With Child

by Laurie R. King

  “Do you really have to do this?”

  “It’s a loose end, and it’ll keep twitching until I tidy it up. After all, I did get all those people on the alert on Friday, then just took off.”

  “Rosa Hidalgo and some computer nut hardly count as ‘all those people.’”

  “It seemed like a lot more at the time. Anyway, it’ll only be for the afternoon, and then tomorrow or the day after I was thinking about taking off for a couple of days.”

  “I think that would be a good idea,” Lee said carefully.

  “With you? Please? If you can get free,” she added.

  The joy dawning on Lee’s face rivaled the morning sun, but all she said was, “Where?”

  “Somewhere on the coast. Just drive?”

  “South to Carmel or Big Sur?” Lee suggested.

  “Fine.”

  “I’ll need to buy a bathing suit. My only one has holes in unfortunate places.”

  “What fun.”

  “If you can guarantee me a private swimming hole, yes.”

  “Jon would love to take you shopping for a suit,” Kate said firmly.

  Kate stared at the telephone for twenty minutes before she could work up her nerve to call Rosa Hidalgo. The question of legality—no, it was not even a question—the fact that what she planned was both illegal and unethical was actually of little concern when compared to the thought of Jani’s anger if she heard that the woman she blamed for her daughter’s disappearance had then been inside her apartment. Scenarios of shame and a permanent state of discomfort around Al almost drove her off—almost.

  Very fortunately, Rosa was not home, and would not be home until late. Furthermore, her daughter, Angelica, had no hesitation about letting Kate into the apartment.

  Albert Onestone, king of the Internet—Richard Schwartz to the rest of the world—took her a while longer, but she eventually got through to him, his real rather than virtual self on the telephone. Had she been conversing through the keyboard, she was certain he would have wriggled out of her grasp, but confronted by a live voice in his ear, he was out of his element and agreed to go with her to tease the secrets from Jules’s computer.

  Richard lived in a converted garage not far from the university, and when he came to the door, she almost laughed, so like the caricature of the computer nerd was he. Stooped, pale, bespectacled, and blinking at the sunlight, he was far from the overbearing persona that came across on the screen. She introduced herself, shook his damp hand, invited him to get in the car, waited while he logged off and shut down some machines, assured him that the jacket he had on would be heavy enough, helped him find a pen, and made sure he locked the door behind him.

  “Richard,” she said when they were in the parking area next to Jules’s apartment, “for your own protection, I’m trying to keep anyone from knowing that you were here.”

  “Protection?” he said nervously. “I don’t think—”

  “Not that kind of protection—there’s nothing dangerous here. It’s just to keep you from getting involved. If anyone finds I’ve been here and broken into the computer, it’s my responsibility. I don’t want to bring you into it.”

  “Would you know how to get through the security blocks by yourself?” he asked dubiously.

  “Probably not, but nobody could prove I hadn’t stumbled through on my own. Don’t worry, I’m great at bluffing. Now, you wait here. I’m going to go up and get the door open, then come back for you. I’ll be five or ten minutes.”

  “Really?” He sat up, looking interested. “Do you use picks? I’d like to watch.”

  “Nothing so clever, just the key. Wait here.”

  Angelica was home, and she came to the door with a phone tucked under her chin.

  “Hi!” she said; then she muttered into the phone, “Hold on just a sec.” Turning back to Kate, she said, “I’ve got the key. Do you want me to come up with you?”

  “Oh, no, that’s okay,” Kate assured her. “Al told me where he kept his sweaters; it’ll only take me a minute.”

  “Funny, Mom just sent them a bunch of things.”

  “Well, you know how men are,” Kate said vaguely. Angelica laughed and went back to her phone conversation, leaving the door open. Kate trotted up the stairs and let herself in.

  It did indeed take her only a minute to locate Al’s unpacked boxes, piled to await his return from the aborted Mexican honeymoon. One in the bedroom held warm sweatshirts, so Kate pulled out three or four and some socks, bundled them under her arm, and went back downstairs with the key, carefully leaving the apartment door unlocked.

