She blinked. “Yes, it is.” She thought about it and smiled. “Turn the next corner and go down that block. It has a bunch of deserted homes that people just left when they lost their jobs. That might be a good place to look.”
“Right.” He turned at the corner and strode down the street. Nothing in the first three houses. The fourth house was almost falling down. No garage.
The fifth house had heavy shrubbery and a garage.
And a gray Aston-Martin.
“Yes.” He phoned Kincaid. “Get over here. I’ve got it.”
Dorothy had run up beside him, her cheeks flushed with excitement. “We found it? I helped?”
“You were magnificent,” Lynch said. “You did it all, Dorothy.” His hand squeezed her shoulder. “And now you’d better get out of here because I’m going to break into my old friend’s car, and I don’t want you to be an accomplice.”
She looked a bit disappointed. “But it’s not really a crime. You’re one of the good guys?”
“In this case, I’m definitely a good guy. But it gets complicated.”
“Like James Bond.”
He grinned. “Something like Bond.”
She nodded. “Then I’ll go back to the pub.” She started down the street. “You’ll let me know if I can help again?”
“I certainly will. Many thanks, Dorothy.”
“No, thank you. It made me feel good to help.” She called back over her shoulder, “And I promise I won’t tell them you broke into the car…”
When she’d disappeared around the corner, he turned back to the Aston-Martin. It took him three minutes to break into the car, and by that time, Kincaid was beside him.
“You know we should wait for forensics before we search the car,” he said. “We might destroy evidence.”
“No crime was committed in this car. Don’t be a dick.”
“Well, when you put it like that. What are we looking for?”
“Anything that could help.” He was inside the car. “I have no idea. Maybe Rye’s tablet. He had his phone with him when he was killed, and that was never found. But he probably wouldn’t have had his tablet. It’s not portable enough when he had to travel really light.” He opened the glove box. He saw a gleam of gray lying beneath piles of receipts and envelopes. “And here it is,” he said softly as he took the iPad out and opened it. “Come on, baby. Talk to me…”
“Who are you talking to?” Kincaid asked, his gaze on Lynch’s flying fingers on the keyboard.
“The cloud. The magic cloud,” Lynch murmured. “Rye had a private cloud account connected to his devices. I’m hoping that there might be something on it that he didn’t manage to transmit to me.”
“Do you think he could—”
“Yes.” Lynch had managed to bring up those first photos he’d received from Rye. He flipped through them quickly, and then froze. His gaze was on the last photo, one that he had never received on the night Rye had died. “Holy shit.”
Kincaid moved closer, staring at the photo. “It’s that lab at the factory.”
Lynch nodded. There was no doubt that area was a lab now. In this photo, the space was no longer empty but filled with equipment and workstations with over a dozen incubators.
He stiffened, his gaze narrowed on those incubators. He enlarged the picture, zeroing in on close-ups of what those incubators contained. He gave a low whistle. “My God.”
There were human organs in those incubators—hearts, livers, kidneys …
Kincaid swallowed. “What the hell was going on there?” he asked hoarsely. “Were those sons of bitches harvesting organs?”
That had been Lynch’s first thought, too. But it didn’t feel right with what he and Kendra had pieced together about what was going on. So now his eyes were narrowed intently on the photo, and he was studying it more carefully. “I don’t think so,” he said slowly. “I think this is something else entirely…”
Los Angeles
Figuroa Street
Kendra and Jessie arrived at Ted Dyle’s downtown office building after a customarily hellish weekday morning drive up the I-5 freeway. For most of the trip, Jessie used her iPad to read aloud about several news stories and blog posts about Dyle’s history of backing ideas that had made him billions of dollars. None of the stories made any mention of the Night Watch Project, but Dyle apparently functioned as a silent investor on many of his endeavors.
At one point in the journey, Jessie cast a quick glance back.
Kendra tensed. “See something?”
