Page 88 of Identity Unknown
“When did you start smoking?” I’ve never known her to do it before now.
“I used to and quit. Then I started and quit again.” Sliding out a cigarette, she tucks it between her lips. “I’m not really smoking again, just sneaking one now and then.”
Just like her mentor, Marino, I think. He chews gum to beat the band when I’m around because he knows I won’t cheat. I refuse to break down and have a smoke when it would take nothing to be addicted again. But Fruge sneaks a cigarette with him when the urge strikes. That’s the upshot of what I’m hearing.
“I know you’re not supposed to celebrate the misfortunes of others.” The Alexandria investigator turns her face away from the wind, blowing out smoke that goes everywhere. “But not much could feel better than locking up Ryder and Piper Briley’s sorry asses. Let the games begin.”
“We have interest in them for other reasons,” Tron tells her.
“Well, you know where to find them. You can talk to the Brileys all you want, be my guest. They’re what’s known as a captive audience.”
Fruge explains that when I ruled the death a homicide, she charged the parents with child abuse and first-degree murder.
“I was ready when you gave the word, and they didn’t see it coming,” she says to me, the rain gusting, water dripping from the overhang’s eaves. “Me personally putting them in cuffs was a special pleasure, I must admit. I hope Luna’s smiling wherever she is.” Fruge flicks an ash.
“When will bail be set?” Tron asks.
“In the morning. But I’m making a big point of the obvious flight risk they pose considering the homes they own abroad and their private jets and all the rest. If I play my cards right, they’ll be held without bail.”
“Yours aren’t the only charges they’ll be facing,” Tron promises. “Wait until we start piling on federal indictments.”
“They could be locked up for a long time before trial,” I reply.
“That’s the idea.” Fruge takes another deep drag. “I want to make sure they never see the light of day again.”
The rain is falling harder, lightning veining the distant darkness. Fruge heads inside Briley Flight Services to see what other dirt she can find on the owners, as she puts it. Tron and I hurry through the downpour to the Secret Service black Tahoe SUV left here for her. I watch thunderclouds churning and lighting up dangerously, the storm front rolling in.
Driving away from the airport, we follow the George Washington Memorial Parkway along the Potomac River, and it’s too foggy to see across it. I’m relieved when Lucy texts me that she’s safe and sound at the training facility in Maryland. She’ll be in her car headed home shortly.
“If Carrie Grethen’s been in and out of Briley Flight Services, wouldn’t it be on camera?” I ask Tron.
“Depending on whether she has the ability to turn the cameras on and off.”
“I suspect that would be child’s play to her,” I answer.
“And I’ll keep saying the same thing,” Tron replies with surprising anger. “She doesn’t care. In fact, if we find video of her walking in and out of Briley Flight Services, she’s going to get a kick out of it. Wherever she is, she’ll be laughing at us.”
“Because she doesn’t believe we can stop her.” I squint in the bleary glare of oncoming traffic, the rain splashing against glass.
“I’m thinking she’s flown the coop and doesn’t give a damn what we find.”
“I don’t know what your plans are.” I look over at her. “But you’re welcome to join us for dinner. Lucy, Marino, Dorothy and Shannon, something relaxed and simple.”
“That’s really nice. But I think Lucy and I could use a break from each other.” Tron is joking and she’s not.
“You two getting along all right?”
“She can be pretty intense in certain situations.”
The certain situation Tron alludes to is Carrie. She’s not done. Maybe she never will be.
“I think you can understand why Lucy would be vigilant when that subject is raised,” I reply with a reasonability I sure as hell don’t feel.
“It’s more than that, Doctor Scarpetta.” Tron has yet to call me by my first name, and we’ve known each other more than four years. “What’s between them is pathological.”
I sit quietly in the passenger’s seat, familiar with the terrain of Lucy’s inner darkness. I know what lurks there, and I’m not about to discuss it with Tron. Or hardly anyone.
“Lucy gets fixated,” she’s saying. “No matter what she’s doing I can tell that a part of her mind is on Carrie Grethen. It’s been like that since last fall. Like something dormant that’s wide-awake again, and it’s not that I don’t understand. But it’s always there holding her like a tractor beam.”