the Innocent (2005)

by Harlan Coben

  "I see," Loren said.

  "Just to be certain nothing was overlooked."

  "That was very thorough of you."

  Mother Katherine nodded, kept her head high. "I assume that you have sources to t rack down unlisted numbers."

  "I do."

  "Would you like to see Sister Mary Rose's quarters now?"

  "Yes."

  The room was pretty much what you'd expect-- small, stark, white walls of s wirling concrete, one large cross above a single bed, one window. Very d ormitory. The room had all the warmth and individuality of a Motel Six. There w as almost nothing of a personal nature, nothing that told you anything about t he room's inhabitant, almost as if that were Sister Mary Rose's goal.

  "The crime-scene technicians will be here in about an hour," Loren said.

  "They'll need to dust for prints, check for hairs, that kind of thing."

  Mother Katherine's hand went slowly to her mouth. "Then you do think Sister Mary Rose was . . . ?"

  "Don't read into it, okay?"

  Her cell phone trilled. Loren picked it up. It was Eldon Teak.

  "Yo, sweetums, you coming by today?" he asked.

  "In an hour," she said. "Why, what's up?"

  "I found the current owner of our silicone breast manufacturer. SurgiCo is now p art of the Lockwood Corporation."

  "The huge one in Wilmington?"

  "Somewhere in Delaware, yeah."

  "Did you give them a call?"

  "Yes."

  "And?"

  "And it did not go well."

  "How's that?"

  "I told them we had a dead body, a serial number on a breast implant, and that w e needed an ID."

  "And?"

  "They won't release the information."

  "Why not?"

  "I don't know. They blathered on and on and used the term 'medical privacy' a w hole lot."

  "That's bullsh--" Mother Katherine's lips pursed. Loren caught herself. "I'll get a court order."

  "They're a big company."

  "They'll cave on this. They just want legal protection."

  "It'll take time."

  She thought about that. Eldon had a point. The Lockwood Corporation was out of s tate. She'd probably need a federal court judge to issue a subpoena.

  "Something else," Eldon said.

  "What?"

  "At first they seemed to have no problem with any of it. I called down, spoke to s omeone, she was going to look up the serial number for me. I'm not saying it's r outine, but it really shouldn't be a big issue."

  "But?"

  "But then some lawyer with a bigwig-sounding name called back and gave me a very t erse no."

  Loren thought about it. "Wilmington's only, what, two hours from here?"

  "The way you drive, maybe fifteen minutes."

  "I'm thinking of testing out that theory. You have the name of Mr. Bigwig Lawyer?"

  "I got it here somewhere. Oh, wait, yes, Randal Horne of Horne, Buckman and Pierce."

  "Call Mr. Horne. Tell him I'm driving down to serve his ass a subpoena."

  "You don't have a subpoena."

  "You don't know that."

  "Oh, right."

  She hung up and placed another call. A woman answered the phone. Loren said, "I n eed an unlisted number looked up."

  "Name and badge number, please."

  Loren gave it. Then she read the unlisted phone number Sister Mary Rose had c alled.

  "Please hold," the woman said.

  Mother Katherine pretended to be busy. She looked in the air, then across the r oom. She fiddled with her prayer beads. Through the phone Loren heard fingers c lacking a keyboard. Then: "Do you have a pen?"

  Loren grabbed a stubby golf pencil from her pocket. She took a gas receipt and f lipped it over. "Go ahead."

  "The number you requested is listed to a Marsha Hunter at Thirty-eight Darby Terrace, Livingston, New Jersey."

  Chapter 14

  "MATT?"

  He stared at the mug shots of Charles Talley. That same damn knowing smirk, the o ne he'd seen in that picture on his cell phone. Matt had the falling sensation a gain, but he held on.

  Cingle said, "You know him, don't you?"

  "I need you to do me a favor," he said.

  "I don't do favors. This is my job. You're being billed for this, you know."

  "Even better." He looked up at Cingle. "I want you to find me everything you can o n Charles Talley. I mean, everything."

  "And what would I be looking for?"

  Good question. Matt wondered how to play it.

  "Just tell me," Cingle said.

