by Chris Mooney
‘The way a normal woman should,’ Darby added.
Hoder’s smile was warm. Paternal. ‘You’re far from normal,’ he said. ‘In all my travels, I can honestly say I’ve never met a woman like you. It’s your capacity for violence that threatens men like Teddy Lancaster. You can handle yourself physically, and you’re a killer.’
‘I’m not a killer.’
‘You’ve killed before and you have the capacity to kill again. And you will, in the right circumstances, without hesitation.’ There was no judgement in his voice, just a cold, clinical tone. ‘You represent castration anxiety in the metaphorical sense – you have the power to emasculate men, make them feel powerless.’
‘Do you feel that way?’
Hoder didn’t have a chance to answer; the waitress had returned, but she wasn’t carrying any plates, just a cordless phone. She pressed a finger to her lips, signalling for them to be quiet. She placed the phone on their table and then she reached inside her apron and came back with a receipt that had been folded once and handed it to Darby.
Darby unfolded the piece of paper and read the bold, black writing:
DON’T SPEAK
LEAVE YOUR CELL ON THE TABLE & STEP OUTSIDE W/CORDLESS
ALONE.
32
Darby handed the note to Hoder as she got to her feet. Phone in hand, she left the diner and moved down the short set of steps to the sidewalk. The afternoon sky was filled with bright sun. She put on her sunglasses.
Two vehicles, a compact car and a truck, were parked on the kerb across the street, in front of a hardware store called Gilly’s. She could see shadows moving behind the glass as her gaze broke to her left, to another street dotted with maples and aspens, the mountains visible in the distance. To her right, on the route she’d used to come here, she saw a pawnshop. There had been cars parked in front of it moments earlier; now they were gone.
The cordless rang. A spike of fear shot its way up her arm as she pressed the TALK button and brought the receiver up to her ear.
‘Hello.’
‘You leave your phone on the table?’
The caged breath trapped in her throat dissolved. The caller on the other end of the line was Ray Williams.
‘That was you who gave the waitress that message?’
‘Yeah,’ Williams said. ‘She told you guys not to talk, right?’
‘She did. How’d you know I was here?’
‘Laurie Richards told me. I –’
‘You there right now, at the hotel?’ Darby was thinking about the possibility of another listening device having been placed somewhere on the front desk.
‘No, I’m calling you from a payphone on Main,’ Williams said. ‘Coop called Robinson looking for you and Hoder, and then the chief got on the horn to me, on the police radio. Told me to call him on a land-line. Sorry for the cloak-and-dagger shit, but Coop’s instructions were real specific. You got a pen?’
‘Yeah.’ Darby fished out a ballpoint from her breast pocket. ‘What’s going on?’
‘I don’t know the details yet, just the broad strokes. Coop wants you to call him, said it’s urgent. I’ve got the number for you.’
Williams gave it to her. He agreed to meet her at the diner and then hung up.
Darby dialled Coop’s number. The phone on the other end of the line had barely rung before Coop said, ‘Darby?’
‘I got your note and I’m standing outside a diner talking on a cordless.’
‘It’s about those pictures of you in your birthday suit. It’s malware. We’re talking two separate programs. The malware hidden in the first photo, it runs a program that turns your cell’s speaker into a portable, walking microphone. You type in the number for the infected cell and you can listen in on any conversation.’
‘And the second one?’
‘Turns your cell into a GPS tracker. The son of a bitch knows where you are – where we all are – at all times, even if your phone is turned off. As long as the battery is connected, he can listen in on any conversation and check your GPS signal whenever he wants, using a laptop or a portable surveillance receiver.’
‘What sort of range are we talking about?’
‘Don’t know yet,’ Coop said. ‘Cell signals are spotty, at best, in Red Hill. You may get a bar or two, but there’s a good chance the signal will drop altogether. The geeks here who specialize in this stuff think he’s using either a satellite phone or a laptop with a 4G connection, maybe even a satellite internet card. We don’t know the frequency yet. For all we know he’s simply using a portable receiver and is parked somewhere within a quarter of a mile of you. You seen anyone following you?’
