David Baldacci - Memory Man

“Well, let’s go see if it shows anything,” said Bogart.

The drive only took about twenty minutes at that time of the morning and with Bogart exceeding all posted speed limits. It was not yet 4 a.m. and thus Burlington was still very much asleep. Traffic was scant, pedestrians nonexistent.

There were two people in the open-all-night pharmacy. One was behind bulletproof glass with the cash register, the other was stocking deodorant on a shelf. Both had been on duty since 8 p.m. Bogart showed the photograph of Lafferty and asked if either employee had seen her.

“I haven’t seen her tonight. But she came in the night before.”

Decker said, “Which means she might not have made it here.”

They asked for and were given the DVD from the surveillance cameras for the parking lot.

“She would have walked here,” said Decker. “It’s too close to drive.”

“And none of our vehicles are missing,” said Bogart.

They loaded the DVD into a laptop Bogart had in the SUV. There was a time stamp on the feed and Bogart fast-forwarded to right before 9:30. The frames ran as they all huddled around the screen watching intently. When they got to 9:58, Decker saw it.

“That’s her.”

Lafferty had emerged from an alley next to the pharmacy. She had taken two steps when she was abruptly pulled back into the alley.

“Run it again and slow it down,” said Decker.

Bogart did so, playing through the scene five more times and enlarging the images as much as he could on the small screen.

Decker stared at the screen intently, every pixel being memorized and placed in his head. “Can’t see who it is.”

“We can try to enlarge the shots,” said Bogart. “My guys can work wonders.”

“He knew the camera was there,” said Decker. “Just like at the school. He didn’t want to be seen. At least certain parts of him.”

“How did he overpower her so quickly?” said Bogart. “Lafferty was no weakling.”

Decker said, “There was a gloved hand at her throat. There might have been something in it. She seemed to go stiff pretty quickly. I think he injected her with a paralytic.”

“Blood test on her body will confirm that,” said Lancaster.

“So nine-fifty-eight she was taken,” said Decker.

“But her TOD was around midnight,” noted Lancaster.

“Which means they had her for two hours before they killed her,” completed Decker.

Bogart looked strained. “You said she was mutilated. Do you think they did anything else to her?”

Decker shook his head. “My wife was not raped. But she was mutilated. In that same... area,” he added.

“So what is this about?” asked Bogart. “Why do that? It makes no sense.”

“When I asked Leopold if he’d done anything else to my wife he didn’t answer. Now, the mutilation was never made public. He could only know about it if he was there, which we know he wasn’t. But someone who was there could have told him about it. But since he didn’t answer, I don’t know if he didn’t know or just didn’t want to tell me. Either way, he’s still a suspect.”

Bogart rubbed his face. “What else?”

“They had her for two hours. Probably some of that time she was conscious before they killed her.”

“What would they do to her?” asked Lancaster.

“Try to find out in which direction the investigation is going,” said Bogart.

Decker nodded at this. “They would want to know what we know. If we’d gotten to certain points or not.”

“Well, Lafferty would tell them nothing,” Bogart said sharply.

“No one is invulnerable to interrogation, depending on the tactics they use,” said Decker. “She may have talked, against her will. Regardless, to be safe, we should assume they now know what we know. Principally, that we found the underground passage.”

Bogart looked at the frozen screen, at the hand around his colleague’s neck. “But how could she not know the guy was following her?” he said. “He must have been right behind her.”

Lancaster said, “He could have been hiding in the alley.”

Bogart shook his head. “What, waiting for her to come along? How would he even know she was going to the pharmacy?”

“He could have been waiting and watching and followed her when she came out. She’d been to the pharmacy before at least once. Maybe they knew this somehow and saw an opportunity if she went there again. And she could have known he was there but for some reason didn’t feel threatened,” added Decker.

“Not feel threatened?” exclaimed Bogart. “A dark alley? A murderer running around? How would she not be on her guard?”

“She might not feel threatened if it was someone she had no reason to suspect,” elaborated Decker.

Bogart’s face turned crimson and his features ugly. “Are you accusing me or one of my men of her murder?” he snapped. “Because she doesn’t know anyone else in this shithole!”

“Not my point really,” said Decker calmly.

Bogart pointed a finger in Decker’s face. “She was left at your doorstep. Maybe you killed her, you son of a bitch!”

Decker’s face remained impassive and his words slow and deliberate. “And left her on my doorstep to incriminate myself? And then called the cops while I just sat there? If I really did something that stupid I could beat the rap on an insanity plea.”

Bogart looked like he wanted to punch Decker, but then he mastered his emotions and looked away.

Lancaster said, “Amos, do you mean someone in uniform? A cop? She wouldn’t suspect someone like that?”

“Yes,” said Decker. “That’s exactly what I meant.”

Bogart glanced at him sharply and nodded. “Right. Sorry I jumped down your throat.” He paused and then declared, “Okay, we’re going to tear that damn alley apart.” He got on the phone and called in his team. Then he turned to Decker. “We need to work on this together . We have got to stop this guy.”

Decker shook his head. “Not guy. Guys .”

“What makes you say that?” asked a startled Lancaster as Bogart stared at him. “The shooter appears to be a loner. You said that.”

“And I was wrong,” Decker said decisively.

“But what specifically makes you think there could be more than one man involved?” asked Bogart.

“Because no one can be in two places at the same time.”

Sunrise.

The clouds had gone and with them the rain. So it was a true sunrise, where the colors changed at first subtly and then suddenly transformed the heavens in a way that no other occurrence could. Short of a nuclear bomb and its towering mushroom cloud.

Yet both were transformative in their own right. One side of the world was lit, the other enveloped in blackness. The bomb’s kiss was for real. The sun’s movement was a metaphor for either darkness descending or light arising.

Decker stood there on the pavement and watched this all take place. Despite the coming light his mood remained trapped in the deepest darkness. He had not gone back to sleep after leaving Bogart and Lancaster. There would have been no point.

The 7-Eleven faced him across the width of the asphalt. It was open. It was always open. Through the glass he could see the same woman counting packs of smokes. But a different punk was mopping the floors. Perhaps “Billy” had moved on to another bucket in another town. Or maybe he was recovering from a night out with the ladies.

He didn’t know why he had come here after leaving Lancaster and Bogart. But this place kept drawing him back like metal to a magnet.

He stepped through the door, and when the little bell tinkled it felt like a drill bit boring right through his skull.