Let It Burn

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

My first call that morning was to FBI Agent Janet Long. When she picked up, I was smart enough to thank her one more time for dinner before launching into my question.

“This is going to sound a little strange,” I said, “but bear with me.”

“I’m listening.”

“Somewhere in your bureau, there’s an agent or two who are aware of several unsolved homicides throughout the Midwest.”

There was a brief silence on the line.

“Yes,” she said. “More than one or two agents, actually. What about it?”

“All women, all multiple stabbings. I know of cold cases in Cleveland, Metro Chicago, and Milwaukee. Are there more?”

“Alex, what are you getting at?”

“Look, you know I was involved in that case in Detroit. The woman who was stabbed in the train station.”

“That’s the case you were telling me about at dinner. With the killer who’s getting out soon.”

“Right. But let’s just suppose for a minute that he didn’t really do it. If you happened to add Elana Paige to that list of unsolved stabbings… I mean, I can’t help thinking that would be something useful to whoever’s tracking those other cases.”

“If it’s the same killer, yes. Of course it would. It’s usually one case that breaks the whole thing. That one time he makes a mistake of some kind.”

“That’s exactly what I was thinking.”

“Just to get it straight,” she said, “you’re talking about the man who was convicted of killing that woman in the train station, right here in Detroit. The man who confessed to the crime. That’s the case you’re talking about.”

“Yes.”

She stopped talking again. I could hear her tapping away at her keyboard.

“Elana Paige,” she finally said. “In Detroit. That was before the other murders.”

“I was wondering if that was the case. So yes, maybe that’s the one time he made a mistake. If it was his very first time.”

“But just because it was a multiple stabbing, that doesn’t necessarily connect it with the others. Especially with a confession and a man in prison. Who obviously couldn’t have killed anyone else while he was in there.”

“That’s my point, Janet. If Darryl King confessed to a crime he didn’t commit…”

“I’ll pass this along to the right person,” she said. “If there’s an angle here and it helps break these other cases, then everybody will be happy. But you have to promise me something right now.”

“What’s that?”

“By giving it to me, you let it go. Are we clear?”

“Even if I wanted to,” I said, “what could I do? These are major cases in other states, going back years.”

“Something tells me you’d find a way. So promise me.”

“I promise. I just wanted to let you know. That’s all.”

“Okay,” she said. “I appreciate it.”

“Will you at least let me know if you guys find something?”

“Yes. You’ll be the first person to know, outside the bureau.”

One more silence. Maybe both of us realizing that there wasn’t much else to say. We didn’t make another dinner date. We didn’t even say “See you soon.” I just thanked her and told her to take care of herself.

As soon as I ended the call, I had a brief debate with myself. Then I dialed Detective Bateman. I wasn’t breaking my promise to Janet. I was simply following up on the conversation we had on his boat.

Bateman answered the phone.

“Arnie,” I said, “this is Alex McKnight.”

“Alex, good to hear from you again. Good seeing you the other day, too. We should do that again sometime.”

“I’d love to. But that’s not why I was calling. Actually, I just wanted to ask you one question.”

“Shoot.”

“Is there any chance I could finally see that confession some time?”

Nothing for a long moment. Phone silences were apparently going to be the theme for the day.

“You know, I had this feeling when you were here, and I was telling you about it… You were doubting even before you got here, weren’t you?”

“I admit, I may have been.”

“Hearing me tell you how it all broke down, that didn’t settle it for you?”

“It’s one thing to hear about it after the fact,” I said. “It’s another thing to see it and hear it yourself.”

“Well, first of all, why are you thinking about this now? It was a long time ago. If you had any doubts…”

“I honestly haven’t thought about it at all,” I said. “Not until I got the call about him getting out.”

“So now, looking back, even though you weren’t there to see it, you feel like you need to tell me it wasn’t a clean confession. Is that what I’m hearing?”

“Look, I know it was a big case for you. We all wanted it to be solved, but-”

“We all wanted it to be solved,” he said. “So we solved it. You were the one who ID’d him, for crying out loud. How can you even be saying this now?”

This is going beautifully, I thought. This was such a great idea.

“I know this is out of the blue,” I said. “Let me try to explain why I’m thinking this way.”

“I told you I was sorry, Alex. You should have made the arrest. You should have gotten the big award, too. We both should have been up there. Even if I had to wait for you to get back on your feet.”

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Stop right there. This has nothing to do with who got credit. Will you please give me one minute to explain?”

“Yeah, sure. You just came up with some new evidence that would overturn a conviction based on a sworn confession.”

“Arnie, come on.”

“I’ll call the prosecutor. We can schedule the hearing. I’ll get up there myself and tell everyone it was all bogus. Then I’ll give back the award. Would that do it for you?”

“Listen to me…”

“No, thanks. I’ve heard enough. Have a nice life, and maybe get some help, huh? I think you got a real problem letting go of old grudges.”

I didn’t get in another word before he hung up. I stood there looking at the phone, too stunned to even be mad. Then I got over it.

“If you weren’t already half crippled,” I said to the phone, “I’d come down there and kick your ass.”

The next couple of days were tough for me. I don’t have much of a talent for putting things out of my mind. I just tried to stay busy. The cold weather was right around the corner, so I started getting cabins ready. There were windows to seal up. One of the woodstoves was on its last legs, so I spent an afternoon with Vinnie, putting in a new one.

“You’ve been thinking about something else all day,” he said when we went down to the Glasgow Inn. “It’s a good thing I helped you with the stove. You probably would have installed it backwards.”

“I’m trying to keep my head here in Paradise,” I said. “I’m really trying.”

But it was getting harder with each passing hour, not easier. I’d be doing something around one of the cabins and I’d suddenly have this vision of a woman lying on a cold floor, all of the blood drained from her body. I hadn’t seen any of these other crime scenes, of course. Not in Cleveland or Chicago or Milwaukee, or wherever else this same killer may have struck. So some part of my mind would make up the details and all of a sudden it would be right there, right in front of me. I was starting to wonder if I’d keep seeing them for the rest of my life. That would surely drive me insane.

Leon was no help, because he was just as compulsive as I was. Maybe even more so, if that were possible. I went down to the Soo Brewing Company a couple of days after his late-night visit. He was standing behind the counter, looking like a man who hadn’t slept much.

When he had a break, he came over and sat down next to me on the old couch. He was carrying a folder. I didn’t have to ask him what was inside.

“I suppose you can guess what I’ve been doing,” he said.

“I probably can.”

“I found a couple more cases.”

“More stabbings?”

“Yes.”

“In the Midwest?”

“No, that’s the thing. See, if you look at the dates for those first three cases I found, they happen anywhere from May to September.”

“Okay…”

He opened the folder and took out the news stories.

“So I looked a little further,” he said. “Here are three more open cases. All three are women, all three were stabbed to death. Nobody arrested in any of them yet.”

“Janet told me they have an active profile,” I said. “She didn’t say there were this many.”

“Savannah, Georgia. Mobile, Alabama. Jacksonville, Florida. The years are mixed in with the others, the difference being that these three all occurred from November to March.”

“You’re telling me we’ve got a fair-weather murderer here. He goes south for the winter, and if he sees his opportunity down there…”

“That’s about the size of it, yes. So what are we going to do?”

“Well, the FBI already knows everything you’re telling me. It’s the Detroit angle that’s new. If that can be tied in, I mean, maybe it helps. Especially if it was earlier than the others.”

“Assuming they buy your idea that it was a false confession,” Leon said, shaking his head. “Assuming they can do anything with that case, even if they do believe it. All these years later.”

“I officially have never felt so useless,” I said. “How about you?”

“I’m with you, buddy.”

“Let me give her another call,” I said, taking the folder from him. “I’ll make up some excuse. But really I just want to find out if anything new has happened.”

“Let me know, okay?”

“I will. Thanks for doing this. Now you should probably try to put it out of your head before it makes you crazy.”

“I’ll do that as soon as you do.”

I had no comeback. I left him there to his beer brewing. I went back to Paradise.

My call to Janet went about as expected. She listened to me read off the other cases Leon had dug up. She already knew about all of them. Not only that, she had one more to add to the list.

“Indianapolis,” she said. “Two years after Milwaukee. So that’s seven unsolved murders, all multiple stabbings. All with the same kind of knife, by the way. I don’t know if I mentioned that before.”

“You didn’t, but what about the Detroit case?” I said. “Have you heard anything about how that might be connected?”

“You know I can’t say anything, but I also know you’re not going to sleep until I do. So here’s what I can tell you…”

“Go ahead.”

“It turns out they did look at that case. It was three or four murders in, when they were first trying to establish the pattern. They couldn’t help but notice the similarities to the murder in Detroit.”

“Okay…”

“So they checked it out. They called the detective who was in charge of that case.”

“That was Arnie Bateman.”

“I don’t know the name. Just some guy who was kind of a blowhard, I guess.”

“That’s him. So what happened?”

“Not much,” she said. “It was a sworn confession, with a man sitting in prison. If there was something more concrete to tie this murder to the others…”

“He gave you the stiff-arm. Isn’t that obvious? He didn’t want to reopen the case that made his career.”

“I asked the agent to look at it again, okay? What else can I do?”

“That sounds like all I can ask for,” I said. “Thanks for doing that.”

“If this takes him down a rat hole, it’s not going to make me look good. You realize that.”

“That’s impossible. You always look good.”

“Don’t even try that,” she said. “Unless you’ve thought some more about moving down here.”

I wasn’t about to lie to her. So we left it at that. I thanked her and let her go back to work. Then I tried to do the same, even though I had a whole new set of dead bodies to think about. I knew it would be a long night.

Maybe I’ll call the detective again, I thought. That would really make the day.

I didn’t, of course. I didn’t have to. All I had to do was wait until that night.

The phone rang just after nine o’clock. I picked up the receiver, thinking it would be Leon, or maybe Janet. I got neither.

“Alex, this is Arnie Bateman. I’m sorry to call so late.”

“Detective, what’s going on?”

“Don’t call me detective. I’m not sure I deserve the title right now.”

“I don’t understand. What are you talking about?”

“Darryl King got out today,” he said. “He’s out of prison.”

“Okay, I knew it was coming up pretty soon, but-”

“You want to know what I did to mark the occasion?”

“I’m guessing you didn’t go down and throw him a party.”

“I watched the tape, Alex. I watched the world-famous confession.”

“What, you have a copy of it?”

“No, no. I had to call down to the old precinct, the district now, find somebody who still remembered me. I asked if I could see it and they said sure, if we can even find it. It got moved over to the records building. Some old VHS tape in a dusty old box. They finally found it, and this sergeant calls me back, tells me he can’t let it leave the premises, but I could see it if I came down there.”

“So you did.”

“Yeah. I don’t drive much anymore on account of the leg. Hurts too much to sit that long. But I figured this was worth it.”

“Why did you think that? You sounded pretty sure when I called you that it was all a big-”

“Okay, just stop,” he said. “I’m sorry. All right? Will you accept my apology before we go any further? I was totally out of line.”

“Accepted,” I said. “Now tell me about the tape.”

“Well, I guess the surprising thing is that it went pretty much exactly how I remembered it. There wasn’t one thing he said that didn’t match my memory.”

“So you’re just calling me to confirm it was a good confession. That I was totally wrong to even question it. Is that what you’re saying?”

“No, Alex. I’m calling you to tell you he didn’t confess at all.”

He let that one hang for a moment, just the faraway buzzing of the telephone line as I tried to process the words.

“You’re going to have to explain,” I said. “I’m afraid you lost me.”

“I watched it three times. At no point does he ever say, ‘Yes, I killed that woman.’ He says, ‘I’m a man, and if there’s something I need to do, I do it.’ That’s what he says.”

“I remember you telling me that, yes. You said those were his exact words.”

“Yes.”

“But then you said he went on to explain exactly what happened. How he saw her up at the station, how he got her up to the balcony…”

“He didn’t do that, Alex. He didn’t explain it. It was me doing all the explaining at that point.”

“How do you mean?”

“It was just a classic dumb mistake in interviewing. Everything I had been trained to do, just right out the window. Because after I got what I thought was the initial confession, I should have made him describe everything in detail from the beginning. But instead I jumped right ahead and said, ‘Okay, so you saw her at the station, right? You thought she’d be an easy mark?’ And so on, right down the line. I led him into it, and all he had to do was keep agreeing with me.”

“Okay…”

“He never said he did it, Alex. Not in a real way. Not one goddamned time. But I was so anxious to solve the case. Hell, we all were. I just heard what I wanted to hear and I rammed the rest right down his throat.”

“I think I see what you’re saying. But that still doesn’t explain why he went along with it. Even if you were leading him.”

“Well, that’s what I’m going to find out. I’m going to go down and ask him myself. Tomorrow.”

“Are you serious?”

“It’s the only way I can know for sure. You want to come with me?”

“Again… are you serious?”

“We can ask him together. Maybe it would be a good idea, too, just in case he’s got some… you know, anger that he might not be able to control. I’m not exactly the physical specimen I once was, if I have to defend myself.”

“Did you contact him? Does he know you’ve got this in mind?”

“Nope. I figure it’s better to just go down there. Let him have tonight to get settled. Then knock on his door in the morning. ‘Did you do it, Darryl? If not, why did you confess to it?’ Maybe we’ll get a genuine, spontaneous answer if he doesn’t have time to prepare for it.”

“You’re really going to do this.”

“Hell, yes. I think you want to, too. Am I wrong?”

I thought about it for all of a second and a half. “No,” I said. “You’re not wrong. How about I come down in the morning and pick you up? You said you’re not great on driving these days.”

“That would be fantastic. It’ll be just like old times.”

“Yeah, something like that,” I said. “Listen, can I ask you about something else? I was talking to an FBI agent today, and-”

“Oh God, so you already know.”

“About the other cases?”

“It was a few years later, yes. They contacted me and said they were looking at the Paige case, on account of certain similarities. Same kind of knife, all women, all stabbed approximately two dozen times. No other evidence on the scene, so the killer was being careful. It all makes sense now, looking back at it, but I’m afraid at the time I was less than accommodating.”

“As I recall, nobody had much love for the FBI back then.”

“Then or ever. But I should have at least looked at it, right? I couldn’t take one day out of my life to go down there and work with them?”

I wasn’t sure how to answer that. Or if I should even try.

“If I find out there was really a connection…” he said. “Hell, how will I ever forgive myself for being such an idiot?”

“Well, let’s just find out first,” I said. “Don’t forget, I was part of this case, too.”

“I tell you one thing, this’ll be a big shock to the brother and the husband.”

“Wait, do you still stay in touch with them?”

“I talk to them all the time. Both Ryan Grayson and Tanner Paige. I’ve even had them up to the lake. Took them out on the boat.”

“Really?” I had a hard time picturing it.

“Sure, why not?”

“What about Elana’s parents?”

“Oh, they both died a while ago,” he said. “One right after the other. That kind of grief is a heavy load. But yeah, Ryan got married, had a couple of kids. If you remember, he had a lot of anger toward his brother-in-law.”

“I remember.”

“He’s got over that, I’m happy to say. He knows it was misplaced.”

“You must have talked to them this past week,” I said, “when they found out about Darryl King’s release?”

“A few times, yes. It really got to them. Sort of brought it all back, you know? Just thinking about your sister’s murderer walking around free. Or your wife’s murderer.”

“They’re not going to do anything stupid, are they?”

“I’d like to think they both have the sense not to. But if this new angle is true… I mean, that puts it all in a different place, doesn’t it? I’m not sure it’s better, but at least they don’t have to think about Darryl King walking around in the sunshine on a nice summer day.”

“I don’t think that’s better.”

“No, you’re right. If this is the same guy, he’s been walking around all this time. Nobody’s even touched him yet.”

“Well, the FBI’s still on this,” I said. “Now they know about this new possibility, at least.”

“I kept copies of the old files, you know. I’ve been going over them all day, looking for what I might have missed. In fact, you should work with me on this, Alex. It’ll be just like old times, you know? Except maybe we’ll get it right this time.”

“Okay, one thing at a time. Let’s start with talking to Darryl King, like you said.”

“All right, fair enough. We’ll do that.”

“I’ll see you in the morning, Arnie. Try to get some sleep.”

“Yeah, sure. You, too.”

Of course, we both knew that would be impossible. I was ready to hit the road right then, drive all night if I had to. I didn’t want to wait for the daylight.

I didn’t want to wait to finally hear our answer from Darryl King himself.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

It was my second trip down to the Lower Peninsula in a week. The first time I’d been on my way down to have a drink with my old sergeant and dinner with Janet. The trip had turned into something else, of course. Now I was heading back down that same road, once again crossing the Mackinac Bridge just as the sun was coming up. Once again it felt like I was leaving a world of stark simplicity and entering another world where I had grown up and become a baseball player and later a cop. Where in one hot summer I had seen the horror of a murdered woman, just days before seeing my own partner die as I lay bleeding on the floor next to him. This world was always there waiting for me, this world of my past on the other side of that bridge. No matter how hard the wind blew off the lake, I would never stop hearing its call.

I made the Houghton Lake exit by eight o’clock in the morning. I drove around the lake to the detective’s cabin, down that same driveway. I pulled in behind his Jeep and got out.

I knocked on the door. Nothing. But then I knew he wasn’t exactly jumping over the furniture to answer the door. I knocked again.

After a full minute, I took out my cell phone and dialed his number. It rang a few times and went to voice mail. I called the number again, but this time I put my head against his door. I could just barely hear the faintest ringtone from somewhere inside.

I knocked on the door again, really banging on it. Then I tried turning the knob. It was locked.

I went around to the back of the cabin. There was a raised deck where the ground sloped away from the house, and there were sliding glass doors on either side of a central fireplace made of stone. I put my face against the glass. I couldn’t see anything inside.

He’s in the shower, I thought. He can’t hear me knocking. He can’t hear his phone. I’ll wait two more minutes and knock again.

I sat down on one of the patio chairs and looked out at the lake. I couldn’t imagine living here and looking out at that calm, flat water every day. Not after living on a lake that sees twenty-foot waves and higher, every fall.

Of course, it would be suicide to take the detective’s pontoon boat out on Lake Superior, so to each his own.

I got up and rapped on the window a few times. I made that glass rattle. No way he couldn’t hear that.

Then it occurred to me to actually try sliding open the glass door.

I pushed the door open, hearing it grind on the tracks. It needed some oil. I was reminding myself to suggest that to Detective Bateman.

Then I stopped dead.

In the deepest, reptile part of my brain, I knew something was terribly wrong. It was probably just the smell in the air. That’s the thing that plugs right into that part of your brain, after all-but it invades every other sense, and all of a sudden you feel like the air itself looks wrong. It feels wrong against your skin. And even though the house was silent, the silence itself seemed to be spiked with one single high note of wrongness.

“Detective,” I said. “Are you there?”

I walked through the cabin. There were stairs leading up to a loft. There were books piled on the coffee table. I went toward the side door and found the short hallway that led to a bathroom on one side and a half-closed door on the other. Probably the bedroom.

I put my hand on the door and slowly pushed it open.

The detective was lying in his bed. He was tangled in the covers. The fabric was soaked through with blood. His face was destroyed. Utterly destroyed beyond recognition. His head was caved in like a goddamned pumpkin.

I looked away. I made myself breathe.

I looked one more time. At the obscenity of what had happened to this man. There was a pipe on the floor, next to the bed. A heavy steel pipe, maybe two and a half feet long. It was covered with blood, and in the blood there were clumps of hair and other material I didn’t want to think about.

I had spoken to this man the night before. Just a matter of hours before this moment. My voice may have been the last he ever heard.

Unless whoever killed him had something to say to him before swinging this pipe.

Unless whoever killed him had a special message for him, something he’d been preparing in his mind for years.

Because you know exactly who did this, I thought. He got out last night. He came here.

You know who did this.

I had to close my eyes again. I had to stand there and command the room to stop spinning. Then, when I could finally open my eyes, I took my phone out of my pocket and dialed 911.

I had been through this routine before. It’s a testament to my willingness to go looking for trouble, or to my bad luck, or to something, I don’t even know what, that I’d had a lot of prior experiences with reporting homicides, even now that I wasn’t carrying a badge anymore. I stayed on the line with the 911 operator. While I waited, I told her that they needed to go find Darryl King, very recently released from prison, living with his mother on Ash Street in Detroit. It felt strange to be dropping the dime on him now, after everything that had happened in the past few days to lead me here. But they had to start with him. They had to.

There was a Michigan State Police post right in Houghton Lake, just minutes away from where I was standing. I had passed it on the way here. So I figured they’d be responding. I had gone outside to get a better cell signal, and to get away from the air in that cabin. I waited by my truck, leaning against it, knowing that I was already on my way to a very long day.

The cruiser pulled into the driveway. One of the boxy old “Blue Goose” cars with the single red flasher on top. Two troopers hopped out and came right over to me. Both of them had freshly buzzed heads under their trooper hats. I hung up the phone and told them where they could find the dead detective. One of the troopers went inside while the other kept an eye on me. He went back to his car and talked to someone on his radio. I knew there’d be more troopers coming down the driveway soon. Eventually there’d be a state homicide detective on the scene. That might take a while, because he might have to come over from one of the other posts. A homicide detective who would investigate the homicide of a retired homicide detective.

The trooper who went inside came out. He wasn’t looking so happy with his career choice.