‘No, but I wasn’t really paying much – oh shit.’
‘What?’
Darby squeezed the phone and rubbed the back of her head. ‘He knows, Coop.’
‘Knows what?’
‘Everything.’ Darby pinched her temples between her fingers and then gave him a quick rundown about the bug she’d found inside her hotel phone. ‘When I came back to tell Hoder, I had my iPhone on me. It was in my pocket. He heard me talking to the woman who works the reception desk, Laurie Richards. How is it this guy always seems to be two steps ahead of us?’
‘Maybe not,’ Coop said. ‘I’m looking at a satellite map of your area. Street you want is called Lomas.’
‘What’s there?’
‘The phone used to send out your nudie pics. I gave the number to the geeks, and they plugged it into their tracking system. They couldn’t trace the signal earlier because there was no signal trace. Our guy must’ve disconnected the battery from his phone right after he sent them. Then, five, maybe ten minutes ago, the signal for that number came back on. It’s coming from Lomas Street, near the Red Hill Public Library. You’re 2.3 miles away from it. You drive there?’
‘Hoder did. He’s inside the diner. Has the signal moved at all?’
‘No, it’s remained stationary since it came back on.’
‘Give me the directions – never mind, there’s a police cruiser coming my way. It’s probably Williams.’
‘I’ll be here for another hour,’ Coop said. ‘Mobile lab’s almost done being fixed.’
Darby ran into the street, her heart bursting with adrenalin, and waved down the patrol car. She saw Hoder watching her from the diner window.
‘Stay there,’ she called to him as the patrol car accelerated towards her, its engine climbing.
Ray Williams stopped next to her, his window down, his face etched with concern and worry. He was about to speak when she motioned for him to be quiet.
Williams looked at her, puzzled. She leaned inside the car, feeling the rough grain of his whiskers against her cheek and inhaling the leathery scent of his cologne as she whispered into his ear: ‘Give me your phone and pop the trunk. I’ll explain later.’
His phone was a standard flip model. She opened the compartment in the back, removed the battery and tossed it inside the trunk.
‘Public library on Lomas,’ Darby said as she slid into the passenger’s seat, shutting the door behind her. ‘Take a right –’
‘I know where it is.’
‘Drive fast. No sirens. Here’s what’s going on.’
33
Ray Williams came to a three-way stop; Darby leaned forward in her seat and, looking to her left and up Lomas Street, saw two vehicles parked against the kerb in front of the library: a white Toyota Camry with a moon roof and, in front of it, a black Ford Econoline van with tinted windows the colour of smoked charcoal and a sagging rear bumper held up by rope.
‘That van was parked across from the hotel this morning,’ Darby said.
‘You’re sure?’
‘Positive. Same rope, and it didn’t have a back plate.’
Williams turned left, on to Lomas, and, as they approached the library, a small, ranch-like building shaded by trees, she saw a mother trying to cradle an overexcited toddler against her thin chest while she fed a stack of books and DVD
s, one by one, into the returns bin set up near the front doors. The building’s windows were dark.
‘You see her?’
‘I see her,’ Williams said, his gaze locked on the mother who had placed her child, a boy with blond hair like fine thread, on his feet. ‘Camry’s got to be hers. There’s no one in there.’
Darby found it difficult to sit still, and her mouth was dry. A hot wire had lit up inside her brain. She shifted in her seat and reached for the door handle as the mother gripped her son’s pudgy hand. The boy wobbled, swaying, and then he began to march forward on his unsteady legs, bringing his sneakered feet up and down, up and down, slamming them against the pavement with purpose, like a drunk assigned the task of stomping grapes for wine.
Darby reached inside her jacket. ‘I don’t see any other vehicles here,’ she said, and undid the strap for her shoulder holster. ‘I don’t want to wait for backup either.’
Williams was nodding. ‘If our boy’s in the van, he might panic, decide to come out shooting. We don’t need a hostage situation here.’
‘Agreed. Let me out and light it up.’
