Chapter 13
ALL RIGHT. LET’S figure this out.”
Eleven A.M., the morning raw and gray, Kevin and Wyatt returned to the scene of the accident. The Audi Q5 had finally been removed. It had taken tow ropes, a pulley system and a great deal of swearing on the part of the state police, but they’d gotten the job done.
Now just the tangle of matted bushes, snapped twigs and dislodged boulders remained to show the vehicle’s careening path down the ravine. And of course, the tracks embedded in the mud next to the road. This is where Kevin and Wyatt now stood. Looking down to where it had gone, preparing to head back from whence it had come.
“We know Nicky’s credit card was used to purchase the bottle of scotch ten miles from here, around ten P.M. Wednesday night.”
“True,” Kevin agreed.
“But we have no eyewitness accounts that place her at the store.”
“Clerk claims it was too busy to remember one woman in particular.”
“And their security system turned out to be compromised.”
“When you rerecord over and over again on ancient discs, errors are bound to happen.”
“Meaning we know her or someone affiliated with her got the scotch.”
“E.g., the husband,” Kevin filled in.
“Just don’t love that man,” Wyatt said. “Three concussions seems less like accidents and more like a pattern to me. But the question remains, if the scotch was purchased around ten, then what?”
“He took the bottle home, liquored up his wife,” Kevin offered.
“Once she appears drunk enough . . . which turns out to be a lower threshold than the legal system dictates, but again, given her multiple concussions . . .”
“He probably assumed she was legally intoxicated.”
“He loads her into her car,” Wyatt continued.
“Drives her out to the middle of nowhere.”
“Or maybe to exactly somewhere,” Wyatt corrects. “To a spot with the proper grade of descent, ending in a sharp enough angle to the left, while being isolated enough from passing traffic; he can get out of the car, place his wife in the driver’s seat, then bump the gear into neutral and let gravity take over. Not just any stretch of road would do the trick. This would take some scoping out, preplanning.”
He and Kevin had now hoofed it to the top of the hill. From here, the forty-degree grade looked startlingly steep, especially given the yellow caution sign at the bottom, alerting motorists to the upcoming turn. Accidents on this stretch of road on a rainy night probably happened regularly enough. Meaning with just a little extra effort . . .
“I think he’d have to push the car,” Kevin said. “To get the kind of acceleration it would require to fly off the edge . . .”
Wyatt gazed down, conceded his detective’s point. “So Thomas positions his wife behind the wheel, puts on her seat belt then knocks the car into neutral. He’d have to move quick: No doubt the Audi is already starting to roll forward as he slams the door. Then he takes three quick steps back, adds his weight to the forward momentum.”
The two detectives pantomimed the deed. “Could definitely be done,” Kevin said.
“We should try to print the exterior rear of the vehicle,” Wyatt added, studying his open hands, poised instinctively to push.
“Plus the husband’s clothes, jacket,” Kevin said. “This time of year, cars aren’t very clean, especially in a storm. Might have gotten debris, mud, all over him.”
“How do you know the car will roll down in a straight line?” Wyatt asked. He studied the hill again, the way the road appeared to travel straight at first glance, except, upon further inspection, had a slight bend to the left, let alone a sloping grade to the right for runoff.
“Could try to tie something to the wheel to keep it straight,” Kevin said.
“We didn’t recover anything at the scene. Rope, scarf. As our dog handler pointed out, there weren’t any personal items in the car at all.”
“Maybe she held it.”
“Nicky?”
Kevin shrugged. “She’s half-drunk but the effects are magnified by the head injuries, someone sticks her behind the wheel of the car. Her husband says, hold the wheel . . . It’s not like she knows what’s going on. I could see her reflexively following orders. Of course, then the road turns and she doesn’t.”
“She might take her hands off, hold them in the air.”
According to Nicky’s medical records, she hadn’t sustained any damage to her thumbs, suggesting she hadn’t been holding on to the steering wheel when the airbag had deployed. Some drivers instinctively gripped tighter, as if that would save them. Others let go, a subconscious free fall. There was probably some Freudian interpretation in there somewhere; Wyatt only knew what he’d seen time and time again in auto accidents; a certain percentage of drivers let go, and a certain percentage of drivers didn’t.
“All right,” he picked back up. “It’s dark, it’s raining, the road’s deserted, Nicky’s incapacitated with scotch and an already twice-concussed brain. In this scenario, Thomas would have to physically move her from the passenger’s seat to the driver’s seat.”
Kevin shrugged. “Husband looks to be a strong guy. And his wife isn’t that big. Might not be the most graceful maneuver in the world, but I bet he could handle it. My question is, if Thomas Frank wants his wife dead, why fasten her seat belt? Odds are better if it’s off.”
