“They have no idea? I mean, no idea we’re watching and listening?”
Nerd let out a hearty laugh, forcing it to a point of annoyance. I chipped his boney arm with a sharp punch, shutting him up immediately.
“Shit!” he snapped, rubbing where I’d tagged him. “Seriously, no hitting. And no, they’ve got no idea. Zero. Nobody knows we’re on except us.”
I glanced back at the screen, thinking this was too good to be true. And then next to my own computer’s camera, I saw a potential problem. “But what about the light?” I was certain Steve would notice the green pin-light at the top of the monitor, telling him when the camera was on. His job was to notice everything. But Steve went on picking at his eyebrow, his lips bumping up and down.
How could he not notice?
“An excellent question,” Nerd answered, peering over with a slow nod. “A very good question. But of course, Becky has disabled them all.”
I wasn’t surprised and chalked up my sudden paranoia to my hangover. Nerd was good. He wouldn’t have come this far only to leave the lights on—so to speak.
“Can we record too?” I asked. I wasn’t entirely sure we’d have the need, but wanted to know everything we could do. “Save it, and play it back later?”
“Like a TiVo,” he exclaimed as he tapped a few more keys, bringing up another interface with a red recording light and a graph that danced a blur of curvy, sinusoidal waves.
“The audio,” I guessed.
“We can time-shift too . . . schedule recordings to watch later, and even skip the commercials.” He laughed again, but then stopped and covered his arm when I frowned.
“Amazing!” I said, patting his shoulder. I was more impressed than I’d ever been before. Dizzyingly shocked might be a better sentiment to describe how I was feeling, actually. And then I had to wonder what it was that he wasn’t showing me.
“How far, Brian? How far have you taken Becky?”
He squirmed, shifting in his seat. He began to close the windows he’d opened. Steve’s was the last to be closed. Nerd playfully waved good-bye to my husband. Steve’s eyes stared blankly at us, his pupils racing from one side of the window to the other, reading. Nerd clicked the mouse, bringing us back to the map of the police station.
“Far enough to cover what we need,” he answered, but I could tell he was holding back.
“And . . ?” I urged. “Beyond what you’re showing me. What else is out there?”
Nerd zoomed out of the screen. More boxes flew in from the top and bottom and sides. I saw red and green and yellow. Some with IP addresses, others just MAC addresses. He’d mapped our town and the city. And then I saw lines beyond the city—narrow paths like highways on a map, stretching and curving with the earth until reaching other cities. Beyond that, the pixels turned fuzzy and faded, as if they had fallen off the edge of the world.
“Becky’s world,” I mumbled, realizing now what Brian meant by an improved infestation. Becky was growing, expanding, reaching, and indexing every device she touched.
“She’s still going,” he added with some concern buried in his expression. “I couldn’t stop her if I tried.”
I caught on to his concern, feeling troubled by it. “Sure you could,” I countered. “I mean, if we had to, you could push an update and turn it off, right?” I hated that I didn’t know all the jargon.
Nerd leaned away, looking insulted.
“Why would we do that!?” he objected. “I mean, I don’t understand it all yet, but we’ve hit the lottery with this one. Do you know how unlikely it is for any one piece of software to go viral? Hacks try every day, but the ecosystem is forever changing. It’s all in the timing and opportunity, and we’ve hit it at just the exact moment to make this work. Absolutely, impossibly rare.”
“I don’t know,” I answered, watching as Becky extended her reach. New boxes appeared, slipping in from the edge of my screen and then squeezing into the fold of pixels before the software moved on to the next plane of computers. “But something tells me this is dangerous. And aren’t we going to run out of . . . I don’t know, space or memory?”
Nerd sighed, a glint of nervous sweat beneath his eyes. He was afraid I was going to pull the plug on his project.
“It doesn’t work like that. Becky isn’t stored here,” he said, pointing to our computers. “Let her run. To be honest, her pace is gaining speed so quickly I’m not even sure if I could push an update that would work fast enough to shut her off. Any push would only chase the software and cause a ripple that could bounce back and start the infections all over again.”
