Last Breath (23 page)

Again that chilly feeling ran along his spine. “Fact is, that alone has me as jumpy as a cat.”

She nodded, her eyes now opaque, revealing nothing at all.

Giving in to the demands of his body, if not his appetite, he opened the pizza box, pulled out a slice, and for form's sake passed it over one of her plates before biting into it.

“If the slashing victim really works for the government, they'd have his prints on file at the FBI, wouldn't they?”

“Yeah. If he does, if he needed a security clearance. I don't know about people who don't need clearances. If he's military, they'll be there. And maybe our guys can get into his computer and we'll learn something there.”

“You have his computer?” Her brows lifted.

“I think so. The perp told us where he'd pawned it, and I picked it up. Password protected, of course.”

“Of course. But that doesn't really mean anything by itself. My computers are password protected. Do you have any idea when your specialist is going to look at the e-mail?”

“In the morning. First thing. He's also going to hack the laptop.”

“Good.” She poured herself a glass of cola and sipped it. “Maybe it's a good thing I left the force.”

He twisted to look at her, pizza in hand. “Why?”

“Because I just realized how fortunate I was in all my cases on the beat. The perp was always as obvious as the wart on the end of a hag's nose.”

“Usually. But it's the same in homicide, babe. It's almost always writ large on the scene. But occasionally …”

“Yeah. Occasionally. I remember those cases, too. I don't like dealing with the absence of information when homicide is involved.”

“None of us do. But in your case it's worse. You might want to remember that.”

“Worse how?”

“You're involved with the victim. And the potential victim.”

“True. And don't call me babe.”

He looked down at the pizza he held. “So … when this is all over, you wanna go out for dinner?”

It was as if everything inside him stopped, frozen in that instant of terrible anticipation. It didn't help to realize that he cared a helluva lot more than he'd thought he should. Slowly, uneasily, he looked at her.

Her eyes had taken on the color of glacial ice again, blue upon blue, with depths that seemed to hold no warmth.

But after a moment, she tilted her head. “Ask me when it's over.”

That, he thought, could either be a reprieve or a delayed execution. But at least the question was still open, which was more than he'd hoped for.

The doorbell rang, saving him. Chloe answered it, returning with Agnes Lucci, who carried a briefcase.

“Detective,” Agnes said, shaking his hand when he rose to greet her.

“Ms. Lucci. Care for some pizza?”

“Actually, yes. I’m starved. I haven't eaten since this morning.”

Chloe promptly got her a plate, napkin, and glass. But before she helped herself to food, Agnes opened her briefcase. “I wish you two joy of this,” she said, pulling out a ream of computer printout. “This is a list of all possible matches, along with their rap sheets, if they have any.”

“Is it alphabetized?” Matt asked hopefully.

Agnes shook her head. “Sorted by probability of match. My contact says the sample from the car was badly deteriorated from the heat. She also added that the matches aren't good enough to stand up in court. Any of them.” She placed the stack of paper on the coffee table and helped herself to pizza.

“Well,” said Matt, “I don't need it to stand up in court. I just need to know if there's a possible link.”

“With this list, you've probably got a possible link to twenty-two hundred people.”

“All that matters is if one name shows up.”

Agnes looked wry. “Good luck.”

Chloe spoke. “Thanks, Agnes. I can't tell you how much I appreciate this.”

“Well, I
did
have to do some arm twisting.” But Agnes smiled. “It's a worthless list. My contact didn't like giving it to me. And she said to warn you that if you try to pull her in court to testify on anything in here, you're not going to like what she says.”

“I have no intention of doing that,” Matt assured her. “The thing is, Ms. Lucci,
I
need to know if there's a link. But it won't turn up in court, because the guy who owned the car is dead. I’m certainly not going to charge him with murder now.”

Agnes laughed. “Okay. I realize you guys get frustrated with the lab, but you have to remember — they work based on evidence only. Not on theories of the case. And the care they need to exercise usually takes time. They're not out to prove or disprove, but only to discover the
facts.
And they're very proud of that.”

Matt nodded. “I see their point. But they need to remember our point.”

