Death Sentences Read Online Free PDF

woman, or even a real person.
    Pursuing the source of the rumor turned up the name Miura.

    The rest was done on computer. They located the addresses for five persons named Miura Sachiko, which they had printed out only yesterday afternoon.
    There was a complete absence of data about one of them.
    That's precisely what bothered Sakamoto.
    There was something strange about that blank-or so he thought.
    Sakamoto concentrated on her.
    So it had begun.
    First he had had his staff check her records. They did it discreetly, of course.
    He himself waited for information from the wiretap.
    Confirmation had come at ten last night.
    She had received a call at her apartment.
    "Hey, it's me."
    It was a man. He didn't give his name.
    "Everything okay?" Miura Sachiko asked.
    "Yeah," he answered.
    They'd traced the call back to a pay phone at the college.
    "See you there at five, okay?" she said.
    "Are you sure everything's all right?"
    This time he sounded worried.
    "Sure ... right on track."
    "See you then."
    That was the end of it.
    It was hardly what you'd call a normal conversation.
    One of the squad had taken a quick spin to the college.
    Since it was the end of the fall term, only a handful of people were still there, grading papers.
    Sagara was one of them.
    The squad leader waited patiently for them to come out after work, snapped pictures of all six, and returned.
    In the meantime, they learned more about Sachiko and Sagara's affair.
    She had undergone a divorce in her twenties. She'd remained single since.
    After the divorce, Sachiko had found work at the college; it was her alma mater, and she had pulled some strings. Sagara was the one who had hired her.

    She had left the job a year and a half ago.
    She cited "personal reasons," but apparently her relationship with Sagara had become public knowledge.
    She moved into her current apartment.
    There was no way that her savings or pension could cover the price of that place.
    She must have been bought off.
    The two had completely severed ties. At least that's how it looked from the outside.
    Now, however, the two of them were clearly doing something together.
    This time it was a completely different sort of affair.
    Money, that was the only possible motive.
    Living high on her settlement money and pension, Miura Sachiko had known a period full of pleasures, even illicit ones. Before she realized it, there wasn't enough left for daily living expenses.
    She was already afflicted. A normal job was impossible.
    She had only two options for making money. She could sell her body, or she could share with others the very pleasures now eating away at her body.
    As things stood, the advance of the symptoms had restored her to an attractive twentysomething, but these days, with teenagers a dime a dozen, even her bout of youthfulness wouldn't bring in enough cash. She was, in fact, a woman in her forties. No matter how hard she tried, it was bound to show.
    That left her only the other option.
    As the wiretap made clear, the exchange between ex-lovers wasn't a matter of love for sale.
    Apparently, Sagara was also strapped for cash.
    Paying off Miura Sachiko was the start of his money problems, and his debts had been snowballing ever since.
    Their mutual desire for cash might well have made them all cozy and familiar again. This was largely guesswork on Sakamoto's part.

    He couldn't be far off, though. And if he were, it didn't much matter. Just about any motive would do.
    Last night-
    Some of his men had pushed for raiding her apartment right away. Sakamoto had stopped them, however. Something bothered him about the way she'd said that everything was "right on track." A screwup would get them nowhere. They could lose their grip on what really mattered, the stuff.
    For the same reason, they hadn't put anyone on Sagara.
    Clearly, Sagara hadn't received anything yet. If something made him jumpy, and the transaction didn't happen, it would slip through their fingers.
    They'd give him slack, and