I kept waiting, just standing there by my truck, feeling the morning sun on my face. When the detective finally got there, he came up to me first. As he shook my hand, he introduced himself as Detective Gruley. Then he asked me politely to stay put while he went inside. When he came back out, he started asking me the basic questions. Name, address, phone number. He looked me in the eye as I answered, like listening to every word was the most important thing in the world to him.

“So tell me what happened,” he said. “Start at the beginning.”

I gave him the rundown. My background first, then the current timeline from the moment I had heard Darryl King was getting out of prison to my discovery of Detective Bateman’s body.

He listened intently, writing down only the occasional word in his notepad. When I was done, he stood there nodding to himself. Then he took a step closer to me.

“Let me get this straight,” he said in a low voice. “The two of you were going down to Detroit this morning to confront the man you put away for murder, back when you were both on active duty?”

“We weren’t going to confront him,” I said. “We were going to ask him if he really did it. Seeing as how we’ve both developed some doubts about his confession.”

Gruley kept nodding. “Did he know you were coming down to ask him this?”

“No, he didn’t.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m positive. I mean, I know I didn’t say anything to him. I’ve had no communication with him at all.”

“Since back in the day, you mean. When you arrested him.”

“The detective made the actual arrest. But yes. No contact since then.”

“So it would seem,” Gruley said, “that Mr. King had already made plans for his first day out of prison, independent of this little mission of yours.”

“I guess it looks that way,” I said. “May I ask if you’ve located him yet? I gave his name and address to the 911 operator.”

“No, I don’t think he’s been located yet. Detroit PD is helping us out on that one.”

I might have caught just a hint of the patented Michigan State Police superiority complex as he said that. Like this part of the operation is out of our hands, so God only knows if it’ll get done correctly.

“This is a former Detroit cop we’re talking about,” I said. “I’m sure they’ll be all over it.”

“I’m sure they will be, yes.”

“Look, Detective, I know this whole thing sounds crazy. For it to turn out this way… I still can’t believe this happened.”

“You see the irony,” he said. “You thought maybe this man was innocent of murder, yet he ends up killing someone within hours of getting out.”

“If it was him.”

“If it was him, yes. By the way, you see where he might logically take this next, right?”

I looked at the detective. My stomach hurt and I was starting to feel a little light-headed.

“You were also closely involved with his conviction,” the detective said. “Surely you must understand the stakes here.”

I put my hand out to the hood of my truck.

“Mr. McKnight, are you okay?”

“Yes,” I said. “It’s been a rough morning.”

“No doubt. But I hope you understand what I’m trying to tell you. If this man made a list of people to get back at, the minute he got out of prison… Well, yours may be the second name on his list.”

Yeah, no kidding, I thought. I never would have made that connection on my own.

“You don’t look so good,” he said. “I think we should get you out of the sun. Get you some water.”

He took me over to his car and opened up the passenger’s-side door. He started the car and turned the air on. Then he pulled out a bottle of water from a cooler in the backseat. I took a long drink and started to feel better.

“You never get used to seeing something like that,” he said. “I don’t know how the crime scene guys do it.”

“I never did get those guys. They were a breed apart.”

“When you’re up to it, I’d like to take you back to the post and get an official statement.”

I took one more drink and felt the cold air from the dashboard vent on my face.

“Ready when you are,” I said, “but I’m not sure this story is going to look any more sane on paper.”

I spent a good part of the day there. I knew I would. You get into a police station, or a state police post, or any law enforcement building in the world probably, and time stands still. Sometimes they make you wait for a reason. To soften you up, to let you stew in your own guilt, whatever mind games they feel will help their cause. Other times it’s just a matter of them doing things their own way, one slow step at a time. They’ll apologize at every turn, tell you you’ll be on your way in just a few more minutes. But then the wheels keep grinding away, as slow as the hour hand on the clock.

I sat in their interview room. I answered some more questions. I wrote out my statement. I sat some more. I had some coffee. I declined the offer of lunch, because I couldn’t stand even the thought of eating. I had some more coffee. It was late afternoon by the time Detective Gruley finally drove me back to my truck. By that time, the crime scene unit had descended upon Detective Bateman’s property. I took one more look around the place, including the pontoon boat docked on the lake. Then I left.

I had Detective Gruley’s card in my pocket, with his cell phone number and a polite request to let him know if I was going to leave the state. To be available for more questions, and yes, I knew the drill.

When I was almost back to the freeway, I pulled the truck over in a gas station and just sat there for a while with my eyes closed. Then I picked up my cell phone and called Leon. As soon as he answered, I let him have it.

“He’s dead,” I said. “Detective Bateman was murdered.”

“Alex, slow down and tell me what happened.”

I took a breath and gave him the whole story. When I was done, there was a long silence on the line. I thought the call might have dropped.

“Leon, are you there?”

“I want you to listen to me very carefully,” he said. “You really need to hear this.”

“What is it?”

“Are you listening?”

“I’m listening. What is it?”

“This was not your fault.”

“I know that.”

“Like hell you do. I know exactly what you’re thinking right now, and you need to stop. Because it’s going to drive you insane. If this was Darryl King getting revenge, then he was plotting this for years. For years, Alex. It was set in motion long before you even started thinking about this case again. No matter what you did or didn’t do or were planning on doing today, it wouldn’t have mattered. This thing happened, and it had nothing to do with you.”

“Okay,” I said. “I hear what you’re saying.”

“I take that back. It does have something to do with you. Because you might be next. In fact, King could be on his way up to Paradise right now.”

“Or in Paradise,” I said, looking at my watch. “He’d have had plenty of time to get up there. Hell, if I hadn’t left this morning, I could already be dead by now.”

“I’m about to get off work. Let me go over and just check out your place. I’ll give Jackie and Vinnie a heads-up, too.”

“Okay, but be careful.”

“I will, don’t worry. I might take my Ruger, though. Just don’t tell my wife.”

“I promise,” I said. “And thank you.”

“What are you going to do now?”

I looked out at the road. The entrance to the freeway had two arrows. One for I-75 North, and the bridge to the Upper Peninsula. Another for I-75 South, and Detroit.

“I have absolutely no idea what to do next,” I said. Then my phone made a beeping noise I’d hardly ever heard it make before. I looked at the little screen. There was another call coming in.

“Somebody’s calling me,” I said, reading the caller ID. A 313 area code. “I should take this.”

I ended the call with Leon and answered a call from the last person in the world I would have expected.

Darryl King’s mother.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

It took me a moment to remember. I had given Mrs. King my card, on that surreal afternoon I’d sat with her in her living room, eating her chocolate cake. Now, as I answered her call, I could barely make sense of what she was saying. All I could make out was that Darryl was gone, after just one night in the house, and the police had been tearing the place apart and asking ridiculous questions. I told her to sit tight, that I’d be there in less than three hours. A crazy thing to do on a day that had already gotten turned upside down. But what else was I going to say to her?

While I was driving down I-75, I gave Sergeant Grimaldi a call, just to let him know what had happened. Then I called Janet to do the same. They were both shocked. They were both worried about me. They both wanted to know what I was going to do next. I didn’t tell either one of them the truth.

I stopped for some gas. I hit a drive-through just so I’d have something in my stomach. I kept driving. Two and a half hours later, I crossed under Eight Mile Road. I was back in Detroit.

I cut over to the west side of town. I went to Ash Street. I parked the truck in front of that house. I sat there for a moment to get my bearings and to shake out the sound of the road from my ears. Then I got out and looked at the house. I could see where the weeds had all been trampled down by the police officers’ boots. The trail circled the house, and there were dirty footprints on the sidewalk.

Okay, I thought, so they were here looking for him. They probably turned this place upside down. But why aren’t they still here now? If they don’t have him in custody yet, surely somebody’s keeping an eye on the place.

That made me remember, of course. My own time watching this very house, all those years ago. Even with some of the houses gone, and the weeds grown up, there was still probably one prime spot for surreptitious surveillance, as they call it. I stepped back from the far side of my truck and looked down the street. Sure enough, there was the vehicle, right in that same spot on the other side of the fence, in the parking lot behind that apartment complex. It was a green minivan, not the panel truck we had used back in the day. I thought I spotted a little lens flash, probably from binoculars. I almost waved to him, whoever the lucky sap was who had drawn this duty, but I thought better of it.

I went up on the leaning front porch and was about to knock on the screen door. Then I looked inside and saw Mrs. King kneeling on the floor, her head on the seat of her chair.

I opened the door and went to her. “Mrs. King,” I said. “Are you all right?”

She looked up at me. Her face was wet.

“Oh, thank God, you came, Mr. McKnight. Thank you so much.”

“Do you need help? Here, let me help you to your feet.”

“It’s okay, I was just praying.”

She let me help her to a sitting position on her chair. I took the other chair.

“It was so good to have him home,” she said, wringing a handkerchief in her hands. “But it all went wrong so quickly. He didn’t even have one piece of his cake yet.”

“Tell me what happened. Tell me everything.”

She wiped her face, then took a moment to compose her gray hair.

“I waited all day for him,” she said. “I thought he’d be out in the morning, but by the time he did all his processing and such, it was nearly dinnertime when I finally got to see him. He looked so…”

She stopped and worked at her handkerchief again.

“He looked so tired, I guess. So used up by all those years in prison. He was so happy to be out, but I could tell he was feeling a little lost, too. Which I guess is understandable. All these years and suddenly you’re standing outside that prison, with no idea what you’re going to do with the rest of your life. Anyway, I had my sister’s car. I don’t drive that much anymore, but I still have a license. So I went to get him, and after all that waiting, I finally got to bring him home.”

“Did he say anything? About what he was going to do?”

“No, he didn’t. Not at all. He didn’t say much of anything. He apologized, said he was still just taking it all in, trying to get his feet under him. He wasn’t very hungry. He had a little dinner, but like I said, he didn’t even have any cake. He said he’d have some today.”

“Okay…”

“He sat with me for a while, then when it got dark, I asked him if he was going to go to bed. Up in his old room, just like old times. I thought he must have been pretty tired after the big day, but he said he wanted to go out for a little bit. I got kinda upset about that, because I know he’s on parole, for one thing, and they have all sorts of rules about where you can go and how late you can stay out at night. Then he asked me if he could borrow my sister’s car for a little bit, and I got really upset. Because I knew he still has to go down and get his license. But he insisted on going out. He just said, ‘I gotta do it, Mama. I’ve been cooped up all these years. I just gotta get some air in my lungs and move around a little bit.’ So eventually I just let him take the car for a while, as long as he promised to come right back.”

She stopped again. She smoothed the fabric of her dress over her knees.

“He never came back?”

She shook her head. A fresh tear ran down her cheek.

“So what happened today? The police came?”

“They rushed right in and started looking for him. Going up the stairs. I told them they had no right to do that, but they said on account of Darryl being on parole, they can do whatever they want. Go in anywhere and just drag him out.”

“I’m afraid that’s true,” I said. “You give up certain rights if you’re on parole.”

“Yeah, well, I never gave up my rights. They had no cause to do that.”

I looked around the room. “It doesn’t look bad right now. Did you have to clean things up?”

She dismissed that with one wave of her hand. “I don’t care about mud in the house. Not with Darryl in trouble again. If I cleaned today, it was just to keep my mind busy. I didn’t know what to do, Mr. McKnight. If I didn’t have your number to call, I don’t know who I would have turned to.”

“Mrs. King…”

“Thank you, by the way. Did I say thank you yet?”

“Yes, you did. It’s okay. But tell me exactly what the police said to you.”

She shook her head, like she didn’t even want to think about it. “Just nonsense, they were saying. They wanted to know where he was. They kept telling me I must know and that I’d better tell them or I’d get in trouble.”

“But you didn’t know? You had no idea?”

“Of course not,” she said, giving me a sharp look. “Do you think I’d be sitting here if I had any idea where he’s at right now?”

“Mrs. King,” I said, knowing this next part would be tough. “Did they say anything to you about what they thought Darryl had done?”

“Yes.” Her voice was dead calm. “They said some foolishness about an old retired detective being killed. Way up north. Like a three-hour drive. I told them Darryl couldn’t have had anything to do with that.”

“Did they mention that that old retired detective was the man who arrested your son?”

She looked away from me, shaking her head. She can’t handle this, I thought. She can’t let herself even think about what this might mean.

“He didn’t do it,” she said, looking back at me. “Whoever got killed, wherever it was, up north or just down the street, I don’t care. Darryl’s spent half his life in prison and he’s not about to throw away whatever time he has left. It’s that simple.”

“Okay, I understand.” What could I even say?

“You have to help me, Mr. McKnight. I know I have no right to ask, but I don’t know who else to turn to. Will you please go find my son and bring him back to me so we can get this whole mess straightened out?”

“Mrs. King…”

I may not have to look for him, I thought. He might end up finding me first.

“Please, Mr. McKnight. Alex. I’m begging you.”

On the other hand… Given the choice between waiting for him to show up on my doorstep and actually doing something…

I didn’t get the chance to say anything else, because at that moment I glanced out the front window and saw the Detroit police car pulling up behind my truck. There were two officers in the car. One was looking at my license plate and talking on the radio. The other was opening his door to get out. He looked both confused and unhappy, never a good combination in a cop.

“This is going to sound a little strange,” I said to Mrs. King, “but do you have a dollar?”

“I do, yes…”

“Can you give it to me?”

“Right now?”

“Yes, please.”

She reached into the waist pocket of her dress and pulled out a dollar bill. She gave it to me.

“You just hired me as a private investigator,” I said. “I now have the right to be here, no matter what the police say. And anything we say to each other is protected by client privilege. Do you understand?”

“I think so.”

“Good, it’s nice to be working for you. Stay right here a minute, okay?”

I left her there in the house and walked out the front door to meet the officer.

“Stop right there,” he said. “I’m going to need some ID.”

“You just ran my plate,” I said. “You already know who I am.”

“Some ID, please. Right now.”

I took out my driver’s license and handed it to him.

“What precinct are you guys from?” I said. “Oh no, wait, you don’t even have precincts anymore, right? It’s all districts now?”

“Can I ask what you’re doing here?”

“Look, I’m a former Detroit cop myself. So can we start over?”

He gave me back my license. “I just need to know why you’re here. I also need to know if you have any connection to Darryl King.”

“No, I don’t. I’ll be honest and tell you that I’m looking for him, too.”

“Mr. King is the subject of a murder investigation, Mr. McKnight. Not to mention the fact that he’s already violated his parole. We’re going to need to know any information you might have in regards to his current whereabouts.”

I dug around in my wallet, thankful that I hadn’t cleaned it out in a while, and found another of my old PI cards. “I’m currently a licensed private investigator. I’ve been hired by Mrs. King.”

“You’re supposed to let the police know if you’re working in our jurisdiction,” he said, looking at the card with a frown. “You know that.”

“I do know that. I was just hired thirty seconds ago. So consider this your heads-up.”

The other officer, done with whatever he was doing on the radio, got out of his car and joined us.

“Mr. McKnight,” he said, “I just talked to a Detective Gruley from the Michigan State Police. Is it true you’re the one who found Detective Bateman’s body this morning?”

“Yes,” I said, looking back at the house. “It’s been a hell of a day.”

“The detective has a message for you,” the cop said. “He wants to know, with all due respect, if you’ve lost your mind.”

“I wouldn’t bet against it,” I said. “But let me ask you guys something.”

“What’s that?”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but who’s coordinating your surveillance these days?”

The two officers looked at each other. They clearly had no idea what I was talking about.

“You can’t pull up in a squad car,” I said, “and announce to the world that you’re here, while at the same time you’ve got your other man down the street…”

“What man is that, Mr. McKnight?”

I pushed past them and went to the sidewalk. I looked down to the parking lot, to where I had seen the man with the binoculars, in the green minivan.

He was gone.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

When the two police officers drove off, I walked down to the end of the block. The street had fed into the parking lot behind the apartment complex, once upon a time, but someone had decided there needed to be a gate here to secure the lot. It had obviously been decided long ago, because I remembered this gate being here back in the day, when I was sitting in that panel truck watching the house. The weeds had grown up on both sides of the gate now. I would have bet anything it hadn’t been touched since the last time I was this close to it.

I looked over the gate, into the parking lot. I didn’t see the green minivan.

“If you’re not the police,” I said to the spot where the minivan had been parked, “then who the hell are you?”

When I went back to the house, once again I saw something inside that made me go right in. This time it was Mrs. King standing in the middle of her living room, holding her cell phone to her ear, her free hand against her chest. A fresh batch of tears was running down her face.

“Darryl, honey, please!” she said into the phone. “You have to come home! We’ll get this all straightened out, I promise you!”

I gestured for her to give me the phone. Not a polite move on my part-in fact, it was downright rude-but I wanted to talk to him.

She started to hand me the phone, then hesitated. I took it from her and put it to my ear, just in time to hear the faraway voice of Darryl King.

“It’s no good, Mama. It’s no good. Whatever they think I did this time…”

“Darryl,” I said. “Is that you?”

“Who is this?”

“My name’s Alex. I need to talk to you.”

“Where’s my mother? Put her back on the phone right now.”

“She’s okay, Darryl. She wants me to talk to you.”

I stepped closer to her, wrapped my arm around her, and held the phone between us so we could both talk into it.

“Tell him it’s okay to talk to me,” I said to her. “Please. Tell him it’s okay.”

“It’s okay, Darryl!” she said. “He’s a good man. You can talk to him.”

“See, it’s all good,” I said. “So tell me where you are.”

“I’m not telling you nothing. Who are you, really?”

“I told you. My name is Alex. You probably even remember me.”

“From where?”

“I was once a police officer,” I said, looking at Mrs. King. This was officially the strangest phone conversation I’d ever been part of. “I was one of the officers who was here the day you were arrested.”

He didn’t say anything.

“I was the one who chased you at the train station. You remember me now?”

“What’s your name again?”

“Alex. Alex McKnight.”

“I don’t remember you.”

I stood there in Mrs. King’s living room, looking down at her wet face. I was talking to her son, the convicted murderer, and now I was trying to decide just how good a liar he could be.

“Are you seriously trying to tell me that you don’t remember me at all?”

“You’re white, right?”

“Yes.”

“That’s all I remember. A white cop chased me. Another white cop arrested me.”

“That was Detective Arnie Bateman.”

“Yeah, that name sounds right. I remember him. What’s the point, man?”

“He was killed sometime last night.”

He took a moment before responding. That said something important, if you believe the guy who wrote the book on interrogating suspects. If he denies it right away, that means he already knows it, and he’s got his story ready. If he takes a while to think about it, then it might be news to him, and he won’t respond until he’s had some time to think it over.

Of course, a really good liar has probably read the same book, and he knows how to beat that game.

“Are you telling me,” Darryl finally said, “that all of those cop cars were on my street because…” He trailed off into a mumbled string of every obscenity ever invented.

“Darryl, where did you go last night?”

“I went out.”

“Where did you go?”

“Where do you think I went, man? I was in prison for a long time.”

“Okay, so you were with somebody?”

He hesitated. “No, I wasn’t. I drove around looking to pick up someone. But I just couldn’t go that way. I guess I really am getting old or something.”

“So you didn’t go to Houghton Lake?”

“What lake? What the hell are you talking about?”

“That’s where the detective lives.”

“Well, I sure as hell didn’t go there. And I sure as hell didn’t kill nobody. That’s the craziest thing I ever heard.”

“It’s not so crazy if you were looking for revenge.”

I heard him let out a long breath. “Look, man. I just got out of the joint, okay? You really think I want to go right back in? So I what, went and killed some old detective who was doing his job? Do you really think I’m that kind of man, Mr. McWho, whatever your name was?”

“If you didn’t do it,” I said, “and I guess I’m at least prepared to believe that you didn’t, then you need to turn yourself in. Your mother and I will both go with you.”

“Okay, first of all, my mother and you are not going to do anything, because you’re going to leave that house right now, do you hear me? And second of all, I’m not turning my black ass in to nobody, because I know how that will go. I’ve been down that road before, believe me.”

“The last time, you confessed,” I said, looking at his mother again, wishing that I could just talk to this man for one minute without her watching. “Which is the reason I came down here in the first place. I was hoping you could tell me why.”

“I was convicted of that crime and I served my sentence. That’s all I have to say. You got no business asking me anything else.”

“You didn’t do it,” I said. “You confessed to a crime you didn’t commit.”

“I was convicted of that crime,” he said, slowly this time, “and I served my sentence. Now give my mother back her phone.”

“Not until you tell me, Darryl. I want to know why you confessed.”

“Give her a message,” he said. “Tell her I’ve gotta go try to make things right first, while I still have a chance. Then I’ll come home.”

“Darryl-”

“And tell her she shouldn’t be inviting white cops into the house.”

He ended the call before I could say another word.

Mrs. King looked up at me, like she expected me to tell her everything was all right. Darryl was on his way home, and everything would be good again.

“He said he was calling on a pay phone,” she said. “He wanted to know why all the cops were here. When he saw them, he just panicked and drove off.”

“He said to give you a message. He has to make things right while he still can. Then he’ll come home.”

“He’s going to go back to prison,” she said, looking away from me. “I only had him home for a couple of hours.”

I wasn’t sure what to say to her. I certainly had nothing that would contradict her prediction. So when all else fails… you go do something. Even if it’s stupid.

