by Ruthie Knox
Someone bumped his foot with a rolling suitcase, and he forced himself to remember where they were and knock off the flirting before he got too far down the road to Foreplayville. He didn’t particularly want to walk through the airport with visible wood.
When he stepped back, Katie blinked and inhaled sharply through her nose before saying, “Let’s go, Flyboy. I need to find a cup of coffee, or I’ll start to get grumpy.”
“C-can’t have that,” he agreed. They strolled toward the gate.
His phone beeped with a programmed alert. He pulled it out of his pocket, but it was only an email from Mike.
Last night, the same sound had chimed to notify him of a suspicious message sent to Judah on Twitter: Life’s short. Better get all your candy hearts in a row.
Death threat, or existential remark? No way to be certain, but it did fit the holiday theme, and it had that menacing, I’m-going-to-kill-you overtone.
He and Katie had spent hours last night crunching data, and he’d driven her home at four thirty a.m. so she could get packed before he swung by her house again at six to drive them to the airport.
The message had come through a dummy account. He hadn’t had any luck tracing it yet, though there were still a few things he planned to try.
Once they’d located the coffee place, Katie offered to stand in line while he scrounged up some food. He bought them egg-and-croissant sandwiches—the best he could do—and stopped at the newsstand to get a paper. On the spur of the moment, he picked up a box of chocolates wrapped in red cellophane and a cheesy card with a teddy bear on it. It was Valentine’s Day, and he figured he should at least take advantage of the one opportunity he’d ever have to spend money on Katie in the name of Hallmark-sanctioned sentimentality.
For my dream girl, he wrote above the pre-printed “Happy Valentine’s Day.” He hesitated over how to sign it, then gave up and wrote Love, Sean.
Then he stood staring at the card for half a minute before he sighed, crumpled it up, and threw it away.
When he found her again at the gate, she had his tablet out and was sorting through the data they’d come up with on possible Judah-stalkers as she sipped her coffee.
He stuck the chocolate box between her lap and the armrest and sat down next to her.
“What did you get me?” she asked without looking up.
“C-candy. Sorry, they didn’t have flowers.”
She raised her head, brow furrowed in confusion. “I meant for breakfast. I can’t have candy for—Oh.” When she saw the chocolates, her face became a study in unguarded expressions. Surprise and delight, followed by concern. Dismay. Disapproval. And then her struggle with knowing he’d seen all of it written there when she wished he hadn’t.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “There’s no ring. It’s only chocolates.”
“Yeah.” Her teeth worried at her bottom lip. “Sean?”
“You don’t wuh-want me to buy you sstuff.”
“I don’t want you to act like you’re not leaving.”
Good move, tossing the card. “It’s just c-candy, sweetheart. It c-cost less than your b-breakfast.”
She inspected the box of chocolates, picking at the overlapping cellophane on one edge with a sour expression. Then she sat up straighter, shoulders squared, and offered him a poor approximation of her usual smile. “I like cordial cherries. I think I’ll have one for an appetizer. You game?”
“Nah. Ssssweet stuff makes me sssick.”
“What a wonderful manly blanket statement.” Leaning over, she kissed his jaw. “Thanks. I’m not very good at getting presents. I’ll say in my defense, though, that this is the only Valentine’s present anyone’s ever given me, and I wasn’t expecting it.”
“Rider never b-bought you anything for Valentine’s Day?”
“He considered Valentine’s Day to be a form of consumer rape by greedy, soulless corporations.”
“Everybody thinks that. Most of us d-don’t use it as an excuse not to d-drop a few bucks on the women we’re sssleeping with.”
“Lovely,” she said, and this time the smile came closer to the real thing. “I sure can pick ’em, can’t I?” She got the lid off her chocolates and popped one into her mouth. It was the final punctuation mark on the conversation.
Sean ate his sandwich, drank his coffee, and watched the passengers go by. Ohio people didn’t look like California people. They were whiter, bigger, and softer. A bunch of doughnut holes clutching Starbucks cups and trailing suitcases on wheels. He felt vaguely ill and attributed it to the view.
