They walked in silence out to the ambulance bay where Rhett's car waited.
“What if it is the guy who's visiting you, Molly?”
Molly thought until she was seated and belted in his unit. Then she shook her head. “It still doesn't make sense.”
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“It doesn't make any sense,” Kathy said when she showed up at Molly's door later that day.
Molly rubbed a hand over her face and thought she should probably open her door. The agent was standing out on her porch in her best London Fog coat, looking more like a soccer mom than an FBI agent. Molly still had destruction art in her driveway, a glazier in her living room, and another round of yellow police tape in her yard, over which some neighborhood wag had draped red ribbons and a couple of ornaments. And that didn't even take into account the size of her headache.
Happy Holidays.
“Agent Kinstle,” she finally greeted the woman. “What can I do for you?”
Kathy didn't even try to look uncomfortable. “You doing anything right now?”
Molly laughed. “I'm waiting to talk to Patrick's parents, Frank's insurance agent,
my
insurance agent, my nephew, and my neighbor. I have half a dozen camera trucks in my street wanting to interrogate me, and an even dozen forensic and police authorities waiting downtown for the same privilege. And then I have to go see Frank and comfort him for the loss of his nearest and dearest. Why? You need something?”
“I've been thinking about your little problem.” Kathy flashed a quick, unrepentant grin. “As a matter of fact, while everybody was crawling over your driveway, I was in your kitchen reading your notes. I'd like to get some more information, if I could.”
Way too tired to resent the intrusion, Molly opened the door the rest of the way to let Kathy in along with a fresh blast of arctic air.
“I was wondering if I could see the notes you've been getting,” Kathy said as she shrugged out of her coat to reveal slacks and sweatshirt crossstitched with holly and kittens.
“They're at evidence,” Molly said, limping into the kitchen. “But there are copies in the ME file.”
Magnum gave Kathy a few suspicious sniffs and a halfhearted growl and settled by the stove. Molly thought of putting on tea and decided she'd just had too much damn tea lately.
“How's Frank?” Kathy asked behind her.
“Annoying.”
Kathy smiled. “And your nephew. Is he still next door?”
Molly looked up to see Kathy considering the CD player on the counter. “Yeah. At least till I can get him back to his parents.”
His parents, who were not returning the call she'd first placed at fourthirty this morning. “Tell you what,” Molly decided, swinging instead to the phone. “Let me tell Sam where I'm going and I'll take you to the ME's office. Do you have a car? The heater in mine isn't quite working right now.”
Not to mention the fact that there was half an inch of ice on the floor of the backseat.
Kathy smiled again. “I have a car.”
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Molly found the file labeled MOLLY'S SECRET PAL on Kevin McNally's desk.
“You the castle guard?” she asked him. “Or is this to ensure I stop by for a chat?”
Kevin smiled, looking far too peaceful for what was going on. But then, Kevin probably had a car without its own koi pond in the backseat. “We decided that all files should stay here for now. To prevent leaks. You okay? You look ⦔
Molly grinned. “I feel ⦠. I do have a present for the office, though. An out-of-work FBI profiler who wants to help. That okay?”
Kevin's bushy red eyebrows lifted. “I'm not sure what the protocol is
on that. I'm not even sure what the law is. But what the hell? Nobody else is coming up with anything.”
“You talked to anybody else?” Molly demanded. “Nobody's saying anything to me but âwhat's your financial stake in all this?'”
“Not me. But don't take it too hard that Davidson's involved. He really is the best.”
Sighing, Molly scratched at her staples and rubbed at her very sore and tired face. “I hope so. Our friend isn't any amateur.” She gestured to the overstuffed, oversize file. “So, is it okay if I do a little end run?”
“Do a quarterback sneak if you want. We need help.”
He handed the thing off like a Torah in temple, and Molly turned for the door. She was halfway out the door when Kevin cleared his throat.
“One more thing, Mol. In the file.”
Molly turned on him.
To anyone who didn't know him, Kevin would have looked passive. Molly saw distress. “Winnie wanted you to see it when you got in. Before we began to circulate it around the street. It's in the file.”
“What?”
He had the grace to face her head on. “Your latest victim.”
For a second, Molly could only stare at him. Then she just walked out.
Back in the investigator's pen, Kathy was being entertained by Vic Fellows, one of the other investigators.
“We're on
Hard Copy
watch,” he was telling her with great relish as he groomed the seven remaining hairs on the top of his head. “Human bones, firebombs, drugged dogs. It's a natural. I'm going from here to get my hair cut so I look good on camera.”
The minute Molly dropped the file on her desk, the party broke up. Kathy made a grab for the threatening notes that sat at the top of the pile. Coat off, pencil behind one ear, the FBI agent bent over the pages like a teacher grading tests. Vic huffed a couple of times and stalked out of the room. Molly carried the rest of the file over to the windows.
She knew where to look for the information she needed. She just didn't want to do it. Her hands were clammy, for God's sake. Her heart was actually pounding. She felt as if she were playing a bad scene in a worse movie. She couldn't stop flashing on the sight of her friend's head in her hands so many years ago. Those eyes staring hard at her, just as those new
brown eyes had. Even so, she opened the file to the back. And saw who had belonged to her skull. Or part of the skull. The upper half, drawn as if peeking over a fence, so the missing jaw wouldn't matter.
