Doom with a View (25 page)

“Did Michael ever talk to you about friends he has at other schools?”

Again Cheng looked confused. “Like who?”

“Like maybe he talked about three other kids that he’d met at a conference. Kids who lived in different states?”

Cheng clearly had no clue what Candice was talking about. “We don’t talk a lot about stuff like that,” he said.

“What do you talk about?”

“Chemistry and biology,” he said simply. “I mean, after that, what else is there?”

I ducked my chin to hide a smile. In a double entendre kind of way I completely agreed with Cheng. “These models are really cool,” I said to him, indicating the DNA hanging from the ceiling.

“Those are Michael’s,” he said. “He’s really got an eye for viruses.”

I gave him a curious look. “Viruses?”

Cheng nodded. “That one you’re standing next to is hantavirus. The one over there is Ebola.”

“Ah,” I said, moving quickly away from the models. “Cool.”

Candice took a conspicuous glance at her watch and said, “I think we’ve taken up enough of your time, Cheng. Thanks so much for talking to us.”

“Sure,” Cheng said, swallowing nervously again.

I waved as I passed him, but he dropped his eyes to the floor. Once Candice and I were out of hearing range, I said, “Nervous little nerd, wasn’t he?”

“A little,” she agreed. “Wonder why.”

We left campus and I followed the directions on the navigator over to the Derby residence. The house we pulled up to was impressive. It had to be at least six or seven thousand square feet in the colonial style with a light tan brick and a shade darker on the shutters. The landscaping was immaculate: every bush trimmed perfectly, not a leaf on the ground, and not a blade of grass out of place. The effect was slightly off-putting and unnatural, like looking at someone who’d gotten too much plastic surgery.

We parked next to a bright blue Jeep Wrangler in the driveway and made our way to the front entrance. Candice rang the bell and we waited for someone to come to the door, but after about forty-five seconds no one had appeared. “Wonder if he’s home,” she muttered as she pushed the bell again.

I sent my radar to investigate, and I felt sure someone wasn’t just home but watching us carefully. I stepped up to the door and said, “Michael, I know you’re in there. We need to talk with you, please.”

Five seconds later the door opened a crack and one gray eye stared out at us. “Yeah?”

Candice flashed both her PI badge and her brilliant smile and took command. “Good afternoon, Michael. I’m Candice Fusco and this is Abigail Cooper. I’m sure you’ve already received a visit from our associates at the FBI, but we were hoping to have a quick word or two with you.”

The eye blinked before it swiveled a few times back and forth between Candice and me. Finally, Michael seemed to think it was okay, because he opened the door and let us inside.“Thank you,” Candice said, moving past him into the large entryway, which opened up to a huge staircase.

Michael Derby was about five feet eight with dark blond hair and nice features. He was well groomed and clean shaven and nothing about him indicated that he might like spending time in the slovenly dorm room we’d just come from. “I gotta get to class soon,” he told us right before his cell phone went off with the awful sound of a metallic mariachi band.

The poor boy quickly yanked his cell out of his pocket and pushed a button, silencing the phone. “Sorry,” he muttered, his cheeks reddening.

“No worries,” Candice assured him before she got to the point. “We don’t want you to be late for your class, so I’ll keep it short. We know you’ve already talked to some of the agents at the bureau, and we know some of our questions will likely be the same as theirs, so I’ll keep it quick and not as redundant, okay?”

Michael dipped his chin slightly and crossed his arms. The poor guy looked really nervous and scared.

Candice began the interview by asking him about Leslie, Kyle, and Bianca. “We know that you four hung out at a conference two years ago.”

“Yeah,” he said.

“Did any of you keep in touch?”

Michael shrugged. “Occasionally,” he said. “I mean, Bianca e-mailed me a couple of times right after the conference, but neither one of us really had time to keep it up.”

I checked what Michael said against my radar, and was relieved to find he was telling us the truth.

“Did anyone at the conference strike you as out of place or someone maybe who was a little too interested in the four of you?”

