Last Shot Read online

  4th June

  To the Vector Biogenics Department of Human Trials: After some deliberation, I have decided to remove my son, Samuel Jameson (Samuel Hardy in earlier paperwork), from the Xedral Phase I and II combined study. Sam’s doctor believes that he has at least a few months, and we’re hopeful we should be able to secure an O-type liver for transplant in that time. We’ve elected to pursue this less uncertain course.

  With much thanks for your consideration,

  Tess Jameson

  Dean said, “Apparently she thought it was a choice between a guess and an outright crapshoot.”

  Wordlessly, Tim handed the letter to Bear, but Dolan snatched it away and read it while Bear occupied himself with the fax copy.

  “The agreement requires written notice if a prospective subject decides to drop out,” Dean said, “and written notice we received.”

  “She wrote that under duress,” Bear said.

  “A handwritten letter? A full page?” Dean shook his head, as if saddened to see Bear clutching at straws. “Send it to your handwriting analysts. They can tell when one has written at gunpoint, if I am to trust my le Carré.”

  The letter was dated four days before Tess’s murder. The day before she’d called Melissa Yueh for an appointment. Maybe she’d discovered something in the three-day interim between firing her lawyer and yanking Sam from the study. Something to do with what she’d seen on Chase’s BlackBerry. But they couldn’t explore that possibility unless Pete worked magic with the digital enhancement.

  Bear was still forging through denial. “The trial starts what? Monday?”

  Still regarding the letter, Dolan nodded faintly.

  “She fought to get Sam into that study. He was dying, on a clock. She’s gonna opt for a liver transplant—that they were way down the list for—when they were just two months away from starting gene therapy?” Bear shook his head, aggravated, it seemed, at all of them, Tess included. “I don’t buy it. Unless you escalated your threats. Unless you scared her so much she decided to stay away from you.”

  “At the cost of her son’s life?” Dean chuckled. “I assure you—not a woman of that constitution. It was a big decision. She got cold feet. We see it all the time.”

  “Right,” Tim said. “Hysterical, emotional Tess Jameson.”

  Dean shrugged. “Out of character, perhaps, but consider the stakes. An experimental protocol, a young life on the line. These are not matters to be taken lightly. And bear in mind, once a patient begins gene therapy, he is removed from the organ-donor list.”

  “It does explain a lot. What it doesn’t explain is how a few days ago you maintained no recollection of this woman.”

  “I never maintained anything of the sort. I fear you’re mistaking me for my younger son.”

  Dolan’s hand was trembling; he’d creased the letter. “How could you not tell me? That it was her choice?”

  “I couldn’t see how the manner in which this woman opted for euthanasia for her son was relevant to your work,” Dean said.

  “It would have mattered to me.”

  Dean leveled his hard, dark eyes at Dolan. Dolan’s shoulders lowered, and then he eased back into the club chair.

  Bear said, “Tess had better judgment than that.”

  “Yes.” Dean sighed. “But she wasn’t well. She committed suicide within the week. Depression is a serious illness”—deadpan—“that must be medicated.”

  “About that,” Bear said. “You might be interested to know Tess Jameson’s case has been reopened. As a murder.”

  Dolan jerked in a deep breath, but Dean just calmly said, “Really?”

  Tim said, “So you knew she was killed?”

  “Why would I know that?”

  “Her brother knows,” Bear said, “and he holds you responsible and intends to kill you. And he’s willing to literally swim through shit to do it.”

  “Well, I’m sure that a delusional prison escapee has all the right answers.”

  Dolan couldn’t help himself and broke in. “She was killed? How do you know?”

  Tim said, “Tess was left-handed. The entry wound was on the left side of her head. Only problem is, she was a right-handed shooter.”

  “Couldn’t she have used her other hand? Lots of left-handed people are pretty ambidextrous.”

  “I don’t know, Dolan,” Bear said. “Gun to temple. Pretty important moment. I think you’d want your shooting hand.”

  “How…? Who do you think did it?” Dolan asked.

  “Sources tell us she was murdered by a contract killer called the Piper,” Tim said.

  Dolan looked shocked, his Adam’s apple vibrating.

