“I’m so interested to see your expression when you find it. The Facebook post from the police has gone viral.”
“You better be kidding,” she grumbled.
“Just search for ‘Woman pouring acid on Jeep’s hood,’” he suggested with a bland smile.
It took a couple of moments, then she gasped. Her eyes narrowed. Her features suddenly relaxed. “This is contrived. Photoshopped.”
“I doubt it,” he said. “You might want to check in with the police.”
“What for?” she asked. “It’s some kind of hoax. Give me a club soda with a twist of lime. Now.”
He stood there for a second, then he called a kid from the kitchen. “Trace, you know who this is?”
“The woman from the news? Looks like her.”
“Thanks,” Rob said. He turned back to Neely. “No club soda. No lime. No service. You’re not welcome here.”
“And if I don’t leave?” she asked.
“I’ll call the police. They’d be happy for the call.”
She grunted and left.
Neely stomped down the street to the police department. This was outrageous. She would get this straightened out. She walked in. “Where’s the chief?” she demanded of the two people behind the counter.
Stan came out of the back, stirring a cup of coffee. “Well, hello there,” he said. “And how can I help you?”
“You can start by putting up a retraction of this bogus video you have on your Facebook page!”
“Come in, Ms. Benedict,” he said pleasantly. “Have a seat here at my desk. I can see you’re upset.”
“I’m not at all upset,” she said. But when a female police officer opened the little half door at the end of the counter, she entered and went to the chief’s desk. “I’m going to sue you, that’s all. And you’ll not only run a retraction, you’ll pay through the nose.”
“I doubt that,” he said. “Both videos have been verified as authentic. I guess you didn’t notice the camera at the back of the bank building. That one’s a little fuzzy, since you had your head down a lot. But with a little help we got a couple of good close-ups.”
“You’re full of shit,” Neely said.
“And that little cabin that Dakota Jones rents? Well, some strange things have been happening to Dakota’s car and on his property so he worried about something happening to the place while he was away. He has some nice furnishings in there. He had a surveillance camera sitting right up in the corner, right behind a bird’s nest. Convenient.”
“You’re just lying,” she said. “It’s all Photoshopped!”
“From what?” he asked, lifting his eyebrows. “Nah, it’s the real deal. And our sister cities in the valley were kind enough to run the videos, too. Including Aurora. A few of them ran it on their local news. It’s made the rounds. I’m surprised you didn’t notice it sooner.”
She relaxed into her chair. She smirked at him. “If you think you have a case, why aren’t you arresting me?”
The female police officer stood from behind a desk. “Boss?”
“You can go. I know you have things to do, Tippin. Thanks.” He looked back at Neely. “I’m sorry. What was that question? Oh—I got it. Arrest, right. Well, to tell the truth, that took some thought. See, I can charge you with malicious mischief and malicious destruction of property. I think it’s a terrible thing you did. Our judge will think so, too. But the penalty that goes with it,” he said with a shrug. “Just not satisfying enough. So I thought about it and decided I wasn’t going to charge you this time. Instead, I’m going to save these videos in case there are more. I hate the thought there could be more, but I wouldn’t be surprised. It seems to be your pattern. You know—those restraining orders, vandalism, breaking into houses, stalking...” He scratched his head. “I wasn’t too surprised to learn this wasn’t your first brush with the law. Disappointed but not surprised.”
She smiled at him. “I wasn’t even on probation,” she said. “So, pffftt.”
“You were, too,” he said. “So, we’re just watching. Everyone is going to be watching now that they all know what you’re capable of. I did talk to your brother. He said he sympathized with us but there was nothing he could do.”
She growled low in her throat before she could stop herself. She bared her teeth. But she regained control quickly. “If you knew who I was, why ask the public to identify me? That’s going to get you into big trouble.”
“It won’t get me in any trouble. But now that you mention it, I should probably run your picture and say you were found and that no arrest has been made at this time.”
“You. Wouldn’t. Dare,” she ground out. “I have a very good lawyer!”
“I bet he cherishes the day he ran into you,” Stan said. He cackled. “You must be making him rich.”
“You’ll be sorry you tried to ruin my reputation with all these false accusations,” she said.
“Good. Sue me. I need the publicity. And you sure do. People are already looking at you sideways, so if you bring a big fancy lawyer in here to try to do hurt to the people in this town, you’ll get more unpopular real fast.” He got a harsh look on his face. “I don’t want this shit in my town.”
“It wasn’t me,” she said.
“It was. There’s so much evidence it makes me tired. But I don’t feel like putting you through the boring effort of writing a check to make it all go away. I’d just as soon you go away. But in case you’re fool enough to think you can test me on this, bear in mind, we’ll be watching you. Closely. All of us. The Timberlake police, other police, citizens who don’t like that sort of thing, everyone will be watching.”
She got to her feet, her expression serene. “You better make this go away before you’re sued.”
She strode toward the door.
