“I understand. She’s fine, she just crashed. I wanted her to get some sleep. It’s been a long couple of days.”
“Tell me about it. But—”
“I’m not waking her up so you can satisfy Price’s curiosity, you understand?” Baldwin tried to keep his tone pleasant, but he’d had just about enough. Wells recognized the signs of impending anger, weighed his choices, then nodded briefly.
“Give me a second,” he said, then flipped open a cell phone. Baldwin heard Price’s voice on the other end of the phone. Wells relayed a status update, said “uh-huh” a couple of times then handed the phone to Baldwin.
“He wants to speak to you.”
Baldwin took the phone.
“Hello, Mitchell.”
“Well, you don’t sound as angry as I expected. She told me you called off your dogs. I think she’s just scared, Baldwin, and hates to admit it to you.”
“You could have given me a heads-up when she called.”
“And risk the wrath of Khan? Hell no. That’s her business. Her cash.”
“You’re right, Mitchell. It’s her choice who to trust right now. I won’t keep you, I just wanted to confirm that these boys were yours.”
“They are. Keep safe, Baldwin. Keep her safe for me.”
Baldwin clicked the phone off and handed it to Wells, who stowed it in jacket pocket.
“We’ll just wait here until she wakes up, sir.”
“Fine. Have a seat. She’s been out for about an hour, I’m going to wake her up at seven. Try not to break anything while you wait.”
They didn’t sit, but Wells leaned against the kitchen counter, meaty arms in a pyramid across his chest. His partner, Rogers, was the quieter of the two. He simply stared at the floor as if he found the wood grain the most interesting thing he’d ever seen, looking up occasionally as if asking permission to continue imitating a statue.
Baldwin shrugged and left them to their devices. Damn if he didn’t feel good having them around. This was all spinning out of control, the grains of sand shifting through the hourglass faster and faster. He could feel it in the very air that surrounded them, a sense of expectation, of doom. They were hurtling toward the resolution of the case whether they wanted it or not.
He called in to Lincoln and asked about Colleen Keck. She was apparently fine, madder than a wet hen that she wasn’t being allowed to leave, but safe, and alive. So the card wasn’t entirely accurate. Just another stupid threat. He told Lincoln to take extra precautions, then hung up the phone.
He discarded the mail on the counter and put on a pair of purple nitrile gloves from the stash in the kitchen’s junk drawer. The beef brothers watched him with interest.
The CD jewel case was taped closed. It had been hand-delivered, obviously. No postmark on the envelope, nothing that could be traced. Smart, creepy as hell. He hated that the Pretender knew where they lived, could access their home at any time.
“Hey, did either of you guys watch the house over the past day?”
Wells shook his head. “No, sir. We followed you to Forest City. Damn boring drive, I’ll tell you that.”
“What, the majesty of the Blue Ridge didn’t do it for you?”
“I prefer the Rockies, sir. Those are real mountains. Better yet, insert me through a HALO jump twenty-five thousand feet above the Hindu Kush. That’s some fun times.”
Wells almost cracked a smile. Almost. Rogers looked interested for the first time.
Mercenaries. Ex-military yahoos, back in the States. Professional tough guys, keeping tabs on his fiancée. He didn’t know whether to be furious or grateful.
“Well, while y’all were on our tail, our killer dropped this in our mailbox.”
“We should call that in, sir,” Wells said, reaching for his pocket.
“Just hold on, okay? Let me see what this is first.”
Wells stopped. There was something to be said for career soldiers, they took instruction well.
Baldwin went to the pantry and took out a small toolbox, one equipped for a rudimentary forensic investigation. A to-go kit. He withdrew fingerprint powder and a brush. Prepped the jewel case, then brushed the powder over the slick casing. Nothing. He used a scalpel to slice through the tape that held it open, then took up a fresh brush and followed the same procedure on the inside. It was too much to hope that there would be prints… Disappointed again. Clean as a whistle.