  Bear said, “But what we’re more interested in is who hired the Piper.”

  “And?” Dolan said.

  “Tess was pregnant,” Tim said, “with Chase’s child.” He eyed Dean. “That’s a start, though I’m sure there’s more to the story.”

  Dolan sank back in the chair as if he’d lost all strength. “Chase’s? You have proof of this?”

  “Of course not. Can’t do a DNA analysis on cinders, now, can you?” Dean’s tone never wavered, but he tugged a handkerchief from his pocket, fluffed it out, and dabbed his forehead. “Now, if you don’t mind, I have a son to put into the ground and a presentation to finish for him.” He tapped a button on his desk, and the door opened, the executives shuffling in. Briefcase lids snapped up and computers chimed back to life, but no one spoke.

  Bear walked out, but Tim lingered a moment, noting the contrast between Dean’s reengagement and Dolan’s near-catatonic repose.

  Dean and his team were back in the swing by the time he slipped out.

  Chapter 59

  Other kids ran and squealed with after-school exertion, but Sam slumped in the swing, his jaundiced face lax with exhaustion. The swings on either side of him were empty, the only unoccupied pieces of playground equipment in the whole park. The sole trail of footprints across the sand pit was his own.

  It took two tries for his hoarse voice to grow loud enough for Kaitlin to hear him over the clanking of the seesaws: “Push me.”

  She rose from the bench and headed toward him, dodging a jump-rope threesome and a swirl of kids hanging from the merry-go-round. Her waitstaff vest was unbuttoned, her dress sleeves cuffed. Though it was just past four, a blanket of clouds blotted the sky, a premature dusk that left their house, a mere block away, blended into gray.

  Kaitlin reached Sam and gave him a soft push, getting him going again. “You ready to go home?”

  “Ten more minutes.”

  “We gotta get dinner going.”

  Together they said, “I’m not hungry.” She laughed, and he managed a smile.

  Dylan threaded through the playground on his dirt bike. The other kids quieted a bit, noting the older boy’s presence. He was only eleven, but thick like a young teenager, and his fake toughness was palpable, precocious.

  “What’s a matter, Piss-Eyes?” Dylan shouted. “Can’t pump yourself?”

  Sam said softly, “Okay. Let’s go home.”

  Dylan popped a wheelie, then rose up, shoving down on the pedals, the bike jerking side to side as he burst from the park. He got about ten yards down the street when a form melted from the sidewalk bushes, stepping in front of him and grabbing his handlebars so he slid forward, racking his nuts on the high bar.

  “Ow! What the hell!”

  “You’re gonna leave that kid alone.”

  The boy yanked his handlebars back, but they didn’t budge in Walker’s hands. “You’re a grown-up. What are you gonna do?”

  Walker leaned forward over the grips, and here the kid’s eyes flickered. “I’m gonna hunt you down, in your bed, while you sleep, and cut out your fuckin’ heart. That’s what I’m gonna do.”

  He released the handlebars, and the kid jerked back in sudden recoil, tangling in his bike. He scrambled up, running and dragging his bike beside him until he could swing a leg over the seat and pedal furio
usly away.

  Walker continued toward the park’s entrance. Kaitlin and Sam stepped through the gate. Sam looked weak, sagging against her side. A noticeable deterioration even from three days ago, when Walker had first seen him at the house.

  Walker started toward them, but Sam just stared at him blankly, then looked away. Kaitlin stiffened. Walker stepped to the fence, putting a parked ice cream truck between him and the street. “What?”

  Sam spoke quietly and with impressive anger. “You don’t care about anything.”

  Walker said, “That’s the first smart thing you’ve said.”

  “Like my life doesn’t suck enough already.”

  Walker looked at him, feeling a grind deep in his chest. “Guess what you win when you complain?” He held up his hand, fingers and thumb curled to shape a zero.

  Sam said, “Screw you,” and sulked off toward home.

  Kaitlin called after him, “I’ll be there in a minute, Sammy.” The lightness at her eyes faded when she turned back to Walker. “You told him that he’d get his gene if he helped you? How could you promise him that?”