Michael looked uneasy. “I dunno. Maybe.” Candice waited for him to elaborate and he added, “There was this creepy dude who sorta followed us around and kept listening in on our conversations.”

“What conversations was he listening in on?” Candice asked, and I felt a chill go down my spine.

“Mostly about where we liked to go on vacation,” Michael said. “Bianca liked to go to her mom’s cabin on some lake, and Kyle liked to go to the sand dunes and Leslie said she was going hiking someplace in Wisconsin soon, and right after she said that, this guy starts trying to tell us where he likes to go on vacation.”

“And where was that?” Candice asked him.

“He said he liked to go to this place in the UP—”

“The Upper Peninsula?”

“Yeah,” Michael said. “And we were all, ‘Okay, dude, whatever, we gotta go,’ you know?”

Candice nodded like she knew all too well. “Did you see him again?”

“Well, yeah,” said Michael. “He followed us into the main conference room and sat near us during the committee meeting that Bianca’s dad was chairing, and then right in the middle of it he jumps up and makes this really big scene and was all pissed off and stuff. I told this all to the FBI last night.”

“Could you describe him?”

Michael looked impatient. “I already sat with that FBI sketch artist this morning. Do I really have to go over it again?”

“Please,” she said, unwavering.

Michael sighed. “He was tall, like, six-one or six-two. He had weird teeth, like they were all jacked up and stuff. And he had this kinda creepy way of looking at you, like he could see inside your soul or something.”

“What color was his hair?”

“I dunno. Maybe gray. He didn’t have a lot of it—he was kind of bald.”

“Did you see him again after he was escorted out of the building?”

“No.”

“And what did the other three think of him?”

“They were sort of freaked-out at first, but then they thought it was funny,” Michael said, scratching his cheek, then crossing his arms again. “I was the only one that thought he was totally creepy.”

Again I checked all that Michael said against my radar, and nothing he’d said seemed fabricated, but there was something I felt I was missing with him—almost like we were asking him the wrong questions, but at the moment I was concentrating too hard on the interview to consider what other questions to ask him.

“I noticed that there’s no security detail nearby,” Candice said casually, glancing toward the front entrance.

“Yeah, my dad said I didn’t need one. He said he’d be home in the morning and he’d keep an eye on me.”

“Your father is a busy man,” Candice reasoned. “Why wouldn’t he want to ensure that his son was safe while he was otherwise occupied?”

Michael dug his hands into his pockets and his face reddened again. “He doesn’t like strangers in the house,” he said softly. “And he thought that having the FBI parked in his driveway might make the press curious. They’re not really nice to him, you know. They make up crap about my family all the time.”

Candice looked at him with sympathy. “So I’ve heard,” she said. “Still, it concerns me that you’re on your own here.”

“We have an alarm,” Michael said, pointing to the wall where an alarm panel was installed. “And I’m being really careful on my way to and from class.”

“Has the FBI told you about what’s happened to your three friends?” Candice said carefully.

Michael paled. “No,” he said after a moment. “They just said that they wanted to check out all the kids my age who attended the conference. When my dad asked why, they said it was because they believed someone might be thinking of kidnapping someone’s kid.”

“Ah,” Candice said, and I knew immediately why the FBI would say that. It was because they didn’t want to start a panic among powerful people before they knew what they were up against.

Michael looked at Candice earnestly. “What’s happened to them?” he asked, his voice cracking.

“They’ve gone missing,” she said, and I thought,
So much for protocol.
But just then my radar began to hum and a small chill seemed to travel up my spine.

Michael seemed to be having a similar reaction, because his breathing intensified. “Oh, man,” he said, and I knew he was now frightened. His eyes seemed to widen and sweat appeared on his forehead. “That’s bad, right?”

“It is,” said Candice. “Which is all the more reason why you should talk to your dad about letting the FBI assign you a security detail.”

And just as she finished that sentence, the chill up my spine intensified and something hit my intuition like a lightning bolt. In my mind’s eye I saw a small poster with Michael’s picture and the word MISSING as a caption. The image was so intense that I took a step backward, gasping as my hand flew to my heart.