“Mrs. King,” I said, “do you know where he might have been calling from? I’d like to go look for him.”

She looked back up at me. A small glimpse of hope there, in the face of this woman who should have given up hope long ago.

“He said he was calling from a pay phone. I didn’t think they even had those anymore.”

“You make a good point,” I said. “That might make it easier to find him. Just find the one working pay phone left in the entire city.”

I knew it wouldn’t be that easy, but I figured it was worth a shot. I had no idea whether Darryl King was telling me the truth or not, but either way I wanted to find him.

Mrs. King gave me a photograph of a grown-up Darryl. It was a few years old, she told me, and it wasn’t a great photograph at all, but it gave me a fair idea of what he would look like if I were to run into him. The high cheekbones were still there, but his face was much fuller now. He was probably seventy pounds heavier, and it didn’t look like prison muscle. He had a little gut on him now, and his hairline was receding. He was photographed sitting in the visiting room at either Jackson or Harrison, and he was wearing a thin smile that he probably didn’t get to use much in prison.

I put that photograph in my back pocket, along with the description of Mrs. King’s sister’s car, and I went out into the fading light. Another strange twist on an already strange journey, that now I was driving down these same streets, looking for the same person. Only now I knew his name, and I had a photograph to show people.

But I wasn’t wearing a badge.

I tried to think where I would go if I were in Darryl King’s shoes and I’d just seen a swarm of police cars around my house. He was driving his aunt’s car, and if he had a brain in his head he’d have to assume they’d found out and broadcast the description and plate number. So every minute on the road would be dangerous. He’d want to get away from the house, but off the road as soon as possible.

This was all assuming, of course, that I believed him and that he didn’t drive up to Houghton Lake. Which would mean he was set up, and that raised a whole new set of questions.

But one thing at a time.

I started out at the end of the street. It was long and straight, so you’d be able to see the police cars from a few blocks away. Arguably a misplay by my alma mater officers, but I wasn’t about to fault them for it. He was right here at this corner, I thought, starting down on Wabash. He’s about to turn, he sees the cops, he panics, he keeps driving.

Why did he panic, by the way? If he’s just coming back from a night driving around looking for company, why not just come home and face the music?

Because he’s been out of the joint for less than twenty-four hours. He knows he’s not supposed to be out unaccounted for, well after dark, and on top of that driving without a license. He sees himself sitting in front of the parole officer’s desk, sees himself getting taken right back to prison. True or not, it’s an understandable reaction on the spur of the moment.

Okay, so assume he’s coming north, coming from downtown and everything that downtown has to offer. He bails out, he keeps going north to MLK. Does he turn? No, not if he has any sense. He stays off the main road, works over to where, Rosa Parks? Grand River?

This is hopeless, I thought. If you gave me one city in the country to hide out in, this would be the one. Too much area, not enough cops. A thousand streets. So many abandoned buildings.

“The pay phone,” I said out loud to myself. “Look for the pay phone, then go from there.”

I thought back to the conversation with Darryl King, tried to remember if I had heard any kind of specific noise in the background. It would have been much more considerate of the man to call from a bowling alley, say, because then I would have heard the rattling of the pins and I’d be heading over to the old Garden Bowl on Woodward. But no, I couldn’t remember anything that distinctive, so every bar, restaurant, liquor store, or anywhere that might still have an old pay phone hanging on the wall was fair game.

I started with the first bar I could find, up by Adams Field, where all of the sports teams from Wayne State came up to play. There was a pay phone by the front door, so I went to the bartender and pulled out the photograph. Here’s where that old badge of mine would have come in real handy, because a random white guy off the street is not automatically going to get every ounce of cooperation. I’d find that out as I left the bar empty-handed, then went down Warren Avenue and hit the pizza place and the next bar and then the next restaurant, and so on. If I found a pay phone, I asked whoever was working there if they had seen a man looking like the man in the photograph. I’d get a little resistance, or a lot of resistance. Or occasionally I’d be stonewalled completely. “If you’re not a cop, then why do I have to say anything to you?” I was asked some variation of that question a few times, and I never had a good answer. Because I’m looking for him. Because I’m a human being and you’re a human being and we don’t have to play this game.

In the end, it didn’t matter. With or without cooperation, I didn’t find anyone who had seen Darryl King that night.

After a few hours of this, I called Mrs. King to let her know I had come up empty. I promised her I’d try again the next day.

“You must have been thinking about this,” I said. “Is there anywhere in this city where you think he might have gone? Somewhere he’d know he was safe?”

“He hasn’t lived in this city for a long time,” she said. “Everything he once knew is gone now.”

“Oh, one more thing,” I said. “I almost forgot. There was a green minivan parked at the end of the street today. Do you know who that might have been?”

“No, I don’t know nobody with a green minivan.”

“Just keep an eye out. Let me know if you see it around.”

“Okay, if you say so…”

One more thing for her to worry about. I was sorry I brought it up.

“Good night,” I said. “Try to get some sleep.”

Then I drove over to my favorite little cheap motel on Michigan Avenue.

“Hold on to something, Leon, because this is going to be the craziest thing you’ve ever heard.”

That was my first line when Leon picked up the phone. I was sitting in that same motel room, not just the same motel across from the Tiger Stadium site, but the very same room I had stayed in the last time I spent the night in Detroit. The night air was cooler now, but it didn’t feel like fall yet. Not like back home in Paradise.

When I told him who had hired me that day, and why, he took a moment to process it.

“Okay, so you’re following your gut,” Leon finally said. “Like you always do. I wish I was down there to help you.”

“Yeah, well, consider us both hired. Remind me to give you your half of the retainer.”

“She actually hired you to find her son.”

“Her son who, on paper, wants to kill me, yes.”

“But then you talked to him, you said. Did you believe what he told you?”

“If I’m really following my gut, like you say, then yes. I believed him.”

“For what it’s worth, I talked to Vinnie and Jackie today. Neither of them have seen a stranger around.”

“See, that’s the part that never added up,” I said. “If he was going to take his revenge on both of us, he should have come right up to my place after he killed the detective. It’s only three more hours.”

“Maybe you just missed him. Or maybe he was only going after the detective who put him away. It would have been easy to find him, you realize that. With the Internet, you can find anybody. And he had years to do it.”

“Maybe,” I said. “Or maybe the detective was killed for another reason entirely. Maybe having Darryl King around for a likely scapegoat was just a happy accident.”

“If it was someone else, you mean.”

“Someone who had reason to believe that Arnie Bateman might be on his trail now.”

“You’ve got to be careful, Alex. Whether it’s Darryl or somebody else… He’s obviously capable of anything at this point.”

“I always wondered if following my gut would get me killed one day.”

He took a moment to think that one over.

“Tell me again why you’re doing this, Alex. Instead of just coming home.”

“Because I was there at the beginning,” I said. “I helped put all of this in motion. I just want to understand what really happened. Besides, I really, really like Mrs. King.”

He gave me a little laugh on that one. I thanked him and ended the call. I knew I should try to sleep a few hours. I’d been running on reserve power for way too long.

As I lay there, listening to the traffic rumbling by on Michigan Avenue, I took out the photograph of Darryl King and looked at it one more time.

“I still have no idea what’s going on here,” I said to that face, “but I do know one thing. Wherever you are, no matter what you really did or didn’t do… I’m going to find you.”

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Detective Gruley called me the next morning. He wanted to follow up with me on just what I might have been doing at the home of Darryl King, a fugitive currently unaccounted for, and also the lead suspect in the murder of Arnie Bateman.

“I’m sorry,” I told him. “My services have been retained by Mrs. King, so by law I am not allowed to divulge any information.”

He expressed a colorful opinion or two on that subject. I promised him I’d call him back as soon as I was in a position to talk more freely.

After another colorful opinion, I ended the call and drove to my client’s house. I didn’t think I’d want to do much more driving around the city, looking for her son. In the light of day that seemed like a waste of time. But I was wondering if he’d contacted her again. Getting him back on the phone, trying to break through and get some answers… That seemed like my best shot.

I pulled up in front of the house. I sat there in my truck for a moment, looking down Ash Street. There was no green minivan parked on the other side of the gate. In its place was another vehicle altogether, a cream-colored SUV of some sort. I wasn’t that interested in the exact make and model. I was more interested in the lens flash I was once again picking up through the windshield. Somebody obviously didn’t realize that you can pick up a pair of binoculars from several blocks way, especially in bright sunlight. But now the question was, what was I going to do about it?

I knew that rusted old gate was locked, and that I’d never be able to get through it before he got clean away. I also knew that if I tried to circle around to MLK Boulevard and the entrance to the apartment complex, he’d still have plenty of time to escape.

I could disguise the fact that I was trying to catch him, but I couldn’t do that if I pulled away right now. I just got here. Cranking the truck around in a U-turn would spook him, and he’d be taking off himself in two seconds.

If I waited, I’d have a better chance. But then I’d have to wait-and hope that he was still parked there when I came back out.

Which left one option.

I got out of the truck. I didn’t look down the street. I went right to the front door of the house and knocked. Mrs. King opened the door, and I went inside.

“Good morning,” she said, looking tired and despondent. I was already moving past her.

“Pardon me,” I said. “I need to use your back door.”

“What’s going on, Alex?”

“Just me doing something stupid. As always.”

I went through the kitchen and out the back door. There were two steps down to the backyard, which ran through the weeds to the far edge of the property. I looked to my left and didn’t see a line of sight to the parked car. So he probably didn’t see me coming out the back. So far so good.

Where the yard had once been neatly mowed, now it was just an unbroken expanse of knee-high weeds, going back to the property line and into the empty lots behind it. I made my way through and eventually hooked a left, fighting my way over some fencing that had fallen down and now was almost completely grown over.

There were six or seven more lots to get through. In one I could see the old foundation of a house that had once stood a couple of doors down from Mrs. King. I saw the remains of a pile of charred wood, now almost completely reclaimed by the earth. The weeds grew taller and thicker as I got closer to the fence that marked the end of the street and the beginning of the parking lot. I had already scraped myself against the thorns of a dozen plants, but now I was faced with the final challenge-how to get through the last thick barrier of foliage on this side of the fence, without going down toward the street, where I’d surely be seen.

I walked a few yards deeper into the field, thinking it might be slightly easier to get to the fence if I got closer to the apartment building. There were abandoned tires and cinder blocks that I wouldn’t see until I was just about to break my ankles on them, but I kept making my slow progress until finally I could see the fence.

I put my head down and pushed myself through the thicket. I felt a hundred pinpricks from the wild raspberry plants. I tried to keep them off of my face, at the very least, but I knew I was destined to donate a pint of blood or two. I thrashed my way to the fence and grabbed it and finally hauled myself over.

When I got to my feet, I was pulling thorns out of my arms and looking down the fence line to where the SUV was still standing. Thank God, because to go through that and see that it was all for nothing would have been too much to bear.

Of course, now I had an even bigger problem. I was about to go roust someone I knew nothing about. Someone who could be armed. Someone who could quite possibly be the same person who killed Detective Bateman in cold blood. Someone who could quite possibly be the serial killer who killed all of those women. And here I was, unarmed and scratched all to hell. My only defense would be bleeding on him.

Something I could have thought about before that moment, of course, but what else was new? I made my way to the SUV, trying to stay low and out of sight. There were a few other vehicles to hide behind on this far side of the lot, so I made my way from one to the other. I was trying to see through the side windows of the SUV, but from this angle I was getting too much glare off the glass.

There was only one thing left to do at that point. I had to commit.

I stepped out from the last vehicle in the line and walked right to the driver’s side door. No hesitation, but no rush either. I went right to the door and grabbed the handle. I pulled. It was unlocked. The door swung open.

I was already reaching inside for the driver’s neck. My surprise was that there were actually two men in the front seat of the car. Their surprise was even bigger, as the man in the passenger’s seat dropped the binoculars and they both looked up at me with wide eyes.

“Out,” I said, pulling the driver from the vehicle. He was a big man, and I was already getting ready for a fight. But when I finally got a good look at his face, I stopped myself.

He looked familiar.

“Who are you?” I said, holding on tight to the front of his shirt. My right hand was ready to hit him if I had to. If they had guns, I was already dead, of course. The second man could have dropped me at any moment.

“Who are you?” the man said, trying to get free. “Let go of me.”

That’s when I finally recognized him. His hair was streaked with gray now. He wore glasses, and he had put on the inevitable few extra pounds. Otherwise he had aged well.

“Mr. Paige? Tanner Paige?”

“How do you know who I am?”

“I’m Alex McKnight,” I said, letting go of him. “I was one of the officers who worked on your wife’s case.”

“I’ll be damned,” he said. “It is you. What are you doing here?”

“I was going to ask you the same thing.”

The other man opened his door and got out. When he came around the vehicle, I had to take an extra beat to figure out who he was. He hadn’t aged nearly as well. His face had filled in more, and he was sporting the signature red nose of a man who’s spent a few too many hours on a bar stool. But then it came to me.

“Mr. Grayson,” I said. “Ryan Grayson.”

“I remember you,” he said, then he looked down at my arms. “You’re all scratched to hell.”

I tried to wipe away some of the blood but only succeeded in smearing it through the hairs on my forearms.

“Not a bright move on my part,” I said. “I just wanted to see who was watching the house.”

“Here,” Paige said, reaching into the car and bringing out a wad of fast-food napkins. I took them and started dabbing at the worst of my cuts.

“I assume you guys were here yesterday?” I said. “In the green minivan?”

“That was mine,” Grayson said. “We figured it would be a good idea to switch vehicles today. Obviously, that didn’t work so well.”

“It’s not exactly something we’re in the habit of doing,” Paige said. “Either of us.”

“Are you guys going to tell me why you’re here,” I said, “watching that house?”

“We know who lives there,” Grayson said. “We know it’s only a matter of time until he shows up.”

“And then what?” I said.

The two men looked at each other.

“Listen,” Paige said. “Can we go somewhere and talk about this?”

“Sure,” I said, “but I should tell you one thing right now. You remember Detective Bateman?”

“Of course,” Grayson said. “We both just talked to him this week.”

“He was murdered yesterday morning,” I said. “The cops are looking for Darryl King.”

I waited for them to absorb that.

“That would explain all the squad cars yesterday,” Paige said.

“We figured he did something,” Grayson said. “But we had no idea…”

“I’ll tell you something else,” I said. Then I stopped myself. “Actually, is there someplace we can go and sit down? This is going to take a little explanation.”

They put me in the backseat of the SUV and drove me to a little corner bar on Grand River. There was an abandoned industrial building next door to the bar, and vacant lots on the other three corners. Ryan Grayson’s green minivan was parked in the lot. There were only three other cars there. Tanner Paige suggested that we go inside for a drink, and I could see Ryan Grayson looking around at the neighborhood and getting ready to object. In the end we went inside and sat down at a table. There were the usual accoutrements for a bar in Detroit, with the Tigers schedule on the wall and all of the other posters for the Red Wings, Pistons, and Lions. As well as both the Michigan Wolverines and Michigan State Spartans, just to be fair to both sides. I excused myself for a minute and went into the bathroom to wash off my arms. When I came back to the table, I didn’t look so much like a human pincushion anymore. Someone had ordered three beers.

“I was sorry to hear about your parents,” I said to Ryan Grayson. “The detective told me they both passed on a while back.”

“They never really recovered from that day,” he said. “Either of them.”

“I also have to say I’m a little surprised seeing the two of you working together,” I said. “I didn’t think you guys got along all that well.”

“The blame for that is all on me,” Grayson said. “I had a lot of anger, and I didn’t know where to direct it. I always regret not being a better brother-in-law.”

“It’s all good now,” Paige said, waving it away. “We were all hurting.”

“So all these years later,” I said, “what in God’s name are you two doing watching that house? Surely you weren’t thinking of doing something that would get you both thrown in prison yourselves.”

They both looked at each other.

“You have to understand something,” Grayson said. “It’s not like we’ve both been sitting around every day, thinking about some lowlife who killed my sister. You have to move on. Obviously. Or you’ll go insane. But when we got the call… When we found out that he would be getting out of prison…”

He looked down at his beer.

“It’s amazing how it can all come back. All at once. One minute you’re not thinking about it, and then bam! Guess what, the man who did this thing will be out walking around by the end of the week.”

“So what were you going to do?” I said. “You weren’t spending all that time watching for him just so you could see him in your binoculars, a block away.”

They looked at each other again.

“Honestly,” Paige said, “I don’t think we really-”

“We were going to follow him,” Grayson said. “At least that was my idea. Follow him and wait for him to go into a bar or something. Someplace like this…”

He looked over at the empty corner of the bar, like he was imagining Darryl King sitting there at that very moment.

“Then, when he got up to go use the bathroom, I just had this little fantasy, I guess you’d call it. That we’d follow him in there. Lock the door. Wait for him to realize who we were. Then we’d just start beating the hell out of him. Just grab him by the hair and…”

He held his hand up to demonstrate, making a claw where he was clutching the hair on the back of the imaginary Darryl King’s head.

“And just start beating his face against the edge of the sink. Over and over again. Just…”

He stopped abruptly and wiped at his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I know I sound a little crazy.”

“It’s okay,” Paige said, grabbing his arm. “I get the same thoughts, all the time.”

“Mr. McKnight,” Grayson said, looking up at me, “I was her brother. Older than me or not, it doesn’t matter. She was my sister and I was supposed to protect her. You understand what I’m saying?”

“Yes,” I said. “I understand, but there’s no way you could have-”

“That was my job. To protect her. If my father were still alive, you could ask him, because he’s the one who told me. Until you get married and have a family of your own, being a good brother is the most important job in the world.”

“It was my job, too,” Paige said. “Being a good husband, I mean.”

“I’ll be right back,” Grayson said, pulling his arm away from Paige. He got up and went into the bathroom. That empty bathroom where there’d be no Darryl King waiting to receive his punishment.

“It should come as no surprise,” Paige said to me, as soon as his brother-in-law was out of earshot, “that this whole crazy thing was Ryan’s idea. Sitting around and watching for him. I tried to talk him out of it, but I knew he’d do it alone if he had to. So I agreed to come along so I could keep an eye on him.”

“Arnie said he’s got kids now? Surely he can see that this is a horrible idea.”

“See, that’s the thing. He was engaged to be married when Elana was killed. I don’t know if you knew that. They went ahead with the wedding, even though maybe they should have waited a little bit. Let everybody heal a little more. But that’s all hindsight, I guess. Anyway, he went right from being a grieving brother to a husband to a father, and it seemed like he was doing okay for a long time. Taking over the business from his father and everything, but then when his second kid went away to college…”

“It’s been that long?”

“They had their two kids pretty quickly. Within two or three years of Elana’s death. So yes, it was all kind of a blur to him, I think. Until all of a sudden his kids are gone and he breaks up with his wife and he’s all alone for the first time. It’s like he never really dealt with it until now. Obviously, it hasn’t gone well.”

“It seems like you’ve dealt with it a lot better.”

“I had a lot more time to myself to deal with it. But that first year or two, God, I was a mess. In fact, now that I think of it, didn’t you and the detective come to the house?”

“We did.”

“So wait a minute,” he said. “I know you already said this, but I still can’t believe it. Arnie Bateman is really dead right now?”

Ryan Grayson came back to the table then. He had washed his face and put himself back together. I was glad to see him, because I didn’t want to have to explain this part twice.

“He is,” I said, “and they’re looking for King right now.”

“He was out of prison one day,” Grayson said. “Not even twenty-four hours and he’s killing again. What the hell were they thinking letting him out?”

“You have to hear me out,” I said, “but I don’t believe that Darryl King killed the detective.”

“Are you serious?”

“Furthermore, and here’s the part where I know you’re really going to need some explanation… Because I know this was your sister we’re talking about, Mr. Grayson. And Mr. Paige, I know Elana was your wife. I wouldn’t say this if I didn’t have good reason.”

They both sat there listening to me. They didn’t move. I don’t think they were even breathing at that point.

“But I don’t think Darryl King killed her, either.”

They both just looked at me.

“What are you talking about?” Grayson said. “Have you seriously lost your mind?”

“That’s the second time I’ve been asked that,” I said. “But no.”

“He confessed,” Paige said. “He confessed to the crime and then he signed it and then he went to prison. Where he should have stayed.”

“I know he confessed,” I said, “but I think there’s something else going on here. I’m still not sure what.”

They both leaned back in their chairs. The body language was clear. They wanted nothing to do with this. I spent the next solid hour trying to explain it to them. All of my gut instincts coming together, the questions I had asked, the way the story fit together if you could just believe that Darryl King had confessed to a crime he didn’t really commit. How if you were willing to go that far, the next step would be to look at all of the other murders that had been occurring over the years, murders with the exact same characteristics. All of them unsolved.

“What you’re really saying,” Paige said, when I was finally done, “is that Elana was really murdered by a mass murderer?”

“By definition, he would be a serial killer,” I said. “Someone who kills one person at a time. From what I can tell, Elana might have been his first victim.”

“How many others?” Paige said.

“Maybe seven, that we know of. Four women in the Midwest, three more down south during the winter months. And now Detective Bateman, which is different from his pattern, of course. Although I think Arnie might have been killed for a whole different reason.”

“Is this supposed to make us feel better?” Grayson asked. “This idea that Elana might have been the first of many? Because if it is, I’d really like to know how.”

