The Pied Piper (49 page)

“What?” Liz asked irritably.

The two men answered nearly simultaneously, “A Spitting Image customer.”

“And that's when you thought to follow the cards,” Boldt said.

“The guy is lifting his vics off the Internet. Why make things harder on himself? He does up a valid credit card, maybe a driver's license all from the same hack. He gets into those files once, he never needs to go back again. Clean and simple.”

“Is someone going to explain this to me?” Liz asked indignantly. “How does his using some silk-screen customer's credit card connect to rental cars?”

Bowler answered shamefully, “I never followed it up, never chased it. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't.”

Boldt told her, “The Pied Piper needs valid credit cards and a valid ID to rent cars, take plane flights, whatever. If he's using Spitting Image customers—and I agree it makes sense that he might—then we may be able to track him.” Boldt told Bowler, “The problem with it that I see is that we know he accessed the victims' credit card records—it's how he knew their movements, how he predicted when to strike.”

This was clearly news to Bowler, who attempted to digest it. Boldt continued, “If he had that kind of access to credit records, he doesn't need the Spitting Image list.”

Bowler contradicted, “Sure he does. He needs expiration dates. Those aren't available from a TRW or some credit service. He's got some ex-con who can pull that kind of information for him,” Bowler speculated. “It doesn't mean he's got valid cards.”

Liz, the banker, said, “He's right, love. He would need the expiration dates for a successful counterfeit.”

“What you've got here is someone who knows computers. With a color scanner you can forge hundred dollar bills. How difficult can a driver's license be?”

Boldt thought back to the CD-R of Sarah—video embedded on a CD-ROM. He said, “They teach computer skills in prison.”

Bowler looked up and said, “Our tax dollars hard at work.”

Boldt returned to the office as fast as the Chevy would safely take him, a dozen ideas competing inside his head for his attention. Kalidja. Hale. Sarah's situation. Time running out. He couldn't hold all the loose ends together.

LaMoia pushed shut both doors to the fifth-floor corner coffee lounge, windows overlooking the secretary pool to one side and the bullpen to the other. The situation room, which offered far more privacy, had become task force headquarters and churned with activity. Daphne warmed her hands on a tea cup. There were no smiles, only anxiety-ridden expressions.

“I'm toast,” LaMoia said. “I'm out of here.” He had called the others to the impromptu meeting.

“Boise?” Boldt asked.

“Sheila—Hill,” he corrected himself, a little late, “wants me on the six o'clock flight, wants me running down every stinking piece of evidence there is—some of which I've already done, incidentally, though I didn't tell her.”

“Econo-Drive,” Boldt supplied. He had asked LaMoia to look into the car rental records.

“Yeah. I had no trouble getting that: The abandoned car in the pileup,” LaMoia said, “was rented to one Lena Robertson.”

“A woman,” Daphne said. “Then it
is
a team.” Boldt could feel her processing the information. She had been among the first to insist that the kidnapped children were intended for illegal adoption, and that if true, the Pied Piper more than likely needed an accomplice to help care for and transport the infants. Boldt's revelation of two uniformed cops, a man and a woman, abducting Sarah from day care had supported her theory and led her to investigate previously arrested or convicted con artist couples on a national level. Con games were often played out in pairs.

“Hold that thought right there,” Boldt said, hurrying from the coffee lounge. Once through Homicide's secure door he started for the elevator but changed his mind and ran the stairs. The climb up was arduous and reinforced his utter exhaustion, reminding him of how little sleep he had gotten over the past ten days and how poorly he had eaten. He reached for some of those dangling strings, knowing that the SPD task force—and their FBI counterpart—was, at the very least, close to identifying and arresting the kidnapper's accomplice. If he could only count on a few pieces of good luck, he might yet beat Hale or Flemming to his daughter's abductor. But luck rarely ran when one needed it. It ran when least expected.

Boldt ran the hallway to his office, unlocked his file cabinet and secured the Spitting Image customer list. He was halfway back downstairs when he located the name on the run: Robertson, a baby quilt shipped in care of Durrel Robertson of Oakland, California.

“You look like you're about to come out of your skin,” Daphne observed of Boldt on his return.

“Robertson was a Spitting Image customer. A baby blanket was shipped to that name in care of Durrel Robertson at what looks like a home address. It was charged to a VISA in the name of Lena Robertson.” Daphne and LaMoia looked back at him blankly. He explained Bowler's visit and the possible connection—never proved and never brought to anyone's attention because of Penny's kidnapping—between the Pied Piper's possible identities and the Spitting Image customer list.

“You're telling me Bowler suddenly got a conscience?” LaMoia said skeptically, finding it impossible to conceal his dislike of a cop who would intentionally throw an investigation. “Or did he drive up here to sell you a bill of goods and stay with his original game plan?”

