The Scarecrow

“Not if they can’t pinpoint time of death to exactly when you were on that plane or already in Vegas. I think our guy is smart enough to realize that. It was part of his plan.”

I slowly nodded and felt a terrible fear start to rise in me. I realized I could end up like Alonzo Winslow and Brian Oglevy.

“But don’t worry, Jack. I won’t let them put you in jail.”

She finally raised her phone and made a call. I listened to her speak briefly to someone who was probably a supervisor. She didn’t say anything about me or the case or Nevada. She just said she had been involved in the discovery of a homicide and would shortly be interacting with the LAPD.

Next she called the LAPD, identified herself, gave my address and asked for a homicide team. She then gave her cell phone number and ended the call. She looked at me.

“What about you? If you need to call someone you better do it now. Once the detectives arrive they’re probably not going to let you use your phone.”

“Right.”

I pulled out my throwaway and called the city desk at the Times. I checked my watch and saw it was well past one. The paper had long been put to bed but I needed to inform someone of what was happening.

The night editor was an old veteran named Esteban Samuel. He was a survivor, having worked for the Times for nearly forty years and having avoided all the shake-ups and purges and changes of regime. He did it largely by keeping his head down and staying out of the way. He didn’t come to work until six P.M. each day and that was usually after the corporate cutters and editorial axmen like Kramer had gone home. Out of sight, out of mind. It worked.

“Sam, it’s Jack McEvoy.”

“Jack Mack! How you doing?”

“Not so well. I’ve got some bad news. Angela Cook has been murdered. An FBI agent and I just found her. I know the morning edition is closed but you might want to call whoever needs to be called or at least leave it on the overnote.”

The overnote was a list of notes, ideas and incomplete stories that Samuel put together at the end of his shift and then left for the morning editor.

“Oh, my God! How terrible! That poor, poor girl.”

“Yes, it’s awful.”

“What happened?”

“It’s related to the story we were working on. But I don’t know a whole lot. We’re waiting on the LAPD to show up now.”

“Where are you? Where did this happen?”

I knew he would get around to asking that.

“My house, Sam. I don’t know how much you know, but I went to Las Vegas last night and Angela went missing today. I came back tonight and an FBI agent escorted me home and we searched the house. We found her body under the bed.”

The whole thing sounded insane as I said it.

“Are you under arrest, Jack?” Samuel asked, his confusion clear in his voice.

“No, no. The killer is trying to set me up but the FBI knows what’s going on. Angela and I were onto this guy and somehow he found out. He killed Angela and then he tried to get me in Nevada but the FBI was there. Anyway, all of this will be in the story I write tomorrow. I’ll be in as soon as I clear this scene and I will write it for Friday’s paper. Okay? Make sure they know that.”

“Got it, Jack. I’ll make some calls and you stay in touch.”

If I can, I thought. I gave him the number of my throwaway and ended the call. Rachel was still pacing.

“That didn’t sound very convincing,” she said.

I shook my head.

“I know. I realized I sounded like a nut job as I was saying it. I’ve got a bad feeling about this, Rachel. Nobody’s going to believe me.”

“They will, Jack. And I think I know what he was trying to do. It’s all coming together now.”

“Then, tell me. The cops will be here any second.”

Rachel finally sat down, taking the chair across the coffee table from me. She leaned forward to tell her story.

“You have to look at it from his point of view and then make some assumptions about his skills and location.”

“Okay.”

“First of all, he’s close. Our first two known victims were in L.A. and Las Vegas. Angela’s murder and his attempt to get to you were in L.A. and a remote part of Nevada. So my guess is that he lives in or is close to one of these places. He was able to react quickly and in a matter of hours get to both you and Angela.”

I nodded. It sounded right to me.

“Next, his technical skill. We know from his e-mail to the prison warden and from how he was able to attack you on multiple levels that his tech skill is quite high. So if we assume that he was able to breach your e-mail account, then we can also assume that he breached the entire L.A. Times data system. If he had free rein inside, then he would have been able to access home addresses for both you and Angela, right?”

“Sure. That information has got to be in there.”

“What about you being laid off? Would there be any e-mail or a data trail involving that?”

I nodded.

“I got a ton of e-mails about it. From friends, people at other papers, everywhere. I told a few people by e-mail, too. But what would it have to do with any of this?”