Honor

by Janet Dailey

  Besides, a beautiful woman had a definite advantage, if the officers she was dealing with were male. The broadcast, if he remembered it right, confirmed that the Ridgewood PD and emergency response team didn’t seem to have heard of affirmative action.

  If Kenzie didn’t see the need to cooperate just yet, he knew a woman who could help.

  Linc swung his feet off the coffee table and reached for his cell. Time to make some calls. His younger brother had to have a phone number for Kelly Johns, star reporter. RJ had said something about her being interested in Deke.

  He remembered vaguely that she’d come up through the ranks, going from smaller stations to larger. The sleazy reporter who’d covered the accident looked like he’d stayed stuck in the trenches. Still, she might know something about him or know someone who did. He figured Kelly would be happy to give him the skinny.

  He speed-dialed Deke.

  Not too long after that, Linc was having a cup of lousy coffee with the reporter who’d covered the crash. Gary Baum had arrived within minutes of Linc’s call, but they were getting nowhere.

  The guy liked to whine. “I have no idea why they towed my freakin’ car—I mean, I had every right to be on the scene of the accident and I showed my press pass. But whoa, I touch the wheel of the wreck and the deputy acts like that was a felony or something, reams me out. The station had to cut the live feed and blast a commercial.”

  “I remember it.”

  The reporter gave him a disbelieving look. “You do? Nice to know someone pays attention to my broadcasts once in a while,” Baum said sourly.

  “You do a good job,” was Linc’s bland response. If he had to stroke this guy’s ego to get a look at the footage, he would. Gary Baum was self-absorbed to a fault. No wonder he hadn’t noticed Linc at the impound lot.

  Baum glanced up at the monitor positioned high on the coffee shop wall. “I’m just a lowly reporter. There’s our star anchor, Mark Huxley.”

  He pointed and Linc looked too. “Uh-huh.”

  “With a late-breaking update,” Baum mimicked the anchor’s deep voice, “on the pothole crisis in downtown Ridgewood.” He watched as the anchorman positioned himself in front of a large crater in the street. “Two steps backward, he falls in and gets mud all over that expensive suit. Okay with me. I want his job,” he sighed. “Then I could afford a suit like that. Around the station my nickname is Baum the Bum.”

  “That’s not nice.”

  “Ambulance chasing isn’t either.” Baum’s eyes narrowed on Linc’s impassive face. “Are you going to tell me why you’re so interested in that particular accident?”

  Point scored for Baum. Maybe he was smarter than he acted. “I’m an investigator,” Linc said.

  “Private? Police department? What?”

  Linc shrugged. “I freelance, let’s put it that way.”

  “How’s the money?”

  “Depends. Sometimes it’s pretty good.”

  “Maybe I should change jobs,” Baum mused. Several teenaged boys eased into the frame with the handsome anchor, smirking and mugging behind his back. “Go get him, punks. Time to wrap it up, Huxley,” he said to his onscreen rival.

  Linc shrugged. Maybe it was time he wrapped up this conversation. There was a limit to how straightforward he could be with the reporter.

  Gary Baum leaned forward, his hands cupping the coffee Linc had bought for him. “So is there a bigger story here? I’m getting that idea. My sixth sense is highly developed. What can you and I do for each other, Linc? And are you related to that other Bannon guy who broke the Montgomery case?”

  Now they were talking. Linc sized up the man across from him and answered the second question first. “He’s my brother. But that case is closed. All I’m interested in is seeing the footage from the accident, start to finish. Unedited.”

  “Yeah, yeah. You paying?”

  Linc had expected that question. He studied the other man for a few moments before he answered. “I don’t know. Depends on what you can get me.”

  “Give me a few days.” Baum went off on another tangent. “Hey, before I forget to ask, how well do you know Kelly Johns?”

  “I’ve met her.” That was true enough.

  The reporter didn’t drop it. “What a babe. And what a nose for news—it was awesome how she got that old kidnapping story to go viral. Isn’t she up for some award for that? National or local?”

