Wonder Guy (24 page)

In fact, it proved easy enough to contact Kathleen’s administrative assistant, Lynn, to ask for a meeting or a chance to catch Kathleen between meetings.

Kathleen’s team occupied stations on the opposite side of the floor from Gloria’s workstation outside Mr. Carlson’s office. The floor plan mirrored itself. Whenever she visited Lynn, she might as well be in a strangely altered universe where different people populated the same cubicles and offices.

Lynn’s cubicle asserted its individuality with post cards from her Hawaiian dream vacation, a lei of hot pink silk hibiscus flowers and a bobble-head hula dancer atop her monitor.

“She’s out of the office for the morning.” Lynn looked up from the Notes calendar on her screen. “But I know she’s planning to come back to the office after lunch because she still has to sign and file the team timecards and payroll report before the weekend.”

“Good,” Gloria said, “I just want a few minutes of her time to square away the tax records on her outside contractors.”

“Sorry I can’t help. She wanted to handle those herself. She should be in her office around one o’clock.”

“I’ll try her then.”

* * * *

Greg biked to the University as usual the next morning. He considered going as Wonder Guy, flying and crime fighting along the way, but he didn’t quite trust this magic stuff after yesterday’s power-loss incident. It seemed great when it worked, but he didn’t understand its rules. Serafina had suggested there were rules, but they weren’t nice and clear-cut like the rules of physics or mathematics. They involved the fuzzy, slippery realms of emotion and imagination.

So he rode his bike, lest the magic suddenly fail him and he be left to make his way home later with neither magic nor wheels.

Fortunately, the morning air filled his breath with June, the sky shone clear and blue, the breeze wafted mild but cool enough to make exertion a pleasure. The Greenway made a nice, semi-secluded route across South Minneapolis, running along the tracks of an old railway. Here it ran under the roads, in a deep cutting with banks overgrown by wild grass and scrawny saplings. Secluded from cars, at least, if not other bikers, the track felt remote from the city–if one ignored the sounds and smells of traffic from above. At this early hour, with the sun just rising, few bikers used the path. He’d go for minutes at a time without seeing anyone at all.

A scream, somewhere ahead of the deserted stretch of trail. Greg skidded to a halt, spraying gravel as he scanned his surroundings. There, the sound of cursing, a woman’s voice just beyond a curve rounding the abutment of an overpass.

He quickly rode the few yards around the curve to find a woman sprawled on the path, her bicycle on its side near her with one wheel spinning in the air.

“You okay?” he called.

“No.” She winced visibly as she spoke, trying to rise to a seated position. “My damned foot isn’t working.”

Greg knelt beside her. “It’s still attached,” he told her, “but the angle looks wrong.”

“I can’t believe this.” The woman, probably Aggie’s age, who’d be attractive if not for the lines of pain etching her face, had short, silver-shot red curls emerging from her black helmet. “I have to get downtown for a job interview this morning.”

“Looks like you’ll have to reschedule.” He already had his cell phone out of the brass-studded brown leather Cell Shell Gloria had made him for his birthday and punched in 911 as he spoke. “You can call them as soon as we get some medical help here.”

“I’ll call them now if you help me sit up.”

“We shouldn’t move you,” Greg turned back to the phone. “Yes, we need medical assistance. A woman’s been injured on the Greenway bike path near Cedar, looks like her ankle’s broken. What should we do?”

By then another pair of bikers had pulled up beside them.

“Don’t move her,” Greg told a young woman in a pink helmet who knelt and put her hands under the fallen woman’s shoulders, seeming about to lift her. “I’ve got 911 on the phone. They say not to move her. An emergency medical team is on the way.”

“Oh.” The kneeling woman turned to the fallen biker. “Sorry. We’ll wait here with you.”

“I know some first aid.” Pink helmet’s companion, a lanky young man, removed his blue striped helmet to reveal short, tousled dark hair. He knelt by the injured woman’s feet. “What happened?” he asked her.

“Skidded and my bike went one way while I went another, but my foot got caught in the toe hold of the pedal.”

Greg stood aside. He’d already done what he could. Not even as Wonder Guy would he have been able to do more. But that was okay. More qualified people had the situation in hand. As it should be. Where did he get the feeling he should be personally responsible for solving every problem to come his way? He hadn’t felt that way before taking on the role of a superhero.

* * * *

Back at her desk, with her
I Can Has Cheezburger
calendar and her own coffee mug reminding her it was a dirty job and she got to do it, Gloria returned to the spreadsheets Patty had given her, finding the batch pertaining to R&D. The report listed twenty projects associated with Inspired Logic and Intelligent DZine. ABM had paid out nearly three quarters of a million dollars for research projects to the two companies in the last year.

The missing tax forms must be a simple oversight on Kathleen’s part. She usually handled such paperwork personally and got it filed promptly. At department meetings, she often touted her ability to seek out the best and the brightest in the computing field and apply their talents to the company’s benefit.

At one o’clock, Gloria headed around the floor toward Kathleen’s office, but even as she passed the bank of elevators, she caught sight of the division sub-head emerging onto the floor. Her hair was in a severely cut bob, and her gray silk suit impeccable.

“Ms. Pederson.” Gloria quickened her pace to catch up to the department subhead. “Do you have a moment?”

“Just.” Kathleen halted, turning to Gloria, with a brow raised. The woman had her suit tailored to reveal only subtle curves. Her honey-blond hair showed not a trace of gray, but the downward lines at the corners of her mouth betrayed a habitual frown and a slight pouching when she lowered her chin betrayed years otherwise concealed by a clever use of cosmetics.

“What is it?” Kathleen tapped a finger against the black leather day planner tucked under one arm.

