If he hadn’t already become a work-obsessed bore, he was certainly running the risk of doing so. Rebecca might easily tire of him. He had adjustments to make, Parnell accepted: positive changes, even. Starting the following day by leaving McLean at a sensible time to help Rebecca ferry her stuff into the apartment. Not just a sensible time, he determined – early, so that after she’d moved in they could go to Giorgio’s restaurant, to celebrate.
With everything firmly planned in his mind – assuring himself it wasn’t work-obsession to compensate for leaving early – Parnell got to work before seven the following morning and had been at his bench for four hours when the secretary at Rebecca’s section came hesitantly into the pharmacogenomics department.
‘Burt Showcross says can you come,’ the girl said.
Eleven
Richard Parnell was the last to arrive at the outer-ring section, and Burt Showcross’s personal office was already overcrowded. Showcross had surrendered his desk to Dwight Newton, who sat at it white-faced, gazing unseeing at its empty top. Showcross, a haphazardly haired man with a distracted manner, was supportively at the vice president’s shoulder, although appearing more distracted than normal. There were two uniform-identified officers from Metro DC police department, a man who introduced himself as Peter Bellamy and a woman whose ID named her as Helen Montgomery. The fifth person was the logo-labelled Harry Johnson, head of Dubette security, a balding, bespectacled man whose expansive stomach melted over a too tightly drawn belt, from which hung a variety of law-enforcement weaponry – the most obvious a pistol – and equipment.
It was Johnson, whom Parnell had never properly met but whom Rebecca had pointed out to him weeks before, who encouraged Parnell further into the cramped office. Johnson said: ‘Hope you may be able to help us a little here, Dick.’
‘What’s happened?’ demanded Parnell. From where he stood he could see Rebecca’s bench space. She wasn’t at it.
‘Rebecca,’ said Johnson. ‘There’s been an accident.’
‘Where is she?’
‘I’m sorry,’ said the female officer. ‘It’s bad. As bad as it gets. She’s dead.’
Everyone in the room, except Newton, looked sharply at Helen Montgomery, critical at the bluntness. She stared back at them, shrugging, unrepentant. Parnell waited – wanting – to feel something. But didn’t. All the clichés snowed in, like it had to be a mistake and it wasn’t true and what were they talking about, but he didn’t utter any of them, either. He said: ‘Tell me.’
Peter Bellamy pedantically took out a notebook, although he didn’t seem to need its reminders. ‘Seems she was going through Rock Creek Park a little too fast in the dark. Overshot a right-hander, went over the edge into a canyon. Took a while this morning before anyone realized the barrier had been busted: the car wasn’t visible from the road. So, it took us even longer to find the vehicle, under a rock overhang.’
‘What …?’ started Parnell but the forthright Helen Montgomery stopped him.
‘The autopsy’s going on now. There wasn’t a lot in her purse but there was the Dubette ID. We’re looking for next of kin. An address, in fact …’ She nodded towards Johnson. ‘From Hank we understood …’
‘There’s an uncle, runs a restaurant in Georgetown … Italian … Her parents are dead … Rebecca had a house in Bethesda … Do you go through Rock Creek Park to get to Bethesda …?’
Instead of answering, Bellamy said: ‘Were you with Ms Lang yesterday?’
Parnell nodded, trying to get himself – his thoughts – into some sort of comprehensible sequence, some sort of order. He didn’t think it was necessary to talk about crab fests and salt glue and Rebecca moving in. Of positive commitments. No one else’s business. Only theirs, his and Rebecca’s. ‘She took me up to Chesapeake. We ate crab … It was …’ He stopped himself from saying fun, realizing that he was talking about crab fests and he wasn’t thinking straight. Rebecca had driven away … crashed … why hadn’t she stayed? Why hadn’t he gone back with her? Wouldn’t have happened if he’d gone back with her. Looked after her. Looked after her instead of staying by himself, thinking of himself.
‘We need to ask you something, Mr Parnell,’ said the woman. ‘You been drinking, you and Ms Lang?’
