Redheads by Jonathan Moore

jetway with his briefcase and followed the signs to the baggage claim. The fork from Allison’s apartment was so valuable he hadn’t risked its confiscation by trying to bring it through security in his carry-on. When his suitcase came along the conveyor belt, he pulled it to a quiet place beside a broken vending machine, knelt, and checked that the fork was still in its evidence bag. Then he zipped the suitcase and went to the rental car kiosks.
    Though he’d hesitate admitting it outright to his new friends, Chris was rich.
    He and Cheryl made a lot of money while she was alive and they were both working. But the heavy money came after she was murdered. As a surgeon at the beginning of a long and promising career, Cheryl had been very well insured. It was enough that Chris didn’t need to worry, but more money came ten months later. Their house had been in a new gated development on the edge of Kaneohe Bay. The developer’s brochures advertised it as a safe place to raise a family. A wrought iron fence surrounded the neighborhood, with guard booths at the entrance drive and guards at the walkway gates leading to the beach. Security cameras watched the common areas; each house was equipped with an alarm wired to the front guard booth. On the day Cheryl was murdered, the guard at the beach gates called in sick and the private security company never bothered to find a replacement. The guard at the entrance drive booth was asleep. To make sure no one saw him sleeping, he raised the gate to let all traffic pass, and he turned off the camera recorders so there would be no DVD from the guard booth camera showing him asleep. It may not have made a difference. The police later discovered the alarm in Chris’s house was improperly installed and couldn’t send a signal anywhere.
    Chris had not been a tort lawyer. He never thought a lawsuit would fix anything. But when he learned how thoroughly Cheryl had been failed, he sued the security company, the developer, and for good measure, his homeowners’ association. The developer had an eight million dollar insurance policy; the security company had three; and the homeowners’ association had two and a half. The developer brought in its electrical subcontractor as a third party defendant; the sub was insured to the hilt. Chris negotiated a global settlement for ten million dollars, made the four defendants pay to raze his house, and got the homeowners’ association to buy the vacant lot. His only concession was to sign a confidentiality agreement. He could live easily enough on what they’d saved before Cheryl was killed, and on the money from her life insurance. The rest was for revenge.
    He was in Boston to spend some of that.
    He drove his rental car into the city and left it with the valet at the Marriott Hotel near the waterfront. The sun was going down. He’d left from Houston shortly after returning to the Galvez with Julissa after her meeting with the prosecutor. She’d come out quietly, carrying Allison’s autopsy report in a folder. She hadn’t said much on the drive back to the hotel.
    Now, standing in the room at the Marriott and looking out over Boston’s harbor, he thought about calling her. To say what, precisely? He wasn’t sure. He told himself it was because he’d gone so long with no friends. Now that he had some, he wanted them. But he knew a lie when he told it to himself. It was Julissa he wanted to call, not Aaron Westfield. He put the idea out of his mind and watched the sun go down. Then he showered, changed into slacks and a white shirt, and went downstairs.
     
     
    The scientist’s name was Dr. Gerard Chevalier. They met at the bar off the lobby. Chris had spoken to Dr. Chevalier on the telephone twice and had corresponded with him by email. He recognized the scientist from his picture on the company’s web page. He was short and square-looking, in his mid-fifties with salt-and-pepper hair just above his shoulders. He wore golden spectacles