Eileen Reed - Ground Zero Part 22

"Yes! You're beautiful and intelligent," D'Arnot said admiringly. "Yes, Sara spoke of Muallah as a man who treated Sufi as a toy. Sufi loved him. She worshiped him."

"Muallah worships himself," Lucy said slowly. She typed quickly. "He had s.e.x with her as a gift to her before killing her, didn't he?"

"Looks like it to me," D'Arnot said. "This is a very dangerous man, I think."

"I think so too," Lucy said. She looked with new eyes at the file on Fouad Muallah. "I think so too."

Colorado Springs.

"Detective," Doug Procell said in tones of relief. His face was thin and white and miserable. He looked like a handsome vampire two kills short of a full meal. He stood in his doorway and regarded Eileen. He was wearing sweats, the Gamer off-duty uniform, it seemed. His were gray, and looked old.

"Can I come in and talk?" Eileen said. "I'm too d.a.m.n tired to haul you in."

"Yes, of course, I'm sorry," Procell said, still looking at Eileen with a relieved expression. He swung open the door and nudged a golden retriever back with his bare foot.

"Back, Cherry," he said. "Go lie down." The dog pressed against his foot and wagged its tail, looking at Eileen with shining happy-dog eyes.

"I like dogs," Eileen said mildly. "It's all right."

Cherry didn't jump on Eileen as she entered. The dog sat in her path and put up a paw, wagging its tail. Then it switched paws. Eileen gravely put out a hand and shook the paw.

"Nelson called me last night, after the police called. He said to stay home today. I don't think I could have gone to work anyway," Procell said. "Do you want some coffee?"

"No coffee," Eileen said, and patted Cherry on the head. She followed Procell down a hallway and into a sunny living room. The newspaper spread over the floor in untidy piles. Cherry immediately headed for a bright band of sunlight, her tail wagging. She flopped down in the sunlit section and gazed back at Eileen.

"She's happy I'm home," Procell said.

"How about your wife? Kids? Are they home?" Eileen knew they weren't, just by the empty-house feel of the place.

"Janet, she's at work. She's an attorney. And Martha is in day care. I had Jan take her to school anyway; I wouldn't be able to think about taking care of her today. You sure you don't want coffee? How about some breakfast?"

"Well, breakfast you could interest me in," Eileen said, and shrugged off her jacket. Her shoulder holster was clearly visible, but Procell seemed more relieved at the sight than discomfited.

"Okay," Procell said. Unexpectedly, he grinned. "I'll fix you a good breakfast and then you won't arrest me. Isn't that how it works?"

"Depends on the breakfast," Eileen said. Procell went into the kitchen and Eileen took a seat at the bar. Cherry abandoned her place in the sunlight and walked over to Eileen. She nudged Eileen's hip with her nose until she reached down and started to pet her.

"Cherry's a big baby," Procell said, opening the refrigerator. "She loves being petted. I think I could eat something now." He set out eggs, cheese, and a package of what were obviously homemade tortillas. "Huevos be okay? I make them spicy."

"Good huevos rancheros might keep you out of jail," Eileen said, and turned so she could rest her back against the wall. She closed her eyes, her hand smoothing the dog's silky head, enjoying the sunshine.

"You don't think I did it, do you?" Procell asked, cracking eggs into a bowl. His voice was sounding less pinched. Eileen suddenly realized why Procell was happy that she was here; Procell felt safe. Procell wasn't afraid of being arrested. He was afraid of being murdered.

"No, I don't," Eileen said. "But I don't think it was your conspiracy, either."

"You don't?" Procell asked in surprise. "I would think that would be certain now."

"Why?"

"Well, because Art was murdered. Why Terry and Art both?"

"Why don't you tell me?"

"I don't know." Procell was honestly bewildered. He started beating the eggs again. He added some spices and milk, and poured the mixture into a skillet. He got a bowl of refried beans from the refrigerator and set them in the microwave to warm, then opened a can of green chili sauce. He handed a block of cheese and a grater to Eileen, who took them and started working on the cheese. The kitchen began to smell delicious.

"All right, then, answer me this. How did a hired killer get clearance to come onto the base?"

Procell, stirring the eggs, stared over at her blankly.

"He'd have to have help."

"Exactly. How did the killer get under the floors?"

"Someone had to put him there," Procell said slowly. "I never really thought about it. If that's the case, then-Major Blaine!" He looked at Eileen with amazement. "It's Major Blaine! It has to be! He-he-"

"Hold your horses," Eileen said. "Major Blaine would be suspect number one in a conspiracy. But even Major Blaine couldn't get a new person on base without leaving a trail a mile wide. There is no trail. No one new came onto the base in the last two weeks, not anyone with a permanent badge. We checked on all the temporary types too, and they're all accounted for during the time of the murder. And what about getting Mr. Hired Killer out of the floor?"

