Painful Truths

by Brian Spangler

  “She did,” he answered, shaking his head. “Not sure why. I disabled the loghost on these two computers—nothing could show up. Probably some kids got caught on another computer.”

  I pulled out my flash drive and asked, “Loghost?”

  “It’s centralized logging,” he answered. “An aggregate—all of ‘em feed to one log file. That way the administrator can search browsing history, flag any porn usage or questionable traffic.”

  “And our activity?” I asked, emphasizing my flash drive with a nudge.

  “Exactly why I made that and disabled the loghost on these,” he answered proudly. “Plus, when working from the flash drive, the computer plays the role of a host, nothing more. All of our activities are isolated. Safe.”

  The host part I understood. But I didn’t know exactly what a log file was and had to ask, “So do we have a loghost on these?” I placed the flash drive in front of him as if returning the device. None of our activity should be recorded, in my opinion.

  “Excellent.” That was the only reply he gave me, but his face showed more. He liked that I had asked him the question. Of course there were no logs on the flash drive. He wasn’t about to chance anything. I think I knew that before asking, but wanted to hear him say it. “And as for the move, I’m already on it.”

  “You have something in mind?”

  “Not just in mind, and not just an idea,” he answered. I heard the excitement in his voice. “I was going to hold off until the project was complete, but we can move on this early.”

  “Move on what?” I asked, eager to hear what he’d been working on.

  “We’re incorporated,” he announced. “To get the money out of the web and into our pockets, we have to be a business.”

  “But don’t you need me? I mean, signatures and lawyers, and all that?”

  He dipped his head and picked up the flash drive. He waved it like some magic wand. “Everything I did is legal, just online. I digitally signed us into a partnership where you own the majority shares of the company. We split it sixty-forty, per our original agreement.”

  “A name?” I asked, knowing the question sounded vain. I had a million other questions about being incorporated, but I really wanted to know what name he’d picked. “What name did you give our company?”

  “Team Two,” he answered, spreading his arms as if announcing I’d won a prize. He waited then, trying to gauge my reaction.

  I wasn’t floored by the name. I mulled it over for a second too long before shrugging my shoulders. He’d picked a good name, a decent name. It wasn’t as if we were going to advertise and put up billboards and shove flyers into mailboxes. It was just about filing the paperwork needed to get paid.

  “I like it,” I assured him. He let out a sigh, relieved. “So, how do we get a paycheck?” I set my bag down and took back the flash drive, preparing to use it. Nerd put his hand on mine, indicating I should wait.

  “Oh, have I got a surprise for you . . .”

  “Team Two wasn’t the surprise?”

  “I’ve been busy. Very busy.”

  “Do tell,” I said, intrigued.

  “Every company needs an address, right? It isn’t quite ready, but if you’re up for a field trip . . ?”

  I listened to Becky shelve the books and pop her gum—the chewy snaps and the sliding books grated on my nerves beyond reason. I liked the library, but it wasn’t a real home for us, for Team Two. It was time to move on.

  “You bet your ass I’m up for a field trip,” I told him without hesitation. “And then you’ll tell me how we’re going to get a paycheck?”

  “I’ll tell you everything.”

  FIVE

  THE AFTERNOON’S SUNSHINE WAS a welcome change from the dark interior of Mainsford Library, and the smell of wet asphalt told me a rain shower had just passed through. I found a cluster of bruised clouds in the east and followed the arc of a fading rainbow until it dropped from the sky. A soft breeze whispered the promise of surprise for our first field trip. I couldn’t wait to see what Nerd had in store.

  Maybe it’s a pot of gold, I thought, amused with myself, as we walked toward the end of the rainbow. I took to following him, noticing for the first time how tall he really was. I’d grown accustomed to seeing him behind a computer, his head down, typing a novel’s worth of hacker prose. But Nerd had height going for him, he just didn’t know it. With a haircut and a few changes in his clothes, Becky would notice him. I was sure of it. Heck, I’d notice. After all, Nerd was handsome, he just didn’t know what to do with what he had. He needs to find his sexy, I laughed to myself. He needs Carlos.

