Scars (Nevada James #2) (Nevada James Mysteries) (11 page)

Chapter 16

I thought
about what Leonard had said on the way back to my motel. Michael Lewis,
although deceased, was my most likely suspect in the bombing. If I could
establish that he had anything to do with artemisinin research, this would be
over. He had the radical background, after all. That couldn’t be a coincidence.
But to prove it I was going to need access to his work. Odds were that would
only be available at a research library at UCSD.

That
presented a problem. I was neither a teacher nor a student at the university. I
needed access to material that wasn’t going to be accessible to the general
public. I could hardly walk in there and start poking around. But odds were
what I’d need would be accessible in their computer system. I didn’t know
anything about computer hacking, but I knew several people who did.

My phone
buzzed as I was driving. It was a text from Sarah Winters.
Can you talk?
Have a weird idea on the copycat case. Could use your ear.
I put the phone
down. I’d deal with that later. I didn’t really want anything more to do with
that case. Given my reaction at the last crime scene, who knew what insanity
I’d get up to at the next one.

Back at
the motel I got out my laptop and used a program I had to access a proxy server
that would both encrypt everything I did and conceal where I was doing it from.
As far as any average person would be concerned, I was now connecting from an
Internet café in Belgium as opposed to a motel room in San Diego. It wouldn’t
fool the NSA, but I didn’t need to fool the NSA. They didn’t have any reason to
be looking for me. Even if they had, they certainly weren’t going to care about
any of this.

Once my
connection was up I logged into a webmail account I kept for this purpose. It
identified me as someone named Trevor Sebastian, which was a name I’d made up a
few months ago. I liked to imagine Trevor was the dashing playboy type, maybe
sipping a glass of champagne while he looked over his stock portfolio from his
own private island somewhere. Not that it mattered much, but it had seemed like
Trevor needed a backstory, even if I never told it to anyone.

I opened
a new email message, putting “Abercrombie” in the “to” field.
Need help
,
I typed as the subject. Then I saved the email as a draft. It was never going
to be sent to anyone.

That
over with, I turned on the motel television and watched half an hour of
The
Price is Right
. Nobody won a new car. The show seemed pointless to me if
nobody won a new car.

When the
show was over I went back to my laptop and looked at the message I’d typed
earlier. The word “what” had appeared in the message body. I wasn’t the only
person with access to this account, which was the whole point.

I
thought it over, then started a new line in the message.
UCSD faculty
research, professor Michael Lewis, anything on antimalarial drugs or development,
artemisinin, variants of artemisinin, explosive properties, peroxide bridge
(?), possible explosive applications
. That was about all I could think of,
but it seemed like it covered everything. I saved the draft message and waited.

A moment
later more text appeared.
Is this one of your stupid jokes
?

No
,
I typed, and saved the message again.

A minute
passed.
If this is a joke, tell me now. You get full credit for the funny,
but I’m not wasting a day on this only to have you throw a pie in my face
.

I’d
never actually thrown a pie at the man I was typing to, but given some of our
history he wasn’t wrong to be suspicious.
No joke
, I typed.
Research
for Anita Collins bombing case in 1993. Bomb composition suggests chemist doing
malaria research. I know it sounds stupid. Deal with it
.

I
waited. It did sound like a joke, of course. I’d hardly believed it, myself.
But my jokes tended to be a bit more elaborate and less science-based.

Will
contact
appeared on the screen.
Confirm.

Confirm
,
I typed. A second later the entire draft email disappeared, erased and lost to
cyberspace.

Fake
emails that never got sent weren’t the most secure way to communicate under the
radar, but it would do. We weren’t planning to blow up an airplane. If
Abercrombie had really been concerned, it would have been a very different
conversation.

I had
very little else to do until I was contacted again. On a lark, I picked up my
phone and dialed Anita Collins. She answered on the second ring. “Hello,
Nevada.”

“Have
you ever heard of Michael Lewis?” I asked. “He was a UCSD professor.”

“I can’t
say that I have,” she said. “Is he a suspect?”

“Maybe,”
I said. “He’s been dead for a while, but so far he’s the best lead I have. I
should know more in a little while. I was just wondering if the name was
familiar. If maybe he was someone you or your husband knew.”