  Matt took out his cell phone. He hesitated, but really, what was the point in t rying to keep it a secret anymore? He flipped it open, hit the camera function, a nd pressed the back arrow until the photograph of Charles Talley, the one taken i n that hotel room, came up. It was the same man, no question. He stared at it f or a moment.

  "Matt?"

  His words were slow, deliberate. "Yesterday I got a call from Olivia's camera p hone." He handed it to her. "This was on it."

  Cingle reached for the camera phone. Her eyes found the screen. Matt watched t hem widen in surprise. Her eyes shifted back and forth between the mug shots a nd the image on the small display. Finally she looked up at him.

  "What the hell is this?"

  "Hit the forward button," he said.

  "The one on the right here?"

  "Yes. It'll take you to the video that came in right after the picture."

  Cingle's face was a mask of concentration. When the video finished she said, "If I hit this replay button, will it run again?"

  "Yes."

  Cingle did. She played the short video two more times. When she was done, Cingle c arefully put the camera on the desktop. "You have an explanation for this?" she a sked.

  "Nope."

  Cingle thought about it. "I've only met Olivia once."

  "I know."

  "I can't tell if that was her or not."

  "I think it is."

  "Think?"

  "It's hard to make out the face."

  Cingle gnawed on her lower lip. She reached behind, grabbed her purse, started r ummaging through it.

  "What?" he asked.

  "You're not the only one who's technically savvy," Cingle said.

  She pulled out a small handheld computer, not much bigger than Matt's phone.

  "A Palm Pilot?"

  "A high-end pocket PC," she corrected. Cingle pulled out a cord. She plugged one e nd into the phone, one end into the pocket PC. "You mind if I download the p icture and video?"

  "Why?"

  "I'll take them back to the office. We have all kinds of software to blow the i mages up frame by frame, enhance them, make a solid analysis."

  "This stays between us."

  "Understood." Two minutes later, the pictures were downloaded. Cingle handed the p hone back to Matt. "One more thing."

  "I'm listening."

  "Learning all we can about our friend Charles Talley may not get us what we n eed." She leaned forward. "We need to start drawing lines. We need to find a c onnection between Talley and . . ."

  "Olivia," he finished for her.

  "Yes."

  "You want to investigate my wife."

  She sat back, recrossed the legs. "If this was just a run-of-the-mill hot-sheet a ffair, it would probably be unnecessary. I mean, maybe they just met. Maybe t hey hooked up at a bar, I don't know. But Talley is tailing you. He's also s ending you pictures, throwing it in your face."

  "Meaning?"

  "Meaning there's something more here," Cingle said. "Let me ask you something a nd don't take offense, okay?"

  "Okay."

  She shifted in her chair. Her every move, intentional or not, came across as a d ouble entendre. "What do you really know about Olivia? Her background, I mean."

  "I know everything-- where she's from, where she went to school--"

  "How about family?"

  "
Her mother ran off when she was a baby. Her father died when she was t wenty-one."

  "Siblings?"

  "None."

  "So her father raised her alone?"

  "Basically. So?"

  Cingle kept going. "Where did she grow up?"

  "Northways, Virginia."

  Cingle wrote it down. "She went to college there, right?"

  Matt nodded. "She went to UVA."

  "What else?"

  "What do you mean, what else? What else is there? She's worked for DataBetter Associates for eight years. Her favorite color is blue. She has green eyes. She r eads more than any human being I know. Her guilty pleasure is corny Hallmark m ovies. And-- at the risk of making you vomit-- when I wake up and Olivia is next t o me, I know, know, that there is no luckier man on the planet. You writing t his down?"

  The door to his office burst open. They both turned toward it. Midlife stepped i n. "Oh, sorry, didn't mean to interrupt."

  "No, that's okay," Matt said.

  Midlife looked at his watch, making a full production out of it. "I really need t o go over the Sterman case with you."

  Matt nodded. "I was just about to call you anyway."

  They both looked at Cingle. She rose. Midlife unconsciously adjusted his tie and p atted his hair.

  "Ike Kier," he said, sticking out his hand.

  "Yeah," Cingle said, managing not to roll her eyes. "Charmed." She looked at Matt. "We'll talk."

  "Thank you."