He took the CD from the case and read the letters. It was gibberish. A bunch of numbers and letters, which meant nothing to him. He was decent at codes, it was one of the weird little things he’d picked up, but nothing was leaping out, announcing itself. He ran it through his mental ciphers, still nothing.
He carefully copied the letters and numbers into his notebook, then left the kitchen for the living room. They had a Bose stereo system. He popped the CD in and hit Play. Turned the volume down so whatever was on the CD wouldn’t go booming out into the world and wake Taylor.
The strains of some familiar music started, and Baldwin shook his head. What a crude, silly attempt to send a message.
It was a song from the fifties, by the Platters. He’d never thought of it in this context. It was perfect for a stalker.
“Oh, yes, I’m the great pretender…I’m lonely, but no one can tell…you’ve left me to dream, all alone.”
Jesus. He was overcome with rage. This goddamn freak was getting on his nerves.
“What’s it mean, sir?” Wells asked. He and Rogers had come into the living room, obviously concerned. Baldwin realized he’d been clutching the jewel case so hard that it had shattered. A small drop of blood dripped off the end of his finger onto the hardwood floor, followed by quicker, more insistent drops. Crap. He’d cut himself badly.
He pushed Stop on the player, ignored Wells and Rogers’s offers of help, and went to the kitchen. Grabbed a towel from the drawer and wrapped it around his hand. Stalked back into the living room to see how much blood he’d spilled on the floor. Wondered how many more chances he was going to get.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Taylor heard voices, then music. What in the world? She forced her eyes open. Good. She’d slept. She sat up, surprised at how refreshed she felt. Just a couple of hours of rest, but rest it was. She’d dreamed heavily, not her usual dark, murky nightmares, but of a happy, smiling man wrapped in a rust-colored sheet. A monk. Holding out a small, thin piece of string for her to tie around her wrist, his toothless smile engaging and encouraging. “Protection,” he’d said.
Protection. Her hand went to her wrist. It was bare.
If only dreams were capable of such powers.
She pulled back the covers, dressed and hurried downstairs. Baldwin was standing in the middle of the living room, bleeding, and two very large men were standing on either side of him. What in the hell were they doing in the house? And why was Baldwin bleeding? Damn it.
“Gentlemen?”
All three of them started. The two bodyguards’ hands instinctively strayed to their weapons before they caught themselves. Baldwin gestured to the men.
“Your guards,” he said.
She was struck by the coldness of his tone. Something had happened while she was asleep, that was obvious.
She met his eyes for a moment, tried to ignore the frustration and questions in them, then addressed the guards. “Wells, Rogers, we’re fine here, as you can see. Why don’t you wait outside. We’ll be heading back to the CJC shortly.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Wells said. They turned and went to the front door, slipped out quietly. Stealthy, for such large men.
When they were finally alone, Taylor turned back to Baldwin. “What happened?”
“They got the drop on me. I was getting the mail. They seem very capable.” He shrugged, she could read the embarrassment in the line of his shoulders. There was more he wasn’t saying, but she didn’t push. He’d tell her when he was ready; she could feel him struggling with something. When he turned and went to the kitchen, she fol
lowed behind. A change of subject was in order.
“Let me see your hand,” she said.
“It’s fine,” he said, but let her glance at it to prove he was okay. She ran the water in the sink, let the blood wash down the drain. It was a shallow cut, but a bleeder. The gaping edges were already starting to clot and crust.
“I think you’ll live, but let me put some alcohol on it, just in case. How did you cut it?”
“We received a gift in the mail.” She retrieved the first-aid kit from the cabinet and went to work. He hissed as she dosed the cut in alcohol, then let her slowly wipe the excess off, apply Neosporin and close it with a large Band-Aid. Echoes of the ministrations that had been performed on her back in Forest City.
“How’s your leg?” he asked automatically. Reading her thoughts again.
“It’s fine. I haven’t thought about it in hours.” Which was true, but now that she remembered, her shin gave a throb. “I’ll change the dressing on it later.”
