Dead Air (Sammy Greene Thriller) (38 page)

Peter Lang was freezing. Parked outside Pappajohn’s home ever since Sammy and the campus cop had arrived, Lang couldn’t risk turning on the engine. He’d sat there without heat for what seemed like hours, without even a cup of coffee to warm him. Worse, he’d had to crack the windows a bit to prevent fogging and now gusts of icy wind blew across his face, burning his nose and ears.

Damn that Greene. So far, this assignment had been a disaster. His hired killer had screwed up badly — not only missing the girl with the car and at the bombing, but allowing her to get a look at him
and
his blasted mustache. If she ever made the ID, the authorities might connect him to Lang. After all, Lang had arranged the contract.

Ishida had been right not wanting to bring in an outsider, but Lang had persuaded his boss that it was necessary. Lang himself wasn’t a killer. He couldn’t even pull the trigger on Conrad.

Industrial espionage was Lang’s game. Planting bugs, gathering dirt, spreading disinformation. He had no qualms about his undercover work — including double-crossing that idiot Taft. Murder, however, was another matter. That was why he’d backed off in New York, why he’d run the minute that kid had yelled “police.” Now
he’d been given only one more chance to stop Greene. Once and for all. Or else. Well, he thought with a certain resignation, he was in too deep to back out. There was no other choice.

He looked over at the house. Lights still burned in the living room and den. That meant at least one of them was probably awake. He held his hands up to his mouth and blew hot air on them, trying to coax feeling back into his stiff fingers. Shit! This was going to be a long night.

Lang was half-asleep when he heard the sound. He sat up to see a shadow emerge from the house and shut the door. It was Greene. Alone. The snow was falling more thickly now, so he wouldn’t have to wait long before he could start his motor and follow. Damn, she was taking the walk path toward the university campus. He’d have to follow on foot. Cursing the foul weather, he dragged himself out of his cold car into the colder night. There was so little light that he had a hard time tracking her progress without moving in too close. He hoped the wind noise muffled the sound of his footsteps.

Fifteen minutes later, hidden in the shadows, he stood shivering outside the building where Sammy lived. She had just gone inside. He saw the lights in her apartment flip on. He checked his watch. The crystal had fogged, making it difficult to read the time. One a.m. It wouldn’t be long before she’d be asleep, and he’d have a chance to make his move.

Soon, very soon, his duty would be fulfilled.

The moment Sammy locked her apartment door, she stripped off her clothes and jumped into the shower, turning on the water full force. Rotating slowly, she let the needle-like jets crash down on her head, rivulets of warmth running along her body, relaxing her muscles made tight by tension. She closed her eyes, emptying her mind of anything but the pure pleasure of the shower.

The sound of the telephone didn’t register at first. Finally, she opened her eyes and listened. Another ring. Who’d call at this hour, Sammy wondered, shutting off the faucet. Hair dripping, she stepped
out of the shower, wrapped a towel around her wet body, and padded into the living room. “Hello?” she spoke tentatively into the receiver.

“Sammy?”

“Dr. Osborne?” What in the world?

“I’m so glad you made it home safely.”

“Me, too,” Sammy said.
If only he knew the half of it
. “Didn’t you get my message?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact. My service said you’d canceled our appointment because you were going out of town.”

“Something came up and —”

“It’s all right,” Osborne reassured her. “I wouldn’t have thought twice about it, but I ran into your friend Reed Wyndham today, and he told me you hadn’t returned from New York. He seemed troubled —”

Oy vey
, Reed! In the midst of all the turmoil she completely forgot to call him.

“And frankly,” Osborne was saying, “after our chat on Thursday, I wondered if somehow Taft’s people had gotten to you.”

Sammy was touched by the psychologist’s concern. More than that, she was gratified that he had believed her story about Taft before anyone else did. “Actually,” she replied, “they almost did.”

“What happened?”

Sammy began to relate the incredible events of the past two days. As she spoke, her eyes wandered to her purse lying on the chair next to the phone. She’d thrown the shoulder bag down when she came in earlier and somehow one of the Nitshi brochures she’d taken from Ishida’s office had fallen out. “Jesus!” she exclaimed into the receiver.

“Sammy, are you all right?”

