Final Breath (31 page)

The cop retreated to his patrol car to call in a report on the police radio. Standing by the front door, Sydney could hear him mumbling and the static-laced muffled responses.

Aidan turned to her. "If that invitation for me to spend the night is still good, I can crash on your couch if you'd like."

"Oh, if you could, that would be great," Sydney said. She worked up a smile for Eli. "I'll feel a lot better with two strong men in the house."

Eli just rolled his eyes at her.

Sydney decided to ignore him. "Could you guys wait here a second?" she asked. "I just remembered something I want to ask the policeman."

Sydney caught up with the cop before he climbed inside his car. "Excuse me," she whispered.

A hand on the hood of his patrol car, the cop turned to her.

"I didn't want to say anything in front of my son." Sydney spoke in a hushed tone. "But when this character followed me down to Auburn on Saturday, I tried not to push the panic button, because--well, I'm on TV, and if somebody's following me around, it sometimes comes with the territory. But if he's preying on my son, that's a different story altogether. What do you suggest I do about it? And I mean beyond battening down the hatches and creating a Neighborhood Watch."

The blond cop frowned a bit. "Well, you could get together with a police sketch artist. Or you and your son might come down to the precinct and pore over our files on convicted pedophiles and other sex offenders. You might be able to ID the guy. But unfortunately, unless we catch him trespassing, peeping in your windows, or trying something with your son, we can't arrest the guy."

Someone who wasn't married to a cop might have argued with him, but Sydney understood how restricted they were at times. It was frustrating as hell, but she understood. She thanked the cop and asked for a contact number to set up an appointment with a police sketch artist. She didn't want Eli looking through those creepy files, but she was prepared to do it.

The young police officer scribbled down a phone number on the back of an unused Seattle's Best Coffee punch card, and handed it to her. "Call them, and they'll set it up for you, Ms. Jordan. By the way, I'm a big fan of your work."

Sydney thanked him again. She had the extra automatic gate-opening device with her, and followed his patrol car halfway down the driveway. Then Sydney pressed the device and watched the gate open for him. The police car pulled out of the driveway and turned down the street. She stood there and watched the gate close again.

She'd considered telling him about the deaths of Angela and Leah and Jared, and how someone had sent flowers in her name to their next of kin. But what could he have done about it? None of the victims had been killed in Seattle or Washington State. And so far, no one had threatened her.

As she started back up the driveway, Sydney warily glanced at the shadowy bushes on either side of her. She shuddered again and nervously rubbed her arms. Sydney spotted Aidan waiting for her by the front stoop. But he was alone.

Then Eli appeared in the doorway. "Hey, Mom, phone's for you!" he called. "Someone named Meredith from New York! She says it's about Troy somebody...."

"How did it happen?" Sydney asked, her hand tightening on the cordless phone. She sat hunched over her office desk. In front of her was the faxed diagram of the Heimlich maneuver. She could hear the TV in the living room. Eli and Aidan were in there, watching the last part of
The Bourne Ultimatum.

Troy Bischoff's roommate had already explained that she'd returned home from a weekend trip this morning to discover Troy dead in his bedroom. She'd been with the police the entire first half of the day, and making funeral arrangements during the second half. But she'd gotten Sydney's voice mail and wanted to call her back.

"The police are calling it an accident," Meredith told her in a shaky voice. "They say he died from self-strangulation."

Sydney glanced down at the first illustration of the Heimlich maneuver instructions. The outline figure was clutching his own throat.

"What does that mean?" Sydney heard herself ask.

"It's a--a sexual thing," she explained. "Autoerotic asphyxiation, I guess some people are into it. They fix it so they cut off their oxygen supply during sex to heighten the--the intensity of their orgasm. They bite into a lemon or lime to get revived so they don't pass out and accidentally hang themselves."

"And choke to death," Sydney whispered--almost to herself. She rubbed her forehead. "Listen, Meredith, do they know who he was with when this happened?"

