Fatal Error ar-6

by J. A. Jance

  When it was clear Rutherford was going down the drain, the landlord had been lucky enough to find someone who was willing to take over the office part of their lease. Because the property manager wanted to maintain a minimum level of occupancy, he had offered Mark and Mina a huge break on the lease for warehouse space. In other words, Mark was glad they still had a place to store their stock of illegal UAVs, even though he sometimes worried about how Mina was managing to pay the rent, even with the steep discount.

  Mark used a clicker to let himself into the shipping/receiving bay, then he used a connecting door between the two to gain access to the assembly area. After turning off the alarm and switching on the lights, he set to work.

  The UAVs were stored in the cage-a locked interior chain-link structure that had been been constructed in the assembly area. Originally it had been intended to hold their inventory of needed parts. Now there was no assembly operation and no need for parts either.

  One by one he removed the UAVs from the cage and deposited them on the remaining assembly tables. Installation of the programming upgrade took approximately fifteen minutes per drone. Once each one was finished, Mark loaded it into a specially designed cardboard shipping box. After cushioning the UAV with a collection of air-filled plastic bags, he then closed the box, taped it shut, and slapped on a suitable collection of labels. If anyone asked, these were model airplanes. Large model airplanes. Specially ordered model airplanes, manufactured in China and shipped to dealers in the United States.

  As each box was loaded, closed, taped, and labeled, Mark carried them back to the cage and stacked them one on top of another. There was no particular hurry. The timetable Mina had given him said that she would return to the cabin sometime on Sunday and that they would deliver the finished UAVs to Enrique on Tuesday. By Wednesday morning, Mark and Mina would be new people. Armed with new names and matching IDs, they would head off into their new lives.

  Mark was excited by the prospect. He was ready for new faces and new places. He was still hurt and disappointed by the number of people he had thought of as friends who had simply turned their backs on Mark and Mina once they fell on hard times. Mark was ready to be someone else entirely. He wanted to go live on a tropical island somewhere with no worries except maybe what kind of fish to catch for dinner. He had tried running the show with Rutherford, and that hadn’t worked out very well for either of them. Now Mark was content to step back and let Mina do the running.

  That wasn’t to say he wasn’t grateful, because he was. It was Mina’s wheeling and dealing that had made this deal possible. Mark’s part of the bargain was to be the on-site tech guy and have the UAVs properly reprogrammed, packed up, and ready for delivery. Ten hours later, right around midnight, Mark stacked the last box in the cage. After locking the door behind him, he put his tools away, turned off the lights, and set the alarm.

  Leaving the warehouse, Mark decided he would reward a job well done by having some fun before leaving for home. Retracing his route back through the office park and back out onto Clairemont Mesa Boulevard, he pulled into the familiar parking lot of the Demon Sports Bar. When he had worked in the neighborhood, Mark had been a regular here. When he walked into the place just prior to last call, he was shocked by how much it had changed.

  In the time Mark had been away, the Demon had apparently undergone a remarkable transformation. There was a redesigned menu. Flat-screen TVs had replaced the old rear-projection models. Settling onto a barstool, Mark looked around in search of a familiar face, but a whole new crop of female bartenders and cocktail waitresses had replaced the ones he had known previously.

  “What’ll you have?” the bartender asked. She was red-haired, good-looking, and maybe five years younger than Mina, which made her much younger than Mark.

  “A draft beer and a burger,” he said with a wink, “with maybe a little salsa on the side.”

  She gave him a look that said she got the message. “Coming right up,” she said.

  So there’s been some turnover since I was here last, Mark thought as he sipped that first beer. No problem. If you’re a good enough tipper, it’s easy to win friends and influence people.

  14

  Sedona, Arizona

  When Ali let herself into the house well after four on Friday afternoon, the aroma of baking scones reminded her that this was Friday, and Sister Anselm was expected around five for what Leland liked to call his Cornish cream tea.

  “I forgot,” she said.

