LITMIR.BIZ

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Governor Jed Danvers) were milling in the green room, eating cubes of cheese.

      Tom fixated on the photographs.

      Cole Kingman.

      Bobby Vega.

      Lou Hopper.

      Daniel McIvey.

      Brian McIvey.

      Roscoe Coffey.

      Names forever added to his memory. Names, like the fourteen in Atlanta, forever associated to a madman with a gun.

      And Esme still hadn’t called him back.

      He’d sent her the e-mail around 10:00 a.m. EST. It was almost 12:30 p.m. now in Amarillo, which meant it was almost 1:30 p.m. in Oyster Bay. She hadn’t e-mailed him back—he had his BlackBerry set to notify him when he received new messages at his work account. What was she doing? Surely she wanted to help out…right?

      Perhaps the seven years had changed her more than he’d expected. Perhaps he didn’t know her anymore at all.

      And yet she’d called him…

      The speakers took the stage. Gradually, the attendees settled, and sat. Mayor Lumley approached the podium. The shoulder pads in her dark blue pantsuit made her look like a transvestite.

      “Good afternoon,” she began…and then Tom tuned her out. He’d met the woman the previous night at city hall, and she’d seemed to possess the trait of being both ignorant and condescending at the same time. It was a trait most commonly found in politicians and actor-activists, and there actually was a psychological term for it. The Dunning-Kruger effect: the dumber you are, the smarter you think you are. Tom’s father, a lawman in Jasper, Kentucky, had a better phrase to describe them: “arrogant fuckwits.” As in: “there’s that arrogant fuckwit on TV again, vomiting at the mouth.”

      Tom pursed his lips in a small grin.

      “Special Agent Piper,” whispered the young Asian woman to his left, “what’s so funny?”

      She was an itty-bitty thing, with spiky faux-black hair. Twenty-two years old, if that. Her dark V-neck cardigan went down to her knees. Her right nostril was pierced. Who is she, thought Tom, and how does she know my name?

      As if psychic, she held out her hand. “Lilly Toro. San Francisco Chronicle.” She had the body of a child but the croak of a chain-smoking octogenarian.

      Tom shook her hand, didn’t notice nicotine on her fingertip. “You’re a long way from home, Ms. Toro.”

      “So are you, Special Agent Piper.”

      They spoke in hushed tones, so as not to disturb those around them, who were apparently enraptured in the mayor’s oratory.

      “I sat next to you on purpose,” she said.

      “Are you asking me out on a date, Ms. Toro?”

      “Not unless you’re hiding a vagina.” Her breath smelled of spearmint and menthol. “And call me Lilly.”

      “Why did you sit next to me?”

      A pasty gentleman to Tom’s right stopped jotting notes onto his steno pad and gave them an accusatory look.

      “Sorry, Roger,” said Lilly.

      “Sorry, Roger,” echoed Tom.

      Up on stage, Mayor Lumley wrapped up her remarks and turned the helm over to Pastor Manny Jessup. Both Roscoe Coffey and Bobby Vega had been congregants at his church. He stepped up to the podium, took a deep, steadying breath, and spoke.

      The service lasted another hour. By the time it was over, much of the mighty crowd outside had dispersed. Plastic cups and candy wrappers were strewn across the parking lot, as if the fair had just left town.

      Tom made his way to his Harley.

      “Special Agent Piper…”

      Lilly Toro, more than a foot shorter, hustled to catch up.

      “I’m in a bit of a hurry, I’m afraid, Ms. Toro…”

      “Lilly.”

      “Lilly.” He fastened his protective leggings over his slacks, lest he crash his motorcycle, shatter his bones, and accidentally bleed on his clothes. “I don’t mean to be rude, but I gave my statement yesterday at the press conference.”

      “Okay.”

      Tom offered her a sympathetic shrug and mounted his bike. The engine started with a tiger’s roar. He petted it. Good boy.

      “I was just wondering,” she yelled over the roar, “I was just wondering why you haven’t disclosed anything about the shoe boxes!”

      Tom sighed. He hated press leaks.

      “I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me who your informant is?”

      “No,” replied Lilly. “But thanks for confirming his story. Or her story. Maybe their story…”

      “You don’t really want to know why I haven’t disclosed that information, because you already know why I haven’t disclosed that information. You understand the principle of withholding key evidence because you’re doing the same thing now with me.”

      She lit up a Marlboro, blew smoke away from his face, and grinned.

      “Okay, so now, Ms. Toro, I guess I’m going to ask you what your price is for your discretion. What is it your newspaper wants to keep any mention of shoe boxes off the front page?”

      “An exclusive.”

      “Mmm-hmm.”

      “Not an exclusive on the whole case. I know you can’t give me an exclusive on the whole case. I want to report about your team.”

      “Me.”

      “‘What’s it like, firsthand, to track down a serial killer?’ I want to be embedded.”

      “Uh-huh. That’s very much not going to happen.”

      He revved the Harley.

      “You know,” she yelled, “once we print the story, you’re not going to have any leverage to tell the difference between the fake leads and the real ones! I imagine that’ll make your team’s lives a lot more complicated!”

      He gritted his teeth. Before she even said it, he knew she was right. By keeping some elements of the crime a secret, his team could sift out the crazies and the wannabes. Once those elements became public, his task force would have no easy way of confirming or denying the validity of any call they received. Their time and resources would be wasted while the real killer remained at large.

      He really hated press leaks.

      He killed the engine. Again.

      “Let me give you my number,” Tom mumbled.

      “Don’t worry,” Lilly replied. “I’ve already got it.”

      “Of course you do.” When he discovered which cop/flunky/politician was slipping information to the press… “Goodbye, Ms. Toro.”

      “Special Agent Piper, please. Call me Lilly. After all, we’re going to be seeing a lot of each other.”

      On his way to the hospital, Tom grabbed a bite to eat at Whataburger. He ate out in the restaurant’s parking lot. Eating outside, come rain or shine, was one of his private pleasures. The quality of the food itself rarely mattered—right now he was at a fast food joint, for Christ’s sake—but the combination of environment and nourishment offered Tom his few fleeting moments of peace.

      As it turned out, by midafternoon the day had become unseasonably warm, and Tom, atop his bike, gratefully shrugged off his heavy leather coat. The breeze tickled at his neck. Although the sun remained hidden behind gray clouds, it was most assuredly up there, somewhere. Trying. One couldn’t help but admire the effort.

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