“No black panel van. That doesn’t mean they aren’t switching vehicles.” She paused. “I did see a white utility truck a block from your condo. And I caught sight of one about four miles back on the freeway.”
“Utility trucks are all over the place in Southern California.”
“Which would be an excellent reason to use them. But if you’re still being followed, they’re very, very good.”
Kendra smiled. “You know, there’s a thin line between protectiveness and out-and-out paranoia.”
“Paranoia is good. If I’m wrong, we take a few precautions we don’t really need to. But if I’m right, it can mean the difference between life and death.”
Kendra couldn’t argue with that. Particularly since that life was her own.
Jessie glanced at her and nodded. “I guarantee Lynch would approve.”
“At the moment, I don’t give a damn what Lynch would or would not approve.”
“Oops. You were a little less antagonistic toward me this morning. But I gather Lynch is taking the full brunt?”
“You’re not out of the woods yet,” she said coolly.
Jessie nodded. “Well, you didn’t let me drive. I figured that was a punishment.”
Kendra looked at her in exasperation. “It’s my car, dammit.”
Jessie held up her hand. “It’s okay,” she said soothingly. “We would have just gotten to L.A. a lot sooner if you’d let me behind the wheel.”
“Or ended up in traffic court.” She paused. “Are you trying to distract me? You glanced in that rearview mirror twice.”
She grinned. “I should have known you’d notice. I didn’t think I should worry you. There just appear to be a lot of utility trucks out this morning. But that one got off at the last exit.”
“Jessie, since it involves my life and well-being, I do think I should worry, don’t you?”
“I stand corrected. In your bad books, but not as deep shit as Lynch. That cover it?”
“That covers it.”
“Well, we can get over that.” She looked back down at her iPad. “Still no reference to Night Watch on any of these blogs. We need to ask him questions about why he was that secretive. For some reason, he buried his association with them very deep…”
After parking on a Figuroa lot, Kendra and Jessie strode through the Dyle Pacific Building’s cavernous lobby. It featured three large fountains continuously exchanging short bursts of water that leaped with the intensity of salmon leaping upstream to spawn.
They took the elevator to the nineteenth floor, which was occupied entirely by Dyle’s offices. A young man in an elegant brown suit and horn-rimmed glasses lorded over the reception desk, slightly elevated from the rest of the room.
He smiled. “May I help you?”
“We’re here to see Ted Dyle,” Kendra said.
“Your name?”
“Kendra Michaels.”
He checked the screen. “I don’t see an appointment for you.”
“No appointment. Tell him we have a mutual friend. Dr. Charles Waldridge.”
“Mr. Dyle is an extremely busy man. There’s no way he can possibly see you unless you have a—”
“Kendra Michaels. Dr. Charles Waldridge. Say those two names to him, and I’ll wait right here.”
The receptionist didn’t like it, but he nodded and spoke into his headset. After a minute or so, he looked up at Kendra and Jessie. “Mr. Dyle may be able to fit you in. If you’ll ha
ve a seat…”
Kendra and Jessie sat in the minimalist waiting area on padded cubes with no backs.
Fifteen minutes passed. Then thirty. Then an hour. Finally, the receptionist leaned toward them. “I’m very sorry. Mr. Dyle will be unable to see you today.”
Jessie stood. “You’re joking.”
Kendra joined her at the reception desk looking toward the hall of offices. “Where is he? Which direction?”
“It won’t do any good.”
“I’ll find out that for myself.”
The receptionist said quickly, “He’s left the building.”
Jessie looked around. “How? The stairs? That’s nineteen floors. He must really not to have wanted to see us.”
“He has a private elevator. I recommend that you call his assistant next time. I can’t guarantee that he’ll see you, but at least you won’t waste your time.”
Jessie’s gaze narrowed on his face. “You didn’t receive a call telling you that he was unable to see us after an hour’s wait. It just came out of the blue. You were told when you contacted him to keep us here for an hour while he left his offices and made his getaway.”
