"Pace, Miriam - Moving Violations" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pace Miriam)

-: Moving Violations :-


-Moving Violations- By Miriam Pace Published by Awe-Struck E-Books Copyright ©1999 ISBN: 1-928670-0-8 This book is- For my husband, Parker Pace, who has supported me for twenty-eight years through thick and thin with laughter and love. For my son, Jeffries Pace, who didn't mind when he spoke to me and realized I wasn't listening to him, but to the voices in my head. For my daughter, Miriam M. Stein, who brings me such joy and a new son-in-law, Peter. And lastly, for my mother, Miriam L. Gast, who helps me with my line edits. Without you, Mom, a lot of words would be misspelled.[Table] Chapter One
Jessica Savage maneuvered her motorized wheelchair through the maze of partitioned cubicles filling the cavernous office. A pile of legal briefs balanced precariously on her lap. Her wrist hurt as she held files steady with one hand while pressing the lever governing motor speed and direction of the chair with the other. A tendril of short black hair fell across her forehead. She blew upward to force it out of her eyes.
"Here's your mail, Jess," Randall Maxfield yelled as she passed his desk. He tossed her a stack of envelopes secured in a rubber band. His elbow brushed a pile of paper that cascaded toward the floor.
Jess caught her mail. "If you did your filing, your desk wouldn't be such a disaster area." Randall grinned.
She motored through the door to her office. The name Jessica Savage was discreetly stenciled in one corner of the glass inset in the doorframe. She had worked hard for her law degree and harder still as a prosecuting attorney in the District Attorney's Office for Orange County, California.
She glanced through her mail, stiffening at the sight of a long, white envelope, her name typed in capital letters on the surface. Handling the envelope by the edges, she carefully slit open the flap, and with thumb and forefinger carefully removed a single sheet of paper.
'Bang! Bang! You're dead,' was spelled out in large letters clumsily cut from a glossy magazine. The letters, different sizes and colors, radiated menace and hostility.
Jess' heart raced. Her breathing accelerated. A chill of terror, so intense, engulfed her till she thought she would scream. Closing her eyes against frightening images super-imposed over her vision, she took a deep breath to calm herself. Slowly, the panicked clenching in her chest eased.
"Jess?" Randall Maxfield leaned against the doorframe, a frown on his square, bulldog shaped face. "Is that another threatening letter?"
Jess nodded. Over the years, she'd received a number of threats, but none so horrifying as these. For the last month, the letters had appeared in the mail every few days. New threats added to old, each one a reminder that someone stalked her.
At first, Jess had ignored the letters, but as they continued she began to fear them. Each one sent a bolt of terror through her so strong she'd come to dread the simple delivery of her mail.
She struggled to control her voice. "I'd better call the police. Again."
The Orange County Sheriff's Department hadn't been able to do much. After analyzing the letters, cut from popular magazines and glued on paper sold at any stationery store, the cops had shrugged. The envelope, neatly typed on a typewriter identified as an old electric Smith Corona, had no fingerprints except those smudges left by the postal department and Jess. The stalker left no clues to give Jess hope that his, or her, identity might be discovered and the reign of terror ended.
"I just wish I knew why," Jess said.
"We all get threats, Jess. They're part of our job description. The cops will get this jerk."
"I hope so."
Randall left, shouldering past a secretary with yellow legal pads clutched to her bosom.
A man entered her office. He was tall and thin with a crooked mouth, sloping brown eyes and neatly trimmed red hair curling damply around his face as though he'd just gotten out of the shower.
"Mrs. Savage?" Tight-fitting black jeans hugged his thighs. Jess slid the briefs to her desk. Her office was tiny. Storage boxes piled neatly in the corners made the room seem even smaller. Windows overlooked the street. One wall held bookcases, the sagging shelves stuffed with the large legal tomes constituting every lawyers' library.
"I'm Jessica Savage," she said. "No one has called me Mrs. in a long time." Jessica's marriage had lasted five wonderful months. She'd expected the months to stretch into years and then decades. A drunk driver had ended the dream. Peter had died. Jessica had ended up in a chair.
"Excuse me, Ms. Savage."
"What can I do for you?" She lifted her chin. Defiance had become a part of her life. Aware of his assessing gaze and the way he frowned at her chair, she knew he wondered if she were competent. The general public seemed to think a physical handicap equaled a mental one. Jessica bristled.
