Damn, she was jittery. The wait was driving her crazy, and with all the food in the conference rooms and her sprained ankle, the weight would pile back on.
She put her laptop in her backpack and picked up her crutches. A couple of crutched jumps around the building might clear her mind and burn a few calories. Praveena promised to call as soon as the last few problems were fixed.
Jen hopped out the back door. Eddie and Bruce stood in the November chill, hunched around the ashtray. Smokers. How disgusting. She avoided them and looped to the side parking lot, shuddering at the thought of a white Camry covered with blood. What if Rey had blackmailed Dave or Mrs. Tyler, his high society date? Dave had been too quick to wash off the evidence. Why? She squinted at the area where the body was found. Piles of leaves lay in soggy puddles. No one parked in those spaces anymore.
She ambled her way out the lot toward the surrounding business park. Rows of vacant office buildings, some with lease signs, others with the tattered remains of once proud dot com logos stood like ghostly sentinels to a dream once bubbly, now popped.
Jen concentrated on skipping over the puddles. She was building up a sweat, and her single working thigh burned. A yellow muscle car, a Charger, turned suddenly onto the driveway in front of her, screeching to a stop. She stumbled to a halt. It was Rey’s car. The doors flung open and two men jumped out, heading straight for her. Jen turned to escape, but her crutch caught in a crack on the sidewalk, and she fell.
A man wearing a dirty red bandana grabbed both her arms and shoved her into the backseat while the lanky one with a scraggly beard threw her crutches and backpack in the trunk.
Jen fought to breathe, and her pulse stuttered like a runaway jackhammer. “W-where are you taking me?”
The guy with the bandana leered at her. “How are the wounds healing?”
“What did you guys do to Rey? You’re driving his car.”
“Well, duh!” Scraggly Beard turned from the passenger seat.
The driver stepped on the gas, and Red Bandana clamped an arm around Jen. “Hey, sweet stuff, gimme a kiss.”
The driver glared at him. “Boss said leave her alone until after she gives us the code.”
“I wasn’t gonna hurt her.” Red Bandana let her go and stuck a piece of chewing gum in his mouth.
While he folded the wrapper into a tiny wad, Jen tucked her left hand into her jacket pocket and punched 9-1-1 on her cell phone. Red Bandana slipped his arm around her before she could say anything.
With no way of knowing whether the dispatcher had picked up or not, she pushed the off button and fumbled to call Dave, thankful she had an old-fashioned phone with raised keys.
Red Bandana made smooching sounds. “Why are you wiggling about, hottie?”
“Where are we going in Rey’s car?” She enunciated clearly.
Scraggly Beard narrowed his eyes and pointed at her. “What’s she got in her pocket?”
Red Bandana grabbed her hand and wrestled the phone from her.
“Help!” Jen screamed right before he threw the phone out the window.
He stuck his gum on the seatback, shoved her against the door, and silenced her by pressing his mouth over hers.
Chapter 18
Dave flattened his palms on Lisa’s desk. “Get Jen for me.”
Lisa quickly exited a browser window and brought up the instant message app. She spit out her gum. “Jen’s not online. I’ll call her cell.”
Dave’s pulse swished inside his ears while a splitting headache clamped behind his eye sockets. “Is she answering?”
“Jeez Louise, calm down. She’s probably in the lab. You look like you met the business end of a rototiller. Remember, deep breaths and calm.”
“Fuck calm!” Dave clenched his fist. “She’s pulling some shit. Lying, stealing code, and dammit! Did we get a good build yet?”
Concern knit her brow. “What’s going on? Should I call your therapist?”
“No!” He kicked her wastebasket. “Jennifer Jones has a lot of explaining to do.”
Lisa stood and grabbed Dave’s shoulders from behind, pressing him down into a chair.
“I don’t need a massage. I need Jen. Where is she?”
Eddie and Bruce walked by.
“Jen’s outside exercising,” Eddie said.
“What the hell is she doing exercising at a time like this?” Dave hit the armrest.
“Beats me.” Bruce popped open a can of soda. “She took off down the sidewalk about half an hour ago.”
Dave pulled his car keys from his pocket. “Cut off her access.”
“But the build hasn’t been fixed yet,” Eddie said. “She was waiting for Praveena to finish.”
“Good, then we still have time.” Dave dropped his broken cell on Lisa’s desk. “I need a new one.”
He ran out the front door, looking left and right.