“Pebble in a pond,” I mumbled.
“Pebble?” Nerd began. “Try a stone! A rock! A big rock—”
“Enough!” I said, my patience wearing thin. “I get it.”
“But this isn’t a pond,” Nerd added. “The energy doesn’t dissipate. It just keeps going and going.”
“So the best thing to do is to do nothing?”
“Well, not exactly nothing,” he offered. “Let Becky run.”
“Let her run then,” I added, tiring of the debate. “Change of subject. The case. Tell me what you’ve found out.”
THIRTY-ONE
“JUST A LITTLE SPYING,” I muttered. “No harm in that.” I clicked to open Nerd’s latest application and braced for the whoosh of flying pixels. A colorful blossom filled the screen for a moment before the layout to Steve’s office appeared again. “He mentioned caching,” I reminded myself. “And getting faster each time.”
Will he be sitting at his desk?
I glanced up at the clock. It was close to lunchtime, but he’d made two sandwiches the night before, packing one of them for lunch. I clicked. Steve’s face showed up on my screen, just as it had before. The gravely pale blue glow had been replaced by red and green, and washed-out reflections bounced in his eyes.
“He’s watching a video,” I said, and then sat back. His pupils followed what was on his screen while his mouth moved, spilling silent words. He jotted down some notes. His cheeks were hollow—emptier and gaunt. He was losing weight. A spur of guilt told me I should have noticed the weight loss, should have said something or asked about how his physical therapy was going.
When was the last time he said anything about it?
I tried to remember, but nothing came to my mind. The guilt deepened.
“This can’t be right,” Steve muttered.
“What’s that?” I heard a woman ask. She stood outside of the camera’s view, and I found myself leaning to one side, as if that would help me see her.
“Not like she’s around the corner,” I said, feeling stupid.
“Air travel. I have airline records showing the husband was out of town on these dates,” Steve explained, pointing to his screen and then to the paperwork on his desk.
A part of me was glad to hear him refer to my father as just “the husband.” The formality made the investigation a little easier to swallow.
“We’re going out for lunch,” the woman told him. She stepped into the camera’s view and sat on the end of his desk. I pinched my lips, curious, and zoomed in on the small window. She was younger than me, attractive, with long, summer-red hair that she’d rolled up and pinned behind her head. Jealousy tugged at me. I tried to dismiss it, but some things were impossible to let go. I recognized the woman from the photos Nerd had texted to me. She was the one who had been with Charlie when they searched my mother’s station wagon.
A detective’s badge on her hip thunked against Steve’s desk, and she shifted it up and out of the way. That’s when I saw the open blouse. She wore a striped top that matched her gray slacks, but the buttons were open. Not all of them—just the ones that were useful.
“John’s replacement,” I said, catching Nerd’s eye as he looked at me over one of his monitors. I waved him off, pointing to my screen. He sunk back down until only the top of his head showed. “You’re John’s replacement.”
Charlie had hired Garrett to take
over Steve’s case load, but Steve had never mentioned who John’s replacement was. My attention stayed fixed on the buttons—I couldn’t help it.
“So . . . lunch?” she asked, turning to face Steve.
“I really can’t,” he answered, picking sheets of paper from the case file.
The detective leaned forward, inviting Steve again as she took the papers from his hand. “Those won’t change anything. Not in the next hour, anyway.”
“So close . . . all these years.”
“It can’t be easy for you,” she said, sounding apologetic. “I mean to have unearthed a serial killer right in your own family.”
“I should have figured it out.”
“Come on out. We all need a break—you need a break.”
“Thanks,” he told her, smiling nervously as his eyes pitched down briefly. Jealousy tugged a little harder this time. While I was intrigued to watch how the scene played out, I hated feeling suspicious. “But maybe next time.”
