The Garden of Betrayal - Lee Vance [42]
“You think this is from the guy who took Kyle?” I asked, my voice breaking.
“No,” he said, laying a hand on my arm. “I don’t. Guys who commit a crime and feel guilty enough to own up to it almost always apologize. There’s no apology here. So, assuming this isn’t bullshit from some particularly clever sick bastard, my guess is that it’s from someone who found out about the crime secondhand and feels bad about not coming forward.”
“But not bad enough to identify him- or herself, or to tell us who did it.”
He shrugged.
“Yeah. But this isn’t necessarily the end of it—whoever wrote might get in touch again. It happens. The first contact is the hardest.”
I studied the Internet gibberish at the top of the e-mail, my fear of the truth receding. Anything was better than more waiting.
“The FBI or somebody must be able to track this back to wherever it was sent from, right?”
“I wish.” He flicked more ash onto the floor. “I already talked to our tech guys. The e-mail was sent through an anonymous remailer, which is a fancy name for a daisy chain of computers in parts of the world where they haven’t got much in the way of disclosure laws. The particular remailer that sent this message is located on the Isle of Man, but the tech guys tell me that the message might have hopped from the sender to India to Africa to God knows where before it hit the last stop. They’re going to take a stab at running it down, but they warned me not to expect much.”
“So, what’s next?” I asked, refusing to believe that we were at a dead end.
“Next I go looking for a red BMW M5.” He took a final hit from his cigarette, dropped the butt to the floor, and ground it out with his shoe. “Seven years is a long time, but I broke in on auto crime, and I know a few tricks when it comes to finding cars. Farther south, we’d have to worry that it went deadhead on a banana boat to South America. Up north, though, most cars get chopped or reregistered under a fake vehicle identification number. If we find the car, we might be able to track it back to whoever stole it.” He swept the change on the bar toward him, leaving a five-dollar bill. “Come on. I got my wheels out front. I’ll give you a ride home.”
I shook my head, feeling a little dizzy.
“I’d rather walk awhile. I could use the fresh air.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay, then. But call me if you got any questions. Don’t worry what time it is. I never sleep much.” He hesitated. “You going to tell Claire and Kate about this?”
I thought about it for a second. If Kate was right, and Claire really did want to put the past behind her, a false lead would be the worst possible thing for her, potentially destroying whatever emotional barriers she’d managed to erect. It might even be the final straw persuading her to flee—from New York, and from me.
“Not until we know more.”
“Your call. But don’t wait too long. You don’t want to be carrying this around by yourself, and they’re going to be upset if they discover you were holding out on them.”
12
The heat of the whiskey dissipated rapidly in the cold night air as I walked south on Second Avenue and then west on Fifty-seventh Street. Long crosstown blocks carried me through the shuttered heart of Midtown, the brightly illuminated shop windows forlorn in the absence of daytime crowds. Kyle Wallace was left in the trunk of a red BMW.… By whom? And in what condition? Head down and collar turned up, I quickened my pace.
I figured out where I was headed only when I arrived. Carnegie Hall is at the intersection of Fifty-seventh and Seventh, a tan brick building that looks like an outsized college library. A uniformed usher told me the concert was due to end in half an hour. I crossed the street and sheltered in a doorway, knowing Claire and Kate would pass by on their way to Eighth Avenue, where they could catch a taxi uptown. Covering my face with my hands, I prayed Kyle hadn’t suffered.
A rush of early departees signaled the