Williams slowed as Darby threw open the door. She got out, gun in hand, slammed the door shut and started running. Williams pulled ahead, tyres biting into the pavement and sirens blaring. The mother scooped her son into her arms, her eyes wide with terror and her face turning as white as chalk.
‘Go,’ Darby said to the woman, waving her hand. ‘Get out of here.’
The mother ran with her son clutched to her chest, the boy shrieking not from fear but from agitation at having been denied his walk to their car. Williams came to a stop directly in front of the van, parking diagonally so the van couldn’t move, boxing it in between the Camry and the cruiser. Then Williams emerged from the car gripping a Mossberg 12-gauge shotgun with a tactical light and a heat shield. Darby approached the van from her right. It didn’t have a back licence plate.
Williams placed the shotgun on the top of the car roof. He looked down the target sight and yelled over the siren: ‘Get out of the van with your hands locked behind your head.’
Darby had reached the van’s passenger door. The glass was tinted; she couldn’t see who was in there. She gripped the door handle and pulled, hearing the lock click back as Williams called out, ‘Come out of the van with your hands locked behind your head.’
The van’s front cab was empty. Darby left the door hanging open as she darted in a crouch around the front. She looked at Williams, gave him the clear signal and then crab-walked to the van’s sliding side door. She reached it, stopped. Another glance at Williams. He nodded and she put her hand on the handle.
‘Come out of the van,’ Williams called out again, and Darby turned the handle. The door was unlocked and she slid it open, her stomach clenching.
‘Down,’ Williams screamed over the sirens. ‘Down on your stomach, right now.’
A high-pitched scream came from somewhere inside the van. Darby heard movement and, still crouching, she swung around the corner, looked down the target sight of her SIG and saw a heavy-set woman dressed in black sweatpants and a matching sweatshirt, her stomach swelling like a balloon behind the thin fabric. She sat on a bare mattress and the feet of her wool socks had holes in them and her dirty blonde hair looked damp. The woman’s hands were held up, her arms trembling. She didn’t have a weapon.
‘It was an oversight,’ the woman said. She had a reedy and nasal voice. ‘I meant to –’
‘Shut it,’ Darby said, her eyes roving through the van and knowing something was wrong. The interior was stacked with milk crates full of clothes. A handful of business suits hung from a ceiling rail. The cardboard boxes scattered along the floor held canned food, meal-replacement bars and bottled water. Darby saw rolls of toilet paper and paper towels and a laptop sitting on a desk made of plywood.
The woman was the only one there, and, while she wasn’t armed, Darby still had to play it safe. ‘Face down on the mattress. Do it.’
The frightened woman complied.
‘Now put your hands behind your back,’ Darby said, the adrenalin shifting into low gear.
After the woman complied, Darby moved inside the van and cuffed her wrists. Darby looked to Williams, who was still peering down the shotgun propped up on the car roof.
‘Clear,’ Darby yelled to him.
Williams pushed himself off the roof with a dejected expression on his face. He moved back inside the cruiser and killed the sirens.
34
Darby found the woman’s Coach wallet lying on the floor. She pulled it open and read the name: ‘Elisa Pike’.
The woman turned her head to the side. She had a fine web of lines around her eyes and mouth, and she had put on mascara. Her damp hair smelled of shampoo, and her skin and clothes smelled clean. There was also a faint whiff of perfume, a sickeningly sweet scent that reminded Darby of Love’s Baby Soft.
Darby looked at the date of birth printed on the licence. Elisa A. Pike was fifty-seven years old.
‘It says here you live at 123 Alabaster Lane,’ Darby said. ‘In Red Hill.’
‘I used to, until the bank took away my house.’ The woman’s face darkened.
‘And now you live in this van.’
‘It’s perfectly legal,’ she said coldly. ‘As long as I don’t have any kids or animals, which I don’t, and as long as I’m not bothering anyone, which I’m not, I can live here. I checked. You can’t arrest –’
‘Your cell phone, where is it?’
‘I don’t own one.’
