She opened the envelope and frowned as she read the note:
Good morning, Spooky-
Meghan and I have gone to visit an old friend of mine. I’m hoping to talk him into staying with us for a little while. I know you’ll like him…
“Don’t be too sure.” She read on.
We should be back by early this afternoon. Meghan wants to know if you’d like to go shopping with her.
“I would rather poke myself in the eye with a sharp stick.”
I’m sorry that I haven’t seen much of you since we arrived in California. I know you are unhappy with me. I wish you weren’t, but I understand. I hope you will try to be patient for just a little while longer. I do miss you. Kit
That part made her throat feel tight and funny. She took the note over to the kitchen sink and set it on fire. It had just burst into flames when Moriarty came running in and turned the water on it.
He was giving her the evil eye. He was good at it. He didn’t look as if he had had much sleep.
“When,” he asked, “are you going to grow up?”
“When people stop treating me like a kid!”
“It works the other way around, Spooky.”
“You and Kit are keeping secrets from me!”
“This, from someone who won’t tell Kit her name?”
“He knows it!”
“Not because you’ve said it to him. What makes you think you get to have all the secrets?”
She sat down hard in a chair and crossed her arms. She swung one leg back and forth.
“When have you ever seen a grown-up sit down like that?” Moriarty asked.
“Fuck you!”
“Oh, you’re gonna make me cry if you’re not careful.”
She was silent. She stopped kicking, though.
He sat down next to her. “What’s the trouble, brat?”
She thought it would serve him right if she didn’t answer, then wondered if only kids said “serve him right.” She eyed him for a minute more before staring at the end of her bare foot. To her big toe, she said, “He doesn’t care about me anymore. He leaves me alone all day in this stupid house while he goes out with Meghan.” She looked up at Moriarty and said, “That’s the trouble.”
“How much of his lifetime do you suppose he ought to spend thinking only about you?”
“He doesn’t think about me at all.”
He waited.
“Not since Meghan.”
“Meghan was before you, kiddo.”
“What do you mean?” she asked, frowning.
He hesitated, then said, “Do you think Kit is lonely?”
“No. He’s got me. We’re a family.”
“He needs you, there’s no doubt about that.”
“That’s what you think.”
“Yes, it is what I think. I also believe that he might need other people to be part of his life, in some other way.”
“What other way?”
“Well, you keep thinking about that. And think about Kit, and not just about what Spooky likes and Spooky wants. Except for this-want me to take you out for an evil breakfast?”
She brightened for a moment, then said, “You’re tired.”
He raised his brows. “I’ll be damned, you sounded like a grown-up just then.”
She smiled at him.
“I’ll take you out to breakfast, and then I’ll come home and sleep-but only if you keep your promise to Kit about the fires.”
“That was yesterday.”
“Was there an expiration date on it?”
“No,” she sighed. “Okay. I’ll put some shoes on.”
He drove her to a little place near Decker Road that he was fond of, and they had a leisurely breakfast that seemed to revive her spirits. He was paying the bill when she told him she needed to use the restroom. He asked her to wait a minute, but she said she couldn’t, so he watched her walk back to the door leading to it. He went back to their table to leave a tip, then gave in to a chill along the nape of his neck that he trusted as completely as he hated it, and ran toward the door that led to the hallway. He shoved it open, then called through the one to the women’s room.
“Spooky?”
“In use!” came a woman’s voice.
He threw his shoulder against the door, and it easily gave way. An indignant woman sat on the single toilet seat with her pantyhose down. She shouted, “What on earth! A little privacy, if you don’t mind!”
“You see a girl-or a boy in here?”
“Which?” she asked, then quickly said, “Neither! Now for God’s sake-”
But he had turned to the other side of the hallway, and was shoving the men’s room door open. No one.
He ran out the back door and into the alley behind the restaurant. He saw a white van turning on to the small street that led to Pacific Coast Highway.
He was in the pickup truck and out of the parking lot in less than thirty seconds. He could see the van ahead weaving in and out of traffic. Keeping his eyes on it, he used his hands-free cell phone to call the house as he closed the distance.
He ordered his security team to send two men for backup. Years of training and experience didn’t fail him-his voice was calm as he said, “White van. License plate-hang on-4GHR302. Wait-just went up some little dirt road. Yes, I’m following. Call Kit. Tell him-no, just call him right now. Yes…I’m staying on…” But as he turned up the road, the cell phone signal was lost. “Damn!”
He heard the sound of a motorcycle pulling out of a dirt driveway and saw the weapon raised. He turned the wheel just in time to keep the bullet from finding its intended mark. It only grazed his forehead, which still hurt like hell’s own fire. His forehead began to bleed. The maneuver had nearly managed to knock the cyclist over, but the biker regained his balance. Moriarty’s truck fishtailed, but he recovered control. They twisted and turned higher into the canyon, the dust cloud from the van obscuring the winding road. He glanced in the side-view mirror and saw the biker raising the weapon again, just as the van went around a sharp bend ahead of him. His stomach dropped-he didn’t think the van would hold the road. He slowed for the turn, but was still going so fast he wasn’t sure he’d make it himself. He did, only to discover the van had come to a sudden stop.
If he hit it going this fast with a truck this big, he might knock the van down the embankment and kill Spooky. So he swerved, just as another shot blew a hole in the rear window. As the truck went through a guardrail, the airbag deployed, briefly blocking all sight and nearly making him scream as it hit his raw forehead. He held on to consciousness as long as he could before one of thousands of bone-jarring jolts took it from him, a few long seconds before the truck finally came to a halt at the bottom of a deep ravine.
41
LASD Homicide Bureau
Commerce, California
Thursday, May 22, 9:00 A.M.
“Alex!” Hogan called to him as soon as he came through the front door. “Just getting ready to page you. Captain wants to meet with us-now.”
Alex had just spent more than a hundred dollars on Chase’s free dog and dropped off a dog bed, leash, collar, food, dishes, brush, biscuits, and more at home before heading out for work. He had taken his climbing equipment and put it in the trunk of the car-out of canine reach. Although no one would have expected him in too early after his long night, he still hoped Hogan didn’t want to know what he had been doing this morning. “What’s up?” he asked.
“All kinds of craziness. You know where Ciara is?”
“Home, I assume. Or on her way in. You call her?”
“I called her home, her cell, and her pager-didn’t get an answer.”
“I’ll try her pager again,” he said, and used his cell phone to dial it as he walked with Hogan toward Nelson’s office.
“By the way,” Hogan said, “we located the Whitfields. They’re in Italy now, as it turns out. They didn’t seem too broken up. Asked us to have their son’s lawyer call them about his estate. Can you believe it?”