“I’m going to hold you to it,” she warned, then leaned forward again. My chest hurt—my heart and head pounded as I spied on my husband. “And Steve . . . please do take a break. You need it.” Her words were kind and attentive and caring. She put her hand on his shoulder and squeezed, comforting him.
When she slipped out of the computer’s view, I picked up my cell phone and texted Steve. Nothing stupid or accusatory. Just a simple message: Hey Hon, I missed ya this morning. Luv u.
I paused for a moment, giving the Luv u a second look, my thumb perched above the Send button. I still hoped—wanted, really—an apology for the way he had treated me after my mother’s funeral. I still hadn’t heard one. I decided on the Backspace button, erasing the Luv u part, and hit Send before I could change my mind.
From across the miles of cell phone towers peppering the open valleys and climbing the hills, my text message landed on Steve’s phone. From his desk corner his cell phone leaped into action, buzzing a jittery dance. He lifted his chin toward the sound, the phone crawling toward him. He picked it up, tapped impatiently to dismiss the buzzer, and then stared at the small text message. I folded my lips around my teeth, anticipating his response. A short reply was all I needed, something loving maybe, something to tell me we weren’t as far apart as I feared. But Steve swiped his finger, shooing my text from the screen like he was batting at a fly.
“Hold up!” he called out. “Lunch sounds good. It sounds perfect.”
I was crushed. My chin trembled, and I tried to swallow. I put my phone down and sunk into my chair. I felt more alone than I’d ever felt before. But it wasn’t just that he’d ignored my text. No, that’s not what hurt. It was because of his expression as he gathered his things and stood to leave.
He was smiling.
***
By the time I left the office, slanting sunlight shined from Romeo’s front windows, stirring a welcome thought: a drink with Katie, or with her memory anyway. I’d sworn off the ritual once before, but with Steve on my mind and that smile stuck in my head, I didn’t care. It’s funny how far-from-significant things become significant when emotions get shoved in the middle. I was a puppet to my feelings, and I’m sure I would have felt completely different about Katie and Romeo’s if it weren’t for what I had seen.
But now? Fuck it.
I was losing him to the case. But I acknowledged that I had begun to lose him with the lies I’d started about the homeless man. If he ever suspected anything else—Katie and Todd, or Sam Wilts, or worse, what led to his getting shot, I knew I’d lose him forever.
Maybe this is payback for Katie’s death. Maybe it’s part of some grand balancing act by powers far greater. A karmic correction to set the balance right.
Katie’s face came to my mind, and the word “fate” rose to my lips. But karma, in my world, was a bitch with sharp teeth and a vicious appetite.
“Well, I can be a bitch too,” I mumbled. My feet scraped the sidewalk as I stepped up from the curb, deciding to have a drink after all. “I didn’t come this far only to lose.”
As the door to Romeo’s creaked shut behind me, the cozy sounds and smells swallowed me whole in one juicy gulp. My troubles stayed outside, and I melted into the restaurant, a gluttonous haze covering my body. I followed the waitress—a young thing who was new, who came after Katie went away. She gave me a lazy smile and settled me at a table by the windows. I glanced over to the table where Katie and I usually sat just as the face of the maître d’ popped into view. He leaned over the white linen, asking if I was certain that table would be okay. Beads of sweat nestled in his thinning hair, telling me he’d come from the kitchen. I nodded, but he fixed the young waitress with a glare anyway, a scold buried in his mannerly smile. I nodded again, assuring him the table was fine. I’d have to learn to sit alone eventually and today seemed as good a day as any to get started.
“Are you certain? No troubles to move.”
“Oh, I’m fine. Thank you.” My voice sounded soggy and tired. I’d begun to rethink the visit and considered going home instead. My stomach pitched and rolled, the kitchen smells getting to me. I was hungry. “I’m only staying for a drink and a small salad if that’s okay . . . and maybe some bread and fried cheese too.”
“Of course. And I’ll bring the dipping sauces you like,” he replied as he began to clear the table setting across from me.