Agnes shrugged. “Theories are just theories, and we can't allow them to affect our impartiality.”

She left a half hour later, and Matt looked at the stack of printouts.

“Let's move to the kitchen table,” Chloe said. “We'll have more room.”

He helped her carry the dinner things into the kitchen, load the dishwasher and dump the pizza box. Then they sat at the table and divided the printout in two. Another hour passed, then Chloe looked up.

“I’ve got it.”

Matt's heart jumped. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. Steve King's name is on the list.”

Brendan served Mass that morning with a heavy heart. Seventy faces looked back at him from the pews, and they seemed to reflect his sorrow.

He felt cut off from them. All the strictures on his movements were slowly taking him away from his flock, from people he had come to know and love over the last six months. He couldn't allow this to go on much longer. He simply couldn't. There was a fine line between protecting himself and failing as a pastor.

But the reality was that there was an officer standing in the doorway of the sacristy, keeping an eye on him every moment. The reality was that after he removed his vestments, he would be escorted across the small courtyard right back into the rectory.

Somehow he had to find a way to continue his duties within these boundaries, or despite them.

During the moment of quiet after the prayers of the faithful, he asked God to show him a way. Any way.

After Mass, despite his guard, he went to the back of the church to talk to his parishioners. They seemed glad that he was reaching out to them again, and shared their worries, their hopes, even a few jokes. Brendan believed that laughter was a good thing, but aware as he was of the gaping hole where the crucifix used to be, it was almost painful to him.

At last, he allowed himself to be escorted back to his temporary prison.

There he found activity at a high peak. Lucy's desk had been taken over by a young man in civilian clothes with a badge on his pocket. Chloe and Matt were both there, watching him work.

He considered waving to them and heading to his office to return phone calls, but instead he found himself drawn into the room, taking a chair near Chloe.

“What's going on?” he asked.

Matt answered. “Jim here is trying to find out more about that e-mail.”

“Ah.” He folded his hands together and squeezed tight, wondering if he should say anything about the memories that had been plaguing him. The weird things that poor young sailor had been hinting at before his suicide. It would probably sound as crazy to them as it had sounded to him.

“You know,” Lucy said, turning suddenly to Matt, “there was … A man came by asking Father to hear his confession yesterday.”

Brendan sighed. “Lucy, people ask for that all the time.”

“I know, but …” She glanced at Brendan, then returned her attention to Matt. “The more I think about it, the more it bothers me. Maybe I’m overreacting, but … it bothered me. He was insistent on seeing Father, even when I told him that Father Dominic would be back shortly. Then he left and said he'd come back another time.”

“Well,” said Brendan, “he
should
have been able to see me.”

“No,” said Matt. He turned back to Lucy. “What did this guy look like? Did he leave a name?”

“No name. I’d say he was fifty or fifty-five. He was thin, maybe a little too thin, not too tall. Average, I guess. Nothing about him stood out.”

“Coloring?”

Lucy thought about that. “Nothing that stood out to me. I don't remember his eyes except they looked tight. And his hair was mostly gray. He was just ordinary.”

Matt pulled a pad out of his pocket and scribbled the description down. “Thanks,” he said. “That could wind up being useful. Which reminds me.” He turned to Chloe. “Do you have a phone number for the family of Thomas Humboldt?”

“Humboldt?” Brendan sat up straighter. “That was his name. Tom Humboldt. Why do you want to call his family?”

“To find out something about his state of mind. And to find out what happened to the suicide weapon.”

Brendan, his heart thudding, managed a nod.

“I don't have a number,” Chloe said. “But my investigator will. Let me call her.” She pulled a cell phone out of her pocket and left the office to make the call from the hallway.

Brendan spoke to Matt. “You think there really
is
a connection?”

“Let me put it to you this way, Father. Somebody's trying to
make
that connection. If nothing else, that makes a link, namely a person who wants to harm you in some way.”

“I can see that. So you want to know Tom Humboldt's state of mind?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Well, I can tell you. He was scared to death.”

“Of what?”

“Of being forced out of the closet. Of losing his navy career.”

