Deadly Pursuit by Michael Prescott Page B

crime-scene ribbon strung across Dance’s doorway, Moore followed Lovejoy inside.
    The living room was three times the size of her entire apartment in Denver, lavish and plush, the giant windows framing a Cinemascope view. It must have been spectacular before the thick pile carpet had been torn free of the tacks, the paintings taken off the walls, the sofa cushions unzipped and emptied of stuffing, the drapes removed, the wall fixtures unscrewed.
    Now it was a scene of orderly wreckage and controlled destruction, unoccupied save for the Justice Department attorney in charge of evidence recovery. He lounged on what remained of Dance’s sofa, listening to Jay Leno over the high-pitched howls of power tools.
    In the bedroom two FBI men, Tobin and Mays, were cutting neat vertical slices in the plasterboard. They shut off their saws and raised their goggles when Lovejoy and Moore entered.
    “What’s up?” Tobin asked. Five o’clock shadow darkened his cheeks and gave him a slightly disreputable appearance that was not improved by an overlay of plaster dust and sweat.
    “I need to look at something,” Moore said, moving toward the nightstand.
    “Nothing in the drawers. Believe me, we checked. Took out all his papers and knickknacks, even X-rayed some of them with the portable fluoroscope.”
    “I’m not interested in the drawers.” She lifted the telephone handset off its cradle, studied it.
    Sheila had said Jack was on the phone. But apparently she hadn’t heard him talking. She had merely seen him with the phone in his hand.
    The handset was thin and lightweight. She saw no sign of tampering. But the cradle ...
    Heavy. Thick. She turned it over. The bottom plate was attached with two small screws.
    Squinting at the screws, she saw abrasions on the minuscule grooves of the heads.
    “This phone has been taken apart,” she said quietly. “More than once, I’d say.”
    “Well, what do you know,” Tobin breathed.
    Mays got a small Phillips screwdriver and carefully removed the screws, then lifted off the plate.
    Inside the cradle, in a narrow cavity between the plate and the guts of the phone, was a single plastic syringe.
    “Physical evidence.” Lovejoy showed Moore a broad smile, his first since the raid. “Thank God.”
    “We would have found it eventually,” Mays said with a note of defensiveness.
    Lovejoy ignored that. “You’d better get the syringe over to the LAPD lab and see if they can find enough fluid in it for serological analysis. Also, see about matching the needle to the puncture wounds in the victims’ necks. And find out if there’s any sort of brand name on this thing, some way of tracing its origin and distribution, determining how he got hold of it.”
    Tobin already knew the procedure. “Right. Right.”
    “And get Justice in here to preserve chain of evidence.” Lovejoy moved toward the bedroom doorway. “And check the other phones—Jack’s office phones, too—in case he tried the same gimmick twice. And—”
    Moore, smiling, gave him a gentle shove from behind.
    “And we need to get going, Peter. We’ve got a plane to catch.”

 
     
     
    11
     
    Jack Dance woke at dawn and rubbed his aching neck. Sleeping curled up in the runabout had left him sore and stiff.
    He had beached the dinghy in the cove, on the seaweed-strewn mud flat, and camouflaged it with palm fronds. He didn’t want it to be spotted from the air in daylight.
    Throughout the night, biting insects had harassed him without mercy. Only after arriving at the island had he realized that he’d forgotten to purchase bug spray. Sleep had been fitful, his fragmentary dreams disturbing.
    Breakfast was a can of pears. He consumed the entire contents, including the heavy syrup. The thick, sugary liquid made his gut roll.
    Jack sighed. Yesterday’s euphoria, born of plotting strategy and taking action, had faded. He pictured his apartment in Westwood—the well-stocked refrigerator, the comfortable chairs, the