“I don’t
remember the name, but we do have any number of donors affiliated with UCSD.”

“It
could be nothing. Believe it or not I’ve got a guy checking to see if he was
involved in malaria research. I know that sounds stupid, but there could be a
connection. Don’t ask me to explain it, though. Chemistry wasn’t my subject.”

Anita
was silent long enough I started to wonder if we’d lost the connection.
“Hello?”

“I’m
sorry,” she said. “It’s just that one of my foundations supports malaria
programs in South America and Africa. It’s a massive project. That seems like
quite a coincidence.”

I
thought it over. “It’s
a
coincidence,” I said. “I don’t know whether
it’s significant. I would think a lot of charities fund malaria programs, and
you yourself probably fund more programs than anyone could remember.”

“I
suppose that’s true,” she said. “I may look through my records and see if I can
find this Mr. Lewis, though. We started funding the drug distribution…maybe ten
years ago. One of my donors came to me with the idea.”

“Was he
by any chance a chemist?”

“No. He
owns a soccer team.”

“Probably
not a mad bomber, then,” I said. “I’ll let you know if I come up with anything.
It’s too late to put him behind bars, but at least you’d know the truth.”

“That’s
all I want, Nevada. I can be satisfied knowing the truth.”

“I’ll
let you know as soon as I know something.”

“Thank
you for the call.”

“No
problem.” We hung up. I looked over at the dresser drawer where my vodka was
stashed. It wasn’t even afternoon yet, way too early for my nightly
booze-holding ritual. It was tempting, regardless, but I decided it could wait
until later. The day I needed to pour two glasses of vodka down the drain to
make it through the day would probably be the day I drank one of them.

My phone
buzzed. It was Dan Evans texting this time.
Channel 5 asked where you are.
They want an interview.

When
hell freezes over,
I sent back.

That’s
more or less what I told them
. Clever boy, that Dan.

There
was a knock at my door. I took my Glock off the bed. “Who is it?”

“Tapestry
Flowers,” a man’s voice called back. “Delivery for Nevada James.”

Only one
person ever sent me flowers. It had been a little while since he’d done so,
which probably made me overdue for an arrangement. I fingered the Glock and
went to look through the window. A teenage boy in a blue polo shirt stood just
outside my door with a bouquet in his arms. The coast seemed to be clear of
anyone else.

I opened
the door, holding the Glock behind my back so the kid didn’t see it and wet his
pants. “For me?” I asked. “How sweet.”

The
teenager smiled halfheartedly. The flowers were carnations in a variety of
cheerful colors. “There you go, miss,” he said, offering them to me. I liked
that he called me
miss
instead of
ma’am
, but I was never going to
admit that to anyone.

I took
the flowers in one arm, keeping my gun hand behind my back. “I don’t suppose
you have any idea who sent them?” I asked, scanning the parking lot behind him
to see if anyone was watching.

He shook
his head. “I just deliver them. There’s a card on there, though. Have a nice
day.”

I shut
the door and watched through the window as he walked back to his car. There was
no other activity in the parking lot. The Laughing Man could be sitting
somewhere farther away with a set of binoculars if he’d really wanted to see my
reaction, but somehow I doubted that was the case. The Laughing Man didn’t do
things like this to get a reaction out of me. He did them because, in his own
twisted way, he genuinely cared.

I put
the bouquet down on the table and sat the Glock next to it. Carnations seemed a
little pedestrian for the Laughing Man, but maybe he had decided to change
things up. Or maybe I had a secret admirer. That didn’t seem all that likely,
though. Had Llewellyn Carter worked out where I was and decided to send them as
a peace offering? No. He’d have had to know I’d just set them on fire and send
him the ashes.

The card
was in a small white envelope. Someone had written
Hope You Like These!
on it. Underneath the words they’d drawn two little hearts.

My
stomach did a flip-flop. I sat the card down on the dresser, then picked up the
Glock and went back to the window to look outside again. Nothing had changed.

