Improper Influence

by Melissa F. Miller

  When he stopped at the East End Food Co-op to pick up some rice noodles, it idled nearby in an alley.

  He emerged with his package of food and continued through East Liberty, up the long hill that bisected the Pittsburgh Zoo & Aquarium, and on into his neighborhood.

  He reached his house, hoisted his bike over one shoulder, and mounted the stairs to his front porch, thinking about a case that had been reported in a medical journal several years back—a sudden death cluster of six unrelated adults who all died from focal myocarditis. He couldn’t recall having read an update.

  He retrieved his mail from the box near the front door and secured his bicycle, eager to log onto his computer and research recent myocarditis clusters.

  He didn’t see the dark green car that crept past him and parked two houses down on the other side of the street.

  Bodhi unlocked his door and went inside, letting the door bang shut behind him.

  The driver of the Taurus killed the engine and settled in to wait.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Leo was surfing bridal websites, Java curled into a soft gray ball on his lap, when the harsh buzz of the front door intercom sounded. The cat jumped to the floor, legs going all directions.

  “Yes?” Leo answered.

  “Uh, Mr. Connelly? It’s Kyle downstairs. You have a visitor. Says his name is Bodhi King.”

  From his tone, Kyle sounded like he very much doubted that.

  “That’s fine. Please send him up.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Leo put the laptop into hibernation mode and straightened the piles of papers and journals that Sasha had stacked by the reading chairs. His stomach growled, a low, threatening grumble.

  He’d been hungry for well over an hour now. Sasha’d called twice and told him not to wait on her for dinner, but, of course, he had. It was after eight, though, and she’d said she wouldn’t stop working until she reached a spot in her document review where she could take most of the day Sunday to hang out. She even claimed to have a wedding-related surprise planned.

  Maybe Bodhi would want to grab a bite. Just in case, he looked around for his shoes.

  He was tying the laces when a quick, urgent rap sounded at the door.

  Bodhi looked pale, tense, and out of breath. He smiled apologetically.

  “Hi, Leo. I’m sorry for coming by without calling. But, actually, I don’t seem to have your number. And I didn’t want to put this in an email.”

  Leo considered this information. He didn’t know Bodhi well. They played volleyball together on a team that one of the courthouse marshals at the federal court had organized. The team was good, made up mainly of former collegiate players, but beyond volleyball, they had little in common.

  He knew Bodhi was a forensic pathologist with the county, a Buddhist, and a vegan. He could spike a mean volleyball. Leo was pretty sure he was single and straight. And he didn’t own a car. That was the sum total of his knowledge.

  “Come on in. Are you okay, man?”

  Bodhi shook his head, setting his blond-streaked brown curls flying. “Thanks. Not really. I think I need your help.”

  He paced around Sasha’s foyer. Java came running over to rub himself against the stranger’s leg.

  “Hello, cat.” Bodhi said it in a conversational tone. Java mewled.

  “I was just getting ready to go out and grab a bite. Have you had dinner?”

  Bodhi looked stricken. “I’m sorry, I should have called first. Should I come back later?”

  Leo took a quick mental inventory of the pantry.

  “No, listen, you’re here now. I’ll make some soup, and you can tell me what’s going on.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “I’m sure. Have a seat.”

  Bodhi sank gratefully into a stool at the kitchen island. Leo pawed through the cupboard and listed ingredients that would comport with Bodhi’s diet. “I have rice noodles, vegetable stock, ginger, and some veggies.”

  “Please don’t cook on my account. I probably couldn’t eat right now if I tried. My stomach’s in knots.”

  He turned and searched the man’s drawn face. “It’s just soup. You know you need to eat. Fuel your body and your mind. Besides, I’m hungry.”

  Bodhi half-shrugged. “That’d be great. Thank you.”

  Leo grabbed a cutting board and started chopping carrots.

  “Okay, you said you need help. Why? And, just out of curiosity, why me?”

