“Frankie’s patient took this video. He was paranoid about what was happening to him, so he started recording the people he met. Frankie found Newman in this video. She didn’t think it was a coincidence, and neither do I. Newman’s involved.”

“This address she wrote down near the piers. Is it Newman’s?”

“His office,” Jason said.

“Where is she? Have you heard from her?”

“Yes, she talked to him this evening,” Jason said. “She says he’s planning something tonight. She’s going to follow him and see where he goes.”

33

33

Darren Newman finally left the warehouse after dark.

Two blocks away, Frankie spotted the lights of the candy-red Lexus as it backed into the empty street. The car shot toward her, and she ducked down into the passenger seat as its headlights swept across her windshield. When he was gone, she turned on her engine, did a U-turn, and followed him away from the pier.

He made a right turn, heading north. She struggled to keep a fix on his taillights in traffic. He drove for several blocks and then pulled into a Shell station. She parked across the street near an auto parts store and watched him from her window. The MUNI tracks divided the street between them. When he was done filling his gas tank, Darren wandered over to a beat-up Malibu parked on the cross street. The passenger window slid down, and Darren leaned inside. Frankie couldn’t see who was in the car, but Darren grabbed his wallet from a back pocket and peeled off several bills. He passed them to someone in the car and received a package in his palm that he quickly secreted in his pocket. He eyed the street and returned to his Lexus.

Drugs.

Frankie wondered what he’d purchased. Marijuana. Pills. Cocaine. Heroin. Or something that could be injected into a woman in a white room.

She pulled behind him as Darren left the gas station. Several blocks later, without a signal, he turned toward the water again. As she followed, she noticed a bar across the street named the Dogpatch Saloon. This was the downscale industrial neighborhood that was quickly being reborn as a hip arts community with yuppie condos.

It was also the neighborhood where Todd Ferris had twice awakened on the streets after his lost time.

Darren headed for the bay past a deserted construction site. Weeds grew out of the cracked street. Just ahead, the road narrowed and veered sharply to the right beside a ten-foot concrete retaining wall. She switched off her headlights, and her wheels rolled forward slowly. Where the street ended, the land near the bay opened up around her. A ruined factory loomed to her left. She saw broken windows punched out like missing teeth and metal walls dripping with rust. Directly ahead, she saw a field of boxy self-storage units protected by a tall fence.