Brian Haig - PrivateSector

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“That’s your problem. Wanta hear my problem? I got a kid with my mama.”

“I’ll buy your kid a shiny new bike, a baseball glove, whatever.”

She stared into her computer screen for a long while. She finally said, “A BB gun. That’s what he wants.”

“Deal.”

I took the stairwell upstairs, tried to fix us espressos, was foiled by the machine again, settled for two cups of regular coffee, and then returned to settle in and observe Cheryl in action. A stream of curses poured out her throat every ten minutes or so. I did not regard this as a hopeful sign.

She had started at ten, and at eleven I thought I detected a faint trace of a smile. It was nearly midnight when she mumbled, “Oh, baby,” leaned back in her chair, ran her fingers through her hair, and announced, “Shit, I’m good.”

I observed a long column of e-mails on the screen.

“Could I?” I asked. She climbed out of her chair, saying, “I gotta go pee. Don’t you break nothin’.”

I began with Lisa’s oldest e-mails and worked forward. I checked incoming mail for the two files, and outgoing for any references to the Boston cases. Modern young executives, like Lisa, transact a lot of business electronically. I’m more old-fashioned, aka, a technological idiot. But even if my mastery were to extend beyond punching off and on, I prefer face-to-face and phone interaction, where a facial tic or a verbal nuance allows you to detect what’s not being said, which often is more revealing than what is. Lisa had sent or received up to a hundred messages a day.

I felt unnerved, and actually a bit sad, rummaging through the messages of a dear but dead friend. Pieces of her-Lisa’s intelligence, warmth, efficiency, and wit-jumped off the screen. I found myself stifling a sob or two.

Half her messages went to other firm members and concerned firm business, from her caseload to mundane administrative matters. I knew barely a handful of the firm’s lawyers. Most of the names were just names.

Twenty or more times a day, Lisa e-mailed friends, associates, clients outside the firm, and I recognized the names of several JAG officers. She was popular and made a point to stay in contact with her chums, passing on jokes and anecdotes, but more often just brief, cheery notes, the high-tech version of a blown kiss. Cheryl returned from the ladies’ room with two cups of espresso, and we sipped and chatted as I opened more e-mails, trying to detect anything curious or suspicious. A number had enclosures I made sure to open on the chance the legal files had been smuggled into Lisa’s file in that manner.

I noticed several e-mails to Janet, and of course I opened those, too. Nothing too personal, though from the jovial, intimate tone you could tell that Lisa and Janet shared more than just sisterhood. Lisa updating Janet on her day, Janet updating Lisa about the family, about some mutual friends, and in one of her last e-mails from Lisa a promise that a package would arrive for her any day. I checked the date, about two weeks before Lisa’s murder, and made a note to ask Janet about that package.

After another thirty minutes of this, the Jacks and Harrys and Barbaras and Marys of Lisa’s life started running together into a big friendly blur. Once or twice I read an e-mail and something funny went off in the back of my head. But nothing went off in the front of my head.

By one-thirty, Cheryl was curled up in her chair and snoring. I was on an e-mail sent by Lisa to ANCAR@SEC. GOV that read, “Dear A., Meet at Starbucks at 7:00 tomorrow AM for package. Friends Always, Lisa.”

Next was a message to DCOULTER@AOL. COM, something about providing an affidavit, when a bell went off inside my head.

I returned to the previous message and wondered what it was. I pondered this… and pondered this, and… nothing.

I moved on, and 122 messages later was one sent to JCUTH@JOHNSMATH. ORG that read, “Dear J., Appreciate your views and expertise greatly. I’ll deliver package to your apartment tomorrow night. Friends Always, Lisa.”

Ding, ding, ding. What? I studied it again. In every other e-mail Lisa referred to the recipient by their full name, not an initial. Actually, there had been another initial-A. So I went back to A., then back to J., and back and forth a few more times, and bingo!

I slapped my forehead hard enough that Cheryl suddenly shot up in her chair.

I had no idea what Lisa’s messages to them were about, and in fact, didn’t really care about the messages-the connection was the only thing that mattered.

J. -well, J. was Julia Cuthburt of Johnson and Smathers. And A. -that was Anne Carrol of the SEC.

Put the two together, and I was staring at the second and fourth victims of the L. A. Killer.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

It was nearly two in the morning, Janet was not answering her cell phone, and I sat at Cheryl’s desk and wondered, with monumental annoyance, why not. So I tried again, got three rings again, and then her throaty recorded voice again saying, “Janet Morrow. Please leave a message and I’ll return your call.”

I said, “Hey, it’s me. I found the connection. Listen… Julia, Anne, and Lisa… they knew one another. This is big, right? Call me. Right now.”

But I wasn’t satisfied. Where could a beautiful twenty-nine-year-old single woman be at this hour, other than in her bed? Well, one just could not ignore the very revolting possibility that she and George the Jerk had completely mended fences, and her cell phone was turned off to avoid coitus interruptus. That suspicion, for some reason, really annoyed me.

So I dug out the Yellow Pages, looked up the Four Seasons Hotel, called the desk, and asked the operator to connect me to Janet Morrow.

In that flat impersonal tone affected by backroom help, she replied, “I’m sorry, that party checked out.”

“What?”

“Sir… I said she checked out.”

“But she… when?”

“Today.”

“Why?”

“I’m sure I don’t have that information, sir.”

“What time today?”

“I’m sure I don’t have that information either.”

“But…”

“I’ll put you through to the desk.”

So she did, and the guy at the desk was both more human and more helpful, informing me that Janet had checked out at six o’clock.

Odd.

No-more than odd. She had never informed me she was leaving. And of course, I distinctly heard FBI-boy make a date with her for dinner.

“It’s real late,” Cheryl sleepily informed me. “I gotta get home and get some sleep.”

“Sure. And Cheryl… thanks.”

“Good. Okay. You got what you need?”

I stood up and pecked her cheek. “More. Much more.” I whipped out my wallet and handed her a hundred-dollar bill. “Buy your son that BB gun.”

“Don’t cost that much,” she informed me.

“Right. Get one for his mother, too. You can shoot at each other.”

She smiled. “You a good man.” She lifted up her purse and wandered out.

I remained at Cheryl’s desk for five more minutes and tried to piece this thing together. There was a connection between Lisa, Julia Cuthburt, and Anne Carrol. The nature of their connection I didn’t know, but the three women knew one another, and the fact that they were all three murdered strongly suggested they weren’t picked randomly by a serial killer. It didn’t eliminate a serial killer, but implied-no, not implied, it established that the killer chose them because of that connection.

So-where was Janet?

I rushed downstairs to the parking garage. My briefcase was in the Jag’s trunk and I retrieved it. I dug around till I found the survivor assistance package that contained the phone number to Mr. Morrow, which I then dialed on the carphone.

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