She carefully checked the door into the garage. It didn’t seem to be wired. When she opened the door, she kept herself out of view until she could be sure there were no switches on any of the doorjambs. It seemed that the outer doors of the garage were the ones wired to the alarm system. It made sense, considering what was in the garage.
There were three vehicles: a Ford F-150 with a snowplow attachment, a Range Rover, and an Aston Martin. There was also a sailboat on a trailer. The room had two freezers, which on inspection were largely filled with venison and elk meat. One wall was covered with power tools and gardening equipment mounted on hooks. This was a meticulous and well-prepared man, Pia thought.
As she followed that line of reasoning, Pia realized it was unlikely Berman would store sensitive material in plain sight in his home. Why risk having documents lying around at home, no matter how good the security system, when he could leave everything at work? Nano had fences, armed guards, iris scanners, multiple cameras, and who knew what else. Pia sighed. She’d give the paperwork one more look and then cut out.
Pia walked up to the main level of the house. As she passed the small room where Berman kept his TV monitors, a movement caught Pia’s eye on one of the screens. She moved closer and was horrified to see something walking up the steps toward the front door that was barely ten feet from where she was standing. It was the tall and unmistakable figure of Whitney Jones.
Pia did an immediate one-eighty and hurried back toward Berman and the den. As she ran along on her tiptoes, she pulled off the surgical gloves and held them in her hand. In the den, Berman hadn’t moved, and he was still snoring peacefully. Pia imagined Whitney was approaching the front door. Quickly she pulled the den door to without shutting it. By then she could hear the sound of heels on the hardwood floor, so she made her way over to the couch. She plopped herself down and curled up in the corner with Berman’s feet in her lap. She hoped she looked as if she were asleep. Once again her heart was pounding in her chest.
Whitney had walked into the dining room but hadn’t looked in the den. Pia peeked and saw from a display on the TV console that it was 4:42 A.M. Did she always show up that early? Maybe the garage had been wired, after all. Pia knew Whitney would have seen her car in the driveway. As the footfalls receded, she figured Whitney was going to check on the bedroom, the logical place. Pia reached under her short dress and stuffed the exam gloves into her panties. Her heart was thumping so loudly in her ears, she thought Whitney could probably hear it from upstairs.
After what seemed like a half hour, the footsteps returned, louder and faster this time. Whitney hadn’t found Berman in his bed, perhaps she was now worried. After another circuit of the living area, the door to the den opened slowly, and the room was filled with light. Pia breathed more loudly. Now her head was pounding from anxiety, and she felt nauseous. Whitney must have surveyed the scene from the doorway because the door quickly closed and the den was plunged back into darkness.
Pia lay still, thanking her luck in seeing Whitney on the monitor and not having to run into her someplace else in the house, wondering if she had left any evidence of her nocturnal visitation. She figured Whitney was still in the house, and she didn’t relish the idea of lying here in the dark, listening to Zach Berman snore. She needed to grab a couple of hours’ real sleep in her bed. Pia swung her legs over the couch, fumbled for her purse in the dark, and stepped over to the door.
CHAPTER 23
Whitney Jones was sitting at Zachary Berman’s dining-room table, expertly tapping a message on her iPad. She was good at it and often sent more than a hundred texts a day. She heard the door to the den open and close. Whitney was pleased someone was taking the initiative, as she wasn’t sure how to handle the situation. She sensed that someone had appeared in the archway into the dining room and gathered it was Pia, as Berman surely would have announced himself. She further sensed that Pia had entered the room and walked over to her, but she didn’t look up. Whitney was being deliberately passive-aggressive — she sensed her boss’s infatuation with Pia and thought it could only lead to trouble.
“Oh, hi, Miss Jones,” said Pia, genuinely embarrassed despite not having been discovered in flagrante delicto. Pia hoped she was doing as good an acting job as the one she had with Berman, albeit in a completely different role. But still, she felt if what she’d been caught doing was not illegal, it was at least naughty. She was glad it was only being found asleep on the couch first thing in the morning with her boss’s boss, and not wandering around Berman’s house, looking for incriminating evidence of what Nano was up to with the Chinese, as she actually had been doing.
“I thought I heard the door open,” said Pia, waiting for Whitney to react in some way. “And of course I saw the light.”
“One second,” Whitney said, and went on typing rapidly with her thumbs. After a long minute, she looked up with arched eyebrows and addressed Pia. “I’m sorry if I woke you. I was looking for Mr. Berman. Obviously enough, I guess. He has a call to make this morning before certain people leave their offices.”
From Pia’s perspective, Whitney appeared to be completely unperturbed by Pia’s presence. Either she was hiding her feelings and doing an acting job, too, or she really was as cool as they came. It also made Pia wonder what the relationship was between Whitney and Berman. Obviously she had a key to the house.
“It’s still very early, isn’t it?” said Pia, looking around as if to see a clock. “What time is it?” She decided to try to be as nonchalant as Whitney, as if this were no big deal. And it really wasn’t, Pia thought, apart from the fact that Berman was drugged rather than asleep. Pia had no idea if he would suspect anything when he woke up, but the thought of it made her anxious to leave. At the same time, she wanted to stick around to see if Berman was okay, because if a doctor examined him, it might be hard to evade the difficult questions that would almost certainly arise.
“It’s a quarter of five here,” Whitney said, interrupting Pia’s train of thought. “But it’s not that time all over the world.” Whitney looked back to her device as an answering text came in, and she went back to tapping on the keyboard.
Pia imagined that in China it was approaching five P.M., since it was on the opposite side of the world. Perhaps that’s where Berman was calling. It certainly made sense.
“Yes, well, he’s asleep in there,” said Pia, suddenly feeling the need to say something. “We both had rather a lot to drink, I’m sorry to say.” Pia didn’t have to fake feeling tired and slightly hungover. She rarely drank alcohol of any kind.
Whitney finished typing and looked at Pia.
“Don’t worry, Pia, you won’t hear any judgment from me,” she said. “One of the reasons Zachary likes me is my complete discretion. But the call has to be made. Excuse me!”
Then she walked off in the direction of the den. Despite herself and after a moment of indecision, Pia thought it would be inappropriate to leave at that point, so she followed. Whitney went over to Berman and tapped him on the shoulder, but he didn’t wake up. She squatted down and shook him more forcibly while calling out his name. There was still no response. She stood back up, looking down at him. “He’s sleeping like a baby. What on earth were you drinking? He looks like he’s out cold.”