Playing Dead Part 29

She was protecting her friends and neighbors from being killed like those poor people in New York. Lora was important.

When the two nice men left her tackle shop, she called the special number she was given for emergencies. Only to be used if someone was asking questions about Tip's Blarney.

"Harper."

She frowned. "Agent Smith or Agent Jones, please."

There was silence, then several minutes later there was a click. "This is Agent Jones."

"Two men came to my shop today. They were asking questions about Tip and another man."

"Who?"

"That man you told me about. Mr. Maddox. The terrorist who was going to poison the river and kill all the fish."

"Do you remember their names?"

"Of course. I got their business cards, too. They said they were from the FBI. Agent Mitch Bianchi and Agent Steven Donovan."

Agent Smith had told her that a lot of people lie. She knew that. Her mama lied about a lot of things to her daddy. Mama didn't think Lora knew, because she thought Lora was stupid, but Lora was smarter than that. She knew that her mama wasn't at Book Club on Thursday nights.

"What did they say?"

"They asked if I remembered Mr. Maddox. I told them yes. He was in the bar. I told them the entire truth, except about the poison."

"You did very good."

"I did?"

"Yes. Lora, this is very important. If a woman comes to the bar who you don't know, and starts asking about Mr. Maddox or a man named Frank Lowe, I want you to do the same thing to her that you did to Mr. Maddox. Can you do that for me?"

"Is she a terrorist too?"

"Yes. Her name is Claire O'Brien and she is very dangerous."

"I promise. I can do that."

"Thank you, Lora. There's no one else we can trust with this very important a.s.signment."

She hung up and smiled, went upstairs, and closed her bedroom door. She locked it, even though she knew her daddy wouldn't be home for a long time. She went to her closet, into the far back, behind all her s...o...b..xes. She pulled out the secret box where she kept things she didn't want her daddy to find. She used to keep candy and the weekly magazines her daddy hated in the locked box. Now, the only thing inside was a large vial of poison.

Terrorists needed to die. And Lora knew how to do it.

TWENTY-EIGHT.

Greg Abrahamson was much harder to get an audience with than Claire thought. He was now a detective, and she left several messages trying to track him down.

She didn't want to talk to him on the phone. She needed ten minutes in person. People were more forthright in person.

Claire took the opportunity while waiting for Abrahamson to return her call to stop by Rogan-Caruso and do more research, this time on Don Collier. He'd canceled his cla.s.ses and seemed to have disappeared, according to Agent Donovan.

She typed in search parameters and pulled up far more detailed records of Collier than she could from home.

He'd earned tenure last year at Davis. Now eleven years as a professor, took pro bono cases, yada yada. Big do-gooder on the surface. His affiliation with the Western Innocence Project was noteworthy. He'd been written up in the paper many times. Philanthropist this, n.o.ble that. Blah, blah. But the more she read about his good work, the more she wondered if she was wrong about him. She dug deeper, using her PI license to do an employment background check.

Confirmed his tenure with UC Davis.

Six years with Madison, Bergstrom, Truedell & Smith. Three years with Johnson & Mather. One-year internship with Young, Blaine, Forsyth & a.s.sociates. Graduate USC law school, 1990. Graduate UNLV, 1987. Born 1964 in Phoenix, Arizona.

Her eye went back to Johnson & Mather. She recognized all three law firms, but that one . . .

Her hand started shaking as she typed in another search.

George Prescott with Johnson & Mather was her father's defense counsel. During the same time that Don Collier was on staff.

Don Collier had been responsible for reviewing her father's case file for the Project, and rejected looking into it. Don Collier had been Oliver Maddox's advisor. Had Maddox known that Collier had been with the same law firm that represented her father at trial? Claire had to a.s.sume he did . . . he was a law student. He would definitely have known who represented her father. And if he was doing research, he would have figured out that Collier was there at the same time. That there was a huge conflict of interest. Collier knew more about the case than he'd admitted.