“I don’t imagine it will make you feel better, no. All I’m asking at this point is that you keep an open mind. That you not destroy your life going after someone who may ultimately be an innocent man.”

“Wow,” Grayson said, shaking his head. “That’s all I can say. Just, wow.”

“I know it’s a lot to take in all at once.”

“So why are you here?” Paige said. “Are you trying to prove this wild theory of yours?”

I raised both hands in surrender. “Look,” I said, “the FBI is already on these other murders. I heard that from an agent myself. If Elana’s case can give them a new angle, then maybe they can all-”

“Stop,” Paige said. “Just stop. I apologize. This has obviously shaken us both up, but we shouldn’t take it out on you. If there’s something to this idea, then we should both want to learn the truth just as much as you, right?”

“Yes.”

“So okay. Please accept my apology.”

“Accepted. No problem.”

We all settled back for a few moments and finished our beers.

“So,” Grayson finally said, “this is what you do nowadays? Go dig up old cases?”

“I don’t make a habit of it,” I said. “But I was part of this case, back in the day. And now, especially with Arnie getting killed… Well, I guess I’m just trying to help make things right.”

Darryl’s own words, from our brief conversation on the phone. It was my own version of making things right, while I had the chance.

“Does that mean you’re going to go look for this serial killer?”

“Hell, no,” I said. “I’ll let the FBI do that, thank you. If I can just help out Mrs. King, I’ll be happy.”

“But what if that means you run into the killer?”

“Then I’ll probably wish I had brought my gun with me.”

“I think you’re probably crazy,” he said. “Where are you staying, anyway? Is it someplace safe, at least?”

“I’m in a motel down on Michigan Avenue. I’m fine.”

“I’ve still got the house in Southfield. You were there, you know how big it is. Now that it’s empty…”

“I appreciate the offer, but I’m fine, really.”

“Well, let me know if you change your mind. You’d have a whole room to yourself. Hell, half the house.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks.”

I was glad we left that bar on good terms, at least. I promised them both that I would call them immediately if I found out anything concrete. They both promised me that they would stop watching the house. I guess that’s all any of us could have hoped for.

Grayson got in his minivan and drove home. Tanner Paige gave me a ride back to Mrs. King’s house. He looked tired and more than a little shell-shocked. Not that I could blame him.

When he pulled up in front of the house, he looked out at the sagging porch. “You’re seriously telling me that the man who lived here is maybe not the same man who killed my Elana.”

“I’m going to try to find that out,” I said. “By the way, I never got the chance to tell you this before. Back when I was a cop trying to solve that case. But I was married then, too, and my wife was taking classes at Wayne State.”

“Really? Did she know Elana?”

“No, she didn’t. I’m just saying, I realized it just as easily could have been my wife and not yours. If it had been, I’m not even sure what I would have done. But I know I can’t blame you or your brother-in-law for whatever crazy things you might have come up with over the years, even sitting down there at the end of the street like a couple of undercover cops.”

He shook his head.

“If the sun’s in front of you,” I said, “make sure you don’t flash your binoculars. A little tip for next time.”

“There won’t be a next time,” he said. “But hey, thanks for everything you told us today. Even if it didn’t seem like we wanted to hear it. Please be careful.”

“You, too. Keep an eye on that brother-in-law of yours.”

He said he would. I watched him drive away, wondering what other surprises this day would have in store for me. When I went back into the house, Mrs. King took one look at me, sat me down at the kitchen table, then went to get the first aid supplies.

“What in heaven’s name did you ever do to your arms?” she said as she pulled her chair up to mine and started dabbing me with disinfectant. This close to her I could see how hard the years had been on her. She wore it on her face, around her eyes that had seen too much. She wore it in her hands, that had worked too hard for her to be sitting every night in an empty house.

“What were you doing running around in that back field, anyway?”

“I thought there might be somebody watching your house,” I said. “So I wanted to see who.”

“Did you catch them?”

“I did, but they won’t be coming around anymore. You’ve got nothing to worry about.”

“They were looking for Darryl,” she said. Not a question.

I looked out the back window, toward the back edge of the property, where I had just recently gone stumbling through the weeds. There was something missing.

The big tree.

I could see the stump. I flashed back to that day, when I spotted the gray shirt on the clothesline and came wandering back here to talk to Mrs. King. The tree gave shade to the whole backyard. A makeshift swing hung from the low branch.

There was a girl who came out the back door to stand by her mother.

There was a boy on the swing.

There was a boy on the swing.

My God, I said to myself, if you are not the biggest idiot who ever lived on this earth. It was just like Ryan Grayson said…

Being a good brother is the most important job in the world.

CHAPTER TWENTY

“Mrs. King,” I said, trying to stay cool and even. “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course,” she said. She kept finding new cuts on my arms. She’d shake her head in disapproval as she squeezed out more disinfectant on her cotton ball.

“Tell me about your family.”

She looked up at me for a moment, then went back to her work. “What do you want to know about them?”

“I know you had two other children. I saw them that first day I was here, when I was a police officer. They were in the backyard with you.”

“I remember, yes.”

“When I came back here the other day, the day we had the chocolate cake…”

I paused for a moment, like a man taking a deep breath before going underwater.

“You told me a couple of very sad things,” I said. “You said that your daughter was gone, first of all…”

“The drugs, yes. The drugs took my Naima from me.”

“I’m very sorry. But as far as your other son goes, I think you said he was homeless?”

“He’s been away for a long time, yes. It wasn’t long after Darryl went to prison. With him gone and no other man in the house… Tremont didn’t have anybody to look up to.”

“Tremont,” I said. “That’s right. That was his name. I think my partner asked him if he liked being on summer vacation. Then he went over and sat on the swing you had hanging from that tree…”

“Darryl was always hard on his little brother. But I know he loved him. He looked after him, because all the other kids would tease him. He was a little different.”

“How was he different?”

“He was just more sensitive than other children. He didn’t talk a whole lot. Whenever he’d get picked on, Darryl would be there to make things right.”

To make things right. Those same words yet again.

“How did he make things right?” I said.

“He’d go after any of those kids who picked on Tremont. Didn’t matter how big they were. Darryl wasn’t that big himself, but he was strong. He worked out all the time.”

“Yes,” I said, remembering that weight bench in the backyard. “But what else would he do to make things right?”

“Tremont was always running off somewhere. I’d be worried sick because he’d be out at all hours of the night, even though he was only fourteen years old, understand. But Darryl’d always say, ‘I got him, Mama. I’ll go find him.’ He always would. He might whip his ass a little bit on the way home, but he’d always find him.”

“Where would Tremont go when he ran away?”

“Oh, just about anywhere. Darryl would have to go all over the place to find him. But he’d always bring him home in the end.”

That’s when the question came to me. The one question I should have asked a lot sooner.

“Mrs. King, did Darryl ever go looking for Tremont at the train station?”

“No, Tremont knew he wasn’t allowed to go there.”

“Why is that?”

“It’s way down by the river,” she said. “That’s too far away for a fourteen-year-old boy to be going all by himself. And besides…”

I took her hands then. I made her stop her work and I sat there holding her hands and looking into her eyes.

“Besides what?” I said. “Why was he not allowed to go to the train station?”

“Because it was a bad place, Alex. People sold drugs in that park in front of the station, and men would go down there if they were looking for young boys.”

“If he was there…”

“He loved his trains, Tremont did. Ever since he was little. But he knew he wasn’t supposed to go to that place.”

“I’ll ask you again,” I said, holding her hands tighter. “The things that went on at that station… If Tremont was there, is it possible that’s why?”

She looked away.

“Mrs. King, please answer me, no matter how painful this might be. It’s important.”

“If he was,” she said, “then I wasn’t able to see it. I’m ashamed to say that now, but it’s true. I just couldn’t imagine my boy doing something like that.”

“What about Darryl? Did he know?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe that’s why he was so hard on him.”

“As far as I know, Darryl never said anything about this to the police. Not when the detective was questioning him.”

“I don’t suppose that’s surprising,” she said. “I don’t suppose he’d be real proud to tell people why he was down at the station, if he was looking for his brother, and thought that he was…”

“Is it possible,” I said, thinking here was where I had to choose my words carefully, “that Darryl may have thought he was protecting Tremont when he confessed to that crime?”

“If he really confessed, then yes, I’d say that’s the most likely reason he’d do something so foolish. If he came back home and got his hands on Tremont, and asked him if he was down at that station on the same day that woman was murdered, and Tremont said yes, he was… Then by the time those police showed up to arrest Darryl, I can see him having it in his head that they were going to send somebody away, no matter what, so it should be him instead of his brother. I can see that all day, yes.”

No mention of taking the diamond bracelet while he happened to be there, I thought. No mention of the possibility that Tremont may have been involved in the murder of Elana Paige.

But no, I can’t even ask her this. I can’t say the words out loud, not in this kitchen.

“I’ll tell you this,” she said. “When Darryl got taken away to prison, sometime I’d think to myself, there’s a reason for this, Jamilah. In your darkest hour, this is a small blessing, that it’s Darryl in that prison instead of Tremont. Because Darryl’s a strong boy. Real strong. While Tremont wouldn’t last a day in that place. Not one single day. I know that sounds like a bad way to see it.”

“You never said anything about this before,” I said. “When you told me that you knew Darryl was innocent…”

“I didn’t say anything about Darryl saying the wrong thing to the wrong person, no. Or why he might have said it. Because I don’t care about that. I only care about the fact that neither of my two boys would kill anybody.”

“Okay, I understand. But tell me more about what happened to Tremont after Darryl went to prison. You said he ran away for good?”

“Yes, because Darryl wasn’t here anymore to go fetch him. Tremont just ran away and he never came back.”

“You never heard from him?”

“Oh, he’d call me sometimes. Those first few years, anyway. I’d wire him some money sometimes, but he always said he was fine. He said he was riding the rails, like he always wanted to. He got hooked up with some people who would hitch rides on freight trains, go all over the place, do some work if they could find it, or else just panhandle. Then hitch another freight train and do it all over again. I guess they’ve got this whole way of life.”

“Like hobos, you mean. Like modern-day hobos.”

“Doesn’t sound like any kind of life to me. But he said he was finally happy, riding the freight trains and never knowing where he’d end up next.”

She stopped. She finally took her hands from mine. She smoothed her dress over her knees and raised her head high.

“It was something else I just had to accept, Alex. One boy in prison, the other a homeless wanderer out on a freight train somewhere. My daughter in a grave. None of them going to school. None of them sleeping in their room at night.”

“When’s the last time you heard from Tremont?”

“It’s been a long time. I couldn’t even tell you if he’s alive or dead right now. I know a mother’s supposed to know such things. I’m supposed to feel if he’s still out there somewhere, but I guess I’m not feeling much of anything anymore.”

“But when you did hear from him,” I said, already dreading the answer, “you say he’d be in a new place every time?”

“Cincinnati, if I recall once. Somewhere in Pennsylvania. Chicago.”

“What about during the winter?”

“That’s when he’d head south. Hitch a train to someplace warm. That’s what he told me, anyway.”

I closed my eyes. It all fit together now. Including why Darryl said he had to try to make things right, while he had the chance.

He was going to go try to find his brother, one last time.

I went outside to make the call, pacing back and forth on the grown-over sidewalk in front of Mrs. King’s house. If I felt any sense of betrayal, I got over it in about two seconds, imagining all of the women who’d been killed across the country. Not to mention Detective Bateman.

When Janet Long answered, she didn’t waste any time.

“Let me guess,” she said. “You’re not calling me from Paradise.”

“I need to tell you something. It’s very important.”

“Okay, I’m listening.”

“You need to find Darryl King’s brother. Tremont.”

A long silence.

“Where are you?” she said.

“I’m still in Detroit.”

“Where in Detroit?”

“At Mrs. King’s house.”

“Can you come down to our office?”

“And have your partner get hold of me? I’ll be there all day.”

“Come and talk to me in person,” she said. “I’ll meet you downstairs.”

“Okay, I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

I ended the call, took one more look at the house, and got in the truck. I drove down to Michigan Avenue, then headed east, past my luxurious little motel, toward downtown. I pulled into the lot next to the federal building. It hadn’t been that long since I was last here. That night when I took Janet to dinner and I actually thought that’s why I had come down to Detroit. How different things can look in just one week.

I saw Janet standing outside the main entrance. When I got out of the truck, she came over and gave me a quick hug.

“Let’s go take a walk,” she said. “Are you hungry?”

“We don’t have to do that. I just wanted to tell you what I know.”

“I need to get away from this place for a minute. Come on.”

She took me by the arm and pointed me down Cass Avenue. With everything else on my mind, it was still good to see her. We walked down past the Free Press Building, toward the river.

“Where are we going?” I said.

“I’ve got a craving for a Coney, and only Zef’s will do.”

“Is that place still there? My partner used to drag me there all the time.”

“Well, now it’s my turn.”

We looped around by Hart Plaza, where the great sculpture of Joe Louis’s fist hung in its triangle. Then back up Woodward, into the heart of my old precinct. We passed the Municipal Center with the famous Spirit of Detroit statue out front. The big green bronze man holding the sun in his left hand and a family in his right. That got me thinking of the building itself, renamed to honor Coleman Young, who was mayor when I was a cop. His hand-picked police chief would be convicted of stealing over two million dollars of undercover funds, a few years after I left the force. That’s always a fun conversation, getting ex-cops to talk about our beloved mayor and our beloved police chief.

A conversation I never got to have with Arnie Bateman.

“This is nice,” I said. “It’s like a little time-out before life gets crazy again. But now you really need to get back and do something about this new information.”

“Are you that sure about what you’re telling me?”

“I think I am.”

“So Darryl King’s brother, you say. What was his name? Tremont?”

“Yes. Tremont King.”

“Tell me what you know about him.”

“Well, he’s a couple of years younger. Very different kind of kid. He ran away from home, right after Darryl got put away. He’s hasn’t been back since. He rides on freight trains.”

“Say that again?”

“He rides on freight trains, all over the country. He goes south when it’s cold.”

I could see her working this over in her head. The list of cities, north at certain times of the year, south at others.

“What about Detective Bateman?” she said. “Do you think he killed him, too?”

“I don’t know for sure. Maybe. Tremont’s a total mystery to me, but somehow I think he found out that Bateman was looking into the case again. Hell, for all I know, Bateman knew exactly where to find him. Which reminds me…”

“What?”

“Bateman said he had a copy of the case files. You should take a look at those. I didn’t see the case at the very end, so maybe he turned up something else. I don’t know. But you should also find out if he made any phone calls in those couple days before he was murdered. Besides to me, I mean.”

“Okay,” she said. “I’m on it. Suddenly I’m not so hungry anymore.”

We started walking back to the office.

“I’m officially no longer surprised by anything you do,” she said. “Although I will remind you, not that it will do any good, that you promised me you were going to let this go.”

“I thought I was.”

“You promised me you were going home. Do you remember?”

“I didn’t go out looking for a serial killer. I just stumbled into this. You should be happy I’m bringing it to you. You’ve got a solid lead now. You can watch the rails and pick this guy up.”

“If this pans out,” she said, “then yes. You’re right. It’ll break this case wide open. After all of those man-hours, we’ll finally have this guy.”

“He won’t kill anyone else. That’s all that really matters.”

She looked at me and shook her head. “I don’t even know what to do with you. I’d tell you to go home now, but clearly you’re not going to listen to me.”

“This time,” I said, “I think I will.”

When we got back to her building, she thanked me and gave me another little kiss on the cheek. She told me to drive safely. I told her I’d see her again soon.

I got in my truck and drove back to Mrs. King’s house. I debated with myself all the way there. How much was I going to tell her? In the end, I decided to just tell her I didn’t think I could find Darryl. It hit her hard, I could see that, but she let me off the hook. She thanked me and gave me a kiss on the cheek. The same cheek that Janet had kissed.

“I’ll be in touch,” I said to her. “The second you hear from him, give me a call, okay? When he comes back, you let me know and I’ll come right back down here. Whoever I need to talk to, I’ll do everything I can to make sure he doesn’t get in big trouble over his parole violation.”

I didn’t say anything about Tremont. I didn’t say, oh, by the way, your other son might be a psychopathic serial killer, and the FBI is out looking for him right now. I figured she’d find out all about that soon enough. At that point, just having Darryl back home would be all either of us could ever hope for.

I drove away in my truck, knowing that she’d be in tears as soon as I left the street. She’d be back down on her knees praying. I knew I’d feel that in my gut, all the way home.

As I drove back to the motel to check out, I decided to take one last detour. I turned the other way on Michigan Avenue and went west, to the train station. I wanted to see that towering wreck one more time.

I stopped by Roosevelt Park. I got out and walked around the Cyclone fence. Maybe they’ll really fix this place someday, I thought. Maybe then I’ll be able to come back and marvel at just how beautiful this building is. Maybe I won’t think about what happened inside on that abandoned balcony.

Yeah, maybe, but I kinda doubt it.

As I stood there, a freight train came by on the tracks. It was going west, so that meant it had come out of that long tunnel from Canada. From here it would keep going west to Chicago, or else turn south into Ohio. You could get anywhere in the country by hopping aboard, as long as you knew where the train was going. As long as you didn’t kill yourself in the attempt.

Fate couldn’t be more obvious, I thought. What a heavy-handed touch, to see this freight train going by, just as I’m about to leave the city behind.

He could be on this train right now, I thought. This very train going by.

He’s not on this train. There are thousands of freight trains moving all over the country at any moment. He could be on any one of them. That’s why you need the FBI to throw a blanket over the whole thing.

You’re not looking for a serial killer. You’re looking for Darryl.

Who, in turn, might be looking for a serial killer. So no, thanks.

You promised her you’d find him, Alex.

That was before.

Since when do you walk away like this? No matter how futile this may seem, you never, ever walk away.

“Okay, just stop,” I said out loud. An actual argument with myself, maybe the product of living alone for too long. “There is nothing else you can do here. So you have to go home now. You have to go back to Paradise.”

The train kept rumbling by.

“There’s nothing you can do,” I said to myself, “that they can’t do better.”

Car after car after car.

“You’ve got no angle that they don’t.”

The last car passed by.

“Except…”

The train disappeared down the tracks.

“Maybe one.”

I took out my phone and called Leon.

“I’ve got a question for you,” I said as soon as he picked up. “I know it’ll take you all of five minutes to look up the answer.”

“Yeah? What’s that?”

“How many rail yards are there around Metro Detroit?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

If you look at a map of Michigan, and you look at those railroad lines that people usually ignore, you’ll see that they all converge on the southwest corner of Detroit. It took Leon all of twenty seconds to see this, and another twenty seconds to figure out that this was the CSX Livernois Yard, the biggest rail yard in the state of Michigan. It felt like something beyond a shot in the dark, but I figured I had to try it.

I headed down to Livernois Avenue. A few more blocks south and the road dipped below the tracks. As soon as I emerged on the other side I could see the northeast corner of the yard on my right. The tracks split apart like an unraveling rope, going from four tracks to a dozen to a dozen more. There were long lines of freight cars waiting to be pulled somewhere. Just more and more cars, as far as the eye could see.

I saw a line of semis turning into the yard, each one of them carrying one of those containers you see rolling along on the open flatbed cars. As I looked toward the service entrance, I saw a pair of gates, and I knew there’d be a man or two standing in each one. I pictured them holding clipboards. I also pictured them less than amused if a pickup truck driven by a curious ex-cop got in line with the semis, so I kept driving, figuring I’d eventually find the main office.

There was a high fence running all along the edge of the yard, topped with razor wire. On the other side of the fence were the same kind of closed freight boxes I’d see on some of the freighters going through the locks. Or on the long freight trains I’d see coming over the railroad bridge from Canada. Here there were more of them in one place than I’d ever seen before, stacked two and three high for a good half a mile. I made the turn on Vernor and came around the southern edge of the yard. At last, there was a sign there, CSX INTERNATIONAL, with another service road. This one ran into more gates, but there was a building near the gates and maybe a better chance of someone there in a mood to humor me.

I saw an opportunity to pull off the service road even before I got to the gates. I parked in the lot and went in through the front door. There was a woman sitting behind thick glass. She looked up at me and hit a button on her desk. Her voice sounded like something half metal as it came through the speaker mounted in the glass.

“Can I help you, sir?”

“I’m wondering if I can speak to the head of security,” I said, figuring that was as good a line as any. “I just have a couple of questions.”

“Can I ask what this is in regards to?”

“I’m a private investigator,” I said. “I just want a minute of his time to ask about unauthorized people who ride on the freight trains.”

I saw her frown at that, and it occurred to me that I probably could have phrased that better. You could hear that and think I was there to accuse someone of letting riders on the trains, like maybe one of them got run over and now here I am representing a lawyer looking to make a big payday, but before I could clarify, she was already on her old-school stand-up microphone.

“Mr. Maglie will be out in a minute,” she said. “He’ll meet you just outside the door.”

I stepped outside to prepare myself for Mr. Maglie. About a minute later, a gleaming white pickup came roaring out of the yard, passing through the gate without slowing down. It came to an abrupt halt a few yards away from me. Naturally it raised a cloud of dust that I had to shield my eyes from.

“I’m Maglie,” he said as he got out of the truck. He was wearing a dark blue uniform with short sleeves, the better to show off his forearms. Pushing sixty, once a tough guy, I could tell. Now even tougher with age.