  “I didn’t know what to say.”

  “Yeah, you sure didn’t.” She crossed her arms, locking down a shudder. “Why are you here?” She nodded at his hesitation, her suspicions confirmed. “You need help.”

  “Never mind.”

  “Gladly. We don’t want to see you again.”

  He watched her walk off. She jogged a few steps to catch up to Sam, then slung an arm across his shoulder. The kid was walking slowly, like a windup toy winding down.

  Walker strode back to the parallel street where he’d parked the Accord—his home for the time being. When he set his elbow on the console, it struck the microcassette recorder, turning it on.

  Dean’s voice said, “Our guns are bigger. And our leverage better.”

  The odd ache in Walker’s chest returned. It wasn’t until he’d hit the freeway and picked up speed that he registered it might not be anger.

  Chapter 60

  Tim nosed out from behind a moving van and floored it, ignoring Bear, who crossed himself elaborately. Tim leaned forward, speaking loudly into the Nextel speaker-mounted on his dash. “Why don’t we have a full rundown on Pierce Jameson?”

  Guerrera, from the command post, sounded irritated. “We do.”

  “Not thorough enough.”

  “I told you, he’s clean now.”

  “Then run his past associates from when he wasn’t. And why the hell can’t anyone get anything on the Piper? Or the Aryan Brotherhood hit men?”

  Wearing a Mona Lisa smile, Bear ticked a finger at the rearview mirror.

  “Shit—gotta go.” Tim swore at the flashing blue lights and pulled over onto the shoulder, his aggravation mounting.

  No updates of any worth from the task force. Guerrera had used the reverse directory to source the fax number tattooed across the top of Tess’s letter. She’d sent it from the dental office she’d managed—no big surprise there, since Tim didn’t remember seeing a fax machine in her house.

  Tim clicked on his interior light to give the cop good visibility, rolled down his window, and put his hands at the ten and two, his left gripping his badge and creds. The CHP officer was fully decked out—riding gloves, white bulb of a helmet, mirrored glasses despite the hour. “Step out of the car, please, sir.”

  “I’m a federal officer. Take a look at the badge in my hand.”

  “Impressive. Now, out of the car, pal.”

  Tim noticed Bear’s shoulders heaving silently, so he turned and squinted into the flashlight beam. Pete Krindon chuckled and slid into the backseat, unscrewing his helmet from his mop of fire-red hair. He imitated Tim’s tough-guy voice, “‘I’m a federal officer,’” and then he and Bear had another good laugh.

  “I oughta haul you in,” Tim said. “What the hell are you doing impersonating a cop?”

  “Same thing you’re doing impersonating one. Only you don’t know who authorized me.” Pete whipped off his glasses, fogged them with a breath, and polished them on his sleeve. His hand flicked inside his vinyl jacket and withdrew a flat-screen monitor the size of a school notebook.

  Bear said, “Cool. I want one.”

  Pete shifted forward, laying the screen on the console. A paused image of Tess in Chase’s G-Wagen outside The Ivy, her head bent over his BlackBerry. Pete tapped around with a stylus, smoothing out the grainy picture in waves as the software compared each pixel to its neighbors and adjusted it accordingly. Once the freeze-frame had been enhanced to sufficient clarity, Pete diminished the window tint and zoomed in on the wireless e-mail device in Tess’s hands. “I captured her forwarding one of Chase’s e-mails, then deleting the last sent-mail entry.”

  “So Chase couldn’t tell she’d done it?” Tim asked.

  “Not from the BlackBerry at least. But what she probably didn’t know is that there’d still be a record of the forwarded e-mail on Chase’s primary computer.”

  “Which would be at Chase’s office. So he could’ve seen it when he went in to work Monday.”

  “And it probably got flagged when it hit Vector’s server. Digital security at an outfit like that—they don’t want to wind up like those bozos at Arthur Andersen.”

  Tim flipped open his notepad, checking the case chronology. The alignment of dates provided a frame for the other loose facts they’d gathered. They were far from the heart of the matter, but it seemed they were finally circling it. “On Tuesday, Tess drops Sam from the trial. Wednesday she calls Melissa Yueh—a reporter—to tell her she had something to show her. She’s killed two days later.”

