He took the same right, following the van's route. Three blocks ahead of him, he saw it turn north onto Aurora, State Highway 99. A four-lane road with occasional lights, the traffic was typically congested and unpredictable. Boldt slowed at the next red light, but ran it. Getting the hang of this. Maybe he would attract the attention of a traffic cruiser. He craned across the front seat and located the dash-mount flasher. He tossed it up onto the dash and threw the switch, facing the blue, pulsating light forward. He forced his place into the left lane and put his foot down. By switching lanes repeatedly, the van continued to pull away from him. Boldt was no match for such maneuvers. He lost sight of it as it followed a long, arching turn to the right. He stepped on it.
A police cruiser approached in the opposing lanes. Boldt rolled down his window and beat on the side of his car, signaling-he hoped-for backup. His eyes left his lane for only a second, but when he looked back, the traffic ahead of him had come to a complete stop.
He slammed on the brakes, the car in an immediate skid, the remaining distance shrinking impossibly fast. He then pumped the brakes as he'd been trained to do-a half dozen times in quick little jabs. He cut his speed in half. The unforgiving back bumper of a pickup truck loomed directly ahead. Thirty yards to go. Twenty. An adrenaline rush choked him. His hands tightened on the wheel. Miles ... Liz ... Bear Berenson saying, "This here is the Lou Boldt . More brakes. Still too fast.
Too close ... Mentally, these last few seconds slowed perceptibly. He could feel the shrinking space between his vehicle and the pickup, he could somehow measure it precisely.
In desperation, he hit and held the brakes. The back tires cried out. The car fishtailed.
The pickup truck-this entire lane of trafficrolled forward as drivers anticipated a green light. This added one vehicle length of roadway between Boldt and the pickup. He skidded to a stop inches behind the pickup.
The van was sitting four cars up. He grabbed for his weapon.
Weapons were not his way, this kind of street cop work was not his work, but he saw little choice.
The driver of that van was connected to Sharon Shaffer's abduction.
The stopped traffic was nothing more than a red traffic light, not a traffic jam as he had first believed. In a moment the traffic would begin to roll again. In a moment Boldt would be doing sixty again chasing him. He checked his rearview mirror: That patrol car was nowhere to be seen. All alone.
He threw the car into PARK and approached the van in a squat from the passenger side in order to avoid the chance of being seen in the driver door mirror. He hurried between waiting cars, his back cramping. Too old for this shit. Someone behind him honked, pissed off, no doubt, that he had left his car. Oh great! he thought. Let's attract as much attention as possible.
The light changed to green. Engines revved, and traffic began moving again. He caught up to the van and, arm outstretched, took hold of the handle to the side door. He yanked, now pulled along by the van's progress. Locked! He lunged for the front door next, the van moving even faster. From behind him the volley of protesting horns continued.
He took hold of the passenger door handle and jerked upward to open it. At that very instant, a finger appeared and locked it as well. The tie didn't go to the runner: Boldt stumbled and fell. The van pulled away.
By the time he reached his car and was driving again, he couldn't see the van for the trucks, the Hondas for the hatchbacks. He stayed with it a while longer, but the van was nowhere to be seen. Without a radio and without backup, Boldt resigned himself to failure.
Depression overwhelmed him-not for what was coming from Shoswitz, he could handle Shoswitz but because a woman was missing, and Boldt was convinced the driver of this van was an accomplice in her abduction.
It was time to start all over, he decided. Time to do things right.
Time to have a little talk with Connie Chi.
Tegg had never seen Maybeck look this desperate, otherwise he might have objected to Maybeck's barging into his office unannounced. Maybeck was relegated to the back hallway, the walk-in, the disposal of waste; he was overstepping his bounds. "What is it?" Tegg complained. "The laptop's been stolen," Maybeck announced.
Tegg felt a sharp pain in the very top of his skull, and one of his tics hit him hard. He felt his shoulder lift and his head strain to meet it. He recovered and said, "Tell me about it, Donald."
"Don't call me that!"
"Start talking, Donald. This instant!"
Maybeck suffered through an explanation, trying to make himself into some kind of hero in the way he had avoided the police. Tegg was beginning to see him in terms of a corpse-just exactly how would he dispose of a person that size?
The laptop? He blamed himself for having ever entrusted such an important matter to Maybeck. It had all been by design: trying to distance himself from incriminating evidence wherever possible. But now? He had to assess his situation, to take control. The planned date of the heart harvest was inside that laptop-the entire history of their operation, if you knew what to look for. "First you handle Connie. She must be dealt with. Hmm? Nothing violent, I'm not suggesting that, just see that she's out of the way, out of town. Now! Then we get the computer back," he said. "One thing at a time. Hmm?" "Connie's first," Maybeck replied like a magpie echoing his master's voice. "Immediately."
"No problem. I know where to find her. I set that up like you told me to."
"You'll watch for cops."
"I know."
"This 'punk/ as you called him," Tegg said distastefully-he had no use for such slang-"is there some way to identify him?" Maybeck said brutishly, "I could always report it to the police."
Tegg waved a finger at him. "Don't challenge me, Donald.
Insolence will get you nowhere with me." A bonfire, Tegg was thinking. That size body was just made for a bonfire. one fire to burn the flesh, a second for the bones. Maybe even a third for those teeth. "This is your error we are attempting to correct here-let's pay particular attention to responsibility, shall we? We've discussed this all before. All before." How strangely seductive the lure of violence could be. He wanted to hurt this man. "I can handle it."
"Spare me such indulgence, would you? Dream on your own time." Tegg felt another tic coming. He squashed it with anger. Interesting how that worked, he thought-perhaps anger, always heralded as the enemy, was indeed a friend. "We will go to whatever means necessary to obtain that computer. A reward, a ransom, I don't care what you have to do."
"I can put the word out. We offer a reward, and we'll be onto this thing like flies on shit. It's password protected," Maybeck reminded. "That's one thing good about it." "There's nothing good about this!" Tegg announced He cleaned out his wallet-one hundred and fifty dollars-and practically threw it at Maybeck. "That kind of thinking is poison! Do you hear me? Poison! We need that computer back immediately. That computer is evidence, Donald! Get that into your head. That laptop is exactly what the police want. That's our battle, don't you see? And it's not one we want to fight, believe you me. No, sir. But we'll fight those we must. Hmm?
You bet we will."
"I can get it back." He waved the money at Tegg. "I have friends."
This seemed unlikely, if not impossible-especially the latter statement. "What an idiot you are!"
"Shut up!"
"An idiot, do you hear me?" He leaned toward Maybeck. "You get that laptop back, and you destroy that database before the police are any the wiser! Get rid of the van, too. If you fail in any of this, you will regret it!"