‘Don’t lie to me.’
‘I’m not!’ she shrieked, indignant. Her sweatshirt had ridden up from her waist and Darby saw skin as white as a fish’s belly. ‘I had to cancel my cell three months ago because I couldn’t afford it any more. I haven’t owned –’
The Pike woman cut herself off. Her eyes widened and her small lips formed an O. Williams had stepped up to the van’s doorway. She looked at him as she said, ‘It’s not mine.’
‘What’s not yours?’ Darby asked, handing the woman’s licence to Williams.
‘The phone I found this morning,’ Pike said. Williams had moved away, back to the cruiser, to use the radio to call in the licence. ‘I woke up and found it sitting on my windshield. It was tucked underneath the windshield wiper so it wouldn’t blow away or fall when I drove off. I didn’t know why it –’
‘Stop. Let’s start at the beginning. What time did you wake up this morning?’
‘Early. Around eight.’
‘Where did you sleep last night? What street?’
‘This one. I slept right here. I sleep here because I use the library computers. They have free internet. I use them for job hunting. Go ahead and check if you don’t believe me. They open in another hour.’
‘Then why did I see this exact same van parked this morning in front of the Wagon Wheel Saloon? Can you explain that to me?’
The woman visibly stiffened, the rolls of fat jiggling underneath her clothes. She didn’t answer.
‘And you showered this morning,’ Darby said.
‘Being clean and looking presentable, that’s a crime now?’ No attitude, just a mild bewilderment.
Then Darby remembered the anxious way Laurie Richards had stared at the van, and she said, ‘I think you parked outside the bar because you and Laurie Richards have some sort of arrangement whereby she lets you use the hotel shower. Only you didn’t go there right away because you saw cops standing out front and didn’t want her to get into any trouble. Am I right?’
Elisa Pike’s gaze had retreated inwards. Her mouth was a tight seam, her lips quivering, as if to cage the riot of words that were trying to escape.
‘Here’s the thing I want you to understand, Ms Pike. I don’t care about whatever … arrangement you’ve got with Laurie Richards. The only thing I care about is this phone you supposedly found magically sitting on your front window.’
‘I did find it. It was sitting on my front window, right u
nder the windshield wiper. I swear on the Holy Father and our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.’
‘What time was this?’
‘Is Laurie gonna get in trouble, because I promised her I wouldn’t tell anyone about –’
‘Tell me what time you found the phone.’
‘Noon, I think. Maybe a few minutes after. After the sheriff left, I went into the hotel and used the shower. When I came back, the phone was sitting on my windshield, just like I said.’
Darby pulled a pair of latex gloves from her back pocket. ‘Where is it?’
‘In the box with my résumés and Bible. Look up to your left, the box next to my socks.’ The woman nodded with her chin. ‘Can you please take these handcuffs off me? They hurt like the dickens.’
‘I will when Detective Williams comes back.’
‘Why? I didn’t do anything wrong.’
That’s probably true, Darby thought as she snapped on the latex. Elisa Pike seemed harmless enough: a woman in unfortunate circumstances struggling to get by with grace and dignity. But that didn’t mean Darby could afford to be careless.
‘May I at least sit up?’ Pike asked.
‘No, please stay right where you are. This will only take a minute.’ Darby pinched the small antenna between her fingers and lifted it out of the box.
‘I thought a Good Samaritan had left it there for me,’ Pike said. ‘They sometimes do that, you know. Leave a box of things on my car, right near the windshield, things like baby wipes and toothpaste, cans of soup. They’re not looking for anything in return, they’re just kind, good Christian people.’
The phone was a disposable model, a high-end burner that allowed you to send text messages and pictures. It also came equipped with a camera.
‘I thought someone had left it there to help me with my job search, or so I could call my ex and say hello to my kids.’ The woman swallowed, pained, and blinked back tears. ‘I can’t always use the phone at the hotel or the library.’
Darby worked an evidence bag from her back pocket. ‘Laurie Richards takes your messages?’
‘Yes. It wasn’t charged. The phone.’
