Michael Connelly - The Poet

The lab got no usable prints off the stereo other than those left by the Tyrells. But the serial number was not a dead end. It came back to a 1994 pale yellow Mustang registered to Hertz Corporation. Matuzak and Mize then headed to Sky Harbor International to continue tracing the car.

The mood of the agents in the field office was upbeat. Rachel had delivered. There was no guarantee that the Mustang had been driven by the Poet. But the time of its being parked outside Sunshine Acres matched the time period in which Orsulak had been killed. And there was the fact that the break-in by the brothers had never been reported to the police. It added up to a viable lead and, more so, it gave them a little more knowledge about how the Poet operated. It was an important gain. They felt like I felt. That the Poet was an enigma, a phantom somewhere out there in the darkness. Coming up with a lead like the car stereo seemed to make the possibility of catching him more believable. We were closer and we were coming.

For most of the afternoon I stayed out of the way and simply watched Rachel work. I was fascinated by her skill, amazed at how she had come up with the stereo and how she had talked to Adkins and the Tyrells. At one point in the office she noticed my gaze and asked what I was doing.

"Nothing, just watching."

"You like watching me?"

"You are good at what you do. It's always interesting to watch somebody like that."

"Thank you. I just got lucky."

"I have a feeling you get lucky a lot."

"I think in this business you make your own luck."

At the end of the day, after Backus had picked up and read a copy of the alert she had transmitted, I watched his eyes narrow into two black marbles.

"I wonder if that choice of car was intentional?" he asked. "A pale yellow Mustang."

"Why's that?" I asked.

I saw Rachel nodding. She knew the answer.

"The Bible," Backus said. "Behold a pale horse; and his name that sat on him was Death."

"And Hell followed with him," Rachel finished.

We made love again Sunday night and she seemed even more giving and needing of the intimacy. In the end, if either of us was holding back, it was me. While I wanted nothing more in the world at that moment than to surrender to the feelings I had for her, a low whisper in the back of my mind found just enough volume to question her motives. Perhaps it was a testament to my own precarious self-confidence, but I couldn't help but listen to the voice when it suggested that perhaps her aim was just as much to hurt her ex-husband as to please me and herself. The thought made me feel guilty and insincere.

When we held each other afterward, she whispered that this time she was going to stay until dawn.

The phone pulled me out of a sound sleep. I looked around the strange confines of the room, getting my bearings, and my eyes fell on Rachel's.

"You better get it," she said calmly. "It's your room."

She didn't seem to have nearly the same difficulty I had coming awake. In fact, for a moment I had the feeling she had already been awake and was watching me when the phone rang. I lifted the receiver on what I guessed was the ninth or tenth ring. At the same time I saw that the clock on the bed table said it was seven-fifteen.

"Yes?"

"Put Walling on the line."

I froze. There was something reminiscent about the voice but I didn't place it in my jumbled mind. Then a thought occurred to me that Rachel shouldn't be in my room.

"You got the wrong room. She's in-"

"Don't fuck with me, reporter. Put her on."

I covered the phone with my hand and turned to Rachel.

"It's Thorson. He says he knows you're there-here."

"Give it to me," she said angrily and jerked the phone out of my hand.

"What do you want?"

There was a period of silence. He must've said two or three sentences to her.

"Where did it come from?"

More silence.

"Why are you calling me?" she asked, the anger back in her voice. "Go ahead and tell him, if that's what you want. If you want him to know. It says as much about you as me. I'm sure he'd like to know that you're some kind of Peeping Tom."

She handed me the phone and I hung it up. She pulled a pillow over her face and moaned. I pulled it off her face.

"What is it?"

"I've got bad news for you, Jack."

"What?"

"In this morning's edition of the Los Angeles Times there was a story about the Poet. I'm sorry. I've got to bring you into the FO for a meeting with Bob."

I was silent for a moment, confused.

"How'd they…"

"We don't know. That's what we're going to talk about."

"How much did they have, did he say?"

"No. But apparently it was enough."

"I knew I should have written this yesterday. Damn it! Once it was clear that this guy knew about you people, there was no reason not to write it."

"You made a deal and stuck to it. You had to, Jack. Look, let's wait on this until we get to the office and talk about what they had."

"I've got to call my editor."

"You can do that later. Bob's apparently already in and waiting for us. I guess he doesn't sleep."

The phone rang again. She jerked the phone out of the cradle.

"What is it?" she said in a voice painted with annoyance. Then in a softer tone, she said, "Hold on."

She smiled sheepishly and handed me the phone. She then lightly kissed me on the cheek, whispered that she was going to her room to get ready and started to get dressed. I put the phone to my ear.

"Hello?"

"It's Greg Glenn. Who was that?"

"Uh, that was an FBI agent. We've got a meeting. I guess you've heard about the L.A. Times."

"You're damn right I have."

The sinking sensation in my chest was growing. Glenn went on.

"They've got a story on the killer in the paper. Our killer, Jack. They're calling him the Poet. You told me we had the exclusive on this and we were protected."

"We were."

It was all I could manage to say. As Rachel finished throwing her clothes on she watched me with sympathetic eyes.

"Not anymore. You've got to come back this morning and write ours for tomorrow. Whatever you've got. And you better have more than they've got. We could've had this in the paper, Jack, but you convinced me. Now we're playing catch-up on our own story, goddamnit."

"All right!" I said sharply just to shut him up.

"And I hope I don't find that you've extended your stay in Phoenix just because you found some babe to bang down there."

"Fuck you, Greg. Do you have the story there or not?"

"Of course I do. It's a great story. A great read. But it's in the wrong paper!"

"Just read it to me. No, wait a minute. I gotta go to this meeting. Have somebody in the library-"

"Don't you listen, Jack? You aren't going to any meeting. I want you on the next plane back here to write this for tomorrow."

I watched Rachel blow a kiss at me and then go out the door.

"I understand. You'll have it for tomorrow. But I can write it here and ship it."

"No. This is a hands-on story. I want to work this one right here with you."

"Let me go to this meeting and call you back."

"Why?"

"There's a new development," I lied. "I don't know what it is and I have to go and find out. Let me go and I'll call you. Meantime, have the library take the Times story off their wire and ship it to my basket. I'll call it up here. I gotta go."

I hung up before he could protest. I quickly got dressed and headed out the door with my computer bag. I was in a daze. I didn't know how this could have happened. But a thought was pushing through.

Thorson.

We each grabbed two cups to go from a hospitality stand in the lobby and then headed to the federal building. She had packed all her things again. I had forgotten.