Fatal Reaction

for. Childress arrived at eight fifty-six in the morning, and he swiped out at three thirty-two in the afternoon.”
    “Does anybody remember seeing him leave?”
    “No. But the guard who was doing duty at the security desk said that wasn’t necessarily unusual, especially if he didn’t have a briefcase or any other kind of bag that needed to be checked out.”
    “What time was his flight to Boston supposed to leave?”
    “Five-ten.”
    “That’s cutting it close. I would have guessed he was the kind of guy who liked to get to the airport early. I know things were sort of crazy with the big breakthrough in the crystallography lab, but everyone was pretty well out of there by quarter to two. So I guess the question is, what was he doing between one forty-five and three thirty-two?”
    “Well, for one thing he called my operative and told her all about his big discovery.”
    “What time?”
    “She doesn’t remember exactly, but she says she thinks somewhere around two.”
    “Maybe there were other people he called as well.”
    “The cops’ll subpoena the company’s phone records if they think it’s important.”
    “Do you?”
    “Maybe. Maybe not. But I’ll tell you a couple of things they’re definitely going to want to know.”
    “What?”
    He ticked them off on his fingers. “They’re going to want to know what happened to his car. It’s not in the lot and it’s not at his house. They found his plane ticket to Boston in the pocket of his pants, but so far his keys haven’t turned up. They’re also going to want to know what happened to his ID card. They looked everywhere for it, and it didn’t turn up.”
    “Anything else?”
    “Yeah. They’re going to want to know why he was naked.”
     

CHAPTER 26
     
    Mother was unable to join us at the Everest Room for dinner that night. The Art Institute was having their quarterly trustees meeting. It had been scheduled months ago, and Mother had no choice—they were voting on the budget, and she had to go. As I drove downtown to the restaurant I could not remember a time, not even when I was a little girl, when I felt like I needed her more.
    I told myself it was just lack of sleep. After all, I’d worked on cases, some of which had dragged on for months, that were so emotionally difficult they made finding a dead body in the freezer look like a harmless April Fools’ joke. Staying unruffled was what I got paid the big bucks for.
    There was no denying I was irritated with myself. I’d had clients throw furniture, break down in tears, and start throwing punches—and I’d never taken any of it personally. After all, when you came right down to it, it was always the client’s ass that was on the line—not mine. But as much as I’d believed I would be able to keep our business and professional lives separate, I had to confess I was feeling not only furious with Stephen, but hurt as well.
    Stephen hadn’t spoken to me since our argument that morning outside the cold room. Not one single word. At lunch he’d taken pains to ignore me and when I’d come to his office after we’d shoveled the Japanese into their limos and sent them on their way, he’d actually gotten up and closed the door in my face. This was petty, junior-high-school stuff, but after what I’d done for him—-coming to work on the Takisawa deal full time, trying to squeeze in work for my clients at night and on the weekend, putting myself into my mother’s debt in order to enlist her help on his behalf—I felt I deserved better.
    On the passenger seat beside me was the folder with Mother’s explicit instructions regarding the night’s arrangements, including a copy of the contract with the restaurant spelling out the menu, and a seating chart she’d faxed over to Cheryl, who’d in turn faxed it out to Oak Brook for me. I was hoping the arrangements had all been carried out according to plan. Otherwise I was going to have to give Mother’s recipe for catharsis— chewing out the catering staff—a try.
    I pulled up to One Financial Plaza, the gleaming home of the Mid-America Commodity Exchange, behind the Board of Trade Building on LaSalle Street. Ignoring the bemused expression of the valet at the sight of my car— this was Bentley and Testa Rossa territory—I handed over my keys and took the exterior escalator to the entrance of the building. Walking through the lobby to the bank of express elevators that would whisk me to the fortieth floor, I could not fault