What worried her most about her planned escape was the way The Keeper used the shock collar to subdue her. The collar could be triggered either of two ways: if she touched the chain link or if The Keeper used the button on the remote "wand" that corresponded to her collar. His routine was to deliver a few devastating blasts to her collar, weakening her before his entry into the cage to change her dressings. By the end of those blasts, she was feeble and in immense pain-she was putty in his hands. He knew exactly what he was doing. He was taking no chances.
It would require all her strength if she were to use the needle on him. She had it all worked out: needle to the eye, out the cage, out the door, lock it, into the car, gone. But his liberal use of the shock collar warned her that she would not have all her strength when the moment arrived., After hours days? — of contemplation, the only solution to this problem that she could arrive at was to condition herself against the effects of the collar. She had to beat him at his own game-to take more than he could deliver.
Getting started was not easy. Knowledge was one thing, execution another. For hours now, while Felix stared at her, she had been staring at the chain link, daring herself to willingly reach out and touch it. It required a morbid perversity-a masochism-that she found impossible to summon.
Nothing, she reminded herself, is impossible. She closed her eyes, bracing herself for the power of that shock, reached out and took hold of the fence. The collar sounded its warning-an electronic buzz-and then delivered its full voltage. The kick snapped her spine straight, lifted her chin, and filled her with a savage heat. it felt as if her neck were burning. She released the fence and tumbled heavily to the cement, at first unable to catch her breath-numb, her joints welded, her muscles locked tight in an impossible, unforgiving cramp. She only realized it had temporarily blinded her when her vision returned and she saw Felix up on all fours, his stub wagging, his eyes locked onto her.
She sat up, prepared herself, and took hold again. She held on a few milliseconds longer this time, endured the seizure, the spasms, the white-hot fire at her neck, finally surrendering and letting go. Again, she collapsed to the cement. Again, her vision failed her briefly. Again, she was met by the hungry eyes of her sentry watching from the other side of the wire wall.
Escape was all that mattered. Since this pain was a means to freedom, she would gladly repeat this routine a dozen times, a hundred. He would shock her, she would act the part, and she would be free. Perhaps, given enough times, she might drain the collar's battery and render it useless. She repeatedly reminded herself that there was no easy way out of here, that sacrifice was the only means to this end.
Her mouth was dry. She felt as if her insides were shaking involuntarily. She denied her fears. She combated the pain with desire.
She reached out and took hold of the fence again, it sang through her like music. it made her dizzy and light-headed. It challenged her to let go. But she fought it, refusing. "Noooo!" she screamed into the gag that rubbed her mouth raw. "Nooo!" as she gripped her fingers more tightly.
Felix looked on with the white-rimmed eyes of disbelief. Awe.
He was her audience. Respectful. He sat back on his haunches and cocked his head in question.
And then she realized she could see! Her vision had overcome the shock from the collar. No more blind moments. A small victory, but for Sharon a milestone.
Encouraged, she grabbed the fence again and again, her collar sounding its warning buzz each time before the voltage surged through her.
One step at a time, she told herself. One step at a time.
With Daphne looking on, Bolt struggled at the coffee machine, trying to turn it on so he could make hot water for some tea.
Lamoia entered the office, bumped Boldt out of the way, flipped the on-off switch twice rapidly, tapped the machine on the side and proclaimed, "No problemo." Sure enough, the light came on, and a moment later the water started dripping.
Lamoia bought himself a Coke. The three of them took seats around Boldt's table.
Boldt asked Lamoia, "We get Anything from Watson? Anything in that database?"
"He's on his way. What I have is Maybeck."
"I'm more interested in the database." I know that," Lamoia said. "We all are," Daphne added. /'Go ahead," Boldt instructed, attempting to contain his impatience. "Donald Monroe Maybeck has no priors, no outstanding warrants, and only a couple of delinquent parking citations. As far as we're concerned, he's clean."
