“Ground floor, left,” Dougal said.
Jane followed his advice. She saw another figure passing the wall of glass doors between the back terrace and the family room. Almost certainly a man. But he was too far from the glass to be identified.
Shenneck or one of the rayshaws?
He disappeared behind granite, but then reappeared in the kitchen. He embraced Inga from behind, cupped her breasts in his hands, and buried his face in her neck.
She tipped her head back to allow him more of her throat.
After nuzzling her, he raised his head. Bertold Shenneck.
19
* * *
PILAR VEGA, MAYBE THIRTY years old, pretty and self-possessed, was not humbled by her job or by her maid’s uniform, or by being a person of interest to the FBI. She assumed that they had come upon her while she was cleaning Room 36, after a late checkout, because they had mistaken her for an illegal alien.
“I’ve always been a legal resident,” she said proudly. “For a year now, I’ve been a citizen.”
“We aren’t interested in your immigration status, Ms. Vega,” Silverman said.
“I have the same rights as you. They can’t be taken from me.”
If her boss, Tio Barrera, had not been present to reassure the woman, Silverman and Harrow might have needed even longer to allay her doubts about their motive.
“What we’re interested in is the phone you found in the trash can this morning,” Silverman said.
“I didn’t steal it,” Pilar Vega said, taking offense at the imagined accusation, raising her head defiantly, chin up, eyes glittering with challenge. “I never steal.”
Frustrated but well aware that patience would be rewarded more quickly than intimidation, Silverman said, “I have no doubt of your honesty, Ms. Vega. Not any doubt at all.”
Tio Barrera took longer to smooth the woman’s feathers this time. At last she seemed to believe they saw her as a source of important information, not as a target.
“I came to work early. I was sitting in my car outside the diner. I was drinking coffee. This woman dropped something in the trash can. It looked like a cell phone. She went into the diner.”
Silverman showed her the photograph.
“Yes, that’s her. She came out with a large coffee and a bag of something. After she was gone, I looked in the trash can. It was a phone she threw away.”
“I understand you may still have the phone,” Silverman said.
“It’s broken.”
“Yes, but do you have it?”
“She threw it away. Now it’s mine.”
“But if it’s broken—”
“Maybe it can be fixed. I know someone who can fix phones.”
“Ms. Vega,” Harrow said, “that phone was involved in a crime.”
“What crime?”
“Murder.”
“Who was murdered?”
“We’re not at liberty to say. But we must have the phone.”
“The woman who threw it away doesn’t look like a murderer.”
“No,” Silverman agreed, “she doesn’t. The phone is evidence, Ms. Vega.”
Reluctantly, Pilar Vega took the phone from a skirt pocket of her uniform and surrendered it.
The casing was dented and slightly torqued, but the screen appeared not to have been damaged. When he tried to turn it on, a pulse of pale gray light washed from the top to the bottom of the screen, just once, but no display appeared.
“Battery’s got juice,” Harrow said.
“No use as a phone,” Silverman said, “but obviously the locater still transmits.”
Just then his own phone rang. He handed Overton’s iPhone to Harrow and took the call. “Silverman.”
“Play Manchurian with me, Nathan.”
“Yes, all right.”
“This is Randolph Kohl from Homeland Security. Are you alone that we might speak?”
The voice was that of Booth Hendrickson, of the Department of Justice, and though Silverman knew it was Booth’s voice, not that of Kohl, he heard himself say, as though from a distance, “Give me just a moment.” To Harrow, he said, “It’s Homeland. I need to take this in private.” He went into the bathroom and closed the door and turned on the water in the sink to mask his voice from those in the adjoining motel room. He said, “Yes, Mr. Kohl,” confused about why he should be playing along with Booth in this manner.
“Update me, Nathan. Have you gotten a lead on Jane Hawk?”
“We’re closing on her. She killed a man named William Overton in Beverly Hills, in his home, evidently on Friday night.”
“Overton? Sterling Overton, the attorney?”
“Yes. William Sterling Overton.”
“Bloody hell. How did the stupid bitch finger Overton?”
“Through Robert Branwick, alias Jimmy Radburn.”
“I don’t know who that is,” Booth Hendrickson said. “Why don’t I know who that is?”
“He was a Dark Web entrepreneur. We had him on the hook, but he didn’t know it. We were letting him run to see what other fish he’d lead us to. Overton hired him to hack someone, and Branwick hacked Overton, too. Is this really Mr. Kohl or is this you, Booth?”
After a silence, Booth said, “Play Manchurian with me, Nathan.”
“Yes, all right.”
Randolph Kohl said, “Who am I, Nathan?”
“Who are you?” Nathan said, perplexed that the head of Homeland Security should ask such a thing. “You’re Randolph Kohl.”
“You said you’re closing in on her. How so?”
“We found the motel where she stayed last night. We’re here now. She brought Overton’s phone, got from it whatever she wanted, dropped it in the trash.”
Kohl said, “You think he gave her his password?”
“The condition he was in, yes. She put him through a wringer.”
“Where is this motel?”
“Just outside Napa.”
“Holy shit! She’s going after Shenneck.”
“Who?”
Kohl gave him a rural-route address. “That’s where she’s going. Be there now, Nathan. Kill her. Kill her. I’ve got to make a call.”
Booth hung up. Kohl. Kohl hung up.
A rushing sound. Like something coming fast at Silverman. No. Just the water in the sink. He cranked off the spigot.
He still felt something coming fast at him.
20
* * *
AS BERTOLD POURS TWO glasses of pinot grigio and brings them to the cutting board beside the kitchen sink, the nearby wall-mounted phone rings. It had also rung a few minutes earlier; but he is in a mood that doesn’t welcome an interruption. As before, he lets it go to voice mail.
Inga glances at her wine and smiles, but she continues to scrub the potatoes.
With his glass of wine, Bertold stands watching her. There is something erotic about the way her elegant hands fondle the tubers.
Usually one of the rayshaws, programmed with a thousand and one recipes, prepares lunch and dinner for the Shennecks when they are in residence at the ranch. During this visit, however, Inga has become convinced that the rayshaws aren’t maintaining their personal hygiene to the standard required of them, that in particular the one who cooks isn’t washing his hands as frequently as he should and that he may be touching himself in unclean ways during his culinary duties. As a consequence, she insists on making their meals until Bertold can study the problem and find a fix for it.
Bertold is not convinced that the rayshaws are, in Inga’s words, “on their way to becoming dirty little animals.” She has observed two or three small aberrations in their behavior, from which she has elaborated an imagined catastrophe impending.
Her insistence on the rightness of her conclusion and her nagging about the matter are annoying.
The nearby wall phone rings yet again. Even though the number is unlisted, they have been plagued recently by robocalls placed by marketers of everything from time-share condos to organic steaks. Again, he lets it go to voice mail.