“My name is Alex McKnight.” I didn’t bother reaching out my right hand to shake his.

“What’s your business here, sir?”

I took out one of my cards and handed it to him. He read it with obvious skepticism, then handed it back to me.

“I just wanted to ask you a couple of questions,” I said. “Let me just say, I don’t represent anyone who’s out to make a buck or anything.”

“Who do you represent?”

“I’m not allowed to disclose that, but it really doesn’t matter. I’m just looking for somebody who rides on the freight trains.”

“Does this person work for the railroad?”

“No, I’m sure he doesn’t.”

“Then he doesn’t ride these trains. Not in this yard.”

“This is the biggest rail yard I’ve ever seen,” I said. “How many hundreds of trains do you have coming through here every day?”

“You want an exact number?”

“No, I’m just saying. I know that people hitch rides on trains. They’ve been doing it for years.”

“Look,” he said. “I know you probably have this image in your head. Hobos riding the rails, all over the country, sitting in empty boxcars, playing the guitar, all their belongings tied up in a handkerchief and hanging from a stick…”

“I’m sure it’s not that way anymore, but-”

“Do you see all those boxes?” he said, gesturing at the stacks behind him. “That’s what we pull nowadays. It’s all closed up. It comes off the truck, we load it, we move it down the line, unload it at the destination. Do you see a place for some hobo to hitch a ride?”

“No, I honestly don’t.”

“That’s right. If they did try to hitch a ride, you know where they’d have to go? They’d have to break into one of the helping engines and ride in the empty cab. Do you think that would be a good idea?”

“I’m guessing no.”

“If we were at a construction site, would you want some vagrant to wander off the street and go climb into the cab of a big crane? Some drug addict sitting behind the controls of a twenty-ton machine?”

“Of course not.”

“That’s what we’re talking about here. A high-risk industrial environment where people can get themselves killed in about two seconds if they don’t know what they’re doing, and get other people killed, too. So unless you have some specific reason to believe that somebody is breaking into my trains…”

My trains. He actually said that.

“No,” I said. “I don’t. I just know that one person rides them somewhere. Obviously he doesn’t ride them here.”

“Obviously not. Are we done?”

“I believe we are. Thank you for your time.”

“Exit’s that away,” he said, pointing back toward Vernor. He got back into his white pickup and took off. Probably to go wash the dust off the bumpers.

“Okay,” I said. “I’m so glad I decided to stay in Detroit today.”

I got back in my own truck and sat there for a moment, trying to figure out where to go next. If there had been any justice in the world, here’s where a long line of hobos would have come skulking through the parking lot and then hopped onto the nearest train.

I was about to put the truck in gear when I noticed another man coming out of the front entrance. He held the door open for a moment, long enough to finish some joke to the receptionist. He was still laughing as he walked to his car.

He’s about my age, I thought. Better yet, he appears to be a genuine human being. I wonder if…

He went right to a perfectly restored mint green midsixties Mustang. This was my chance. I got out of the truck.

“Hey, excuse me!” I said. “Is that a 1965?”

He looked at me and smiled. “Actually, it’s 1964.”

“I can’t believe it,” I said, bending down to give it a closer look. “This is maybe the most beautiful car I’ve ever seen. Did you do the work yourself?”

“My son and I did. You want to see inside?”

“I’d love to.”

He opened the passenger’s-side door so I could make a big fuss over the interior, right down to the original gearshift knob.

“You’re not selling this,” I said, “are you?”

“Not unless you’ve got a million dollars on you.”

“If only I did,” I said, shaking my head, “but hey, you work here at the yard, right?”

“I do.”

“Cars and trains. My two passions. Would you mind if I ask you a couple of questions?”

“Sure, go ahead.”

“Is there someplace around here I can buy you a beer?”

I followed him to a place two blocks down the street. It was a workingman’s bar, for the rail workers and for the men who worked at the city’s truck garage right next door, too. A lot of steel-toed work boots had come through these doors.

“So let me ask you something,” I said, when I’d set us both up. “What’s with your man, Mr. Maglie?”

“Oh, he’s always been like that,” the man said. I hadn’t gotten his name yet. “You should have seen him before his wife came back.”

“Someone came back to that?”

“Imagine being that lonely, yeah.”

“The people who ride the trains,” I said. “I was just wondering how that works, and I guess I must have hit a nerve.”

“Yeah, I’d hate to be hitching a ride and run into Maglie, but you’re really not gonna see that kind of thing here anyway.”

“Why not?”

“It just doesn’t make sense. Trying to get through that fence, then pick out the right train… There’s too much going on here. Much better to let the train get on its way, so you know which direction it’s going in, then hop on later.”

“So you’re saying you could hop on just about anywhere.”

“No, that wouldn’t make any sense, either. Depending on what kind of load they’re carrying, these trains will get up to seventy miles an hour. You feel like trying to jump onto that?”

“So where do they get on?”

“They call it ‘catching out,’ by the way, but usually one of the small stations is your best bet. The trains will still come in slow. Sometimes they’ll even stop to switch out the crew or take on a new car or two. There’s a lot less security, plus you already know pretty much where the train is heading, because there’s not that much traffic. Hell, sometimes the crew will even tell you if you catch the right guy on the right day.”

“Have you been that guy before?”

“Maybe. Once upon a time. When I was working down the line.”

“Maglie said these guys have to break into the helper locomotives now. That that’s the only way they can ride.”

“He’s an idiot. It’s true there aren’t that many open boxcars anymore, but you’ve got the rear platforms of grain cars, you’ve got your empty slots in a car carrier. You can even lie down under a semi if it’s getting piggybacked. There’s all sorts of places you can ride, believe me. I admit, even though I’ve worked around trains all my life, I’ve often thought it might be a blast to just hop on and ride someday. See where I end up.”

“Okay,” I said, “so here’s the big question. If I wanted to find someone who’s riding the rails, where would I go?”

He looked at me. “You’re not really a train geek at all. This is why you’re buying me this beer.”

“I think you got me,” I said, “but I did love your car.”

That made him smile. “You could have asked me that from the beginning,” he said. “Because the answer is pretty simple. If someone is riding the rails, the only person in the world who’ll be able to find them is another person who’s also riding the rails. You’d be surprised at how fast word can get around. Especially if you put a little money behind it.”

“So how do I find someone like that?”

“Go to one of the smaller stations, like I said. Probably River Rouge is your best bet. Lots of trains, pretty much anything going south or east has to go through there. You should be able to find a rider if you look hard enough. Or find a worker who looks like he’s an easy touch. Like me. He’ll know where to send you.”

“River Rouge,” I said. “I got it. Here’s the last question, I promise. This one’s the hardest yet.”

“Shoot.”

“Say I don’t want to get the word out. Say I want to find out what the word is that’s already gotten out.”

“Come again?”

“My guess is that somebody’s already done exactly what you’ve just described to me. He’s found out how to get a message down the line to someone on the rails.”

“So you want to know what that message is. Even though it’s not a message for you.”

“That’s about the size of it, yes.”

“Well, remember how I said a little money would help?”

“Yes.”

“Just bring more. That’s the one thing these guys will always respond to.”

I reached out and shook his hand.

“Can’t tell you how much I appreciate it,” I said. “My name’s Alex, by the way.”

“Jerry, and I wish you good luck. It sounds like you could use some.”

“You can say that again.”

I thanked him one more time. Then I went out, got in my truck, and headed downriver.

It’s called downriver, naturally, because the Detroit River flows south between Michigan and Canada, all the way to Lake Erie, and on the Michigan side you’ll find a set of suburbs that probably aren’t going to rival the French Riviera. The River Rouge cuts inland from the Detroit River, and it was once so polluted it caught on fire. I hear it’s a lot cleaner now, but as you cross the River Rouge you’ll still pick up the heavy smell of pig iron from the blast furnaces on Zug Island.

I found the rail yard. My new friend was right-it was a lot smaller than Livernois. There were maybe a dozen tracks at its widest point, all running north and south, with plenty of freight cars standing by. Probably just enough to give a rider a little cover, without being an overwhelming jumble. The fence that ran along Haltiner Street had a token string of barbed wire on top, but I’m pretty sure I could have gotten over it myself if I had to.

I knew better than to march through the front entrance and ask to see the head of security. Even if he didn’t turn out to be another Maglie, I had already learned my lesson about who to talk to. I found the main parking lot, across the street from the yard. A sign let me know that I’d be towed if I wasn’t there on official yard business, but I figured I could take my chances. I parked the truck and waited.

Another human being, I thought. That’s all I need here. Funny how that’s a real commodity these days, no matter where you go.

It was still the middle of the afternoon. Not exactly prime time for the men who worked in this yard to be coming out to their vehicles. Eventually, I did see two men walking across the street to the parking lot, but I didn’t get the right vibe from them. They both looked unhappy, like maybe they’d both just gotten fired. So I let them go without a word. About a half hour later, I saw another man. He looked a little happier, so I figured he was worth a shot.

“Hey, hold up,” I said as I got out of the truck. “Can I ask you a quick question?”

“Who are you?” He didn’t stop moving.

“I just want to ask you a question. I’m a private investigator.”

That usually gets people interested, at least, but this guy put it into a higher gear and practically jumped into his car. He sped off without so much as another glance in my direction.

“Now that,” I said to myself, “is a man who’s expecting to be served with a summons any day now. Either that, or I’m a lot scarier than I think.”

I got back in my truck and sat there for another hour. I had the windows rolled down and there was a nice breeze, but it was still my own version of hell, just sitting there and not accomplishing anything. Finally, I saw a car pull into the lot. A man got out. He didn’t look particularly unfriendly. As he was about to walk across the street, I got out to intercept him.

“Hey there,” I said. “Sorry to bother you. Can I ask you something?”

“I’m in a hurry here.”

“Just one quick question?”

“Sorry, pal.”

“I’m a private investigator,” I said, deciding it was time to pull out all the stops if I didn’t want to spend the rest of the day sitting here. “And I’ve got fifty bucks right here if you’ll answer one question.”

That stopped him dead. He turned around.

“What’s this about, pal?”

I stepped closer to him. I opened my wallet and took out a fresh fifty-dollar bill.

“One question,” I said, “and then I’ll let you go.”

He looked at the fifty. I could tell he didn’t mind the sight of it.

“I’m told that certain people hitch a ride on freight trains here,” I said. “I think they call it ‘catching out,’ right?”

“That’s right.”

A good sign, that he recognized the term.

“Any chance you know where I could find these people?”

“Anyone in particular?”

“Well, I’m looking for one person, but I’d settle for anybody who could tell me if a message got sent down the line recently.”

He nodded his head, then sneaked a look at the front entrance to the yard.

“You know, catching a ride is trespassing,” he said, “and helping anyone catch a ride is grounds for getting your ass fired.”

“Sounds like that’s none of my business,” I said. “None of Mr. Grant’s business, either.”

He looked a little confused about that one, until he looked at the face on the bill.

“Well, I may be able to put you in contact with someone,” he said. “If you give me a little while.”

“How long’s a little while?”

“There’s a train going out at nine thirty tonight. I’m guessing you might be able to talk to a couple of guys who just might be hitching a ride.”

“That’s a long time to wait.”

“That’s their train,” he said. “This isn’t Amtrak, in case you didn’t notice.”

“I appreciate the help,” I said, giving him the bill. “Where do I meet these guys?”

“Be back here in the lot at nine. I’ll set it up.”

“I’ll be here.”

“Oh,” he said, “and you might want to bring some more of those fifties.”

I grabbed something to eat. I sat in my truck and read the paper. I found a bar and watched the first two innings of the Tigers game. When I looked at my watch for the five hundredth time, I figured it was finally time to head back to the rail yard.

The sun was down. It was a cool night, almost cold. I knew it was probably below freezing up in Paradise. A good night to be sitting by the fireplace at the Glasgow. So of course here I was, waiting to meet a couple of vagrants in River Rouge.

I pulled into the lot. I sat there and waited for a while. The lights were on in the yard, and I could see a long train coming through. It didn’t stop. Not the train these guys were waiting for, I thought. It was only eight thirty.

At eight forty-five, I saw my new friend walking across the street to the lot. He looked both ways on the street and then came over to my truck. I rolled down my window.

“Evening, pal,” he said. “You got another fifty for me?”

“I thought I already paid you.”

“You paid me for the front end of the deal. I made the contact and arranged the meet. Now I need the back end.”

“That doesn’t sound like two ends of anything,” I said, but I was already pulling out my wallet. I wasn’t about to see the whole day go down the drain over another fifty bucks.

“You go down this street,” he said as he pocketed the bill. “Toward the southern end of the yard. There’s a street there called Emiline. On your right, you’ll see a boarded-up house. The guys hang out there until it’s time to jump the fence and get on board.”

“How do I know you’re not just sending me down a dead end and pocketing a hundred dollars?”

“You don’t,” he said. “Have a good night.”

He left me and walked back across the road. I shook my head and started up the truck. When I pulled out and hit my lights, he gave me a little wave over his shoulder.

I drove down the street, parallel to the fence line. I found Emiline Street about a quarter mile down. There was a boarded-up house on the corner, just as advertised. I pulled up in front and turned off the truck. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do next. Eventually, I got out and wandered around to the backyard of the house. I knew I was just over the Detroit line, but here was yet another house that had once held a family, with kids playing in the yard and a dad going off to work every day. The job disappeared and then so did the family. They couldn’t sell this house, because it’s one of a million other houses for sale. So now it’s just a boarded-up wreck.

I heard a scraping noise. Then I realized one of the boards was moving. Two men emerged from the house and came toward me. As they got closer I could smell cigarettes and cheap liquor, sweat, and maybe a few other things that they probably wouldn’t be bottling as perfume anytime soon. They were both wearing dark clothing, the better to blend into the darkness, I’m sure. One had his hair tied in a ponytail. The other’s was wrapped up in a bandanna.

“You the guy with the fifties?” one of them said.

“Apparently I am.”

“Let’s see ’em.”

I let out a long breath as I took out my poor wallet again. I didn’t even bother asking if they’d be willing to split one bill.

“I’ve got a hundred right here,” I said, “but first tell me what you know.”

“Guy said you’re looking for a message that got sent down the line. Maybe we heard something.”

“When did you hear it?”

“Two nights ago.”

I worked that out in my mind. Two nights ago was the night Darryl King took his aunt’s car and disappeared. So far, it was checking out.

“What was the message?” I said.

The two of them looked at each other. “It’s gonna sound a little fuzzy,” the one said. Apparently he’d been elected to do all of the talking.

“I’m all ears,” I said.

“The message was ‘Meet me in the breadbox. At midnight.’”

“That’s it?”

“That’s the message.”

“Meet me in the breadbox. Whatever that is. At midnight, when? What night?”

“Whatever night,” he said. “Guy’s probably just going there every midnight until the man he wants to see shows up.”

It occurred to me as I gave them their money that they could have just made up this message. They might be hopping on the train and laughing about it for the next few hundred miles, but then the silent partner finally spoke up.

“The message was for TK,” he said. “If that’s any help.”

“Oh yeah,” the other one said. “For TK.”

TK. Tremont King.

I thanked the two of them and wished them well. I was tempted to ask them a lot more questions about life on the rails, but they had a train to catch, and I had to go figure out just what the hell the breadbox was, so I could be there at midnight.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

It was going on ten o’clock at night when I pulled up at Mrs. King’s house. Too late for polite company to knock on her door, but I figured this was important enough to bend the rules.

Then I stopped myself, just as I was about to get out of the truck. I was working with the gut feeling that one of her sons might be a killer, after all. I was still trying to find her other son, but in doing that it felt more and more like I might eventually end up finding them both. Could I really ask her to help me do that?

I thought about it for a few seconds. That’s really all it took. Then I got out and went to knock on the door.

“Alex!” she said as she opened it. “I thought you were going back home!”

“Yeah, I thought so, too, but then I thought better of it.”

“I don’t understand. You said there was nothing left for you to do.”

“There really isn’t,” I said, “but there is something for you to do.”

“What’s that?”

“Tell me where the breadbox is.”

She looked at me for a long moment.

“It’s in the kitchen,” she finally said. “Where else would a breadbox be?”

“I don’t think that’s the breadbox I’m looking for.”

“Come sit down,” she said. “I’ll make some coffee. You can tell me what in heaven’s name you’re talking about.”

I was about to protest, but a cup of coffee sounded perfect at that point. I sat in the kitchen and watched her make it. I tried not to show my disappointment, because I had just seen my angle disappear. Her intimate knowledge of her two sons, that was my advantage, after all. My only advantage. The FBI had a national organization with agents spread out across the country. They had the technology. They had satellites in space, for God’s sake. All I had was Mrs. King.

“You’re the only one who can figure this out,” I said to her. “If Darryl wanted to meet Tremont at the breadbox, where would that be?”

She put the two mugs of coffee on the table and sat down.

“I never heard them use that term before,” she said. “Neither one of them.”

“Are you sure? Think back.”

She sat there and worked it over.

“No, Alex, I’m sorry. I’ve never heard either one of my boys call anything a breadbox, except the one we’ve got right here in the kitchen.”

“Well, I suppose they could always meet here,” I said, looking over at the wooden box on the counter, “but that just doesn’t make sense. Why would you say it that way? You might as well say, ‘Meet me at the toaster.’”

“Maybe they’re going to meet at a bakery,” she said. “Somewhere they make bread.”

“Do you know of a place like that? Maybe even called the Breadbox?”

“No, I don’t, but that bakery where they made the Wonder Bread, that was just a few blocks over.”

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Was that still open when Darryl was still…”

I did the math in my head.

“I think it was,” I said. “The big Wagner Bakery, with the WONDER BREAD sign out front. On Grand River.”

“Which isn’t there anymore.”

“He has to know it’s not there anymore, right? It’s been closed for years. In fact…”

“The casino,” she said. “They used that building for the casino.”

I tried to imagine Darryl King meeting his brother at the Motor City Casino. Maybe the most camera-dense environment in the entire city. He’d be a fool to show his face there.

Yet what if he sent that message down the line without thinking about what that building had become? He could be sitting outside that casino, watching for his brother to appear, cursing himself for not doing a better job in his planning, but sitting there just the same because the message had been sent and now he had to play out his hand.

“I should go over there and check it out,” I said. “Lacking any better idea.”

“I’ll keep thinking,” she said. “If I remember another kind of breadbox, I’ll give you a call.”

“All right, please do. I’m gonna get going.”

I was half out of my chair when she stopped me.

“It was really him? Darryl’s really looking for his brother?”

“Somebody’s looking for TK,” I said. “As of two nights ago.”

“That has to be Darryl,” she said. “After all this time, he’s looking for his brother.”

That much was true, I thought. As for what he’d do with him when he found him… I wondered if I’d end up being there when it happened.

It was a short drive to the Motor City Casino. Of course, that was the general idea behind the message. Pick a spot they both knew, a spot both could have walked to, back in the day. Pick a spot that would mean something to the two of them, but nobody else.

But if you were looking for the old bakery where they made the Wonder Bread, dominating the corner of Grand River and Temple Street, your only clue would be the WAGNER BAKING CO. sign high on the original brick walls. The rest of the corner was taken over by the gleaming metal facade of the casino, with the new hotel looming right behind it.

It lit up the night sky, of course, as all non-Indian casinos do. There was a parking structure next door that took up a good city block. It was already feeling like a lost cause, but I drove up through the structure, all the way to the top level. I parked near the edge overlooking the casino, and I went and stood there and looked down at the people all dressed up for the evening, going into the casino to lose their money.

I looked at my watch. It was pushing eleven o’clock.

“One hour,” I said to the night. “What are the odds it’ll be anywhere around here?”

I went down to the street and walked around the casino. I tried to look like I was on my way somewhere at all times. I figured the security guys probably wouldn’t look kindly on a man just standing outside, scoping out the building for an hour.

Midnight came and I had my answer. If Darryl was going somewhere every night at midnight, hoping to meet his brother, I was pretty sure it wasn’t here. My biggest worry was that the meeting had already happened. I just had to hope that a few days would pass before Tremont got the message and made his way up here, assuming he felt like coming at all.

I gave Mrs. King a call, apologizing for the late hour, but of course I knew she’d be up. I told her I had come up empty. That we would regroup tomorrow and try to think up a new plan.

“Put it in your head,” I said to her. “Right as you’re going to sleep. Ask yourself where the breadbox is. Maybe in the morning it’ll come to you.”

I wished her a good night. Then I went back to my motel.

When I went back to see her the next morning, she didn’t have an answer for me.

“I did like you suggested,” she said. “I told myself that I’d remember some reference to the breadbox by the time I woke up, but it didn’t happen.”

We had coffee in her kitchen. I had brought along my map of Detroit, and I spent a good part of the morning figuring out just how far a young Tremont would venture from his mother’s house, and where Darryl would go to find him.

I shook my head and drew a big circle, with Ash Street at the center. It was a good-sized piece of the city, from downtown all the way up to Wayne State. It was basically the western half of my old precinct.

“I know these streets,” I said. “I drove on them every day. That same summer he went away. So where the hell is the breadbox?”

She got up and grabbed the phone book. Then she sat back down and looked up “Bakery” in the Yellow Pages.

“There’s a bakery over on Cass,” she said. “Kinda far, but no, this is one of those organic places. I don’t think that was around then.”

