His pale eyes narrowed, the tips of his brows curling down toward the bridge of his nose. "How do you know that?"
"We're friends. He was worried about his wife's safety, so he came to me. I thought he might be able to help me figure out who killed Royal Peterson. We've been helping each other."
"Are you lying?"
"You still have my cell phone?"
"Yeah."
"Hit redial. You'll see his number. He's the last person I called. Or check caller ID. His number's in there."
Ramp retrieved the cell phone from his duffel and hit the redial button. He read the number that came up and then killed the call.
Lucy asked, "You know how to work it? Check the directory and you can match the name and number."
"Yes," he said, touching a series of buttons. "There it is. Alan Gregory."
"See?"
"He could be anybody. You could be playing me right now. How do I know you're not lying?"
Lucy said, "He knows about Paul."
Ramp smiled in a way that seemed full of compassion and something else. She wasn't sure about the something else. "You think Naomi told this Alan Gregory what the plans were?"
"I know he knows some things. I also know he was reluctant to tell me some other things."
"But he knows about the bombs?"
"Yes. And that you're angry at the justice system."
His jaws tightened. "She told him that?"
"Yes."
"What else? Tell me."
"He knows about the wouldn't-it-be-cool games."
"God, really? The man might really know something."
Lucy's phone suddenly came alive, chirping in his hand.
Ramp stared down at the phone. Didn't answer it.
He asked Lucy, "Who do you think was trying to call you?"
She hesitated a heartbeat or two. "My partner. His name is Sam Purdy. He's a detective in Boulder. And he's my friend."
"You were trying to decide whether to lie to me right then, weren't you? What did you decide?"
"I decided to tell you the truth." She paused. "Mostly because you can check for yourself on caller ID."
She waited for him to check the caller ID log. He didn't. "So your friend, this detective, he makes a habit of calling you in the middle of the night?"
"Sam knows I'm missing by now. I told him I'd check in with him when I got back from seeing your grandmother."
"What will he do if he thinks you're missing?"
"Whatever he can think of to find me. Sam's relentless and he's pretty resourceful."
"What does he know?"
"Whatever Alan Gregory knows, Sam knows. They're good friends."
"You making this whole thing up as you go along? You're pretty good if you are."
"It's all true, Jason."
"Do they know about the bombs?"
"For sure? No. But they're the ones who found the bomb at Royal Peterson's house, and Dr. Gregory was so worried that you might have targeted his wife with a bomb that he brought an explosive-sniffing dog into his house and to check his cars."
"Really? You mentioned his wife already. Who is she?"
"She's a deputy DA in Boulder who was tangentially involved in Marin's rape case."
"Her name?"
"Lauren Crowder."
"Doesn't ring a bell. I don't think Marin mentioned her."
Lucy shrugged to hide her sense of relief.
Ramp was flipping the phone into the air, catching it again as it completed one end-to-end rotation.
She said, "The special part you mentioned that would be coming at the end of the day. That's part of your route?"
"It is."
"What good am I in all this?"
"So far you're just good company. I appreciate that. I'm still considering what else you'll do."
"You're going to kill me, aren't you, Jason?" The use of his name was intentional. She even emphasized it.
He stepped back from the window and moved halfway into a shadowed place close to the wall. "I don't think I'll have to. I really hope not."
"I don't understand."
"If I'm still standing at the end of the day, your job is over. I won't have to kill you."
"But if they catch up with you before that?"
"That's up to them, of course. Your presence is to ensure that I get to keep going. To finish what I started."
"But there will be bombs close by all day long. Who knows what will happen? That's what you're saying?"
Ramp's hand flashed toward his right hip as though he'd been stung there by a yellow jacket.
The swift movement of his hand caused Lucy's breath to catch in the middle of her chest as though she'd suddenly been dipped in ice water.
He lifted a beeper from his belt and lit the screen.
"Wow," he said. "What a surprise. I have to go make a call. I'm going to have to gag you. I'm sorry."
"Please, no."
"I said I'm sorry. You want something to drink first?"
CHAPTER 41
They wheeled her to X-ray. She went out a back door when the tech went to get something."
A young detective whom I'd never met was the one doing the I-can't-believe-it-but-we-lost-her shuffle. Even without glancing at his face, I could tell that Sam Purdy wanted to take someone's head off and was considering whether this young man's noggin would be a good place to start.
Sam said, "We were watching her, right?"
"Yeah, we had someone outside her door for her protection. He followed her wheelchair down to X-ray and checked out the room. He thought the other door in the room went to a place for developing the X-ray film or something. Didn't know it led to a hallway."
"So she went out that other door? That's how she got away from him? She just walked away?"
"Yes."
"What's she wearing? One of those hospital gowns?"
"Probably not. There's a supply closet close by where scrubs are stored. We found a gown on the floor by the scrubs. We think it was hers. So she's probably wearing scrubs. Light purple. You know, like lavender."
Sam glared. My guess was that he was reacting to the detective's use of "lavender."
"She's barefoot?"
"She's wearing a pair of those little foam hospital slippers, as far as we know. They weren't with the gown."
"What kind of head start did she get?"
"A few minutes. Maybe five."
"The building get sealed?"
"Not for another five or so minutes after that."
"Maybe ten?"
"Yeah, maybe ten. Seven or eight, you know."
"She's ambulatory?"
"Unfortunately, yeah. Injuries from the bomb were to her upper body. Worst damage is to her left hand, from shrapnel. That's what she was in surgery for earlier. Her face is cut up, too. She has a bandage on her cheek right here, between her ear and her eye." He touched his own face to demonstrate the spot. "Got patched up by a plastic surgeon."
"So she's ambulatory and she has a ten- to fifteen-minute head start. She could be somewhere in this big hospital or she could be out on the street."
"That's the situation."
"What did you get before she ran?"
"Not much. Her surgeon only gave me about five minutes with her at first. She was still pretty groggy from the anesthesia and the painkillers, said she didn't remember anything at all about the bombing. Kept asking me about her mom as though she couldn't believe she was dead."
"But she knew?"
"She knew."
Sam inhaled like he was about to blow up a balloon. Then he sighed. "Nothing at all about this guy Ramp?"