Procell stirred the eggs and shook some chili powder into the skillet. His attention remained focused on the food. Eileen couldn't see his expression.

"I think I just figured whoever it was could do anything. But killing Terry like that... you know, it's not their style."

Eileen, still grating cheese, felt a chill. There was a pattern in the Procell file, and she'd completely missed it until now. The deaths were all automobile related. Not a single scientist whose obituary filled Procell's file had died of any other cause. Some were more bizarre, like the young Briton who had driven his car into a stack of gasoline canisters. Some were completely normal, like Harriet Sullivan's single-car accident on the highway. Procell, the author of the file, saw the pattern. Eileen hadn't.

Terry's murder, and now Art's, were completely out of pattern. What troubled Eileen was the feeling she was seeing the shadowy edge of something much larger than Terry or Art. If there was a relationship, it was too subtle to be seen. She still couldn't believe in Procell's conspiracy. But there seemed to be something going on.

"If they are separate, if they were murdered by another person, what will that do to my conspiracy members? That's what I'm thinking now," Procell said. He spread the refried beans over the tortillas and folded the eggs inside. He took the cheese from Eileen and filled the tortillas with the shredded cheese. Then he poured the green chili sauce on top and put the huevos into the oven to warm.

"This is going to be good," Procell said. "I mean, let's say we have Person X, who murdered Terry and Art. Then we have Organization Y, which has murdered a bunch of scientists on missile defense. What is Organization Y doing right now? If Person X is some clumsy amateur, Organization Y may be revealed simply because X is out there. I hope this happens. You know that somebody is killing us."

"Maybe two somebodies. Maybe two groups of somebodies."

"So maybe Organization Y panics? Maybe they make a mistake. Like killing Art."

"So you're saying Terry was killed by Person X, for reasons unknown, so Y responds by taking out their next victim early."

"Right. Art Bailey. Smartest man in defense simulations. Breakfast is done. Want some juice? Milk?"

"Milk would be fine," Eileen said. She smiled wryly at Procell. "You get this detachment from your job, don't you?"

Procell looked at her in surprise. He was carrying the hot plates with two oven mittens. They were shaped like cartoon sharks.

"Detachment?"

"Yes. We're talking about murder, you know."

Procell put the plates down and went back for the milk. He flushed a little.

"Well, we're all used to talking about death. In the large sense. Casualties, millions of them. We put together this one briefing for a senator from a state I won't name. The b.a.s.t.a.r.d wanted to cut out our black funding. We showed him a War Game where a submarine from-" Procell paused. "Well, from a place. This sub launched a missile and took out one city. Los Angeles. We calculated the casualties. Deaths from the blast wave at ground zero. The overpressure drops exponentially as you move outward from ground zero. So some people survive, the ones quite a way from the blast and behind big buildings. You have hundreds of thousands who won't survive, blinded and burned. We showed him the graphs. Came up with a dollar figure. Every burn unit in the country would be filled by the ones who just might make it. d.a.m.n, we even calculated burial costs for the dead. Added up to our funding for five years. If we stopped one bomb, that would equal our funding for five fiscal years. Talk about cheap insurance. b.a.s.t.a.r.d still voted to cut funding."

"You're used to death, in other words."

"Yeah, I am. Not so much my own, though. I'm not very brave. I've been sitting here all morning waiting for some Bond a.s.sa.s.sin to come through my door and tell me we're taking a ride." He gestured to the table. "Let's eat."

The meal was as good as it looked. Eileen dug in, relishing the taste of homemade food. She was an indifferent cook and didn't spend much time at home as it was. Procell was neat and quick.

"This is very good," Eileen said after half her tortilla was gone. She felt more tired but better able to handle it. A quick nap in the early afternoon and she could go all night. She would have to.

"Thanks. I'm glad you came over. Not just because I feel safe. But because I want to help."

Eileen straightened in her chair at that. "Art wanted to help, too," she said grimly. "I think he figured out something. And I think that may be what got him killed." She told Procell about seeing the lines "Found" before the screen went dark. She did not tell Procell any other details.

"Found," Procell said slowly. "Art must have thought about something. I don't know what he did. It was the computer, you said, not the videotapes?"

"The computer terminal. That's what said 'Found.' "

"Well, maybe he did," Procell said. "If so, then perhaps my Organization Y is sitting tight, maybe even going underground."

Eileen kept from sighing by taking a mouthful of tortilla. Procell was on a single track about his pet theory.

"That means we have Murderer X who has killed twice. Why? I can come up with all sorts of reasons why Organization Y would kill scientists. Money from powerful governments, political goals, even environmental extremists who want to keep mankind out of s.p.a.ce. But why one murder? Why Terry?"

"Terry was a girl that made people hate her," Eileen said. She glanced at Procell, who was finishing his milk. Procell looked mild and innocent. "Why did you want to murder her?"