“I imagine not.”

“Here’s a bagel place by the college. Did they even have bagels back then?”

“In New York, yes. Michigan, I’m pretty sure, no.”

She went through the rest of the listings.

“There’s just no other bakery in the area anymore,” she said. “Of course, I’m not surprised. Most of the businesses are gone now.”

I looked at her. “Say that again.”

“Most of the business are gone now.”

“So we need to go back in time,” I said. “Look up bakeries in old phone books.”

“Where are we going to find those?”

“Where do you think?” I said, getting up from the table. “You feel like taking a ride with me?”

I held open the passenger door for her. My truck was a little high off the ground, but she hauled herself up with no problem.

“I can’t remember the last time I rode in a truck,” she said. “Not since my man ran off.”

“Sounds like the worst move any man ever made.”

She smiled at that. “You got that right, Mister.”

She put her seat belt on, then sat with her purse in her lap as I drove us over to the Detroit Library. We parked and went inside, found the reference desk, and asked for the old editions of the Yellow Pages. I remembered being here once before, at this very desk, asking to see the old city directories. I was hoping that once again the trusty reference librarian would come through for me. Ten minutes later, Mrs. King and I were sitting at one of the big tables, looking back in time.

“There was so much more of everything,” she said as she took a quick run through the book at random. “Even back then, when it felt like we were already hurting.”

There wasn’t much to say to that. So I asked her to go to “Bakery” and start reading off the entries. I had a pad of paper to write down any that sounded promising. There was the Wagner Baking Company, of course. We’d already been down that road. We found another old bakery that had been on Michigan Avenue, and another that had been up on Warren Avenue. There was nothing else within reasonable walking distance from Ash Street.

We thanked the reference librarian and got back in my truck. Then we went and searched for the address of the old bakery on Michigan Avenue. It was west of the stadium site, on a block where someone had been taking old abandoned storefronts and painting them bright colors.

“Someone’s going to town here,” she said. She nodded her head toward the building in the center of the block. “That one’s got the windows you’d expect to see for a bakery, huh? Put those nice cakes right out front for people to see?”

“Did you ever come here to buy bread? Or anything else?”

“Not that I can remember.”

As we sat there pulled up against the curb, I couldn’t help but look out across the opposite side of the street, where the old train station rose a few blocks away from us, high above everything else.

“All right, let’s check out the other one,” I said, pulling back into traffic. We turned on Rosa Parks and went up to Grand River. It was the one diagonal street in a neighborhood full of east-west and north-south. When we got to the intersection with Warren Avenue, it was yet another illustration of just how badly this city had fallen apart.

“I remember this,” she said, pointing to the southwest corner, where there was now nothing but a buckled slab of concrete in the ground. “There was an auction house here, and a place to buy tents and awnings and things.”

“I think the bakery was half a block this way.” I took the turn around a great brick building that had probably once been a manufacturing site. The sign on the top of the building now advertised ARCHITECTURAL SALVAGE. At ground level someone had spent many hours spray-painting an elaborate set of graffiti and garish cartoons.

I couldn’t find the actual address for the bakery. Whatever building it had once lived in was now long gone.

“No breadbox here,” Mrs. King said as she looked at the empty lot. “There’s nothing here at all.”

“We’ve got a couple of possibilities now,” I said. “Although that last one down by the station feels a little more promising. Coming up here, that’s the opposite direction entirely.”

“What are we going to do next?”

“You’re going to go back home. You never know when Darryl might just show up there.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to do my favorite thing in the world,” I said. “Sit around and wait.”

I took her back to her house. Then I went back to the Michigan Avenue site by myself to scout it out. There was a pawnshop on one corner, then the old storefronts, then a bar on the other corner. There were two more bars across the street. It was quiet now in the afternoon, but I had to figure this block would really pick up after dark.

I circled around the block. There was parking behind the buildings. I could keep making a loop around the block, watching for Darryl King, or for the car he was driving, assuming he was still in his aunt’s car, a ten-year-old powder blue Pontiac Bonneville with a big dent in the front right quarter panel. Or else I could get out and walk around on foot. Either way, I’d have to keep my eyes open.

If it was later in the day, I would have just stayed there and gotten ready for my midnight watch. But I still had hours to kill, so I ended up going back up to the other location. I still wasn’t feeling like this was nearly as promising, but I parked my truck anyway and walked around on the empty streets. There was an auto parts store next to the old empty bakery site. Next to that was one of those “wholesale distributors” where you can buy office furniture, light fixtures, refrigerators, probably even a kidney if you hit them on the right day.

This can’t be the place, I thought. I turned to go back, already thinking about when I would grab something to eat. Then I saw the railroad bridge.

It was a block to the north, down a little one-way side street. As I walked closer, I saw that it was actually two separate bridges for two separate, parallel sets of tracks, about thirty feet apart. There was a sidewalk that ran under the bridges, and as I walked along it I found what seemed like a decade’s worth of trash and dirt and a few halfhearted attempts at graffiti.

There was a thin trail that sloped up from the sidewalk into the gap between the two bridges, where it disappeared into a thick mass of sumac trees. It was the last thing I wanted to do at that point, but the train tracks were here, right here behind the site of an old bakery, and I couldn’t make myself ignore that fact. So I bent down to clear the lowest branches and pushed myself through the underbrush, following the trail as it led up a short slope to the higher ground between the tracks. This little sumac forest was protected on either side by the tracks, and it ran from this street all the way to the next street a block away, where the train tracks crossed over another set of bridges. It wasn’t a place you’d expect to find any people, not in this forgotten strip of real estate, yet the ground was littered with candy wrappers and condoms and hypodermic needles and God knows what else. I was just about to turn around and get the hell of there. That’s when I saw the remains of a little shed at the end of the trail.

“Oh, no way,” I said to myself. “This can’t be it.” Yet as I moved closer I saw that it had been here for a long, long time and, while empty at the moment, had been used by a thousand drug addicts and vagrants and probably a few animals.

A low rumbling had been building all the while I was up there. Now as it broke through to my consciousness, I knew exactly what it was. I stood there next to the shed and watched the freight approaching on the northernmost tracks. It didn’t seem to be going that fast, but as it came upon me I felt the push of the air around me and the earthquake under my feet from the ten thousand tons of iron. It was close enough that I could reach out and touch it if I wanted to. I could imagine grabbing a handle as it passed by, letting it lift me off my feet with a great jerk. The moment of sheer terror as I trusted all of my weight to the strength of one hand, with failure meaning that I’d surely fall under the wheels and feel my legs sliced cleanly from my body.

You might come here, I thought, if you were a fourteen-year-old boy with nowhere else to go. No friends to hang out with. If you loved trains and dreamed about hitching a ride on them someday, you might come here to this little shed in the right-of-way between the railroad tracks, behind the bakery.

You might even call it the breadbox.

I wasn’t sure how much I wanted to come back here at midnight, but I knew that was exactly what I had to do.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

When the night came, I rolled into the lot by the auto parts store. There was a service center built into the store, with a dozen cars all parked outside waiting for new brakes, a muffler, or whatever else. I lined my truck up between two of those cars and turned off my ignition and lights.

I had gone to a hardware store and bought a strong flashlight, the kind with a long, heavy handle that could double as a club if it had to. That was the only preparation I had done.

Now that I was finally here, sitting in my truck and waiting for midnight to come, I had a couple of hard questions to ask myself. Questions that I had been doing a good job of avoiding. I was there to find Darryl King. That’s the only thing I knew for sure, but once I found him, then what?

Try to talk to him. Find out what he knew about his brother. Find out what he planned on doing with his brother, once he found him.

So you’re looking for a man, I told myself, who is himself looking for another man. So what happens if you find them both tonight?

Then maybe I find out if my gut feeling about Tremont is right after all, and maybe I finally learn that I should think these things through a little better, before I start wandering down dark streets at midnight all by myself.

There were a few cars going by. I watched them stop at the intersection, waiting for their green light. Midnight was coming fast. I got out of the truck and headed down the street. I had my light jacket on, with the flashlight tucked inside. I couldn’t help but wonder if I’d be feeling better with a gun tucked in there as well. Or if I’d be feeling better with Leon there to cover my back.

I took a quick look down the side street. I didn’t want to just walk right down to the railroad tracks. Not yet. I turned at the corner, made a loop, and came back onto the main street. Cars kept going by, but I didn’t see anybody stopping. Nobody turned down the side street.

Then I saw the car.

A powder blue Pontiac Bonneville with a big dent in the front right quarter panel. This had to be Mrs. King’s sister’s car. This had to be Darryl King behind the wheel.

I didn’t panic. I didn’t try to hide. He had no reason to suspect I’d be there, and apparently he wouldn’t even recognize me anyway. So I acted like a man who has transacted whatever business has brought him to this lonely corner of the city, and now he’s walking back to his truck. The car turned down the side street, toward the tracks. I waited a few beats. Then I made my move.

I walked down the side street to where the railroad bridges would pass over it. I walked quickly, a man with purpose. I had my hand on the flashlight, ready to swing it if I had to, but as I passed by the parking lot behind the wholesale distributor, I saw the car parked there on the far side of a big Dumpster. It was the perfect hiding place. No cop would ever think to come down this dark road to nowhere and look in this one lonely, half-hidden spot.

I kept walking, past the lot, under the first bridge. I went past the trail in the sumac and under the second bridge. Then I took a quick look behind me. There was nobody there. I ducked behind the far side of the bridge’s abutment.

I took a few deep breaths. I willed my heart to slow its beating. I listened.

A few minutes passed. Then I heard the sound of a car door closing softly. Footsteps on gravel, then on pavement, then on dirt. I peeked around the embankment and made out a figure disappearing into the brush. I gave him another few beats. Then I was back on the move again.

There was nothing on this earth that would have gotten me to follow him up that trail. He’d hear me coming and then he’d have every advantage. So I went over to his car and found the best spot to surprise him on his way back. The surprise was for one simple reason. If he had a gun, I wanted to take it away from him. Then once I knew I wasn’t going to be shot, I would start trying to talk to him.

You’ve always been good at talking to people, I told myself. Now we’re going to find out just how good you are.

I settled down on the other side of the Dumpster. The one streetlight back here was burned out. That worked in my favor. There was a half-moon that kept hiding behind the clouds and reappearing again. My eyes were fully adjusted to the dark now. I was ready to finally meet Darryl King.

The minutes ticked by. At twelve fifteen, I heard the footsteps again. He had given up for the night. He wasn’t going to see his brother. I couldn’t help wondering, how long was he going to keep doing this before he gave up hope? A week? A month? That can be one of my first questions, I thought, because it’s just about showtime.

I waited for his feet to hit the gravel of the parking lot again.

Step. Step. Crunch.

That’s when I came around the Dumpster, turned on my flashlight, and pointed it in his face. He was a bigger man than I had been counting on. In the photo he looked soft, but now that he was here I could see he must have spent the last year or so getting himself into shape.

“Stop right there,” I said. “If you have a gun, drop it. Right now.”

He stepped back in surprise. Then he held up his hands to shield his eyes from the glare of the flashlight. I knew he wouldn’t be able to see me yet. For all he could tell, I had a bazooka slung over my shoulder, pointed right at his head.

“Right now,” I said. “You got a gun?”

“No! I don’t have no gun.”

Some handcuffs, I thought. That would have been a beautiful idea, about two hours ago when I was out shopping for the flashlight. Now I’ll just have to rely on my natural charm.

“My name is Alex McKnight,” I said. “I talked to you on the phone.”

He stood there, still shielding his eyes from the light.

“I’m working for your mother,” I said. “All I want to do is talk to you. Are we cool?”

“We’re cool. Please get that light out of my face.”

I pointed the beam at the ground.

“How did you know I’d be here?” he said.

“Brilliant detective work. Or maybe just a lot of luck and a little help from your mother.”

“Where is she?”

“She’s at home. Where else would she be?”

“I thought I told you to stay away from her.”

“She’s worried sick about you. You were only home for like five minutes. Then you disappeared.”

“I told you…” he said as he came closer to me. He’d figured out that I wasn’t armed. Either that or he didn’t care.

“Don’t do something stupid,” I said. “Neither of us needs that right now.”

He was already committed. I shined the light back in his face, but he was quicker on his feet than I ever would have thought. He blindly grabbed at me, and as he got a hand on my jacket I brought the flashlight down on his forearm. Not hard enough to break anything, which may have been a mistake because he started swinging with his other hand and caught me on the side of the head. The flashlight went dark as it hit the ground. I ducked under another wild swing, then I tackled him and drove my shoulder into his gut as we both went down.

I rolled off of him, scraping my knees on the gravel as I went for the flashlight. Operating or not, it was still the best weapon I had. He tried to grab me, but I threw an elbow back in his face. I knew I hit something vulnerable, because he let out a cry of pain as I finally found the flashlight and got to my feet.

“You’ve got two choices right now,” I said. “You either talk to me like a man, or so help me God I’ll beat you until your ears bleed.”

A shaft of moonlight fell over us. I could see that his nose was bleeding. He sat there in the gravel and looked up at me. My right shoulder hurt like hell. When you get shot in the shoulder three times, you’re not supposed to be wrestling with ex-cons in parking lots.

“I’ve got nothing to say to you,” he said. “This is none of your goddamned business.”

“For your mother’s sake,” I said, “you’re going to talk to me. So tell me what you’re planning on doing when you find your brother.”

He shook his head. He was still holding his nose.

“Are you going to kill him?”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because you took the fall for him. You spent a lot of years in prison, just so he wouldn’t have to.”

“Says who?”

“Says the man who helped put you there. I know you didn’t kill Elana Paige.”

“Now there’s a thought that would have come in handy a number of years ago.”

“Look,” I said, “if you want me to apologize, I’ll apologize, but you confessed to the murder. That usually ends the whole conversation right there.”

“I was going down for it. No matter what I said.”

“No, somebody was going down for it. You just made sure it was you.”

“So what do you want me to say? Huh? What do you want from me?”

“I want you to come back to your mother’s house,” I said. “So we can all figure this out. I believed you when you told me you didn’t kill Detective Bateman. They have no proof you did, apart from the motive. and I know you’ve pretty much blown your parole, but if we can get a good lawyer, we’ll overturn the original conviction.”

“Says the white man from the suburbs. You think that’s the way it’s gonna work for me?”

“Your mother deserves a few years of her life with a son who isn’t in prison.”

He let out a bitter laugh at that one.

“Yeah, that was the whole idea,” he said. “Tremont was supposed to stick around and take care of her. He wasn’t supposed to hop on the next train and disappear.”

He had things to do, I thought. More people to kill but this is probably a topic I should approach carefully.

“He wasn’t supposed to turn into a serial killer, either.”

Or maybe not so carefully. Even in the near-dark, I could tell that one got to him.

“Now you’re talking nonsense,” he said.

“Am I? Let’s start with Elana Paige. Did your brother kill her?”

He looked away.

“I asked you a question,” I said. “It shouldn’t be that hard to answer. Did your brother stab Elana Paige to death in the train station?”

“I didn’t think so. Not at the time.”

“What about now?” I said, a little surprised by that answer.

“Tremont was always a stranger to me, okay? Even when we were sleeping in the same room. One thing prison teaches you is that people will do things you never thought they’d be capable of doing. Not in a million years.”

“So what are you saying? Is it really possible that you went down for your little brother? That instead of thanking you, he abandoned your mother and went off and kept killing people?”

“What?”

“If that’s true,” I said, “then not only did you spend all that time in prison for something you didn’t do… you also helped your brother do a lot more of it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“There were more murders,” I said. “Just like Elana Paige. All over the country.”

“No. That wasn’t Tremont. I don’t believe it.”

“You’re willing to believe he might have killed one woman, but not more? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”

He was staring at me now. Burning a hole right through me, but he didn’t answer.

“So I’ll ask you my first question again,” I said. “What are you going to do when you find him?”

“I’m going to ask him if it’s true. Any of this. All of it.”

“And if it is?”

“Then I don’t know. I’ll do whatever comes next. Whatever I feel like I have to do.”

“Sounds like my kind of planning,” I said, “but I have to admit, I’m kind of curious myself now. You really think he’s going to show up here?”

“Yes, I do.”

“That little hut up there, by the tracks. That’s the breadbox.”

“There was a bakery that used to put their day-old bread by the back door. They did that instead of selling it half price, because I guess that’s the kind of people they were. Which explains why it’s not there anymore, but we’d go pick up the bread and eat it in the shed.”

“And watch the trains.”

“Tremont would. I didn’t care one way or another. Until one day, he said, ‘Watch this,’ and then he ran along the train that was coming by. He reached up and grabbed something and held on. It scared the crap out of me. I was sure I’d have to go back home and explain to Mama why my brother had been cut in half by some train wheels, but he kept riding, all the way down to the station. Then he jumped off. I didn’t see him again until that night. He acted like nothing had happened.”

He stopped talking. Like he realized that for one moment, he actually sounded like a man who was proud of something his little brother did. It was a sentiment he probably didn’t feel like he could afford anymore.

“So what are you going to do?” I said. “Keep hiding out all day, come back here every night?”

“That’s the plan, yes. Until I see my brother. Until I can talk to him.”

“What if I say I’m taking you to your mother’s house right now?”

“You’re not going to do that.”

“How about this?” I said. “I’ll come back here tomorrow, with your mother. She can take you by the ear and drag you all the way back herself.”

“You’re going to promise me you won’t do that,” he said. “Right now. Or I swear, I’ll kill you.”

“And here I was thinking you weren’t a murderer.”

“I already did my time for a murder I didn’t commit,” he said. “I figure they owe me one now.”

I almost laughed at that one. It was that strange a night.

“Look,” he said. “Give me a couple more nights. If Tremont doesn’t show up, we’ll talk about doing it another way.”

“I think you’re wasting your time, and meanwhile-”

“I’m not. There was a guy I knew in the joint. He rode the trains himself, for years, so he knows about this stuff. He said if you send a message, it’ll get there. It might as well be Western Union. When Tremont hears it, I know he’ll come here as soon as he can.”

I looked up at the moon. If I was expecting to see the answer written across its face, it wasn’t there.

“I’m going to leave now,” he said.

“I don’t think I can let you do that. Not alone.”

“You can’t stop me.”

“I’m pretty sure I can. If I have to.”

He was back on his feet now, facing me.

“I have an alternate plan,” I said. “I’ve got a motel room on Michigan Avenue. You come back with me. You have something to eat. You could probably use a drink about now, too. I know I could. We’ll sit down and figure this out.”

“You’ll just take me to the police.”

“I’m not a cop. I haven’t been for a long time. I won’t take you anywhere else, I promise.”

I could tell he was thinking it over. He’d probably been living in that car for too long now. Not much money left. Maybe none at all. Running out of gas. No food. If nothing else, I’d be able to keep him alive for a few more days, unless he really wanted to put on a mask and start holding up gas stations.

“My aunt’s car is here,” he finally said.

“I don’t think they’ll mind,” I said, looking around the empty lot. “Worst they can do is tow it. She’ll get it back eventually.”

“All right,” he said, “but I’m coming back here tomorrow.”

“Like I said, we’ll figure that out. Let’s go.”

I took a few steps down the street. He looked at the car he was leaving behind for a moment, then he shook his head and started to follow me. Nobody would have confused us for long-lost best buddies, but it was better than fighting again.

When we got back to the main street, I pointed in the direction of the auto parts store. “My truck’s over there.”

He nodded, didn’t say a word, but he kept following me. It occurred to me then that a suspicious person would have been a little more wary of this whole situation. He could have been playing along, planning out when he’d take my money, and maybe my truck, too. I had about three seconds to think that one over.

Then we both heard the train.

It was coming from the southwest, still picking up steam as it came out of the big turn from the station. It was going on twelve thirty at that point. A little late for the rendezvous, but Darryl King looked at that train, and it was obvious he had the same thought I had. He turned and ran back down the side street. Now it was my turn to follow, and once again to chase him, all these years later. Somehow he had gotten a lot faster than me.

Down the incline, past his car, to the bottom of the street where the two railroad bridges passed over. Then he stopped dead.

He was looking at that one spot, where the trail ran up to the breadbox.

Darkness. No movement.

Then something.

I was still a good thirty yards away when I saw the man step out from the trail. Even from where I was I could see that he was a twig of a man. He was a sliver. The two of them stood there looking at each other. I stopped running.

I waited to see what would happen. After all these years.

That’s when the vehicle came barreling down the side street. I looked back and was blinded by the headlights. Everything that came next happened before I could even think about how to react. I recognized that same green minivan, made the connection with Ryan Grayson. I heard the screech of the tires as the vehicle came to a sliding halt. The driver’s side door opening and Ryan Grayson himself practically falling out of the car. The dull thud of the gun hitting the road, then Grayson picking it up and waving it wildly at the two men on the sidewalk. Darryl King grabbing his brother by the shoulders and pushing him to the ground, as Grayson came closer and aimed the gun at both of them, at point-blank range now. Nothing could stop him at this point. Just one more little movement of one finger and it would be done.

But it didn’t happen.

Everything frozen in that one instant. Darryl and Tremont King on the concrete, waiting to see which one would get shot first. Ryan Grayson with the gun pointed and then the look on his face of a man about to pull the trigger. Then the bewilderment that it wasn’t happening. That a bullet wasn’t tearing into flesh.

