Die for Me (27 page)

“That’s Ray,” Dom said. “He’s a gamer. So is Jesse.”

“So what’s the big deal with this game?” Vito asked.

Ray shrugged. “Everything in the game part’s a rehash from this company’s last five games. Game physics, environments, AI . . .”

“Artificial intelligence,” Dom murmured.

“I know,” Vito murmured back. “So I repeat, what’s the big deal? The characters are flat and the AI really sucks. I mean, Jesse here just took out a dozen bad boys with armbands and not one of them winged him. What’s the challenge in that?”

“We’re not playing it for the game,” Jesse said, apparently unoffended. “We’re playing it for the cut scenes.” He laughed softly. “Fuckin’ unbelievable, man.”

Dom looked around, frowning. “
Jesse.
My little brothers are here.”

“Like they don’t hear it from your old man,” Jesse said, bored.

Dom gritted his teeth. “They don’t. Look, let’s get back to work.”

“Just a minute,” Vito said softly, his eyes on the screen. He’d let this play out because he was curious, both about Dom’s classmates and what kids were playing these days. He never knew when knowing current kid-speak would come in handy in the interview room. He’d caught many a teen off guard pretending to share their interests. But as soon as Vito’s curiosity was sated, Jesse would be out on his ass.

On the screen, the American soldier reloaded his weapon and muttered, “This was a trap. She betrayed me, the whore.” He cocked the rifle. “She’ll come to regret that move.” The scene changed and the soldier was at the door of a small French cottage.

“So what’s the story here?” Vito asked Ray.

“This is . . . the cut scene.” He said it like it was the Sistine Chapel or something. When Vito frowned, Ray looked disappointed. “A cut scene is—”

“I know what a cut scene is,” Vito interrupted. The cut scene was the animated movie clip where the main character talked to people, learned secrets, or simply got free stuff. “Most of the ones I’ve seen have been boring and just kept you from the game. What I was asking was, what’s special about this one?”

Ray grinned. “You’ll see. This is Clothilde’s house. She claimed to be French Resistance, but she gave our soldier up. That’s why he was ambushed back there at the bunker. It’s payback time. Jesse’s right. This really is unbelievable.”

On the screen, the door opened to the inside of the cottage as the game flowed into the cut scene. The graphics abruptly changed. Gone were the grainy characters and choppy motion. When the American soldier walked through the door and began to search the cottage, it looked real. The solder finally found Clothilde hiding in a closet. He yanked her out of the closet and up against a wall. “You bitch,” he snarled. “You told them where to find me. What did they give you? Chocolate? Silk stockings?”

The busty Clothilde sneered up at him, although her eyes were wide with fear.

“Watch her eyes,” Ray whispered.

“Tell me.” The soldier shook the woman’s shoulders violently.

“My life,” Clothilde spat. “They said they would not kill me if I told. So I told.”

“Five of my buddies died back there. Because of you.” The American put his hands around her throat and Clothilde’s eyes grew wider. “You should have let those German bastards kill you. Now I will.”

“No. Please no!” As she struggled the screen filled with her face and his hands. The fear in her eyes . . .

“Amazing,” Ray whispered beside him. “The artist is truly amazing. It’s like watching a movie. It’s hard to believe somebody created this.”

But someone had. Disturbed, Vito felt his jaw tighten. Somebody had drawn this. And kids were watching it. He nudged Dom aside. “Go check on your brothers.”

From the corner of his eye, Vito could see Dom’s face relax in relief. “Okay.”

On the screen, Clothilde was sobbing and begging for her life. “Are you ready to die, Clothilde?” the soldier mocked and she screamed, loud and long. Desperate. Too real. Vito winced and looked at the kids’ faces as they watched transfixed. Eyes wide, mouths slightly open. Waiting.

The scream ended and there was a long moment of silence. Then the soldier laughed softly. “Go ahead and scream, Clothilde. No one can hear you. No one will save you. I killed them all.” His hands tightened, his thumbs moving to the hollow of her throat. “And now I’ll kill you.” His hands tightened further and Clothilde began to writhe.

Vito had seen enough. “That’s it.” He leaned forward and hit the power button on the monitor and the screen went dark. “Show’s over, kids.”

Jesse whipped the recliner down and stood up. “Hey. You can’t do that.”

Vito pulled the computer’s power cord from the wall. “Hey. Watch me. You can play that crap in your parents’ house, but you’re not playin’ it here. Pack it up, buddy.”

Jesse weighed his options. Finally he turned away in disgust. “Let’s get out of here.”

“Dude.” One of the boys winced. “Without Dom’s science project, we got nothin’.”

“We don’t need him.” Jesse tucked the computer under his arm. “Noel, get the monitor. Ray, get the CDs.”

