Exponential

by JM Addison

  Chapter 8

  “Hello?” came the sleepy voice. He rubbed his eyes in the dim pre-dawn and tried to focus on the time display on the bed stand clock.

  An incomprehensible woman was spewing something about accepting reverse charges. Over her voice he could hear another familiar, yet desperate sounding woman.

  “Will! It’s me, Mara!”

  “Yes, I’ll accept the charges…”

  “Thank you.” Replied the operator.

  “Mara? What are you doing it’s not even six a.m. yet?”

  “Sorry Will, but I really need your help. Somebody was waiting for me at my place last night. They tried to make a grab for me and sort of beat me up a little. I got away but then spent the night hiding in the streets.”

  Instantly he was awake. His mind filled with a million questions. “Are you hurt? Do you need an ambulance or anything?”

  “No, just come and get me. I need to clean up, get a bite to eat and get warm!”

  “Where are you? I’ll be right there.”

  “About five blocks or so over from where my street is. It must be… Swan just past Central. I’m standing at a pay phone. My purse and cell phone went flying during the attack. I can see the big Lutheran church on Westwood from here.”

  “I know where you are. Sit tight. I should be there in about ten or fifteen minutes. Will you be alright ‘til I get there?”

  “Other than practically getting the crap kicked out of me and spending the last few hours running through the cold, I’m sure I can wait a few more minutes. I’m just trying to stay out of sight in case they’re still looking for me. I would have called the police, but what I really need is someone that I know. Someone that will help.”

  “No problem, be there in a few minutes.”

  *

  She sat huddled and shivering in the passenger seat of Will’s car as he drove her back to his place. He glanced over at her small form and noticed a smear of blood along the bottom of her right cheek. A slightly fattened lip, probably the source of the blood. Scratches on her hands. Wet clothes. Overall, she didn’t look too good at all. “Want to tell me what happened?”

  She began haltingly to relate what happened. As she progressed, the tears began to flow and she had to fight the occasional sob. She explained how she eventually found herself trapped between the fences behind the trash dumpster. “I thought I was in for it. Here I just broke this guy’s hand and humiliated the other one. I figured when they found me, they would be mad enough to kill me.”

  “How did you manage to escape!?”

  Just then they pulled into his drive. “Let me get a hot shower and some food and I’ll tell you about it.” She stumbled out of the car and shuffled to the door. He held it open for her and she entered.

  He led the way to the bathroom and left her while she showered. “I’ll leave a bathrobe here for you to wrap up in when you come out,” he called above the noise of the shower. He went to fix something for them to eat.

  After a while she emerged, with wet hair, wrapped tightly in his bathrobe. She looked quite good for a person who had just spent the night in the streets on the run from potential kidnappers. He indicate a seat at the breakfast bar with a place setting of a warm English muffin, juice, coffee and some fresh fruit.

  He began with an apology, “Sorry, I didn’t really have much by way of breakfast food in the house.”

  “This is fine! I can’t believe how good it feels to get out of wet clothes and get a hot shower.”

  It struck him as rather sensual to have this wet, attractive young woman, apparently nude under his bathrobe sitting in his kitchen. His thoughts began to wander a bit.

  Between mouthfuls, she continued her story, “Just as I thought I was doomed, a phone rang. Must have been one of their cell phones. I think it was the guy with the broken hand because it sounded like he spent some time fumbling with it before he finally was able to answer. I tried to listen in a little, but I was more concerned with making my escape.

  “In the moment of their distraction, I was able to wedge my foot into the space between some of the fencing that separated the back lots. I got up high enough to get my other leg over the top but then I found my shoe that I wedged, was firmly stuck between boards. I had to leave the shoe behind.

  “I think I gouged my thigh a little on the top because it caused enough pain for me to lose my balance and flop over the other side. That’s how I think I hit my face.

  “Anyway, they must have heard me because one of them yelled out and they came charging to the fence. I skittered on my hands and knees to a sub-basement stairwell in the side of an adjacent building and cowered in the shadows.

  “I heard them talking about not being able to see me any place. I guess the one guy was still on the phone because he was sounding like he was ending the conversation. Then bad luck again… They seem to have discovered my shoe, still wedged in the fence. He snarled some orders about not letting me get away. And that somebody was going to be very upset if they didn’t find me and bring me in.

  “I didn’t stick around to listen. While they were talking and apparently receiving their orders and discussing my eventual capture, I made my way along the shadows to the front of the building. I finally rounded the corner and took off. I wanted as much space between me and them as I could get. Favoring the foot with the remaining shoe, I scurried across back lots and through hedges. I figured I needed to stay out of sight of the streets.

