Chapter 37

It was late afternoon by the time Cole had covered the governor’s speech and had followed up on a tip given him by one of Dick Crawford’s sources at the Capitol. Despite California’s budget being pared to the bone, there were still some fat cats getting more than their share. It would make a great front page article, and his first exclusive political story.

He parked his rental car at the fairgrounds where the Sports Gear Trade Show was being held in a tent the size of a football stadium. This is probably a wild goose chase, he thought as he got out and walked toward the entrance. He was going to have to slug his way through the traffic going back to San Francisco, turn in the rental car, dash home to shower and dress, then rush to the party. He doubted he’d make it there until halfway through the dinner following the play.

Since the show was open to members of the trade only, he had to flash his ID from the Herald and pretend he was doing a piece on the show to get in. Once inside, he followed the guide map through a maze of booths to the rear of the tent where smaller exhibitors were set up.

He spotted the KOOL KUSTOM SHOEZ sign over the booth, but no one was in it. He questioned the guy in the next booth and found out the woman went outside the tent to smoke. It took a few minutes, but he located a group of people who’d slipped through the flap in the tent by the portable restrooms and were outside smoking.

“Someone here with Kool Kustom Shoez?”

“I work for the company.”

The slim woman with the Canadian accent walked toward him, a cigarette in one hand and a purse in the other.

“I’m Cole Rawlings with the Herald, a San Francisco newspaper. I need to ask you a few questions.”

“You doing an article on us?”

“Quite possibly. The woman who answered the phone at your Vancouver headquarters said the shoe designer was down here.”

“Right. That’s Allen Radford.”

“Is he around?”

“Yes. He’s checking out the competition.”

“Does he have a cell phone?”

“Sure. Want me to call him?”

Cole nodded. While she fished in her bag for the phone, he asked, “What do you do there?”

“Sales, marketing. This and that. It’s a small company. Only five of us in the front office. We have three Vietnamese women in the back on the machines. Really big orders are sent overseas to China to be fabricated.”

A small company. Good. Chances were better someone would remember the order.

“Do you recall making an athletic shoe that had inline skates? They retracted into the shoe’s sole and became regular athletic shoes.”

“Sounds kind of familiar, but Allen would know for sure. He does all the designing.” She punched a speed dial button and took another drag on her cigarette. “Strange. He’s not answering or his battery is dead.”

Cole waited while she left a voice mail. Based on “kind of familiar” Cole decided to stick around and talk with Allen Radford. It was going to make him much later than he’d thought. He called Jessica and left a message on her machine.

Troy arrived at the venue hours before he actually needed to be there. He wanted to hide the gun before they set up the metal detector. Since Mayor Brown planned to attend and several state senators were coming, security had been tightened.

He stowed the gun at the bottom of one of the props trunks, which had been brought over earlier by the movers who’d transported the sets and assembled the portable stage and dressing rooms. He’d taken off the afternoon from Quiksilver Messenger Service to give himself time to steal two cell phones. Now he could make two important calls that couldn’t be traced back to him.

Hiding the satchel with the phones was a piece of cake. He stuck it at the back of the wardrobes that had costumes the troop wasn’t currently using. The company had made enough money on Chasing the Dragon to move to a better theater. They’d shipped all their props and costumes here so that the charity paid for their move.

It wasn’t exactly kosher, but San Francisco society was full of limousine liberals who threw money at charities. They were going to move part of their equipment. Why not all of it?

“We’re good to go,” Troy muttered to himself.

He’d spent way, way too much money on this. S’okay. The West Coast Tech Angels were funding his project next week. He would have plenty of money to cover the cost of the used truck and the new paint job.

Wait until Courtney found out. The bitch could have been in the dough big time if she would have stuck with him.

Soon he would be rich and famous.

But before he started a new life—away from his freaking mother—he was going to send Jessica Crawford to her grave with a daring murder that would shock the city.

Fucking A!

Shock the country.

He checked his watch. In a little over two hours the tent would start to fill. While the guests had cocktails, the actors would be putting on makeup and costumes. Then the play would begin.

Troy truly hoped Jessica enjoyed his performance. He’d been tempted to send her an e-mail the way he had the others, but he didn’t want her to know she was going to die. Why spoil her fun?

Cole hung around for over an hour before Allen Radford returned to the booth. By then he was on a first name basis with the woman whose name was June. Allen was in his early thirties and had hair gelled into spikes and a diamond stud in his left ear.

“Allen, this reporter has been waiting to see you.”

Cole introduced himself. “I’m looking for a designer who figured out how to make a custom athletic shoe with retractable in-line skates.”

Allen thumped his chest with one fist. “That would be me.”

Cole almost kissed the guy. “Do you remember anything about the person who ordered it?”

“It was an on-line order. Until we came to this trade show, most of our business came off the Net. Now, we’re bigger—”

“What about the guy who ordered the shoes? What do you remember?”

Allen didn’t hesitate. “We chatted on-line. He wanted to be able to skate then retract the mechanism and walk around in the same shoes.”

The woman spoke up. “Isn’t he the guy that sent us in-line skates?”

“Right. The client bought Stoltz in-line skates. They’re made by a German company. Best on the market. He sent them to us so he would have the best in-lines in his custom shoes.”

“We usually ship them malleable plastic to make their own mold, and they send it back to us,” June told him.

“I took the in-line mechanism out of the Stoltz, used the mold he made for the shoe, and figured out a way to retract the mechanism.” Radford smiled, obviously proud of his work. “It wasn’t easy, I’ll tell you. If you popped the inlines straight up you add about four inches to the sole, which looks stupid. I found a way to make them flip to the side. The shoe I designed looks just like any other athletic shoe.”

