Free Red Mist by Patricia Cornwell

brochures. When I tried repeatedly to call Bryce to complain, leaving him the pointed message that I can’t believe a high-end
     concierge rental company would have something like this in their fleet, he never called back. I’ve had no communications from
     him all day, as if my chief of staff is avoiding me. Then there’s strange information I’ve been given. And now this.
    I smooth open a piece of white paper that was folded into a diamond shape no bigger than a throat lozenge. Written in blue
     ball-point ink is a phone number that is vaguely familiar at first, and then I’m jolted by recognition. “USE PAY PHONE,” the
     note says in tiny block printing, and there is nothing else, just that underlined directive and Jaime Berger’s cell phone
     number. The late afternoon is darker, rain starting again, tapping the metal roof of the van, and I turn on the windshield
     wipers. They leave greasy arches as they slowly, loudly sweep across the glass, and I retrieve my shoulder bag from under
     the seat. I watch the black Mercedes wagon drive out of the lot, noticing a Navy Diver bumper sticker on the back as I get
     a strange feeling. Then I realize why.
    My bag has been gone through. Am I sure? I think so. Yes, I’m certain, I decide, as I reconstruct what I did when I first
     arrived several hours earlier. I sent Benton a text message and zipped my phone into the rear pocket of my bag, where I always
     keep my wallet, my credentials, my keys, and other valuables. Now my phone is in the side compartment. How simple and safe
     to search the van while I was inside the prison. Officers had my keys, and I was locked up in Bravo Pod, talking to Kathleen,
     but I can’t think of anything important that someone might have found. My iPhone and iPad are password-protected, so no one
     could have gotten into those, and I can’t think of anything else that would matter. What might someone have been looking for? Perhaps case files, it occurs to me. Or, more likely, something that might indicate I came here today for reasons other than
     what I told Tara Grimm. I unlock my phone.
    My first impulse is to call my niece, Lucy, and bluntly ask her if she’s been in touch with Jaime Berger. It’s possible Lucy
     has information that might give me a hint about what is going on, about what I’ve just walked into, but I can’t bring myself
     to do it. Lucy hasn’t talked about Jaime since all of us were together last, some six months ago, during the holidays, and
     she has yet to admit they’ve broken up, when I know they must have. My niece wouldn’t have moved from New York to Boston if
     there hadn’t been a personal reason.
    It wasn’t about money. Lucy doesn’t need money. It wasn’t about her wanting to bring her extraordinary computer expertise
     to the Cambridge Forensic Center, which just began taking cases last year. She doesn’t need to work for me or the CFC. Her
     decision to relocate her entire existence most likely was about fearing a loss she believed was inevitable, and she did what
     she’s always done so well. She aggressively avoided pain and dodged rejection. She probably ended the relationship before Jaime had the chance, and by the
     time Lucy did so, she’d already set up a new life for herself in Boston. My niece has a habit of telling you she’s leaving
     after she’s already gone.
    I drive away from the GPFW, going out the same way I came in, past the nursery and the salvage yard, wondering where I’m going
     to find a pay phone. There isn’t one on every corner these days, and I’m not sure I should call Jaime or anyone else. Benton
     worried that I was being set up, and I’m about to conclude he is right. By whom and for what reason? Maybe by Dawn Kincaid’s
     defense team. Maybe by something far more sinister. Dawn Kincaid tried to murder me and failed, so now she wants to finish
     the job. The thought gusts through my mind like an arctic blast, and my head is beginning to pound as if my