"Shit," Boldt hissed. He opened a file folder just to occupy his hands, to keep busy. He had been hoping-praying-that Maybeck's record might tell them something about the man. DMV records-all J Lamoia had to go onoffered you precious little information. Vii;diill Lamoia continued, "He owns a blue 1981 Ford panel van. Other than that, officially we don't have squat on this guy. I did, however, put in a call to a buddy of mine who is able to pull credit records no questions please," he said to Daphne. "I supplied him with the gasoline credit card number. He's going to poke around for us. No promises." He sipped from the soda can. "You hear about the laptop?" Boldt shook his head. Lamoia was one of those cops who knew anything of importance before anyone else. He prided himself on it.
Lamoia said, "J.C., who's working the first shift of surveillance along with Butch, just called in that Maybeck already deep-sixed the laptop. He got a photo of him tossing it into Lake Union. I suppose we could pick him up for littering."
"Well," Boldt said, trying to see the positive, no matter how small the victory, "if we ever get as far as trial, his tossing a perfectly good computer in the drink may help reinforce the possible criminal nature of the data he had in there. We can assume he erased the data, so chances are that he also knew that the laptop was hot-maybe he even stole it himself. He's protecting himself. It's not much, but it's something." "There's a down side to that," Lamoia reminded. "If he's trashing evidence, there has to be a reason." Daphne said, "He's already onto us?" Boldt felt an added pang of urgency. Bile stung the back of his throat. His stomach had turned on him. Welcome back, he could hear it saying. If Maybeck and the harvester knew about the investigation, then the laptop wouldn't be the only evidence being destroyed. They would have to move quickly now. Every day, every hour gave the harvester more opportunity to distance himself from his work.
He scanned his current checklist. Addressing Daphne, who was still glowing with their success at the pawn shop an hour earlier, he asked, "Do we have the count on the number of vets in King County?" He had asked her for this the night before on the way to the gravesite. It felt like a week ago. "Not officially, but we have a bare minimum." She hesitated.
Boldt knew that disappointed look of hers, knew that he didn't want to hear her answer.
She told him, "Three hundred and seventy." The, number hit Boldt like a truck. "That's a joke, right?"
"That's only the veterinarians who advertise in the US WEST Yellow Pages. There's probably a third again as many who don't elect to advertise."
Seriously?" A number that size seemed impossible. It was impossible in terms of the investigation. Boldt instructed, "We've got to narrow that down. Fast. That's way too big a list to even begin Y I thinking about." There were background checks to make, bank records to scrutinize, interviews to be conducted. A number like that would take a team of twenty investigators over six months to whittle down.
She added, "Some of those are clinics. A clinic can have one or as many as ten or more vets. We're going to need an army if we're going to go after these guys one by one," she suggested, having come to the same conclusion as Boldt.
Boldt fought to maintain some optimism. Given his fatigue, it wasn't easy. "I'll hit Shoswitz up for the army-for task force status. You try to narrow that list down to surgeons. Or maybe tighter-internal surgeons? Transplant surgeons? I don't know.
See what's possible. We've got to cut that list in half at the very least. Half of that, if we're lucky."
I'll do this during all my free time, right?" she asked sarcastically
. He wasn't the only one showing fatigue. "Listen, I know it's hard-"
"It's impossible," Lamoia interrupted, supporting Daphne. "I'm not laying this on you, Sarge, but we gotta have a bigger team. I've been pulling office hours and surveillance duty. Not only is the lieutenant gonna shit when he sees my overtime, but I'm a walking zombie. A guy makes mistakes when he gets this tired. Even me. We could be overlooking something here-something major-and we wouldn't even fuckin' know it."
"Any suggestions?" Boldt asked. He'd been up all night with Dixie at the bone dig.
He could hardly keep a thought straight in his head.
Lamoia said, "Like you said, a task force would sure help. We could pull guys from County Police; the FBI boys would be able to help out maybe. We've got to have more manpower."
"And womanpower," Daphne corrected. "I said I'll try," Boldt snapped irritably. "Sorry," he apologized.
Lamoia drained half the Coke. Daphne wrote herself a note.
She said, "I'll do what I can to narrow down the vet list. Maybe Maria can help me out."