  “Local,” Linc bluffed. He had a sudden feeling that Baum was testing him.

  Apparently not. The reporter took his answer for the truth. “You going to the ceremony?”

  “Can’t say.”

  Gary Baum sat back and looked at him enviously, then took a long slurp of his coffee. “You lucky dog.” He set down the cup. “Okay. Nice talking to you, but I gotta get back to the station.”

  Linc wished he had a nice crisp hundred in his wallet for encouragement, but he didn’t. “I understand. You have my cell number. Let me know when you have something.”

  “Sure thing.”

  Kenzie had gone back and circled Christine’s block several times, acting like she was hunting for a parking space—fortunately, there weren’t any—and looking around intently.

  No homicidal maniacs with glowing laptops in sight. The nearby parked cars were unoccupied. None had tinted glass. She knew her recon was kind of pointless, but she had to do it. Finally she pulled up in front of the building again, backing into a just-opened spot with a single swoop.

  Get in, get out.

  She reached under the passenger seat and took out a weapon. Not one with bullets—it was a curved slab of iron made to fit her palm. Meant for fighting dirty. A ring, the only part of it that showed, slipped over a finger.

  Better than nothing.

  Kenzie got out, moving fast, uneasy because there wasn’t anyone else around. She went up the exterior stairs.

  The hallway was empty. She pressed her ear to the door to Christine’s apartment, hearing nothing. Quietly, she stepped back a bit and turned the key in the lock, pushing it open and staying to the side.

  No sound. A faint smell of closed-in air. Her instincts told her that no one was there.

  Kenzie moved to the open door and saw the laptop on the floor where she had left it. Glancing around the room and through the open interior doors as she dashed in, she yanked out the cord and scooped up the laptop.

  Mission accomplished. It hadn’t taken more than a few seconds. Kenzie closed the door, then locked it.

  She got back to her car and slid behind the wheel, the laptop on the seat next to her. She steadied it when she drove off, going a little too fast for the residential neighborhood. She’d put it in the trunk when she got to the hospital.

  No way in hell would she take the laptop into Christine’s hospital room until Linc had gone over it thoroughly. Maybe not even then. They could put all the stored photos on a couple of CDs and have them printed out at a drugstore.

  A few fall leaves whirled red and gold in the air as she zoomed away. In another minute, Kenzie reached a wide cross street that would take her to the interstate and the hospital. Going through the intersection, she took off the palm iron and tossed it into the passenger footwell.

  She didn’t notice the black car idling near a hydrant.

  Later, much later, sitting in the hospital parking lot after her visit, she bit her lip to the point of pain. Sometimes that little trick worked to keep back tears. Not now. Kenzie scrubbed the hot drops away.

  She found it hard to believe the doctors’ prognosis—Christine seemed worse, not better. She was moaning again and restless, even with her mother’s soothing care. Her hands found the tubes and pulled at them until a nurse was summoned.

  Restraints or sedatives. What a choice to have to make.

  The Corellis opted for the latter. A nurse came in to administer them intravenously, per Dr. Asher’s orders. The drug was something new, not as strong as what she’d been on previously, they told Kenzie.

  She’
d waited with them until Christine was calmer and Alf finally insisted that his wife go to her sister’s house. The woman, who seemed kind but careworn, had driven in to pick her up.

  That was one less thing for Kenzie to worry about, at least for a little while. She hadn’t said a word about the laptop and Mrs. Corelli hadn’t asked.

  Kenzie popped the trunk and got out to make sure it was still there. She lifted the cover over the spare tire.

  There it was, held in place with a bungee. She touched it to make sure it was still secure. The pearly surface was cold. How long had she been in the hospital?

  She wiped her hand on her jeans when she straightened, as if she’d made contact with the stalker. Weird. She hadn’t felt that way when she’d whisked the laptop from the apartment. Maybe the adrenaline served as an antitoxin.

  Kenzie replaced the spare tire cover.

