“I never turn down a free lunch,” I said.
“Excellent,” he said. “Why don’t you meet me at the College Club at 1:00 on Friday?”
“I’ll see you then,” I said.
After I hung up, I sat for a minute and thought about Elias’ offer of lunch. I had expected him to tell me that there was no disc in Terry’s office, of course. I was more interested in his reaction to the possibility of the existence of such a disc. Apparently, I’d find that out on Friday.
At the College Club, no less.
Chapter 35
While running along some of the paths at Frick Park the next morning, I thought about the disc some more. I’d played around with it a little the night before at my own computer, but, of course, had gotten nowhere. I’m an almost wickedly-fast typist with my Microsoft Ergonomic Keyboard, and I can do a few other things associated with word processing, but other than that, I know diddly about computers. I know people who assume that everyone knows, and cares as much, about computers as they do, and talking to these folks always makes me wish I’d bought stock in Excedrin when I was younger. I could have taken the disc to one of them, but I didn’t want anyone else to see whatever might be on it. I trusted Irv, and he never talked computerese to me, so I’d just have to wait until he got back to see if he could unlock the secrets of the disc. This was Thursday, so it would be just a few more days. Meanwhile, I thought about the possibility that the information on the disc might not be relevant, but at the moment, it was all I had to go on, so I was treating it like an actual clue. Besides, I had a gut feeling that this thing was important. I also thought some more about the fact that Terry, or I assume it had been Terry, had written “Master Copy” on the disc. That implied the existence of at least one other copy. If so, where could it be? Logic would seem to dictate that, if the information on the disc was really important, Terry wouldn’t have kept the backup copy at home along with the master. And if it had something to do with work, maybe something he didn’t necessarily want his colleagues or bosses to get their hands on, he wouldn’t keep it in his office. So if I went with the assumption that the second disc wasn’t at home and it wasn’t at the office, then where else would Terry have put it? Rachel said they didn’t have a second home or a cabin in the woods or anything like that, and as far as I had been able to learn, Terry didn’t have an apartment on the side. So, again, the question was where?
Or maybe not. Maybe I’d been looking at this from the wrong angle. Instead of asking where, perhaps I should be thinking who. To whom would Terry give something for safekeeping? How about somebody he figured hardly anyone else knew about?
Dee-Dee.
And I remembered that when I’d talked to her the week before, there had been just the slightest hesitation when I’d asked if Terry had mentioned anything about a partnership. Dee-Dee. Oh, yeah, I definitely would be seeing Dee-Dee again. And soon.
After my run, I shaved and showered and called The Joker’s Wild. Jake answered the phone, and I identified myself.
“Decided to take me up on that bouncer’s job?” he asked.
“Not today,” I told him, “but I’ll keep you in mind. In my business, you never know when your revenue streams might dry up.”
“So what can I do for you?”
“I need to talk to Dee-Dee again for a minute. I assume she’s not in yet, so I was hoping you might be willing to give me her home phone number.”
“Tell ya what,” he said. “How about I call Dee-Dee and give her your number instead?”
Jake hadn’t lost his cop instincts.
“Works for me, Jake. Thanks a lot. Give my best to Marko.”
“Right,” he said, and hung up.
Five minutes later, Dee-Dee called. I asked her if we could meet somewhere for a few minutes, and she suggested I drive over to her place, which was not too far from where she worked. I wanted to talk to Dee-Dee in person, and I preferred that it not be at the bar, since I didn’t want the possible distraction of another go-round with Marko, so I said her place would be fine, and she gave me directions.
* * *
Within an hour, I was pulling into the parking lot of her apartment complex. There were four buildings in all, each three stories high, each with an exterior stairwell. I’ve never liked that arrangement, especially anywhere where the winters tend to get harsh. If you’re not going to spring for elevators, then at least put the stairwells inside. On the other hand, as I looked around the complex on my way to Dee-Dee’s first floor apartment, it didn’t appear that the builder had adopted a spare-no-expense approach to any aspect of this project. The parking lot had several potholes, the wooden sidings of the buildings were in need of repair, and some paint would have helped here and there or, more to the point, everywhere.
Like all the units, Dee-Dee’s apartment had a steel door of some indeterminate grayish-green color. She opened it when I knocked and invited me inside.
I doubted if Dee-Dee could wear anything that didn’t carry with it at least the suggestion of sexuality. Today she had on a pair of designer jeans that were tighter than the corners of the bedsheets in a good hotel, four-inch heels, and a snug-fitting white blouse with the top three buttons undone. Her blonde hair cascaded down around her shoulders, framing a face on which the makeup had been expertly applied. More than just her physical appearance, though, there was an attitude