  “No worries,” Leland said. “Sister Anselm called a little while ago and said she was running late too.”

  Realizing that a nap was out of the question, Ali hustled out of her Sugarloaf Cafe duds and took a quick shower. Then she settled down on the love seat to let her hair air dry for a few minutes. Within seconds, Samantha appeared at Ali’s feet and then scrambled up on the love seat next to her.

  Sam had arrived in Ali’s life in what was supposedly a temporary fostering situation with no official papers of origin. Ali hadn’t particularly liked cats in the beginning, but Sam had grown on her. Their temporary situation had now stretched into years. Sam’s vet estimated her to be somewhere in her early teens, which meant she was verging on feline elderly. Her sixteen-pound body could no longer deliver the graceful leaps that had once carried her to the top of the running clothes dryer, her favorite snoozing perch during the day.

  Leland Brooks’s concession to Sam’s diminished mobility was a kitchen step stool he placed next to the dryer, an aid which she deigned to use on occasion, but only when no one was looking. Ali had done her bit to solve Sam’s mobility difficulties by placing a set of pet steps next to the bed in her bedroom. That way Sam could make it on and off her favorite spot on the bed without having to suffer the indignity of being lifted up and down.

  With Sam purring contentedly at her side, Ali checked her e-mail. There were more than a dozen lined up and waiting, but she chose to open only four.

  The first one came from her mother:

  Your father is acting like a kid. He bounces out of bed at the crack of dawn and doesn’t go to sleep until all hours. I can’t believe he’s the same man I’ve been married to for all these years.

  I think he’s sad that today is our last full day on the ship. So am I, but I’m like an old dray horse, and I’m ready to get back in harness. See you tomorrow. There’s a chance we may be able to switch our reservation to an earlier flight.

  Next up was an e-mail from someone named Robert Dahlgood with a subject line that said, “Velma Trimble.”

  Years earlier when Ali had retreated to Sedona in the aftermath of the end of her marriage and the loss of her job, she had started a blog called cutlooseblog.com. Velma Trimble had been one of her blog’s most ardent fans. During the dark time Ali had been dealing with Paul Grayson’s death, Velma had taken a cab from her home in Laguna Beach and had come all the way across Los Angeles to Ali’s hotel in Westwood in hopes of offering her assistance.

  As a result of that selfless action despite the age difference between them, Ali and Velma had become good friends in a way that was not unlike Ali’s friendship with Sister Anselm. When Velma had been diagnosed with breast cancer at age eighty-eight, her son had opposed her seeking treatment. Ali had encouraged it, and the treatment had worked. In the intervening years, Velma had managed to take a round-the-world first-class private jet tour with another new friend, Maddy Watkins.

  Now, though, Velma’s cancer had returned. Expecting bad news, Ali opened the e-mail from Velma’s nephew with a sense of dread.

  Dear Ms. Reynolds,

  Robert Dahlgood here. I’m not sure if you remember me, but my aunt, Velma Trimble, asked me to be in touch with you.

  I regret to inform you that her situation is deteriorating rapidly and she is now receiving hospice care at her home in Laguna Beach. The nurses are able to manage her pain, which is a real blessing.

  I’m helping her put her affairs in order, and she is most interested in meeting with y
ou and would like very much to do so in person. I know that a request of this kind is a major inconvenience, but as you know, once Velma sets her mind to something, she is not easily dissuaded.

  If you could see your way clear to come see her any time in the next few days-time is of the essence-I would be eternally grateful. If it’s not possible, I certainly understand and will be glad to pass along that information in hopes I can convince her to settle for some other arrangement.

  Sincerely,

  Robert Dahlgood

  Considering what Velma had done on Ali’s behalf years earlier, Ali could hardly ignore this very real plea for help. She wrote back immediately:

  Dear Robert,

  I’m so sorry to hear this. I have a prior commitment that will keep me stuck here in Sedona until tomorrow at the earliest. I may be able to fly over tomorrow evening or Sunday morning. I’ll let you know.

