Supersymmetry

CHAPTER 11

Halfway through their quesadillas, Messinger’s phone rang. She made a terse reply, and hung up. “We’ve got to go.”

“What is it?”

“They found your sister’s car.” Messinger stood. “Are you coming?”

“Yes. Absolutely.”

“Not as a cop,” Messinger qualified.

Sandra frowned. “If I’m a suspect, you can’t hold me. You can’t make me go anywhere.”

“I’m not making you,” Messinger said. “I’m asking you to come, as an expert witness, to help with the investigation.”

“Okay,” Sandra said. “I’m in.”

They abandoned the rest of their meal and got back into the cruiser. It had grown dark outside while they were eating. Sandra thought Messinger might just leave her, or else drop her at the station first, but she turned south instead. Messinger was choosing to trust her. It meant that she believed her story, at least to a point.

They stopped outside a Dunkin’ Donuts that was already crawling with cops. The CSI van was there, and cops were routing traffic away from the block. Sandra’s stomach turned over. What if Alex was dead? Messinger hadn’t said very much on the drive. What if she had brought her here to identify Alex’s body?

They approached the car. There were floodlights on it from several angles, and a man was laser scanning the steering wheel for fingerprints.

“Does this belong to your sister?” Messinger asked.

Sandra nodded, not trusting herself to speak. Finally, she asked, “Is she dead?”

Messinger looked up, confused. “What? Oh—no. At least, not that I know of. We haven’t found a body.”

Sandra felt a rush of relief, and at the same time, a flood of pure anger at Alex for putting her through this. What on earth had she been thinking, to help reproduce the same technology that had nearly killed them before?

“Were there any cameras?” Sandra asked.

Messinger made a sour face. “No. The cameras in the Dunkin’ Donuts are just fakes to deter thieves. We’re tracking credit cards to find customers who may have been here at the time, to see if they have viewfeeds, or just remember seeing something. Anyone paying in cash will be practically impossible to track down.”

Sandra thought about the route her sister would have taken driving here from the NJSC. She would have crossed over to Pennsylvania on either the Walt Whitman bridge or the Commodore Barry bridge, either one of which would have brought her to I-95. She could have been heading home to their parents’ house, but that wouldn’t have required getting off at this exit. It seemed unlikely she would have stopped just for a doughnut.

“She was meeting someone,” Sandra said.

“What makes you say that?”

“She ditched her car here. If she wanted public transportation, she could have gotten off at the airport instead. It would have taken us a lot longer to find the car, and she could have taken a bus, train, or taxi practically anywhere. There’s no public transportation here, so either she’s on foot in a poor neighborhood where she knows no one, or else she left in someone else’s car.”

Messinger nodded. “Can you think of any friends for whom this would be a likely meeting place?”

“Not at all. It doesn’t make any sense.”

Sandra peered into the back seat of the car, careful not to touch anything. It was pristine, without a receipt or gum wrapper or discarded grocery bag in sight. That was typical Alex, neat to a fault. For a moment, Sandra’s vision swam. She could still see the car in front of her, but at the same time, she saw a stern woman, short and overweight, peering through a gate. She recognized her: Marta Gonzales.

The sensation of having seen Marta was strong. Years ago, before the two copies of her father had resolved into one person again, each of his selves had seen glimpses of what the other was seeing. Was that what was happening? Was she seeing through Alex’s eyes?

The thought was terrifying. It was an unwelcome reminder of the fact that she and Alex were two versions of the same person and might someday resolve again into a single individual. No satisfactory explanation had ever been made as to why their probability wave had never resolved, and that meant there was no reason she knew of why it might not collapse at any moment.

Neither of them knew exactly what would happen if their wave collapsed. Their father had spent weeks split into two people, and when they combined again, he retained many of the memories from both versions, but not all. The real problem was not just the memories, however, but the personality, the sense of identity, the sense of self. Sandra was not Alex, and she didn’t want to become her, not even a little bit. It was part of what had prompted her to spend less time around Alex, to minimize the overlap in their experiences.

But the vision had been clear, and she was pretty sure it wasn’t just her imagination. It made sense, now that she thought about it. Alex wouldn’t have wanted to leave her car at the mission, because the police would be looking for it. From here, it was a long walk to Salt and Light, but it was doable. And Marta would certainly take her in.