“Getaway? Ridiculous. Mr. Dyle is an important businessman, not a hoodlum.” But he did not meet her eyes and tapped his headset and turned slightly away. His body language signaled the end of his involvement with them in no uncertain terms.
It was obvious that they weren’t going to get anywhere here. Kendra whirled and headed for the elevator. “Great,” she said. “Total waste of time. The only thing we learned was that he definitely doesn’t want to talk to us about Waldridge. You said you were having trouble finding his home address. It looks like you’re going to have to dig deeper. We can’t let Dyle skip out on us like—”
“Later.” Jessie was looking at her phone as she nudged Kendra onto the elevator and pressed the button. “He may not be first on our agenda right now.”
There was something in Jessie’s tone that caused her gaze to fly to her face. Jessie’s usually impassive expression was still in place, but her eyes were glittering. Excitement? “Later?” Kendra repeated. “You have somewhere else to be?”
“We both do.” She was still looking down at her phone. “We’ll talk outside.” She glanced around as they exited the elevator. “There may be prying eyes and ears here.”
Once outside, they walked toward the parking lot in a direction that took them past Pershing Square, an outdoor park outfitted with brightly colored sculptures.
“So where are we going?”
“Back to the car.”
“I noticed that. Then where?”
Jessie raised her phone and showed Kendra the screen. “Here.”
Kendra looked at her phone. There was a still shot of a man in a half-empty apartment. She looked closer. Could it be…? She stopped, her eyes widening. “Biers?” she said. “This looks like Dr. Hayden Biers.”
“That’s because it is. Keep moving. We have to get there before he flies the coop.”
Kendra hurried after her. “What coop?”
“I planted a couple motion-activated webcams in his apartment in case he showed up. I got a text alert while we were talking to that receptionist upstairs. It looks like he’s gathering some of his stuff. Let’s see if we can catch him.” She held her hands out for the keys. “And I drive.”
“You think I can’t get us there in a hurry?”
“I’m sure you can. But not fast enough. I can do it faster and in a way that won’t get us killed. Trust me.”
Kendra was remembering that ride on Jessie’s motorcycle that had both terrified her and filled her with admiration. She dropped the keys in Jessie’s palm. “A street race may be in order someday.”
“I don’t believe so.” Jessie jumped into the driver’s seat. “You have a thing about humiliation.”
“Okay, now it’s definitely on the books,” she said as she buckled the safety belt on her passenger seat.
“You’re on. But right now, the only place I’m racing is to Redondo Beach. Get ready to hold on.”
True to Jessie’s word, it was a wild and woolly ride to Redondo Beach. Jessie whipped through a rear alley just in time to block a blue pickup truck roaring through. The truck braked to a screeching stop.
Before Kendra even realized what was happening, Jessie had thrown open her door and was in the alley, staring down the driver. “Dr. Biers. I need to talk to you.”
The man behind the wheel glanced to the rear, as if he might try to back out of the alley.
“No, don’t move,” Jessie said. “I’m here to help you. Dr. Waldridge hired me to find you.”
The man froze. “You know Charles Waldridge?”
Jessie nodded. “I told you, he hired me to find you. He was worried about you.”
Biers moistened his lips. “I heard Charles Waldridge is missing.”
“And you heard right. He hired me before he went missing.”
Biers looked at her doubtfully. He then glanced around as if still planning his escape route.
Kendra climbed out of the car. “Dr. Biers … Do you know who I am?”
He studied her, then nodded. “Kendra Michaels?”
She nodded. “Were you on my medical team?”
“No. I joined Night Watch a couple of years later. But of course I studied you and your case. To meet you under these circumstances is…”
She stepped closer to him. “I’m trying to find Charles. I’m terribly worried about him. We could really use your help.”