“I’m going to keep track of you,” he said to her back. She stopped suddenly. “But I’ll give you a tip. If you were to leave, I wouldn’t be bothered to track you out of state.” She took two more steps. “You might want to check and see where Officer Tippin put that GPS tracker on your car.”
She stiffened before she could stop herself. She turned around. “He came on to me,” she said angrily.
The chief stood. “No, he didn’t,” he said. “It’s all on the video. Dakota Jones is a decorated war hero. In my town that just fucking trumps lying trust fund babies. You’re done here.”
Neely stormed out of there before she said one more thing. She drove down the main street a little too fast, leaving that shithole town in her dust. She took a slight detour to a rather isolated lookout with some parking. No one was there. She parked and turned off her engine. She got her mirror out of her purse—it was a sterling silver compact mirror. She held it under the wheel wells, front and back bumpers, under the car doors. She groaned in equal parts anger and frustration. Then she eased down on her back and slid under the car with her compact mirror and her phone flashlight, looking for the GPS tracker. While she was under there, she saw the tires of a car pull up behind her car.
Neely wiggled out from under her car and stood face-to-face with Officer Tippin. Officer Tippin, Neely thought, was homely and mannish, so she sneered at her. Tippin was a cow, Neely thought meanly.
“Car trouble, ma’am?” the officer asked.
“No, thank you very much,” she said, brushing off her short satin skirt. “Can you move your car so I can be on my way?”
“Absolutely, ma’am,” she said. And she smiled.
Neely thought she’d sue her also. After she traded in this car.
* * *
Stan sat behind his desk, staring at the computer screen, tired. The door opened and a grinning Officer Tippin stepped in.
“Boss, it was classic. She actually rolled under her car looking for a tracking device.”
Stan grinned but it wasn’t a big grin. “I’d
have loved seeing that.”
“You don’t need a tracking device—she’s easy to follow. She’s kind of a ninny.”
“No,” Stan said. “She’s pretty smart. She just has no empathy and very little fear. She’s arrogant and malicious. And she has some tools—looks and brains being primary.” He took a breath. “She’s a psychopath.”
A dog reflects the family life. Whoever saw
a frisky dog in a gloomy family, or a sad dog
in a happy one?
—ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE
18
TEN DAYS AND COUNTING, Dakota thought. The August heat had become oppressive, unusual for this part of the country. Or maybe it was his mood. He missed Sid. He talked to her every evening, texted her when he could dream up something to say, sent her a picture of his newly repaired Jeep. He tried to stay upbeat and positive. But she’d said she’d be gone a few days, then a week or two. It took her hours to answer his texts and, more often than not, he had to leave a voice mail and she’d call him back late.
He was afraid he was losing her, afraid she wasn’t coming back.
That was tremendously difficult with all that was going on. Sunday dinner with the family had become dark and sad. Sierra and Connie were nursing broken hearts and would be for a long time to come.
On Monday he got a text from Stan asking him to stop by the police department when he had time. He braced himself for more bad news. That seemed to be the trend in his family right now.
“She’s gone, Dakota,” Stan said. “Apparently Neely decided this wasn’t her ideal place, after all.”
“How do you know?”
“We’ve been keeping an eye on her. Not surveillance exactly. But it seemed in everyone’s best interest to at least have her license number and home address. Seems like she skipped out on her lease a few days ago. She registered her new car in Dallas.”
“New car?” Dakota asked dumbly.
Stan just shook his head. “She had some cockamamy idea there was a GPS tracker on her car. Can’t imagine where she got such an idea.”
Dakota smiled in spite of himself. “Remind me not to doubt you again.”
“Why, thank you,” Stan said. “I’m not going to spend a lot of time following her movements. Angry as it makes me at the stuff she was capable of doing, and much as the good people of this town think I’m just on paid vacation, I do have real police work to do. I might have Tippin or Castor see if they can locate her in a few months. Just because.”
“Thanks,” Dakota said.
“If you see her around here, even at a safe distance, you best tell me. I think the woman has an evil streak.”
“Obviously,” Dakota said. “Trust me, if I see her coming, I’m running in the other direction. Now, you think you ran her off just by embarrassing her on some social media network?”
“Not exactly,” Stan said. “In fact, I doubt she has the capacity to be embarrassed. She’s really cold as ice, isn’t she? But the woman likes an audience for her stories and just about everyone around here is all done believing anything she says. Poor thing can’t even get a club soda at the bar down the street. She needed a fresh field to plow.”
“What the hell do you suppose she wants?”
“I bet she doesn’t even know what she wants. I suspect she enjoys keeping people off balance and the attention she gets from stirring things up. I suspect a personality disorder.”
“You ever run into anything like this before?” Dakota asked.
Stan laughed. “In law enforcement?” he asked. “Hell, boy, liars and troublemakers is just about all we got!”
When Dakota left the police department, he walked down the street to the bar. It was almost lunchtime and Rob was watching the bar. “How’s it going?” Dakota asked.
“Not bad. How about you?”
“Up and down. I just got some good news from Stan. It seems Neely has blown Dodge. Looking for new friends and playmates.”