"It looks like he was alone, masturbating," Meredith said quietly. "I found him, dangling from this harness he'd made out of his belt. I still don't believe it, even though I saw it with my own eyes. I knew Troy better than anyone, and he wasn't into that kind of kinky stuff. We used to make fun of people who were into really weird scenes like that."

"You said earlier that you talked to the police," Sydney said, reaching for a pen. "Was there one cop in particular, one who was in charge of the investigation?"

"Yeah, I forget his name. He gave me his card. It's in my purse."

"Could you dig it out for me? I'd really like to call this policeman and talk to him."

"Sure, Sydney, hold on."

She stared at the Heimlich maneuver diagram while she waited. Troy Bischoff saved someone from choking to death, and that was how he'd died. Angela Gannon had talked a man from jumping from a fourteenth-floor window; and she'd plunged to her death from that same window. Leah and Jared had foiled two killers who had intended to rob that Thai restaurant and shoot the staff.

Sydney suddenly remembered something from the interview she'd done with Leah and Jared. With the phone still to her ear, she stuck the pen in her mouth, then got up and checked her DVD files. She found Leah and Jared's segment from December and loaded it into her computer's DVD drive.

Meredith got back on the line. "Sydney, are you still there?"

She took the pen out of her mouth, and sat down. "Yes, Meredith."

"The guy's name is Detective Lyle A. Peary," Meredith said. She read off a phone number with a New York area code.

"Thanks, Meredith," she said. "You said you found Troy's body this morning. About what time, do you remember?"

"Around ten."

Sydney stared at the time at the top of the fax sheet:
6:32
A.M
. She knew about Troy's death before anyone else. His killer had told her. And before anyone else, the killer would send Troy's next of kin flowers, and her name would be on the card.

"Sydney?"

"Yes, I'm here. Do you happen to know how I can get hold of Troy's parents? I--um, I want to send them some flowers."

"Well, I wouldn't bother with them. They kicked Troy out of the house when he was seventeen because he told them he was gay. I tracked them down today and called with the news. I just said it was an
accident
. I didn't go into specifics. The mother cried, and then his father got on and said that as far as he was concerned Troy died when he was seventeen. Then he hung up. Sweet, huh?"

"Well, I'd like to talk with them anyway," Sydney said. "Do you have a phone number?"

"It's right here.
Mr. and Mrs. Ronald Bischoff, 501-555-1452
."

Sydney scribbled it down at the bottom of the fax sheet. "Five-oh-one, where is that, Arkansas?"

"Yeah, some suburb of Little Rock."

"Can I ask you for one more favor, Meredith? If you happen to receive some flowers from me tomorrow, could you get the name and phone number of the florist delivering them?"

"Oh, you don't have to send any flowers, Sydney. Besides, I'm not at the apartment right now. I'm staying with a friend for the next few nights. If you want to do anything for Troy, make a donation to charity in his name."

"I will," she said, scribbling the word
donation
beside Troy's parents' names. "But if the flowers should arrive anyway, could you get the florist's name, please? Call me, and reverse the charges."

"Um, okay," she said, obviously a bit puzzled by the request.

"Thank you, Meredith. I know it doesn't make sense, but it might later."

After Sydney hung up with Meredith, she clicked on the DVD and watched the
Movers & Shakers
segment with Leah and Jared. Her friend Judy had left her the message on the Fourth of July, the night they'd been shot in their apartment. She remembered Judy telling her that the murder scene had looked like a "burglary gone from bad to worse," and one of Leah and Jared's neighbors had found both bodies in the bathroom.

Sydney watched the two of them together in the video short, and her heart broke. They were both so young and cute, such a sweet couple. She thought of Angela, and now, Troy. All of them heroes, and all of them had met such violent, senseless deaths.

But to someone, it made sense.

Sydney watched a visibly shaken Leah in close-up as she talked about the thugs in the Thai restaurant. Leah was crying:
"When I heard they planned to--to take us all into the bathroom and shoot us, I was just so scared...."

Sydney's finger clicked on the mouse, hitting Pause. She leaned in closer to her computer screen, and played it back again.
"Take us all into the bathroom and shoot us..."

