The Cold Nowhere

39

Under cover of clouds, night fell like a stone.

The cold air resurrected winter, and wet April snow descended in streams from the black sky. He could hear its quiet hiss outside the open garage. Under the shelter of the roof, he could barely see the pines that grew near the old house, and the rural highway was empty.

It was safe to move.

He climbed into the Charger and revved the powerful engine. He backed down the rutted driveway, tires crunching, until he reached the highway. Martin Road was in the far north of the city. Most of the terrain around him was desolate woodland. The snow was heavy; soon it would cover his tire tracks and leave a virgin bed between the trees.

He turned right. In the mirror behind him, his tires kicked up a white cloud like a tornado. For four miles, he didn’t see another soul. When he finally saw headlights he slowed, but the other vehicle was nothing more than bright eyes behind a curtain of snow. He reached Rice Lake Road and turned south toward the city. Traffic thickened, but to anyone other than the police, a black Dodge Charger was just another cool sports car. He felt secure as he closed in on the urban corridor. Cars around him slipped and slid through the intersections, and he was careful to give them plenty of space. He couldn’t afford an accident.

He kept a tight grip on the wheel. His hands were covered in hospital gloves, and he wore leather gloves on top of those. His hair was completely covered by a wool cap. He was conscious of everything that might shed from his body. Every cough. Every flake of dry skin. Every mucus dribble from his nose. The odds of the Duluth Police recovering trace evidence from the vehicle for a DNA match were slim. This was the real world, not CSI. He was cautious anyway.

The steep downtown streets, when he reached them, belonged in San Francisco, not in the Midwest winter. He glided downhill, coasting through yellow lights, keeping an eye for patrol cars. This was the place where cops congregated, the place where he stood the greatest chance of being seen. Every cop was looking for a dark Dodge Charger. If the plates didn’t match, it wouldn’t matter. They’d follow anyway. They might even pull him over and spot the bloodstains on the leather interior. He couldn’t let that happen.

He held his breath, but the storm gave him cover. He passed through the hub of downtown and crossed over the interstate toward Canal Park. Like a ghost in the snow, he took the back street to the lift bridge and across to the finger of the Point.

It was three miles to Stride’s house.

*

‘We have to find Dory,’ Stride told Cat.

The girl sat cross-legged on one of the twin beds in the small room facing the street. She squeezed the gold chain around her neck between her fingers. ‘I don’t know where she is. I don’t understand any of this. You found the knife that killed Kim in Dory’s room?’

‘Yes, we did.’

‘I don’t know how it got there.’

‘Did you open the bottom drawer of the dresser?’ Stride asked her. ‘Did you look inside?’

‘I can’t remember. I don’t think so. I didn’t put the knife there. Really, I didn’t.’

‘What about Dory?’ Serena asked from the other twin bed in the room. ‘Could she have had the knife?’

‘No, why would Dory hurt Kim?’ Cat said. ‘She wouldn’t do that.’

Stride stood over her. She was scared to see his face dark with suspicion and concern. She felt his distance. He was the same as everyone; he didn’t trust her anymore.

‘Maybe you’re right,’ he said, ‘but we need to talk to her right away. Dory’s sick. You know that. Drugs can change people in terrible ways.’

‘She always told me she was a bad person,’ Cat said, ‘but not like this. She wouldn’t do this.’

Serena got up from the bed. She knelt in front of Cat and stroked her hair. Serena was strong; there was something about her that drew Cat in the way a mother would. A connection. A need.

‘Cat, listen to me. I know she’s your aunt. I know you love her, but you have to think about this very carefully. Is it possible that something could be wrong with her? Is it possible she could be violent?’

Oh, Dory. Tell me it’s not true.

‘I – I don’t think so.’

‘You don’t sound sure,’ Serena said softly.

‘I am. I’m sure. Dory didn’t do this. Neither did I.’

Stride sat down on the bed beside her. ‘We don’t believe you did, Cat.’

She hooded her eyes from both of them. ‘I know I’ve lied sometimes. I’ve kept things from you, and I’m sorry. I’m not lying now. Someone else is making this happen.’

Stride slid a photograph from his pocket and held it front of her. ‘Do you know this man?’

She stared at it. He was one of those middle-aged men who leered at her, like hundreds of other men. They were all the same, but he looked familiar. ‘I think I’ve seen him on television. Who is it?’

‘His name is Leonard Keck,’ Stride said.

‘Oh, Lowball Lenny. The car guy. Yeah, I’ve seen his commercials. When you’re looking for a deal, Lowball It! That’s him, right?’

‘That’s him. Have you ever met him?’

‘In person? No.’

‘Are you sure?’

Cat stared at the photo again. ‘Pretty sure.’

