Chasing the Night - Iris Johansen [92]
“What about these holes?” Eve asked an hour later as she sat down at the table across from where Kelly was sitting with her computer. “Yes, I know what Catherine told me, but have you pinned down when, why, and where?”
“You sound like a newspaper editor,” Kelly said. “I wanted to be on the school newspaper at college, but all my professors said that I shouldn’t waste my time. I didn’t think it was a waste of time.”
“Not if you wanted to do it.” Eve wondered how many other fun activities Kelly had been kept from doing because of that extraordinary and unique brilliance. “You should have told them to go jump in the lake.”
“It’s hard to know what’s right when everyone thinks you’re wrong.” She looked down at the yellow note pad on the table beside her. “I think the holes were the periods when Rakovac visited Luke. That was the only secret Rakovac wouldn’t have wanted Venable to know about. I was looking for triggers to his behavior that might give me a clue. I made Catherine think back and try to tell me when Rakovac’s phone calls occurred. But she couldn’t remember everything or every time he called her.”
“Of course not. For goodness’ sake, it’s been nine years. How could she possibly remember?”
“He didn’t call her that frequently. Only several times a year. Just enough to twist the knife and keep her under his thumb.” She made a face. “But there were some calls that she’ll never forget. The ones in which he hurt her the most. She was able to remember where she was, what she was doing, and the approximate date. I was able to pull those periods out of the report and do a graph that indicated where he was approximately and who he was dealing with at that particular time.”
“What good will that do? You said that probably none of these clients had anything to do with Luke.”
“Probably. We don’t know anything yet. I’m just trying to explore those black holes. I’m paying particular attention to the early days after he took Luke. He made more calls than usual to her during that period. He must have been enjoying himself.” She shook her head. “What a terrible man he is, Eve.”
“Yes. What next, Kelly? How do you connect the dots?”
Kelly smiled faintly. “Catherine said that was what you did with your reconstructions. It’s strange that we work in the same way. I thought perhaps we might.”
Eve nodded. “I keep telling Catherine it’s science combined with instinct. What about you? Do you have hunches?”
“Everyone has hunches occasionally.” She looked down at her pad. “I try not to let them get in the way. In this case, dealing with a personality and not a concept, I’m going to have to rely on Rakovac’s background and personality to help me.”
Eve leaned back in the chair and gazed at her. Kelly was really incredible. Eve kept forgetting how young the girl was. She had been talking to Kelly as if she were an adult and professional on her own level. Yet hunched over that computer, with her blond hair tied back in a ponytail, Kelly appeared even younger than her fourteen years. “Like a puzzle. But I don’t know how realizing just how much of a bastard Rakovac can be is going to help you.”
“That’s not what I’m looking at. It’s the way he reacts, his past pattern of behavior. I’ve analyzed his behavior in the last nine years, then called Venable and had him send me his entire file. He’s…remarkable.”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s totally self-serving and definitely has a God complex. But I was interested in the way he handled his business interests. He’s totally without any sense of loyalty. When he was a child, his father brought him up as a rebel and later was killed in the war. You would think he would have some feelings for the cause, but it didn’t happen. He betrayed Kelsov at the first opportunity to better himself. But after the betrayal, there’s some information that he may have worked a few deals with the rebels once he’d established himself with the mafia in Moscow. You’d think he’d be afraid of getting his throat cut by the rebels after what he’d done. But he’s totally fearless. Wherever the money was, wherever the power