  Please tell Velma that I’m thinking about her and that I’ll be there as soon as I can.

  Ali

  Next Ali opened the e-mail from Brenda Riley. What she read there left her feeling both relieved and anxious. On the one hand she was delighted that Brenda was evidently working at putting her life back together. That was a good thing, but the idea that she was writing a book about Richard Lowensdale was worrisome.

  Ali was well aware that without the information contained in the High Noon background check, Brenda wouldn’t have known the man’s real name, to say nothing of the names of his former employers. If Brenda was writing a book about her experience with him as well as that of “other women” in his life, there was a chance that B.’s company might well be pulled into some kind of unsavory drama. On the other hand, doing background checks was part of High Noon’s bread-and-butter business.

  In the end, Ali simply forwarded Brenda’s request to B. with a subject line that said, “What do you think?”

  The last e-mail she opened was one from B., written to her during a lunch break at his conference in D.C. Ali scanned it quickly and then marked it unread because by then it was past time to be dressed and ready for tea.

  Sister Anselm was already seated by the gas log fireplace when Ali entered the library a few minutes later. A driver from the Phoenix archdiocese had dropped her off for tea on the condition that Leland Brooks agree to take her the rest of the way back to Jerome once the visit was over.

  They passed a pleasant hour together in front of the fire, sipping English breakfast tea, nibbling on Leland Brook’s tiny egg salad and cucumber sandwiches, and downing still-warm scones slathered with clotted cream.

  In the course of their conversation, Ali mentioned her dying friend’s request that Ali come visit her. “You’re the one with the Angel of Death moniker,” Ali said to Sister Anselm. “I know you deal with ill and dying people all the time, but how do you handle it? How do you know what to do or say? I know Velma has a son. Why is she asking for me to be there instead of him?”

  Sister Anselm’s blue eyes sparkled cheerfully behind her gold-framed glasses as she answered Ali’s question.

  “You don’t know that,” Sister Anselm said. “The son may very well be at her side when the time comes. When someone in a family is dead or dying, it’s been my experience that one of two things may happen. Occasionally, long-standing quarrels and fissures in families are suddenly and inexplicably healed. In other families, relationships that may have seemed untroubled in the past sometimes splinter completely due to some invisible fracture that has long lain hidden beneath an otherwise placid surface. When I’m summoned in this fashion, I always set off on the journey trusting that I’ve been called there for a reason and that I’ll be able to offer comfort to those in need.”

  “But going there at a time like this feels like an intrusion somehow,” Ali objected.

  “The nephew indicated that your friend wants you there, right?”

  Ali nodded. “She specifically requested that I come. I told the nephew that I’d fly over to California either tomorrow or the next day.”

  “Go as soon as you can,” Sister Anselm advised. “A lot of the time, loved ones are in denial and think they have more time than they actually have. Whenever you go, Ali, do so in the knowledge that what you’re doing places you in your perfect place to do the perfect thing, whatever that may be.”

  Ali smiled at her friend. “You really believe that, don’t you?”

  “Yes,” Sister Anselm said forcefully. “I certainly do.”

  When Leland left to take Sister Anselm home, Ali retreated to her bedroom once more.

  An instant message from B. told her he was off to a conference banquet and wouldn’t be available until much later. He also told her he had alerted Stuart Ramey about Brenda’s request for a background check and that Stuart would be working on the problem.

  Ali knew that her parents were due to be back home on Saturday afternoon and that they would be on duty at the Sugarloaf bright and early on Sunday morning. With that in mind, Ali made arrangements to fly out of Phoenix to LAX Saturday night. After her conversation with Sister Anselm, leaving sooner rather than later seemed like the right thing to do.

  Once all the travel arrangements were in hand, Ali tried calling B. His phone was still off, so she sent him an e-mail bringing him up to date on Velma Trimble’s situation as well as her travel plans. After that, Ali took to her bed in the company of the Count of Monte Cristo. Within minutes, the book was facedown on Ali’s bed covers, and she was sound asleep.

