Yours, Mine, and Ours Read online

  For shame. Thinking about a man when I had work to do. So: enough with the distracted musings about Dr. Max Gallo. Back to business.

  Great name. Max Gallo. Like something out of an Ian Fleming novel.

  I picked up the letter, felt it carefully—no watch battery lumps, no gritty powder—and then noticed Agent Thyme for the first time. “Good morning.” It was morning, correct? “Nice to see you again.”

  “Whoa,” George said. To Thyme: “She never does small talk.”

  “You owe me money.”

  “See?” he cried triumphantly, pointing at me.

  Emma Jan glared. “Best two out of three, you said. We can settle it at the range, you said.”

  “And we will.” I felt the envelope around the edges. Still good. “We absolutely will. And you will owe me still more money. Fret not. I take personal checks.”

  “Cadence thought the killers sent that letter?” Emma Jan was looking from me to George to me, not nearly as interested in her debts as in our mail. “So she … disappeared?”

  “But luckily, Shiro is here to save the day.” He could not finish the sentence without rolling his eyes.

  “But how’d you know it was Shiro?”

  “Shiro stands tall and her babbling tends to be more clipped. And she doesn’t use near as many contractions. Cadence slouches, like she’s trying to hide in her own skin. Which I guess she does.”

  “That was almost profound,” I said. It was precisely times like these that made it impossible to simply dismiss George as a sociopath. I would almost prefer it if he was an ass 100 percent of the time.

  “Don’t tell anyone.”

  “You’re not opening that,” Thyme protested, seeing me prepare to do so.

  “The probability of it being safe for me to handle is quite high. It is too small and thin for any kind of charge. No C-4 sheet. And every piece of mail that comes into this building is routinely scanned. You may also recall that the post office irradiates all mail addressed to government offices, and has since the anthrax scare.

  “Finally, these people are smart. They will have left no DNA or prints. They would not make the mistake of licking the envelope flap or mailing it from a city they were anywhere near. They’re likely using a mail service. We won’t find anything, and what they’ve written for us could be of critical import.”

  “In other words,” George said with a grin, “she knows she’s not supposed to, but she’s gonna anyway.” His green eyes sparkled. George loved trouble, especially when someone else was going to get into it. “Here we go, ladies! Yee-haw!”

  “Well put.”

  “Can I have your gun after Michaela fires you?”

  “Be quiet.” I carefully slit the envelope and pulled out a single sheet of paper.

  Dearest Cadence, Shiro, and Adrienne,

  How we have missed you! Life is simply not the same. We apologize for having to leave the party so soon this past summer; terribly rude.

  You may recall that through your actions, you created a vacancy in our family. After giving it some thought, we have decided you are responsible for filling it. Any one of you will do. Or all of you! My. Wouldn’t that be an embarrassment of riches?

  We are thrilled to see you working the June Boys Jobs; you do have experience in these matters … need we remind you just what kind? But we disapprove of JBK’s agenda; our murders were puzzle pieces you eventually put together. JBK’s murders are simply fuel for a blood-hungry malcontent.

  We want only your happiness, ladies, and thus would like you to keep in mind that the trite clichés about the racial demographics of serial killers are not always cold truth.

  If you don’t believe us, then look at the three of us! Oh. Excuse us. The two of us.

  Stay in touch, won’t you, dears?

  Because we intend to.

  With all our love and respect,

  Two of the ThreeFer

  chapter thirty-nine

  “We have a break, I think.” Agent Thyme, George, and I had reported to her other office for the JBJ briefing.

  “This is her other office?” Agent Thyme seemed bewildered to see we were all assembled in the department kitchen. We were perched on bar stools in front of the sizable granite-covered kitchen island, while on the other side Michaela was chopping a peeled banana.

  “Fruit salad,” she said, though no one asked. “I see it’s Shiro and not Cadence, which can only mean something’s happened.” She scraped banana bits off her knife and into a large red bowl big enough to hold a chicken. “What break?”

  I held up the letter for her to read. No use getting banana smeared on it.

