Max realized during her conversation with Nick Santini that if he knew what she planned on doing, he would legally have to try and stop her. Or if he knew that she planned to break the law, he might have to arrest her. She didn’t want to put him in that position, and she really didn’t want to spend the night in jail. She’d spent a few days in jail in the past, and it was never fun, even when the charges were dropped. And they always were.
Plus, she liked Nick. He was intellectually challenging and she suspected there was a lot more depth to him than most of the cops she worked with. Maybe that was because most of them kept her at arm’s length, as if by definition, reporters were poison. Sometimes she didn’t blame them, but sometimes it just made all their jobs more complicated.
Job. This wasn’t a job for Max, and maybe that’s why she rubbed people the wrong way. This was a vocation, a calling she couldn’t avoid if she wanted to. Not knowing the truth about what happened to her mother, what happened to Karen Richardson, who her father was—she knew what drove her. She could give answers to others, even if she couldn’t find them for herself.
Max went up to her room and first called Jasper Pierce. He didn’t answer his cell phone, so she left a message with her name and number and suggested they meet for dinner to talk about the Sterling Pierce Sports Center. Then, she changed into jeans and Nick Santini’s USMC T-shirt. She didn’t have a lot of options with her limited wardrobe, and her workout clothes needed washing. But this would work for what she wanted. She scrubbed off her makeup, then reapplied just a hint of mascara and concealer, put her hair up in a sloppy ponytail, and figured she could pass as a college student if confronted.
She drove to Dru Parker’s small house in Redwood City. Max had researched the property and Parker’s roommates the night before. House managed by a property company, two female roommates, all three students at Ca?ada Community College. Max parked and rang the bell, then knocked. It was clear no one was home.
Max picked the flimsy front lock and slipped in. The house had an empty feeling. The only sounds were the low hum of a refrigerator, a ticking clock, and a faint scratching sound. Max looked around the living room and realized the scratching was coming from a hamster who scurried through a tunnel that connected one plastic cage with another. When he got to the end, he turned around and went back, then jumped on a wheel and started running.
There were three small bedrooms and one bath in the tiny house. It was marginally clean, but dishes were unwashed in the sink and junk mail was piled high on the kitchen table. Max ignored the living quarters and looked in each bedroom, quietly, in case someone was sleeping. Empty.
Dru had the smallest bedroom, in the back of the house, hardly larger than an oversized closet. Max could tell it was hers because the walls were decorated with save-the-earth posters and pictures of cute baby animals. And the pictures of Dru pinned to the walls. Unmade bed, dresser with a television on the top, desk with a laptop computer.
She hadn’t brought her computer with her last night? That was odd—or was it? What if she wasn’t really planning on going to her mother’s house? Or what if she bolted before she could go home? Or didn’t think she’d need a computer because there was nothing important on it?
Max turned on the computer. While it booted up, she searched Dru’s room. In fact, she had been here last night—her top drawer was partly open and it appeared as if half the contents were missing. Her pillows were also missing from her bed—Max used to travel with her favorite pillow, until she forgot it in hotels too many times.
Dru had come home from work, found Nick waiting for her with questions, got scared, packed quickly, and left. Where’d she been when she called Max? Had she been packing up? Already driving? She’d said she could be at the Caltrain station in twenty minutes; her house was less than fifteen minutes away. Max guessed she was here, packed and ready to go.
The computer was on and there was no security or passwords required. Max first looked at her browser history. Dru had indeed looked up train times to San Francisco right before she’d called Max. She’d also checked her e-mail.
Because she used an SMTP protocol, all her e-mail popped up into her computer. Max didn’t need a password to access it.
More than half the messages were from makeup and clothing stores with 25 percent off coupons or one-day-only sales. Most of the others were from environmental groups. Few seemed personal. Nothing had come in yesterday or today that looked odd or suspicious. Max checked the deleted items folder; nothing was there, either. She searched the mailbox for messages from anyone at Evergreen; nothing except a woman named Janice Platt who sent weekly messages about schedules. She searched for Roger Lawrence; nothing. Brian Robeaux; nothing. Sara Hoffman; nothing. But people often didn’t use their full or real names in e-mails. She searched “Hoffman” alone and immediately hundreds of messages popped up—all from Jason Hoffman, they were dated more than a year before he died and up until the morning of his murder.
Max started reading them.
It was immediately clear that Dru and Jason were more than casual acquaintances. They might have had a relationship, but they were also friends. The last message he sent, the morning he died, was cryptic, because there were no messages before or after in the thread. It was as if he was continuing a verbal conversation.
Dru, thanks for understanding. I’ll make it up to you tomorrow, tonight I have something to do. Jase
Why hadn’t Dru come clean about their relationship? Why hadn’t she told Nick that Jason had canceled plans with her the night he was killed?