The Dark Room(88)

And he was still bothered by the shallow cuts on Grassley’s neck; his car abandoned in front of Lucy’s house, the driver’s seat soaked in blood.

“We’re missing something,” Cain said.

“I know.” She turned right onto Mission. “We’ll work it out.”

“She had two hundred thousand in cash in her room, and she went to a bank but didn’t bring it.”

“We’ll work it out, Cain.”



The Hall of Justice was dark when they came to it, and there was a crowd out front. Cain caught the story in snippets of conversation as they passed the knots of office workers waiting on the sidewalk: a flooded utility tunnel, a shorted electrical main. The backup generators were offline, again. A young woman in a white lab coat said, “If the stiffs thaw out, it’ll reek for ten blocks.”

He led Fischer past the out-of-commission metal detectors, holding his badge up for the guards. An even bigger crowd had gathered in front of the nonfunctional elevators. He turned to the fire stairs and pushed the door open. Battery-powered emergency lamps gave a dull red light, reminding Cain of dark rooms. Maybe the Pi Kappa Kappa brothers had shot and developed the film without leaving the mansion. The brick wall in the first photograph could have been in the basement. He wondered what other prints they had developed, where all those images had gone.

They came out on the sixth floor and then crossed the cubicle farm to his office. On Cain’s chair were two copies of the Grizzly Peak murder book from the Berkeley Police Department—the files Frank Lee had found in Chun’s trunk. Cain set them side by side on his desk and flipped through them to be sure they were the same. Then he gave one of them to Fischer.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said.

“Yerba Buena?’

“She doesn’t have a phone. I hate to be gone so long with no way to check in.”



They parked in the half-empty lot and looked through the windshield at the Coast Guard outpost. The buildings were low and squat, hunkering against the rain. As they watched, the streetlights began to blink on, one and then another.

“You’re going to the airport tonight?”

“Midnight.”

“In this car?”

“Shit,” Fischer said. “I forgot about that.”

Cain’s car was parked outside Lucy’s house, unless the city had towed it. He wasn’t sure if he’d left it parked in front of a neighbor’s driveway. At the time, it hadn’t mattered.

“I can take a cab tomorrow, or have a patrolman come out and get me.”

“Forget it—use this one,” she said. She took the keys from the ignition and handed them to him. “Michael can take me to the airport.”

“You’re sure?”

“Just don’t drive it on the sidewalk. I saw what you did to yours.”

They got out of the car and walked through the rain to the barracks.



He found Lucy on the desk chair, which she’d moved to the window. A wool blanket covered her shoulders. She didn’t turn around when he came in, and it wasn’t until he was by her side that he realized she was asleep. He put his briefcase and his copy of the murder book on the desk, then sat down on the end of the bed and took off his shoes. He removed his jacket and unholstered his gun. After he’d unloaded it and put it into the drawer, Lucy stirred and turned to him.

“Did you get him?”

“Not yet.”

“When?”

“I don’t know,” he said. The room was so small that he could reach out and put his hands on her shoulders without getting off the bed. “Have you eaten anything today?”

“I went to the café.”

“Do you need dinner?”

“No.”

“What’s wrong?” he asked, regretting it before the words were out of his mouth.

They hadn’t gotten in many fights, but questions like this were a good way to start. It was obvious what was wrong. She got off the chair and came around to the other side of the bed. She sat with her back against the headboard, the blanket still wrapped around her. When he put his hand on her leg, she immediately bent her knee to get away from his touch.

“It’s only been one day,” she said. “And everyone is very nice. But I hate it here, Gavin.”

“I know.”

“Promise me you’ll fix this,” she said. “I want to go home.”

“I promise.”

“Take your briefcase and your binder, and work in the café. You can read in there without bothering me.”

“Okay.”

“It’s cold war cuisine, seven nights a week. Tonight you get Salisbury steak and carrot salad. With raisins.”

“Are you okay?” he asked, and regretted asking that, too.

She looked at him, her hands folded on the gentle rise in her belly.

“I just want to sleep until I can go home,” she said. “Or anywhere. Anywhere but here.”





33


HE WAS IN bed next to Lucy, on top of the covers and still wearing his clothes. He was half awake, thinking of getting out of bed and driving into the city to begin again, but not sure what good that would do. It was four thirty in the morning when his phone began vibrating in his pants pocket. The long, sustained pulses of an incoming call. He got out of the bed and went quickly to the bathroom.