The road was silent. In the past hour and a half, only one car had passed along this stretch of New Jersey country road. Jay was standing, frozen, on the asphalt shoulder, his hands on his head.
“I found the phone.” David said heavily.
Jay turned and looked at the crushed remains of Alice's cell phone.
There was complete silence for a moment.
Jay slowly raised his head, rubbing his chin.“So we can't contact her. What about her watch? Shouldn't that still be transmitting?”
David sighed. “The watch isn't transmitting. My best guess is that it met the same fate as the phone.”
“We should try to find the watch.” Jay said. “The signal died in this spot, right?”
“Do you think they're okay?” Kim asked, looking around at the ground.
David shook his head. “There are only two things that could have happened: either Alice intentionally destroyed the phone and watch, or she was captured.”
“Captured by whom?” Jay asked incredulously.
“I have no idea. Alice is good, though. It would take quite a special person to get her.”
“What about the other three?” Kim asked, kneeling and picking up a piece of glass. “You know, Will, Nel, and Alice's doctor friend? What if they got in the way or slowed her down?”
David nodded tightly. “Good point.”
“Here!” Jay held up the woman's watch. The face was bashed in, the hands were crooked and still.
“So are they taken?” Kim asked, taking the watched and looking at it.
“I don't know. Let me see that.”
David looked at it carefully.
“She hasn't left any symbols or clues...but there's no blood, either.”
“So, what are we going to do?” Jay asked.
“I think...” David ran his finger over the navy blue band of the watch, “...our best bet is to keep traveling in the direction they were headed when we lost the signal.”
It was almost midnight before Tyler came out of the hospital. His face was pale and slightly swollen, but he had put on a stony expression that matched his determined gait.
He walked for about an hour until he reached an ambiguous coffee shop. He'd used this coffee shop's free computers on multiple occasions in the past, usually when he wanted some privacy from Jay's well-meant prying.
He had slacked off on reading the news since he and Jay had joined David and Alice. It had cost him his father, and he wasn't about to miss anything else. He needed some information.
Every major newspaper and news website in New York had written about Carlton Fog's shooting. Tyler grew more and more frustrated as he dug deeper. For all the fancy ruffles and twists of the writers, there was no real information. The only new thing he learned was that his father's shooter had not been caught.
Otis Burkley. That was the name of the man who killed his father. Tyler stared at the picture. The man's bleached white hair stood out grossly from his tan face and dark eyes. Tyler shuddered. Those eyes.
Tyler stood up and headed out of the coffee shop, leaving a tip on the counter for the black coffee he'd consumed.
He was going to kill Otis Burkley.
Marlowe checked her gun from bullets for what seemed the thousandth time. Her breath unsteady, she sat on the edge of her seat, her seat belt straining against her shoulder.
The agent who was driving glanced over at her.
“Are you alright Agent Marlowe?”
“Yeah, Thompson, I'm fine.” Marlowe tried to relax slightly.
“So, this apartment we're going to...it's the one that he died in?”
Marlowe knew, even though Thompson hadn't said his name, that he was referring to Borjes.
She cleared her throat and looked out the window.
“Yeah.”
Thompson shut his mouth tightly and nodded.
They remained silent as they pulled up in front of the run-down building. A glance over her shoulder told Marlowe that the three other cars full of agents had arrived as well.
The lead agent opened her car door and stepped out, taking a deep breath and running her hands nervously through her black hair.
She wasn't sure what she was looking for. If Tyler had killed Borjes....
She banished the thought from her mind. It was highly plausible that either Otis or Tyler had pulled the trigger ending her partner's life. She was only looking for evidence pointing her and her team in either direction.
“Alright, remember that we are working with an unofficial crime scene.” she addressed the other agents.
“Don't disturb anything. We're looking for fingerprints, DNA, the usual...anything linking Tyler Fogg to this crime.”
Tyler finished wiping the dried blood from his deformed nose and shoved the rag he had been using into the back pocket of his jeans. He had dampened the rag when he had washed his hands and straightened his hair in the fountain outside of a large, upper class apartment building on the edge of Gramercy Park. He was not pacing, afraid to enter, as he had thought he would be. The rage and exhaustion inside of him was about to drive him out of his mind, and nothing, not even fear for his life, was going to stop him from confronting Jack Freid.
Tyler had no doubts that Freid had avoided being blown to bits by the inferno that had consumed the limo on the night that Will, Jay, and himself had talked to Freid.
Tyler had spent the three days since his father's death tracking down every scrap of information he could find about Freid; he had come up with several addresses, all of which were completely phony. This one, this last address...this had to be it. He was so sure of it. Something inside this apartment was going to lead him to Freid.
Running his hand through his hair one last time, he stepped up to the buzzer next to the door and pressed the call button.
“Hello?”
Tyler grinned, exhaling through his teeth.
“Charlotte Freid, I need to talk to you.”
“Who's asking?”
“It's about your father.”
Instantly, the voice on the other end was cut out to static. Tyler slammed his palm into the granite next to the buzzer and ground his teeth.
“Come on, Charlotte.” he muttered.
Determinedly, he jabbed the call button again.
Nothing.
Suddenly, a soft hand was pressed firmly over his mouth, a gun against the back of his head.
“Hello Tyler.” Charlotte whispered in his ear. “Let's take this somewhere more private.”
Jay shook his head violently to keep himself awake. Kim was sprawled out in the backseat, asleep, and David was flipping through Will's files again. Jay squeezed his eyes open and shut briefly, his hands tightly on the wheel as he tried to focus on the road ahead.
“Do you want me to take over, Jay?” David asked without looking up.
“No, I'm good for another half hour or so. Have you found anything?”
“Maybe.” David said.
“What does that mean, maybe?” Jay suddenly felt more awake.
“Well, these these are the records for the Drexler, yeah?”
“But we've been over those a million times. There's nothing there.”
“I'm not so sure...every time this painting is mentioned, there's a typo. I looked at all the other paintings...not a single typo. But this painting, there's a typo every time. It could be something.”
“What's the painting?”
“It's called The Leaders. It portrays the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Painted by some obscure artist...this is the only painting that Jefferson Cobb ever did that was shown.”
Jay felt the excitement is his chest building. This could be it.
“Is there anything else?”
“Yeah, actually there is. There are copies of this painting in six other art museums across the country.”
Jay chewed on his lip as he digested this new information. Just the relief of any information at all was incredible. He couldn't make heads or tails of it; his hope was back and bright, though. For the moment he was content.