‘You never had sex with him? He was never a … customer?’

Her eyes widened. ‘No!’

‘You told me once you don’t usually look at their faces. Is it possible you don’t remember him?’

‘Well, I try to forget faces, but him, I’d know him. I wouldn’t forget. I never slept with him.’

Stride stood up again, and Cat thought he looked disappointed.

‘Do you think he did this?’ Cat asked. ‘Is he the one who’s trying to hurt me?’

‘I don’t know,’ Stride said. ‘I thought you might know something that could be a threat to him.’

‘I really don’t think I’ve ever met him,’ Cat said. ‘I’m sorry if that’s the wrong thing.’

Serena stood up, too. ‘Don’t be sorry. If you never met him, that’s good.’

Cat nodded. ‘Okay.’

‘If you need anything, we’ll be right outside,’ Stride said. ‘Try to get some sleep.’

Cat reached for Serena’s hand. ‘Will you still take me to see Dr. Steve in the morning?’

Serena smiled. ‘I promise.’

The two of them left her in the bedroom and closed the door. Cat wasn’t tired, but she turned off the light. She preferred the darkness; she could hide inside it. On the other side of the window, snow danced in the wind. She climbed off the bed and stared outside. The grass was already white.

She opened the window and squeezed her head and shoulders into the night air. She wore a pink sweatshirt and pajama bottoms, and her feet were snug inside slippers. Snowflakes made moist drops on her cheeks. She felt them in her hair. A couple of houses had turned on their holiday lights, making the neighborhood look like Christmas again. Not far away, a dog barked; it was small, with a tiny yipping howl, like a terrier pretending to be a Great Dane. It made her smile.

Cat looked at the ground and her smile bled away.

Beneath her window, there were footprints in the snow.





40

‘I got a head start,’ Brooke told Maggie, holding up a glass of white wine that was nearly empty. ‘This is my second glass. I’m already a little buzzed.’

Maggie slid into the booth beside her. ‘I’ll catch up.’

They were at Black Woods on the north end of London Road. It was Brooke’s favorite spot. Maggie found her eyes drawn to an empty table for two near the window. She knew from her investigation that it was the table where Kim Dehne had spent Saturday evening with Cat. Her last evening.

‘Bad day?’ Brooke asked, watching the frown on Maggie’s face.

‘I have an uncanny knack for screwing up my life.’

Brooke pushed her straight blonde hair back behind her ear. ‘Don’t we all?’

The waitress brought Maggie a matching glass of Pinot Grigio, and Maggie finished half the glass with her first swallow. ‘I started the day by accusing my boss of murder.’

Brooke choked on a slice of pepper-seared ahi. ‘What?’

‘I saw a video of one of Cat’s sessions with Roslak,’ Maggie said. ‘He tried to bring her back to the night her parents were killed. She made it sound like someone was there when Marty killed Michaela. That Marty didn’t necessarily pull the trigger on himself.’

‘That’s crazy.’

‘Yeah, well, I let my mouth get ahead of my brain and asked Stride whether he did it. Stupid. Mostly, I’m just pissed off at him. Plus, Serena’s back in town. That doesn’t help.’

‘Big surprise,’ Brooke said. ‘You had to see that coming.’

‘I know. It shouldn’t bug me, but it does. I’m letting it get in the way of my new thing, too.’

‘Yes, I hear you’re dating a cop,’ Brooke said, but when she saw Maggie slam down her glass of wine, she blanched. ‘I’m sorry, babe, is that supposed to be a secret? Because everyone knows.’

‘Damn that Guppo,’ Maggie said. ‘Do you remember Ken McCarty?’

‘Sure.’

‘He and I have been hooking up.’

Brooke’s face registered her disapproval. ‘I’m not trying to interfere, but you don’t exactly have a winning track record with men.’

‘No, you’re right.’ Maggie finished her wine just as the waitress brought a second glass. ‘Listen, I need your help on something. We’re hearing about an upper-crust prostitution ring in the city. Guys with money. Kind of like the Nice Guys ring in Minneapolis a few years back. You know, lawyers and execs who are willing to pay for high-end girls.’

‘Not too many high-end girls at my place,’ Brooke said.

‘I’m thinking about college girls who need the money,’ Maggie told her. ‘Anyone like that drop in for an STD test?’

‘Sure, but most of them don’t give us a name.’

Maggie frowned. ‘How about Lowball Lenny? Any rumors about him paying for upscale girls?’

‘Lenny?’ Brooke seemed genuinely shocked. ‘Where did you hear his name?’

‘He hosted a party on the Frederick. Cat was there, along with some other girls. Paid companionship.’