“That is good news,” Rob said. “Something to drink? Eat?”
“How about a Coke,” he said. “Have you talked to Sid lately?”
“A couple of days ago. She sounded kind of tired.”
“But happy?” Dakota asked. “She sound happy to you?”
“I don’t know that I’d characterize it as happy. She did sound kind of, I don’t know, satisfied? I’m just guessing here, but I think that work makes her feel more self-confident than slinging drinks and packing lunches for the boys. Haven’t you talked to her?”
“Not as much as I’d like,” Dakota said. “I’m surprised. Busy as she was while she was here, she seemed to have plenty of time. Are they working her to death?”
“While they have her,” Rob said.
“And she likes that?” Dakota asked.
“Oh, yeah,” Rob said with a laugh.
“She said that kind of work overwhelmed her,” Dakota said. “She said she ran into big trouble not having balance. It takes her longer and longer to answer a text or call me back. I’m wondering if she’s coming back. Did she tell you she’s coming back?”
Rob leaned on the bar. “Dakota, I didn’t ask her.”
“Okay, I need a little enlightenment,” Dakota said. “I want her to be happy. I want her to have whatever she needs to be happy. But I’d sure like to know if I fit into that plan.”
“Ask her,” Rob said.
“Ask her to choose between computer programming or us?”
“Yeah, that was romantic,” Rob said. “It’s not computer programming exactly.”
“Then what is it? Exactly.”
Rob just stared at him for a long moment. “What do you know about Sid?” he finally asked.
“That she worked in computers. That she was overworked in computers. Writing code, she said. Software not hardware. That it could be intense and lonely. I guess I just don’t get why it had to be her for this project. Don’t they have plenty of programmers in California? This Faraday—he have a special interest in her?”
Rob looked at him in shock. Then he stuck his head in the kitchen. “Trace,” he yelled. When the boy came from the kitchen, Rob said, “Man the bar. Do not serve alcohol. I’ll only be ten minutes.”
“Okay,” Trace said.
“Dakota, my office. Come on through.”
Dakota followed. Rob’s office was very small. He had to move a chair out of the way to close the door. “Sit,” Rob told Dakota.
“Why do I get a bad feeling?”
Rob didn’t answer. “Listen, I don’t know why the two of you haven’t talked about this but Sid is special. She’s a genius.”
“I don’t have a problem believing that,” Dakota said. “She must be the best programmer in the west.”
“She’s a physicist. A PhD. A Rhodes scholar. She might be writing some code but it’s far more complicated and exceptional. They’re working on quantum computing, the sort of high-speed, complex, intuitive computing that can lead to artificial intelligence. The computer they’re working on is processing and analyzing DNA. It can process millions of pieces of information in seconds. Less than seconds. She can explain this much better, not that you’ll understand it any better than I do. Molecular genetic research will change the world, save lives, wipe out disease, and they’re creating and constantly refining the quantum computer that’s doing it. She’s working with a Nobel laureate. Do they have a lot of people with her qualifications? I don’t think so. She is so important in this field it’s mind-boggling.”
Dakota gulped. “Hang on,” he said. “Let me scrape my chin off the floor.” He shook his head as if to settle the pieces in place. “Man, look at what can happen when a kid is in an accident and can’t go out and play.”
“Nah, she was born that way. She has an IQ that puts a lot of geniuses to shame.”
“Now I really have no idea where this leave
s me. Us.”
“I hate to break it to you but she was this smart way before she met you. She didn’t explain all that to you?” Rob asked.
“Not the way you did,” he said.
“Let me tell you what else she is,” Rob said. “A flesh and blood woman with a huge heart and a very soft center. Even geniuses can get their hearts broken. She has a very intimidating brain but around here people just think of her as Sid the bartender and they don’t treat her like she can’t be a friend, can’t be loved. She’s fun and funny and loyal. I didn’t kill the last man who used her and dumped her but I might kill the next one.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Dakota said. “I’d never hurt her.” Dakota stood. “Is there anything else I should know?”
“That should do it, I guess.”
Dakota grinned. “Damn, who knew I had such magnificent taste in women.”
“Yeah, who knew,” Rob said. But he wasn’t smiling.
* * *
Trace had been eavesdropping. Not exactly on purpose. Only for a minute. He had gone to fetch Rob because someone wanted a glass of wine with their lunch and he heard that little speech. He didn’t know all that about Sid. She’d helped him with physics but he just thought she was good at math. He hadn’t even suspected...
It had a pretty strange effect on him. Not the part about her being over-the-moon brilliant. About her being made of flesh and blood and feelings. He was pretty quiet the rest of the day. When he was done with work, he didn’t go straight home. He went to the diner. His mom was working.
“Well, hey there, Trace,” she said, smiling. “Do you want some dinner?”
“Nah, I ate something at the bar.”
“Going to play ball tonight?” she asked.
“Yeah, I might hit a few with some of the guys, if I can find anyone. So, I broke a promise.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah, I promised Tom I was going to talk to you about my worries about us all moving in together and I didn’t.”