I saw Tanner Paige through the passenger’s-side window. He was looking out at the whole scene with his hands on his head.

That’s when the second vehicle came. A sleek dark SUV. Then the third and the fourth and a few more that I stopped counting.

The agents came streaming out of their vehicles, all wearing black bulletproof vests with FBI on the back in white letters. They yelled at Grayson to drop the gun and to lie down on the street. They yelled at Paige to exit the vehicle with his hands on his head. They yelled at Darryl and Tremont King to stay exactly where they were, not moving a single muscle. Everyone complied.

An agent came up to me and told me to put my hands on my head, just as they had done to Paige. It was all still an underwater dream to me, but I knew enough to cooperate, and a moment later I felt the cold sting of the handcuffs being put on my left wrist. Before he could do the other wrist, I heard a voice from behind us telling him to let me go.

The handcuff was removed. The agent pushed by me to assist his teammates in securing the area. There were at least seven, maybe eight vehicles now, with their headlights blazing from both ends of the street. The whole scene lit up in sudden bright clarity like a nighttime movie shoot.

I still hadn’t made the connection. How all of this could have happened. How Grayson and Paige could end up here, first of all. Here on this lonely back-alley street that I had only discovered myself a matter of hours ago. Then a whole goddamned team of FBI agents, right behind them.

But of course, I knew that voice behind me. The familiar voice of the agent who ordered me uncuffed. I turned to see her face.

“It was you,” I said to FBI Agent Janet Long. “You set me up.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

It was my first time inside the McNamara Federal Building. The FBI occupied the twenty-sixth floor. Everything was gleaming and immaculate. The room I sat in was worlds away from the old Detroit precinct interview room, where you’d find food wrappers, coffee stains, and a wobbly table and chairs that should have been put out on the street years before.

I sat there with my hands folded together on the table. The door opened. Agent Fleury came in. Janet’s partner. I didn’t look up.

“How are you doing?” he said. “Can I get you anything?”

I didn’t answer.

“Look,” he said, sitting down across from me and putting his leather portfolio on the table. “You have to understand something. This is a person who brutally killed seven different women in seven different states. Now possibly eight women in eight states, if the information you’ve developed is correct.”

He sat there and waited for me to say something. I didn’t.

“I’m really curious, Alex. What did you think we were going to do? Just sit around and wait for something to fall in our laps? After we’ve been working on this guy for years?”

He opened up his portfolio, took out a piece of paper, and slid it across the table. I didn’t bother looking at it. I was reasonably sure I knew what it was anyway.

“For the record,” he said, “this was my call. Not Janet’s. The law is very clear on this point. We contacted the judge. He verbally approved the warrant. We don’t have to have it in our possession. We only have to know it’s on the way. So that part was covered.”

“Is the GPS tracker still attached to my truck?” I said, finally speaking up. “Or are you going to track me all the way back to Paradise?”

“The device has been removed.”

“You said this was your call.”

“Yes.”

“Was it your call to have Janet take me for our little walk around downtown, so you’d have the chance to attach it?”

“Once again, Mr. McKnight… I mean, here’s where I should apologize for the deception, but I’m not going to, because sometimes the ends really do justify the means. In this case, it’s not even close. It’s the easiest decision I’ve ever made. I’ll sleep like a baby tonight.”

“I would have brought him in,” I said. “What else did you think I was going to do?”

“There were two of them. You were unarmed. If I gave you those odds, knowing the stakes, would you take them? For anyone else?”

“Are we about done here?”

“Just about. You care to tell me how you figured out where they were going to meet?”

“You guys are supposed to be the smartest group of law enforcement officers in the world,” I said. “I’m one ex-cop in a truck. If I were you, I’d be embarrassed to ask that question.”

He smiled at that one.

“I knew you’d get somewhere,” he said. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to leave it alone, and I knew you’d find a way to the end of the maze. I knew it. That’s why I scrambled to get that GPS on you. You’ve gotta give me credit for that much.”

“Good hustle, Agent Fleury. The two of you will richly deserve your big raises.”

“She thought you were really going back home this time, Mr. McKnight. She was sure of it. I guess that means I know you a little better than she does.”

He folded up his portfolio. Then he stood up.

“For what’s it worth,” he said, “you helped us catch a serial killer. I will always be thankful to you for that. No matter what you say to me.”

Then he left the room.

I sat there a while longer, looking out the blinds at the darkness. I knew it was beyond late now. I didn’t even bother looking at my watch.

The door opened again. Agent Janet Long came in and sat down across from me.

“It would save time if you guys talked to me together,” I said. “You don’t have to send in a parade.”

“Stop it,” she said. “I’m sorry for the way this worked out.”

“Why are you sorry? Everybody wins. All you had to do was play me like a drum. Which I guess must have been pretty easy, seeing as how I never would have suspected it.”

“It wasn’t my idea.”

“Yeah, I know. Your partner copped to that.”

“I’m pretty sure I told you to go home, too. More than once.”

“You did.”

“And I’m pretty sure you promised me you would.”

“I’d have to review the tape,” I said, “but you’re probably right.”

“I wasn’t straight with you, Alex. I admit that, but you weren’t straight with me, either.”

“Can we stop?” I said. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”

“Fine with me. You want to talk about what happened?”

“To be honest,” I said, “it’s still just a blur to me. How did Ryan Grayson and Tanner Paige show up?”

“I was hoping you could tell me.”

“They must have followed me. The old-fashioned way, I mean. I’m sure they didn’t have a GPS device they could trick me into carrying around.”

“I thought we were going to stop.”

I raised a hand in surrender.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Of course they followed me. It was easy. The last time I talked to them, I told them I was staying in a motel on Michigan Avenue. They already knew what my truck looked like.”

“You didn’t notice them on your tail? All day?”

“I guess I was preoccupied.”

“You realize, they forced our hand and almost blew everything. If Grayson didn’t have his safety on…”

“Are you serious? Is that why his gun didn’t shoot?”

“For once, thank God for clueless gun owners who have no idea what they’re doing.”

“They promised me,” I said. “No more stupid behavior.”

“Yeah, I guess lots of promises got broken this week.”

“So what’s going to happen to them?”

“Grayson and Tanner have both been charged with obstruction. Grayson’s also been charged with unlawful use of a weapon. Which is a lot better than attempted murder. I’m sure he’ll get a good lawyer and end up with probation and a fine.”

“What about Darryl King?” I said.

“We’ve got him for aiding and abetting, which I imagine will get dropped, but the state wants him for all of the parole violations, and I’ll be honest with you, they still like him for the murder of Detective Bateman.”

“Maybe he’ll confess again. For old times’ sake.”

“As far as Tremont King goes… Well, that’ll be a project and a half right there. We’ve got a lot of ground to cover.”

“I imagine. Has he said anything?”

“Not a word.”

I nodded at that. We both sat there.

“My partner did thank you,” she said.

“He did.”

“It’s a good night, Alex. I hope you know that.”

“I think you’ll have to ask me that tomorrow.”

“Fair enough,” she said. “I’ll call you?”

“Okay.”

We both sat there for a while again, looking at each other. Then I got to my feet. She took me to the elevator and showed me to the main entrance. We said good night. We didn’t touch each other. I was pretty sure we never would again.

My truck had been brought over from the apprehension site, or whatever you would call that place now. The keys were on the front seat. I started it up and drove out of the lot.

I went right to Mrs. King’s house. The place was completely dark. I saw a note taped on the front door. It was for me. An FBI agent had come to tell Mrs. King what had happened. Her sister had come to take her away for a while. She’d call me the next day.

I sat in the truck for a while. Then I drove back down to the main streets and tried to find a bar. They were all closed now. It was after 2:00 a.m.

Eventually, I went back to the motel. I lay on the bed with my clothes on, looking up at the ceiling. After everything that had happened that day, I didn’t even want to sleep. Then I closed my eyes and the day beat me again.

My shoulder hurt like hell the next morning. A souvenir of my little tussle with Darryl King, which should have been more than enough excitement for the night right there.

I got up and took a hot shower. Then I checked out of the motel.

I gave Leon a call to tell him everything that happened. He was just as amazed that an amateur had been able to follow me all day long, which certainly made my morning. When I was done with Leon, I called Tanner Paige. He spent the first minute apologizing. Literally saying, “I’m sorry,” about twelve times in a row.

“I didn’t know he had a gun in the car,” he said, when he finally moved on from the apologizing. “I didn’t know he was going to run right into the middle of everything like that.”

“Sounds like he was pretty lucky,” I said, “but I still don’t get why you guys were-”

“Following you, I know. I know! He was the one following you all over the place, you realize. Then he finally called me last night. I kept telling myself, I was just going along with him to make sure he didn’t get himself killed or something, but I gotta admit, Alex, I guess I was just as curious as he was to see what this guy looked like. If he was really the man who killed Elana.”

“Well, you’ll probably never get a chance to ask him to his face. Not now.”

“I know. I guess it really is time to move on now, too. I never want to live through something like these past few days again.”

“You were released last night, I take it. What about your brother-in-law?”

“Yeah, they held him a little longer. He has a bunch of hearings to go to in the next few days, but he’s home now, at least. I’ll go see him, make sure he’s okay.”

“I was just going to call him.”

“Give him a day,” he said. “I think he’s pretty shaken up. He’ll probably be at his lawyer’s office all day anyway.”

“Okay, fair enough.”

Tanner Paige apologized a few more times. Then he thanked me and wished me a good trip back home.

I tried calling Mrs. King. Her cell phone was apparently turned off. I wanted to see her, but I didn’t think I could stand one more minute in the city. I’ll catch up with her on the phone, I thought. I’ll probably come back down, too, as soon as I figure out how I can help.

That made me think of Detective Gruley in Houghton Lake. It was finally time to call him back. I was thinking maybe I could stop in at his post on the way home, too. Explain everything in person.

I looked across the street one more time, at the vacant lot where Tiger Stadium once stood. It seemed like a fitting farewell, at least for the time being, as I pulled onto the road and made my way to the freeway.

Something wasn’t right. It was that feeling you get, when you leave the house and you know you’ve forgotten something, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.

North to the edge of town. Eight Mile Road. That feeling still there.

Then I saw the exit for Twelve Mile. I pulled off the freeway.

I was in Southfield now. I thought back to that trip I had made this way, all those years before. Detective Bateman and I, coming up to see Elana’s parents. I went west. It was right off this road somewhere. I flashed back on the conversation I had with Ryan Grayson and his brother-in-law in the bar a couple of days ago, after I rousted them at the end of the street. He was still living in the same house. In fact, he even offered to let me stay there.

I found the side road that led to Grayson’s house. I drove down the long driveway. It was the same big house, just as I remembered. Except not quite. As I got closer, I saw that the lawn needed cutting. I saw that the windows all needed cleaning and the white columns on either side of the door needed a good pressure-wash. Grayson’s green minivan was parked out front. Next to that was Paige’s cream-colored SUV.

I parked behind them and got out. A few seconds later, Tanner Paige came out the front door. He was carrying a box.

“Alex,” he said. “What brings you out here?”

“I was on my way home. I just thought I’d stop by.” I looked up at the house. “You’re seriously telling me he lives here all by himself now?”

“Ever since his kids moved away. Then his wife left. Yeah, it’s kinda sad now, after all the things that used to go on here. All the parties and everything. This place was a real hot spot, back in the day, when Ryan’s father was ruling the world. Now it’s just…”

He looked up at the house, just like I was doing. Then he opened up his trunk and put the box inside.

“I’ve got to take this stuff over to the lawyer’s,” he said. “It’s a bunch of old news clippings from Elana’s murder. The lawyer thought he should have them, just in case.”

“Just in case what?”

“He’s pretty sure Ryan will get off clean, but just in case he runs into a judge that doesn’t understand his state of mind…”

Paige looked down at the box and shook his head.

“He’s really been hurting, Alex. This past week has been so hard on him.”

“So let me just ask you something,” I said. “About yesterday…”

“It was insane, I know. Apparently, Ryan followed you from your motel to, wait, let me get this right, to Darryl King’s house, then to the library? Is that right?”

“Yes.”

“Then down to Michigan Avenue somewhere, then up to that corner of Warren and Grand River. Then, what did he say, you went somewhere else after that, before coming back…”

He looked up, like he was playing it all back on a tape recorder.

“Yeah, back to the Kings’ house, he said. Then back to Michigan Avenue. Then back to Warren and Grand River, for God’s sake. Or something like that. I might have the order mixed up. I think he was running out of gas at that point and he almost lost you, but then you went and ate somewhere, and that’s when he called me.”

“So you went to meet him,” I said. “So you could keep him company while he stayed on my tail.”

“I believe I’ve already apologized for that, but yes. That’s what I did. Like I said, I thought I was looking out for him, because I sure as hell couldn’t have stopped him, but anyway, you went to a hardware store. Then you went back to that corner, for like the third time that day, he said. Although that was the first time I saw it, of course. I was thinking, why the hell would you come here? Then you walked down by where the railroad tracks went over the road. Ryan was getting really anxious then. He figured you were up to something important.”

“I still don’t get it,” I said. “Why did he go to all this trouble? He put his whole life on hold so he could follow me around all day?”

“He was convinced you’d lead him to the man who killed his sister, Alex. I mean, after what you told us yourself… That’s what he thought, and you have to admit, in the end he was right.”

I stood there looking at the house, waiting for it to make sense.

“You really didn’t know he had a gun,” I said.

“I had no idea he even owned one, no. I swear.”

I took a few steps toward the front door, then came back.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Why did he choose that exact moment to come down the street?”

“I don’t know. I’m trying to remember. The two of you were running, right? You and Darryl? Running back to the tracks?”

“Yes.”

“That’s what made him go. He figured something was happening. I tried to stop him, Alex. I really did, but he was out of his head at that point.”

“He knew that was Darryl I was with? Even though he’d hadn’t seen him in years?”

“I think he was just assuming, yes.”

“Then when Darryl’s brother came out of the woods…”

Paige just stood there, looking at me.

“How did he know?” I said. “How did he know that was the man?”

“I don’t know what to tell you, Alex.”

“He was ready to kill him. He was that sure.”

I looked back at the house, one more time.

“It doesn’t add up,” I said. “Unless…”

“Unless what?”

“Unless he already knew Tremont King.”

He thought it over for a moment.

“Oh my God,” he said. “Of course. That would make it all work, wouldn’t it…”

“It would, yes.”

“That son of a bitch.” Paige reached into the wheel well of his trunk and brought out a tire iron.

“Put that down,” I said. “You stay here. I’m going to go inside and talk to him.”

Paige pushed by me and grabbed the handle on the back of the minivan. Then he raised the rear door.

“What are you doing?” I said. Then I saw what was inside the vehicle. The backseats were folded down. There was a plastic drop cloth spread out on the floor. There was something else, wrapped in more plastic.

A body.

“No need to go inside,” Paige said. “Ryan’s right here.”

Before I could even react to what I was seeing, I heard the sound of that thing moving in the air, behind my head.

Then I was out.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Sounds. Movement. I’m rolled one way, then back the other way. A wave pushing me toward shore, then pulling me back.

No. I’m in a vehicle. I’m lying down, feeling the momentum of the turns. I’m on plastic. It crinkles every time my weight is shifted.

A voice.

“Hey, Alex. How’re you doing back there?”

God, my head hurts so much. I can’t move. Why can’t I move?

“Settle in, buddy. We’ve got a little drive here.”

My hands. I can’t move my hands. I try to open my eyes, but everything is too bright and spinning too quickly. It makes my head hurt twice as much.

I’m trying to sit up. I have to sit up. I have to get out of here. I have to remember what happened and then I have to get out of here.

My hands are behind my back. Why can’t I move my hands?

God, my head hurts.

The vehicle swings into a big curve. I’m rolling right. I hit something. More crinkle of plastic.

I open my eyes.

I see three other faces. Then two. Then one.

I focus on Ryan Grayson. His dead eyes staring at me.

Then I’m out again.

I opened my eyes again. I didn’t know how much time had passed. The vehicle wasn’t rolling me from side to side anymore. There was just the steady hum of an engine maintaining a straight, level speed.

I tried to speak. A groan came out.

“Alex, is that you?”

I couldn’t make words anymore. I’d forgotten how.

“We’re almost there.”

I tried one eye. Just the right eye squinting open. I saw Tanner Paige behind the wheel of the minivan.

“I’m glad you’re awake, Alex. Finally. This would have been a whole lot better with someone to talk to.”

My hands. I still couldn’t move my hands.

“I apologize, by the way. I know that doesn’t make it one hundred percent better, but I hope it helps. I’m really, really sorry.”

I tried to sit up again. It was impossible.

“I was starting to like you, Alex. I thought we were really on the same wavelength, you know? I really liked Arnie, too. I hope you realize that. I’m not a monster.”

My hands are tied behind my back, I thought. I’m tied up in the back of this minivan, and Tanner Paige is driving it somewhere.

I opened one eye again and saw the dead body of Ryan Grayson next to me, haphazardly wrapped in the green plastic, the face exposed through a gap at the top. Bloody and bruised, the nose broken, the front teeth knocked out.

It’s only the women he kills with knives, I thought. The men, he just bashes their heads in.

So why am I still alive?

“He kept in touch with me all those years, you know. He was a good guy. Ryan and I even went up there a few times. We’d always take a ride on his boat. Did he tell you that? You were there, too, right? Did you take the exciting ride on his boat?”

I looked up and saw the sunlight coming through the windows. It was still daytime.

“Mostly we just talked a lot, and I think it was good for both of us. Made us both feel less alone, I think, and for him, it was always a good reminder, too. Getting that confession was the highlight of his career. I’d always tell him how much it meant to me. I knew that made him feel good. I was happy to do that for him.”

My ears were still ringing. Every sound had an edge to it. I tried to shake my head… Big mistake. Don’t do that.

“If they hadn’t released Trey’s brother, none of this would have happened, you realize. That’s where all the trouble began. Right there with that cockamamie decision. That’s what got everybody all stirred up again. The last time Arnie called me, he said he probably shouldn’t say anything yet, but he had to talk to somebody. He said you were trying to cast some doubt on the confession. Which didn’t make him happy, but then he said he was getting the old files out and going over them. I guess he drove down and looked at the old confession, too. On tape, I guess? That was the day before Arnie passed.”

I hadn’t really been listening, but that part broke through. The day before Arnie passed? Did this man really just say that?

I struggled to get my hands free. It didn’t feel like rope. It felt more like something rubber, with a little give to it. It was tight. But maybe…

“It kinda got a little funny there. Maybe just my overactive imagination, but he was saying how if Darryl King didn’t kill Elana, then he wanted to find out who did. Make up for the big mistake he’d made. He said he’d owe me a big apology if that ended up happening, because he knew it would be a shock for me. Kinda funny he would say it that way, looking back on it, but he asked me if I thought Ryan should know, and I said no, not yet. That’s why Ryan was so surprised when you brought it up.”

I had to close my eyes again. I had to lie still for a while, let the pounding in my head settle into some kind of rhythm.

“Poor Arnie. You really got to him, Alex. When we were done talking, he said he had to make the hardest phone call of all. He had to call you up and tell you he was wrong. Or might have been wrong. Was probably wrong. Whatever. It was really eating him up. Although I could tell he was kind of excited about maybe the two of you guys working together again. Going back over the old case, just like old times. I told him it sounded like he was trying to bring back those days when he was a young hotshot detective. Back when he owned the city, but he said no, he just wanted to make things right.”

Those words again. Even now, those words haunting me. To make things right.

“As far as Ryan goes… Yeah, poor Ryan. He passed today, too. As you can see. So that got me to thinking, maybe it would be better if people thought he ran away. Couldn’t take it anymore. You see where I’m going with this? His safe is open, all the cash is gone. Yeah, if he just goes, and this car goes… That’ll probably be easier for everyone to deal with.”

I could feel the minivan accelerating. I looked up and saw a truck on the right side. For one brief second, the face of the truck driver. Another human being who could theoretically help me. Then he was gone.

“I do feel bad for Ryan, but maybe this was all for the best anyway. He was in such pain, Alex. He was so obsessed about finding the man who killed his sister. Kind of funny, again, looking back on it. That I would be helping him, but he made it easy. All I had to do was point to Trey and say, ‘That’s him!’ He didn’t even think about it. He just reacted.”

The back windows were tinted. A fact that just came to me then. Even if we passed another truck, I don’t think anyone could see inside.

“Of course, after all the dust settled, Ryan asked the same question you did. It finally came to him today. How did you even know who that man was? That’s when I realized that, no matter what I said, it would only be a matter of time until Ryan started looking a little deeper. How I was alone that day, the day Elana passed, supposedly playing a practice round at the club. Good excuse to disappear for four hours, by the way, but then also all the traveling I’ve been doing. I’m a manufacturer’s rep for a golf club company. Don’t know if I told you that. I’ve got the whole eastern half of the U.S. I’ll go and do a demo day at a golf club somewhere, pack up and go somewhere else the same day. Go south in the winter, where people are still playing golf. It keeps me pretty busy.”

I concentrated on my hands. This is why a cop handcuffs you this way, because it makes you pretty much useless. Even getting to my feet would be a monumental chore right now, but if I can get these hands free…

“It gave me a chance to work things out, too. All that time on the road. It really helped me. It was good therapy, reliving that day, seeing if I could be a little less angry each time. A little more in control of myself.”