The shot went home so easily, Eileen felt ashamed. Procell paled instantly.

"Me? I didn't. You know I didn't!"

"I didn't say you murdered Terry. I just want to know why you wrote her code for her."

Eileen trusted her instincts. They weren't wrong this time. Procell looked as though he'd been punched in the stomach.

"Why-how did you know?" he said finally, after swallowing a few times. There was a green tint to his face. Eileen hoped Procell wasn't going to lose the excellent breakfast he'd just eaten.

"I found out. Terry couldn't have written good code. Not the stuff she magically started turning out. Why did you do it?"

Procell slumped in his chair. He put a hand over his eyes. Eileen leaned forward intently. What did Terry do to this man? She could still see the image of the young, defeated 'Berto in her mind. She could still hear the baffled hurt in his voice.

"She was blackmailing me," Procell said quietly behind the hand. "We went to the same college together. She knew she couldn't keep up on the project, but she wanted to stay on. I don't know why. Maybe because Game Days are so fun. Maybe she liked to walk around with all the military officers looking at her. I don't know why."

"What did she have on you?"

"I had a love affair with the wrong person," Procell said. He didn't meet Eileen's eyes. "She knew about it."

"A love affair? How could she blackmail you with that?"

"Security clearances are touchy things," Procell said wearily. "You have financial problems, you're out. You have relatives in some foreign country the government doesn't like this year, you're out. Anything in your past that could be a blackmail risk, and you're out."

Cherry wandered over to her master and nudged at his hip with her nose, hoping for a treat. Procell caressed her head absently.

"So what was her blackmail?"

"An affair with the wrong person."

"Stop stonewalling," Eileen said. Procell looked at Eileen's face and paled even more.

"You going to write this down? Could you not write this down?" There was naked appeal in Procell's voice. "This is my life you can ruin. Terry was the last one who knew. I thought I was okay once she was dead-"

He stopped. Eileen looked at him.

"I didn't, though! I would never. I'm-"

"So what was the blackmail?"

"I did her code for her," Procell said, looking at the carpet, "so she wouldn't let slip that I had an affair with a professor at college."

"A prof-"

"A male professor," Procell said, and looked at Eileen.

There was a silence.

"Oh," Eileen said. There didn't seem to be much else to say.

"I'm not even bis.e.xual now," Procell said. "I think I got fooled into it for a while. I'm not one of those closet gays who marry and raise a family. I wasn't sure of my ident.i.ty and so I experimented, and then I met Janet right after I graduated. That was it for me. I love her more than my life, Miss Reed. She's everything." Procell looked down at his hands as his voice broke. "She's everything. And we have Martha. If I were an attorney too, then it wouldn't be a big deal, maybe. But I'm in Defense. I'd lose my job in a snap. I will lose my job. They don't give gays security clearances, even if they aren't gay."

"That's a d.a.m.n good motive for murder," Eileen said. She felt fresh outrage at the military, at the whole clearance system. Eileen supposed you could murder to keep your clearance, if it was that hard to keep. Although she wasn't quite sure. Murdering someone over a piece of paper? But Procell was the proof, sitting in a devastated silence at his own dining-room table. Nelson Atkins, with his pale freckled face. Major Blaine, with his endless report writing. The security clearance was the means of earning a living. Without the paper, the good life would be lost. Would someone do murder to keep from losing their livelihood, their job, their self-respect? Eileen didn't have to think about that one for long. And Terry knew the weaknesses of the people she worked with. What was Joe Tanner's Achilles' heel? How about Sharon Johnson? Nelson Atkins?

"If I was going to murder her I would have done it a year and a half ago," Procell said bitterly. "I haven't spent an entire weekend at home for almost two years because I've been doing two jobs. Terry never leaves late, she takes weekends and holidays, and she would smirk at me and flip her narrow little hand at me as she got into her coat and left, while my two-year-old daughter is being fed at home and I'm working on Terry's code. Writing her name instead of my own into the computer code! I wish you knew how that felt. Like painting a picture and having someone else sign their name to it. I would have done it long ago, if I was going to do it."

"She wasn't a good person, was she?" Eileen said gently.

"She was a monster. She's owned my life for the past two years, and now she's going to ruin me forever after she's dead."

"No, she won't," Eileen said impatiently. "What do you think I am?"

Procell looked up, and Eileen had to look away from the expression in his eyes.

"There's no reason to take any of this down unless you turn up as the murderer," Eileen said. "Sure you've got a motive, and you're still a suspect, but I don't compare notes with Major Blaine."

Procell put his head in his hands for a moment, his long fingers squeezing his skull through the thick handsome hair. Then he took a deep breath and sat up straight.

"Thank you," he said quietly. "I don't know how else to say it. Thank you."