One side of his mouth tilted slightly up in a wry smile. "I'm Sergeant Will McCready of the Sheriff's Department. My friends call me Mac." He flipped open his ID for her to look at, gripping it with callused hands, the fingernails neatly trimmed.
She glanced at the ID, reassured he was indeed who he said he was. He looked older, harder than the photo which stated his age as thirty-seven. He'd seen a lot of life since he'd last posed for a picture. She detected a haunted edge to his eyes, and a careworn, dispirited droop to his expressive mouth. Life had not been kind to Will McReady.
Jess said, "I'm not a friend." A more detailed study of him showed a faint bulge under one arm of his jacket--a holstered handgun.
Jess didn't like guns. She had seen the results of uncontrolled gun possession too often to have any sympathy with NRA idealistic narrow-mindedness.
Mac laughed, low and raw like a sore throat mixed with smoker's cough. "I didn't mean to suggest you are. I hope we can be, though. Friends, that is."
"Maybe."
His face was cool, stoical as though trying to decide how to respond to her handicapped status.
He settled for politeness. "May I sit down?" He glanced around for a chair.
Jess's office was usually neat, with papers filed, and folders returned to the file drawers. Recently, the stacks had gotten out of control, occupying every available surface, especially now when she had so many cases to juggle and too many distractions. She fretted over the lack of order. Her office wasn't messy, but the extreme tidiness she craved was currently missing and the clutter made her feel claustrophobic. The government thrived on paperwork; results seemed secondary.
"Just put those files on that table." Jess pointed at an empty spot near window. She leaned back in her chair, waiting for him to reveal his purpose.
Jess had learned long ago to wait. Her husband had been a man who had revealed himself to her slowly, like an onion peeled layer by layer. Something about this man reminded Jess of Peter, soft-spoken and gentle--a man at odds with his profession.
"I've been assigned your case." He settled down gingerly, stretching long legs out in front of him, hands resting lightly on the chair's arms. He flexed his fingers. He studied her as though trying to decide if he liked her.
Jess opened a side drawer and pulled out a clear plastic bag. Gently, she dropped threatening note and envelope into the bag, sealed it, and handed it to Sergeant McCready. "Here's an addition for your collection."
Cautiously, he accepted the bag and glanced at the letter, his frown increasing. Faint wrinkles fanned the edges of his eyes. "We've got quite a file started on this guy. I'm deeply sorry, Mrs. Savage. I know how frightened you must be feeling." His gaze flickered over her chair, the chrome chassis catching the light of the sun and reflecting it back, refracted against the walls.
"Sometimes I'm more angry than frightened, Sergeant. What I really want is for you to catch him, or her. I sometimes think it's a woman." Jess swept her hand at the note in the evidence bag. She hated the way this unknown individual made her feel vulnerable and helpless, a Peeping Tom interfering with her life, creating invisible barriers that kept her isolated and alone.
"That's why I'm here. The order came down from on high." He raised his eyebrows at her and looked skyward, the names of the 'powers that be' left unmentioned. "You've been given top priority. I'm assigned to you for the next week or two to see if we can figure out who's writing you these nasty notes."
"You mean you have no idea yet," Jess said caustically. "Your people went through my files weeks ago." They'd turned her life upside down and inside out looking for clues and made a mess, too.
Sergeant McCready flushed, then offered her a disarming smile. "You've been with the D.A.'s office for six, seven years. You've tried a lot of cases and made quite a few enemies. The Department has been following up on what they found and narrowed their leads to three possibilities."
"Only three!" Exhausted, the adrenaline rush ended, she slumped.
He opened a briefcase, put the evidence bag inside and drew out a manila folder. "Do you remember Alphonse Piaget?"
Jess remembered and shuddered at the hatred the man had aimed at her when she'd successfully won a conviction.
Sgt. McCready continued, his eyes moving over the folder's contents. "He escaped from the Men's Colony in San Luis Obispo two days ago and is still at large."
"I've been receiving these letters for nearly a month." Jess frowned. "The prison authorities wouldn't just let him mail them from prison. Don't they monitor the inmates mail?"
He ran his hand through his hair. "Yes they do, but Alphonse could have gotten someone else to compose the letters and mail them."