‘Yeah, I knew about the party. The girls were talking about it last week. I didn’t hear Lenny’s name. I can’t believe he’d risk getting caught up in a scandal like that.’

‘The cock wants what the cock wants,’ Maggie said.

‘Why the interest?’ Brooke asked. ‘What’s going on?’

‘Margot Huizenfelt may have been digging into this prostitution ring when she disappeared.’

‘And you think she got too close?’

‘Maybe. Except now we have a new problem.’

‘What’s that?’

‘Dory Mateo,’ Maggie said.

Brooke put her glass down, and her brow furrowed with concern. ‘Dory? What about her?’

‘I found a knife in her room that was used in one of the murders last weekend.’

Brooke’s long, slim fingers covered her mouth. ‘Oh, my God, no.’

‘She was also one of the last people to see Margot alive.’

‘Dory’s not a murderer,’ Brooke said.

‘Then why is she running? She left the Seaway in a big hurry. No one’s seen her since.’

‘I – I saw Dory last night. She was scared. She thought someone was coming after her.’

Maggie scowled at Brooke. ‘Why the hell didn’t you call me?’

‘She was strung out. I didn’t believe her. She wasn’t making any sense.’

‘What did she say?’

‘She heard about Margot disappearing. She was afraid she was next.’

‘Next? Why?’

Brooke hesitated. ‘I can’t – I can’t say. Dory’s my friend.’

Maggie curled her fingers tightly around Brooke’s wrist. The woman’s skin was warm, and her pulse raced. ‘Brooke, if you think you’re protecting Dory, you’re not. You’re just making it worse.’

‘I’m telling you, she was paranoid because of the drugs. She had it in her head that Margot disappeared because of something Dory told her. I told Dory she was wrong. There was no connection. There couldn’t be, not after all this time.’

‘What did Dory tell Margot?’ she asked.

‘I shouldn’t say anything. It’s not my place. You need to ask her about it.’

‘Goddamn it, Brooke, I’m asking you. What did Dory tell Margot?’

Brooke stared at the table. Her pretty face was beet red. ‘It was years ago. It has nothing to do with today. Dory hated herself for it.’

‘Tell me.’

‘It was just before her sister was killed,’ Brooke said. ‘Dory needed money for drugs. She was desperate. He knew she’d do anything for cash, so he – he paid her for sex. She never forgave herself.’

‘Who? Who paid her?’

‘Marty,’ Brooke said. ‘It was Marty. Dory slept with him.’

*

The footsteps led away from her window. Where they ended, Cat saw Dory in the middle of the lawn. She held a cigarette in one hand, and her other hand was wrapped around her stomach. The smoke from the cigarette mingled with the steam she exhaled into the cold air.

Cat squirmed out of the bedroom window and dropped to the ground. The snow was slick under the rubber soles of her slippers. She slid like a skier across the lawn to her aunt and threw her arms around her.

‘Dory! I’m so glad you’re okay!’

Dory hugged her back limply, and Cat saw that her aunt’s face was as pale as the snow, with tears making icy streaks on her cheeks. Dory’s eyes were bloodshot. Her entire body trembled.

‘Oh, my God, what’s wrong?’ Cat asked.

Dory’s lips had trouble forming the words. Her voice slurred. ‘I had to talk to you.’

‘You’re freezing, come inside.’

‘No! I’m going away. It’s better for you if I leave town for good.’

‘Are you kidding? Don’t talk like that, Dory.’

Dory put her bare hands on Cat’s cheeks, and her fingers were cold and wet. A sad, crooked smile played on her aunt’s face. ‘I wanted to see you before I left.’

‘Please come inside. Let me help you.’

‘No. I can’t.’

Cat’s heart filled with worry. ‘Dory, you didn’t do something bad, did you? Tell me you didn’t. They found a knife in your room. It was covered in blood.’

‘A knife? In my room?’

‘It was the knife that killed the woman I was with. Did you – did you hurt her?’

‘I didn’t! Cat, how could you think that?’

Dory held out her hands to embrace her, but Cat recoiled. All she could see in her head was the image of the knife. And blood. Blood everywhere. Blood making a spider on the floor. It was so vivid that her stomach churned, as if she were about to be sick.

‘You have to believe me, I didn’t!’ Dory insisted. ‘I would never put you in danger. You know that. The only thing I’ve ever wanted is to protect you. To rescue you. That’s what Michaela would want.’

‘But Dory, the knife—’

‘Someone put it there! Someone was in my room waiting for me. That’s why I ran.’

Cat wanted to believe her. She’d sworn to Stride and Serena that Dory was innocent, but she would have said that even if it weren’t true. Dory was her only family. You didn’t betray family. If they needed your life, you gave it to them.