“So, Mr. Owens,” Katie said after he came back from throwing away the breakfast garbage, “I’ve been trying to make heads or tails of this pile of gibberish you gave me, and I think I might be getting somewhere. Look at this.” She rotated the screen to where he could see it. “I invented some group profiles from what we’ve got, like what sorts of people are interacting with Judah and how. And I think some of them we can definitely exclude.”
Sean started reading the document she’d pulled up.
The Tween. Eleven to fourteen, the Tween has a crush on Judah and tends to check his Twitter stream, blog, and Facebook pages multiple times a day, most frequently in the hours before and after school. She usually participates using her phone, with a desktop computer as a backup. Her spelling sux, and almost everything she writes is an IM abbreviation. The Tween is no threat. Can we try to filter her out?
“Sure,” he said, tapping the screen. “By age, p-probably. I’ll have to ffiddle with it, but I ought to be able to m-make that work.”
The Musician. Twenty to thirty-five, male, the Musician reaches out to Judah as an equal, usually by direct email or through blog comments. The Musician writes from one IP, presumably a home computer, often in the evening. None of the threats so far has mentioned any aspect of Judah’s music. Can we drop the Musician from the results? Maybe by searching for musical terms or references to old shows … Help!
“They’re wordier, aren’t they? I can p-probably do something with the length of the interactions c-combined with the presence of musical terms like ‘lyrics,’ ‘key,’ that kind of thing.”
There were more profiles, at least half a dozen, but he didn’t get a chance to read them before Katie asked, “Will this help? I mean, is this a waste of time?”
“No, this is good. We have too much d-data as it is. I’ve been working on the threats, trying to follow them back to figure out as much as possible about who sent them, where they c-came from, where they were routed. If I c-can make a profile from that direction and you c-can help me narrow down the results until we’ve got a more reasonable pool, we might be able to make this work.”
He clamped his hand over her shoulder. “You’re g-good at this. How’d you get from that database I gave you to this sstuff?”
Katie shrugged, ducking her head. “I was spinning stories out of nothing,” she said. “You know, reading over all the dates and times and snippets of messages and imagining what someone who had created them would be like. After a while, I started to see some patterns, but I don’t know if they’re really there or if I just want them to be.”
“They’re there. Keep doing what you’re d-doing. Once we get to Iowa City, I’ll hook up to the servers and put some of your new filters in place. We’re going to get this guy, sweetheart. I c-can feel it.”
“I hope so,” she said with a small, worried smile. “Some of the kind of people I’m finding in here … they’re not pretty. I don’t like thinking about what could happen to Judah.”
“He’s protected, though,” Sean pointed out. “Somebody is with him at all times, keeping him ssafe.”
“Yeah.” She picked another chocolate out of the box on the seat next to her and put it in her mouth. After swallowing, she added, “I’ll still feel better after we’ve nailed this bitch to the wall.”
“Send me that d-document, okay?” Sean got out his laptop and waited for the file to appear in his Dropbox.
She w
as right to worry. He’d seen it too: behind the cheerful, energetic fans were the rabid ones. The angry ones. The haters.
Somebody should be tracking all these people for Judah all the time. Keeping an eye on the activity behind the scenes, watching for emerging threats. You could do it with software, set up a system that would monitor and alert security when someone’s behavior crossed whatever threshold of shadiness seemed appropriate. He could write the program himself, if he had enough time. Take the bare-bones, patched-together bits of code he’d been using to search for Judah’s stalker and turn them into a real program that could be modified for every individual client.
A personalized celebrity security protocol. Now there was an idea. Not just for celebrities—too small a pool—but for any kind of public figure. Newscasters. Politicians. Give them a watchdog for their social media accounts, something that would define suspicious behavior and send up different kinds of alarms whenever a wire got tripped.
Something like this, if he took it to Anderson Owens and developed it, could potentially make them enough money to get the lenders off their backs and get Mike to stop talking about selling.