No sign of Jen. Exercising? Likely story. She’s probably meeting her crime buddies. The attack at his house, the scratches on her stomach, decoys to make him sympathize with her.
He marched to his SUV and opened the door. Jen’s personnel file was stuffed in the map pocket. He flipped through her resume: Newark Memorial High class of 2005, San José State 2007-2011. One year missing: 2006. The year Jocelyn died from a hit and run. The year Abby was kidnapped.
Wait! No. She couldn’t. Jennifer, oh shit! Jocelyn and Jennifer, the two J’s. What happened to that fat nanny? She was Hispanic. Her last name, what was it? Not Jones. He screeched out of the parking lot. The answers lay in Jocelyn’s yearbook. He ran three red lights before a police car pulled him over. The officer was unsympathetic. “I don’t care if your wife’s going into labor or your baby’s been kidnapped.”
Dave’s pulse swished hot under his collar, but he stayed silent and accepted the ticket. Never give the police a reason, his father had taught him. He drove through Saratoga at a reasonable speed because school children were walking home. But as soon as he left the school vicinity, he floored the accelerator.
He tore around the screen of oleanders into his driveway. A loud metallic thud shook the car, and an explosion of white punched his sunglasses into his brow and slammed his eardrums like a stun grenade. He swept aside the deflating airbag and swung the door open.
Melissa’s orange Volkswagen van lay smashed in front of his SUV.
“Melissa,” he yelled and scrambled to the driver’s door of the van. Empty. Tiny stars flitted in his field of vision. He stumbled and threw up on his front lawn, barely missing a pair of feet in glittery, gold-winged goddess stilettos.
“You’re bleeding.” Melissa removed the cracked sunglasses from his face. “Oh, you poor thing.”
Dave struggled to his knees. “Help me into the house.”
Blood dripped down his forehead and made a trail on the pebbled concrete. Melissa walked to the SUV and took Dave’s keys from the ignition. “Should I call an ambulance?”
Dave staggered to his feet and leaned against the porch rail. “I’m fine. How about you?”
“Oh, my stars! I would have been hit had I not been peeking in your window.” Melissa opened the door and guided Dave to the leather couch.
Dave’s head careened like the ball in the roulette wheel. “I’m sorry about your van.”
“Oh, it’s Pete’s old van. You lie down, sweetie.” Melissa clucked and pressed him into the couch. She headed for the kitchen, and a moment later, she brought an icepack and damp towels.
“My poor, sweet Dave.” She adjusted his head on a throw pillow and took his shoes off. “Were you rushing to see me? I wouldn’t have been parked so close to the edge if it hadn’t been for that red sports car hogging the driveway. Whose car is that, by the way?”
It was Jen’s. Dave wasn’t about to admit to Melissa how foolish he had been. He groaned and held his throbbing head.
“Let’s cuddle.” She nudged him to make room for her.
“Could you bring me Tylenol first? There’s a jar in the guest bathroom.”
“Sure thing, big boy.” With a flounce of her lavender scarf, she fluttered to the guest room, tottering on too-high heels.
Dave blew out a deep breath and willed his head to stop spinning. What else could go wrong?
The phone rang. He let it go to the answering machine to record the call in case it was the kidnappers.
“Dave, it’s Lisa. Are you there?”
Dave picked up the handset. “Lisa?”
“Jen’s still missing, and Lester wants to give you an update.”
“What? Have you tried calling her again?”
Lisa didn’t reply. Lester’s voice came onto the line. “We’ve fixed all the issues and have a good build.”
“Great. Thank you.” He ended the call.
So they had a good build for Jen to steal. Damn. Eddie should have cut off her access by now. Where could she be? Painful twinges radiated in his chest. She had seemed so sympathetic, like she cared about him, about Abby, even about Jocelyn. Too good to be true. Too quick to accept his wife. She knew and planned to… to stalk and seduce him and steal him blind, that’s what!
Melissa floated down onto the couch with a bottle of pills and a cup of water. “Your lady friend left her glasses.”
“What did you say?” His head spun and he thought he saw double, but it was just Melissa’s big hair poofed from side to side. He swallowed the tablets, spilling water on his shirt.
“Her glasses.” Melissa unsnapped the waistband of her dangerously tight cigarette jeans. “I placed them on the kitchen table.”
“Thanks, I’ll let her know when I next see her.”