  “I don’t know who else to ask. And, to be honest, I’m not even sure what you do-but, I have the sense that you still have connections with the federal agencies and can access their databases. Is that right?”

  “Something like that. Are you in some kind of personal trouble?” he asked over the rhythmic slap of knife against wood.

  He liked Bodhi. The man seemed like a low-drama, upstanding person. But he didn’t really know him. He had no intention of putting himself on the line with his contacts at Homeland Security if this guy was trying to avoid a child support obligation or track down a former lover or something.

  “No. Yes. Maybe?”

  “Ah, well, thanks for clearing that up.”

  Bodhi gave a small laugh that seemed genuinely amused.

  “I guess I should start at the beginning.”

  “Always a good place to start,” Leo agreed. “Do you want a beer?”

  Despite being half-Vietnamese, Leo wasn’t entirely clear on the tenants of Buddhism regarding alcohol. He thought he recalled Bodhi cracking a few cold ones after summer volleyball matches, though.

  “Love one.”

  Leo took two bottles from the refrigerator and twisted off the caps. He handed one to Bodhi and took a swig from the other.

  “Great. You talk; I’ll cook.”

  Bodhi took a small sip and placed the bottle on the island.

  “You know I’m a forensic pathologist.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  He poured the stock into a copper-bottomed pot and lit the flame to heat it.

  “Okay. I don’t know how much attention you pay to the local news?”

  “Exactly none. Unless it involves sports.”

  “Fair enough. Well, there’s been a recent rash of deaths from myocarditis. The victims—”

  Leo interrupted. “Three young women all in the past week, week and a half. Yeah, I did read something about this.”

  “Right. Well, three reported in the press. As of today, it’s four. Four dead twenty-somethings in nine days.” Bodhi’s voice was grim.

  Leo felt his eyebrows crawl up his forehead. “So, is this an epidemic?”

  He hoped to God not. His nightmares about the winter’s narrowly averted influenza pandemic had only recently stopped. Sasha’s were still plaguing her.

  Bodhi shook his head, his hands spread wide. “I have no idea,” he admitted miserably.

  Leo dumped the noodles, ginger root, and vegetables into the stockpot and gave Bodhi his full attention.

  “Well, isn’t it your job to investigate?”

  “It is. But I think someone doesn’t want me to. I caught the first three cases. And protocol would be for me to handle any suspected cases once the pattern emerged. But the office hasn’t even actually acknowledged that there is a pattern. And then when the fourth body came in today, the ME himself handled it.”

  “Okay.”

  He shot Leo a meaningful look. “The boss doesn’t usually get his hands dirty like that.”

  Leo had worked for enough governmental agencies to know that didn’t mean there was a conspiracy.

  “Couldn’t that just be that this has the possibility of blowing up big? Unless the Chief Medical Examiner is different from every other elected official on the planet, he’s going to want to cover himself in glory. Don’t worry. If it goes south, I’m sure you’ll get to take the fall.”

  Bodhi twisted his mouth into a small, wry smile. “I would have thought it was just politics as usual, if it weren’t for my missing files.”

&
nbsp; “Your files are missing?”

  “All of the records for the first two girls are gone. Like they never existed—they aren’t on my hard drive, they aren’t on the network. And my personal journal was stolen from my office.”

  “Well, crap, that sounds pretty shady,” Leo admitted. “But, I don’t know how I can help you. The county medical examiner isn’t subject to federal jurisdiction. The people I used to work with can’t retrieve your files for you.”

  At least not legally, Leo thought. He was fairly certain Hank Richardson could get his hands on pretty much any electronic files in the country, so long as he didn’t mind violating innumerable privacy laws.

  “I understand. Actually, I went to the Chief Medical Examiner this morning and he said he’ll look into the missing files.”

  “That’s good.”

