J. Jance: Fatal Error

Mina reached into her purse and pulled out a thumb drive, which she handed over to him. “I brought the latest version of the programming with me. Here it is,” she said. “Everything you need should be on that.”

The fact that Mark and Mina still had drones and were getting ready to sell working models meant that the Blaylocks had gone over to the dark side. From Richard’s point of view there was a definite upside to working the dark side-lots of money.

“It’ll take me at least six months, but that’s not a guarantee,” he said. “Fifty thou total. All communications are to be done this way, in person and eyeball to eyeball. No e-mails back and forth; no telephone communications; all payments to be made in cash. Half down; half on delivery.”

“Five months, not six,” Mina countered. “I need to be able to do the test flight before the end of January. I’m offering twenty thousand down, and ten a month until the job is completed. Plus, I’ll give you a twenty-five-thousand-dollar bonus in January after a successful test flight.”

Once again Mina reached into her oversized purse. This time she plucked out a packet of cash and handed that to him as well. “Count it if you want.”

Richard didn’t have to count it. He knew it was all there. He couldn’t help but be a little disappointed. He’d had no idea that she knew him so well. The fact that she was offering more than he’d asked was surprising.

“Oh,” Mina added. “There is one more thing. We’ll need the ability to remotely detonate this thing.”

“As in blow it up?”

“Yes,” she said. “Blow it to pieces.”

“That’s a little more complicated,” Richard said with a laugh. “But I get it,” he added. “It’s like the beginning of one of those old Mission: Impossible stories on TV where they say, ‘This tape will self-destruct in thirty seconds.’”

Mina frowned. “I don’t think I ever saw that movie.”

“It wasn’t a movie,” Richard said. “It was an old TV series. From the sixties.”

“I never saw that either,” Mina said.

But Richard had seen those shows, countless times. Ron Mills, Richard’s stepfather, had loved Mission: Impossible, especially Cinnamon. He had owned DVD versions of all three seasons. Richard had found those DVDs in the same box in the basement where he had found his mother’s prized boxed sets of Murder, She Wrote VCR tapes.

“Too bad,” he said. “You’re missing out on an essential piece of Americana.”

Mina stood up and gathered her purse. Richard didn’t bother getting up to show her out. He looked at the money-money he had never expected to see. Without having to pay taxes and at his current rate of expenditure, that much money and the rest Mina had promised him would last for a very long time.

Richard felt an immense sense of satisfaction. He had Mina Blaylock just where he wanted her. Richard knew that if there was that much money lying around just for the asking, then there was obviously far more where that came from.

Sacramento, California

Brenda’s enforced jail-based sobriety didn’t exactly take. It lasted long enough for Valerie to drive her home to Sacramento from Barstow. It lasted long enough for Brenda to be far too sober during the name-calling blowup between her sister and her mother, Camilla, when Valerie dropped Brenda off at their mother’s P Street home.

“Here’s your jailbird,” Valerie had said, opening the door so Brenda could make her way inside. “I brought her home to roost.”

Camilla heaved herself up out of the chair and hurried to meet them. “I’m so glad you’re safe,” she said, hugging Brenda close. “When I didn’t hear from you, I was worried sick.”

“She’s a drunk, Mom,” Valerie said. “She wrecked her car and she damned near killed herself. She probably would have done us all a favor if she had.”

“Valerie,” Camilla said, “you mustn’t talk like that.”

“Why not? You don’t think she’s learned her lesson, do you? Just wait. She’ll be drinking again the minute your back is turned.”

“Valerie. .”

“Save your breath, Mom. I don’t want to hear it, and the next time she gets in hot water, don’t bother calling me. I did this once. I won’t do it again.”

Valerie had slammed out the door on that note and hadn’t been heard from again. She hadn’t phoned. Camilla called and left messages. Valerie didn’t call back.

As for Brenda? Unfortunately, Valerie’s assessment proved to be correct. Brenda was all right for a couple of days, but then she got around to opening the mail, including the background check on Richard-Lowensdale, it turned out, not Lattimer. Reading through the material and uncovering the fabric of lies behind everything he had told Brenda was enough to push her off the deep end once more.

That night, after her mother was asleep, she let herself out of the house, walked six blocks to the nearest liquor store, and bought a supply of booze that she smuggled back into the house and upstairs to her room. One of the pieces of furniture in the room was her mother’s old hope chest. From Brenda’s point of view, the best thing about it was the fact that it came with a lock and key. Brenda deposited her booze purchases in among mother’s extra sheets and pillowcases, then she turned the old-fashioned key in the lock and hid the key in her purse, concealed in her hard plastic tampon holder.

She drank the rest of the night, reading and rereading the background check and fanning her anger to a fever pitch. She was furious to think that while she had been sick with worry about Richard’s health, he had been fit as a fiddle and only an hour or so away. She thought about calling him, but then she realized that wouldn’t work. He had stopped taking her calls, and once he recognized her new cell phone number, he wouldn’t take calls from that device either. No, what was called for was a visit-a personal visit, one where Brenda would have the opportunity to let Richard have it. She wanted to talk to him face-to-face and tell him how contemptible he was.

She fell asleep around four a.m. and woke up at eleven. She had breakfast in the kitchen while her mother was having lunch. Camilla greeted her daughter with a smile. “Good morning, sleepyhead,” she said. “You’re keeping the same kind of hours you did in junior high.”

“I couldn’t sleep,” Brenda said.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Camilla asked.

Yes, Brenda thought. Leave me alone. “Can I borrow your car for a while this afternoon?”

“Well, of course,” Camilla said. “When do you expect to get your own car back?”

The answer to that was never. Valerie would have spilled the truth about that in a minute. Fortunately for Brenda, Valerie hadn’t hung around long enough to do a huge amount of damage.

“They’re getting the parts in,” Brenda lied. “It’s going to be a while.”

On that sunny afternoon in early October, Brenda stocked her purse with enough booze to tide her over, then she borrowed her mother’s car keys and took off for Grass Valley in Camilla’s twenty-year-old Taurus. All the way there, Brenda rehearsed exactly what she would say to Richard Lattimer Lowensdale. By the time she reached the house on Jan Road, she was only partially drunk, but she had worked herself into a seething rage.

Ready for war, she marched up to his door, stomped across the front porch, and gave the doorbell button a furious punch. But nothing happened. Richard didn’t come to the door. The house was totally silent. Convinced he had recognized her and was simply hiding from her, she wandered around to the side of the house, where she found a second door. This one didn’t have a doorbell, but it did have a series of glass panes.