she rocked gently against the stacks. I had thought I might smell her perfume drifting over my shoulder and turn to see her there. I imagined us talking casually, exchanging smiles. It never happened. And then she just appeared in my office to invite me out.
I spent the next two hours trying to focus on the background reports from the library, but I couldn’t. Most of it was useless anyway. There were pages of telephone and address listings for Dan, Daniel, and Danny Kelly or Kelley, scattered all over southern California. The same for various spellings of Raymond Gee. It would take days just to contact them all to see if they were the right person. I thought about Reilly’s comments. If Ray Gee was a reporter, I didn’t need to waste my time. I decided to set him aside. At least that would cut my workload in half.
I pushed my chair back and put my feet up on the desk just in time for the phone to ring. It was Liz.
“Hey there worker bee. You want to come over for dinner?”
A mild panic ran through me. I thought of Morgan. Liz and I could have dinner anytime. “I’d like to, but I’ve got to get this research done. I’ve got a meeting with the partner tomorrow morning. My head feels like someone put it in a vise.”
“That’s why they call that place the death star.”
“Cute. So what are you doing?”
I was trying to play it cool, but I was starting to sweat. I was convinced she was going to figure out that I wasn’t really busy, that I was just preferring the company of my co-workers over her. But Liz began describing her day, as if nothing was wrong. I asked myself what I was doing over and over. Then I realized the line was silent, that it was my turn to talk. I muttered a feeble, “Sure.” But it was not the right response.
There was silence again. Then Liz spoke, cold and flat. “Okay, someone’s not listening to anything I’m saying.” She was pissed.
“No. Sorry. I was just thinking. I think this case has melted my brain.”
“Sounds like it.”
I was back in the clear. Always blame work; you’ll always be believed. So I poured it on a little more. “Shit, I’m sorry, I was just looking at my notes here and I got side tracked. Like I said, I’m kind of stressed, I gotta get ready for this meeting tomorrow morning.”
“Well, I won’t keep you from your first all-nighter. Enjoy that.” Still mad, but what could she really say? “You’re getting sucked in already. Pretty soon you’ll be billing 3,000 hours a year and talking about how you love your clients and your practice.” She was getting a kick out of harassing me.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Spare me.” I was trying to transform her anger into teasing. “The day I start talking like that is the day you can have me euthanized. Deal?”
“Deal.”
I was relieved to get off the phone. Why did I feel so bad? Why not go out with a group of people from work and have a couple of drinks? There was Liz, sure. But we’d only been dating for a year. We weren’t that serious, were we? We weren’t talking about marriage, or futures, or any of the other topics that seemed to escalate a relationship into serious territory. And besides, it was only drinks with co-workers. I sat there, listening to the hum from the computer and feeling guilty. I hadn’t lied to Liz. I really did need to work. But the truth was, I didn’t want to.
An hour later, the phone rang again. I knew it was going to be Liz and I didn’t want to answer it. But after my lie about being chained to my desk, I figured I had to talk to her. I couldn’t not be in my office, so I picked it up on the third ring and said hello.
A voice like broken glass said, “Don’t fuck around, motherfucker. We’re watching you.”
“What?” I couldn’t think of anything else to say.
“This is a friend of Matt’s. Step out of line asshole, and see what happens.”
The line went dead. I sat with the receiver in my hand and stared at it like I didn’t know what it was. My mind immediately raced to images of burly bikers with tattoos and scars waiting to beat me with chains in a dark parking lot somewhere. And then I started to think rationally.