‘If you didn’t do anything, then tell Stride what happened,’ Cat said. ‘If you run, he’ll think you’re guilty.’

‘It doesn’t matter what anybody thinks. I just want to get as far from this place as I can. Somewhere warm. Somewhere where the past doesn’t exist anymore.’

‘What about me?’ Cat asked. ‘You’d leave me alone? What would I do without you?’

Dory held out a hand. ‘Come with me.’

‘What?’

‘Come with me. Listen to me, Catalina. The two of us, we can go together. We’ll be safe. No one will ever find us. Can’t you see it, you and me starting over? It would be like nothing ever happened before. We can forget all the people who have hurt us. Forget them! Like they never existed!’

Go away. Escape for ever.

Cat wanted to say yes. A fresh start, a new life, sounded like paradise. She wanted to leave now, without another thought. They could live in a place where William Green didn’t matter. Where Vincent didn’t matter. Where the things she had done didn’t matter.

The trouble was, she knew there was no such place.

She also knew that she had a new life already. Inside her.

‘Dory, I can’t leave. I need to stay here. I’m pregnant. I’m going to have a baby.’

Her aunt’s mouth fell open, half in shock, half in fear. Cat had no illusions about Dory. She wasn’t strong. For something like this, she was little more than a butterfly in a hurricane.

‘Well, I could help you,’ Dory said without a glimmer of conviction.

‘I know you could,’ Cat lied, ‘but this is my choice, not yours. I have to do this myself.’

She could see relief in her aunt’s face. ‘If that’s what you want.’

‘It is, but I wish you’d stay. I want you close.’

Dory shook her head. ‘No, you’re better off without me. Especially now. I just came here to tell you something.’

‘What is it?’

Dory’s fists squeezed open and shut. She looked as if she were trying to drag words out of her chest. ‘It’s about your father,’ she said. ‘He was shit. He was nothing but shit. I know you don’t like me to talk like that, but I’m sorry, it’s true.’

Cat’s face clouded over. ‘Stop it, Dory.’

‘No! No, you have to hear this. I have to tell you. Marty always said I was the one who turned Michaela against him. He said I was poison. He loved it when the drugs took over my life. When I dropped out, when everything went to hell, he’d come by to laugh and tell me how worthless I was.’

Cat said nothing.

‘That winter, that last winter, Marty came by in the night. I was at the end of my rope, Catalina. No money. No food. I was curled up in a ball like a little baby, and all I could think about was how was I going to get more drugs. That was the only thing I cared about. He stood there and he called me names. He said I was the most pathetic person on the planet, and I was. I was. He said he would give me money. Five hundred dollars! Cash! I needed that money, bonita, you have to understand, I needed it. All I had – all I had to do …’

Dory crushed her hands against the sides of her temples, as if she could squeeze the memory out of her brain.

‘He made me … I mean, I had to let him … I had to let him …’

‘You whored yourself with my father.’

‘I’m so sorry! God, Catalina, I’ve carried it with me all these years like a knife in my chest. And then to lose Michaela, to have him do that to her. I always thought … I always imagined he told her about it as he was killing her. He would have told her what I did, so it was the last thing she ever heard, the last thing in her heart as she died.’

No no no no … oh God … oh God …

Please … I’m dying … I’m dying …

‘He didn’t,’ Cat said. ‘He didn’t say anything about you.’

‘You remember?’ Dory asked.

‘Some things. It’s been coming back to me for days. I wish it would stay away.’

‘Can you ever forgive me, Catalina?’

Cat opened her mouth, but she didn’t have time to say a word. The cold night broke apart into the pieces of a kaleidoscope spinning in her brain. She was conscious of a car on the street, of a window opening. It was a black car, a death car. Dory took two steps toward her, spreading her arms wide for an embrace the way an angel spreads its wings. She didn’t see the car behind her. She didn’t see the mortal danger looming from a gun in the open window. Cat began to shout a warning, but it was too late.

She saw the desperate plea that lingered in Dory’s face – forgive me – and in the next instant, the light snapped off in her eyes, turning them black. Her forehead exploded, showering Cat with blood and brain. Cat heard a scream gurgle out of her own throat, simultaneous with the blast of the gun. Dory spilled forward, crumpling against her body, taking them backward onto the cold ground.

Covering her. Protecting her.

The blasts went on, again, again, again, again, again. Snow and earth erupted around her. She screamed until she had no breath. When the bullets finally stopped, when the engine roared and the car vanished, Cat couldn’t get up. She clung to Dory, who was motionless in her arms. No matter how hard she shook her, no matter how many times she called her name, Dory lay atop her like a dead weight. The remnants of her aunt’s life were splattered on Cat’s face. Dory’s blood was warm on her skin, but in the frigid air it had already begun to cool.