  “And her hard drive was stolen,” Bear added.

  “That’s a helluva e-mail,” Pete said. “I’m thinking we’ve got a whistle-blower who drank one too many Vioxx-Celebrex milk shakes or nude JPEGs of Chase in a three-way with Bigfoot and Michael Jackson.”

  Tim said, “Did you make out what address she forwarded the e-mail to?”

  Another click set the footage rolling frame by frame as Tess’s thumbs worked the mini-keyboard. “Only these forty-seven frames are visible, just a couple seconds plus,” Pete said. As Tess continued, her forearm blocked the BlackBerry screen and keypad from view, and then the angle was lost on the unit altogether. “All I could make out was that the address ended with ‘azzu-dot-com.’”

  “So what do we do with that?” Bear asked.

  “You don’t do anything with that, for you are a mere bumbling deputy. But I do several things with that. The logical domain name was ‘pizzazzu-dot-net,’ one of those cheap-ass banner-intensive ISPs. Working off the assumption that she forwarded the e-mail to herself—the obvious bet given how she covered her tracks—I tried the typical screen-name variations. They all bounced back undeliverable. So I sat down on my doughnut break and had another look at Ms. Tess. Well-put-together girl, not a lot of money. You see her jeans label?” He reversed Tess out of the Mercedes. A few clicks brought the brand name in question into view above a hip scarf. “Tarz. It’s Turkish for ‘style.’ Turkish textiles—great quality and cheap as dirt.” Pete regarded Bear’s rumpled jacket. “You might consider looking into it. Only one company distributes Tarz in the U.S. They’re based in Paterson, New Jersey, and they’re online only. So I called, told them I was Tess Jameson’s personal assistant and I never received an e-mail receipt for my last order, could they double-check the e-mail they had on record.”

  Bear said, “And?”

  “Tuffnuff-at-pizzazzu-dot-net. Cracking her password wasn’t hard: Sammy. But here’s where I hit a wall. Pizzazzu deactivates an account and clears the mail cache after it’s inactive for two months. Hell, she probably set up the account just to receive this e-mail.”

  “And we’re at?”

  “Two months and eight days.”

  “What now?”

  Pete shrugged. “I can’t recover the e-mail from her computer because the hard drive was—wisely—switched out.”

  “Mayb
e she printed the document and it’s hidden at her house,” Bear offered.

  “And the Piper elected to whack her and steal the hard drive but not check under the mattress? If she did have a hard copy, you can bet your ass he didn’t leave it behind.”

  Bear looked at Tim as if to say, A little help here, but Tim was sorting through Bear’s last words. He pictured Tess’s cluttered workspace in her bedroom—what was missing from it?

  “You’re right,” Tim said slowly to Bear, “she would’ve wanted a printed copy of whatever she found in the e-mail to bring to her meeting with Yueh.”

  “But…” Bear circled a pawlike hand, a monkey who’d flipped the script on the organ grinder.

  Tim was still putting it together, the thoughts a half step ahead of his words. “She didn’t have a fax machine, so she faxed her letter to Vector from work.”

  “So? What’s that give us?”

  “No printer either. That’s why her letter to Vector was handwritten.”

  Pete snapped his fingers, coming upright in the backseat. “She would’ve forwarded the e-mail to her work e-mail address—”

  “To print it there,” Bear finished triumphantly.

  Tim squealed out from the shoulder, throwing Pete back in his seat. “Come with us,” Tim said. “You’re dressed for it.”

  A slender woman with clean, pleasing features and maroon-rimmed eyeglasses pushed around some paperwork behind the reception window. On the counter a ceramic tooth held a stack of WESTIN DENTISTRY business cards in caricatured hands.

  Tim tapped his knuckles on the glass, and the woman looked up with a smile. A pencil protruded from her dark brown hair above her ear.

  “Can we see Dr. Westin, please? We need to ask him a few quick questions.”

  “That’s me.” She stood—not far—and offered a hand. “Michelle Westin.”

  Behind Tim, Bear fake-coughed his amusement.