“Do you remember where the guy lived?”

“It’s in the computer.”

No, it wasn’t. “You don’t recall?”

Allen frowned and looked at him with suspicion. “What’s this all about?”

“I’m working on a case. Have you heard of the Final Call Killer who’s been strangling women in San Francisco?”

“Sure!” June cried.

Allen asked, “Does my shoe figure into the case?”

“I’m not sure,” Cole hedged. “It could. Did the man you made the shoe for—”

“He lives in San Francisco. I remember because I thought he had to be in great shape to skate up all those hills.”

“There are a lot of parks and places he could skate that aren’t so steep,” Cole said.

Allen shook his head. “Nope. He wanted the skates so he could do his job faster. He wanted to skate from place to place and walk into a building without having to change shoes. I thought it was odd because we have plenty of courier services in Vancouver, but they ride bikes.”

“I don’t know of any who use skates,” added June.

“In New York the couriers are on bikes,” he heard himself say. There were couriers in the Herald’s offices all the time. He’d assumed they had bikes out front.

Zoe would have opened her door to a courier she recognized.

Jessica looked in the mirror, dazzled by her reflection. She was in her mother’s Campton Place suite. She’d come here to dress for the party because her mother had insisted on having their hair and makeup done at the hotel.

“You look stunning,” her mother said. “Wait until Cole sees you.”

“You look beautiful, too.”

She meant it. Her mother had chosen to have her silver-blonde hair piled high on her head, a sophisticated look that went perfectly with the dramatic black dress with a diagonal white band that ran from the bodice down to the hem.

“I have something for you.” Her mother handed her a small shopping bag.

Jessica didn’t reach for it. She wasn’t comfortable having this woman buy her gifts. “You shouldn’t have. You already bought me this dress.”

“Come on. Take it. It’ll make me happy.”

Reluctantly, Jessica accepted the gift bag. Inside, nestled among dozens of sheets of scarlet tissue was an evening bag. It was a sparkling green Judith Lieber bag in the shape of a frog.

“Oh, my gosh! I’ve always loved this bag.”

“A frog. The symbol of good luck.”

She held the tiny bag in the palm of her hand. It was soooo cute. “I can’t take this. It’s too expensive.”

Her mother put her arm around her. It was the first time she’d done anything more than touch Jessica’s arm while talking.

“I want you to have it. Money doesn’t mean anything unless you can buy something for those you love or do some good with it.”

She took the bag out of Jessica’s hand and opened it. Inside was a long gold chain, a tiny gold comb and a mirror the size of a nickel. She hooked the chain over Jessica’s arm so that the frog hung down and rested against her hip.

“Smashing! I knew it would be perfect against that dark blue.”

Jessica glanced at her reflection in the full length mirror. The green frog glittered, the light refracting off the thousands of emerald green crystals. Every time she moved even just slightly the Swarovski crystals on the bodice of her gown twinkled.

“It is perfect. Thank you. I’ve always admired Lieber bags.”

“Now you have one.”

“Thank you so much.”

With a smile her mother said, “There’s just one problem with them. All there’s room for is a lipstick and a key.”

For a second tears came to her eyes. She blinked them away. “My friend Zoe used to say that when you wore a Lieber bag, you needed a man on your arm with pockets to carry your stuff.”

“It’s true. We women carry too much junk around.”

“I’ll just take my lipstick. Cole’s going to meet me there. He’ll have a key to the apartment.” Too late she realized she had just revealed that she lived with Cole.

The telephone rang, and her mother answered. “We’re on our way.” She turned Jessica. “Your father is downstairs in the bar.”

Jessica was a little amazed her father had asked to meet them for a drink. But after he’d gotten over the shock of her mother’s return and had been assured Jessica still loved him, her father had become more cooperative.

Cole crawled through the slugfest on the I-80. The traffic was bad every day, but even worse on a Friday evening. He’d called his source on the Rapid Start Task Force and told him to check the courier services. Let the guy take the credit for the tip. It would make him even more likely to keep Cole up-to-date.

More important, the authorities had manpower up the ying-yang. They would locate the psycho in no time.

He’d tried to reach Jessica but had missed her. He’d tried to call Dick to get his take on this, but hadn’t been able to reach him.

“A courier on skates,” he muttered to himself.

They had been going at this from the wrong angle. He would bet his life that when they located the courier service that used skaters—could there be more than one?—their records would show deliveries to all the murdered women.

He had Stan Everetts on his cell’s speed dial. He pressed the button and a few seconds later the profiler came on the line. Naturally, the news about the courier hadn’t filtered down to the profiler yet. Cole explained what he’d discovered.

“Do you still think he’s that intelligent and into computers, if he works as a courier?” Cole asked.

“Absolutely. We know he’s a whiz because he used a remailer and hacked into the database of the shoe company. Why he’s working as a courier is hard to say.”

“You’d think he could get a better job doing something with computers.”

“There’s an explanation, just not an obvious one.”

“Do you have any idea what types of things couriers deliver other than documents?” Cole asked him.

“Blood. Terminally ill patients and people with AIDS need their blood monitored constantly. Often they’re too ill to go anywhere. Caregivers draw the blood and couriers rush it to the lab. If you wait too long, it goes bad.”

“Bingo! That’s how he got into that rehab facility. Don’t places like that draw blood and have it tested for controlled substances?”

“Probably.”

“We’re gonna catch this psycho before the weekend is over.”