The jangle of flatware rang out in the air. He stopped with his hand on a plate, unsure. I gave a nod and he bowed his head, slipping back to the kitchen. I gazed through the window to my alley, to where the homeless man had been. I expected to find the blackbirds swooping in from overhead. The sky stayed empty, though, a hazy green curtain starting to yellow. A few of tree leaves randomly winked, flicking like switches as thick drops of rain found them.
I should have told the maître d’ two settings and made an excuse later when the seat across from me remained empty. With only the linen and a single table setting, I felt alone. Katie’s death had become a reminder of who I was. But more so, Katie became a reminder of why I was.
Was my mother responsible for my becoming a murderer? What about my father? Was I born a murderer, or raised to become one?
I began to try and piece my thoughts together, to sew them into a sickening quilt. I knew it was a waste of energy, though. The truth was, I had no idea why or how.
I am what I am.
I thought again about karmic corrections and considered that maybe I was put here to be the balance, put here to fix things.
“Maybe I am karma incarnate,” I mumbled sarcastically. “Maybe I am the vicious bitch with the sharp teeth and the wicked appetite.”
I bellowed a laugh, a pitchy and wheezy chortle. I didn’t care if anyone heard me. The notion made me feel better, made me think of something other than my father and mother. I’d never know the answers anyway. I decided right there and then that I didn’t care to know.
The waitress returned to my table, balancing a wine glass and a carafe in her hands. Her earlier smile had been replaced with a solemn look that I’d come to recognize at Romeo’s. The maître d’ was always nice to Katie and me, but to those who worked for him, he was a hard-ass. I was sure he’d given her a difficult time. I just hoped it hadn’t been on my account. I made a mental note to leave a little extra in her tip.
“Some wine?” she asked, offering the carafe, her brow raised. I looked at her, watching her mouth move, but paid no attention to her words. And before I could say no, she set the glass down and poured. “To go with your meal.”
“Thank you,” I answered. I turned to look out the window again just in time to see Steve’s truck pass the restaurant.
A full head of red hair flashed in the passenger seat of his cab. My heart squeezed to a cold stop. His truck slowed, and I jumped up from my seat to get a better look. My thighs clipped the underside of the table with a loud bang, making the plates and the carafe rattle. A few heads turned as I pressed my hands against the windowpane. The glass felt warm
and moist, and I cupped my eyes against the daylight glare to see the reddish hair fade and disappear like a late sunset.
But in my head, I suddenly saw a terrible image that knifed at my insides. I saw Detective Summer-red kissing my husband passionately, licking his lips, her hands rubbing and grabbing him. And then I saw her going down on Steve and moaning in that same voice I had heard come over my computer’s speaker. I shuddered, disgusted, and shook my head, trying to clear it away. I hated the images I saw in my head. I hated that my feelings about us had become so confused, could trick me into thinking something so ridiculous and impossible.
And it was impossible, wasn’t it?
THIRTY-TWO
WITH THE NEW SCHOOL year just around the corner, Michael had retreated into the game room again. He disappeared in there as if to store up some late-summer gaming points, like a bear readying to hibernate. And while I was careful not to overstep or to smother him as much as I wished I could, there was one excuse I could always use to garner some of his company. Team Deathmatch, a favorite game of ours. It helped that I could hold my own too.
“Need a partner?” I asked. I couldn’t help but notice his sneakers touching the floor. It seemed as if just yesterday his bare feet still only hung over the edge of the sofa, bouncing to the tune of the video game’s music. He was becoming a man, and this was the summer that I would have to say good-bye to my little boy. His voice had lowered, and hair sprouted below his knees. In the bright reflections of the screen, I thought I saw a scraggly growth on his chin as well.
Too soon, I thought, comforting myself for my motherly sadness.
Michael’s gaze stayed fixed on the game. A miniature battle of characters bounced in his eyes and then exploded in red as the game ended in victory. He let out a small cheer and shoved a controller toward me.
“Duty?” he asked, his fingers fluttering over the buttons.
Affair with Murder The Complete Box Set Page 42