I mean. There’s only so much you can do by telephone.” Then she stood up and grabbed London’s hand. “Come on, darling, we’re heading to DIA.”
“You know I don’t have money for that.”
“Don’t worry about it, it’s going on my plastic.”
Two hours later they were cruising at 35,000 feet, pointed east, maybe wasting their time, maybe not.
30
Day Five—June 15
Friday Morning
TEFFINGER CRAWLED OUT OF BED without waking Venta, slipped into sweats, cranked out a three-mile jog, took a shower downstairs and watched her sleep as he brushed his teeth. He got to headquarters just as the sun cleared the horizon. He inhaled caffeine alone in the room and worked the computer to find out what he could about Mark Remington, the owner of the house that the Frenchman was scoping out last night before Leanne Sanders got blindsided.
Remington turned out to be a partner at Vesper & Bennett, specializing in international law.
He had no record, not even an unpaid parking ticket, or a paid one for that matter.
The clean didn’t get any squeakier than his.
Why would someone from France come over here and pay attention to him? Did he cross swords with the wrong opposing party? Did he get on the wrong side of some foreign leader?
Teffinger scratched his head.
The florescent light directly over his desk hummed like a madman. He ignored it as best he could, but the more he concentrated on not letting it bother him, the more it did.
He climbed up on his desk and pulled it out, then carried it into Chief Forrest Tanker’s office and set it on his desk. He stuck a yellow Post-It on that said, “This is how long my nose grows whenever I say something nice about you.”
TWO MINUTES LATER HIS PHONE RANG and the voice of Leanne Sanders came through, framed by hospital sounds in the background. He could almost smell the antiseptic.
“When I dialed I was going to say thanks for saving me last night,” she said. “But now I changed my mind.”
He smiled.
“Oh?”
“So don’t take this as a thank you,” she said. “What I am going to do, however, is subtract one that you owe me.”
Teffinger considered it and found it fair.
“So how many do I still owe you then?—just for the record.”
“You owed me five. Now you’re down to four.”
“Four, huh? That’s the lowest I owe anyone.”
“That’s not a bragging point, Teffinger.”
He took a sip of coffee, found it lukewarm, dumped the cup in the snake plant and headed over to the pot for a refill.
“You scared me last night,” he said.
“Scared you? You should have seen it from my point of view,” she said.
“Did you see him, before he did it?” Teffinger asked, referring to the Frenchman.
“No.”
He frowned.
That meant they didn’t have enough probable cause to haul him in.
He told her what he found out this morning about Mark Remington, the owner of the house that Frenchie had been so interested in.
“We should drop in on him,” Leanne said. “You want to come down here and pick me up?”
“You good to go?”
“According to the docs, no. According to the stuff I need to get done today, yes.”
Teffinger looked at his watch.
8:15 a.m.
He knew he should be concentrating on Tessa Blake but couldn’t think of anything concrete to do on that case, so he walked down the three flights of stairs to the parking garage and pointed the front end of the Tundra towards Denver General Hospital.
THE RECEPTION AREA OF VESPER & BENNETT looked like a museum. Leanne sat on a leather couch and sipped coffee from a fancy cup and saucer. She looked pretty good considering what she’d been through. Take the gauze wrap off her head and there’d be no evidence at all, except for the tiredness in her eyes.
Teffinger sipped coffee from an equally fancy cup as he walked around and checked out the paintings.
The receptionist smiled every time he looked her way.
He smiled back.
The paintings bored him.
They lacked passion.
They had
J. K. Accinni
Mari Carr
Chris Kennedy
Ann Christy
Robert T. Jeschonek
Rachel Abbott
Michele Jaffe
T.W. Piperbrook
Sandra Sookoo
J.R. WRIGHT