranger said. “Appearances can be so deceiving.” He squatted and ran his hands along each of Sky’s legs and feet. “My family raised Borzoi,” he added, concluding the frisk with her abdomen and crotch.
“I told you I don’t have it,” Sky snapped. She grabbed the red cowboy boots and sat on the sofa. “So what’s on the thumb drive?”
“Sorry. My employers insist on discretion.”
“Really?” she shot back. “What about my employers? How do you think Homicide
will take it when they find out you’ve frisked me? And trashed my office?” Sky winced as she pulled a boot over her swollen left ankle. “They’ll be very interested in your thumb drive.”
“Ordinarily, Doctor, I would agree with you. But your credibility with Homicide is … shall we say, strained?” The stranger offered a sympathetic smile. “I doubt they would believe anything you have to say.” He gestured at her ear. “Detective O’ Toole thinks that bump is affecting your judgment. Darling.”
Sky slumped into the sofa, too shocked to reply. There had to be bugs everywhere.
“Yes,” the stranger read her face. “Information. You are beginning to understand. But I was not expecting murder. Or worse, murder investigations. I have developed an aversion to that sort of work.”
That sort of work? Something in the man’s weary tone prompted Sky to ask, “Who murdered Nicolette? You must have an opinion.”
“Not my job.” The stranger shoved his hands in his coat pockets as though that were the end of it. Moving silently to Sky’s desk, he appeared to be squinting at the framed photograph of her parents. “Monk,” he whispered.
“I have shit to do.” Sky rose from the sofa and kicked the yellow gym bag in frustration. “If you can’t help me, get the hell out.”
The stranger ignored her and continued frowning at the photograph of her parents. He appeared to be having some kind of internal argument. A deep sigh escaped the pale lips and he raked an exasperated hand through his hair.
“Fuck me,” he said with conviction. He took two steps to the zebra-print backpack and ripped something from an outside pocket.
“Hey,” Sky protested, “Leave that –”
The stranger shook his head and lifted a conspiratorial finger to his lips.
Sky got the message: shut up.
Digging a stiletto from the front pocket of the black chinos, he sliced a cuff button from her trench coat. Then he moved to the bookshelf nearest the desk and scraped something from the top shelf.
Tiffany dogged his heels, navigating awkwardly through the clutter. The stranger kneeled and fiddled with the dog’s collar, extracting a second small button. So quick were his movements that it took Sky a moment to realize: the man was debugging her office. Debugging her.
Digging a three-day old Dunkin’ Donuts coffee from the wastebasket, he dropped the bugs into the sludge and swished the cup with a deft wrist motion.
Twisting an object shaped like a deformed mosquito from his right ear, he scraped at it with a fingernail and said, “Number one, DNA evidence can now be fabricated. The Israelis have already done it.”
“What?” Sky wasn’t sure she’d heard correctly. “What are you talking about?”
“I am telling you that anyone can engineer a crime scene.” He flicked a finger at the picture of Ellery tacked on the bulletin board. “Your prime suspect, for example. If his DNA profile is in a database, anyone with access to that database can construct a sample to match. No tissue necessary.” He gestured to the wastebasket. “Or they might scavenge a bit of tissue and concoct a blood sample. From a drinking cup. Or perhaps a cigarette butt.”
Ellery’s DNA was available, Sky knew that much. The guitar player had been sued twice, quite publically, for paternity.
“Fabricate DNA evidence? How?” she asked.
“They removed white cells from a woman’s blood and added DNA from a man’s hair. Voila! All genetic material in the blood sample is now from the man. Piece of cake.” The stranger shrugged. “Easily planted at a crime scene. A dab here, a dab there.” He touched a finger to ear and wrist, as though he were putting on perfume. “A real can of worms, is DNA.” He read Sky’s face. “You don’t believe me. Google it. Forensic Worldwide Genetics, February issue.”
Sky pushed past him and typed the name of the journal into the computer.
“I am surprised you were not aware of this development, Doctor. Forensics is your field, no?” The stranger stood uncomfortably close to Sky. The odor of cigarettes clung to him like aftershave.
“I’ve been away. Move back.” Sky nudged him with a hand and scanned the on-line February issue. “Authentication of forensic DNA samples,” she read aloud. “Is this it?”
“Number two,” he said, “have your men run the following license plate.” He reeled off a short jumble of numbers and letters.
Sky jotted the number on the desk blotter. “Who –”
“Number three,” he interrupted, “you are absurdly vulnerable here. Leave town. Disappear for a while.”
“Thank you so much for your advice,” she said with arch civility. “Any suggestions?”