Parnell wished they’d stop being politically correct or whatever it was, and pronouncing Ms as ‘Miz’, which sounded like a nickname. ‘We had just one pitcher of beer. I drank most of it, because she was driving. Rebecca wasn’t drunk.’
‘You didn’t stop, on the way back?’
‘At my apartment … we got dirty, eating the crabs. Washed up there …’ Parnell was suddenly caught by Dwight Newton’s stillness. The man didn’t appear to have moved since he’d come into the office, the usual twitching hands clasped tightly in his lap.
‘You do … get dirty,’ said Johnson, as if there were a need for confirmation.
‘You have a drink back at your apartment?’ persisted Helen Montgomery.
‘No.’
‘So, the day ended early?’ questioned Bellamy. ‘How early would you say, Mr Parnell?’
‘I don’t know,’ shrugged Parnell, emptily. ‘Eight-ish, nine-ish. I don’t know.’
‘The car clock’s busted at eight fifty,’ said Bellamy.
‘Like I said, eight-ish, nine-ish,’ said Parnell, numbly
‘You have an argument, Mr Parnell?’ demanded the woman, hard-voiced.
‘No!’ protested Parnell. ‘Why ask me that?’
‘Where she crashed. It’s a bad spot. Lots of warnings to slow down. Be careful. To have gone through the barrier … over the barrier … like she did, she was going a lot too fast …’
‘Speedo’s broke, too,’ came in Bellamy. ‘Stuck at sixty-five. That’s an illegal speed in Rock Creek Park.’
‘Rebecca didn’t drive fast,’ insisted Parnell, defensively. ‘She didn’t drive fast and she wasn’t drunk and we hadn’t had a fight.’ Hadn’t had a fight echoed in his mind. But it hadn’t been an easy day. The contradiction came at once. Yes, it had. Ended good, at least. They’d decided to live together, for Christ’s sake! She was happy, going home to pack. Could that have been it, the opposite of what they were thinking? Going home too quickly, to pack?
‘So, she was a good driver?’ persisted the woman.
‘Very good.’
‘What about seat belts?’
‘What about seat belts?’ echoed Parnell.
‘She wasn’t wearing hers,’ said Bellamy, flatly.
‘No!’ refused Parnell. ‘She always wore a seat belt. It was a routine. Always. That’s how her parents died, not wearing their seat belts.’
‘She wasn’t wearing one last night,’ said Bellamy, just as insistent. ‘It might have helped if she had been.’
‘You sure things were OK between you?’ asked Helen Montgomery.
‘Couldn’t have been better …’ Why not, he thought. ‘We decided yesterday to move in together.’
The admission deflated some of the woman’s belligerence but not by a lot. ‘I’m not trying to be offensive,’ she began.
‘Maybe not trying hard enough,’ said Parnell, angrily.
Helen Montgomery ignored the outburst. ‘Did Ms Lang have other friends?’
Ms cut into his head like a buzz saw. ‘What’s that question mean?’
‘Other men friends? Boyfriends?’
Parnell bit back the instinctive rejection. He didn’t know, he conceded. She’d never introduced him to anyone else, male or female. Or talked about anyone else, until yesterday, the walk-away lover who’d made her pregnant. And he didn’t know who he was. ‘What’s the point of that question?’
‘What car do you drive?’ avoided Bellamy, once more.
‘A Toyota. Why?’
‘What colour?’ demanded the woman.
‘You answer my question first,’ said Parnell, still angrily.
‘No,’ she refused. ‘You answer mine.’
‘Grey. Now, why?’
The two police officers looked at one another. The woman smiled. The man may have nodded, Parnell wasn’t sure. The man said: ‘The barrier Ms Lang went into … and over. It’s white. Fluorescent, to reflect light, like these things do. The offside of Ms Lang’s car is all stove in … we found a lot of another car’s paint. It’s grey …’
A cohesive thought wouldn’t form. The impressions, his reactions, were jumbled, one or two words at a time. ‘You think … you mean … there was another car …?’
‘We need to understand a lot of things, Mr Parnell. A lot – too much – we haven’t worked out at the moment.’