  “I guess, but it doesn’t feel right. Sonny seemed, I don’t know, scared ... or worried. And he should have mobilized a team of field investigators days ago, and he still hasn’t. There’s been no concerted effort to draw a link between these deaths. This isn’t being handled properly, and I don’t know why.”

  Leo was about to share his view that one should never blame on malice what could be explained by incompetence but Bodhi leveled him with a long, impassive gaze and added, “Now there’s another dead girl. I’m afraid she won’t be the last.”

  They stared at each other in silence for a moment. Then Leo caved.

  “What do you need?”

  Bodhi acknowledged the offer with a slight bow of his head in thanks.

  “I don’t want to go mucking around in the county’s files. Yet. I want to make sure there’s really something here. I’ve spent the whole day trying to research clusters of SUD online, but I’m running into roadblocks.”

  “SUD?”

  “Sudden unexplained deaths. They happen. Sometimes, you can trace a cluster to a common point of infection—like a guest who stayed in a hotel room where the next three guests fell ill and died—or a common origin—a group of hikers all ingested the same poisonous mushroom, things like that. SUD cases are rare but they generate a lot of interest, both academic and in the media. There’s a wealth of literature on them. The methodology to uncovering the source of a SUD is part art, part science. So, I cast a wide net. I searched for myocarditis cases, of course, but also any other SUDs in the past year.”

  “And?”

  Bodhi shook his head. And I just keep finding dead pages. It’s like someone’s one step ahead of me, removing the information I need. Or, if they aren’t a step ahead of me, they’re right there with me—recording every key stroke, walking in my electronic footprints. I’ve tried to let those thoughts exist without obsessing over them, but I just can’t find my peace with this. I sound crazy, don’t I?”

  Leo supposed Bodhi might come across as paranoid to a civilian. But if experience had taught Leo anything, it was that sometimes the truth of a situation is far-fetched—if not downright crazy. And if working for Homeland Security had taught him anything, it was that privacy of electronic data simply didn’t exist. Properly motivated, and with sufficient resources or know-how, anyone could stalk another person’s electronic presence virtually undetected.

  He was about to share this hard-earned wisdom with Bodhi when he heard keys jangling in the hallway.

  Sasha came through the door in a hurry, her arms full of files and a heavy paper-laden briefcase hanging from one shoulder.

  “Sorry, I’m so late. I hope you went ahead and ate,” she said, her head bent over the papers, as she kicked the door closed behind her. She looked up and noticed Bodhi. “Oh, I didn’t realize you had company.”

  “Sasha, this is Bodhi King. We play volleyball together. Bodhi, Sasha McCandless, my fiancée, and hardworking, dinner-skipping attorney extraordinaire.”

  While he made the introductions, Leo pulled three deep bowls from the cabinet. “You’re just in time to join Bodhi and me for some soup,” he told Sasha.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Bodhi.”

  Sasha shook Bodhi’s hand and gave him a warm smile. Then she walked around the island and pulled Leo close for a hug.

  She wrapped her arms around his neck and stretched up onto her toes. He was enjoying the feel of her body pressed against his when she whispered, her breath hot against his throat, “Do we have a situation?”

  He pulled his head back slightly and shot her a puzzled look. “A situation?”

  She cut her eyes toward Bodhi and then reached past Connelly to roll open a drawer and remove three soup spoons. She spoke in a low, casual voice. “Maybe you’re doing some freelance work for Hank?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  She met his gaze. “There’s a car parked across the street, at the mouth to the residential lot. A dark-colored Taurus. The engine’s killed and the lights are off, but there’s a guy I’ve never seen before sitting inside staring up in the direction of the living room window. With binoculars.”

  It said something about his life with Sasha that she assumed her apartment was being watched and that he assumed she was right.

  He shook his head and resisted the urge to go to the window.

  “It’s not me. I’m not doing anything exciting for Hank, it’s just back office stuff.”

  It was a white lie. More of a fib, really. But the assignments he’d accepted for Hank so far had been sufficiently preliminary that he knew whoever was outside in the Taurus wasn’t interested in him.

