Jeffery Deaver - The Sleeping Doll

"You can call me back," Dance said. She hadn't expected an answer immediately.

"No…just hold on… Where was the substance found?"

"On the floor of Pell's car."

"Hm. Car." Silence for a moment, then Rhyme was muttering to himself.

Finally he asked, "Any chance that Pell had just eaten in a restaurant? A seafood restaurant or a British pub?"

She laughed out loud. "Seafood, yes. How on earth did you know?"

"The acid's vinegar-malt vinegar specifically, because the amino acids and glucose indicate caramel coloring. My database tells me it's common in British cooking, pub food and seafood. Thom? You remember him? He helped me with that entry."

Rhyme's caregiver was also quite a cook. Last December he'd served her a boeuf bourguignon that was the best she'd ever had.

"Sorry it doesn't lead to his front door," the criminalist said.

"No, no, that's fine, Lincoln. I can pull the troops off the areas we had them searching. Send them to where they'll be better used."

"Call anytime. That's one perp I wouldn't mind a piece of."

They said good-bye.

Dance disconnected, called O'Neil, and told him it was likely that the acid had come from Jack's restaurant and wouldn't lead them to Pell or his mission here. It was probably better for the officers to search for the killer according to their original plan.

She hung up and continued her drive north on the familiar highway, which would take her to San Francisco, where the eight-lane Highway 101 eventually funneled into just another city street, Van Ness. Now, eighty miles north of Monterey. Dance turned west and made her way into the sprawl of San Jose, a city that stood as the antithesis of Los Angeles narcissism in the old Burt Bacharach/Hal David tune "Do You Know the Way to San Jose?" Nowadays, of course, thanks to Silicon Valley, San Jose flexed an ego of its own.

Mapquest led her through a maze of large developments until she came to one filled with nearly identical houses; if the symmetrically planted trees had been saplings when they'd gone in, Dance estimated the neighborhood was about twenty-five years old. Modest, nondescript, small-still, each house would sell for well over a million dollars.

She found the house she sought and passed it by, parking across the street a block away. She walked back to the address, where a red Jeep and a dark blue Acura sat in the driveway and a big plastic tricycle rested on the lawn. Dance could see lights inside the house. She walked to the front porch. Rang the bell. Her cover story was prepared in case Samantha McCoy's husband or children answered the door. It seemed unlikely that the woman had kept her past a secret from her spouse, but it would be better to start out on the assumption that she had. Dance needed the woman's cooperation and didn't want to alienate her.

The door opened and she found herself looking at a slim woman with a narrow, pretty face, resembling the actress Cate Blanchett. She wore chic, blue-framed glasses and had curly brown hair. She stood in the doorway, head thrust forward, bony hand gripping the doorjamb.

"Yes?"

"Mrs. Starkey?"

"That's right." The face was very different from that in the pictures of Samantha McCoy eight years ago; she'd had extensive cosmetic surgery. But her eyes told Dance instantly that there was no doubt of her identity. Not their appearance, but the flash of horror, then dismay.

The agent said quietly, "I'm Kathryn Dance. California Bureau of Investigation." The woman's glance at the ID, discreetly held low, was so fast that she couldn't possibly have read a word on it.

From inside, a man's voice called, "Who is it, honey?"

Samantha's eyes firmly fixed on Dance's, she replied, "That woman from up the street. The one I met at Safeway I told you about."

Which answered the question about how secret her past was.

She also thought: Smooth. Good liars are always prepared with credible answers, and they know the person they're lying to. Samantha's response told Dance that her husband had a bad memory of casual conversation and that Samantha had thought out every likely situation in which she'd need to lie.

The woman stepped outside, closed the door behind her and they walked halfway to the street. Without the softening filter of the screen door, Dance could see how haggard the woman looked. Her eyes were red and the crescents beneath them were dark, her facial skin dry, lips cracked. A fingernail was torn. It seemed she'd gotten no sleep. Dance understood why she was "working at home" today.

A glance back at the house. Then she turned to Dance and, with imploring eyes, whispered, "I had nothing to do with it, I swear. I heard he had somebody helping him, a woman. I saw that on the news, but-"

"No, no, that's not what I'm here about. I checked you out. You work for that publisher on Figueroa. You were there all day yesterday."

Alarm. "Did you-"

"Nobody knows. I called about delivering a package."

"That…Toni said somebody tried to deliver something, they were asking about me. That was you." The woman rubbed her face then crossed her arms. Gestures of negation. She was steeped in stress.

"That was your husband?" Dance asked.

She nodded.

"He doesn't know?"

"He doesn't even suspect."

Amazing, Dance reflected. "Does anyone know?"

"A few of the clerks at the courthouse, where I changed my name. My parole officer."

"What about friends and family?"

"My mother's dead. My father couldn't care less about me. They didn't have anything to do with me before I met Pell. After the Croyton murders, they stopped returning my phone calls. And my old friends? Some stayed in touch for a while but being associated with somebody like Daniel Pell? Let's just say they found excuses to disappear from my life as fast as they could. Everybody I know now I met after I became Sarah." A glance back at the house, then she turned her uneasy eyes to Dance. "What do you want?" A whisper.

"I'm sure you're watching the news. We haven't found Pell yet. But he's staying in the Monterey area. And we don't know why. Rebecca and Linda are coming to help us."

"They are?" She seemed astonished.

"And I'd like you to come down there too."

" Me ?" Her jaw trembled. "No, no, I couldn't. Oh, please…" Her voice started to break.

Dance could see the fringes of hysteria. She said quickly, "Don't worry. I'm not going to ruin your life. I'm not going to say anything about you. I'm just asking for help. We can't figure him out. You might know some things-"

"I don't know anything. Really. Daniel Pell's not like a husband or brother or friend. He's a monster. He used us. That's all. I lived with him for two years and I still couldn't begin to tell you what was going on in his mind. You have to believe me. I swear."

Classic denial flags, signaling not deception but the stress from a past she couldn't confront.

"You'll be completely protected, if that's what-"

"No. I'm sorry. I wish I could. You have to understand, I've created a whole new life for myself. But it's taken so much work…and it's so fragile."

One look at the face, the horrified eyes, the trembling jaw, told Dance that there was no chance of her agreeing.

"I understand."

"I'm sorry. I just can't do it."

Samantha turned and walked to the house. At the door, she looked back and gave a big smile.

Has she changed her mind? Dance was momentarily hopeful.

Then the woman waved. "'Bye!" she called. "Good seeing you again."

Samantha McCoy and her lie walked back into the house. The door closed.

"Did you hear about that?" Susan Pemberton asked César Gutierrez, sitting across from her in the hotel bar, as she poured sugar into her latte. She was gesturing toward a TV from which an anchorman was reading news above a local phone number.