  She slammed the trunk closed and got back into the driver’s seat, reaching into her purse for her phone. There were several messages from him. The last one gave the address of his motel just in case and the room number, which she didn’t know.

  It didn’t take her long to get to the motel, which wasn’t far from her own apartment building. For some reason she’d forgotten how seedy it was. The main sign flickered intermittently and under it was a neon triangle that said Vacancies. Only a few of the windows were lit up. Kenzie squinted up at the room numbers from her angled space, looking for Linc’s.

  With the laptop under her arm, she went up the stairs and knocked. He opened it before she could blink.

  “Come on in,” he said, cheerfully enough. “My motel room is your motel room. Sorry about the mess.”

  “I don’t care about that.” She edged past the TV and the crumpled bags of takeout food on the table next to it. “Where should I put this down?”

  Linc glanced at the laptop she held. One thick eyebrow went up but he said nothing. She didn’t offer an explanation.

  “Here it is.” Kenzie cleared a space on the table. She set down the slim machine well away from his. Linc glanced at the kittycat decals and pearly cover.

  “Anyone see you get it?”

  “I don’t think so. Didn’t take me long.”

  “I was on the phone with my CO when you called. Couldn’t blow him off in time. Sorry about that.”

  She felt a flash of guilt for not waiting. Linc accepted what she’d done without knowing the reasons for it.

  “Mrs. Corelli asked me to get it—and no, she still doesn’t know.” She explained why and what was going on with Christine. “It was so hard to see her like that.”

  He knew better than to hug her. “Kenzie, there’s nothing worse than seeing someone you love in pain and not being able to do a thing about it. But I think you have to trust the neuro team.”

  “I know. We all know that. Me and the Corellis, I mean. They’re patient people. But I can’t stand doing nothing.” Kenzie sat down on the couch and rubbed her upper arms as if she was cold. The sound of her cell phone ringing deep inside her purse claimed her attention but only for a second.

  Linc raised an eyebrow when she ignored it. “You going to answer it?”

  “Every time I do, it’s bad news.”

  He sat down on the couch but kept a reasonable distance. It made her want to jump into his arms and get held right. For a long time.

  The phone stopped ringing, then started again in another minute. Kenzie swore and searched for it, looking to see who it was, then shaking her head.

  “Oh no. Not him.”

  Linc refrained from satisfying his curiosity, looking elsewhere as Kenzie pressed the icon for forwarded e-mail.

  “If you want to know, and I know you do,” she said, “it’s from Randy Holt.”

  He turned toward her. “Who?”

  “He’s a medic—he was with Frank Branigan when he died.” She stopped, unable to say more. “Randy posted on the memorial page, looking for me. I don’t know why. We were going to e-mail. But I can’t. Not now.”

  Linc nodded.

  She switched to the tiny keyboard screen and typed a fast reply, sending an e-mail instead of a text to avoid confusing abbreviations and to make sure Randy could get it. Linc couldn’t see what she wrote. Kenzie filled him in.

  “I told him it would have to wait,” she said when she was done.

  Holt responded right away. Kenzie’s eyes widened. She held the phone so Linc could read the message on it.

  Short furlough. Have to talk to you. Confidential. Urgent. Heading home in two days.

  Linc hesitated for a bit before asking a question she might take the wrong way. “You sure about this guy?”

  So far he’d listened to what she knew about Randy Holt without interrupting. That the medic was suddenly heading home was a game changer.

  Kenzie shrugged uneasily. She didn’t want to tell Linc that she’d sent him her phone number just in case. “I guess I should vet him with Donna.”

  “Do that,” Linc said. “Before you answer him.”

  She sat up straight on the couch, firing off another e-mail from her phone. How secure it was, she couldn’t say. But the stalker had hacked Christine’s laptop, not hers. Yet. She couldn’t give up all forms of communication.

  There was no reply. Kenzie got up and paced, her arms crossed over her chest, looking around the motel room. “Yikes. This place is kind of a dump,” she said, not rudely. “Sorry you had to sleep here.”

  “It’s okay. Seen worse.”