“It’s all I can do to help myself.” Biers slumped in his seat. He was in his early forties with a full head of red hair and a matching, close-cropped beard. Kendra was surprised that he didn’t speak with a British accent. Canadian, she guessed, probably near Vancouver. “I’m not good at this running. I knew I was taking a chance by coming back here.”
“We can help you,” Jessie said.
“Help me wind up like Shaw? Or maybe Waldridge?”
Kendra felt a bolt of panic that he’d linked the dead man with Waldridge. “Of course not. We just need to talk to you.”
He glanced around again. “Whatever we do, we can’t stay here. If you found me, so can they.”
“Who’s ‘they?’” Kendra asked.
“Not here.”
“How about my office?” Jessie said. “It’s just a few miles down the Pacific Coast Highway in Santa Monica.”
Biers thought about it and shook his head. “No offense to either of you, but I’d prefer to stay in slightly more public locations right now.”
“No offense taken,” Kendra said. “Name a spot where you’d feel comfortable. We’ll talk there.”
“How about … the Redondo Beach Pier. You can’t get much more public than that.”
Jessie nodded. “Fine. You lead the way.”
* * *
“WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON, Dr. Biers?” Jessie asked with her customary bluntness.
Jessie had only waited until she, Kendra, and Biers had staked out a relatively quiet spot toward the end of the pier before she had turned to confront the doctor.
“It’s a long story.”
Jessie shrugged. “It’s why we’re here. Start with where you’ve been.”
“Hiding.”
“That I figured. But where? And why?”
“I’ve been in San Clemente. I was sure I’d been found out here, so I immediately took off. I destroyed the disposable phone I’d been using and left without even going back to my apartment. Then when Waldridge disappeared, and Shaw turned up dead, I knew I’d done the right thing.”
“But you came back anyway,” Kendra said.
“There are some things in my apartment I really wanted to get my hands on. I left with barely the clothes on my back. I broke in through a back window. I thought I could get in and out without anyone’s knowing about it. I really didn’t think anyone would have twenty-four-hour surveillance on that place.”
Jessie smiled. “Two hundred dol
lars at Best Buy will get you all the surveillance you need. I stashed some motion-activated webcams there. I received a texted photo the second you walked in there.”
Biers looked out at the ocean. “Of course. Technology is making us both safer and less safe at the same time. I’m glad I insisted on getting out of there quickly. Someone else might have done the same thing.”
“Possibly. But it hadn’t been done when I installed my webcams.”
“Please. We need to know what’s going on, Doctor,” Kendra said.
He turned back toward her. “I’m sorry, but it’s hard to know whom to trust. Shaw died trying to protect this project.”
“But you know who I am,” Kendra said. “You can trust me.”
Biers stared at her for a long moment. “Charles Waldridge does think the world of you.”
“I feel the same about him. But I can’t help him unless I get some answers.”
Biers hesitated, then nodded. “How much did Waldridge tell you?”
That Waldridge hadn’t trusted her with information would only make him less likely to do so. “I need to hear it from you.”
“Everything,” Jessie said. “We can’t help you if we’re stumbling around in the dark.”
Biers took a deep breath. “But you’ll find a way to keep me safe?”
“I give you my word,” Jessie said.
He was silent. “Okay. As you know, the Night Watch Project began with Waldridge and his cornea-regeneration treatment. It was wildly successful, obviously, but the team was soon exploring new frontiers, pushing even more exciting boundaries.”
“I don’t know, getting my eyesight was pretty exciting for me,” Kendra said.
“Of course it was. And it’s something that has always been a constant source of inspiration to Waldridge and the team. But just imagine … if we could replace any organ in the body at any time. Not just transplants, but perfect genetic replacements.”
“Spare parts?” Jessie said.
“To put it crudely, yes. When vital organs are lost to disease, infection, cancer … It’s often a death sentence. But every cell in your body contains a genetic blueprint to create exact copies of each of your organs. If your liver is dying, what if we could grow a new one exactly like the original? What if we could do the same with your heart? Your kidneys?”
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