Just One Look by Harlan Coben Page A

“Grace?”
    “Hello, Mr. Vespa.”
    “Please call me Carl.”
    “Carl, right.”
    “You got my message?” he asked.
    “Yes.” She did not tell Carl Vespa that it had nothing to do with why she was calling now. There was feedback on the line. “Where are you?” she asked.
    “My jet. We’re about an hour outside of Stewart.”
    Stewart was an air force base and airport about an hour and a half from her house.
    Silence.
    “Is something wrong, Grace?”
    “You said to call if I ever needed anything.”
    “And now, fifteen years later, you do?”
    “I think so.”
    “Good. And your timing couldn’t be better. There’s something I want to show you.”
    “What’s that?”
    “Listen, are you home?”
    “I’ll be there soon.”
    “I’ll pick you up in two, two and a half, hours. We can talk then, okay? Do you have someone to watch the kids?”
    “I should be able to find someone.”
    “If you can’t, I’ll leave my assistant at your house. See you then.”
    Carl Vespa hung up. Grace kept driving. She wondered what he wanted from her now. She wondered about the wisdom of calling him in the first place. She hit the first number on her speed-dial again-Jack’s cell phone-but there was still no answer.
    Grace had another idea. She called her friend of the no-ménage, Cora.
    “Didn’t you used to date a guy who worked in e-mail spam?” Grace asked.
    “Yep,” Cora said. “Obsessive creep named-get this-Gus. Hard to get rid of. I had to use my own version of a bunker buster on him.”
    “What did you do?”
    “I told Gus he had a small wee-wee.”
    “Ouch.”
    “Like I said, the bunker buster. Works every time, but there’s often, uh, collateral damage.”
    “I might need his help.”
    “How?”
    Grace was not sure how to put this. She decided to concentrate on the blonde with the X across her face, the one she was sure she’d seen before. “I found this photograph…,” she began.
    “Right.”
    “And there’s this woman in it. She’s probably late teens, early twenties.”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “It’s an old picture. I’d say fifteen, twenty years old. Anyway, I need to find out who the girl is. I was thinking maybe I could send it out via spam mail. It could ask if anyone can identify the girl for a research project, something like that. I know most people erase those e-mails, but if a few looked, I don’t know, maybe I could get a response.”
    “Long shot.”
    “Yeah, I know.”
    “And wow, talk about creeps coming out of the woodwork. Imagine the replies.”
    “Got a better idea?”
    “Not really, no. It could work, I guess. By the way, you notice I’m not asking you why you need to find the identity of a woman in a picture from fifteen, twenty years ago?”
    “I do.”
    “I just wanted it noted for the record.”
    “So noted. It’s a long story.”
    “You need someone to tell?”
    “I might. I might also need someone to watch the kids for a few hours.”
    “I’m available and alone.” Pause. “Sheesh, I have to stop saying that.”
    “Where’s Vickie?” Vickie was Cora’s daughter.
    “She’s spending the night at the McMansion with my ex and his horse-faced wife. Or as I prefer to put it, she’s spending the night in the bunker with Adolf and Eva.”
    Grace managed a smile.
    “My car is in the shop,” Cora said. “Can you pick me up on the way?”
    “I’ll be there right after I grab Max.”
    Grace swung by the Montessori Enrichment program and grabbed her son. Max had that near-tears thing going on, having lost several of his Yu-Gi-Oh! cards to a classmate in some dumb game. Grace tried to humor him, but he wasn’t in the mood. She gave up. She helped him get his jacket on. His hat was missing. So was one of his gloves. Another mother smiled and whistled while bundling up her little bundle in color-coordinated knit (hand-knit, no doubt) hat, scarf, and yes, matching gloves. She looked over at Grace and faked a sympathetic smile. Grace did not know this