  As I stepped around the cracks in the sidewalk, I realized that we were headed toward the alley. A familiar flutter came over me, as did thoughts of the homeless man—images of him sprang immediately into my mind. I slowed as I remembered the sound of blood splashing against the brick and shook my head as if to clear away the rusty smell. The memory was powerful—too powerful. But maybe it was supposed to be. A memory I’d never abandon, a memory to give his death merit.

  “Where are we going, exactly?” I had to ask. I hesitated at the mouth of the alley, wondering if Nerd was leading me inside, wondering if he’d put the clues together about the homeless man’s murder. Did he want me to understand that he knew of my secret? He couldn’t blackmail me, if that was what he had in mind. We’d worked six cases together, five of which had been “successful.” We were well past that point. “Seriously, dude. Is it far?”

  “Do your kids complain about road trips too?” he asked, snapping back. I heard the annoyance in his voice and immediately regretted my tone. “Just about there; it’s across the street.”

  “Are we there yet?” I whined, trying to sound funny, to add a bit of levity. He slowed, shook his head, and lifted his hand, pointing to Romeo’s Café.

  “Why yes, dear,” he answered. “Why, yes. We are.”

  “Romeo’s?”

  “Not quite . . .” he told me and moved his hand. “See the hairdresser a few doors down?”

  “Mr. C’s?” I answered, instinctively raising my hand to touch my hair. “Why Mr. C’s?”

  Nerd spun around to face me and began to walk backward as he explained. “This is the surprise,” he announced, stretching his arms out wide. “We are the new tenants! Above the hairdresser, that is. It’s the home office of our new company, Team Two.”

  I stopped walking and gazed at Mr. C’s large plate-glass window. I shielded my eyes from the sun’s sharp reflection and followed the building’s stone facade up to the second floor.

  Team Two. Our office.

  At first glance, it wasn’t very appealing. In fact, passing it on the street, I would have guessed it to be abandoned. I peered up at two narrow windows surrounded by a thick wooden frame. The glass was covered with grime and drops of paint, and one of the wavy panes featured a spidery crack, like lightning—tape was holding it together. And on the inside, cheap window shades hung cockeyed, the louvered aluminum blinds pinched and stretched like an Oriental fan. It was ugly and needed some work. But it was ours.

  I think this was an apartment, I thought, recalling my walks with Katie. I’d never noticed the other stores along the street, but all of them had apartments above them too. “Are you sure it isn’t an apartment?” I asked, trying to sound excited, but wondering why he had picked this particular place.

  “Might have been once, a long time ago. But it was made into an office—a lawyer or accountant or something. They retired two months ago.” Nerd didn’t say any more and instead held up a pair of keys in front of him. He jingled the metal, rattling them until the sound made me smile.

  “And it’s ours?” I asked, feeling impressed at how he had managed to swing this without my knowing.

  “All of it. As-is too.”

  “As-is?”

  “Haven’t been inside, but whatever the last tenant didn’t take with them is ours to keep. And as for web access, I already have that taken care of so we ca
n . . . well, you know.”

  “Work,” I answered for him.

  “Yes, work . . . at a hundred times the library’s speed and bandwidth.”

  By now, I could see into Mr. C’s and was tempted to tap on the glass and wave to Carlos. He sat back in one of the pedicure chairs, flipping through a newspaper, his face appearing and then disappearing behind the shutter of black-and-white newsprint. I held back, lowering my hand, knowing he’d want me to come inside. That man loves to talk. We’d stop in after we were done. I had a surprise of my own in mind for Nerd.

  “Ready?” Nerd asked. We entered the corner nook that held our office door, adjacent to Mr. C’s. I cringed at the sight of our door, comparing the two. It was in a sad state. Dull metal, painted in drab green with nothing but an eyehole in the center. Carlos’s door was the picture of warmth—welcoming thanks to bright colors and a fancy nameplate.

  “It’s just an office door,” I blurted. I did that sometimes—thought aloud.