Noel shook his head. “I can’t fail again. You might not need Dom’s project, but I do.”

Jesse’s eyes narrowed. “Fine.” The others followed, leaving Ray and Noel.

Ray grinned at Vito. “His parents wouldn’t let him play the game at home either.”

Vito looked over his shoulder. “Will Jesse cause any problems for Dominic?”

“Nah. Jesse’s no match for Dom. Dom’s the captain of the JV wrestling team.”

Vito bent his mouth, impressed. “Wow. He never told me that.”

“Dominic can take care of himself,” Ray said. “Sometimes he’s just too nice.”

Dominic came back down the hall, Pierce riding on his back. The five-year-old had just gotten out of the bath and his hair was wet, and his pj’s were Spiderman. Vito was glad he’d turned off that filth before the little ones had seen it.

Dom looked at the remaining two teenagers. “Jesse’s gone?”

Ray grinned again. “Sheriff here ran him out of town on a rail.”

“Thanks, Vito,” Dom said quietly. “I didn’t want him watching that stuff here.”

Vito presented his back to Pierce, who took a flying, screeching leap. “Next time, just tell him to leave.”

“I did tell him to leave.”

“Well, then . . . toss him out on his ass, if you have to.”

“Awwww,” Pierce said. “Uncle Vitoooooo. You said the donkey word, Uncle Vito.”

Vito winced. He’d forgotten “ass” was on the swear-word list. “Sorry, pal. You think Aunt Tess’ll wash my mouth out with soap?”

Pierce bounced. “Yes, yes!”

“Yes, yes,” Tess said from the hall. Her hair hung in damp waves. Obviously as much water had landed on her as on Pierce. “Vito, watch your mouth.”

“Okay, okay.” He gave a final nod to Dom. “You did fine, kid. Next time you’ll do even better.” He jogged back to Tess, giving Pierce a ride.

“Well? Did she get it?” She was referring to the present she’d left for Sophie.

“Don’t know. She gets out of class soon. I guess I’ll find out then. But thanks for picking it up. Where did you find a memory neutralizer toy anyway?”

“Party store on Broad Street. Guy advertises he’s got every Happy Meal toy ever sold. The neutralizer was a pretty popular one when the movie came out.” She lifted a brow. “You owe me two hundred bucks for the toy and the curtains.”

Vito nearly dropped Pierce. “
What?
What kind of curtains did you buy? Gold?”

She shrugged. “The curtains were only thirty bucks.”

“You paid a hundred and seventy dollars for a Happy Meal toy?”

“The toy was in its original wrapper.” Her lips twitched. “I hope she’s worth it.”

Vito blew out a breath. “Me, too.”

Chapter Thirteen

Tuesday, January 16, 9:55
P.M.

I
s something wrong, Dr. J?”

Sophie looked up to see Marta walking across the parking lot behind the Whitman humanities building. “My bike won’t start.” She got off and huffed a weary sigh. “It was running just fine right before class. Now it tries to start and just sputters.”

“Bummer.” Marta bit her lip. “You do have gas in the tank, don’t you? The last time my car wouldn’t start I got all upset till I realized I’d forgotten to get gas.”

Sophie bit back her impatience. Marta was trying to help. “I filled up this morning.”

“What’s wrong?” Spandan had joined them, along with most of the other students in her Tuesday night graduate seminar. This semester she was teaching Fundamentals of the Dig to a packed classroom, and while she normally would have hung around to answer questions, she’d bolted right after class tonight. Vito was waiting for her at Peppi’s Pizza and all she’d been able to think about during class was that kiss.

“My bike won’t start and now I’m late.”

Marta looked interested. “For a date?”

Sophie rolled her eyes. “If I don’t get there soon, no.”

The door behind them opened again and John came down the wheelchair ramp. “What’s wrong?”

“Dr. J’s bike’s busted and she’s late for her date,” Bruce said.

John steered his chair around the crowd and leaned forward to peer at her engine. “Sugar.” He tapped her gas tank with one gloved finger.

“What?” Sophie leaned forward to immediately see that he was right. A dusting of sugar crystals around the gas tank sparkled in the light of the street lamps. “Dammit,” she hissed. “I swear to God that woman’s going to pay this time.”

“You know who did this?” Marta asked, wide-eyed.

That the saboteur had been Amanda Brewster was almost certain. “I have an idea.”

Bruce had his cell phone in his hand. “I’m calling campus security.”

“Not now. I will report this. Don’t worry,” she added when Spandan tried to protest. She unbungeed her backpack from the seat. “But I’m not going to wait around for them to come right now. I’m really late. It’s a good fifteen-minute walk to the restaurant.”

“I’ll drive you.” John asked. “I’ve got my van.”