  “It doesn’t look like it’s been to the lab and back,” was her first comment. I almost smiled. I admired our boss quite a bit; she was the epitome of cool control. Most supervisors would have gone the “Holy shit!” route.

  “I felt I should bring it to you immediately.”

  It didn’t work; she arched a silver brow at me as I carefully put the letter down on a clean stretch of counter. “Indeed. After you opened it and read it.”

  “Well. Yes.”

  Michaela glanced at the letter again, then went to the large stainless-steel fridge and withdrew two zucchinis. She rinsed them in the large industrial sink (also stainless steel), then began slicing them. She was not a timid slicer: Thwack! Thwack! Thwackthwackthwack! “It has the ring of authenticity.”

  “I thought so, too.”

  “A pity they’re still fixated on you, but not entirely unexpected.” Thwackthwackthwack!

  “No.” Goodness. For Michaela, that was warm concern. Wait until I thoroughly defeated Agent Thyme at the range, I thought. Michaela would enjoy my triumph.

  For a moment, I was deeply confused. Why … why had I thought that? Why did I want to prove something to Michaela? And at the new agent’s expense?

  Ye gods. Cadence couldn’t stop mooning over the darkly irked Dr. Gallo (he was, I grant you, rather moon-able), and I was plotting to bring our boss a tale of victory, like a cat takes a dead rat to her owners. One would think Michaela was some sort of—ha, ha—mother figure to me. Ha ha!

  I probably needed more sleep.

  “But why didn’t they send you something, too, Michaela?”

  We were still getting used to having Agent Thyme in our midst, so for a few seconds nobody realized what a relevant question it was, or that she had even spoken. Usually, when a new employee had their first meeting in Michaela’s other office, they needed several minutes to take in the large, gleaming, restaurant-size (and quality) kitchen.

  Thyme caught on fast. It appeared that if reflective surfaces were not involved, she was on her game.

  “Sorry, what?” Michaela asked. “I didn’t catch that.”

  I looked at Agent Thyme. Her eyes were so wide they showed whites all around, like a horse about to flee fire. Tremendous fear, then. Or tremendous excitement. Given our line of work, I was betting on the latter.

  “I mean…” She coughed, realizing she had the full attention of all three of us. “Michaela shot their brother. They’re down to two because of you.” Pointing to Michaela. “Not you.” Pointing to me/us. “I read up on the case before my transfer. Which reminds me, I have many, many questions for you guys.”

  “Later.”

  “Yeah, I agree, Shiro. Just so you know, ‘later’ doesn’t mean ‘never bring it up again’ in my vocab. But like I was saying, why didn’t they send something to Michaela, too?”

  “Because they don’t think they’re in love with me,” she replied. “Though I doubt such damaged people have any idea what love is.”

  “Awww,” George said, smiling. “Who couldn’t love you, Boss? Your hair is so silver. And your sneakers are so white!”

  She pointed the tip of her very sharp knife at his left eye. “Stow it, Pinkman, or I’ll have you shot.”

  I considered taking offense at her statement about damaged people and love. Everyone in this room was deeply, deeply damaged. But
I knew about love. I loved …

  Patrick? Yes. I … think so.

  I loved that he loved me. Was that the same thing? I did not know, and was too proud to ask.

  Focus, Shiro.

  “Even though Michaela performed the coup de grâce, I can assure you the two of the three hold my sisters and me responsible.”

  “Because they killed all those people, all those sets of three, to get your attention? So you’d stay with them. All of you, I mean.”

  “Correct.” Michaela had dumped the sliced zucchini into a different bowl. “Not that Shiro, Cadence, or Adrienne should blame themselves for the murders, or Opus’s death.”

  “Worry not,” I replied. “We don’t.”

  “No, but they should blame themselves for my kidnapping!” George bitched.

  “We decline,” I said, smiling. “Your own fault for letting psychotics get the drop on you.”

  “Must have been a Thursday,” he mumbled.