“Yes, I’m fine.” She picked up the brochure and stared at a small unlabeled group photo on the back cover. “A man I saw Friday in New York — a man who apparently works for Nitshi.” Sammy flipped through the brochure until she found him again — this time in a shot with Yoshi Ishida. She searched for a name in the caption. “Uh, here
it is. Peter Lang. I couldn’t place him when I saw him walk past the elevator, but now I remember,” she said excitedly. “He was at the animal rights protest. My God, that means he’s also working for Taft!”

“You’re sure it’s the same man?”

“I’ve got pictures from the demonstration.” Sammy grabbed her purse and pulled out the photo of Luther Abbott. There, standing behind him, was the short, stocky man she hadn’t recognized before. No question. That was Peter Lang. “This time I have real proof.”

“Sammy, listen to me. You’ve got to be very careful with this information.”

“I’m not going to talk to the police. I think Sergeant Pappajohn may be involved in some kind of cover-up. Or worse.” She told him what she’d seen on his computer. “He even has a file on me!”

“Incredible,” Osborne sounded shocked. “But if what you say is true, you could be in grave danger.” His voice was laced with concern. “Sammy, you mustn’t breathe a word of this to anyone.”

“I have to get this out. We’re talking about murder!”

Osborne’s voice was calm. “We will. But we can’t do anything in the middle of the night. I’ll see if I can set up a meeting with Chancellor Ellsford sometime in the morning. Give me a call around ten. Meanwhile, stay home, lock your door, and try to get some rest. Whatever you do, don’t go out. Oh, and you’d better leave the phone free in case of emergency.”

“All right.” Sammy was both frightened and relieved. Chancellor Ellsford could take care of things and her nightmare would be over. “But, what if something — ?”

“Take my number.” He gave her the seven digits. “If anything happens, call me immediately. I’ll call the state police and come right away.”

She wrote the number down on a loose piece of paper and stuck it in her purse.

“Thanks,” Sammy hung up the phone, too keyed up to sleep. She didn’t know if she could take much more. What she did know was that she didn’t want to be alone. Even if it meant facing Reed.

Sammy put on long johns and pulled on a pair of jeans and a warm sweatshirt. She slipped the brochure back in her purse and reached for her jacket. The blinking light on her answering machine drew her back. It was a message from Larry. He needed to talk to her. She checked her watch: 1:30. She’d call him first thing tomorrow.

Sammy bounded down the stairs, one eye over her shoulder, her ears cocked for footsteps. The only footsteps she heard were her own, echoing up and down the barren stairwell. As she neared the front entrance, Osborne’s words came back to her.
Stay home, you could be in grave danger
.

She paused, then made a quick decision. The back door was unlit. She could sneak out, be in the woods in seconds, and still make it to Reed’s relatively quickly. Without further hesitation, she ran to the back, and looking around to see if she was followed, stepped into the cold, snowy night alone.

Sammy wasn’t the only one getting middle-of-the-night calls. The telephone beside Pappajohn’s bed rang four times before he realized it wasn’t part of his dream and picked it up. “Yeah?”

The man at the other end identified himself as Tom Nelson of the Peoria Police Department. “I’m afraid I have to report a death. One of your students at the university. Name of Lucy Peters.”

Pappajohn sat up to full attention. “How’s that?”

Nelson explained how he’d discovered Lucy’s body in the snow near the track. “Best as we can guess, she must have fallen from the southbound train. Unfortunately, the northbound local was coming down the track where she fell. Her body was completely crushed. ME dispensed with the autopsy.”

“How’d you make the identification then?” For Pappajohn, the news was an unpleasant surprise. He’d called the Amtrak office for a list of passengers from St. Charlesbury. Lucy’s name hadn’t been on the roster. Not that an oversight wasn’t possible. It happened all the time.

“There was a student ID card a few feet from where she fell,”
Nelson explained. Hesitating, he added. “Uh, in fact, that’s why I’m calling. I figured you guys would want to uh notify the . . . uh . . . next of kin.”

“Yeah,” Pappajohn said. “I’ll take care of it.” Who could blame Nelson for wanting to dump the call? He took down the Illinois trooper’s number, then hung up and reluctantly dialed the Peters. Almost twenty-five years as a Boston city policeman and he’d never gotten used to this. But now as a campus cop, it was a part of the job he’d never counted on.

2:00 A.M.

“Well look who finally made it.” Reed stood in the open doorway of his apartment dressed only in a T-shirt and jockey undershorts. At this hour Sammy knew she’d gotten him out of bed. “Miss your plane?”

