There wasn’t time to mourn. Once I’d left the station, I dialed Dana Essex, then thought better of it. I walked up to Broadway, bought a prepaid phone from a convenience store, then made the call.
I told her the news. It was pointless to apologize, but I did anyway.
“It’s not possible,” she said. “There’s simply no way.”
She spoke softly. I could hear the collective murmur of voices behind her.
“I have class in a moment,” she said. “Why don’t I end early and call when I’m finished?”
“Best to stay off phones till we get a chance to talk. Can you meet me tonight?”
“I can be back in the city by nine. How about we meet by the wharf on Granville Island?”
“That works,” I said.
“Am I—are we in trouble, Dave?”
“Right now we’re just careful. See you tonight.”
After the interviews, Kay and Greg had headed back to the main office. I found them in the boardroom, searching online for information about the killing. They looked to me for answers I didn’t have.
“You both should take some time off,” I said. “Don’t speak to anyone. If you’re pressed, call our lawyer. Then call me. Don’t mention our client to anyone.”
“This isn’t my fault, sir, is it?” Greg said.
“It’s mine,” I told him.
“Does Dana know?” Kay asked once Greg had gone. “All that waiting, and then heartbreak. She’ll want you to work on this, find who did it.”
“It’s not our job to solve murders. Right now it’s to protect our client. You’re sure you didn’t mention her?”
“Cross my heart,” she said. “And Greg doesn’t know. So what next?”
It was a good question.
“I need to phone Jeff,” I said. “Help Ralph re-encrypt the storage drive and then get some rest.”
Jeff understood why it was important, going to the wall for a client. That didn’t mean he liked it. I told him I’d advise Dana Essex make full disclosure to the police, unless she gave me a reason not to.
“What possible reason could there be?” he asked. Waves breaking on the shore in the background.
“Protection,” I said. “The person who killed Tabitha might be after her, too.”
“Dave,” Jeff said delicately. “What percent sure are you this woman didn’t do this?”
“One hundred.”
“Or have it done?”
“Ninety eight. She’s not the type to get worked up into a white-hot rage. And if this was about money, well, you don’t teach English at community college because you harbor a deep desire for wealth.”
“So who did it, then?” Jeff asked.
I was getting tired of being asked questions I was already asking myself. “Someone who got a look at the report, either in the office or on our client’s end.”
“Unlikely it came from us,” Jeff said. “Our office staff doesn’t leave info lying out.”
“It’s a zoo, Jeff. There’s a million ways you could get a glimpse.”
“This isn’t your fault,” Jeff said. “You know that, right?”
I couldn’t answer him.
Tabitha Sorenson was dead. She’d died badly, and in some way I’d led the killer to her. The report I’d written for Dana Essex was a murderer’s blueprint—address and schedule of the only person who knew where Tabitha was. The document was saved to our cloud storage account, which meant anyone in the Wakeland & Chen offices or anyone with the password would have access.
And it wasn’t a small company anymore—a full-time office staff, part-time guards, Jeff and Kay and anyone that any of us knew. Someone in the waiting area could have over-the-shouldered Ralph and seen him enter the password. To say nothing of decryption. To say nothing of anything.
If Essex and the office were protected, the smart thing was to let the police take over, the professionals with the databases and the lab equipment and the sanctioned use of force. I could harm the investigation and wreck any chance of her killer facing justice.
So often what you know to be a stone-cold, irrefutable fact sits in opposition to the kind of truth that comes to you through intuition and surmise. The head and heart work different terrain. Perched in my mind was the image of a faceless someone who wielded a knife with precision and skill, who had no qualms about applying that blade to a twenty-four-year-old woman. I saw that someone standing over her, listening to her weak pulse speed her toward death. Getting what he or she wanted and killing her in an instant, with no more emotion than a creditor balancing accounts. I couldn’t let that go.
Before I left to meet Essex, I checked the news sites. Already the Sun had an article up about the mysterious death in Mount Pleasant.
The neighbors had seen nothing. None of them had ever met Tabitha, and few had spoken to Gill more than to say hello. Of course it was terrible, they said, and wondered who could do such a thing.
A clean stab wound doesn’t hurt much more than a stiff punch, at least initially. Police sources said the wound in Tabitha’s side had probably been done first, then followed by the severing of the subclavian artery. Pain and immobilization, then a merciful slash to the base of the throat.
The police were interested in any help they could get from the community to solve this vicious crime.
They’d get it.