  She looked at him a second longer than necessary and spun toward the door.

  Midlife moved out of her wake. After she left, Midlife took her seat, whistled, a nd said, "Who in heaven is that?"

  "Cingle Shaker. She works for MVD."

  "You mean she's a private dick?"

  Midlife laughed at his own joke. When Matt didn't join in, he segued it into a c ough and crossed his legs. His gray hair was neatly parted. Gray hair works on l awyers-- a full head of it anyway. It gave them a certain gravitas with jurors.

  Matt opened his desk drawer and pulled out the Sterman file. The two talked for t hree hours about the case, about the prelim, about what the DA might offer.

  They had just about talked themselves out when Matt's camera phone rang. He c hecked the caller ID. The screen spelled out: "Unavailable." Matt put the phone t o his ear.

  "Hello?"

  "Hey." It was a man whispering. "Guess what I'm doing to your wife right now?"

  Chapter 15

  FOR LOREN MUSE, there was no escaping dej vu today.

  She pulled up to the home of Marsha Hunter at 38 Darby Terrace in Livingston, New Jersey. Livingston had been Loren's hometown. Growing up, she'd decided, was n ever easy. Adolescence is a war zone, no matter where you live. Comfortable t owns like Livingston are supposed to cushion the blows. For those who belonged, m aybe it did. For Loren, this was where she lived when her father decided that h e really, truly did not belong anywhere, not even with his daughter.

  Livingston had all the trappings: great schools, great sports programs, great Kiwanis Club, great PTA, great high school productions. When Loren grew up here, t he Jewish kids dominated the honor roll. Now it was the Asians and Indians, the n ext generation of immigrants, the new hungry ones. It was that kind of place.

  You come out here, you buy the house, you pay the taxes, you get the American d ream.

  But you know what they say: Be careful what you wish for.

  She knocked on the door to Marsha Hunter's home. Loren hadn't figured the c onnection between this single mom, a rarity in Livingston, and Sister Mary Rose-- other than a six-minute phone call. She probably should have done some c hecking first, a little background work, but there was no time. So here she s tood, on the front stoop in the bright sunshine, when the door opened.

  "Marsha Hunter?"

  The woman, attractive in a plain way, nodded. "Yes, that's right."

  Loren held up her identification. "I'm Investigator Loren Muse from the Essex County prosecutor's office. I'd like a moment of your time."

  Marsha Hunter blinked, confused. "What's this about?"

  Loren tried a disarming smile. "Could I come in a moment?"

  "Oh, yes. Of course."

  She stepped back. Loren entered the home and whammo, another hit of dej vu.

  Such a sameness to the interiors. In here it could be any year between 1964 and n ow. There was no change. The television might be fancier, the carpet a little l ess plush, the colors more muted, but that feeling of falling back into her old b izarro-kid-world dimension still hung in the air.

  She checked the walls, looking for a cross or Madonna or some hint of Catholicism, something that might easily explain the phone call from the faux Sister Mary Rose. There was nothing hinting at any religion. Loren noticed a f olded sheet and blanket on the edge of the couch, as if someone had recently s lept there.

  There was a young woman in the room, maybe twenty years old, and two boys no m ore than eight or nine. "Paul, Ethan," their mother said, "this is Investigator Muse." The well-trained boys dutifully shook Loren's hands, both going so far as t o make eye contact.

  The smaller one-- Ethan, she thought-- said, "Are you a policeman?"

  "Woman," Loren replied automatically. "And the answer is, sorta. I'm an i nvestigator in the county prosecutor's office. That's like being a police o fficer."

  "You got a gun?"

  "Ethan," Marsha said.

  Loren would have responded, would have shown it to him, but she knew that some m others freaked about things like that. Loren understood it-- anything to prevent Precious from understanding violence-- but the gun-denial step was a woefully i nadequate long-term tactic.

  "And this is Kyra Sloan," Marsha Hunter said. "She helps me look after the k ids."

  The young woman named Kyra waved from across the room, picking up some kind of t oy. Loren waved back.

  "Kyra, do you mind taking the boys outside for a little while?"

  "Sure." Kyra turned to the boys. "How about a game of Wiffle ball, guys?"

