Come and Find Me A Novel of Suspense - By Hallie Ephron Page 0,78

put a mattress or a couch in here,” she said.

“Mmmm.” He crossed his legs like a little kid sitting at a campfire. “Jake?”

“He’s in Maryland. For the meeting with Vault?”

“Oh, yeah.” He started to tip sideways. Stopped and looked at her. “What time is it?”

“We have plenty of time. The meeting’s not for another couple of hours.”

“But I need to . . .” Again he tried to push himself up. He was like the blow-up clown toy she’d once had that kept bobbing upright no matter how many times you smacked it down.

“I’ve got it under control. We’ll be ready,” Diana said.

“But . . .” He mumbled something unintelligible.

She knelt beside him and wrapped her arm around him. He smiled and gave her leg a weak squeeze. Rank, coffee-scented breath rose to meet her.

“You don’t need to worry,” she said. “I’m finishing up the presentation. Adding some material I researched. Enumerating the benefits and assessing the downside of doing nothing.” She went on, making it up as she went, allowing her voice to rise and fall in a gentle rhythm like this was a bedtime story. “Don’t worry about Jake. He’s probably in the air. I checked. There’s no weather to speak of in Baltimore. Looks like his plane is scheduled to land on time.”

She went on and on, inventing status updates. Little by little she felt Daniel go limp. She eased him the rest of the way down onto the floor. He turned over and curled up. She took off her jacket, folded it, and slid it under his head.

Then she waited. Daniel’s eyes were closed. His breathing evened out. When his computer beeped, she slowly got to her feet and went over to it. Another message-waiting alert had popped up on Daniel’s screen. This time it was a voice mail.

She hooked the Bluetooth over her ear, turned it back on, and clicked open the message. “New message, marked ‘urgent,’ ” said an electronic voice. A pause. Then: “Dr. Kennedy? This is Ashley Highsmith. You treated me at Neponset Hospital and left me your business card?” Ashley’s voice sounded decidedly odd. Lighter and breathier. “I’m running a hundred-and-three-degree fever and”—she coughed and wheezed—“my chest aches.” In the background, Diana heard a mockingbird singing. That had to be Pam’s birdie clock. “My fingers and toes are swollen. Please. Call me.” The phone number she left was Pam’s.

When the message finished playing, a window popped up asking Diana if she wanted to return the call. She glanced quickly at Daniel. He was snoring. But before she could click yes, an e-mail message from Jake appeared. He’d sent it just seconds earlier, at 2:31 P.M. An hour and a half to go, just in time for him to get to Bethesda for the meeting. His message to Daniel began:

Plane delayed. Finally at BWI. Did u c? ^5!

On the next line was a link. Diana clicked and a news article came up.

DNA evidence proves the impossible

Federal law enforcement officials confirmed today that DNA collected from blood evidence at the scene of a recent bank robbery matches the DNA of a woman who died five years ago after undergoing a bone marrow transplant. When asked how this was possible, officials had no comment.

This was worthy of a high five? Diana read the rest of the article, then read it again, trying to wrap her head around the implications. Blood evidence at a crime scene matched a woman who’d died after undergoing a bone marrow transplant. How was that possible?

Diana rocked back in her chair. The implications were staggering. Every defense attorney in the country would be saving that news clip to read to their next jury, proof positive that DNA analysis was unreliable. Talk about instant reasonable doubt, and it could infect every case that involved DNA evidence. Daniel would have called it sabotage in defense of privacy.

Surely it was no coincidence that the file stolen from MedLogic was a DNA profile, or that one of the files she’d opened on Volganet was a DNA profile too. Many of Gamelan’s clients would have had DNA profiles of patients stored in their databases. How many of them had Jake and Daniel amassed?

Diana retraced her steps, looking for the DNA profile she’d found earlier. It didn’t take long. In the same directory, there were hundreds and hundreds more.

Now she understood why Jake and Daniel had been desperate to ensure that Gamelan’s relationship with their newest client got off to a smooth start. Working with Vault would