She brought his hand to her mouth and kissed the bandage.
“All better?”
“We’ll see,” he said, and the obliqueness of his tone made her take a step back. He really was upset, just keeping it hidden, right below the surface. Was he mad at her? Or was it something else?
“What came in the mail, Baldwin?”
He flexed his fingers a few times, as if testing the binding. He made a fist and didn’t grimace. She knew he was okay.
“Our friend sent us a message. Though I’ll be damned if I know what to make of it. Come on, I’ll show you.”
The Valentine’s card was on the counter where he’d left it. She opened it with a pen, read the words. Was surprised at how little they affected her. She was becoming inured to his threats. This was just a game to Copeland, just a stupid game. No wonder Baldwin was so peeved. He was poking at them, just trying to get a rise.
She let the card close.
Baldwin led her back to the living room and pressed play on the stereo. Music streamed from the speakers.
After a moment, she said, “The Platters?”
“Yep. There’s more. Writing on the disc. He burned it himself, it’s not an original recording.”
“Let’s see it.”
Baldwin ejected the CD midwail and handed it to Taylor.
“It’s gibberish to me. I don’t see any rhyme or reason to it.”
At first glance, she had to agree. There were just a bunch of numbers and letters, none that spelled out anything obvious.
“White board,” she said, heading up the stairs to her office. She erased everything that was on the board, then wrote down the numbers and letters at the top, enjoying the strange scent of the erasable marker and its small, squeaking scratches as she wrote. She loved her white board.
When she was finished, she stood back and looked at the string.
148NAD77HCBOTM4482901QRE
“What about a VIN?” Taylor asked.
“Nope. Vehicle Identification Numbers are only seventeen digits. That’s twenty-four.”
“You remember when we used to get actual airline tickets? There was always that huge long string at the bottom that didn’t make sense, but it was really the codes for the airports, and the equipments, dates and seat numbers. Maybe that’s it.”
“Good idea.”
They started playing with combinations of letters, breaking them into groups, writing them backward, but nothing was apparent. No call signs for airports, no dates, nothing that made logical sense.
Baldwin was getting frustrated, his hair was standing on end. Taylor smoothed it down, then wiped away all their conjecture, leaving them with the original numbers and letters at the top of the board.
“Let’s look at this a different way. He’s sending us a message. What do we think is happening, right now?”
“He’s playing a game.”
“Right. And we know that he has probably recruited people to play with him. There have been three recent copycat crimes that we know of.” She stared at the board, mind whirling.
“Break it into threes?” She transcribed the numbers on the board.
148NAD77 HCBOTM4 482901QRE
“Still means nothing.”
She had the first glimmers of an idea. “Let me see the disc again,” Taylor said.
Baldwin handed it to her. She looked closely at the placement of the letters, then wrote a new pattern on the board.
148NAD77HCBOTM4482 901QRE
“It looks like there’s a space between the first string of letters and numbers and the end. If we break that off, then separate them into three sections…”
She scribbled on the board, then stood back and looked.
148NAD 77HCB OTM4482 901QRE
“License plate numbers?” she said, and heard Baldwin suck in his breath. He tapped the computer on her desk to life, fingers flying over the keys as he accessed a database through his FBI identification.
“Damn, you’re good. That’s got to be it. Let me call Kevin, have him put some elbow grease into this.” He smiled at her, his face radiant, and she knew she was forgiven her transgression.
Would he feel the same way if he knew she’d killed a man on purpose?
She shoved that thought away.
She took the CD and put it into her laptop, stepped out of the room so she wouldn’t interrupt Baldwin. Went into their guest room, sat on the bed, and hit Play. The song spilled out of the computer, and she listened carefully to the lyrics. They gave her the creeps. Such a simple song, perverted for a psycho’s purpose.
The song finished, and there was silence, deafening quiet. She started to press the eject button, then heard something. Leaning closer, she turned the speakers up as far as they could go. There was rustling, like a plastic bag being wadded up, then a cough. She strained to hear more, but there was nothing. Then a deep voice spoke.
