After logging off Worldwide Stock Market, he dialed the main computer of the California Multi-Agency Task Force on Computer Crime. He entered that system by a deeply concealed back door that he had inserted prior to resigning as second in command of the unit.
Because he was accepted at the system-manager level (the highest security clearance), all functions were available to him. He could use the task force’s computer as long as he wanted, for whatever purpose he wished, and his presence wouldn’t be observed or recorded.
He had no interest in their files. He used their computer only as a jumping-off point into the Los Angeles Police Department system, to which they had direct access. The irony of employing a computer-crime unit’s hardware and software to commit even a minor computer crime was appealing.
It was also dangerous.
Nearly everything that was fun, of course, was also a little dangerous: riding roller coasters, skydiving, gambling, sex.
From the LAPD system, he entered the California Department of Motor Vehicles computer in Sacramento. He got such a kick from making those leaps that he felt almost as though he had traveled physically, teleporting from his canyon in Malibu to Los Angeles to Sacramento, in the manner of a character in a science fiction novel.
Rocky jumped onto his hind legs, planted his forepaws on the edge of the desk, and peered at the computer screen.
“You wouldn’t enjoy this,” Spencer said.
Rocky looked at him and issued a short, soft whine.
“I’m sure you’d get a lot more pleasure from chewing on that new rawhide bone I got you.”
Peering at the screen again, Rocky inquisitively cocked his furry head.
“Or I could put on some Paul Simon for you.”
Another whine. Longer and louder than before.
Sighing, Spencer pulled another chair next to his own. “All right. When a fella has a bad case of the lonelies, I guess chewing on a rawhide bone just isn’t as good as having a little company. Never works for me, anyway.”
Rocky hopped into the chair, panting and grinning.
Together, they went voyaging in cyberspace, plunging illegally into the galaxy of DMV records, searching for Valerie Keene.
They found her in seconds. Spencer had hoped for an address different from the one he already knew, but he was disappointed. She was listed at the bungalow in Santa Monica, where he had discovered unfurnished rooms and the photo of a cockroach nailed to one wall.
According to the data that scrolled up the screen, she had a Class C license, without restrictions. It would expire in a little less than four years. She had applied for the license and taken a written test in early December, two months ago.
Her middle name was Ann.
She was twenty-nine. Spencer had guessed twenty-five.
Her driving record was free of violations.
In the event that she was gravely injured and her own life could not be saved, she had authorized the donation of her vital organs.
Otherwise, the DMV offered little information about her:
That bureaucratic thumbnail description wouldn’t be of much help when Spencer needed to describe her to someone. It was insufficient to conjure an image that included the things that truly distinguished her: the direct and clear-eyed stare, the slightly lopsided smile, the dimple in her right cheek, the delicate line of her jaw.
Since last year, with federal funding from the National Crime and Terrorism Prevention Act, the California DMV had been digitizing and electronically storing photographs and thumbprints of new and renewing drivers. Eventually, there would be mug shots and prints on file for every resident with a driver’s license, though the vast majority had never been accused of a crime, let alone convicted.
Spencer considered this the first step toward a national ID card, an internal passport of the type that had been required in the communist states before they had collapsed, and he was opposed to it on principle. In this instance, however, his principles didn’t prevent him from calling up the photo from Valerie’s license.
The screen flickered, and she appeared. Smiling.
The banshee eucalyptuses whisper-wailed complaints of eternity’s indifference, and the rain drummed, drummed.
Spencer realized that he was holding his breath. He exhaled.
Peripherally, he was aware of Rocky staring at him curiously, then at the screen, then at him again.
He picked up the mug and sipped some black coffee. His hand was shaking.
Valerie had known that authorities of one kind or another were hunting her, and she had known that they were getting close — because she had vacated her bungalow only hours before they’d come for her. If she was innocent, why would she settle for the unstable and fear-filled life of a fugitive?
Putting the mug aside and his fingers to the keyboard, he asked for a hard copy of the photo on the screen.
The laser printer hummed. A single sheet of white paper slid out of the machine.
Valerie. Smiling.
In Santa Monica, no one had called for surrender before the assault on the bungalow had begun. When the attackers burst inside, there had been no warning shouts of
Valerie. Smiling.
That soft-voiced woman with whom Spencer had talked last night at The Red Door had seemed gentle and honest, less capable of deceit than were most people. First thing, she had looked boldly at his scar and had asked about it, not with pity welling in her eyes, not with an edge of morbid curiosity in her voice, but in the same way that she might have asked where he’d bought the shirt he’d been wearing. Most people studied the scar surreptitiously and managed to speak of it, if at all, only when they realized that he was aware of their intense curiosity. Valerie’s frankness had been refreshing. When he’d told her only that he’d been in an accident when he was a child, Valerie had sensed that he either didn’t want or wasn’t able to talk about it, and she had dropped the subject as if it mattered no more than his hairstyle. Thereafter, he never caught her gaze straying to the pallid brand on his face; more important, he never had the feeling that she was struggling
Valerie. In black and white.
He could not believe that this woman was capable of committing a major crime, and certainly not one so heinous that a SWAT team would come after her in utmost silence, with submachine guns and every high-tech advantage.
She might be traveling with someone dangerous.
Spencer doubted that. He reviewed the few clues: one set of dinnerware, one drinking glass, one set of stainless steel flatware, an air mattress adequate for one but too small for two.
Yet the possibility remained: She might not be alone, and the person with her might rate the extreme caution of the SWAT team.
The photo, printed from the computer screen, was too dark to do her justice. Spencer directed the laser printer to produce another, just a shade lighter than the first.
That printout was better, and he asked for five more copies.
Until he held her likeness in his hands, Spencer had not been consciously aware that he was going to follow Valerie Keene wherever she had gone, find her, and help her. Regardless of what she might have done, even if she was guilty of a crime, regardless of the cost to himself, whether or not she could ever care for him, Spencer was going to stand with this woman against whatever darkness she faced.
As he realized the deeper implications of the commitment that he was making, a chill of wonder shivered him, for until that moment he had thought of himself as a thoroughly modern man who believed in no one and nothing, neither in God Almighty nor in himself.