  "I'm up first!"

  "No, you were up first last time! It's my turn!"

  They headed outside, still debating the batting order. Marsha turned toward Loren. "Is something wrong?"

  "No, not at all."

  "So why are you here?"

  "This is just a routine follow-up to an ongoing investigation." It was a lot of v ague malarkey, but Loren had found this particular brand fairly efficient.

  "What investigation?"

  "Mrs. Hunter--"

  "Please. Call me Marsha."

  "Fine, sorry. Marsha, are you Catholic?"

  "Excuse me?"

  "I don't mean to pry. This isn't really a religious question. I'm just trying to s ee if you're in any way associated with St. Margaret's parish in East Orange."

  "St. Margaret's?"

  "Yes. Are you a member?"

  "No. We're with St. Philomena's in Livingston. Why would you ask that?"

  "Are you associated in any way with St. Margaret's?"

  "No." Then: "What do you mean associated?"

  Loren kept going, not wanting to lose the rhythm. "Do you know anybody attending t he school?"

  "St. Margaret's? No, I don't think so."

  "Do you know any of the teachers there?"

  "I don't think so."

  "How about Sister Mary Rose?"

  "Who?"

  "Do you know any of the nuns at St. Margaret's?"

  "No. I know several at St. Phil's, but no Sister Mary Rose."

  "So the name Sister Mary Rose means nothing to you?"

  "Nothing at all. What is this about?"

  Loren kept her eyes on the woman's face, searching for a mythical "tell."

  Nothing was showing up, but that didn't mean much.

  "Do you and your children live here alone?"

  "Yes. Well, Kyra has a room above the garage, but she's from out of state."

  "But she lives here?"

  "She rents a room and helps
out. She's taking classes at William Paterson University."

  "Are you divorced?"

  "A widow."

  Something in the way Marsha Hunter said it made a piece or two tumble into p lace. Not all of them by any means. Not even enough yet. Loren almost kicked h erself. She should have done some background work.

  Marsha crossed her arms. "What is this about anyway?"

  "A Sister Mary Rose recently passed away."

  "And she worked at this school?"

  "Yes, she was a teacher. At St. Margaret's."

  "I still don't see how--"

  "When we were going through the phone logs, we found a call she'd made that we c ouldn't quite explain."

  "She called here?"

  "Yes."

  Marsha Hunter looked perplexed. "When?"

  "Three weeks ago. June second to be exact."

  Marsha shook her head. "It could have been a wrong number."

  "For six minutes?"

  That made Marsha pause. "What day again?"

  "June second. Eight P. M."

  "I can check my calendar, if you'd like."

  "I'd like that very much, thank you."

  "It's upstairs. I'll be right back. But I'm sure none of us talked to this s ister."

  "None of us?"

  "Excuse me?"

  "You said, 'us.' Who did you mean?"

  "I don't know. Anyone in the house, I guess."

  Loren didn't comment on that. "Do you mind if I ask your babysitter a few q uestions?"

  Marsha Hunter hesitated. "I guess that wouldn't be a problem." She forced up a s mile. "But the boys will throw a fit if you use the word 'baby' in front of t hem."

  "Understood."

  "I'll be right back."

  Loren headed through the kitchen toward the back door. She glanced out the w indow. Kyra was pitching underhand to Ethan. He swung wildly and missed. Kyra t ook a step in closer and bent lower and pitched again. This time, Ethan made c ontact.

  Loren turned away. She was almost at the back door when something made her pull u p.

  The refrigerator.

  Loren wasn't married, didn't have kids, didn't grow up in one of those sweet h appy homes, but if there was anything more Americana-- more family-- than the f ront of a refrigerator she did not know what it was. Her friends had r efrigerators like this. She didn't, and she realized how pitiful that was.

  Loren had two cats and no real family, unless you wanted to count her m elodramatic and self-involved mother.

  But in most American homes, if you wanted to find the personal, this-- your r efrigerator front-- was where you looked. There was kid artwork. There were e ssays from school, all adorned with stars for mediocrity that passed for e xcellence. There were preprinted birthday invitations, one to a party at s omething called the Little Gym, the other to the East Hanover bowling alley.