  “Riiight, I remember reading about that,” Thyme said. “They stuck you in a closet, and you shit your pants so you’d be found, only…”

  “Only I’m surrounded by dumbasses so my brilliant plan didn’t work. At all! Those slacks were ruined. My dry cleaner actually cried, you believe that? Cried. The man’s been cleaning unspeakable stains out of my work clothes for years, but that … it broke him, the poor bastard.” He checked himself, then added, “How many times did you read that fucking file?”

  “Oh, lots. So we think the note is real,” Thyme said.

  “What ‘we,’ New Girl?” George was getting whiny again. Not a pleasant harbinger for the rest of the meeting.

  “Yes, Agent Thyme, we do. We’ll have it analyzed, of course. But I am proceeding under the assumption it’s genuine.” Michaela pointed her knife at me. “You need some careful habits when you’re not here.”

  “Agreed.”

  “If it’s real, then, how did they know we’re working the JBJ killer?” Thyme asked. If they came for us, I hoped it would be while I was driving the body. Cadence was not up to that confrontation. “How could they know that?”

  “Well,” I said gloomily, “they’re brilliant. That’s one unfortunate happenstance.”

  “The three of them were brilliant,” Thyme corrected. “And then there were two. When it was all three, it was almost like the triplets had a sort of … of … hive mind. I know how it sounds,” she added hastily, “and of course it’s not an actual, y’know, ‘hive mind.’ But they were pretty formidable then. How about now?”

  “You saw the note. They know things they have no business knowing.” I paused. “George had a good question.”

  “Goody,” he grumped.

  “How many times did you read that fucking file?”

  Thyme laughed. “Lots and lots. My only alternative was the new Stephen King book, and he’s been phoning it in since he kicked the coke and the booze.”

  “Ouch,” Michaela said mildly. “We have a book critic.”

  “So—and tell me if I’ve got this wrong—Opus was the idiot savant—”

  Now Michaela’s knife was pointing at Thyme’s face. “Savantism. You need to be up on all your politically correct terms for various mental and psychological malfunctions if you want to work here, Thyme.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” she replied in a tone of great respect. Since the tip of the knife was less than two inches from her nose, I was certain she meant it. She need not have worried. Michaela hardly ever cut people. “Okay, so … Opus was the one who had savantism. He couldn’t tell you what he had for breakfast, but he could add a stack of six-digit numbers in his head in all of four seconds.” Thyme shook her head. “That’s amazing. I need a calculator to add double numbers, for heaven’s sake.”

  “What was it Treffort said? The researcher? ‘Their minds were deep, but narrow.’” I must admit, I loved the elegance of that explanation. “Tracy, the middle triplet, has Asperger’s syndrome. Same family of disorder.”

  “Correct.” Michaela had pulled a celery bunch (Ugh! As my hero, Newman, would have said on Seinfeld, “Vile weed!”) from the fridge and was now rinsing it. Soon the thwacks would begin again. “A mild form of autism. But unlike autism, the person in question retains linguistic development.”

  “They just absolutely suck when it comes to reading social cues,” George added. He was steadily munching on the bananas our supervisor had chopped. I thought he was insane to put his hand so close to that knife every time he reached into the bowl, but it was not my concern.

  “Oh, ‘they’ do, do they?”

  Munch, munch. “Remember Jamison? Photographic memory, but he had to learn that when someone does this…” He showed us a ferocious smile, all teeth and malice and mashed banana. “… it means they are happy, it’s a smile. And when someone does this…” His scowl would have made a pregnant woman miscarry. “It’s a frown, it means they’re mad or sad or both. He had to be taught stuff that most people suck in with breast milk or formula or whatever-the-hell.”

  “Thank you so much for Asperger’s 101. The third triplet, Jeremy, had a stutter. But there was nothing wrong with his mind.”

  “Except for the whole serial killing issue,” I prompted.

  She shrugged. Now she was pulling the stalks of celery apart, the better to slice you with, my dear. “Correct. Yes, losing a third of their little … ‘hive mind,’ did you call it?” At Thyme’s nod, she continued. “It’s as good a term as any. So they’re damaged, certainly. But by no means neutered. They were all brilliant in their own way, and there’s still two of them. Jeremy and Tracy…” Michaela paused, then started thwacking the celery. “They’ll be formidable.”