“Really, will you see her again? I doubt she’d look that attractive through those soda bottles.” Melissa drew her scarf over his eyes and kissed him. “Were you so dizzy in love with me you smashed your poor weetle truck? I’ve still got the bubbly in the ice chest. Fortunately it was in the front seat.”
His stomach lurched. He wasn’t here to bed Melissa. He tried sitting up. “Shouldn’t you check if your van is drivable? Or call a tow truck?”
She looped her swirly scarf around his neck and pointed toward the master bedroom. “After I tow you to bed and check if you’re drivable.”
“No.” He resisted. The master bedroom was off-limits. Jocelyn’s territory.
* * *
Nausea rocked Jen. Red Bandana’s forced kiss slobbered worse than a St. Bernard. She squirmed and pushed, but it made him more fervent. He assaulted her with his tongue and she bit it.
“Ow!” He shoved her head into the door. “Bitch!”
The two men in the front laughed. “What happened? Cat got your tongue?”
Red crossed his arms and scowled. “She’s a horrible kisser.”
Jen wiped her mouth with her jacket sleeve and spat his disgusting taste from her tongue. The car swerved off the freeway and turned into the parking lot of a dilapidated apartment complex. The sign was unreadable, pockmarked with bullets and missing letters.
Red Bandana and Scraggly Beard carted Jen up a set of outside stairs and into a second floor apartment.
“I need to use the bathroom,” Jen protested when they flung her onto a ratty plaid couch. Maybe she could escape out the window or find a weapon.
The driver, the one with the snakehead tattoo, shoved her laptop at her. “Transfer the code first.”
“Or leave the door open.” The other two laughed.
Guess that didn't work. Jen settled on the couch and opened the laptop. She’d stall them. “I can’t download the code if you don’t have internet here.”
Red Bandana cracked his knuckles. “See? She doesn’t have the code. Let’s jump her now.”
Snakehead bent over her to look at the screen. “Our neighbor has unprotected wireless. Isn’t the code on your laptop?”
“Actually not, our laptops are terminals into the system. Our company is serious about security.” Jen flipped her hair back. She’d act cool, buy time. They were idiots anyway. “I’ll need a comfortable place to work. A glass of cold water, maybe a sandwich. It’ll take me a while to access the code. I have to hack through security first.”
Snakehead gave her a memory stick. “Put it on here.”
She rolled her eyes. “How many gigs does this have?”
“She’s stalling,” Red Bandana said. “Let me break her in first.”
“Shut up!” Snakehead yelled. “Do me a favor. Order some pizza or get lost.”
Bandana shuffled off, but not before giving Snakehead the finger behind his back.
Jen put the stick in her laptop. “Only two gigs. Not enough. Our code is vastly complex, includes many binary libraries and utilities. Did you want source or compiled?”
“Uh… source?” Snakehead answered.
“In that case, I need to take it off the source code configuration tree. We have many branches and versions. I’ll create a label, tag the version you want, and create a build using that label. I’ll also package the source in a separate directory for your reference. Oh, you’ll also need driver code for all of the multiple clients. We support over thirty of the major cell and PDA vendors.”
“Uh… whatever.” Snakehead scratched his head. “Get yourself connected. How many gigs will I need?”
“At least a terabyte. Buy a portable hard drive, something they use for backups. It’ll be about as big as a hardcover book. Make sure it’s USB 3 so we get decent transfer rates.”
Snakehead addressed Scraggly. “Hey, did you hear her? Go to the store and buy what she said.”
“You might want to try Best Buy,” she yelled after him.
Snakehead pulled a chair close to her and threw another memory stick on the floor. “And don’t give me the same garbage.”
Jen’s heart jolted. It was the blue one they mugged her for. Her stomach sunk to a new low, and she swallowed the upwelling panic.
“Where’d you get that?” She hoped she sounded casual enough.
Snakehead stared at her. “Rey sold it to me. But it doesn’t work.”
He had to be lying. Rey couldn’t have had the stick if he were already dead. She visualized swaying palm trees and ocean waves, breathing through her nose to relax her vocal cords. “Of course, it was sample code for his class project, not the entire build.”
Snakehead shrugged. “The boss said this was fucking useless. Don’t try any more tricks.”
“Who’s the boss?” It was worth a try. Maybe he was really stupid. Her voice cracked, and she coughed to clear her throat.
“Just get the code and we won’t hurt you.” Snakehead glared at her.