Harlan Coben - Just One Look

Cora.

Uh-uh, no way. Grace shook it off. “So we need to find that recorder.”

“Yes.”

“And then we wait and watch,” she said. “We see who picks up the tape.”

“That’s one way of doing it,” Cram said.

“You have a better suggestion?”

“Not really.”

“Then, what, we follow the guy, see where it leads?”

“That’s a possibility.”

“But…?”

“It’s risky. We could lose him.”

“What would you do?”

“If it were up to me, I’d grab him. I’d ask him some hard questions.”

“And if he refused to answer?”

Cram still wore the sea-predator smile. It was always a horrific sight, this man’s face, but Grace was getting used to it. She also realized that he was not intentionally scaring her; whatever had been done to his mouth had made that become his permanent, natural expression. It spoke volumes, that face. It rendered her question rhetorical.

Grace wanted to protest, to tell him that she was civil and that they would handle this legally and ethically. But instead she said, “They threatened my daughter.”

“So they did.”

She looked at him. “I can’t do what they asked. Even if I wanted to. I can’t just walk away and leave it alone.”

He said nothing.

“I have no choice, do I? I have to fight them.”

“I don’t see any other way.”

“You knew that all along.”

Cram cocked his head to the right. “So did you.”

His cell phone went off. Cram flipped it open but did not speak, not even a hello. A few seconds later he snapped the phone shut and said, “Someone is pulling up the drive.”

She looked out the screen door. A Ford Taurus came to a stop. Scott Duncan stepped out and approached the house.

“You know him?” Cram asked.

“That,” she said, “is Scott Duncan.”

“The guy who lied about working for the U.S. attorney?” Grace nodded.

“Maybe,” Cram said, “I’ll stick around.”

They remained outside. Scott Duncan stood next to Grace. Cram had stepped away. Duncan kept sneaking glances at Cram. “Who is that?”

“You don’t want to know.”

Grace gave Cram a look. He got the hint and headed back inside. She and Scott Duncan were alone now.

“What do you want?” she asked.

Duncan picked up on her tone. “Something wrong, Grace?”

“I’m just surprised you got out of work already. I figured it’d be busier at the U.S. attorney’s office.”

He said nothing.

“Cat got your tongue, Mr. Duncan?”

“You called my office.”

She touched her nose with her pointer, indicating a direct hit. Then: “Oh wait, correction: I called the United States attorney’s office. Apparently you don’t work there.”

“It’s not what you think.”

“How enlightening.”

“I should have told you up front.”

“Do tell.”

“Look, everything I said was true.”

“Except the part about working for the United States attorney. I mean, that wasn’t true, was it? Or was Ms. Goldberg lying?”

“Do you want me to explain or not?”

Now his voice had a little steel. Grace gestured for him to continue.

“What I told you was true. I worked there. Three months ago this killer, this Monte Scanlon, he insisted on seeing me. No one could understand why. I was a low-level lawyer on political corruption. Why would a hit man insist on talking only to me? That was when he told me.”

“That he killed your sister.”

“Yes.”

She waited. They moved toward the porch furniture and sat down. Cram stood in a window watching them. He let his gaze wander toward Scott Duncan, hang there for a few heavy seconds, survey the grounds, go back to Duncan.

“He looks familiar,” Duncan said, gesturing toward Cram. “Or maybe I’m flashing back to the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disney World. Shouldn’t he have an eye patch?”

Grace shifted in her seat. “You were telling me about why you lied?”

Duncan ran his hand through the sandy hair. “When Scanlon said the fire was no accident… You can’t understand what it did to me. I mean, one moment my life was one thing. The next…” He snapped his finger with a magician’s flourish. “It wasn’t so much that everything was different now – it was more like the past fifteen years had all been different. Like someone had gone back in time and changed one event and it changed everything else. I wasn’t the same guy. I wasn’t a guy whose sister died in a tragic fire. I was a guy whose sister had been murdered and never avenged.”

“But now you have the killer,” Grace said. “He confessed.”

Duncan smiled, but there was no joy there. “Scanlon said it best. He was just a weapon. Like a gun. I wanted the person who pulled the trigger. It became an obsession. I tried to do it part-time, you know, work my job while searching for the killer. But I started to neglect my cases. So my boss, she strongly suggested I take a leave.” He looked up at her.

“Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“I didn’t think it would be a great opening line, you know, telling you I was forced out like that. I still have connections in the office. I still have friends in law enforcement. But just so we’re clear, everything I’m doing is off the books.”

Their eyes locked. Grace said, “You’re still holding something back.”

He hesitated.

“What is it?”

“We should get one thing straight.” Duncan stood, did the run through the sandy hair bit again, turned away from her. “Right now we’re both trying to find your husband. It’s a temporary alliance. The truth is, we have separate agendas. I won’t lie to you. What happens after we find Jack, well, do we both want the truth?”

“I just want my husband.”

He nodded. “That’s what I mean about separate agendas. About our alliance being temporary. You want your husband. I want my sister’s killer.”

He looked at her now. She understood.

“So now what?” Grace asked.

He took out the mystery photograph and held it up. There was a hint of a smile on his face.

“What?”

Scott Duncan said, “I know the name of the redhead in the photograph.” She waited.

“Her name is Sheila Lambert. Attended Vermont University the same time as your husband” – he pointed at Jack and then slid his finger to the right – “and Shane Alworth.”

“Where is she now?”

“That’s just the thing, Grace. No one knows.”

She closed her eyes. A shudder ran through her.

“I sent the photograph up to the school. A retired dean identified her. I ran a full check, but she’s gone. There is no sign of Sheila Lambert’s existence over the past decade – no payroll tax, no social security number hit, nothing.”

“Just like with Shane Alworth.”

“Exactly like Shane.”

Grace tried to put it together. “Five people in the photograph. One, your sister, was murdered. Two others, Shane Alworth and Sheila Lambert, haven’t been heard of in years. The fourth, my husband, ran overseas and is missing now. And the last one, well, we still don’t know who she is.”

Duncan nodded.

“So where do we go from here?”

“You remember I said I talked to Shane Alworth’s mother?”

“The one with the fuzzy Amazonian geography.”

“When I visited her the first time, I didn’t know about this picture or your husband or any of that. I want to show her the picture now. I want to gauge her reaction. And I want you there.”

“Why?”

“I just have a feeling, that’s all. Evelyn Alworth is an old woman. She’s emotional and I think she’s scared. I went in there the first time as an investigator. Maybe, I don’t know, but maybe if you go in as a concerned mother, something will shake loose.”