  15

  Scotts Flat Reservoir, California

  Brenda Riley awakened confused and frightened in a terrible moving darkness. Somewhere nearby her cell phone was ringing, but she couldn’t reach it, couldn’t answer. Her hands were bound behind her. Her feet were bound too. There was a strip of something fastened to her face, and she was desperately cold.

  She realized she had to be in the trunk-the large trunk-of a moving vehicle. She could hear the rush and scrape of pavement under the tires, but she had no idea where she was, where she was going, or how she came to be there.

  Her memory was fuzzy. Foggy. She vaguely remembered being at home in the morning. After that she had gone to her meeting, her usual Friday noon meeting. And then she was supposed to meet someone for lunch, but right that minute, Brenda couldn’t recall the woman’s name. She had no idea of what had happened to her or how much time had elapsed. What she did know for sure was that she needed to pee desperately.

  Brenda tried moving her legs and managed to make a few feeble thumps with her feet. It didn’t do any good. The car kept on moving and her sudden movement, compounded by the cold, made her need to urinate that much more critical. If the person driving the vehicle heard the racket from the trunk, it made no difference, at least not at first, but then the car seemed to hesitate. It turned off the pavement onto a rough gravel track of some kind.

  As the vehicle came to a stop, Brenda’s heart filled with dread. Moments later, the engine died. With a thump, the trunk release was engaged and the lid opened automatically. For a moment she was astonished by how bright the night sky was overhead. After the impenetrable darkness, the stars above were more brilliant than she had ever seen.

  She heard the crunch of footsteps on gravel. A moment later a woman’s face appeared in the starlit night. In that moment of clarity, Brenda recognized her. Mina Blaylock, the mystery woman on Richard’s list.

  Brenda struggled against her bonds, tried to say something. “Please, let me out. I need to use the bathroom.”

  For an answer, Mina reached inside. Brenda saw the hypodermic in her hand. She tried to dodge out of the way, but she couldn’t. The needle plunged deep into the muscle of her upper arm. That was one of the reasons Brenda was so cold. Her arms were bare. Where was her coat? Where was her blouse? Brenda tried to struggle, but she couldn’t escape the woman’s fierce gloved grip. At last Brenda lay still.

  “Good,” Mina said. “That’s better.”

  She reached inside the trunk again. As Brenda watched, Mi
na took Brenda’s purse out of the trunk. With the purse gone, so was Brenda’s cell phone and so was any hope of summoning help. Next Mina wrenched off Brenda’s shoes.

  “Where you’re going, you won’t be needing your purse anymore, and you won’t need shoes either.”

  Dimly, Brenda heard a sound from somewhere nearby. Mina heard it too. She looked over her shoulder, then slammed the trunk lid shut. There were more footsteps, hurried ones this time, then the engine turned over, and the car moved. As darkness enveloped her again, Brenda realized that her prison was now lit with an eerie reddish glow leaking into the trunk from the taillights outside the car. She wondered how much time had passed, enough to turn day into night.

  Brenda considered briefly about the kind of substance that had been in the hypodermic. Moments later, however, she felt her heartbeat speed up. For a time she had difficulty catching her breath. Then, gradually, the drug overwhelmed her and she drifted into unconsciousness once again, unaware and unembarrassed that when she lost control of her mind, she also lost control of her bladder.

  16

  San Diego, California

  The trip from the Scotts Flat Reservoir to San Diego took more than ten hours. Mina stopped for gas only once, in Bakersfield. She worried that Brenda might awaken when the vehicle came to a stop and start bumping and thumping around in the trunk. Fortunately that didn’t happen.

  Maybe she’s dead, Mina thought. Considering how much Versed Mina had plugged into Brenda’s system, death by overdose would have been a likely outcome. Parking at the pumps, Mina stood for a moment listening. When there was no sound from the trunk, she hurried into the gas station, where she used the restroom and paid cash for her fuel as well as for bottled water and a collection of energy bars.