Be Mine (41 page)

“Please. I’m sorry.” Surreptitiously she tried her door. He’d locked
it from the driver’s control panel.

“You left me no choice but to prove that I am the only man for you.
And I had to keep proving it.”

“Please.”

Her bag was on her right, resting against the door. She slid her
hand into it, unseen. Oh God, she’d forgotten her spray. Wait. She had
something else.

“I had to prove it with Hooper. With Beamon. With Yarrow. Over and
over. I left you messages asking you why? Why? Why wasn’t I getting through to
you?”

“I’m sorry.”

Frantically she probed her bag’s contents. Where is it? Where?
Please be here. Brush, compact, gum. There. There it was! The familiar shape.
Present in her hand. Concentrating with every fiber, she delicately explored
the surface with her fingers. This was her only hope. She began pressing the
sequence.

“You wounded me deeply, treated me as if I were a bad movie you
walked out on. It was as if you’d used me as a diversion between other men.
Only one other person in my life did that to me. Humiliated me. She’d refused
to rectify matters. So I worked on a special way of enlightening her.
Unfortunately, things went awry.”

Glancing off, his thoughts took him to another time until Molly
found the words to ask, “What happened?”

“I killed her.”

Oh Jesus. All the saliva dried in Molly’s mouth. This isn’t
happening.

“It was a mistake. Her name was Amy. How was I to know that she was
sitting in the car next to her ‘boyfriend’ when it went over the bridge on
that
night? Don’t get me wrong, Kyle was an asshole. He had it coming to him. I
enjoyed watching him die.” He pounded the steering wheel. “He had it coming!”
he screamed, then his voice softened. “But Amy was an accident.”

Molly felt his hand patting her lap.

“I won’t be making any mistakes with you.”

He hadn’t paid attention to how she’d shifted her open bag until it
was resting on the console between them.

“I know what I’m doing. Older and wiser, as they say. I’ve worked so
hard at this. After you ended it with me, I watched you. Praying you would see
how wrong you were about me. I watched you with the others. It tore me up.”

She had to think. Find a way out. She studied the rental company’s
tiny elegant seal near the console. Golden Pacific Luxury. This has to work.

“I watched every move you made. I watched you that night at Jake’s
where you waited for Hooper. I watched you weep over him. Then who did you turn
to? Beamon. You grieved for Hooper and turned to Beamon? Then Yarrow pops up.
Pathetic Frank. He needed to be put out of his misery. You let these obstacles
get in the way. It was all wrong.”

He turned, saw her attention flicker to her bag, and followed it
inside to her cell phone! And the goddammed thing was on!

“What the hell is this!” Rage twisted his face. “What the hell are
you doing!”

“Let me out! God, please let me out!”

Tom was waiting on the other side
of the
police tape stretched around Simon Lepp’s rented house in the Richmond
District. TV news helicopters were approaching when his cell phone rang.

“Reed.”

Loud highway noise spilled into his ear. “Hello?”

Pushing the phone against his head, he heard the highway rush and
the faint voices of people talking in a car.

“What happened?”

“Molly?” Christ, it’s Molly! Reed could barely hear. He increased
the volume, plugged his finger in one ear, then pressed the phone against the
other.

“I killed her...it was a mistake--”

That’s Lepp! Jesus! Molly’s put out a call! Tom scanned all the
uniforms and suits until he spotted Turgeon. He covered his cell phone’s
mouthpiece, then waved at her, holding up his phone, pointing at it. Turgeon
trotted to him.

“What is it?”

Tom mouthed the word “Molly.”

Moments later, Sydowski, Turgeon, several other detectives, and
crime scene techs huddled around Tom over the hood of a police car. The
whooping of the news choppers distracted them.

“This is no good! Move it into our truck! Quick! Let’s go!” said one
of the Tac team’s electronics experts.

The Tac officer set a speaker amplifier next to the cell phone,
boosting the sound after he’d taped over the mouthpiece. Tom switched on his
microcassette tape recorder, placing it next to his phone.

“I’ve worked so hard at this--”

IT’S LEPP & MOLLY! Tom scrawled in big letters for the others.

“After you ended it with me, I watched you. Praying you would see
how wrong you were about me. I watched you with the others. It tore me up--”

No one spoke. They held their breath. Sydowski called Gonzales at
the homicide detail. Whispering, he got him to flip through Molly’s file for
her cell phone service carrier, knowing in his gut that it was unlikely they
could pinpoint the location of the call.

“It’s Ocean AirNet Systems,” Gonzales said. “I’ve got Emergency
Communications making the call now. Stand by.”

Helpless to do anything, Tom and the others continued listening to
Molly’s call. How the hell did he miss that it was Lepp? A nice guy who gave
off a weird little vibe, which Tom had dismissed because Lepp probably
possessed the highest IQ at the
Star
. That was the joke. Lepp should’ve
been a rocket scientist, not a reporter. He blinked at Lepp’s house.