  Angelica was still on the phone. She was sitting on the sofa with her feet on the coffee table, painting her toenails with bright red stars against a white background. Kate held up the key between two fingers. “Where does it go?” she asked.

  “Oh, stick it on the hook next to the kitchen phone,” the girl answered, waving at the door. Kate found the hook and returned the key to what she hoped was the same place that Angelica’s mother had left it. When she came back through, the girl looked up from her task.

  “Just a sec,” she said again into the receiver, and to Kate: “Did you find what he wanted?”

  “I did, thanks. And look, Angelica, maybe you shouldn’t mention this to your mother. Actually, she sent the wrong stuff, not what Al had asked her for. She’d be embarrassed if she knew.”

  Angelica giggled conspiratorily, and Kate shut the Hidalgo door behind her when she left.

  Richard was reading the driver’s manual from the glove compartment.

  “Come on,” Kate said, throwing the clothes across the backseat.

  “Wait a minute. I don’t know if I—What are those?”

  “Old sweatshirts. Let’s go.”

  “Just how illegal is this?”

  “Not at all. He’s my partner,” which had nothing to do with it, but it seemed to reassure him. He allowed her to take the manual from his hand and pull him out of the car.

  “I really don’t—” he whined.

  “Shhh!”

  “I really don’t understand,” he said in a whisper. “You never explained why you need to get into Jules’s computer.”

  “I told you she disappeared. She was kidnapped.”

  “Yes, I know.”

  Feeling she had given the feeble explanation so often that it was nearly threadbare, she sighed. “If Jules disappeared voluntarily, she may have left behind an indication of why—a friend’s address, for example, or a phone number. She kept a written diary, but she took it with her. She may also have kept a diary in her computer.”

  “It’s an invasion of privacy,” he said desperately. “There are laws against it. I’m sure there are.”

  They were on the stairs now, the back ones, which did not run right past the Hidalgo door. “I thought hackers believed in freedom of information,” she commented.

  “Corporate or governmental information, sure, but not private stuff.”

  “Never mind, Richard, I won’t make you read it. Just unlock the door and I’ll rob the palace.”

  They got into the apartment without being seen. Richard booted up, then tapped and scowled at the keyboard for a while before giving a brief grunt of satisfaction as Jules’s files fell open before them.

  “Before I open these,” he said to her, “I need to know if you want to hide your tracks.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, as it is, when I go into one of these, the computer will record that it was opened on this date and time. If you don’t want that to happen, I have to change the date on the computer so it thinks it’s last month, or last year. It’s not perfect, and someone looking for it would probably see it, but it’s a way of escaping a quick glance. I can be more elaborate if you like, and nobody would ever know, but that takes more time.”

  “No, we don’t need to be paranoid about this. Go ahead and do the simpler cover.”

  The files Richard opened were as tidy as Kate would have expecte
d, clearly delineated between work and private material. She had him open each one to be sure, but many of them were simply for school—science and English assignments, book reports and homework of various kinds.

  There were three oddball files, and Kate, knowing that Jules used a compatible, if more advanced, version of the word processing program that Lee had on their computer, had him copy them onto a disc. He then closed down the files, restored the proper date to the computer’s brain, and shut it down.

  “Should we wipe off our prints?” he suggested eagerly.

  “No,” she said, to his disappointment. When they left, it was quite dark, and again nobody noticed their presence.

  Twenty-Three

  There was a lot of material on the disc, and Lee’s archaic printer was smelling overheated before Kate finished. But that was nothing compared to what the stuff did to her brain as she read far into the night, lying on the couch in the guest room.

  She fell asleep at some time before dawn, waking three hours later with a drift of papers covering her and the floor around the sofa, like a caricature of a park-bench sleeper with a blanket of newspapers. She groaned, eased her rigid neck, and cobbled the papers together in rough order before walking stiffly down the stairs to the coffeepot.

  “Sleeping beauty,” commented Jon. He was constructing a shopping list, which always seemed to involve turning out the entire contents of every cupboard. Fortunately, there was a bit of cold coffee in the pot. Kate splashed it into a mug and put it in the microwave to heat.