  “It’s a great door! Fantastic! Don’t you think?” Nerd answered, excitedly. “Couldn’t ask for better security.” He slapped his hand flat against the metal. I nodded, understanding now, and agreed with him once I began to see the metal slab from his perspective.

  Nerd turned the key, and the sound of sliding metal and latches tumbled behind the door’s face, finishing with a clank before releasing the lock’s bind. The door creaked open, revealing a narrow set of stairs.

  “Up?” he asked as he motioned.

  “After you,” I began, but the smell of dust and stale air slowed us.

  “Leave the door open,” I told him, waving my hand.

  “I’ll open the windows too. Get the air moving again.”

  As we ascended, I expected to see the type of place where the doors hung crooked and the hinges had voices. Where the cracks in the plaster told a story like the aged lines around a person’s eyes. I thought we’d see layers of torn wallpaper, crinkled and hanging. I expected to step back to an office from decades past, to a room forgotten. But that wasn’t the case. Our new office was the gold at the end of the rainbow.

  The stairs opened up to a beautiful office space. My first guess was the past tenant had to have been a lawyer—an expensive lawyer. The windows were beautiful. What I’d mistaken for abandoned were the remnants left behind by painters who hadn’t quite finished. The crack looked to be an unfortunate accident of cleanup. The room was fully furnished. And not with cheap stuff: a plush couch and desks, complete with a conference table. All made of exotic and expensive hardwoods that I couldn’t even identify.

  “This is crazy!” Nerd screamed. “I mean, this just can’t—”

  “There is no way this is all ours!” I said, talking over him.

  “I’ll take that desk . . . that one! Right there!” He jumped up, then ran across the room until he landed on a swivel chair. His body disappeared into the luxurious black leather’s high back. He thumped his hand on the table and pointed at the empty seats across from him, bellowing, “You’re fired!”

  He roared and laughed and I joined him, unable to contain myself. “This is too much. Nobody is this lucky,” I said, adding to my earlier sentiment.

  “Go with it!” Nerd demanded. “I’ve got the lease—signed, sealed, and delivered. It states: as-is. And that includes whatever they didn’t take with them.”

  “Okay. Just don’t get your hopes up. The owner of the property could lay claim to it too.”

  “Who? The guy downstairs?” Nerd asked.

  I hadn’t realized Carlos owned the whole building. Immediate relief came over me. I trusted Carlos.

  “He didn’t want any of it. Said it was too stuffy. Can you believe that?”

  “I guess this is all ours, then,” I said quietly, running my hand over the smooth wood of my new desk.

  Nerd shook his head, agreeing. “A few e-mails, a phone call, dropped off the deposit, and got a key. He even repeated ‘as-is,’ like a warning.”

  “Just not his taste,” I said, guessing. “It’s not like he’d use this style of furniture downstairs.”

  I went around the desk adjacent to Nerd’s. It was the bigger desk—what would have likely been the main desk in the office. I sat down and let the chair swallow me in its deep cushion and leather smell. My desk was a type of cherry wood, I realized, and had beautiful curves and lines that made it far too grand for the kind of work we’d planned. Selfishly, I kicked all the sentiments about fairness from my mind. This was our office now, and I was going to make the most of it.

  And there was no better time. We needed another case, and we needed the money to flow. Nerd leaned over the arm of his chair, and I heard the sound of a zipper opening. He sat up, producing two new laptops I’d never seen before. My heart swelled a little when he handed one over to me. Slim and light, the end of it tapered to a point. I stared as if it were a jewel, then eagerly placed it in front of me. The cover eased up with the touch of my finger and the screen sprang to life—the empty black exploded into a list of red and yellow and green links from his program. I sighed, satisfied. Nerd had thought ahead, and had us already connected to the

  Deep Web and ready to go shopping.

  “Thank you,” I said. “I really wanted to work this afternoon.”

  “I’ve got some monitors on order too. No reason to hide the screen in here. We’re safe.”