She dialed Randy Sizemore at the Western Innocence Project. It took several minutes, and a threat to come by and sit in the office until closing, before he came on the phone. "Ms. O'Brien, I don't see how I can help you any more than I already have."

"One question. Please."

"One."

"Do you allow the attorneys reviewing case files to a.s.sess cases they've worked on, or where one of their colleagues worked on it?"

"Of course not. That would defeat the purpose of our checks and balances system."

"Do the attorneys know this?"

"Of course they do. They simply recuse themselves from reviewing the file. It's not a problem. I have dozens of attorneys who review files for me."

"Thank you."

"May I ask why?"

"You told me that Don Collier reviewed State of California v. O'Brien and deemed it a just conviction."

"Yes."

"Collier worked for the same law firm as my father's attorney. Johnson & Mather."

"That's not possible."

"It's not? Why?"

"Don would have told me." Randy Sizemore didn't sound so sure of himself.

"So you didn't know."

"Ms. O'Brien, I don't know what you've found, but there must be a logical explanation."

"Thank you for your time." She hung up. She didn't think that Sizemore had known about Collier, but since they were friends, she didn't want him to tip Collier off that she was onto him.

"Claire?"

She jumped, turned, and saw her friend Jayne standing in the doorway.

"You scared the h.e.l.l out of me."

"What are you doing?"

"Background check."

Jayne frowned. "J.T. called me this morning about you. Asked me to monitor your database usage. He's a little worried."

Claire straightened. J. T. Caruso was one of the princ.i.p.als of her firm. "Worried? Why?"

"He didn't say, but, well, I did a little research and I think he found out your dad is in Sacramento."

Claire's stomach dropped. "How could he know that? How did you know?"

"The FBI has a surveillance tape of your dad in Redding. And then there's the buzz around the D.A.'s office that he's surrendering today. J.T. knows people there. And in the FBI."

"I'm not doing anything illegal," Claire said.

"Just watch yourself, okay?"

Claire didn't want to be fired, she loved her job, but her father's innocence and safety were more important than her career.

"I'll be careful."

Jayne nodded. "If you need me for anything, you know how to reach me."

"I have a question. A computer question."

Jayne sat down on the corner of Claire's desk. "What?"

"How could a digital file disappear?"

"You need to be more specific."

"Don't ask me why."

"All right."

"There're two missing coroner's reports. They are archived digitally and kept in a data warehouse. They are in the log, but not on the tape."

"Is there other data on the tape?"

"I think so."

"Well, if there isn't, the tape was corrupted. Someone didn't check once they burned the tape or the disk that the data was readable or even there. It happens all the time because people are lazy. But if there's other data on the tape, then those files were never copied over."

"You can't just delete them?"

"Most data warehouses store data on unrewritable software, to prevent accidental deletion of data. There are a lot of protections in place. Climate controls, backups of all data, and-"

"Backups? Why would they need a backup?"

"Most good archive systems have a searchable system, then a condensed data file that has everything they have in the searchable system. So if there's some big catastrophe, they can re-create the data files."

"Is there a way to erase some files and not the others?"

"There's a way to do everything, Claire. But it wouldn't be easy. They'd need access and everything leaves a trail. It's easier to leave a false trail than no trail. Unless you're really good."

"Like you."

Jayne smiled.

"But if it was never there . . ."

"If it was never there, you can't do anything about it, but then there shouldn't be a record of the data in the log. Unless the log was manually created, which sort of defeats the purpose of eliminating human error. If there's a log of the files, and they're just gone, then they're still there."

"Stop. You've confused me."

"Anything deleted isn't really deleted. Unless the tape is completely wiped-and there're ways of doing that-then the data is still there. It's just hidden."

"Could you find it?"

"If it's there, I can find it."

"Would you do me a favor?"

"Depends."

"I have a friend in the coroner's office. He has access to the archives. He's the one who discovered the files were missing. If I clear it with him, can you help him find the hidden files?"

"Between you and me, right?"

Claire pretended to zip her lip and toss away the key.

Jayne nodded. "Okay."