Lawyer Trap

16





DAY THREE–SEPTEMBER 7

WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON


Teffinger wadded up a piece of paper and tossed it up in the air, trying to get it to land in the middle of the snake plant. It hit one of the outer edges and bounced onto the floor. Then his cell phone rang. He couldn’t find it at first but followed the sound to his left pants pocket.

He answered just as Sydney pulled up a seat in front of his desk, wearing a nice pants outfit with a matching jacket, one he had never seen before. She looked exceptionally good, and he glanced at her as if to say, “Just give me a second.”

“Teffinger,” he said.

“Mr. Teffinger?” The voice belonged to a woman, a crying woman. He sat up and concentrated.

“Yes, this is me.”

“Mr. Teffinger, this is Marilyn Black.”

Marilyn Black.

He didn’t recognize the name.

“You gave me your card once,” the woman said. “You said you’d help me.”

Still no memory.

“Calm down,” he said. “Tell me what’s going on.”

“I met you down on Colfax,” she said, “when you were asking us questions about Paradise. You gave me your card and said I could call you if I ever needed help.”

Still nothing.

Then he suddenly remembered.

She was one of the hookers from the Rainbird Bar, a young woman, probably no more than twenty or twenty-one, with needle marks in her arm. Teffinger had interviewed her in connection with the murder of Paradise—a hooker who ended up with a six-inch knife in her eye. He told her to get off the drugs and get off the street and get her life back on track. He said he’d help, if she ever needed it.

He gave her his card and even wrote his home phone number on the back.

“I remember you now,” he said. “How can I help?”

She cried. “Can you come and get me?”

He got directions.

“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. Just hold on.”

Standing up, he looked at Sydney. “I have to run,” he said. “But here’s what I need you to do. First, get a cadaver dog down at the railroad tracks. If there are any more bodies buried around there, I want to know about it now rather than later. Do that ASAP. It’s starting to cloud up and I’m afraid it’s going to rain.”

She nodded.

“I was thinking the same thing,” she said.

“You’re always a step ahead of me,” he said. “Then, in your spare time …”

She laughed.

“… we need to start getting as much background information as we can on Angela Pfeiffer and Tonya Obenchain. Somehow they’re both connected to the person who killed them, and we need to find out what that connection is. Let’s start by getting lists of their friends, work, schools, clubs, vacations, hobbies and whatever else you can think of where they might have overlapped, either with each other or with the same man.”

Ten seconds later, he trotted past the elevators, ran down the three flights of stairs to the parking garage, and squealed out in his truck. He found Marilyn Black on Colfax, sitting on the sidewalk under a payphone, shaking and disoriented.

He double-parked the Tundra in the street and ran over.

Then he picked her up and put her in the vehicle.

“I’m taking you to the emergency room,” he said.

She looked at him vaguely, then closed her eyes and slumped over.

He stepped on the gas.

A half block later, a man stood in the street, waiting to cross. Teffinger recognized him as one of the local drug pushers. Maybe even the one who’d been supplying Marilyn Black. He pointed the truck at him and stepped on the gas even harder.

The man jumped out of the way at the last second and gave Teffinger the finger.