I
thought for a minute about what to do, then I went to the dresser, took my
vodka out, and tossed it into my suitcase. My laptop followed it, along with my
toothbrush and everything else I had in the bathroom. I jammed my dirty clothes
in on top and zipped the suitcase shut. The .45 Dan had given me went on my hip
and the Glock found its place in my shoulder holster. I looked around. That was
everything I had in here other than my Laughing Man files, and I wasn’t going
to try to move them now.

There
was no small amount of nostalgia involved in leaving the room. It had been home
for a while. There was no way in hell I was staying here, though, and it was
hard to say when I’d be back, or
if
I’d be back. I took a last look at
the flowers on the table and then headed for my car.

I called
Dan as I drove up I-15. “What’s going on?” he answered. “Don’t tell me you
actually want the interview?”

“I’m
disappearing,” I said. “Go to my motel and get my files. You shouldn’t have any
trouble getting a key from the desk. The guy likes me. Don’t tell him I’m
checking out, though. As far as anyone else is concerned I’m still there.”

Dan
inhaled sharply. “What the hell is going on?”

“Someone
sent me flowers today.”

“The
Laughing Man? That’s nothing new. Why are you running? Did he make a threat?”

“That’s
the thing, Dan,” I said. “They weren’t from the Laughing Man. They were from
the copycat.”

“What?”

“He
knows where I am, Dan. He knows me.  I don’t know what this is yet, but…I guess
I’m part of it now.” I couldn’t think of anything else to say. “I’ll call you
in a while.”

Dan
started to say something but I hung up and tossed the phone onto the seat
beside me. I didn’t feel like talking. I felt like shooting someone. Talking
was just going to have to wait.

Chapter 17

I ignored
half a dozen calls from Dan as I drove up the freeway. He finally gave up,
which I took as a good sign. He’d be on his way to the motel to see what was
what. Meanwhile, I needed to find a new place to live. I obviously hadn’t been
careful enough last time. That was what I got for checking into a hotel under
my own name. It was time to be someone else. Julia Roberts, maybe.

How the
hell did Julia Roberts check into hotels anonymously, anyway? Most places made
you show identification. Somehow I doubted she had a fake driver’s license. Or
maybe she did. The truth was I didn’t know much about Julia Roberts.

I made a
stop at my bank and took out ten grand in cash. I wouldn’t be using plastic to
pay for anything for a while. Debit and credit cards were easy to trace. Cash
was anonymous. Anonymity had just become even more important to me than it had
been before.

The only
reason I was still alive today was that the Laughing Man valued playing our
game more than he did just killing me outright. He’d had me at his mercy twice
and could have ended me with a flick of his straight razor. But doing that
meant the game was over, and he didn’t get to have any more fun. He’d never
find a playmate he enjoyed as much as he did me. The copycat was another
situation entirely. What that unstable asshole was up to I didn’t know yet, but
I didn’t have a way to hunt him and the cops hadn’t gotten very far. Sarah was
still asking
me
for advice, which meant she had nothing. Death didn’t
scare me; I’d accepted that I was going to die young a long time ago. Dying for
nothing bothered me a great deal, though. Having some idiot walking up behind
me and sticking a knife in my neck wasn’t the way I wanted to go out. I’d
either die by my own hand, or by the Laughing Man’s. Nobody else got to dance
with me.

I found
a motel near Miramar that looked like it was on the edge of being condemned.
Compared to this place my old motel was the Ritz Carlton, but this one had good
sight lines of the parking lot and the nearby streets. It would do. I went into
the office where an older man in his 60’s sat behind a desk that also looked to
be falling apart. For a moment I thought I saw a group of cockroaches doing
aerobics in the corner by the copy machine.

“I need
a room,” I said. “I’ll pay cash up front.”

The old
man looked me up and down. “It’s thirty-five dollars a night. Includes tax.”

Those
were flophouse rates for San Diego. “You rent by the week?” I didn’t plan to
stay long, but I didn’t want to ever be in this filthy office again, either.

“$240 if
you want a week.”

I
counted out five hundred-dollar bills onto the desk. “Give me two weeks. Keep
the change.”

The
clerk glanced at the cash but didn’t make a move to take it. “You a drug
dealer? You don’t look like a drug dealer.”

“I’m
someone who wants to be left alone.”

