"If I wanted it to detonate, it would have. And if I didn't want it to . . ."
"It wouldn't have. You'd have done it wrong . . . properly."
She nodded. "I do know how to make a device like that. I won't pretend otherwise. I've worked in explosives. But I'm not going to fuck it up. I'd never send a fake bomb as a scare tactic. That's stupid. It doesn't matter if it was made to fail, it's still a criminal offense."
"What did you conclude when you saw the device?"
"Detective Lee wouldn't let me. I was a suspect. The hired expert they got"--she rolled her eyes--"was strictly amateur hour. I could have helped them figure out who might have done this. But no . . ."
"If I could get you details--"
"Sheila Walling?"
We turned to see a police cruiser stopping behind us with the window rolled down. One officer climbed out.
"Sheila Walling?" he said again. "You are under arrest for the murders . . ."
Chapter Eighteen
Nadia
Detective Lee had found the evidence she needed to charge Sheila. Not that she was telling me what it was--she was understandably busy interrogating her suspect. I hung out at the station, but I didn't push. I had too much respect for the police, even when I was sure they'd made a mistake.
I was still waiting at the police station when Howard Lang texted me to say they'd arrested Sheila. I got back to him and discovered he already had the details through his contacts in the department.
The police had recovered a hair from the IED left for Angela. That wasn't new--they'd had the hair from the start and been running a DNA comparison, which doesn't happen nearly as fast as Hollywood might lead us to believe. They'd compared the DNA to Sheila's, which she'd provided back when Cherise died. I was sure her lawyer had argued against volunteering that, but I could see Sheila saying, I didn't do this, so fuck it. Take my DNA.
That DNA matched the hair taken from the device. Lee still hadn't been quick to arrest her. She knew Sheila wasn't going to run, and she wanted more evidence. That came in today, with the results of a credit card search--the DNA match gave Lee what she needed to conduct that search. Sheila's card had been used to order bomb-making materials shortly before the IED showed up in Angela's car. It was the same material used in Angela's device . . . and also used in the previous two. That wasn't enough to charge Sheila with the murders. For now, she'd only been charged with attempting to kill Angela, but that arrest opened up Lee's search powers, and the detective was certain she'd find what she needed to connect Sheila to the murders.
I suppose it was possible that Sheila only sent the device to Angela, which explained the DNA match and purchase history. But that didn't make sense. Why would she construct a bomb to kill Angela when she was already a suspect in Cherise and Sara's bombing deaths? That was crazy. Sheila Walling was not crazy.
She was being framed.
No one as smart as Sheila was going to use her credit card to buy the materials she'd use to build an IED. She wouldn't even need to buy them--she worked in the industry, and at most, she might have to purchase a single component. As for the DNA, a hair is the easiest source to "steal." It was possible there'd been hairs left with the first two devices as well--they just wouldn't have survived the blasts.
After speaking to Howard, I called Evelyn. Normally, I'd avoid asking for her research help. Evelyn doesn't work for free. Unfortunately, she doesn't work for mere cash, either. Her system is trade. Work done for a chit owed, and Evelyn didn't cash her chits promptly. She stockpiled them as leverage.
Luckily, right now we were in a reverse-credit situation--I'd helped her more than she'd helped me. I also had leverage of my own: Jack.
If you asked Jack and Evelyn what their relationship was, Evelyn would say she was his mentor. Ask Jack, and he'd point out that she'd been his mentor and was now a colleague. They're also friends, but neither was the type to say that. Business was the more important relationship.
The truth, though, was that to Evelyn, Jack was the closest thing to family she'd ever have. The closest thing to a son. But he was the kind of son who didn't call home nearly as often as he should. He cared . . . He just got busy, and yes, sometimes he didn't have the patience for Mom's bullshit. That placed me in a position of power. I was the daughter-in-law who could encourage him to call and visit. Or discourage him. I won't say that I used my power to its full potential, but I was aware it existed, and Evelyn was very aware it existed.
Today, I set her on Sheila's credit card history. I wanted that purchase order. Mostly, I wanted to know where the goods had been sent, which would take more than a phone call from a sweet old lady. That was good, because I'd seen Evelyn's sweet-old-lady impersonation, and it sucked. Her true skill required only the use of her brain and her fingers,
traveling along the back channels of the wired world.
She called an hour later.
"Okay," she said. "I have . . . Damn it, Dee. Can you call me back when you have a better connection? There's static."
"That's surf."
A long pause.
"We're on the beach," I said.
"Why?"