“This weather is dreadful. Perhaps some place warm?” The stranger stepped over Tiffany, who was chewing vigorously on the v-shaped Achilles notch of Sky’s Reebok. “Many years ago your father saved my life. I was young, I did things by the book, as you Americans say. Monk told me to trust my instincts. Monk was very big on that, you know. I suggest you take his advice.”
“Trust my instincts? About what? Are you Mr. Viper?”
“I must leave.” He pulled a black stocking cap from his pocket and shoved it over his head.
But the stranger lingered near the door.
“Three days ago I would have called you reckless. But now?” His eyes lit on the Balenciaga. The gown still floated from the green celadon hanger on the back of Sky’s office door. “Now I see a woman driven to find the truth at any cost. You lack a healthy fear of death. Why is that?” Reaching out with a tentative finger, he touched the peau du soie bodice. “You have invaded my dreams, Skylar Stone. The more I discover, the less I comprehend. I confess I have fallen a little bit in love.” With that he slipped out of the office.
Sky nearly tripped over Tiffany getting to the door.
There were too many questions. How did the stranger know Monk? Where did he get the license plate number? Who’s license plate number was it? And what about her abduction?
But the hallway was deserted.
The stranger was gone, leaving behind only the faintest scent of cigarettes.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Sky closed and locked the office door – a futile gesture, under the circumstances.
Tiffany stopped gnawing the Reebok and stared at her.
“You’re fond of him, don’t deny it,” Sky said. “It’s written all over your face.”
The Shih Tzu’s gaze didn’t waver.
“He’s right,” Sky admitted. “It’s not safe here. But where can we go?”
She moved around the office stuffing items into the backpack; Tiffany’s food, pictures from the bulletin board, Aunt Olivia’s letter, her wallet, the box of Tampax, a stack of unopened mail bound with a rubber band, and a Hewlett Packard netbook. She was extracting a pair of jeans from beneath the chewed Reebok when she bumped against the television, knocking the purple DVD case to the floor.
Sky stared at the writing on the case: DOC DEMO.
She slipped the disk into the DVD player and watched the video again.
The title scrolled, The Science of Happy, followed by shots of the tall ship, Wellbiogen building, lobby, laboratory and the lab-coated woman peering into a microscope. When the off-screen voice ordered, “Get a head shot,” Tiffany’s ears pricked and Sky realized why the stranger’s voice rang familiar. It was the same voice that introduced Porter Manville on this documentary. The same voice that complemented the CEO on his suit. Nice suit, by the way. Nice sweater, by the way.
Tiffany’s tail bobbled whenever the voice spoke.
“Yes,” Sky agreed. “That’s him.” The stranger who had ransacked her office and frisked her was the same man issuing orders on this documentary, the voice was unmistakable. He was the film director.
A documentary film director who knew Monk? And Nicolette? Something else that needed sorting out, but where? Candace’s was out of the question.
Tiffany rested a possessive paw on the Reebok and tracked Sky’s movements with intense interest.
&nb
sp; “There is one place …” Sky put on the trench, slipped the backpack over her shoulder, grabbed the black duffel bag and scooped up the surprised Shih Tzu on the way out the door. “It happens to be the last place on earth I want to go.”
Taking stairs to the Adams Street exit, Sky planted a kiss on Tiffany’s dome-shaped head and said, “But you’ll probably love it.”
CHAPTER FORTY
It was past midnight but Raj greeted Sky at the door of her grandmother’s Beacon Hill mansion as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
“We need a place to stay,” she said.
“Come in, come in.” The Nepalese butler hustled Sky into the marble-floored vestibule. “Most charming.” He nodded to Tiffany and secured the front door with two dead bolts. “Shall we retire to the summer kitchen for a bite before bed?”
Sky nodded wordlessly and followed him down the central hallway. She was drained by the shock of Teddy’s death and confused by the stranger’s revelations. Her excitement at the discovery of the thong and phone at Manville’s that evening seemed naïve to her, now.
Kyle was right. It wasn’t evidence.
Raj led her past the formal dining room, through the first floor kitchen and down the back stairs to the summer kitchen.
Sky took a seat at the battered table and watched Raj work the old Chambers stove. Over a low flame, he browned a handful of rice in butter and added milk from a salt glaze beaker.
“An old family recipe,” he said with lyric inflection, “a pudding we call kheer.”
As a child, Sky had sought refuge in the cloistered walls of this room because Izzy rarely entered the arched stone doorway. The summer kitchen belonged to the servants. Francois Duquette’s story insinuated itself and Sky pictured her grandmother preparing soup for an ailing Whip. Spooning something into the soup.
Did Izzy murder Whip? Only a disinterment could answer that question.
The Profiler's Daughter (Sky Stone Thriller Series) Page 34