“Um . . .” Sophie shook her head. “Thanks, but I’ll walk.”

John’s chin went up. “It’s equipped with hand controls. I’m a good driver.”

She’d offended him. “It’s not that, John,” she said hastily. “It’s just . . . I’m your teacher. I don’t want to appear improper.”

He angled her a look up through his ever-shaggy hair. “It’s a ride, Dr. J. Not marriage.” One side of his mouth lifted. “Besides, you’re not my type.”

She laughed. “Okay. Thanks. I’m going to Peppi’s Pizza.” She waved to the others. “See you Sunday.” She walked alongside his chair until they came to the white van he drove. He opened her door, then activated the lift for his chair. Capably, he swung his body out of the chair and behind the driver’s seat.

He saw her watching and his jaw tightened. “I’ve had lots of practice.”

“How long have you been in the chair?”

“Since I was kid.” His tone was clipped. She’d offended him again. Saying no more, he pulled the van out of the parking lot.

Unsure of what to say next, Sophie went for something she hoped was more neutral. “You missed the first part of class tonight. I hope nothing was wrong.”

“I got tied up at the library. I was so late that I almost didn’t come at all, but I needed to ask you about something. I tried to catch you after class, but you rushed out.”

“So you had an ulterior motive for offering me a ride.” She smiled. “What’s up?”

He didn’t smile back, but then John rarely smiled. “I have a paper due tomorrow for another class. It’s almost done, but I was having trouble finding primary references for one piece of it.”

“What’s the topic?”

“Comparison of modern and medieval theories on crime and punishment.”

Sophie nodded. “You must be taking Dr. Jackson’s medieval law class. So what’s the question?”

“I wanted to include a comparison of the medieval practice of branding with contemporary use of sex offender registration. But I couldn’t find any consistent information on branding.”

“Interesting topic. I can think of a few references that might help.” She dug in her backpack for her notebook and started writing. “When is your paper due?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

She grimaced. “Then you’ll need to use the online references unless the librarians work later than they used to. I know some of these are available online. The others might only be available through old-fashioned books. Oh, Peppi’s is right around the corner.” She ripped out the page and handed it to him as he pulled into the restaurant’s parking lot. “Thanks, John. Good luck on your paper.”

He took the sheet with a sober nod. “See you on Sunday.”

Sophie stood still as he drove away, then held her breath as she scanned the lot for Vito’s truck. Slowly she let the breath out. He was still here.

This was it. She’d walk into that restaurant and . . . change her life. And suddenly she was scared to death.

Tuesday, January 16, 10:00
P.M.

Daniel sat on the edge of his hotel bed, exhausted. He’d been to more than fifteen hotels since breakfast and he was no closer to finding his parents. His parents were creatures of habit, so he’d started with their favorite hotels, the expensive ones. He’d gone on to the big chains. No one had seen them, or remembered them if they had.

Wearily he toed off his shoes and fell back against the mat-tress. He was tired enough to fall asleep like this, his tie still knotted and his feet still on the floor. Maybe his parents hadn’t come to Philadelphia after all. Maybe this had been a wild goose chase. Maybe they were already dead.

He closed his eyes, trying to think past the pounding in his temples. Maybe he should call the local police and check the morgues.

Or the doctors. Perhaps they’d been to one of the oncologists on the list he’d printed from his father’s computer. But no doctor would tell him anything. Patient confidentiality, they’d say.

The ringing of his cell phone startled him out of a near doze. Susannah.

“Hello, Suze.”

“You haven’t found them.” It was more a statement than a question.

“No, and I’ve walked all over town today. I’m beginning to wonder if this is really where they came.”

“They were there,” Susannah said, little inflection in her tone. “The call from Mom’s cell phone to Grandma’s was placed from Philadelphia.”

Daniel sat up. “How do you know that?”

“I called in a marker, had it traced. I thought you should know. Call me if you find them. Otherwise, don’t. Good-bye, Daniel.”

She was going to hang up. “Suze,
wait.
”

He heard her sigh. “What?”

“I was wrong. Not to leave. I had to leave. But I was wrong not to tell you why.”

“And you’re going to tell me now?” Her voice was hard and it pricked his heart.

“No. Because you’re safer if you don’t know. That was my only reason for not telling you then . . . and now. Especially now.”

“Daniel, it’s late. You’re talking in riddles and I don’t want to listen.”

“Suze . . . You trusted me once.”

“Once.” The single word rang with finality.

“Then trust me again, please, just on this. If you knew, you’d be compromised. Your career would be compromised. You’ve worked too hard to get where you are for me to drag you down for the simple purpose of unloading my guilty conscience.”