Sean stood, jostling Katie’s arm as he pulled his phone out of his pocket. “Sorry,” he said. “Back in a minute.”
He walked to the window while he dialed, working out the time difference after he’d already committed to the call. It was only five in California. Too early. Mike would still be sleeping.
Sean let it ring. He had something worth waking him up for.
Chapter Thirty
“This isn’t a c-concert, it’s a hipster cocktail party,” Sean said with disdain, scanning the dense collection of bodies packed into the small dance floor of the Iowa City Yacht Club.
“Crowded cocktail party,” Katie commented.
“Yeah, and they’re knocking back a lot of vodka. Those guys have their work c-cut out for them.”
Katie followed Sean’s gaze to the stage, where Judah’s bodyguards flanked him as he fiddled with an amplifier. Ginny hunkered down beside him, taping the set list to the floor.
The basement smelled of sticky mixers and noisy excitement. Sean was right. It wouldn’t be easy for the Palmerston team to keep Judah safe once the concert got under way. Within an hour, this place would be hot, deafening, and roiling with drunk bodies.
The Yacht Club had a low paneled ceiling and black walls. The stage, decorated by nothing more than the brick behind it and a few neon beer signs, raised Judah less than a foot above the concrete floor.
One more venue that didn’t make any sense for a musician with Judah’s profile.
“I’m going to go up there and see if there’s anything I can do to help. I’m useless back here.” She’d been told to stay out of the way and observe, but she needed to be watching a door or scanning the crowd from one side of the stage. She had to do something.
Sean caught her hand. “Don’t. You’re safer here.”
“It’s not my safety I’m worried about.”
When she pulled away, he followed her, and she suppressed the urge to sigh. One overprotective man in her life was plenty. She didn’t want Sean worrying about her, too. It made it even harder to pretend she was on this case as an agent and Sean’s equal, as opposed to some kind of mascot Judah had picked up to suit his superstar whims.
Judah was getting just as bad. He’d whisked them into a meeting as soon as they’d arrived at the hotel—effectively cock-blocking Sean, who’d missed out on his chance for a quickie when their flight got delayed—and kept them busy until it was nearly time to leave for the Yacht Club. They drove from the hotel to the venue in his limo, and when it arrived, he’d told her, “I want you to hang around the back and pretend to be watching the concert. You don’t know me tonight.”
“But—”
“No buts, Kate. This is how we’re going to play it.”
Sean had backed him up, making her wonder just how useless they both thought she was. And exactly what Judah was worried about.
“Jude!” Paul’s shout reached the stage at the same time she did. Katie turned to see Paul approaching with two people behind him, a redhead and her imposing male escort.
“Don’t you ever do what you’re told?” Judah asked, hopping down off the stage to stand behind her.
“All the time. I’m bored with it. I need more fun in my life.”
“Well, get ready for some fun. Since you’re up here, I’m gonna need your help.”
Before Katie could process what that meant, Paul arrived and said to Judah, “These folks want to talk to you.” He was red-faced and visibly pissed off. Katie supposed he had any number of legitimate reasons to be, from the absurdity of the venue to the fact that Judah was onstage and out in the open ten minutes before his show was supposed to start. “I told ’em no, but security says you left instructions to wave these guys through if they showed up.”
Judah put on a wide, easy grin—his stage smile—but Katie thought he’d gone a little pale. Or was that just the harsh illumination of the orange and blue gels over the stage lights? “Thanks, Paul. You must remember Melissa and Ben?”
Paul glared at him. “You knew this was gonna happen,” he said. “I don’t want nothing to do with it.” He turned his back and walked out the rear exit of the building.
“Sorry about him,” Judah said to his visitors. “I’m not sure what that was all about.”
Katie recognized his tone from when they’d been playing sexual chicken in his penthouse suite. Judah’s bullshit voice.
And then he was pumping the woman’s hand, saying, “Look at you, Melissa! You look fantastic. I haven’t seen you in, what …?”