Candice’s head snapped over to me and I stared at her in alarm. Michael too seemed to notice my sudden change in demeanor, because he asked, “What’s wrong with her?”

“Nothing,” I said in a shaky voice before turning to Michael. “Can I use your restroom?” I asked.

He seemed surprised by my request, but he motioned up the steps. “At the top of the stairs,” he said.

“Thank you,” I said, and bolted. When I’d crested the landing, I went straight into the bathroom and shut the door and sat on the side of the bathtub for a minute trying to take deep breaths. I was used to seeing things that caused me some alarm, but something about the intensity of the vision I’d had downstairs was throwing me. It wasn’t just the imagery; it was the level of panic associated with it. My heart was still beating very rapidly. Quickly I pulled my cell phone out of my purse and called Dutch. I got his voice mail and left him a message to call me immediately, then hung up and went to the sink to run some cool water over a clean washcloth to pat my cheeks with. After a minute I felt better and moved to leave.

When I pulled the door open, I was shocked to see Candice standing there with her hand raised as if she was about to knock. “You okay?” she asked me.

I looked around for Michael. He wasn’t in sight. “I need to talk to Dutch,” I whispered.

“What’s up?”

“Michael’s in serious trouble and I don’t care what his father says. He needs a security detail assigned pronto.”

“You’re sure?”

“Positive,” I said, feeling a little shaky again as another wave of emotion hit me. “I think our killer is about to go after him.”

“What did you see?” she pressed.

“A poster with his picture on it and the word ‘Miss ing’ for a caption.”

“Shit!”

“I know. Maybe we should keep an eye on him until I can talk to Dutch and he gets an agent assigned.”

Candice grabbed my hand and yanked me toward the stairs. “Come on!” she said.

I stumbled after her. “What’s the matter?”

“Michael left a few minutes ago. He said he didn’t want to be late for class and he took off.”

“He
left
?” I gasped as we dashed down the stairs.

Candice glanced at me. “He even punched in the alarm code right in front of me,” she said with a mirthless laugh. “Jesus, the kid’s so trusting anyone could nab him!”

“We’ve got to catch up to him, Candice!”

“I know,” she said as we reached the bottom of the steps, and Candice moved to the alarm panel, which had a green flashing button like it was in a standby mode. Candice pushed a button on the panel labeled ARMED before she tugged me down a hallway and through the kitchen. “He told me to hit the Armed button and go out through here,” she said, pulling open a side door that opened to the garage. Punching the button to the side of the light switch made the garage door creak slowly up. We hurried toward the opening and ducked under the slow-moving door. Candice then pulled up the lid on a side panel mounted on the wall next to the garage, and hit another button, which made the door pause, then creak its way closed again. “Hurry!” she commanded as we dashed toward her car.

I ran to the passenger side and got into the cab fast. There was no question about who would be behind the wheel; Candice didn’t have any qualms about driving like a maniac to make up time.

She started the engine and before I even had a chance to pull the seat belt across me, we were rocketing out of the driveway. Tires squealed as she cut the corner and pushed down hard on the accelerator. We wound our way through side streets and I tried not to watch. I also tried not to get carsick.

As we neared campus, she commanded,“Look out on your side for his Jeep!” I did, but it was nowhere to be seen. I even opened up my radar, hoping it would guide me in his general direction, but no information came.

Arriving at Michael’s dorm, Candice parked illegally next to a fire hydrant and reached across me to her bag. “I’ve got his schedule in there,” she said. “We’ll go to his class and keep him in sight until you can talk to Dutch and get someone else down here to babysit.”

As if on cue, my cell phone rang. Caller ID said it was the FBI. “Dutch!” I gasped in relief.

“No,” said a hard voice. “It’s Agent Harrison.”

That brought me up short. I’d been so intent on hearing from Dutch that for a minute I couldn’t make any sense of why Harrison was on my phone.

“Tell him that Derby’s next class is at Williams Hall, across from the student union!” Candice shouted as her fingers flew over a map of the campus.