Sonia tied the robe around her waist, letting her breasts wobble free. She grabbed for Stride's belt and sank to her knees in front of him. He wrenched away and looked down into her dilated eyes. "What are you on?"
She giggled. "A little Diet Coke and a little regular coke," she whispered.
"Son of a bitch. How much did you take? Do you need to go to a hospital?"
Sonia stuck out her tongue. "Come on, Jonathan. For old times, huh? I'm wet, and you're hard, so why the hell not?"
Stride felt the bones in his hand stiffen like a club. He hated Sonia at that second and hated that she had anything to do with his past. He jerked his hand back and knew that in the next instant he would slap her and watch her tumble backward, her cheek tattooed red with his fingerprints.
"No, Jonny."
He turned and saw Serena standing beside him. She was unbelievably calm as she shook her head.
He swore and turned away. He watched as Serena knelt down in front of Sonia, who gave him a crooked grin. Sonia closed her eyes and rocked back.
"Where is Kathy Lassiter?" Serena asked her in a mellow voice.
"I told you, she's not here." Sonia opened her eyes and waggled a finger at Stride. "She borrowed my car. She didn't want you to find her."
"Where the hell was she going?" Stride demanded.
"To meet Mitchell Brandt. She said she had to stop him before he ruined everything."
41
Serena sat for a long time in the frozen silence without starting her car. She wrinkled her nose. A faint aroma of fish lingered in the leather seats, and she wrote it off to the smoked fish she had bought at Russ Kendall's last week. She opened the window, trying to dispel it, but the smell had already made its way inside her nose and lodged there. The wind whistled into the car and brought crystals of snow with it.
Jonny was gone. The alert for Mitchell Brandt and Kathy Lassiter had spread through the city, but she wasn't part of the chase. Her frustration gnawed at her. This was the time she regretted giving up her shield, when she felt cut off from the adrenaline rush as it began. She had to watch his car peel away from the curb and not follow him. She hated it.
She was worried about Jonny, too. He was surrounded by lies and secrets, and she felt guilty because some of the lies were her own. She wondered again if she was making a terrible mistake by keeping him in the dark.
Was the man in shadows just a blackmailer?
Or was he a predator whose evil went far deeper? Someone who raped. Someone who killed.
Someone who was following her.
She was uneasy, because the feeling was back. She was being watched. She didn't know where he was, but he was close to her again, and time felt short. Her unease trebled as she realized the streets were empty. All the cops were gone, and she was alone. Was that what he wanted all along?
Serena jumped as her cell phone let out a jangling ring. She thought, It's him.
But it was Dan Erickson.
"He wants the money tonight," Dan said. "I've got it."
"We should bring in the police right now," Serena advised him.
"I hired you because you were a homicide cop," Dan retorted, his voice hoarse with anger. "You said you could deal with this guy. Now you're telling me to throw away my life by making this public?"
"We don't know who we're dealing with."
"I don't care. I want this over. He says this is the final hit. He's on his way out of town."
"He's telling you what you want to hear," she said.
"You're not listening to me. We're doing this my way. If this guy so much as smells a cop, the photo of me and Tanjy goes to the papers. Do you understand what that means?"
"Completely."
"Then get down here to pick up the money."
"Where's the drop?"
"He said he'd let you know."
"I don't like this."
"This isn't about you," Dan said.
He hung up.
Serena threw the phone down and gripped the steering wheel, which felt like ice. Dan was right. This was business, and she couldn't make it personal. She had a job to do, period. Make the drop. Just like before.
She turned the key and started the car. Her heart stopped.
Shattering noise exploded inside the car like a bomb. Rap music screeched from the speakers, so loud and painful that she felt the beat in her chest and instinctively pressed her palms against her ears. She reached for the volume switch and turned it so hard and so fast that the plastic knob broke off in her hand.
The car fell silent. She breathed hard.
The reality sank in. He had been in her car.
She felt as if ants were crawling inside her clothes. Her skin rippled, and she rubbed her palms with her fingertips. When she realized the window was still open, she quickly closed it. She studied the front and backseats of the car to see what was missing, but nothing was disturbed.
He was playing head games with her.
This isn't about you.
She drove away and kept her eyes on her mirror, but there was no one behind her. He had been here for a reason. When she glanced at the glove compartment, she knew without opening it that he had left a message for her there. Again. She had begun to think like him.
She pulled over to the curb and looked inside. Another white envelope was there, with a note in red ink:
Under the high bridge. Bring the money. One hour.
42
Stride was in the Lincoln Park area, a rectangle of green climbing from the freeway that served as a hot spot for crime and drugs. Even the winter cold didn't deter buyers and sellers. He did a circuit of the park and then began a slow survey of the nearby residential streets.
He was on and off his cell phone as he drove. He connected with the detective who was waiting in the dark inside Kathy Lassiter's home, but Lassiter hadn't returned. The uniforms outside did a search of the perimeter around the house and in the woods behind, but reported no sign of Mitchell Brandt or anyone else. Stride checked with the team outside Brandt's apartment and got the same response. Throughout Duluth and Superior, squad cars were hunting for Brandt's Porsche and Sonia's Mercedes, but so far, Brandt and Lassiter had eluded them.
His cell phone rang again.
"This is Philip Proutz with the SEC, Lieutenant. My office said you were trying to reach me."
"I am," Stride said. "We have a situation here, and I could use some information."
"Does this concern Mitchell Brandt?"
"Yes, but I'm more interested in someone else. Kathy Lassiter."
Proutz took a long time to reply. "Why don't you tell me about this situation you've got?"
"I take it you know who Lassiter is," Stride said.
"Yes."
"She's primary outside counsel for Infloron Medical, isn't she? So she would be among the first to know about the status of the company's applications with the FDA."
"Of course." Proutz sounded pained. "Please don't tell me she has a relationship with Mitchell Brandt."
"We think she does. They're both part of an underground sex club here in Duluth."
"A sex club?" Proutz groaned.
"Did Lassiter know you were launching an insider trading investigation into Infloron's stock sales? Or that Brandt was a target?"
"No, we didn't know where the trail would lead us. We don't alert the company or its counsel until we've gathered more information."
"You weren't focusing on Lassiter as the source of the leak about the FDA approval?"
"Not at all. She would have been way down our list. Think what you will of lawyers, Lieutenant, it's rare for corporate counsel to be personally involved in this kind of criminal conduct. But we'd have looked at her and her law firm eventually, I assure you."
Stride didn't think they would have found the connection easily, not without access to Sonia's member lists.
"Could Lassiter have been your anonymous informant?" he asked.