“Prostitute,
then? I don’t care, mind you. You wouldn’t be the only one here. I just don’t
want trouble in the parking lot.”

I stared
at him. “Do I look like a prostitute?”

“They
never do, at first.” He shrugged. “I’ll need an ID.”

I put
another hundred on the desk. When he didn’t say anything I added another, and
then another on top of that. “Fine,” he said. “Forget the ID. You were never
here.”

“I don’t
want housekeeping knocking on the door.”

He
snorted. “That’s not going to be a problem.”

I gave
him a serious look. “If anyone asks about me, or comes by here looking for a
woman my age and describes me, it would be worth something to me to know about
that. You understand? If you got me a description of whoever it was, or footage
from a security camera, that would be worth even more.”

The
clerk squinted at me. “You famous or something?”

“I’m
Julia Roberts.”

He
laughed. “You’re pretty, but you sure as hell aren’t Julia Roberts. I’ll keep
an eye out for you. You need anything, let me know.” He looked out the window
at my Mustang. “You come in that?”

“Yeah.
Don’t take down the license plate number. Just make sure I don’t get towed.”

“They
don’t come unless I call them. You got a dead body in the trunk or something?”

“Not
yet. It’s still early, though.”

My phone
buzzed as I was lugging my suitcase into the first-floor room I’d been given.
It was Dan calling again. “Hey,” I answered.

“I’m in
your room,” he said. “Where are you?”

“Gone,”
I said. “Gone like the wind. Wind that was in a hurry, even.”

“Damn
it, Nevada…”

“I’m
near La Jolla,” I lied. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to hide from you. Just
everyone else. You see the flowers?”

“Yeah.
The card is a dead giveaway. How did the copycat find you?”

The
Laughing Man had been sending me gifts for years, usually with a card attached.
On the card he’d write a friendly message, and he always drew a laughing face.
The drawing wasn’t any more elaborate than a circle for a head, with a few
lines sketched inside to make eyes, a nose, and a mouth, but it was always the
same. He’d never drawn a heart. Even if he’d been sane enough to entertain
romantic feelings for me, he’d have considered that an inelegant way to express
them. “I was staying under my own name there,” I said. “I figured the Laughing
Man would be able to find me if he really wanted to, but I didn’t think anyone
else gave a shit.”

“Someone
else does,” Dan said. “I’ll get this over to the forensics guys. We probably
won’t get a fingerprint, but maybe they’ll find something we can use.”

“I doubt
it,” I said.

“So do
I.”

“He did
do the card himself, though, so he’d have had to go into the flower shop. Maybe
someone would remember him.”

“I’ll
check it out. Tell me where you are.”

“No.”

“
What
?
You just said you weren’t hiding from me.”

“I’m
not,” I said. “I’m hiding from the fleet of patrol cars you’ll send to babysit
me the minute you know where I am.”

He
paused just long enough to try to think of a good lie. “I wasn’t going to do
that.”

“Wow,” I
said. “That was the best you could do? You are the worst liar of all time.”

“Nevada…”

“You
could have said, ‘Nevada, I respect your judgment and would never try to force
bodyguards on you,’ or something like that.”

“Nevada…”

“Wait, I
know,” I said. “You could have tried, ‘Nevada, we live in dangerous times, but
as long as you
promise
to be careful I’ll respect your wishes.’ See,
that might have worked. You’d have been playing on the fact that you know how
seriously I take promises, so if you managed to get one out of me, you might
think I’d believe you in turn.”

Dan
didn’t say anything for a long minute. I imagined if I cracked an egg on his
head right now it would fry in a great hurry. “You okay, Dan?” I asked. I liked
needling him a bit, but this was a time it was important not to go too far. If
I did, he might be willing to go as far as defying department protocol and
having my cell phone traced. And if he did that, shortly afterward he’d be
wondering why their tech guys
couldn’t
get a location on my phone. I
wasn’t about to tell him about the modifications that had been made to it. He’d
start wondering what kind of company I was keeping.

“All
right, Nevada,” he finally said. “But I am going to want to see you. I’ll call
to check in after I hit up the flower shop.”

“Sounds
good,” I said.

“And
what are you going to do until then?”

“I don’t
know,” I said. “I’ll think of something.”