“Force of habit? Doesn’t want the accident to appear too suspicious?”
“Woman’s got a fifth of scotch in the car. A drunk driver without a seat belt? Nothing suspicious there.”
Wyatt shrugged. “I don’t know. Clearly the guy isn’t a master criminal. I mean, if our theory is correct, this is the third accident he’s staged for his wife.”
“Assuming he was behind her first two falls.”
“Assuming he was behind her first two falls,” Wyatt agreed.
“We got a lot of assumptions here.”
“Which is why we’re walking through it. To see if some of these assumptions can lead us to some evidence. For example, now we know we should print the rear bumper to see if Thomas Frank’s fingerprints or, better yet, palm print is on it. While we’re at it, we should examine the seat-belt clasp and gear shift as well.”
“None of which proves anything. A husband’s fingerprints in his wife’s car.”
“Gives us grounds for a warrant to test his clothes. That might be more interesting.”
“Assuming he hasn’t washed them yet.”
Wyatt rolled his eyes. “Every now and then we do get lucky. What are the odds of reconstructing the Glenlivet bottle? Testing for prints on that?”
Kevin gave him a look. “Now who’s been watching too much TV?”
“Fine, then. What do you think happened here?”
“How’d he get home?” Kevin asked.
“I don’t . . .” Wyatt stopped, drew up short, seeing Kevin’s point.
“In this scenario,” his detective continued, “the husband drives his wife out here in the middle of a storm. Then puts her behind the steering wheel and shoves her down the hill. At which point, he does what? Walks thirty miles home in the rain?”
“Or flags down a ride,” Wyatt murmured.
“Which gives us a potential witness. Assuming, of course, a driver is going to stop and pick up a stranger on a dark and stormy night.”
“Someone would,” Wyatt said, because it was New Hampshire and people did still hitchhike. In fact, many of the locals hitchhiked, as good cars were expensive and not everyone had the kind of job where they could afford to buy their own set of wheels.
“But something like that would stand out,” Wyatt continued, musing out loud. “Be a major weakness in the plan. I mean, all we have to do is hold a press conference. Anyone pick up a guy in this area, around this time, on this night? If it was Thomas, how could he explain away being at the site of his own wife’s accident? I don’t think he’d leave something like that to chance.”
“So maybe he left a car parked nearby,” Kevin said. “His ride home.”
“Where?” Wyatt asked. “Closest gas station is a few miles back, and even then, same problem. How does he get home after parking that car? One way or another, someone would have to give him a ride from here to his house. Either sometime during the day on Wednesday, or later, during a severe rainstorm.”
“Phone a friend,” Kevin suggested. “Claim to have a flat, need a lift.”
“He says he doesn’t have any friends.”
“That’s one way to keep us from questioning them.”
Wyatt frowned. “I don’t like it,” he said bluntly. “As accidents go, staged or otherwise, this leaves too much to chance. What if the Audi veers off the road before it gathers enough speed? Why put on the seat belt if the whole point is to kill the wife? And what does the suspect do, after pushing his own ride down the hill? Walk home in the pouring rain?”
“He would have to have access to another vehicle,” Kevin agreed. “An accomplice.”
“Which brings us to an important question: Why would a controlling husband suddenly seek to harm his wife?”
“She met someone new, was threatening to leave him.”
“Or . . . ,” Wyatt prodded.
Kevin got it. “He met someone. Wanted to leave his wife, but not halve his assets.”
“Meaning maybe we’re not looking for a male friend. We’re looking for a woman. Who could’ve parked somewhere on the top of the hill. Headlights out, no one would notice the vehicle—and wait for her lover boy to get the job done.”
Neither of the detectives commented on what kind of woman would do that for a man; frankly they’d seen it too many times before.
“We should return to the gas station,” Wyatt said after another moment. “Pull their video footage from the last week. Study it for any vehicles that pass by multiple times in a short span of time. Say, because they’re scoping out the road—”
“Or it’s part of their regular commute.”
“Which will be easy enough to rule out during the follow-up interviews. We can also revisit the night in question. See if anyone was hanging out between four and six A.M. Particularly a female, in a nondescript sedan, waiting for a call from her lover.”
Kevin nodded. Not a fun plan; reviewing hours of grainy security video was much more difficult than a person might think. But it was a doable plan, and frankly, they needed traction.
“Still think the husband did it,” Kevin said as they climbed back into their vehicle. “But I don’t think we’ll find him on tape. Guy’s a pretty cool customer. Feels like the push down the basement stairs, the shove out the front door, were warm-up acts. Now he’s getting serious about things.”
“Then she shouldn’t have been wearing a seat belt,” Wyatt muttered.
Kevin didn’t answer. They drove in silence to the gas station, got back to work.