Matt nodded. “You've already shared that with me.”

“Well, there's something more. I didn't think too much of it at the time. It sounded too wild, as if he was imagining things. When he killed himself, it occurred to me that he'd been far more over the edge than I’d thought at the time. That he was truly psychotic, not just a little disturbed and wild. I even began to think that he might have been schizophrenic.”

Matt leaned forward. “But something's changed your mind?”

Brendan hesitated. None of this had been revealed under the seal, and if Tom hadn't been imagining things, it might well have something to do with what was going on now. Especially considering that e-mail. “Yes,” he said finally.

“That e-mail.”

“Why?”

“Because before he died, Tom gave me a fractured account of some kind of conspiracy he was involved in. And I don't exaggerate when I say it was fractured. Some black ops group was planning some terrible event, and they were apparently sending messages hidden in e-mail. Pictures, he said, that contained messages. Something like stega … stego …”

The computer expert at Lucy's desk looked up. “Stegnography,” he said.

“That's it.”

“Holy shit,” said Matt. Rising, he looked at the expert. “Jim, see if you can find anything embedded in that photo.” Then he left the room, apparently to go hunt up Chloe.

Jim, the computer expert, looked at Brendan. “Like I can figure out something like that without studying it. I’ve only just heard about it.”

The bemused priest spread his hands. “I didn't understand a thing about it, when he told me.”

“Well, Father,” Jim said, “basically the idea is that a few pixels are changed in a digital photo, not enough to alert anyone to the fact the photo's been altered in any way. It looks perfectly innocent. But the altered pixels contain information. So …” He looked at the computer screen. “I guess I can look for something suspicious. Other than the fact that this is one of worst photo-doctoring jobs I’ve ever seen.”He looked over the monitor at Brendan and smiled. “There's one thing I can tell you for sure, Father.”

“What's that?”

“The priest didn't do it.”

Chapter 19

With the phone number that Chloe had gotten from her investigator, Matt slipped into the rectory parlor and called the Humboldt household. A woman answered.

“Mrs. Humboldt?”

“Yes?”

“This is Detective Matt Diel of the Tampa Police Department.”

From the other end of the line came a gasp, and a moment of silence. Then, “Was Wayne hurt? How bad?”

The question surprised him. He hadn't expected to upset her, because he hadn't thought … “Is Wayne in Tampa, Mrs. Humboldt?” He almost held his breath, awaiting her answer.

“Yes, I think so. Tell me he hasn't been hurt!”

Matt felt his scalp tense. “No, ma'am, he hasn't been hurt. I wasn't calling about your husband.”

“Thank God!”

Matt waited a few moments, waited for her ragged breathing to ease, waited for her to be ready to speak again. “I’m sorry, I didn't mean to distress you. I had no idea Mr. Humboldt was in town.”

“It's all right. I guess, as long as he isn't hurt, you wouldn't know. But … why are you calling me?”

“I’m calling about your son's suicide, ma'am.”

She caught her breath audibly. “That was a long time ago. What do you want? Why are you asking about it?”

“There's a case I’m working on down here that may be related. Or at least, someone is claiming it is. So I need to ask you a few questions if you wouldn't mind.”

“It's that priest, isn't it.”

Matt was a little surprised that she drew the connection so quickly. Or maybe not. “What about the priest?”

“Well, you know or you wouldn't be calling. This man who used to know Tommy, that's my son, said that the priest drove him to suicide.”

“What man was this?”

“Some guy named Lance.”

Matt's grip on his cell phone tightened. “How was the priest involved?”

“Well, he seduced Tommy. I mean, our boy wasn't a fag. He was a good boy. But that priest seduced him.”

“Which priest?”

“I don't remember his name. Wayne probably would, though. He's been stewing about it something fierce. Too late to do anything now, I tell him, but he's still angry.”

“Do you know where I could get in touch with Mr. Humboldt?”

“No, he calls me when he's traveling. He moves too much. He's in sales, you know. Are you after that priest again?”

“Not exactly. Mrs. Humboldt, do you happen to know what became of the gun Tommy used to kill himself?”