“Don’t be late, Taylor. We’ll be waiting.”
The CD spun to a stop.
She froze for a moment. We’ll be waiting. We who? Ewan Copeland and Ruth Anderson? Ewan and his copycat monsters?
Her mind flashed back to the white board, to the last set of numbers, the ones that had given her the idea to break them apart from the rest anyway.
901QRE
We’ll be waiting.
It hit her like a landslide, and she yelled for Baldwin. She heard him excuse himself from the phone and rush to the room immediately.
“What’s wrong? You’re white as a sheet.”
“The last numbers. I was wrong. They aren’t a license plate.”
“What are they?”
“I don’t know what the E is, but 901QR has to be 901 Quaker Run.”
The significance dawned on him. “Oh, my God.”
“That’s Sam’s address. Baldwin, he’s got Sam.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
To: [email protected], 44caliber @ncr.ss.com, [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Game Over
Gentlemen,
My deepest apologies to share this untimely news, but your covers are blown.
Accelerate the schedule and rendezvous at your predesignated final assignment.
Time to come to Papa. And hurry. The Pretender
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Taylor had never felt the level of panic that was cruising through her system. Despite that, she stayed outwardly calm. She picked up the phone and speed-dialed her best friend’s cell number.
It went directly to voice mail, a sign that the phone had been turned off. Taylor ended the call, then dialed Sam’s house. Simon Loughley, Sam’s husband, answered the phone. Taylor could hear the twins crying in the background. She tried to sound as normal as possible.
“Hi, Simon. Sam around?”
“Hey, Taylor. Good to hear from you. No, she has the overnight shift this week, probably up to her elbows in entrails right about now. She has a doctor’s appointment this morning, too. She’s not supposed to be home until a
round ten or so. Hey, are you and Baldwin coming to Thanksgiving? No, let me rephrase. Please tell me you and Baldwin are coming to Thanksgiving. Sam can’t drink, and you know how she gets when she’s pregnant on national holidays.”
Taylor fought the rising nausea. It’s okay. She’s okay. She’s at work. Nothing can happen to her while she’s at Forensic Medical.
“We’d love to, Simon. We’re planning to be there. I’ve got to run, I need to track her down. I’ll—I’ll tell her I talked to you and told you we’d come, okay?”
“Everything all right, Taylor? You sound tense.”
“Big case. Lots of stress. You know how it is.”
“I do. Be good. See you Thursday, okay?”
She swallowed hard. “Of course. Kiss the twins for me.”
She hung up the phone and sought Baldwin’s hand. He grasped hers, gave it a good hard squeeze.
“Should you tell him what’s going on? Simon has a good head on his shoulders. He won’t panic.”
“We don’t know there’s a problem yet. There’s no reason to scare him for nothing.”
“You’re right. It’s going to be okay. I’ll call Forensic Medical, see if I can locate her there.” He flipped open his cell phone.
A horrible thought crossed her mind. “Hold on. I have to get Simon and the twins covered. Maybe he’s planning to hit them instead of Sam.” As she said it, she knew it wasn’t the truth, but it was better than doing nothing. She called McKenzie’s cell phone.
“Hey there. We got the warrant for Colleen’s blog participants.” he said, exhaustion making his voice hoarse.
She cut him off. “I need you to do me a favor, okay? No questions. Please go to Sam’s house and keep an eye on Simon and the kids. Don’t let anyone near them, for any reason. You understand me?”
McKenzie’s voice sharpened. “Yes. Are you okay?”
“I am. I’ve gotten what I believe might be a threat against Sam, and I don’t want to take any chances. Take extra weapons, get backup, but most of all, be discreet. I don’t want Simon freaking out on me, okay?”
“He’s going to be suspicious. Where is Sam now?”
Lieutenant Taylor Jackson Collection, Volume 2 Page 87