“Reed, I —”

“I waited for you, you know. Three hours. At the airport.”

“Oh, Reed,” Sammy groaned. “You weren’t supposed to come until I called.”

“My fault. I forgot.”

Sammy brushed at the snow on her jacket. “Can I come in?”

Shaking his head, Reed stepped aside to make room for her to enter. “I don’t know why I —”

“Thanks.” Sammy locked the door after her. She followed him to the bathroom, where he bent over the sink and splashed cold water on his face. “Look, Reed, I’m really sorry. If I could only explain.”

“You’re always sorry. That’s not the problem.” He turned off the faucet, but remained with his back to her, staring into the mirror.

Sammy studied his reflection, feeling a rush of tenderness. More than anything, she wished she could melt in his arms, feel his warm embrace. If only she could pour her heart out to him, tell him her thoughts and her fears, have him keep her safe.

“I was attacked in New York,” she finally said with forced calm. “Almost raped.” She watched Reed’s expression carefully, trying to
gauge his reaction to the information. His face was unreadable. “That’s why I didn’t call. I-I couldn’t.”

Reed turned around. “You’re serious?”

Sammy nodded. “I’ve never been more serious.”

“What exactly happened?”

Starting from the visit to her old neighborhood, Sammy quickly told him about the attack — including the fact that the clever youngster had saved her. “If he hadn’t yelled, I’m sure —” her voice choked with emotion.

“Were you hurt?” Reed’s tone was now solicitous.

Sammy shook her head. “Just a few bruises. I was lucky.”

“That wasn’t very bright — going into a neighborhood like that alone.”

“That’s exactly what Lieutenant Rodriguez said.”

“Smart man.”

She couldn’t blame Reed for his reaction. Grandma Rose would have said the same thing. Instead, she blurted, “I think the man who assaulted me was one of Taft’s people.”

“Did you tell that to the police?”

“Uh, no. I didn’t.”

“Why not?”

“Well, because I didn’t have proof. Not then.”

“And now you do?”

“Yes.” Sammy took the brochure from her purse and pointed out Peter Lang. “Lang works for Nitshi.”

“So?” Reed frowned.

“So he also works for Taft. I saw Lang at the animal rights demonstration. That’s why he had someone try to run me down. Lang knew I’d taken his picture, that I could connect him with Taft.”

“Whoa. You said you were attacked. What’s this about running you down?”

Sammy stopped, realizing she’d never mentioned the hit-andrun to Reed. “Uh, it was the other day, near Mr. Brewster’s store.” Now she related the incident.

“Why didn’t you tell me about this before?”

“Mr. Brewster thought it was just an accident, and I wasn’t really sure — not until I found out the man with the mustache stole my pictures.”

“What man with a mustache?”

Again she explained how she’d caught sight of the driver — the same man Mr. Brewster described in his shop the next day. “Taft must have hired this guy to kill me and steal the pictures of Lang.”

Reed ran his hand through his rumpled sandy mop. “I’m trying to keep up with this story, but —”

“It’s what I tried to tell you the other day. If Taft can discredit Nitshi, the university will be forced to cut all ties with the company. He’s trying to stop Nitshi’s AIDS research. Targeting any professor even remotely associated with that kind of work — Nakamura, Conrad, now your Dr. Palmer.”

Sammy’s face was flushed with the excitement of unraveling a puzzle. “Look at this.” She produced the list she’d created on Pappajohn’s computer. “If you buy my hypothesis, then these deaths can all be linked to Taft.” She took out Sergio’s autopsy report. “Tomorrow I plan to talk with Dr. Palmer —”

“Enough.” Reed ‘s voice was tinged with anger. “Sammy, you can theorize until you’re blue in the face. Reverend Taft is a man obsessed with his view of morality, I’ll admit. I’ll even admit he’s gone to some extreme measures to foist those views on others. But so far, you haven’t convinced me that he’s resorted to murder. If it turns out he’s tied up with the bombing, then he might be held responsible for Katie Miller’s death. At the moment even that link hasn’t been proven. As for these other people,” Reed cast the list aside, “you’ve made fantastic leaps, apparently taking all sorts of risks with your life — and my career, I might add — to come up with a whimsical explanation for what are clearly a series of unconnected, unfortunate incidents.”