  “Safe,” I repeated, liking the sound of that. I searched our new office, trying to find some fault, something to put on my to-do list, but found nothing. Even the previous tenant’s artwork seemed fitting: a collection of black-and-white photos of the city from decades earlier. The photo closest to me even showed the part of town where that old diner was—Suzette’s, I think it was called, only the name on the glass in the shot was Angela’s.

  “So much for needing Google Maps,” I said and motioned to the artwork. Nerd followed my hand and raised his chin, but seemed uninterested.

  “Look at that,” he said, pointing to the back of the office. I wasn’t sure how we’d missed it, but at the far end of the main room, a ladder climbed the wall. The bottom rungs swung out in a steep pitch so that the top could reach a square opening. What I thought was the attic had been opened and finished, creating a huge loft—big enough for another office. “How cool is that?”

  “What do you think is up there?”

  “Only one way to find out,” Nerd answered. I followed him to the ladder, clasping my hands around the wooden rungs, climbing, and thinking it unwise for both of us to be on the ladder at the same time. But the old wood, smoothed from years of use, hardly creaked; it was thick and sturdy so it easily supported us. The loft was the only space without furniture. One side had been filled with boxes. The floor held the impression of a handful of dusty outlines, revealing that until recently more boxes had been there. Curious, I lifted the top of a box and found newspaper after newspaper. Old and yellowing, the newspapers had become dry but were still readable. Some of the boxes dated to a few years ago, while others went back decades.

  “Why would they have kept these?” Nerd asked, sifting through another box. He sneezed suddenly, the sound causing an echo.

  A shiver of dust marched into the sunlight diving in through a keystone window. A second sneeze erupted, sending more dust into the air. It wasn’t long before my own nose began to tickle and run.

  “Close them,” I pleaded. I waved my hand, trying to push the source of the itch away from my face. “There’s got to be decades of newspapers here.”

  “City, too,” Nerd added. Wet, teary streaks cut into his cheeks as he wiped annoyingly at his face. “Even a few prints from the surrounding towns.”

  “Maybe we can donate them to the library or something,” I said. As soon as the words left my mouth, though, I began to wonder if there was a possibility of finding news articles about the men my mother murdered—that I murdered.

  Could I learn anything from them?

  “Or something—” Nerd began, leaning over t
he rail to look down at our new office. I followed and felt my stomach reach into my throat when I looked down from the high space. “Whatever we do, we should do it soon. Old, dried newspapers? They’ve got to be a fire hazard, sitting up here like that.”

  “This space would make for a nice office too, don’t you think?” I asked. Nerd considered it and shrugged.

  “I suppose,” he answered. I could sense disappointment. “Nicer down there, if you ask me.”

  “It is,” I agreed. I could tell he liked the company. Admittedly, I liked the company too. Especially when it came to working through new Wile E. Coyote designs. I no longer called them Killing Katie designs. Just the thought of those words hurt my heart now, sending regret through me like some sick chill since I hadn’t been able to prevent her murder. “Anyway, not sure we could get furniture up here.”

  “A hoist,” Nerd answered, pointing out that the building’s roof had been completely exposed and finished off as well. “We’d have to hoist the furniture over the railing.”

  “Too much work,” I quickly answered, assuring him that I’d work next to him. “If we do anything, I want to put a big dry-erase whiteboard down there for us. No more making designs on paper and then burning them.”

  Nerd shook his head and made his way back down to his desk. “The wall!” he exclaimed. “We’ll convert the wall to a whiteboard. I saw one at a think tank I used to work at. There’s whiteboard paint we can buy. Cool stuff.”

  “Yes, cool,” I answered. “Now let’s get some work done.”

  When we settled in front of our laptops, filling our new office with the sound of keystrokes and mouse clicks, I felt like we’d made progress. Good progress.

  SIX

  WE NEEDED A PAYCHECK. Don’t get me wrong, I loved our new office—we needed that too—but we needed a paycheck. And it wasn’t just about the money, it was about everything else. Steve had been accepted to law school and was about to start classes, and I didn’t want to give him any reason to delay. With a paycheck, I could support the family, show him that he could concentrate on school. Maybe even quit the force if he wanted.