The Never Game

“That’s the way,” Standish said, and his impression was that she was devoted to her parents too.

Shaw asked, “Anything new about Henry?”

“Henry Thompson? No.”

He asked, “Forensics?”

Shaw guessed she wouldn’t share with a civie. Standish instead spoke without hesitation. “Not good. No touch DNA on Sophie’s clothes. Too early to tell with Thompson’s car and the rock that got pitched into his windshield, but why would the unsub turn careless now? No prints anywhere. Wore cloth gloves. Can’t source anything — the screws he sealed the door with, the water, the matches and the other stuff he left. Tire treads’re useless, thanks to the grass, which I guess you knew. Oh, and I did have a team look over that access road where you said somebody was watching you.”

When he met Kyle Butler. Shaw nodded.

“That was gravel. So: useless encore. And I ran the traffic cams on Tamyen en route to the park from the Quick Byte...” She furrowed her brow, staring at his face. “You told Dan to check them out too?”

“I did.”

“Hmm. Well, nothing, sorry to report. No cars parked near the café were tagged on Tamyen.”

A good job, Shaw was thinking.

“With Thompson, he picked another place with a grassy field — no tire tracks there. Now, our unsub’s shoes’re men’s size nine and a half Nikes. That means he — or she — was wearing men’s size nine and a half Nikes. Doesn’t mean they have size nine and a half feet. No security camera footage except for what you found at the Quick Byte Café. Had an unfortunate rookie spend hours scrubbing through the tape. Nobody seemed interested in Sophie, going back for two weeks. Other stores, bars and restaurants? Nothing. Was it you or Dan thought of the CCTV at Tamyen and Forty-two?”

“Did it show anything?”

Standish seemed amused Shaw wouldn’t say. “There wasn’t one. Weapon was a Glock nine. And he took the brass with him. While he was a ways from Kyle Butler, he made a clean headshot. He’s done some range time in his day. I’d say he was a pro, but pros don’t do weird things like lock people in rooms. They shoot them or promise not to shoot them if the family coughs up the bucks.”

“You?” Shaw said.

“Me what?”

“Combat.” Shaw nodded at the OD jacket.

“No. It’s cozy. I chill easy.”

“You canvassed for the gray stocking cap?”

“From the Quick Byte tape? Yep. Nothing yet. I’ve got another rookie looking at about ten hours of security video from the parking lots at Stanford.”

Shaw said, “The lots on Quarry Road would be best. The ones closer to the Gates Center are small and they fill up fast.”

“What I was thinking too.”

He added that he had canvassed stores and security guards on the campus. She smiled when he used the cop term.

“Anybody talk to you?”

“Most of them did. Nobody saw Thompson.”

“And what about the poster?” Shaw asked.

She frowned quizzically.

“That I gave to Wiley. Of the face.”

She flipped through her notebook. “Something about a sheet of paper left at a café. The lab ran it and it was negative DNA and prints. I didn’t see it.”

Explained why she hadn’t shown it to Sophie.

Shaw opened his computer bag and withdrew the sheets he’d printed earlier. On top was the image of the stenciled face, which he turned her way.

“What’s this?”

“It’s the Whispering Man.”

“Why’s it important?” she asked.

“Because it might be the key to the whole case.”

31

Shaw was explaining. “I was looking into some leads that Brian Byrd gave me. Places that Henry had been over the past day or so. I wanted a witness who’d seen somebody following him, maybe find another security video. Nothing panned out. I told that to Brian. And he said it made no sense to kidnap Henry. It was somebody playing a sick game.”

Standish grunted, though it was a benign grunt. She looked up from the printout.

Shaw continued: “You know the C3 Conference in town?”

“Computers. Gamers, right? Screwing up traffic. But that’s in San Jose, so I don’t care in particular. What’s that got to do with the unsub?”

“He could’ve raped or killed Sophie anytime. He didn’t. He left her in that room in the factory with things she could use to survive. Five things: fishing line, matches, water, a glass bottle and a strip of cloth.”

“Okay.”

He sensed she was guessing where this was going and the skeptic’s flag was starting to go up.

“I was at the conference yesterday.”

“You were? You into games?”

“No. I went with a friend.”

I had time to kill after your people hijacked my car...

He said, “And I saw a game where you collect objects you can use to play. Like weapons, clothes, food, magic power things.”

“Magic.”

“What if Byrd was right? This is a sick game? I went online and looked for video games where players are given five things and have to use them to survive. I found one. The Whispering Man.”

She fanned out the top few sheets. While the stenciled image of the Whispering Man was crudely done, Shaw had downloaded a number of pictures that were professionally drawn or painted, most from promotions or ads for the game. Some from rabid fans.

“Is he a ghost?” she asked. “Or what?”