“Do you see anything else?” Messinger said. “Anything missing or out of the ordinary?”

Sandra shook herself, as if waking from a dream. “No,” she said. “Nothing jumps out at me.”

“All right. I’ll drop you back at the station, and you can take a cruiser home.”

They drove to the district station in silence. Halfway there, Messinger took a call. She listened for a while, and then said, “That was confirmation from DNA. The body found at the stadium was your father.”

Sandra nodded, unable to speak. Tears stung her eyes, and a hard ball formed in her throat. The last time she had seen him, she had walked out in irritation because he had called her Alex instead of Sandra. It seemed so petty now. All she had ever wanted was his approval. For him to look at her in admiration like he did Alex, or to get that excited gleam in his eyes when she suggested some new physics conundrum.

Despite that, she had always known he loved her. She would miss him desperately. She would have to call Claire and tell her, and somehow they would have to get the word to Sean in Poland. She imagined him in that distant country, hearing such dreadful news without any family members nearby. Would they give him leave to fly home for the funeral?

They pulled into the parking lot of the police station. Messinger pointed to a black sedan and made an exasperated noise. “Mr. Black Suit got here ahead of us,” she said.

“You mean Liddle?” Sandra said.

“That’s the one.”

As they drove past the sedan, Sandra could see Liddle himself standing there, and another cop helping a woman out of the back seat. It was her mother.

Sandra opened the door, heedless of the fact that it was still moving, and jumped out. Messinger called after her, but she didn’t stop. “Mom!” she called.

Her mother turned. Her beautiful long hair was loose, curling around her shoulders and arms, and her face was red and streaked with tears.

Sandra went to embrace her.

“Keep them apart,” Liddle barked, and the other cop, a man Sandra knew and had talked Philadelphia sports with over coffee, stepped forward with a cold expression to block her way.

“She’s my mother,” Sandra protested.

Messinger jogged up to join them, and Liddle glared at her. “Detective, get this woman away from here.”

Messinger took Sandra’s elbow, but Sandra shook her off. “I just want to see my mom. There’s no law against that.”

“The easy way, or the hard way,” Messinger said in low tones.

Sandra growled in frustration. “I’ll be back soon, Mom,” she called. “It’s going to be all right.”

She allowed Messinger to lead her away. “Sorry about that,” Messinger said. “But you know we can’t have you talking to her.”

“I don’t know any such thing. She’s not under arrest, and as far as I know, neither am I. We should both be free to walk out of here if we want.”

Messinger shrugged. “Maybe. But practically, we can hold you for twenty-four hours if we feel you’re interfering with the investigation or withholding crucial evidence. And we need to talk to your mother before you do.”

“What do you think I’m going to do, threaten her to keep her mouth shut? Feed her a story?”

“I don’t know you, Miss Kelley. I don’t know what you’re going to do. But we need to talk to her before she talks to anyone else.”

The clouds were low, and a strong wind was picking up. “My father is dead,” she said. “You saw his body for yourself. Isn’t that enough?”

“That doesn’t stop the investigation. The blast originated from his seat. We have to question everyone who knew him or saw him recently. Besides—his car was found at his house, not at the stadium. Somebody must have driven it home.”

“I told you—”

“I know what you said,” Messinger said. “It doesn’t matter. We have to investigate.”

Sandra thought about Alex and the Salt and Light mission. Was she afraid? Did she have a plan? Sandra didn’t know why she hadn’t told Messinger to look there for Alex, but she realized now that she didn’t trust the Philadelphia police department to investigate this mystery. There was too much going on, too much that was beyond their ability to understand. Even if the police did find Alex, they might not believe her story, and they certainly wouldn’t let Sandra talk to her. The only way Sandra was going to understand what was going on was if she found Alex herself.

She stopped walking. Messinger kept going for a few steps before turning to look at her.

“Am I free to go?” Sandra asked.

Messinger hesitated. “You are. But don’t go far.”

“I won’t,” Sandra said. But she didn’t mean it. She planned to go as far as it took to get some answers. She was on her own now. They didn’t trust her to be a cop, and she didn’t trust them with her family. Sandra didn’t know what next steps the police would take, but she knew one thing. She would find Alex before they did.