  Kenzie noticed the formal clothes he’d been wearing the night of the accident, still slung over a chair. “At least you got to see your brother get married before all this happened.” Absently, she smoothed the satin lapel of the jacket. “How are the newlyweds?”

  “On honeymoon. No one in my family knows I’m here.”

  She gave him a rueful look. He stuck to the business at hand.

  “So. Do you want me to open up that laptop while we’re waiting?”

  “It’s password-protected,” she said ironically.

  The corner of Linc’s mouth twitched but he didn’t say anything.

  “Nothing you can’t handle. Go for it, super spy.”

  He unzipped a small duffel bag and took out a pair of transparent exam gloves, pulling them on.

  “Are those necessary?”

  “Your prints are on it. Christine’s too. If anyone else touched it, the police might need those. Not mine.”

  She knew he meant the stalker. Something else she hadn’t thought of.

  He went over to the laptop and plugged in the cord, then lifted the top. Kenzie looked away. The screen stayed dark.

  She looked back when she heard a jingle. Linc had taken his car keys out of his pocket.

  “What are you going to do with those?”

  “Not those. This.” He separated a flat, three-inch gizmo from the keys and held it up for her to inspect. “Ten bucks at any office supply store.”

  “Do you expect me to believe that?” she asked scornfully.

  He grinned at her. “No. You’re too smart. I invented it. Among other things, it cracks passwords.”

  “That’s nice,” Kenzie said without much enthusiasm. She picked up her cell phone to make sure she hadn’t missed a text from Donna and set it down again.

  “I take it you don’t want me to let the genie out of the bottle.”

  “No,” she said flatly. “I don’t.”

  “Can’t blame you. But do you think you would recognize him if you saw him again?”

  “Maybe. Why?”

  Linc replied in an even tone. “While you were gone, I got hold of the TV reporter who was on the scene at the accident.” He left out Kelly’s part in arranging the meeting. “His name’s Gary Baum. There’s always extra video that doesn’t get on the air. He said he’d look into it.”

  “And?” she asked.

  “Whoever forced Christine off the road might have come back around to enjoy the commotion. He’d be a face in the crowd, but it was digita
lly recorded. If Gary Baum comes through, we might have something. There are a lot of ways to enhance video.”

  “Oh.”

  She actually seemed impressed. But he wasn’t going to get her hopes up. “It’s a long shot, I know. Thought I’d try. This creep isn’t going to walk up and knock on the door.”

  He put the keychain gizmo into the USB port and waited. “I can pinpoint when this was accessed remotely without going into Christine’s personal files or anything like that. At least we’ll have a time line.”

  A minute later, he was into the hard drive and checking recent activity. “Someone got through the firewall an hour before you arrived at Christine’s apartment.”

  Kenzie stared fixedly in the other direction. “Don’t turn that screen in my direction, please.”

  “I’m not going to,” Linc said. “He’s not inside. But I’m looking for traces of his visit.”

  Kenzie seemed curious. “Does that count as evidence?”

  “It could. Everything adds up. Slowly.”

  “That’s the part I don’t like.”

  “Get over it, Kenzie. Due process means something. The law is the law.” He felt compelled to make the point. Right now Kenzie was relatively calm. Angry, she was an unstoppable force.

  But this evening, she’d run out of steam and she looked exhausted. There were faint circles beneath her beautiful green eyes and her petite body was rigid with tension.

  “I’m tired of thinking about it,” she said finally. “What now? Looks like Donna’s not going to get back to me, and I don’t want to watch TV.”

  There seemed to be an unspoken agreement that she wasn’t returning to her apartment tonight. Linc was fine with that.

  “Get some sleep.” He gestured toward the bed. “Take the right side. It’s less lumpy.”

  She didn’t budge.

  “That doesn’t mean I’m sleeping on the left side,” he added quickly. “You can have the bed all to yourself.”

  “Don’t be so noble.”

  He pointed to the laptop. “I’m not done with this. It takes a while to explore an operating system, and I’m not even sure what I’m looking for.”