She should have known.
It was the eyes. Wide, soft, dark eyes. Beautiful eyes. Young eyes. Molly wanted to cry. The computer generation was flat, unspecific, merely adding millimeters to bone structure, flesh to form. But somehow, the magic had happened anyway, and Molly saw a young girl with wide, sweet brown eyes and delicate cheekbones.
Asian
, Dr. DeVries had written in her note.
FORDDISC computation based on gross morphological and metric analysis suggests race to be Indochinese, possibly Vietnamese; well nourished, age approximately eighteen, of small stature, female.
Molly wanted more. She wanted a name. An address. She wanted the rest of this girl, who only lived now in the pixels of the Video Image Capture and Reproduction programs.
“Molly?”
Startled by the sharp note in Kathy's voice, Molly looked up. Kathy was smiling, which meant she'd been trying to get Molly's attention.
“The notes came in the order I have them here?” the agent asked, displaying them on Molly's desktop.
Molly took a distracted look.
Just die
.
Fuck you
.
You'll scream. Bitch witch
.
Die Bitch
.
YOU DESERVE WORSE
. All scrawled, heavy-handed and urgent. Furious strokes for furious emotions. And then, printed, as if the bones themselves had sapped out the rage that demanded personal force, the last note.
If anybody should understand, it's you. You SAW me
.
“Yep.”
“And the last note was the only one that came
with
a bone.”
Molly's hands were beginning to sweat again. Maybe because she'd never seen the notes all together, like a truculent gang gathered at the edge of an alley.
“Yes.”
“And then the bomb.”
“Uh-huh.”
Kathy took one final look at the notes and scooped them into a pile. “Who's the homicide team on this?” she asked, shoving the pile into the
folder right over the young girl's face. “I'd like to compare some ideas.”
Molly's attention was still on the file, on the tumble of threats she'd received. On the feelings of helplessness they'd generated.
She hated that feeling. She hated the fact that she'd been backed away, chased down, threatened. She hated feeling so responsible for that soft-eyed girl on the bottom of the file.
That soft-eyed girl.
Suddenly Molly swept the notes aside to look again at that single sheet with its summation. The summation, which suddenly meant more to her than those empty eyes.
Asian ⦠possibly Vietnamese
.
It meant something. It meant something particular in St. Louis. At least, Molly truly hoped it did.
“Molly.”
Molly started again. She blinked up at the agent and found a half smile. “I wonder if the homicide guys saw what I did,” she said.
Now it was Kathy's turn to blink in confusion. “Pardon?”
“It may be nothing,” Molly said, getting to her feet, then pushing the notes the rest of the way off that young girl's face. “She may be from Seattle or New Orleans for all we know.”
Now Kathy was taking a serious look at the vacant-eyed image. “Yes?”
“But we do have a couple of areas in St. Louis with a high concentration of Asian immigrants. Especially,” she said, finger to the last supposition, “Vietnamese.”
Kathy straightened like a shot and took a long look at the page. “And you said the homicide team is who?”
“Headed by a Sergeant Davidson. Who, unless they're doing doughnut duty, should be next door. Wanna go?”
Kathy's flashing smile said it all. “Oh, yeah. I think I would.”
Molly was finally reduced to just nods. She was walking into Kevin's office to return the folder when she heard a chair crash over behind her.
“We're famous!” Vic Fellows yelled, delighted. “
Hard Copy
on line one!”
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“Aren't you supposed to be chained to the office poring over mug books or something?”
Molly rubbed at her head again and settled into the most uncomfortable visitor's chair in the universe. “Shut up, Frank.”
“She always says that,” Abigail announced from where she was perched on the side of the bed, her father's arm around her waist.
“That's 'cause she loves me, honey,” her daddy assured her, his voice still breathy with discomfort.
The twins were standing on the other side of the bed, taut, careful of going anywhere near the tube that snaked out from beneath the covers to the bag that hung in front of them.
“But you said âshut up' was a bad thing to say,” Abigail insisted.
Frank tousled her hair with a hand that shook just a little. “I give Molly special license for putting up with me.”
“We put up with you,” his son said with an embryonic version of the famous Patterson grin.
Frank scowled. “Remind me to smack you when I can get out of bed in under twenty minutes.”
He got a snort of derision. “You'll need a twenty-minute lead to catch me on a good day.”
“Then I'll have Molly do it.”
“No thanks,” Molly demurred. “Molly doesn't smack.”
“Even Patrick?” Abigail asked.
“Especially Patrick. He's bigger than I am.”
“He's at work,” the little girl informed her father in a breathy whisper as if it were a secret. “I kissed him good-bye when we dropped him off.”
Frank gave her his best outraged father look. “That will be quite enough of that, young lady,” he objected. “No kissing boys until you're at least twenty.”
“Oh, Daddy,” both girls protested in disgust.
“Make that thirty,” he amended. “Now, I need you to go buy Tim a soda. He had soccer today and needs the nourishment.”
The two girls scowled at Molly. “Can't
you
tell him we're big enough to stay?”
Molly shook her head. “Your dad's right. Tim looks positively peaked.”
There was grumbling, but the kids finally ran out, which gave them no more than a few minutes grace.
“So, what's on your mind, St. Molly?” Frank immediately asked.