"I don't know. Does it matter?"
"No."
Rebecca eased back and studied him. "For an undocumented alien you look pretty damn good. You really do." Her arms looped him. The nearness of her body, bathed in air fragrant with ripe sea vegetation and pine, added to his already stoked arousal. He slipped his hand into the small of her back. The pressure inside him growing. He kissed her hungrily, tongue slipping into her mouth. "Daniel . . . not now. I have to get back."
But Pell hardly heard the words. He led her farther into the forest, put his hands on her shoulders and started to push her down. She held up a finger. Then set her sketchpad on the wet ground, cardboard base down. She knelt on it. "They'd wonder how I got wet knees." And began to unzip his jeans.
That was Rebecca, he reflected. Always thinking.
*
Michael O'Neil finally called.
She was glad to hear his voice, though the tone was purely professional, and she knew he didn't want to talk about their fight earlier. He was, she sensed, still angry. Which was odd for him. It bothered her, but there was no time to consider their grievances, given his news.
"Got a call from CHP," O'Neil said. "Some hikers halfway to Big Sur found a purse and some personal effects on the beach. Jennie Marston's. No body yet, but there was blood all over the sand. And blood and some hairs and scalp tissue on a rock that crime scene found. Pell's prints're on the rock. The Coast Guard has two boats out looking. There wasn't anything helpful in the purse. ID and credit cards. If that's where she kept what's left of the ninety-two hundred dollars, Pell's got it now."
He killed her. . . .
Dance closed her eyes. Pell had seen her picture on TV and knew she'd been identified. She'd become a liability to him.
A second suspect logarithmically increases the chances for detection and arrest. . . .
"I'm sorry," O'Neil said. He'd understand what she was thinking--that Dance never would have guessed releasing the woman's picture would result in her death.
I believed it would be just another way to help find this terrible man.
The detective said, "It was the right call. We had to do it."
We, she noted. Not you.
"How long ago?"
"Crime scene's estimating an hour. We're checking along One and the cross roads, but no witnesses."
"Thanks, Michael."
She said nothing more, waiting for him to say something else, something about their earlier discussion, something about Kellogg. Didn't matter what, just some words that would give her a chance to broach the subject. But he said merely, "I'm making plans for a memorial service for Juan. I'll let you know the details."
"Thanks."
" 'Bye."
Click.
She called Kellogg and Ove
rby with the news. Her boss was debating whether it was good or bad. Someone else had been killed on his watch, but at least it was one of the perps. On the whole, he suggested, the press and public would receive the development as a score for the good guys.
"Don't you think, Kathryn?"
Dance had no chance to formulate an answer, though, because just then the CBI's front desk called on the intercom to tell her the news that Theresa Croyton, the Sleeping Doll, had arrived.
*
The girl didn't resemble what Kathryn Dance expected.
In baggy sweats, Theresa Croyton Bolling was tall and slim and wore her light brown hair long, to the middle of her back. The strands had a reddish sheen. Four metallic dots were in her left ear, five in the other, and the majority of her fingers were encircled by silver rings. Her face, free of makeup, was narrow and pretty and pale.