Harlan Coben - The Innocent

"Now?"

"The camera phone," he said. "The picture. The video. It still doesn't add up. Why would Yates and Dollinger take those pictures?"

"They didn't. Darrow did."

"Why…" He closed his eyes again. "Why would he?"

Loren thought about that. Then Matt's eyes suddenly opened. "What time is it?"

She checked her watch. "Eleven thirty."

"At night?"

"Of course at night."

And then Loren remembered. The meeting at midnight. At the Eager Beaver. She quickly grabbed the phone and called down to the emergency room receptionist.

"This is Investigator Muse. I was down there a few moments ago with a woman named Olivia Hunter. She was waiting for a patient named Kimmy Dale."

"Right," the receptionist said, "I saw you."

"Are they still there?"

"Who, Miss Dale and Miss Hunter?"

"Yes."

"No, they hurried out the same time you left."

"Hurried out?"

"Into a taxi."

Loren hung up. "They're gone."

"Give me the phone," Matt said, still flat on his back. She nestled the phone next to his ear. Matt gave her Olivia's cell number. The phone rang three times before he heard Olivia's voice.

"It's me," he said.

"Are you okay?" Olivia asked.

"Where are you?"

"You know where."

"You still think…"

"She called, Matt."

"What?"

"She called Kimmy's cell. Or someone did. She said the meeting was still on, but no cops, no husbands, nobody. We're on our way over now."

"Olivia, it has to be a setup. You know that."

"I'll be fine."

"Loren is on her way."

"No. Please, Matt. I know what I'm doing. Please."

And then Olivia hung up.

11:50 P.M.

THE EAGER BEAVER

RENO, NEVADA

WHEN OLIVIA AND KIMMY ARRIVED, the fat man at the door pointed to Kimmy and said, "You left early. You got hours to make up."

Kimmy showed him her arm in a sling. "I'm hurt."

"What, you can't get naked with that?"

"You for real?"

"This." He pointed to his face. "This is me being real. Some guys get turned on by that kinda thing."

"An arm in a cast?"

"Sure. Like the guys who get off on amputees."

"I'm not an amputee."

"Hey, guys get turned on by a strong wind, you know what I'm saying?" The fat man rubbed his hands together. "I used to know a guy who got off on toe jam. Toe jam."

"Nice."

"So who's your friend?"

"Nobody."

He shrugged. "Some cop from New Jersey was asking about you."

"I know. It's okay now."

"I want you to go on. With that sling."

Kimmy looked at Olivia. "I might be better able to watch up there, you know. Like I won't be noticed."

Olivia nodded. "Up to you," she said.

Kimmy disappeared into the back room. Olivia sat at a table. She did not see or notice the crowd. She did not look in the dancer's face for her daughter. There was a rushing in her head. Sadness, an overwhelming sadness, weighed her down.

Call it off, she thought. Walk away.

She was pregnant. Her husband was in the hospital. That was where her life was now. This was in the past. She should leave it there.

But she didn't do that.

Olivia thought again about how the abused always take the path of self-destruction. They simply could not stop themselves. They take it no matter what the consequences, no matter what the danger. Or maybe, as in her case, they take it for the opposite reason- because no matter how much life has tried to beat them down, they cannot let go of hope.

Wasn't there still a chance that tonight she'd be reunited with the baby she'd put up for adoption all those years ago?

The waitress came over to the table. "Are you Candace Potter?"

There was no hesitation. "Yes, I am."

"I have a message for you."

She handed Olivia a note and left. The message was short and simple:

Go to backroom B now. Wait ten minutes.

It felt like she was walking on stilts. Her head spun. Her stomach churned. She bumped into a man on the way and said, "Excuse me," and he said, "Hey, baby, my pleasure." The men with him yukked it up. Olivia kept walking. She found the back area. She found the door with the letter B on it, the same one she'd been in just a few hours ago.

She opened it and went inside. Her cell phone rang. She picked it up and said hello.

"Don't hang up."

It was Matt.

"Are you at the club?"

"Yes."

"Get out of there. I think I know what's going on-"

"Shh."

"What?"

Olivia was crying now. "I love you, Matt."

"Olivia, whatever you're thinking, please, just-"

"I love you more than anything in the world."

"Listen to me. Get out of-"

She closed the phone and turned the power off. She faced the door. Five minutes passed. She stayed standing, not moving, not swaying, not looking around. There was a knock on the door.

"Come in," she said.

And the door opened.

TRY AS HE MIGHT, Matt couldn't get out of bed.

"Go!" he told Loren.

She radioed the Reno Police Department and ran to her car. Loren was within two miles of the Eager Beaver when her cell phone sounded.

She picked it up and barked, "Muse."

"So are you still in Reno?"

It was Adam Yates. His voice was slurred.

"I am."

"Are they all applauding your genius?"

"I'd say just the opposite."

Yates chuckled. "I was, alas, beloved."

He had definitely been drinking. "Tell me where you are, Adam."

"I meant what I said. You know that, right?"

"Sure, Adam. I know."

"I mean, about them threatening my family. I never said it was physical. But my wife. My kids. My job. That tape was like a big gun. A big gun they were pointing at us all, you know what I mean?"

"I do," Loren said.

"I was working undercover, pretending to be a rich real estate dealer. So Clyde Rangor figured I was the perfect mark. I never knew the girl was underage. You need to believe that."

"Where are you, Adam?"

He ignored her question. "Someone called. Demanded a payoff in exchange for the tape. So Cal and me, we went to see Rangor. We leaned on him hard. Ah, who am I kidding? Cal did the leaning. He was a good man but he had a violent streak. He once beat a suspect to death. I saved his ass then. He saved my ass, I saved his. That's what makes a friend. He's dead now, isn't he?"

"Yes."

"Damn." He started to cry. "Cal hurt Emma Lemay. Punched her hard in the kidney. That was his warning. We walk in and I think we're just going to talk and he starts off by spinning Lemay and pounding her back like a heavy bag. Rangor, it doesn't bother him. He beat that woman silly anyway. Better her than him, you know?"

Loren was nearly in the parking lot now.

"So Rangor pisses in his pants. Literally, I mean. He's so scared he runs to his cabinet to get the tape. Only it's gone. The girl, he says, the one in the video. Cassandra, her name is. He says she must have stolen it. He says he'll get it. Cal and me, we figure we got the fear of God in him now. He'll do what we say. Next thing we know, Rangor and Lemay and that Cassandra girl, they all disappear. Years pass. I still think about it. I think about it every day. And then we get that call from the NCIC. Lemay's body's been found. And it all comes back. Like I always knew it would."

"Adam, it's not too late."

"Yeah, it is."

She pulled into the lot. "You still have friends."

"I know. I called them. That's why I'm calling you."

"What?"

"Grimes is going to bury the tape."

"What are you talking about?"

"If it gets out, it destroys my family. It'll destroy those other guys on the tape too. They were just being johns, you know."

"You can't just bury the tape."

"Nobody needs it anymore. Grimes and his guys will arrange it for me. They just need you to cooperate."