Three homicides. Two detectives. An ex-cop. Now he had Molly. And
there wasn’t a damned thing anyone could do. Tom knew the odds were fifty-fifty
the cell phone carrier could track Molly’s exact location. Some systems had the
capability, some didn’t. Come on, Molly, give us something. A landmark. An
address. Anything.

“I watched you that night at Jake’s where you waited for Hooper. I
watched you weep over him. Then who did you turn to? Beamon. You grieved for Hooper
and turned to Beamon? Then Yarrow pops up. Pathetic Frank. He needed to be put
out of his misery. You let these obstacles get in the way. It was all wrong.”

Gonzales gave Sydowski the verdict. Ocean AirNet Systems had no way
to locate Molly through her cell phone. Sydowski cursed. Turgeon stared off at
nothing, just as Lepp discovered what Molly had done.

“What the hell is this! What the hell are you doing!”

“Let me out! God, please let me out!”

Static crackled through the line, causing the sound to break up.

“How long has this--give it--”

“No--we’re in siller...ced...50 S...entel...den Pacific...stop
please--”

“You stupid...ruin everything--”

Silence. The call went dead. The faces of the investigators tensed
with concentration.

“Replay your tape, Tom, the last bit,” Sydowski said. They heard the
same garbled exchange as they strained to listen.

“Again,” Sydowski said. “Adjust the speed, slow it down.”

“We’re in a silver...450 SL rent...golden--”

“Again.”

“We’re in a silver Mercedes 450 SL--”

“Again.”

Tom replayed it several times at varying speeds. Until they’d
finally determined the last thing Molly had screamed. “We’re in a silver
Mercedes 450 SL rental from Golden Pacific Luxury--”

One of the cops listening was Harry Saguer, a bomb expert with OED working
with the tactical unit.

“A car like that should have Global Positioning Satellite or
cellular tracking,” Sauger said. “We can get them to activate the system as if
the car were stolen, but don’t shut it down until we’re on them.”

Turgeon called emergency communications. The 911 operator called
Golden Pacific, alerting the company to a life-threatening police emergency,
then patched Turgeon through.

“Who’ve I got?” Turgeon said.

“Mark Jepson, district supervisor. How can we help?” Turgeon passed
the vehicle information to Jepson, hearing him typing on a computer keyboard
before reading to her from his screen.

“We’ve got twenty 450 SLs, Inspector. Eight of them silver. All of
them rented. Do you have a name?”

“Lepp. Simon Lepp.”

The keys clicked. Then stopped. “Sir, I’m not sure I can do this.”

“Read off the rental agreements.”

“We have privacy issues. Maybe a warrant would--”

“We’ll get one. But if we’re too late, you’ll face a wrongful-death
lawsuit. Your call, Jepson.”

Turgeon heard Jepson gulp over the line before he nervously began
reciting customer names. “Wong, Chambers, Klinner, Romaz, Lepp. Here we go.”

“When was it rented?”

“This morning.”

“Have you got location systems in that car?”

“Yes, GPS coordinated out of the central tracking station near Los
Angeles.”

“Can you get us a trace on that car immediately as if it were
stolen?”

“Well, don’t you need a warrant for that?”

“This is a life-threatening emergency. We need to track that vehicle
now! Just track it. Don’t shut it down.”

“I’ll call them and get them to call you as soon as I--”

“Now! Get them now! Damn it!”

Helicopters thumped above them.

The
Star
had a cost-sharing deal with KKGW’s news helicopter,
which was hovering overhead with Henry Cain, a
Star
photographer,
aboard. As Tom dialed the
Star’
s photo desk he got Sydowski and Turgeon
to guarantee their help.

“Swear you’ll give me Molly’s location when you get it!”

“Tom, you can’t--”

“Swear! I’ve been helping you and I’ll stay out of the way.”
Sydowski agreed just as Tom got through to the photo desk and quickly explained
to the editor.

“Get them to pick me up,” he said. “I think I can take them to
Molly.”

“Hang on, Tom, I’ll get Henry on his radio.” Less than thirty
seconds later, the editor came back. “There’s a vacant lot two blocks east of
you. They’ll pick you up there now. Run.”

After Tom left, the California Highway Patrol requested Sydowski
accompany their helicopter crew to assist with aerial observation of the
vehicle suspected in three San Francisco homicides.

Turgeon stayed on the ground and on the line with Golden Pacific
Luxury and the emergency dispatcher ready to relay the location and direction
of travel.

Bleeder seized Molly’s cell phone
and
studied the number on the call display. Recognizing it as Tom Reed’s, he
pressed it to his ear. He listened intensely for a long moment. Hearing
nothing, he surmised that she’d probably got his message box.

He switched it off, smashed it against his door frame, then hurled
it out his window along a windswept section of Highway 1, somewhere southbound
between Swanton and Davenport.

Bleeder ran the back of his hand across his mouth as he glared at
Molly. She could smell the strawberry farms, saw the hills rushing by as the
Mercedes gathered speed along the twisting road near the sea.