She was quiet so long he had to check to see if they were still connected. They were. Finally she murmured. “I know what your son did. Do you know, Daniel?”

“Yes.”

“And you want me to forgive you?”

“No. I don’t expect that. I don’t know what I want. Maybe to hear you call me Danny again.”

“You were my big brother, and I needed your protection then. But I learned how to take care of myself. I don’t need your protection now, Daniel, and I don’t need you. Call me if you find them.”

She hung up and Daniel sat on the edge of a strange hotel bed, staring at his phone and wondering how he’d allowed everything to become so completely fucked up.

Tuesday, January 16, 10:15
P.M.

“Honey, if you’re not going to order, you have to leave. Kitchen closes in fifteen.”

Vito checked his watch before looking up at the waitress. “How about a large with everything?” he said. “And just bring it in a box. I’ll take it with me.”

“She’s not coming, huh?” the waitress said sympathetically, taking his menu.

Sophie should have been there a half hour ago easily. “Doesn’t appear so.”

“Well, a man like you should have no trouble finding somebody better.” Clucking, she went back to the kitchen to place his order, and Vito leaned his head against the wall behind his booth and closed his eyes. Tried not to think about the fact that Sophie hadn’t come. Tried to focus on the things he could really change.

They’d identified four of the nine victims. Five more to go.

Roses.
He smelled roses and felt the booth shake as someone slid into the other side. She’d come after all. But he stayed where he was, eyes closed.

“Excuse me,” she said and he opened his eyes. She was sitting across from him wearing her black leather jacket. Huge gold hoops hung from her ears and she’d pulled her hair over one shoulder. “I’m waiting for somebody, and I think you might be him.”

Vito chuckled. She’d taken them back to the moment they’d met. “That memory zapper works better than I thought. Maybe I should try it.”

She smiled at him and he felt some of his stress ease. “Hard day?” she asked.

“You could say that. But I don’t want to talk about my day. You came.”

She lifted a shoulder. “It’s hard to resist movie swag. Thank you.”

Her hands were grasping each other so tightly that her knuckles were white. Taking a breath, he reached across the table and pulled her hands apart, then held each one. “It was hard for you to give his name, but you did it anyway, to help us.”

Her hands tensed as her eyes skittered away from his. “And all those mothers, wives, husbands, and sons. I didn’t want you to talk to Alan because I was ashamed. But I was more ashamed at not telling you.”

“I meant what I said in the note. Brewster is an ass. You should forget him.”

She swallowed. “I didn’t know he was married, Vito. I was young and very stupid.”

“Everything made sense when I met him. I think you knew it would.”

“Maybe.” She looked up, resolutely, he thought. “I brought you something.” She pulled a folded sheet of paper from her pocket and handed it to him.

Vito unfolded it and laughed. She’d drawn a four-by-four matrix. Across the top she’d written
French, German, Greek,
and
Japanese.
Down the side were
damn, shit, hell,
and
fuck.
In the boxes she’d filled in what he assumed were translations. “I like this four-by-four matrix a lot better than the one I’ve been staring at for two days.”

She was grinning at him and he felt even more weight roll from his shoulders. “I promised to teach you some new swear words. I wrote the phonetic spelling, too. I wouldn’t want you pronouncing them wrong. It spoils the effect.”

“It’s great. But you’re missing ‘ass.’ I got busted by my nephew for that one tonight.”

Brows lifted, she took the paper from his hands and pulled a pen from yet another pocket, then wrote the offending word and all its translations. She handed it back and he folded the paper and slipped it in his pocket. “Thank you.” Then he took her hands in his again and was relieved to find her relaxed. “I wasn’t sure you were coming.”

“I had trouble with my bike. I had to catch a ride with one of my students.”

He frowned. “What kind of trouble with your bike?”

“It wouldn’t start. Somebody put sugar in my tank.”

“Who would do that?” His eyes narrowed when her lips pursed. “Who’s been bothering you, Sophie?”

“Oh, Brewster’s wife. She’s a nut case. Sent me a threatening . . . note. Kind of.”

“Sophie,” he warned.

She rolled her eyes. “She sent me a dead mouse, then called to tell me to keep my hands to myself. She must have heard Alan talking to Clint. The woman’s certifiably crazy. She thinks all the women are throwing themselves at Alan.”

“His current assistant probably is.” He sighed. “But I’m sorry she thinks you did.”

“It’s okay. Really. I’ve been tiptoeing about dealing with Alan for a long time, and this forced me to deal. It’s all good.” She scowled. “Except my bike. That pisses me off.”

It was an opening he couldn’t pass up. “I can take you home.”

His words came out deeper and more suggestive than he’d planned. Her cheeks heated and she looked down, but not before he saw her eyes darken with desire, sending a wave of lust singing through his system.