“You are the all-time cynic,” Daphne said.

“Bowler put together Spitting Image just as we did. But he made a leap in logic that we did not: With a bunch of valid credit card numbers at your fingertips, why not put them to good use? It works for me,” Boldt impressed upon LaMoia, referring to the customer list. “Robertson's card was used to rent a car here in Seattle that's later abandoned on the way to God knows where. Do we need it any clearer?”

“It's your call,” LaMoia said irritably.

“You're just pissed that Hill can call the shots,” Daphne, the psychologist, explained to him. LaMoia was no fan of her psychological evaluations. “You don't like a woman bossing you around. I know you, John. I know where this is coming from.”

“You don't know shit about it.”

“Hey!” Boldt chided. He told LaMoia, “The Bureau blocked the financial records of the victims, we assume so they could have it all to themselves. But we can pull credit card statements for the Spitting Image customers and look for charges that coincide with the Pied Piper's calendar. You see what they've done?” he asked, tapping the Spitting Image records. “The Pied Piper uses fresh, valid credit cards—Robertson ordered that blanket just last week. If he has the access we think he does, then he knows her statement dates; he knows she won't actually see any of his charges for a month or more. He's protected from discovery. What we want to do is get to those statements electronically ahead of time—we can do that—then we focus on car rentals in and around the abduction dates; gas charges, airfare, lodging, restaurants.”

“They won't use the cards for small-ticket items,” LaMoia countered. “The car rentals, sure—you have to show a card.”

Daphne said, “And that card has to match your driver's license.”

“Fake ID?” LaMoia asked. “So they could use a card and license to board a plane as well. I'd buy that.” He added for Boldt's sake, “But I'm off to Boise to measure skid marks and work a traffic accident. That's what this is, you know?” he complained. “Hill is knocking me down to metro.”

“I need both of you with me in New Orleans, if any of this pans out,” Boldt announced. “Hill will have to settle for Mulwright.”

LaMoia snapped, “Forget it. She's talking a minimum of two or three days over there.”

“She's going too, isn't she?” Daphne speculated.

“It's where the press will be,” LaMoia said, though he blushed and squirmed in his chair. “What do you think?”

“The press, are you sure?” Boldt questioned, the ramifications for Sarah echoing in his thoughts.

“I'm sure. They're all over it.”

“Already?”

“Already.”

“That couldn't have been what Flemming wanted,” Boldt pointed out.

“Ten to one, the Captain did it, Sarge—Hill. She wanted Flemming slowed down; she wanted to punish him for trying the end run. What better way than to dump the press in his lap?”

“Games,” Matthews said, disgusted.

“You gotta get me off the Boise assignment, Sarge. You've got tattoos to run, con artists, adoption records. A foreign town.”

“How badly do you want off?”

“Whatever it takes,” LaMoia answered.

“I'll go,” Daphne confirmed. “I won't be missed.”

Boldt asked LaMoia, “Straight answer. Is there any reason Hill would be mad at you?”

“Moi?”

“I need it straight, John, because from here, from what we know about what you face in Boise —”

LaMoia interrupted, “You mean failure? Trying to track down this driver and child
after
the Bureau has a substantial lead on us.”

“It looks more like a setup. This may be the investigation's biggest lead, and if it goes nowhere—”

“Hill needs a scapegoat,” Daphne said, following Boldt's reasoning.

“Or else there's a personal agenda at play,” Boldt said, challenging LaMoia directly, “and she's either intentionally sending you off to Siberia, or getting you out of the way so you can't screw things up for her at home.” He added, “How 'bout it?”

LaMoia didn't answer. He looked searchingly back and forth between Boldt and Matthews.

Boldt said, “Sarah's out of time. If the press picks up on the abandoned car …” His throat caught. To Daphne, he said, “Better go pack. We have seats on the red-eye.”

LaMoia boiled at the thought of pursuing dead leads in Boise, Idaho, while Boldt attempted to track the tattoo and criminal records to the actual suspect in a place like the Big Easy. The central question that needed answering—was Sarah better off with him in Boise—seemed obvious enough: Bobbie Gaynes or Patrick Mulwright could easily handle Boise. How Sheila Hill could have made such a call without discussion was beyond him. Once again she was using him, this time in a political move that left too many unanswered questions. Was she afraid of someone within the department? Was LaMoia a threat? Or did she simply want three days with him in a hotel out of town to mend their fences? He feared this latter thought the most: playing gigolo in Boise for an oversexed, overly ambitious woman who had the power to trash his own career. Exactly what had he gotten himself into? Perhaps his handcuffing incident had awakened her, had made her realize how strong his feelings were for her.

He had no choice but to obey orders. A police department was not a democracy. The Boise investigation could have been handled over the phone, and Sheila Hill knew it. But the cameras—along with the fresh sheets and room service—were in Boise.