Lamoia offered tentatively, "I'm overseeing the Maybeck surveillance, but J.C.'s got it pretty well handled. I'll still be putting in a lot of office time. I'm available."
It was times like this, when,everyone reached deep and suddenly rallied around each other in the crunch, that Boldt remembered what it was like to be a team, what he had missed about this job. just yesterday he had wondered why he had come back; now he wondered why he had ever left. God, was he tired.
He consulted his list again and said to Lamoia, "There's more."
"Always is."
"Now that we've located these bones, I want a follow-up.
Granted, anybody and their brother with a four-wheel-drive has access to that area of the Tolt River, but I want to search county records for any landowners out there. Forestry anything we can think of. We cross-check anything we get both with the AMA's list of surgeons and with the list of vets that you put' together," he said to Daphne. "Sometimes people bury bodies a million miles from home-just as often, in their own backyard. Let's check that out." "I'm on it," Lamoia said, writing it down, trying his best to mask his discouragement. "I know that it's a long shot and a hell of a lot of work," Boldt admitted. He also knew that Lamoia didn't like this kind of paper research; he preferred street work. "But these bones are part of this thing. Dixie proved that with the tool markings. We can't let this slide." He encouraged, "If we go to task force status, we may be able to wrestle loose a chopper to do an aerial search of the Tolt region. Maybe that would speed it up."
Daphne suggested, "U.S. Geological might have satellite maps of the area. We could look for structures, identify locations, and check county records. Kind of work it backwards. Our friends at the Army Corps might be able to help us with the maps." "I'll call them," Boldt said, making a note. "What else?"
Watson entered and took a seat in a chair over by Daphne. His glasses were filthy. He needed new blades in his electric razor his face looked like an old weed patch. He adjusted his glasses and said, "I won't bore you with the details."
"Good," Lamoia said, intimidating the man.
Watson looked a nervous wreck. His domain was wires and cathoderay tubes. He didn't take to a meeting like this.
Daphne advised him, "Don't worry about John. He has a testosterone problem."
"To every problem, a solution," Lamoia chimed in, trying to stare her down. "Not in your wildest fantasies." She stared back. "Watson?" Boldt asked. When people came under too much stress, it found strange ways of manifesting itself. "That's not my name, you know," he complained. "With a name like Clarence, you should be grateful, " Lamoia advised him. "The database?" Boldt reminded. "The laptop. Did you print up the database for us?"
He handed Boldt a sheet of paper. The database looked like a spreadsheet, a grid of rows and columns. There were seven columns and had they been titled across the top, which they were not, Boldt guessed they might have been labeled, DATE, NAME, FILE NUMBER, ADDRESS, PHONE NUMBER, BLOODTYPE, (?). The rows were created by the — names of the donors, listed alphabetically.
"The minute we had this list, we faxed it down to Bloodlines for comparison. According to them, what distinguishes ours from theirs-in terms of layout-is the addition of a new column-the last column over-which contains as yet unexplained four-digit numbers. This column is unique to this laptop database; that is, there is no such column in the Bloodlines database. The other distinguishing feature is that the date column-far left has also been modified so that only a small percentage of the records now contain a date. They should all be dated. "It is sorted alphabetically by the donor's name," he continued. "What's interesting is that if a name has a date, it also has an entry in this new column. There are twenty-eight such dated fields."
"Twenty-eight?" Boldt asked, flipping forward. "It's the donor list," Daphne speculated. A silence hung over the room. Daphne broke it. "Is Sharon on there?"
"Twenty-eight donors," Boldt repeated, looking ahead on the list. How many dead? How many victims of electroshock? He spotted the name. "She's on here," he confirmed.
Daphne went a sickly pale and excused herself from the room.
Boldt fought his stomach. Lamoia killed the Coke. Watson toyed with his glasses nervously. Boldt waited for Daphne's return. She didn't look much better.
He ran down the column of names, calling out: "Blumenthal, Chapman, Shaffer, Sherman, Walker: They're all here." He felt it as both a nauseating moment of reality and a major moment of triumph the extra care they had taken with Maybeck had proved worth it.