  “So maybe they hacked into the JBJ file? Did Opus have clearance?”

  “No, he was the janitor. Uh, custodial engineer.” I hid a smile; Michaela normally did not make PC slips like that. “He never had clearance.”

  “Still. They know about it, which is a good trick given how the press has stayed out of it, more or less. And even if it had been in the press, how could they know Shiro would be working it?”

  “That,” Michaela said, “is a wonderful question. One I shall ponder for some time, you can be sure of that.”

  I thought about it. It seemed to me there was a pretty logical explanation … I could almost feel it. It was on the tip of my brain.

  “I need to think about this,” I told them, and left.

  chapter forty

  I blinked and saw I was in Michaela’s other office and, judging from the mounds of chopped fruit and vegetables, had been there about twenty minutes.

  “Okay. What’d I miss?”

  “Nothing.” George’s voice was muffled; he appeared to be devouring slices of banana as fast as Michaela had chopped them. Gross. “A big fat pile of nothing, that’s what you missed.”

  “May I see the note?” I knew, knew Shiro would have opened it. What FBI procedure? Yeah, right. For someone who insists everyone should obey rules, she flouted them an awful lot.

  “You won’t liiiiiiike it,” George warned with a mouthful of mush.

  “I didn’t like it before the envelope was opened.” I read it—I was still wearing Shiro’s evidence gloves—then carefully put it back down. Even with gloves, my fingers felt dirty after handling it. Greasy, even. You could pretty much feel the insanity crawling off the page. “Gross. And how do they know we’re working JBJ?”

  “That’s what we’re trying to figure out. It’s why you’re … back? Is that the right word, Cadence?” Emma Jan peered at me. “You’re back?”

  “I’m back. And not liking it much, either.” I didn’t like Emma Jan’s too-interested expression. I wondered if she looked at Shiro like that … like she was an interesting and slightly yucky lab experiment. “Great, they’re still fixated on us.”

  “You cannot be that surprised,” Michaela said mildly. She was chopping celery … yum! Nothing better than ants on a log … celery sticks smeared with peanut butter and then sprinkl
ed with raisins. Mmmm … ants on a log … when was lunch, anyway? Had I skipped it? Had I been someone else?

  “Surprised, no. But I had hopes that they’d turn themselves in or whatever.”

  George laughed at me.

  “Fine, call me naive.”

  “Naive! Naive!”

  I glared, for all the good it would do, which was none. “A girl can dream.” I, for example, dreamed of the day George would become a real boy. Oh, Blue Fairy, why have you forsaken BOFFO?

  “Shiro and I had a bet … she calculated there was a better than forty percent chance they’d kill themselves.”

  I didn’t say anything. I was too grossed out. Shiro had bet…? Had hoped, even? Ugh! Never. I’d never wish suicide on anyone. I didn’t like the remaining two of the trinity, but I didn’t wish that on anybody.

  And it doesn’t have a dang thing to do with my mother.

  It didn’t!

  “Assuming Tracy and Jeremy know their stuff, did they actually give us a worthwhile clue?” I asked.

  “Clue? Clue!” George hooted. “Oh my God, nobody says ‘clue’ anymore! Where’s your Sherlock hat and meerschaum pipe, Sherlock? Clue. Jesus.”

  Emma Jan picked up the hateful, hateful letter and read aloud: “‘We are thrilled to see you working the June Boys Jobs; you do have experience in these matters … need we remind you just what kind?’”

  “Why,” George demanded, “are you reading that to us?”

  She ignored him and continued (she was definitely a fast learner … too bad I just couldn’t warm up to her):

  “‘But we disapprove of JBK’s agenda; our murders were puzzle pieces you eventually put together. JBK’s murders are simply fuel for a blood-hungry malcontent.’”

  “Seriously. We all read this note, more than once, mere minutes ago.”