She lay down on the bed. Her Beretta was at her side. Probably by tomorrow Richard Doyle would be identified, and the police would naturally scrutinize his dealings at the bank. She and Doyle had been very careful. But if Houston Police Department brought in the Feds, and Doyle had left any traces in moving money that she didn’t know about, it was probably over. HPD was a smart force, very capable, and of course so were the Feds. She might have to run from the mob and from the FBI. She could try and cut a deal for the Witness program, but she’d known of people who went into WitSec and still got killed.
Her cell phone rang again. No caller ID. She clicked it on.
‘Ms Michaels?’ A man’s voice she didn’t know, low.
She said nothing.
‘Silent treatment, and you don’t even know me yet.’
‘Who is this?’ Eve sat up on the bed.
‘My friends call me Gooch. I met a gentleman tonight named Bucks who is very protective of you. We had to beat him up to get your phone number.’
‘I don’t know you.’
‘Bucks seemed rather desperate to know why I wanted to find you. I got the impression you’d caused him to have a bad day.’
‘What do you care?’
‘I don’t like this Bucks guy at all. He’s got a black eye right now and he doesn’t like me either,’ Gooch said. ‘He’s a common enemy to you and me.’
‘And why do you want to find me?’
‘I can explain,’ Gooch said. ‘Meet me tonight.’
‘I’m not meeting anyone I don’t know…’
‘You know the Pie Shack restaurant over on Kirby?’
She did. Pie Shack was an all-night eatery famous for delectable pies and big-plated breakfasts, an eclectic favorite with the late-night bar crowd, Rice University students, night-shift workers. It was always crowded, presumably safe. If this was a trick and Bucks was planning an ambush, it was hardly a good choice.
‘Go there. To the rear booth. We can talk. Tons of people around, no need to be afraid. Because you sound kind of nervous and upset.’
‘I’m not meeting anyone I don’t know who calls me out of the blue.’
‘James Powell. Bozeman, Montana,’ Gooch said.
She let ten seconds of silence pass, her tongue drying into sand. ‘I don’t know that name and I don’t intend to continue this discussion.’
‘The police in Montana would be interested in talking to you even after almost thirty years.’
She finally gave a coarse laugh of disbelief. ‘If you’re a blackmailer, buddy, you’ve picked the worst day possible.’
‘You have something I want,’ Gooch said, ‘but it’s not money. Skip meeting with me and I’ll happily give every bit of information I have on you to the Feds and to the police back in Bozeman. I’ll see you at Pie Shack in thirty minutes. Come alone. No gun.’ He hung up.
She was scared, but she calmly checked the clip in her Beretta and put it in her purse. The leather of the bag was thin. She could fire right through it. She had closed the curtains but now she opened them slightly, looking out across the coastal plain, covered with strip centers and housing developments and chain restaurants that made this part of Houston practically indistinguishable from any other major city. She could burrow deeper down in the sprawl, hiding in the anonymity of sameness. Rain, starting, turned the lights of suburbia into smears.
She sat back down on the bed. James Powell. She had not thought of him in weeks. You could not kill a person and wipe them from your mind, but James Powell did not haunt her every day.
James Powell. Her sons. The past rising up out of nowhere, this phone call and the strange man today, it could not be coincidence.
Eve got up and dug her car keys out of her purse.
She headed out the door.
13
‘I have a surprise for you.’ Tasha was a little breathless after the sex. The first night with Paul, him wine-drunk, had been nothing to savor. But tonight, nervous and seeking release, he had been a smarter lover, conscious of her pleasure, taking an interest in it first with his fingers and mouth. The good, leisurely lovemaking done, she smoothed out a raised lock of his brown hair. ‘It might make your night,’ she whispered, getting up from the bed.
‘Baby, my night was already made.’
She went to her computer, checked her e-mail, keyed a button. Papers peeled out from the printer. She picked them up, read them, tossed them on his naked stomach.
‘What’s this?’ he said.
‘Credit reports.’
He picked up the pages. She waited for him to speak. He blinked at the data, but it was clear his mind was fuzzed so she sat down next to him.
‘About your problem with Eve,’ she said. ‘I know a guy who’s a black hat.’
‘A what?’
‘A hacker. Gets through computer systems. He worked with me at Houston PrimeNet as a security consultant. We both lost our jobs at the same time. Energis was our big client. They went under, we went under.’
‘Yeah,’ he said.
‘So my friend Ralph, he’s what you call socially maladjusted.’ She ran a finger along Paul’s leg, watched the flesh goose-bump. ‘He started hacking because he couldn’t find a job for the longest time. He hid himself a Trojan inside the Visa and MasterCard authentication systems.’
‘A what?’
‘A Trojan.’
Paul still gave her a blank look. ‘It’s not a condom, baby,’ she said. ‘It’s hidden computer code that does what you want. Get you account information, for example. He uses it now and then to steal an account. He’s been asking me business advice, ways we could make the most money off of this little private access. He doesn’t want to get caught before he can make serious profit.’ Tasha patted the papers. ‘I can solve your Eve problem.’
‘You could get me five million?’
Tasha took a very subtle, calming breath and locked her smile in place. ‘No, sweetpea. He can’t get you five million in cash. But let’s say Eve planned to run. And let’s say she took the precaution of getting new credit cards under new names.’
Paul’s eyes widened.
‘When a credit card is used for the first time, it creates an initial entry in the account file. So I asked him to find all first-time credit charges in Houston and Galveston for today. For planes, trains, rental cars. Hotels if she’s hiding out. And to key it to women’s names or cards with the same initials as the name.’
‘Holy shit.’ Paul stood up and scanned the pages. ‘Her name’s not here.’
‘No. And this only works if she hasn’t used the card before. But there’s twelve women who bought plane tickets, one named Margaret Scott to Detroit. That could be Eve. Or if she’s hiding in town, she might’ve rented a room. Three rented hotel rooms as initial charges as of eight tonight. Alice Masters at the Doubletree over on Post Oak. Deanna Lopez at Moody Gardens, down in Galveston. Emily Smith at the Hilton out by Addicks, out on the edge of town.’
‘My God, baby, you are amazing.’ Paul kissed her, hard, slow, grateful, and she felt him rise in her hands. She tickled him with her fingertips.
‘There’ll be time for that later,’ she said. ‘See how I can help you?’
‘Tasha, what a team we could make.’ He tongued her ear.
‘Sweetpea.’ She cupped his chin with her hands. ‘If I give you Eve Michaels, what are you going to give me?’
He smiled, put her hands back on his erection.
‘That’s a given,’ she said. ‘I’m asking for a bonus.’
‘Okay.’ He kissed her. ‘But I need to make a call, get guys out to those hotels.’ He started to scoot off the bed.
She gave him a little squeeze and he stopped, one leg on the floor. ‘Let’s move beyond bonus to an actual cut.’ She curled her feet up under her rear.
‘You’re cute when you’re smart,’ he said.
‘I’m never not cute, then,’ she said.