‘Wait!’ demanded Parnell, raising both hands towards the tightly packed group. ‘You believe Rebecca crashed into another car – got thrown over the edge of a ravine …?’
‘Maybe forced over the edge,’ said Helen Montgomery.
‘Or sideswiped,’ added Bellamy.
‘But didn’t stop?’ stumbled Parnell.
‘Why do you think she was going so fast?’ said the woman. ‘How about trying to get away from someone? In too much of a hurry even to fasten up her seat belt?’
‘Maybe,’ accepted Parnell, ‘But she would have definitely fastened her seat belt.’
‘You sure you didn’t have a fight?’ demanded the woman.
‘We decided yesterday to move in together!’ protested Parnell.
‘You said,’ nodded Bellamy.
‘You actually think I drove Rebecca off the road! I loved her, for Christ’s sake! We were …’
‘… going to live together,’ finished Helen Montgomery, flatly. ‘Tell us some more about last night. Rebecca left around eight-ish, nine-ish?’
Parnell was holding himself rigidly under control, hands and arms stiff beside him, exasperated and impotent. Tightly he said: ‘Rebecca left, like I said. I sat around, thinking. We’d already decided we didn’t want anything to eat. I didn’t want a drink, either. I went through some papers I’d taken home – work things. Research. Then I went to bed.’
‘You’d decided that day to live together?’ pressed the woman.
‘Yes.’
‘You didn’t celebrate?’
‘We were going to, tonight. At her uncle’s restaurant. It was going to be a surprise.’
‘You didn’t call her, see she got home safely?’
‘No.’ Why not? Parnell thought, agonized.
‘You didn’t call anyone? Speak to anyone?’
‘No.’
‘Watch television? Remember a programme you saw?’
‘No.’
‘Listen to the radio?’
‘No.’
‘Your car outside in the lot?’ demanded Bellamy.
A sweep of sickening awareness engulfed Parnell. ‘It’s damaged.’
The two officers looked at each other again. The man said: ‘How did that happen, Mr Parnell?’
‘Hit in the car park. This car park.’
‘When was that?’
‘Last week.’
‘Guy who did it leave a note? Inform security?’
‘No.’ Parnell wished his voice hadn’t wavered.
‘Did you inform security?’ said Bellamy.
‘No.’
‘Get an estimate from a repair shop?’
‘No.’
‘Make an insurer’s report?’
‘No.’
Tell anyone?’
‘Rebecca.’
‘No one else?’
‘No. No one else.’
Helen Montgomery said: ‘I think we’d better take a look.’
Parnell was conscious of the attention of everyone in Rebecca’s unit as he emerged into it from Showcross’s office: aware, too, of the two officers forming up either side of him. They stayed that way even as they threaded their way through the lined-up cars. Parnell guessed there would be people watching from the windows behind him. As they approached the vehicle, he said: ‘There! There it is.’
Bellamy, to Parnell’s left, said: ‘Quite a lot of damage, Mr Parnell. Just the sort of damage that would have been caused by your driving Ms Lang off the road.’
‘You’re making a mistake,’ said Parnell, the cliché echoing in his head.
‘People tell us that all the time,’ said the woman.
They’d known about the damage before they’d even begun to question him, Parnell thought.
