“I think we can assume that was not a drunk driver,” Kate Delbridge said.
She was huddled in the rear of Cabot’s SUV. There was a tremor in her voice.
“Agreed,” Cabot said. He was back behind the wheel of the SUV. He had his phone in his hand. “I’m going to call the cops.”
“Wait, please.” Kate wrapped her arms around her midsection. She rocked slowly back and forth. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
Kate appeared to be hovering on the edge of hysteria. Cabot looked at Virginia, trying to send a message. He knew she got it because she turned in her seat and looked at Kate.
“We can wait to notify the police, Kate,” Virginia said. “What was it you wanted to tell us?”
She kept her tone quiet but firm. Kate visibly steadied.
“I told you, there have been rumors about embezzlement circulating around Night Watch for weeks,” she got out in low tones. “A few days ago I found a large cash deposit in my bank account. I was sure it was a mistake. I called the bank. They looked into it and said it was a legitimate deposit. As far as they were concerned the money was mine. For a while I told myself I had just been on the lucky end of a banking error. I was sure the bank would figure it out sooner or later, so I was careful not to spend the money. But today it happened again.”
“There was another big cash deposit?” Virginia asked.
Kate nodded weakly. “I wasn’t stupid enough to believe I’d gotten lucky twice. Both deposits were sizable but under the limit that banks are required to report.”
“What, exactly, do you think is going on?” Cabot asked.
“I admit I’m not very tech savvy,” Kate said. “But I’m not as dumb as everyone at Night Watch seems to think. Someone is setting me up to take the fall for the embezzlement scheme.”
“If that’s the case, why try to kill you tonight?” Cabot asked.
Kate shook her head. “I don’t know. Probably because I made the appointment to talk to you. Someone is watching my every move. I have to get out of town.”
“Got any idea of who might want to use you for the fall guy?” Cabot asked.
Kate was silent for a few tense seconds.
“Maybe,” she said finally. She took a deep breath and seemed to regain some control. “But I have absolutely no proof.”
“Go on,” Virginia encouraged.
“When the rumors of embezzlement first started, I assumed it was someone in the accounting department or in IT. We all did. I mean, those people must know every possible way to skim money off the top, right? And they’re all pretty tech savvy, at least when it comes to dealing with money. After Sandra Porter was fired, we all thought it was because she was the embezzler and management had decided to let her go quietly. But today, when I realized that someone was trying to make it look like I was embezzling, I realized Sandra couldn’t have been the one stealing the money – or, at least, not the only one involved.”
“Who, then?” Virginia prompted.
“This is just a guess, you understand, but Laurel Jenner, the head of marketing, is really pissed at me.”
“Why?” Cabot asked.
Kate rocked a little in the seat. “I’m almost positive she’s sleeping with the boss, Josh Preston. And she knows that I know. I think she’s afraid I’ll ruin her cushy situation. Preston has made it clear that he doesn’t approve of workplace romances. Those things happen, but at Night Watch people get fired if the relationship becomes common knowledge.”
“So you think Jenner might be willing to murder you in order to keep you quiet?” Virginia asked.
“I just don’t know,” Kate whispered. “But if she’s using her relationship with Preston to get the kind of inside information she needs to steal from his company, and if she thought that rumors of the affair might put her scheme at risk – maybe. Like I said, it’s just a theory. I’ve got no proof. I can tell you one thing, though. Laurel has a gun.”
“How did you find out about the gun?” Cabot asked.
Kate grimaced. “She told me about it a few months ago. That was before she and Preston started their affair. Laurel and I were friends back in those days. She said she bought the gun because she’d just gone through a nasty divorce. She was afraid her ex might become a stalker. Look, I really have to get to the airport. My flight leaves in less than two hours.”
“Where will you go?” Virginia asked.
“Mexico,” Kate said. “When I was younger my family vacationed down there every year. I know my way around. Please, I’ve told you everything I know. I need to go now.”
“We’ll follow you to the airport,” Cabot said. “Make sure you get safely past security.”
“Thanks,” Kate said. “I would appreciate that.”
“What about your car?” Virginia asked.
“It’s a rental. I’ll turn it in at the airport. When I realized that someone might be watching me, I decided it might be smart to leave my own car in the garage at my apartment building. Obviously that brilliant plan didn’t work. Shit. Still can’t believe someone tried to kill me.”
“It’s a weird feeling, all right,” Virginia said.
A short time later Virginia and Cabot stood inside the bustling Sea-Tac terminal and watched Kate wend her way through the airport security screening lines. When she disappeared, they went back over the sky bridge into the parking garage.
They got into the SUV and sat quietly for a moment.
“It feels like we’re chasing shadows,” Virginia said.
Cabot cranked up the engine. “Old shadows and new ones.”
The cool, distant tone of his voice told her that he had moved into his zone. She glanced at him. In the harsh light of the parking garage his profile was hard, fierce. This was the man she had glimpsed the first day in the offices of Cutler, Sutter & Salinas, a man who could be your best friend or your worst nightmare of an enemy.
Any brute could be dangerous, she thought. What she found so deeply compelling about Cabot was that he adhered to a code, one that involved gritty, old-fashioned qualities like honor, determination and loyalty. This was a man who would walk into hell for those he loved and those whom he felt bound to protect.
“We need to find the intersection between the past and the present, don’t we?” Virginia said.
“Yes.”
“Got any ideas?”
“One.”
“I feel a cryptic martial arts saying coming.”
“Nope, this is a pragmatic detective saying.”
“What is it?” Virginia asked.
“Follow the money.”
“Wow, that’s old-school, all right. But we’ve already followed the money. We know our mothers hid it twenty-two years ago in a secret account.”
“That’s one money trail,” Cabot agreed. “But we are dealing with two, and the second one goes directly to Night Watch.”
“How could the embezzlement that seems to be going on at Night Watch be connected to the money that disappeared all those years ago?”
“I don’t know yet, but there has to be a link,” Cabot said. “I can almost see it.”
Virginia smiled.
“What?” Cabot asked.
“In your own way, you’re an artist, Cabot Sutter.”
“I keep telling you, I’m no artist.”
“You’re wrong. But never mind. Where do we go next?”
“Obviously we need to take a closer look at Laurel Jenner, but first I want to try to get a handle on what Sandra Porter was doing in your back room on the night she was killed.”
“I take it you’re not buying Sandra Porter in the role of drug dealer?”
“Nope. Doesn’t fit. Nothing else in this case is actually about drugs, but it’s interesting that people keep trying to point us in that direction.”
“Porter is dead, so where do we look for answers?”
“In my experience, the home of the dead person is always illuminating. The crime scene tape should be down by now. Tomorrow we’ll see if we can get inside Porter’s apartment.”
“All right. You know, it occurs to me that whoever was driving that hit-and-run car tonight might have been aiming for you,” Virginia said. “Maybe Kate wasn’t the target.”
“Funny you should mention that,” Cabot said. He put the SUV in gear and reversed out of the parking stall. “The possibility did cross my mind.”