  “Do you think we could bear to have lentils again?” he asked her. He was tapping his teeth with the eraser end of the pencil, a gesture Kate suddenly recognized as pure Lee, adopted by her caretaker.

  “I like lentils,” she said finally.

  “Maybe I should substitute flagelot. Such a saucy name, don’t you think?”

  “They sound delicious,” she said absently, turning to remove the still-cold coffee from the whirring machine. Dio—she’d meant to call Dio before he went to school.

  She took the cup into the living room, making a face when she sipped it, and paused to get her notebook from her briefcase. She flipped through it to find the phone number she wanted, sat down, dialed, sipped, and grimaced again, then sat forward when the phone was answered.

  “Wanda Steiner? This is Kate Martinelli.”

  “Hello, my dear. How is your poor head?”

  “Much better, thanks. How is Dio doing?”

  “He’s coming along nicely. I do like him. He’s one of the nicest boys we’ve had in a long time. Not a mean bone in his body, despite everything he’s been through.”

  “Has he given you any other ideas about his past? Where he came from, what his name is?”

  “As you know, Inspector”—Kate grinned to herself: When being official, both Steiners invariably called her Inspector Martinelli; otherwise, to the wife, she was Kate, dear—“I try to give my boys as much privacy as I can, and they know I won’t violate their confidence. However, having said that, there’s really nothing to tell. I think he may have come from a medium-sized city in some western state, and I believe his mother died within the past five years.”

  “That’s more than he told us.”

  “Oh, he hasn’t said anything directly. I judged it by his habits, and the fact that he has very pretty manners when he chooses. He spent a childhood around a woman who loved him and taught him well, but he’s had a fair amount of rough treatment since then. There are scars on his back, you know.”

  “Are there,” Kate said grimly.

  “From a belt or a switch, I’d say, which drew blood, and more than once.” The words were cool and factual—she had, after all, seen worse beneath her roof—but the voice was not.

  “And he hasn’t let a name slip?”

  “Never. In fact, he’s taken the birth name of his friend, your partner’s daughter.”

  “Jules?”

  “When he first came to us out of the hospital, we told him he needed two names for the records, at school and so forth, so he asked her permission to borrow it temporarily.”

  “Good…heavens.”

  “I thought it was rather sweet.”

  “I wonder what her mother thinks.”

  “I doubt that she knows,” Wanda said complacently. “So, were you just asking after the boy, or was there something in particular I could help you with?”

  “There is, yes. I’d like to talk to him again after school, if you don’t mind. I’ll drive him home afterward.”

  “He was a little upset last time, dear,” she said in oblique accusation.

  “I know; I’m sorry. And I can’t promise he won’t be upset this time, as well.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “Dio knows something about Jules that may have some bearing on her disappearance.”

  There was a long silence while Wanda Steiner thought it over. “You’re not going to arrest him?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Or threaten him with arrest.”

  “I won’t threaten him with anything. I like the kid, too.”

  “That doesn’t mean you won’t do your job, Inspector Martinelli. Very well, you may talk with him after school, under two conditions. One, that you tell him clearly, at the beginning, he does not have to talk with you, and two, that you keep firmly in mind, Inspector, that if you cause him to run away from here or lose the progress he has made in the last month, I will be very upset.”

  It was funny, Kate thought, how this gray-haired lady with the grandmotherly act could produce a threat of sharpened steel with her voice.

  “Yes, ma’am,” she said meekly.

  However, when she called Dio’s school to leave a message, she was disconcerted to find they had no student by the name of Dio Cameron.

  “I was just told he was with you. In fact, his guardian gave me your number.”

  “Just a moment, please. I’ll let you talk to one of the vice-principals about it.”

  Before Kate could stop her, the call clicked and hummed, and a woman answered.

  “Cathryn Pierce.”

  “My name is Kate Martinelli. I’m trying to leave a message for one of your students, and I was just told that he isn’t registered there.”

  “But you think he should be?”