“Fifteen years,” she said, accepting Judah’s outstretched hand. “We’ve seen you, though. We see you all the time, don’t we, Ben? In the magazines, on TV—everywhere! I thought you’d have forgotten all about us.”
Melissa and Ben Abrams weren’t especially forgettable. She had flaming red hair that bounced in long, curled locks around her shoulders. Her brother, by contrast, defined the term “buttoned up”: charcoal slacks, black dress shirt, folded arms, hooded eyes, and a mouth that looked born to refuse. He had his sister’s coloring, the fair skin and blue eyes, but his hair was a lighter strawberry blond, cut punishingly short.
“I could never forget you guys,” Judah said. He extended his hand to Ben, who shook it after an uncomfortable pause.
Katie caught sight of Sean off to one side behind Melissa and Ben, close enough to watch over this unanticipated meeting.
Was it unanticipated? She hadn’t anticipated it, but Judah clearly had. His entire demeanor had changed when he’d spotted Ben.
Ben Abrams was the reason Judah had brought them to Iowa City. He had to be.
But how had Judah gotten Ben and Melissa here? Sean was monitoring Judah’s cell and email accounts. If Judah had invited them, Sean would have known it. But if he hadn’t invited them—
“This is my girlfriend, Katie.” Judah’s hand dropped to the small of her back. “Honey, I’ve told you about Ben and Melissa, remember?”
She whipped around. Judah gave her a fake smile. His eyes gave away nothing.
I’m gonna need your help, indeed.
“Sure,” she said, extending her hand to Ben. “Good to meet you.”
She caught Sean’s expression as she shook hands. Granite again. He wasn’t happy.
Join the club, babe.
“I’ve seen you on the gossip sites lately,” Melissa commented. “Nobody seems to know if you and Judah are together-together.”
“We’re keeping it quiet,” Judah said, letting his hand drift up to Katie’s shoulder. “Katie doesn’t like to be in the spotlight.”
“That must be hard for you,” Melissa said. “With Judah being such a big shot and all.”
Was there a hint of acid in her voice?
“We do all right,” Katie answered. “He more than makes up for it when we’re alone.”
She smiled swe
etly at Judah and brought one hand up to his face, craning her head around to kiss him on the cheek. At the same time, she kicked backward with the heel of her boot, connecting with his shin. He flinched.
Served him right for getting her into this mess.
“So what brings you guys here tonight?” Judah asked. “I’m sure the Yacht Club isn’t part of your usual routine.”
“Ben saw the message on Facebook,” Melissa confessed. “We’ve seen you twice before, but that was at the Carver-Hawkeye Arena, and this is so much more intimate. We couldn’t pass up the chance.”
“I wish I’d known you’d been to a show before. I’d have liked to catch up. Do you have time to stick around after? The four of us could go out for a drink.”
Melissa flicked a look at Ben, who frowned and shook his head slightly.
“Sorry,” she said. “Ben has work in the morning.”
“Oh?” Judah asked. “Still working at the hospital, Benjamin? I hear you’re a nurse.”
“You hear?”
Judah smirked. “I might have Googled you once or twice.”
Ben surprised her with a reluctant, crooked smile, and suddenly Katie could see the two of them together. Judah the outspoken one, provoking a taciturn Ben into laughter.
“I’m still at the hospital,” Ben confirmed.
“That’s so gay.”
Katie had to work hard to keep her jaw from dropping, but Ben just smiled wider. “It is, isn’t it?” he said. “But I like it.”
“He’s amazing at it,” Melissa said, wrapping her hand around her brother’s arm possessively. “He’s always winning awards at the hospital, and the patients are crazy about him. Last year—”
“Please don’t,” Ben said.
Melissa frowned. “Sorry. I shouldn’t gush. It makes him uncomfortable. But he’s really excellent at his job.”
Ben glanced at his watch. “We should leave you alone. Have a good show, Jude.” He extended his hand for a second time, and Judah shook it.
“You, too. Enjoy it.”
