Promise Not To Tell(34)

“Virginia, wait —”

She reached the bedroom, moved through the opening and turned to face him. “The word humiliation does not even begin to describe what I experienced that night. It happened months ago and I still can’t get that scene out of my head. So, yes, I’m having second thoughts about trying to have sex with you.”

She closed the door with rather more force than was necessary and stood for a moment, seething.

When she had her emotions back under control, she opened the door again. Cabot was standing right where she had left him.

“I apologize for that incredibly ridiculous display of high drama,” she said.

“No problem.”

“I deal with a lot of dramatic artistic types but I’m not usually into the theatrics myself.”

Cabot propped one shoulder against the wall and folded his arms. “Like I said, not a problem.”

“Yes, it is a problem, but it’s my problem, not yours, so, again, my apologies.”

“No prob —”

“Don’t say it.”

She closed the door again, this time with exquisite control. She crossed to the window and stood looking out at the city lights for a long time.

CHAPTER 20

“Last night after you went back to bed, I did some research on Night Watch, the tech company where Sandra Porter worked,” Cabot said.

He was behind the wheel of his gunmetal-gray SUV. Virginia was in the passenger seat. They were forty minutes into the roughly one-hour drive to Wallerton and the site of Quinton Zane’s first compound. He had exited Interstate 5 a while back and now they were on a two-lane road and deep into rural country. Tiny towns, farms and small ranches dotted the landscape.

Thus far conversation in the front seat of the SUV had been polite but stilted. He figured he now knew the precise meaning of the phrase walking on eggshells.

He knew he couldn’t blame all of the brittle tension in the front seat on the searing late-night kiss. It was the sight of the holstered gun he had picked up at his place on the way out of town that had made Virginia’s eyes narrow.

“We may be dealing with a killer,” he had said.

“I know,” she said.

That was pretty much all she had said for the past several miles.

Virginia took her attention off the road long enough to give him a quick, curious glance. “You mentioned that Night Watch was a tech company.”

“It is in the sense that it’s selling products online and has no brick-and-mortar presence, but as far as I can tell, it’s just a straight retail operation.”

“What do they market?”

“According to the website, they offer a variety of personalized sleeping aids. Herbal products, guided meditations that are supposed to help insomniacs get to sleep, one-on-one online sleep therapy sessions, special music designed to help you sleep – that kind of thing.”

Virginia thought about that. “Zane’s cult sold a program that he claimed would allow people to control their dreams and channel the latent powers of the mind.”

“Zane’s operation was your basic pyramid scheme. It had several tiers. Customers had to keep buying their way up to the next level. In addition, they only made progress if they brought in new customers.”

“It sounds somewhat similar to selling insomnia therapies.”

“Night Watch may be selling junk cures for insomnia, but from what I can tell, the business is not a pyramid scheme.”

“Well, it’s probably all bogus, but given the number of people with sleep disorders who are desperate for a good night’s rest, I’m guessing that business is brisk.”

“It was doing well enough to catch the attention of a venture capital firm a year ago,” Cabot said. “Night Watch burned through that first round of funding and is rumored to be getting ready to go out for another.”

“I assume you checked out the people who are running Night Watch?”

“I did. Like most start-ups, it’s still a small organization. The founder and CEO is Josh Preston, a former wunderkind tech whiz who made his first fortune before he was thirty. He designed a social media app that was hugely successful. Got bought out by one of the big companies. Looks like he kicked around for a while, enjoying his money, and then decided to reinvent himself with Night Watch.”

“He wants to see if he can catch lightning in a jar twice?”

“Probably. But here’s the bottom line: according to the business media, Preston is only in his midthirties and none of his employees are over thirty.”

“In other words, there’s no one involved with the company who might be Quinton Zane,” Virginia said.

“No.”

“I suppose that would have been too easy.”

“Yes. That’s why we’re going back to the beginning again.”

Virginia gave him another searching look. “Because you’re sure there must be some connection between Hannah Brewster, Sandra Porter and the past.”

“I think so, yes.”

They stopped for coffee at a small restaurant in Wallerton and then Cabot drove the last few miles up into the heavily wooded foothills. The closer they got to the old house, the more tense Virginia became. She wasn’t the only one, he thought. He was on edge, too.

The last stretch of road was a strip of badly weathered pavement that was barely wide enough for the SUV.