  “I was told so—by his current guardian, Wanda Steiner.”

  “This is one of Wanda’s boys?”

  “He’s using the name Dio Cameron, although—”

  “Dio Kimbal.”

  “Kimbal?”

  “That’s how he registered, although I was told that wasn’t his actual name. Why, is there something wrong?”

  “No, no. Sorry, I must’ve misunderstood Wanda. But there couldn’t be two kids named Dio who live with the Steiners.”

  “Not likely,” the vice-principal agreed.

  “Anyway, I’d appreciate it if you’d get a message to him, to say that Kate Martinelli would like to speak with him after school. Tell him he doesn’t have to but that she’d appreciate it.”

  There was a pause while Pierce wrote the message down; then she said, “Okay, I’ll have it delivered.”

  “Thank you very much. How’s he doing, by the way?”

  “Surprisingly well. Are you a friend?”

  “I found him, when he was sick.”

  “You’re the police officer who saved his life and was nearly killed?”

  “Both exaggerations. But I’m glad he’s doing okay.”

  “He seems to have a lot of catching up to do, but by his tests, I’d say he’s a bright boy. Not that being bright is everything.”

  “It probably helped him survive.”

  “There is that, yes. Well, thank you, Ms. Martinelli. Let me know if there’s anything else I can help you with.”

  Kate thanked her in return, and cut the connection with her finger. Kimbal? After a moment she allowed the button to come up, and dialed the Steiner number again.

  “Wanda? Kate here. T
ell me, why is Dio using the name Kimbal?”

  “I’m sorry, I assumed you knew. Kimbal is apparently the girl’s birth name. I ought to have made it clear, but I thought you knew her so well.”

  “Who told you her last name was Kimbal?”

  “I suppose Dio must have. That is to say, I know her name is Cameron now, but I assumed her mother changed it after the divorce. Is this not the case?” she asked, sounding more resigned than concerned. “Has Dio been lying to me?”

  “No. I mean, you seem to know more about Jules than I do.”

  “I never met her, or her mother, but it sounds like she was a lovely girl.”

  Kate felt her throat constrict at the flavor of eulogy in Wanda Steiner’s words, but she forced herself to say, “Yes, she was. Thanks, Wanda. I won’t bother you any more.”

  “It’s not a bother, dear. Tell me, do you want me to say anything to Dio about the name? I will if it’s important, but at this stage with my boys I generally find it best to keep the number of confrontations to a minimum.”

  Kate agreed that it was a question that could be put off for an easier time, thanked her again, and hung up.

  After a minute of staring unseeing at the carpet, she blinked and then went in search of Lee, whom she found in the consulting rooms, where she saw her clients. There was no client this morning, just Lee, tidying the crowded shelves of figurines used in the therapeutic process.

  “Can I consult?” Kate asked.

  “The couch is free.”

  “Not for me, Frau Doktor. A consultation about a mutual friend.” Lee put down her cleaning cloth and lowered herself into a chair. Kate sat in the chair across from her, picking up a glass unicorn to fiddle with. “As you know, I’m trying to reconstruct why and how Jules disappeared.”

  “There’s been nothing to connect her with the Strangler, then?”

  “Al would’ve called. No, I think something else happened to her.”

  “But I thought—Are you saying you think she’s alive?”

  “No.” Kate took a breath, then forced herself to say it. “I think Jules is dead. But I’m not convinced the Strangler did it. There are too many oddities: Jules was getting weird phone calls from a man; on the drive north, she seemed at times preoccupied, touchy; and unless she was snatched from the parking lot at the motel, which is unlikely, she opened her door to her abductor. Voluntarily. No, I’m uncomfortable with a number of things, and I think there’s a chance that someone either watched her or communicated with her over the Internet, or both, then either followed us on the freeway—which wouldn’t have been difficult to do, and I certainly wasn’t watching over my shoulder—or else arranged to meet her along the way, as soon as she was away from the fairly tight watch Jani kept over her.” She rubbed her forehead with her free hand. “I don’t know, Lee. I’m just trying to find an explanation that makes sense.”