"Any idea who?" Dublowski asked.
"No. Like I said, we're not sure how this happened tonight."
"Can I?" Parker asked, pointing at the phone.
Sam nodded. "We got all we need. You can look at it, but I need it back."
She tried to pry the phone out of Takamura's hand, but the fingers wouldn't budge.
"Here." Dublowski offered her a Leatherman, open to the pliers.
"Jesus," Parker muttered.
"I'll do it," Dublowski said. He used the pliers to pry back the dead fingers one by one until he could remove the phone. "What's the cord?" he asked as he worked.
"It's an adapter for a computer. So you can send from a laptop over the cell phone with a modem."
He handed the phone to her. She pushed some buttons. "Here's the last number he called. Less than an hour ago."
Dublowski looked. "It's on post."
Parker wrote it down.
"Was there a laptop in the car?" Dublowski asked.
Sam shook his head. "Nope."
Parker pulled out her own cell phone and dialed the number. She pulled the phone away from her ear when she heard the static hissing in it. "It's a modem."
"First thing we do" — Dublowski was staring at Takamura's body—"we find what that modem is connected to."
"Where did he live?" she asked.
Sam took a deep drink of coffee, then crushed the Styrofoam cup. "Well, that's another thing. We got his address from his wallet. He lived outside Aberdeen on State Road 211. Just so happens the Aberdeen Fire Department responded to a call at the same address thirty minutes ago. Last I heard a trailer there burned to the ground."
Parker glanced at Dublowski.
"Mind me telling what's going on?" Sam added.
"If I had a clue, I'd tell you," Dublowski said.
"He had your number in his pocket, Dan. Don't bullshit me. I think we have a homicide here."
Dublowski sighed. "I'm telling you the truth, Sam. I don't know. But if he was killed and his trailer was burned down, then this is bigger than you or I and I don't think you're going to find the killer."
Sam nodded slowly. "Government shit."
"I don't know," Dublowski said. "But it's deep." He turned to Parker. "Let's go."
The two of them slowly walked to his car. They got in and Dublowski started the engine.
"What the hell is all this about?" Parker broke the silence as they left the scene of the accident behind.
"I don't know." Dublowski's jaw was working. "All he was doing was checking on people, looking for whoever killed my daughter. And he must have hit a live wire. Maybe it's a wire connected to her, maybe it ain't. But he's dead and I'm gonna make someone pay for that."
"You said this might be connected to the government back there," Parker said. "What did you mean by that?"
"I didn't say that; Sam did."
"But you did nothing to contradict him."
"You'd be surprised at the shit that goes on," Dublowski said cryptically.
"Actually," Parker said, "no, I wouldn't. I was in the Omega Missile launch control center, remember?"
Dublowski pounded a meaty fist into the dashboard, startling her. "What's wrong?" she asked.
"Takamura was just a kid. It shouldn't…" Dublowski just shook his head. The rest of the trip was made in silence.
Chapter Sixteen
"There’s a lot of drugs, sex, you name it, they do it." The driver of the car pointed out the window to a shadowy group gathered on a street corner. "Dealers. I've seen dependent girls — and boys — selling themselves to get money to buy drugs."
The car's wipers made loud squeaks every time they swept across the dirty windshield. Thorpe shifted his gaze from the exterior of the car to the driver. Morty Lorsen was the next point of contact that Master Sergeant King had directed him to after Major Rotzinger had turned out to be a bust. Morty was a wizened old man, so short he could barely see over the steering wheel, a thin fringe of white hair framing his wrinkled and age-spotted head.
King had told Thorpe that Lorsen was a retired master sergeant who had settled in Germany, his last duty station. Married to a German woman, he had spent almost half his adult life in Germany and knew the ins and outs of Stuttgart as well as any American. He spoke fluent German with a Bronx accent, a mixture Thorpe found most interesting.
"One of the girls I'm looking for didn't do drugs and she wouldn't have been standing on a street corner trying to sell herself," Thorpe said.
Lorsen gave him a sideways glance. "Says who? Her parents?"
"I knew her."
"We don't ever know kids," Lorsen said. "Even our own."
"Listen, I—"
"I've lived a lot longer than you," Lorsen interrupted. "I thought I knew things and every day I learn I don't know things." He tapped the side of his skull with a gnarled finger. "You listen to Morty, sonny boy. I know things."
"Do you know what happened to Terri Dublowski and the other girls?"
Lorsen turned a corner and drove down a narrow alley. He stopped the car, then leaned back in the worn upholstery. "Listen, my friend. I will ask around. But you might not like the answers you get."
Thorpe pulled out several bills and placed them on the seat between them. "I just want an answer."
Lorsen glanced at the money. "We Americans think we can buy everything."
"I was told you worked as a private investigator."
Lorsen pocketed the money. "I do. And I'm an American. You think you know so much, who were the guys watching your meet with Rotzinger?"
"How do you know about that?" Thorpe asked.
"Because I was watching you meet with Rotzinger," Lorsen said. "And there was other surveillance there. Lots of people around here watching each other."
"Who do—" Thorpe stopped as his phone rang. He pulled it out. "Thorpe."
"Mike, it's Parker."
He could tell by her voice that something was wrong. "What happened?"
"Takamura's dead."
Thorpe sank down into the car seat. "What happened?"
"His car hit a tree. The police think it might be a homicide. His trailer was burned down also."
"Jesus," Thorpe said. "What have we got into?"
"I don't know. He called Dan just before he was killed. Said he found something. We're going to check on it."
"Be careful," Thorpe said.
"You can count on that."
"Give me a call the second you find out what it was."
"I'll do that. You be careful too."
The phone went dead and Thorpe sat back in the seat, deep in thought.
"Bad news?" Morty asked.
"Yes."
"Care to share it?"
"No."
"Come with me." Lorsen got out of the car, pulling his old green raincoat tight around his frail body and grabbing a paper bag from the back seat. Thorpe followed as Lorsen slipped into an alleyway. The brick buildings on either side were three stories high and the alley barely wide enough to allow a car to pass if it weren't for the dumpsters and cans scattered throughout.
Lorsen was walking quickly, glancing neither to the right or left. Thorpe caught movement out of the corner of his eye and his hand was on the butt of the 9mm pistol Dublowski had given him.
"Leave it alone," Lorsen said.
A girl was on her knees, giving a blow job to a man, the two of them crammed between a dumpster and the brick wall. The man was watching Thorpe torn between pleasure and wariness, the girl concentrating on the job in front of her. She looked to be no more than fifteen, but it was hard to see in the dim shadows. The man was obviously over fifty.
Thorpe followed Lorsen to a narrow opening on the left side. Lorsen stepped in, motioning for Thorpe to follow. They went down a narrow space between two buildings, less than three feet wide. Lorsen suddenly disappeared to the right. Thorpe stepped up and saw that an entrance had been hewn out of the rock. He could barely see Lorsen inside. Hand firmly on the pistol grip, he stepped inside.