I knew Louis well, and it didn’t take long for him to break his silence about the case. It also didn’t take him long to conclude that Jenni’s death was nothing more than what it had appeared to be—a hit-and-run. Just as that man on the CD, the Planner, had intended.
Parnell’s final report concluded that Jenni had been walking through the Hennepin County Medical Center parking ramp and had been hit by a yellow Toyota Corolla. He knew the make, model, and color of the car because of paint transfer on Jenni’s clothing and part of a headlight that remained behind. I don’t think Parnell spent all that much time looking for the car, and I don’t believe he lost too much sleep over not finding it. I didn’t fault him for that. His efforts didn’t matter, because I had been looking for that car. Nights and weekends. An obsession at first, but as months turned into years, it took on the pattern of a hobby—walking through junkyards and randomly stopping by body shops, leaving my card wherever I went.
Then, four months ago, I found the car—or rather the car found me. An anonymous envelope with a cryptic note and storage-room key sent me, once again, into the night in search of the yellow Corolla. And, by God, this time I found it—me—the husband. I was responsible for the break in the case. I was the one moving the game pieces forward. And still, I was the one who was once again frozen out of the investigation—reprimanded for sticking my nose where it didn’t belong.
Like a dutiful Boy Scout following the rules, I turned my evidence over to my commander—well, maybe I didn’t follow all the rules. I had come too far to pay attention to needless roadblocks. So, I kept the clone file. I got my ass chewed when Commander Walker found out that I’d taken the file home; he had to do it, but he never asked if I’d made a copy. I always figured Walker didn’t want to know. He was a good man that way.
The second file, the Kroll file, was another story all together. When he handed the file to me, Boady told me, flat out, that he had secreted it out of the office of a dead attorney named Ben Pruitt. Boady had been placed in charge of resolving the dead man’s cases and client funds. Sanden would lose a great deal if his deed ever came to light. Friend or not, that would be a line I’d never cross.
I turned my attention first to the Ray Kroll file and read that he was a small-time criminal who graduated to the big leagues by bashing a guy’s head in with a brick. I had never heard of Ray Kroll, nor could I remember Jenni ever mentioning the guy’s name. Yet his file held the key to Jenni’s death. It was in Kroll’s file that Boady found the CD of the telephone conversation.
I laid the contents of the two files out across the tables, separating stacks of police reports, witness transcripts, pictures. There were some pictures, however, that would remain tucked away in a sealed folder. When I took Jenni’s hit-and-run file to the copy center, I gave the clerk instructions to place all the photos of her body into a special folder and tape the edges shut. I had never looked at those pictures, and I never would, unless it became gun-to-the-head important. I had enough nightmares without having to wrestle with those images.
There were nights when I dreaded closing my eyes, knowing how my Freudian cup had runneth over. Usually, those dreams didn’t start off all that bad. In fact, they often began in a world where Jenni and I had been happy, sitting on the porch and playing gin rummy or wading through the shallows up at the cabin. I liked that part of the dream, but that part never lasted. Soon the sky would grow black and the air cold and Jenni would be ripped away from me. The dream that came to me most often involved a pack of wolves, their eyes glowing, their teeth long, silver, and dripping with appetite. In their snarls I could hear the whisper of Jenni’s name, and in their eyes I saw my condemnation for having failed her.
But now I had Kroll’s file and the CD. I knew about the Planner, the Henchman, and the Boss. The time had come to go on the hunt.
I did an Internet search for Raymond Kroll and Ray Kroll and R. Kroll. The man had done a pretty good job of living under the radar. I had his date of birth and address, so I could weed through the Ray Krolls who had nothing to do with my investigation. I found his mug shot; but, more than anything, I wanted to hear his voice, compare it to the voices on the CD. If only he had made a YouTube video or something. But I found nothing.
I went back to the paper reports on my table, poring over them until my eyelids became heavy and my mind thick. I fought to keep sleep at bay, as though calling a halt to my work that night might make it all disappear, nothing more than a hallucination born of my desperation.
When I finally went to bed, I found myself floating in an unfamiliar calm, a strange concoction of equal parts wariness and excitement. Yet one final thought kept me from nodding off. Everything I had in my possession, all of my evidence, had been pilfered. None of it came through legal channels. None of it would be admissible in a trial—a small detail that would undoubtedly grow into one of those insurmountable problems.
How would I explain the CD? I had the voices of the men who killed my wife, but no jury would ever hear them. I couldn’t say that a friend of mine stole a file from another attorney’s office. Boady would lose his license to practice law, and that would only be the start. In the end, the evidence would get kicked out and the killers would walk away free. I may end up uncovering the truth about what happened to Jenni, but those men who plotted and carried out her murder would never be convicted in a court of law.
I tried to put that minor wrinkle aside and get some sleep. I felt oddly hopeful as I meandered between wake and sleep, ready to take on those demons that prowled in the darkest fissures of my subconscious. Maybe tonight would be the night that I would stop the wolves. Then, as I was about to fall asleep, a new thought brought me back from the deep dark. This thought was not calming; it made my heart thump inside my chest. Fear? Excitement? I wasn’t sure, to be honest.
Yes, it was undeniable that this evidence would never be admissible at trial. But it struck me that there would be no trial if the wolves were dead.
CHAPTER 4
Up North
The man is stirring. He’s trying to speak, but the garbles that stumble from his mouth make no sense. I should tie him up while he’s still in this state of tranquil befuddlement. I take off my gloves and unbuckle my snow pants to get to the belt on my blue jeans. I’m on my knees, pushing through the snow, shuffling around him until I’m above his head. I lift his shoulders to sit him upright.
He mutters something unintelligible.
I pull his arms back and wrap my belt around his elbows, buckling them behind his back.