His words breaking through again. Good therapy? Reliving that day? Is that what he’s really calling it? Murdering seven women?

“Do you play golf, Alex? You look like you could be a good golfer.”

Focus, God damn it. Your hands are tied crossways. There’s something looped around them in both directions…

“Ryan was terrible at golf. No patience at all. He was about as good at golf as he was at shooting a gun.”

If I can flex my wrists. Work them one way, then the other. Back and forth.

“Although, I’ll be honest with you, Alex. I’m kinda glad he didn’t kill Trey. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen him, but he still looked like that old kid in the train station. I’d meet him there at the station most every Saturday morning. It was a lot better than playing golf with those guys at the club, believe me.”

Trey. He keeps calling him Trey. His pet name for Tremont?

“You should have seen him back then. What a sweet thing he was. My God did I love that kid.”

Stay calm. Work your hands. Ignore the way your head feels. Ignore the bile rising in your throat. Just stay calm and work your hands.

“He wasn’t supposed to be there on a Thursday. That part wasn’t planned. I was not happy with him, believe me.”

Damn it damn it damn it.

“I told Trey, I said, this was supposed to be between Elana and me, and nobody else. That’s why I told her to come down to the station because I was going to surprise her, and not to tell anybody because I knew we weren’t supposed to be up there, but there’s this place in the old part of the station where the light comes through those big windows and I knew she’d love it and be able to get some great shots there, you know? And she really did love it, I gotta say, I mean I totally nailed it, but then that’s not why we were there, not really, which kind of became obvious, I guess.”

Don’t listen to him, I told myself. Don’t get sucked into this. Just keep concentrating.

“So when Trey was there, I was like, you and I have a secret now, my little sweet thing. We’re in this together now.”

Work the hands. God, my head hurts so much.

“That was a long time ago, Alex. I swear, things were really getting better. I was in such a better place mentally. I’d worked it all out of my system, I think. I was even ready to forgive her for what she did to me.”

Shut up, you goddamned psychopath. Just shut the hell up.

“None of it would have happened if she wasn’t planning on leaving me. You realize that.”

It’s working, I told myself. You can move your hands a little bit more now. I was rubbing them raw, but I was making progress.

“Her family never thought I was good enough for her. Not rich enough, not successful enough. I wasn’t a County Amateur champion like her father, but that stuff isn’t supposed to matter, right? I thought me and Elana had something there. I thought we had something bulletproof.”

You’re going to get free. Then you’re going to crawl up behind him and you’re going to grab him by the neck. Even if that means sending this vehicle right off the road.

“Listen to me. I just got done telling you I’m finally ready to forgive her, and now here I go again. I guess I’ll never really be over it, huh?”

I felt the vehicle slowing down. Then turning right. I had no idea how long I had been out. Five minutes or five hours.

“You want to hear something funny? You’ll like this. We’re going to this golf club where I did a demo day in the spring. The pro there, thinks he’s a real hotshot, thinks he’s got the greatest little gem of a golf course, the best in all of Western Michigan.”

Western Michigan. A piece of information, not that it will do me any good.

“He’s got this house across the river, raised up a little bit so it’s got a little view, right? All you can really see is the water treatment plant, but I wasn’t going to say anything to him. I was just like, oh yeah, this is so nice. Anyway, he takes me out to the back of his property, down by the river. There’s a bend there and it gets kinda deep, and he actually says to me, he says, ‘You could dump a body back here, huh?’ Can you believe that? He actually said that to me.”

The vehicle was slowing down again. This time we came to a complete stop. I looked up at the hazy sunshine coming through the tinted windows. I wondered how many minutes of sunlight I had left.

No, do not think this way. You still have a shot as long as you’re breathing. As long as you’re thinking. Keep working those hands.

“He’s golfing in Scotland this week. Think he was bragging about that trip a little bit? Even six months beforehand? But now it all kinda works out, so I hope he’s having a good time.”

The vehicle turned right again, then left. Then it slowed down almost completely.

“Now, where was that turn again?”

I slowly brought my knees up toward my chest. I knew we had to be getting close. I’d be lucky to get one chance to do something. If I got that chance, could I even move?

“Ah, right here.”

He turned hard to the right, sending me sliding against the side of the minivan. I hit my head and everything went out of focus again.

I lay there for the next minute, just trying to get my head back on. Then he turned hard to the right again. He was driving slowly now. I knew I was running out of time. I gave up trying to sit up. I closed my eyes and tried to work my hands free. I was sweating, and I could feel the blood on the back of my head, running down my neck.

The vehicle left pavement. We were on gravel. I opened my eyes and looked at Paige. He was leaning forward in the driver’s seat, staring out at the road. I heard branches scratching on both sides. Then we hit a series of bumps that had me bouncing up and down. I cried out in pain, despite myself. A line of blood came trailing out from Grayson’s head.

“Sorry about that,” Paige said. “We’re almost done, I promise.”

I felt the incline. We were rumbling down one more stretch of rough road. I knew whatever came next would happen in a matter of minutes. My hands still weren’t free. I didn’t have any options left.

Except one. Maybe.

The minivan came to a stop. The driver’s side door opened. Paige got out. He closed the door. I could hear his footsteps coming around to the back. The rear door opened.

I stayed still. I kept my eyes open. I kept my mouth open. I did my absolute best impression of a man who had just breathed his last breath.

“See, it’s perfect,” he said. “The town’s right over the hill there, and yet nobody can see us here.”

Eyes staring dead ahead, looking at nothing. Not a muscle moving. Not a breath taken. I am a hunk of meat here, just like the hunk of meat lying next to me. You will look at me and realize this. Then you will let down your guard. You will pull me out of this minivan, thinking I’m nothing more than dead weight now.

Then I’ll have my only chance.

“I know they’ll find this thing eventually. I’m not an idiot, but it should be a while, I would think. By then I’ll have figured out where I need to go next.”

What did he just say? What is he going to do?

“Alex, you there?”

I felt a sharp jab on the back of my knee.

“Alex. Hey. Wake up.”

Come closer, I thought. Come see if I’m really dead.

The seconds passed. Then there was a loud thud as the tire iron landed on the floor next to me. Before I could even realize what he was doing, the rear door closed.

I heard the footsteps again. The driver’s side door opened, but he didn’t start the vehicle. Instead, he hit the gearshift, and then in the next second he was out and the door was closed. I felt the vehicle moving. It was rolling downhill. Faster and faster.

It was going into the water.

I felt the jolt as the front end hit. The momentum reclaimed the vehicle, only now the movement was smoother and even more downhill. I slid up against the back of the driver’s seat. My head slammed against it, then my shoulder, then my arms, still pinned behind me. Everything just a riot of pain as I was folded into a ball. The dead body hit me a second later, pinning me against the seat as the weight of the engine pitched everything forward. The vehicle was pointing almost straight down now, and as I looked back and up at the rear window, I saw the last of the daylight disappearing.

It wasn’t done moving. Down and down it went, impossibly deep. The pressure built in my ears and made my head pound even louder. It was getting darker. I could barely see a thing now. Then the one last interior light blinked off and it all went black.

I’m not dead yet, I thought. I have a little bit of air left. I need to gather whatever strength I have left. I need to get out of this thing and get back up to the surface. Yes, even with my goddamned arms tied behind my goddamned back.

It was time to move, no matter what it did to my head. I let out a loud yell as I moved my shoulder against the dead body. Nobody to hear you now, I thought. You might as well scream all you want.

I tucked my knees into my chest. I pushed myself up. God, my head was hurting so much. The water was starting to come inside the vehicle now. The dashboard was underwater.

The windows are closed, I thought. I need to break one open. I rolled over onto my back. I was on top of Ryan Grayson now. I kicked at the window. Then again and again, but I couldn’t get enough leverage.

The tire iron. I need that tire iron.

I spun over onto my stomach. I moved my body over the rumpled-up plastic, feeling with my face for the heavy weight of that tire iron.

I have to find it. Or else I will die.

I willed my body to move, to cover every inch I could reach, no matter how much it hurt.

Find it find it find it.

There.

I grabbed the thing with my teeth, feeling the cold sting of the iron. Then I worked myself into a sitting position and dropped it into my lap.

That’s useless, Alex. You need it in your hand.

Even then, can you hit the window hard enough?

I rolled my body and caught the tire iron as it hit my hand. The water was coming higher now. Soon the air would be gone.

I gripped the tire iron and turned around so I was facing away from the window. I started swinging the iron at the glass. I felt it hit. The glass didn’t break. I swung again. Then again. Then again.

I felt the water on my legs. It was cold. I swung the iron. I fumbled with it, nearly dropping it. Then I recovered and swung again, trying to use my whole body to get more force behind the blow.

The water was rising. Shockingly cold. I was shivering already.

You are going to die, Alex. You are going to die right here with this other man. This fellow victim. They won’t find you for weeks, maybe months. Tanner Paige will go on killing while you slowly dissolve in this cold dark river.

Swing again. Like you mean it. Like you want to live. Like you want to get out of here and go find him.

I swung the iron. It hit the glass and broke through before falling from my hand. A rush of water hit me, wrapping its icy arms around my chest. I gasped for my last breath of air as it overtook me completely. Then I was under.

Get out. My only thought. The only two words in the language. Get out.

I kicked against Grayson’s body. I kicked against the seats. I felt my head knocking through the rest of the broken glass as I kicked again and again. My face out of the vehicle now, then my shoulder. Another kick. Another. My last breath dying in my lungs as I finally put my knee against the frame of the glass and pushed myself into the open water.

I didn’t know up from down at that point. I was moving, but I was in my wet clothes and it felt like I would sink to the very bottom. This way, I thought. No, this way, this way, and now my breath is gone, and the next thing that goes in will be the river itself, no, I must hold on for the air but I’m going the wrong way.

Then I saw light. I was going to the surface after all. It came closer and closer as I tried to dolphin kick, even with my hands still tied behind my back, with my lungs on fire now, until finally…

Air! I gasped for breath, my face just above the surface. I kicked and sputtered and took a breath of that beautiful air and filled my lungs with it. Then I gasped again and gagged on the river water. I spit that out and coughed and wheezed, keeping up my dolphin kick somehow, finding the strength to keep my face above water.

A second breath, a third, a fourth. It was all I could do to keep my body in a position to keep breathing, but as my breath came back to me, I knew I had other problems. I was still in the water, still unable to swim. For all I knew Paige was standing on the shore, watching me and figuring out what he had to do next to deal with this last problem.

From somewhere in the back of my mind, I remembered a technique for breathing in water. You arch your back and turn your face up so that your nose is the high point, and any buoyancy you have will naturally keep that one point above the water. You can do this without having to tread water, so you can regain your strength.

A fine theory, that may or may not work if you’re fully dressed. Worth a shot. I arched my back and put my head up.

Nice and easy, Alex. Stop kicking. See if this will work.

Yes. I think we’ve got something here. As long as I stay perfectly still.

Breathe. Yes. Breathe. Relax.

I did that for a full minute. Then the cold water started to get to me. It was time to move again. It was time to take whatever strength I had recovered and see if I could get to shore, and hope that Paige wasn’t waiting there for me.

I dolphin kicked one time, hard enough to drive my head up over the water. I took a quick look. I saw where the road led down to the river. What must have been the boat launch. I didn’t see Paige anywhere. I went back under, then dolphin kicked again, looking in the other direction. I was actually closer to the other shore.

I tried to flatten out my body on the water, but I was too bottom-heavy. I kicked and kicked and got nowhere, feeling the strength draining away again.

Turn over, you idiot. Do this on your back.

I flipped over and looked at the sky. I sucked in the air as I kicked and thrashed and finally started making progress, eventually settling into a cadence. Kick breathe kick breathe.

Until finally, I felt the bottom of the river under my feet. I turned over and went down to my knees, then stood up and stumbled out. I collapsed on the shore, feeling myself sinking into the black mire on the side of the river. I looked back behind me. I didn’t see Paige anywhere. He had left. The son of a bitch had turned and walked away, thinking I was already dead. Or if I came to, that I’d be dead in another few seconds anyway. Whatever, I didn’t even care. All I knew was that I was here on the shore, feeling like my head was about to explode-but alive.

I lay there for a while, until I started to shiver. When I finally rolled myself back up to my knees, I felt my hands shift. I gave them one great twist and felt them come free. When I pulled the thing around to look at it, I saw that it was a set of jumper cables. I threw them on the ground and looked at the raw skin on my wrists. Then I tried to get up.

Whoa, that’s not going to work, I thought. Standing is one thing I’m not ready for. That’s when I remembered my cell phone. I reached into my pocket and grabbed it. I turned it on. Nothing. Goddamned cell phone can’t survive one lousy dunk in the water. Without another thought, I tossed it into the river.

I started to shiver again, so I put one hand on the ground and tried to stand. One more time, I thought. You can do this.

I got one foot under me, then the other. I took a step and almost went down, caught myself, took another step. I had no idea where I was. I had no idea where I could go for help. I just knew I had to move.

I reached around and felt the back of my head. There was a big lump there. The skin was broken and I felt blood. A cold rational voice in the back of my head made the general announcement that I surely had a concussion and could use some medical attention as soon as possible. I took another few steps and felt everything spinning around me.

When things came back into focus, I saw something just down the shoreline. A large facility of some sort. A building and a pair of great round tanks set into the ground. The water treatment plant. He said something about that. Something about the view from this house, and the man being in Scotland. A useless detail, and yet I remember that part.

“Where are you, Paige?” I asked out loud, my own voice sounding strange and faraway. “Where did you go?”

He drove the minivan all the way out here, after all. He said we were in Western Michigan, right? Didn’t he say that? That’s a long way back to Southfield. How’s he going to get there?

I kept putting one foot in front of the other. The ground was more even here. It didn’t feel like I’d fall with every step. I was walking through the facility now. I found the sidewalk that ran between the building and the tanks. I didn’t see anybody there. I kept walking.

I need to get out of these wet clothes. I need to get warm. I need to get my head looked at. I need to get the police on Paige’s tail. The checklist was right there in my head, yet I kept walking and walking. Out of the facility, down a street lined with houses. I could have stopped at the first house. Banged on the door, collapsed in a heap. Asked them to call 911. Yet I kept walking. Because I saw something ahead of me.

A railroad bridge. Yet one more goddamned railroad bridge, this one crossing over the river. It was pulling me toward it. One more bridge that meant something. I didn’t even realize what yet. Until I got closer and I saw the tracks.

I could hear the train. It wasn’t moving yet. It was sitting at the station, just a quarter mile from the bridge. Not a freight train. A sleek Amtrak train, sitting there at the station, hissing and humming, ready to go.

This is how he’s getting back home, I thought. This is part of the plan right here.

I started walking down the tracks. I could see people getting on. A porter helped an elderly man with his suitcase. What a lovely day for a train trip. What a beautiful lovely perfect day.

I must have been a sight. I was soaking wet and half covered with black slime from the river. There was blood running down the back of my neck. Yet nobody turned to look at this monstrosity, until I was finally right there on the platform.

It was a quaint little station made of bricks. A quiet little out-of-the-way stop on the Amtrak line, from Chicago to Detroit. There was a sign there, but I wasn’t sure if I could even read it. Then the letters came together. NILES, MICHIGAN. I was three hours west of Detroit, close to the Indiana border.

“Excuse me, sir!” A voice coming from somewhere. “Excuse me, do you need help?”

No, I thought. I’m just practicing to be the Swamp Thing, for an upcoming movie. I grabbed on to the metal handle, almost missing it. Then I hauled myself into the train.

“Sir! You need to stop right now!”

I was in the rear car. Everyone was settling in for the ride, arranging themselves in the seats. Heads started turning toward me. A woman gave out a little scream.

I could hear the porter outside, yelling at someone to call the police. Yes, please do, I thought. That’s right here on my list. Call the police.

I went up the aisle, looking for Paige. He’s on this train somewhere. I remembered doing something like this a million years before, looking for someone on a train. Then a new wave of pain washed over my head and my knees buckled. I had to grab onto the seats to keep myself up-but I kept going.

He wasn’t in that car. I went to the next. He wasn’t in that car. Everyone was looking at me now. Mothers were holding their children. Nobody tried to stop me. Not yet.

When I got to the last car, the conductor was standing in the aisle, blocking my way. I couldn’t really hold him in my vision at that point. He was too fuzzy around the edges, and he wouldn’t stand straight up and down.

“Sir, you need to get off this train right now,” he said. “I really think you need some help, too.”

I looked past him. I saw a man sitting at the far end of the car. I pointed in that direction.

The conductor turned to look. I grabbed him by the shoulders and threw him into the seat.

I went up the aisle. One step at a time. In the distance I could hear the police siren.

I came up beside him. Finally. I looked down at him. He was wearing sunglasses. His head was tipped back against his seat. Even without seeing his eyes, I knew he was dozing. Exhausted from his labors.

I stood there for a moment, waiting for him to realize that I had come back from the dead. At that moment, I was every single one of his victims, rolled into one person.

“Mr. Paige,” I said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “I’m here to punch your ticket.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

You ask the right questions at the right time. It’s basic police work. Detective Arnie Bateman didn’t ask the right questions when he had the chance. A man went to prison for a crime he didn’t commit. The man who did commit the crime lived to kill again. I can’t blame Detective Bateman for this, of course. I didn’t ask the right questions, either.

Elana’s brother, Ryan, finally did ask the right questions, but at the wrong time. He paid for that mistake with his life. I almost joined him, but in the end I survived and, after an eventful few hours at the Niles, Michigan, train station, I was there to see Tanner Paige taken away in handcuffs, thanks to a few phone calls to the FBI, and especially to an agent named Janet Long.

My concussion was officially listed as Grade 4. I had lost consciousness twice, once for a few minutes, after Paige first hit me, then later for a good couple of hours in the minivan. It takes a while to get over something like that. If you came into the Glasgow Inn anytime in the month of September, you’d see me sitting by the fireplace, wearing sunglasses. Sudden flashes of bright light really got to me. Just destroyed me. Not to mention sudden loud noises. Jackie had to take it easy on me that month. I think it almost killed him.

When I got over the post-concussion symptoms, I still had a nice new scar on the back of my head. At least this one I couldn’t see when I looked at my own face in the mirror.

I took Leon to dinner and told him everything that had happened. I thanked him for all of his help. He said he was sorry he wasn’t there to help me in person. Even if his wife would have killed both of us when we got back home.

Janet called me a couple of weeks after the arrest, to give me the general rundown on the legwork she and her fellow agents were doing on the other murders. It was an exhausting process, but they were definitely connecting Tanner Paige to each date and location. She also mentioned the possibility of coming up to see me sometime. She said it was her turn to make the long drive.

She hasn’t made the trip yet. I honestly don’t know if she ever will. Maybe we both lied to each other one time too many, even if it was always for the right reasons.

I kept in touch with Sergeant Grimaldi. I got back to work on the cabins. Vinnie and I replaced another woodstove. On the first day of October, it snowed. Later that month, I received a visit from the King family.

They rode up in Mrs. King’s sister’s powder blue Pontiac Bonneville. It still had the big dent in the front right quarter panel. I put them up in one of the empty cabins. I took them down to the Glasgow Inn to meet Jackie and Vinnie. On the second day, I took them to Sault Ste. Marie.

We all had a quick beer at the Soo Brewing Company with Leon. Mrs. King looked tired but happy. Darryl looked like he wasn’t quite sure what he was doing in the Upper Peninsula. Or what he was doing with me, but we did shake hands and have a beer together. After all we’d been through, that had to mean something.

Tremont was the real enigma those couple of days. He didn’t say much at all. After all those years living alone, out on the rails, he was like a feral animal who suddenly finds himself inside a house with a nice bed and regular meals. Add to that the guilt that he had to be feeling. Whether it was truly justified or not, you could look at him and wonder why he didn’t do something about Tanner Paige back then. He was a scared fourteen-year-old kid in Detroit and Paige had every advantage over him, including the threat of lethal violence. So maybe you can’t really blame him for running away and letting his brother take the fall for him, but there’s a big difference between looking at something on paper and waking up in the middle of the night and thinking about what you could have done, if only you’d found a way. I could tell Tremont would be living with that for the rest of his life.

When we all bundled up and went up to the observation deck overlooking the Soo Locks, there was a big freighter coming through. The flag was Australian. Mrs. King and Darryl were both shivering and already looking at the stairs, obviously ready to go back to Paradise and sit by the fireplace, but Tremont looked out at the big boat that had come all these thousands of miles to be here, and I could tell what he was thinking. I knew he probably wasn’t done riding on freight trains. I just hoped he’d always come back, now that he had a place to come back to.

On the day they went back to Detroit, Mrs. King gave me one of the biggest hugs of my life. I promised I’d call her. I promised I’d come down to see her again soon.

“Maybe you’ll move back to the city someday,” she said. “Detroit needs more good people. Otherwise, I don’t know if she’ll survive.”

I promised I’d think about it, but I knew it would never happen. Paradise was my home now.

On the night before Halloween, we got more snow. I lay in my bed that night, listening to it fall. I thought about Detroit. The Motor City. Motown. A great city that could still be great again.

Then I remembered what night it was. Devil’s Night. The night they burned down the empty houses, all over the city. It would have been a hard night to be there, watching the sky glow red above every corner of the city.

Watching the city I love burning to the ground.