He noticed for the first time that the date alongside Sharon Shaffer's name was not a date in the past, but was for two days from now: Friday, February 10. "Lou?" Did it show that easily? Or was it her? She always seemed to know his thoughts.
in less than forty-eight hours, Sharon Shaffer would be cut open, According to Dr. Light Horse, it was likely to be a major organ.
There would be no time to organize a task force, no time to sort through a list of three-hundred-seventy veterinarians. They would have to force every lead they had. Every suspect. Sharon Shaffer's life had a burning fuse attached to it now. Look for the good, he reminded himself-they were too tired to take a setback like this. "Accentuate the Positive"-it was one of those songs occasionally requested in a piano bar. He missed The Big joke; he wondered how Bear was doing with the IRS. "She's alive," he said. "Sharon Shaffer's alive."
"Lou?" she asked again, sensing something wrong. He slid the printout over to her, pointing to the date. He watched as her eyes glassed up.
A confused Lamoia asked, "But that's good, right?" Daphne slid the sheet to him, and he too fell silent. "What did I miss?" Watson asked.
Boldt inquired, "What do these four-digit numbers mean?"
"I can tell you what we ruled out," Watson explained. "We know it's not phone numbers. Not social security numbers. Not zip codes."
"But what is it?" Boldt asked angrily. "What are they?" Watson leaned away from him sheepishly.
The coffee room's phone rang. Boldt answered it. He listened.
He said to the receiver, "Can't you just tell me?" He paused.
"I'm on my way." He hung up. "What's up?" Daphne asked.
"Dixie's got something."
Boldt turned the car into the back of the Harbor View Medical Center and started hunting for a parking place. Five minutes later, two blocks away, he found one across from the Lucky Day Grocery.
He climbed out of the car. A student cycled past him on a mountain bike. The tires splashed street water onto Boldt's shoes and onto a section of newspaper that was stuck to the pavement. A display ad for an American Airlines special to Hawaii looked up at him. This meant something. He studied it more closely. It was the airplane in particular. And then it occurred to him. He unlocked the car, so nervous with the keys that he dropped them. When he finally got inside, he shoved the key into the ignition, turned it to battery power, and punched in the cellular's security code
.
He dialed the downtown office and asked to speak to Daphne. She had to be paged. Boldt was losing patience when he finally heard her voice. He said immediately: "They're flight numbers. The extra numbers in the database are flight numbers."
There was a long pause as she processed this. A woman bought a newspaper outside the Lucky Day Grocery. He added, "They had to connect these organs to specific flights in order to get them to their destination in the allowable time. It all had to be arranged in advance-the timing just right."
"A courier!" she said. "Track down those flight numbers. See if we're right. Move it to the top of your list."
"Don't spend all day over there," she cautioned. "You know Dixie," he said. "When he makes a discovery, he tends to drag it out a little."
"A little?" she did know Dixie. "I'll try to hurry it along."
The medical examiner's offices are in the basement of the Harbor View Medical Center. The ceilings are low, the windows rare-and then just half windows looking out at the sidewalk. The hum of computers, the active ventilation and fluorescent lights, the percussion of typewriters, and the electronic purring of telephones were the only sounds as Dixon led Boldt into a back room, where the excavated skeleton was now laid out on a stainless steel slab. "It's a damn good set of remains," Dixon announced. "All but the teeth. We're missing the lower mandible. Several teeth in the upper jaw were chiseled out. He used a screwdriver, maybe. He didn't want us identifying her. I like that," Dixon said. "That means he had something to hide. That kind of effort always makes me all the more determined." He pointed to what remained of the rib cage. "He cut ribs six and seven," he leaned closer, "here and here, immediately above the abdominal cavity. We got a nice set of tool markings off the butt end of number six." He handed Boldt a set of black-and-white lab photos just like those he had showed him at jazz Alley, only with today's date, February 8, photographed into the upper right corner. The upper set of magnified tool markings was labeled Peter Blumenthal. The bottom set, Jane Doe. The tool markings matched.
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