“Just a follow-up HR requested.” Gloria rushed to get the words out. She admired the other woman’s accomplishment and poise, but often got nervous speaking with her–as if every word must count and she had to convey the most information in the fewest words in the least time. It took her some effort to avoid stumbling over her own tongue. “You know. Jo Willard, who was...well.” Gloria swallowed a wave of sorrow. “They gave me some reports left out on her desk, and I need to verify whether the 1099 forms were filed for a couple of your outside contractors.”

Kathleen’s eyes narrowed as Gloria spoke. “Of course,” she said. “I know the ones you mean. I’ll have to get the files to you on Monday. Today is booked. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” She turned away without awaiting a response and headed toward her office.

“Monday will be fine,” Gloria muttered to herself.
No hurry at all.
She shrugged and started back to her own cubicle. She’d been through this before. Department subheads had more urgent matters to deal with than helping a lowly administrative assistant square away a report.

* * * *

Kathleen Pederson told Lynn to hold any calls and closed her office door behind her.

She leaned back against the slab of dark wood and let herself breathe.
Damn. Damn, damn, damn.
She’d have to do something about those forms or the HR report on them anyway. She had managed to get access to the report. That HR flunky, Jo Willard, had been willing enough to log in at Kathleen’s desk when she’d told the girl, “I have the files here, why don’t you go ahead and log in. We can update the database right now.” Jo had sat at Kathleen’s desk, logged in with her own password as Kathleen watched.

She should have altered the report right away to reflect the non-existent tax forms, but there’d been other, more urgent matters to deal with once she had a dead body on her hands.

Everything had fallen into confusion once she’d struck the girl on the head from behind, using her solid Lucite
Distinguished Service Award
. At least the thing had been easy to clean and set back in its proper place on her shelves. Kathleen could now admit she’d panicked. She hadn’t realized she’d need fake tax forms. She wasn’t prepared to deal with anyone asking for them.

Jo had said the discrepancy only turned up by accident. They didn’t normally include R&D’s contractors on the company’s Human Resources reports, but once they’d noticed the missing forms, they had to establish their existence. It had looked for a moment as if everything would fall apart around her. Kathleen had seen her plans, her career in ruins. She refused to face the possibility of jail time.

She’d needed to think fast, call on Ms. Ellis for help disposing of the body, for help making it look like criminals broke into the loading bay. She hadn’t anticipated that anyone else would show up to ask again about the forms. Now if Kathleen altered the database, Gloria would know there’d been no tax forms for the three quarters of a million dollars in expenses. She’d be the only one who knew.

Ms. Torkenson needed to go away. But it would look odd–too odd–if two employees died within a few days of each other, both of them after working on the same report. No. This called for something less direct than her handling of Ms. Willard.

It wouldn’t look quite so strange if Ms. Torkenson died at her own home, by her own hand, despondent over the death of her beloved friend, leaving a note to that effect. If anyone were capable of arranging such an event, it would be Ms. Ellis.

Kathleen shuddered, moving away from the door, to her desk. First, she would alter the database records from which HR had run the troublesome report. Then there’d be no more inquiries concerning her outside contractors. After that, she’d contact Ms. Ellis. Kathleen shuddered again, took her place before the monitor and gripped the mouse.

She had serious doubts about the Ellis woman. Meetings at midnight, and with her strange go-betweens–always some stunted, twisted-looking person in rags. At least Ms. Ellis got things done. She knew people. People motivated to do practically anything.

With all that the woman had on Kathleen, Ms. Ellis could motivate her, too now to do practically anything. At least they were both in this, both equally at risk. But, equally equal?

What did she truly know about the odd Ellis woman with her eerie, almost sickly, beauty and her midnight meetings? The woman had no phone, no email, no street address, but Kathleen also had no other recourse for getting Ms. Torkenson out of the way without creating inconvenient suspicions. Kathleen wasn’t letting the inconsequential clerical worker stand in the way of a scheme yielding millions of dollars for her and her partner, with plenty more to come for as long as they kept things under wraps. Not to mention the advancement of her career plans. Soon, ABM’s Department Head of Minneapolis R&D. Tomorrow, the New York offices–maybe ABM Worldwide.

* * * *

Greg spent the morning in the computer lab, checking the last batch of simulations and setting up the next run. Each run simulated the properties of different components. Finding those optimal for reducing heat when relaying streams of photons constituted his personal treasure hunt. The potential combinations of materials and their properties ran to millions. With his algorithms, he had a reliable means of testing possible solutions–a faster, less costly way than real time tests with actual materials. He’d get to that challenge once he’d figured out his best bets.

After his usual lunchtime, Greg turned to tracking down the IP addresses he’d gotten from Ted in Tech Support.

He hadn’t had much luck with them so far. The listings showed up as private registries, like unlisted phone numbers. When Eric came into the lab, still sucking down a McD’s large soft drink, Greg hailed him from across the otherwise empty room.

“Hey, Eric. How’re your hacking skillz?”

“Why do you want to know?” Eric, grinning like a Cheshire cat, sauntered to Greg’s workstation.

“Just trying to get the address of a RL site for this IP address.” Greg leaned back in his chair. “It’s private registry. Guess I’m out of luck. Nobody could bust their security.”

“Think again,
compadre
.” Eric leaned in, studying the screen. “Just move aside and let me drive.” He pulled up another chair while Greg did as instructed.

Watching Eric in action might have been an education, but the screen switched from one view to the next before Greg got a handle on exactly what Eric did to make the changes. He didn’t want to distract the driver while he maneuvered so rapidly around firewalls. Only a few minutes later Eric tapped the screen and announced, “Here it is.”