  She arched a brow at that. He knew he’d need to talk with her about his work for Hank eventually. But not now, not in front of an outsider.

  He nodded toward Bodhi. “Did you bring company, Bodhi?”

  Bodhi, who had been lost in his own thoughts, snapped his head up. “Pardon?”

  Sasha looked as confused as Bodhi did.

  Leo ladled the steaming soup into the bowls. “Sasha says there’s someone watching the apartment. Were you followed?”

  Bodhi inhaled sharply at the news and then thought. Leo waited. Finally, Bodhi shook his head slowly. “I don’t think so. I don’t have a car. I biked over. I did cut through the park, and I think I’d have noticed a car then.”

  Maybe, Leo thought, unless the driver was a pro.

  “Why would someone be following you?” Sasha asked, turning her bright green eyes on Bodhi.

  Bodhi glanced at Leo, unsure.

  “Sasha’s whip-smart. And she knows her way around a crisis, unfortunately,” Leo said with a wry smile. “Might as well fill her in. But, do it over dinner. Let’s eat.”

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  By the time they’d finished dinner and cleared the plates, with Bodhi’s cheerful assistance, the evening had given way to night. Connelly insisted they give Bodhi a lift home.

  When they reached his narrow street, they found both sides parked up, the cars jammed in close to one another. Connelly left the engine running and idled in the middle of the road while Sasha hurried around to the back of the SUV and popped the hatch so Bodhi could retrieve his bicycle.

  He balanced the bike against his left thigh and extended his right hand.

  “Thanks again for the ride. It was very kind of you and Leo, but it really wasn’t necessary.”

  She shook his outstretched hand and fixed him with a serious look.

  “I know you think we’re overreacting. But if you’re right about the death cluster, you may be in danger. Whoever stole your files isn’t going to stop there if they’re trying to protect someone or keep a secret. You need to be careful. And alert.”

  He smiled gently at her.

  “It’s my practice to be mindful of my surroundings. I won’t walk in fear, though, Sasha.”

  “Fair enough. Connelly will be in touch if he learns anything about who, if anyone, is monitoring your computer use. In the meantime, call us if you need anything. And, please, be careful.”

  She knew he didn’t fully understand what he’d gotten himself into. But how could he? Most peop
le had little experience with the sort of dangerous people she and Connelly seemed to attract. It was like she was wearing Eau de Psycho perfume.

  He gave her another beatific smile. “Have a peaceful night.”

  Then he guided his bike up onto the sidewalk, waved to Connelly, and mounted the steps to his small brick duplex.

  Sasha watched until he had unlocked his front door and disappeared inside. When a light appeared in the window, she turned and scanned the street behind her, looking for a Taurus idling down the block.

  The street was quiet. Most of the houses were dark, except for a sprinkling of porch lights that dotted the rows of homes—probably homeowners tucked in bed, reading or watching the late night programs while awaiting the return of a teenaged child or a spouse who worked the evening shift.

  She hopped back into the car, satisfied no one was sitting on Bodhi’s house.

  “See anything?” she asked Connelly, rubbing her arms to ward off the chill from the night air.

  He shook his head. “No Taurus.”

  He turned his gaze from the rearview mirror to meet her eyes.

  “So, you think he’s right about the deaths?” he asked, shifting out of park and easing the SUV out into the narrow street.

  She shrugged. “His journal didn’t get up and walk away, Connelly.”

  “Could be a competitive coworker. Or a jealous old girlfriend who thought it was a diary.”

  “Could be. But we both know that’s not what’s going on here.”

  He sighed heavily.

  She knew what was bothering him. It weighed on her, too.

  “Listen, we agreed not to go looking for trouble. Bodhi came to you. He clearly trusts you. If you can help him confirm whether someone’s tracking his Internet usage, great. Maybe that’s all this will be.”

  He twisted his mouth into a bow to let her know he was unconvinced.