  “Eventually I came across a car that didn’t seem to be locked and let myself in the rear passenger door and just huddled on the floor. I don’t know how long I sat there debating what to do. I couldn’t go back to my place. Even if I could find it again – they might have someone posted there waiting for me. Calling the police was no good because without my cell phone they could easily spot someone openly standing at a public phone. Even though I was scared stiff, I guess I eventually dozed off. When I awoke, I wandered a bit until I found a phone and called you.”

  “Well, I’m certainly glad you’re alright” Will said after looking at her for a few moments. “You know, there aren’t all that many pay phones left anymore. Lucky you found one. You’re welcome to stay here for as long as you need.”

  “Actually, I was wondering if you could lend me a set of sweat pants and a shirt and give me a lift home. I could use some of my clothes. In the struggle, my purse and keys went flying. I’ve got an extra set of car keys at home. I’ll just need to get the building manager to let me in. He doesn’t live there in the same building, so I will need to stop by his place to get a key.”

  She surprised herself with her calm resolve. She determined that she was going to get to the bottom of this one way or another. Somehow she was able to successfully incapacitate, at least to some degree, and evade three thugs set out on kidnapping her. Her. All 121 pounds of her. They must have been amateurs or it was simply providential that she escaped. Obviously, they must have had something to do with her brother’s disappearance. Whoever ‘they’ are, they had the answers.

  Somehow in all this, Viiradium was involved. Since her phone and computer were evidently ‘examined’ there had to be someone at the company who knew what was happening. The problem was though, that same someone was likely dangerous. She wondered what Will discovered through his inquiry to Chris’ department managers. He didn’t say anything about it, so she supposed he didn’t have any new information.

  He was a member of senior management, perhaps she should tell him of the episodes of apparently unauthorized voicemail access as well as her computer being tampered with. How would he react? Was the company involved in some sort of cover up? She decided to tell him some more and judge from his reaction how to proceed.

  After she finished eating, she began again, tentatively at first, “Will, I’ve got something else to run by you.”

  “What is it?”

  “Well, some funny things have been happening at Veriduim and I think that those things might have something t
o do with the disappearance of Chris,” She said.

  In somewhat of a defensive tone he responded, “Oh, really?”

  She had to realize she was talking to one of the corporate executive vice presidents here and she didn’t want to damage the trust she felt in her relationship by seeming to put blame on Viiradium for what happened to Chris. She gingerly explained the circumstances of the voice mail tampering. That even though she left messages for Chris, his message wait light indicated no new messages when she stopped by his work area before. And the funny thing about her own messages – the fact that she had received new messages – ones that she was positive were new only because she had never heard them before – yet the system treated them like they were already heard and kept. It was almost as if someone else had listened to her messages.

  The irregular behavior of her computer was curious too. You couldn’t gain access to a desktop computer’s files in the company without first successfully logging on to the network. That was the way they were set up. Did someone else log onto her desktop computer just to snoop through the contents of files that were stored in her PC? Look through her email? Couldn’t they do that remotely with no reason to use her computer?

  After she explained all of this, Will thought about what she said for a moment and said, “There could be any number of explanations that might cause those conditions. Maintenance on the voicemail system for example. Maybe Chris is not really missing at all and called in himself to retrieve his own messages. Perhaps someone needed access to information on the network and your machine was unused and thus available. Certainly against our corporate information usage policies, but hardly a link to the disappearance of Chris.”

  “I know what you mean. In fact, my first thought was the same – Chris must have called in. And I’ll admit, there certainly could be valid explanations for the things that happened to our messages and computers or whatever. But then to be followed to work, and stalked to the point of kidnap simply made me try to tie everything together. First, Chris was an employee there. He’s evidently missing. It could be because of something to do with Viiradium, maybe not.

  “Then me being followed, three times now, since going to Chris’ apartment. Then someone evidently breaking into my place – that from the medicine door incident. Finally going to the point of assaulting me and forcing me into a car in an attempt to kidnap me.”

  She felt her anger rise up a bit and continued on a little hotly, “I don’t care what you think, somehow all this is connected and I intend to find out what the hell is going on! If they, whoever they are, are willing to kidnap me, who knows what they might have been willing to do to Chris. And the worst thing is, I don’t have the slightest inkling why!”

  She realized she was getting mad at Will and didn’t want to destroy any chances of him helping her discover the facts. So she calmed a bit and continued, “I’m sorry Will. It’s just that I feel scared, frustrated and determined all at once. I spent the night in the back of a strange car with no heat. I think the thing I really need now is to get a ride home so I can change clothes and figure out what to do.”