"Oh, God," Sydney whispered, hitting the Pause icon again.

On the computer screen, Leah's face was frozen. Tears were locked in her eyes and her mouth was open. Leah didn't know it at the time, of course. But she was describing exactly how--six months later--she and her fiance would be killed.

"You've reached the desk of Detective Lyle A. Peary, NYPD,"
said the man on the recording. Then an automated voice chimed in:
"To page this person, press one now, or leave a message after the beep. If this is an emergency, please hang up and dial 9-1-1."

Sydney paged him, and left her phone number. Then she called the number again and waited for the beep.

"Hello, this is Sydney Jordan," she said into the recording. She gave him her phone number again. "I've just paged you as well, Detective. I have some important information about the death of Troy Bischoff. I'm a correspondent with
On the Edge
, and I did a story about Troy a few months ago. Someone sent me a fax at 6:32 this morning from Kinko's..." She gave him the Seventh Avenue address. "I believe this fax was sent to me by the person who killed Troy. I don't think it was a self-strangulation. I can explain everything to you. Just check with that Kinko's. The manager's name is Paul. This person used a credit card to send this fax, and it's on file there. I'm sorry about the late hour, but I--"

There was a beep. Then the automated voice chimed in again, saying if she was satisfied with her message to press one.

Sydney wasn't satisfied, not yet at least. But she pressed one anyway.

She figured she wouldn't hear back from Detective Peary until tomorrow morning. It was too late--past eleven-thirty in Arkansas--to phone Troy's parents. She'd have to try them first thing in the morning--before the florist delivered the
With Sympathy
floral arrangement from
Sydney Jordan
.

She realized what was happening. The fog of uncertainty had lifted, and it was so terribly clear. Someone was killing the heroes from her
Movers & Shakers
stories. And in a twisted kind of "What goes around comes around" logic, he'd taken the fate from which they'd saved someone and used it to design their murders. He'd furnished her with tokens symbolizing each murdered hero--a broken teapot and some spilled rice, a dead bird, and a diagram on how to save someone from choking. And if she didn't catch on to his cryptic calling cards, there was always a thank-you note from the victim's next of kin for the sympathy bouquets sent in her name. It was as if he wanted her to feel included in each murder.

But who was doing this, and why? This person was making some kind of statement. He obviously had a grudge against her. Maybe it was someone who didn't like one of her
Movers & Shakers
segments about a hero.

Hunched forward in her desk chair, Sydney held a hand over her mouth. She wondered if her stalker was somehow connected to the
Movers & Shakers
killer. Eli had seen him at the beach yesterday and today. So when did this man have time to fly to New York City and kill Troy? Perhaps he was working with the killer, spying on her and Eli, breaking and entering to leave her the occasional cryptic clue.

Sydney was grateful to have Aidan spending the night. She'd left the poor guy parked in front of the TV with Eli for the last forty-five minutes. Getting to her feet, she started toward the living room. She could hear people on TV talking about
The Bourne Ultimatum
, which meant the movie was over, and Eli had moved onto the Special Features.

"You're going to go blind," she said, finding Eli on the floor directly in front of the TV.

He just nodded and kept staring at the screen.

Dead asleep, Aidan was slumped in the corner of the sofa with his head tipped back. He made a faint snoring sound.

"Aidan?" she said. "Aidan, did you want to wash up or anything?"

He didn't move.

"I tried to wake him up earlier," Eli explained. "He didn't budge. He's history. Great bodyguard he's gonna be tonight."

Sydney turned to him. "You have a choice. If you want to share your room, I'll get him upstairs now, and you can stay down here as long as you want. Otherwise, you need to skedaddle so I can make up the couch for him."

Pausing the movie, Eli gave her an apprehensive look. "Would you be ticked if said I don't feel like sharing my room?"

She shook her head, and then sat down on the floor beside him. "No, honey, you hardly know him," she whispered. "And I really don't think it's going to make any difference to Aidan where he sleeps tonight. But I am ticked at you. I can't believe you didn't tell me about that man following you around at the beach yesterday--and today. Why didn't you speak up earlier?"