They arrested him there and handcuffed him and as they led him towards their Metro police marked car, Parnell saw there were people lined up at Dubette’s windows. Dwight Newton, walking with them, told Parnell he’d talk to the company’s legal department. Johnson said something Parnell didn’t hear. He didn’t hear a remark from Helen Montgomery, either, but didn’t ask her to repeat it, withdrawing into himself, forcing himself to think logically, coherently. He needed a lawyer, obviously: not the one who’d negotiated his contracts, a lawyer accustomed to courts. America was a law-orientated country. It would be a formality, one he’d enjoy, humiliating the two assholes in front of him into a demanded – and necessary – apology. Science would be the answer, as it was to so much. He didn’t know how long it would take, an unwelcome day, two at the most, forensically to establish that the crash-paint residue on Rebecca’s car didn’t match that of his Toyota. Which was hardly the problem, merely an inconvenience. Who had made her crash? Who had forced Rebecca to drive at sixty-five miles an hour, inevitably to crash. Why? An attack. That’s what it had to be. She’d been running, fleeing, to escape from an attacker. Someone who had attacked her. Smashed into her car and forced her over the edge of a canyon or ravine or whatever they called it. Without a seat belt. That didn’t make sense, Parnell decided, his mind back to Showcross’s office and the knowing questioning from the two in front of him in the car. Rebecca never, ever, drove without a seat belt. Never drove off without buckling up, nagging him to do the same. So, hers would have been fastened outside the apartment at Washington Circle, long before she got to Rock Creek Park. What panic, aberration, had made her unfasten it? To jump out of the car – to escape? Not at sixty-five miles an hour. Why then? So many questions. Too many questions. Would – could – the two officers relaxing ahead of him ever answer them? He would, Parnell determined. When his own release had been secured – with apologies – he’d demand a proper investigation, not one already decided before it began. Which prompted another question. Had they known about the earlier damage to his Toyota? How? He hadn’t reported the car-park accident to security: hadn’t told anyone except Rebecca. So why had the two police officers behaved as aggressively, as disbelievingly, as they had in Showcross’s office. And smirked and nodded when he’d shown them the damage to the Toyota? He was guessing, Parnell reminded himself. Shouldn’t guess, like they’d guessed. If he was going to get this right – make them get this right and find the man or woman who’d caused Rebecca’s death – he had to get everything right. Not guess. Be sure. He’d do it, Parnell promised himself. He’d make enough fuss, do whatever it took, to ensure there was a proper investigation. That the bastard was caught and tried and jailed. That would surely be the sentence on someone who’d chased a terrified woman through a forest, driven her to her death. That was murder. How terrified Rebecca must have been! All alone, fleeing an unknown pursuer, lights blazing in her mirror, knowing … knowing what? That she was going to be raped. Not a woman then. Had to be a man. A man depraved enough – insane enough – to kill her, if he couldn’t have her sexually. The imagery, the horror, physically welled up inside Parnell and he choked and coughed against it, doubling up.
‘No good crying, English boy,’ said Bellamy from the passenger seat. ‘We got you, fair and square. You’re going to have all the time in the world for tears and regret.’
‘You think …?’ started Parnell but stopped, intentionally, deciding it was pointless arguing with either of them. Instead he said: ‘Don’t call me boy. You’re going to be made to look very stupid. Don’t make it worse for yourselves, when I bring a case for wrongful arrest and
blatant dereliction of duty and we discuss all this in a court with you in a dock.’
There was a long, unsettled silence. Then Helen Montgomery said: ‘You quite sure we got those charges here on the statute book …’ Bellamy filled the silence with an anticipatory snigger. ‘… English boy?’ the woman finished, even exaggerating a southern accent.
‘I hope not,’ said Parnell, recovered and totally in control. ‘I hope my lawyers can find something far worse than that. You’re giving more time for a killer to get away, by being stupid. That’s what I’m going to hang around both your necks, a label saying Stupid.’
‘You ever wonder what it feels like, getting a Billy club around your neck, English boy?’ threatened Bellamy.
He’d picked the wrong fight at the wrong time, Parnell realized. There were a dozen witnesses to his docile detention but there would be two against one testimony to his later attempting to resist arrest.
‘You lost your tongue, English boy?’ said the woman, when Parnell didn’t speak.
‘There’s a good English boy, learning respect,’ mocked Bellamy, after a further silence. ‘You’re going to have to learn that well, proper respect, in an American jail. You could even be a prize. Now, wouldn’t that be something, a big hunky English boy like you being a prison prize! You know what a prison prize is, English boy?’
‘I don’t think I want to,’ said Parnell, forcing the humility.
‘You bet your very sweet ass you don’t want to,’ guffawed Bellamy, a clearly rehearsed joke. ‘But I got money that says you’re going to find out in a very big way.’ He and Helen Montgomery were still laughing when they pulled up in front of the police headquarters
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