Thief River Falls

17

The IPA in Noah Power’s hand was cold and cloudy, and when he drank it, he could taste a bite of citrus in the back of his mouth. That was how he liked his ales. It was strong, too, with a kick that left a mellow haze in his head, particularly on his third pint. He sat on a stool near the taproom windows, looking out at the rush hour traffic on First Avenue in downtown Fargo.

Down, down, down came the rain.

Whenever it poured, he thought of it like that. Those were Lisa’s words from the prologue of her fourth book, Thief River Falls. He could still hear the words in Lisa’s voice. She’d read the book to the whole family after it was done. They’d spent an entire February weekend that way, with beers in hand and a fire roaring in the fireplace, all of them gathered around her. It was the last time he could remember the family being together like that. She’d spent ten hours reading the manuscript to them on Friday and Saturday evenings, from the first sentence to the last. Noah remembered how proud he’d been of his twin sister and how he’d known that book was going to change her entire life.

As he sat in the taproom, his mind sent her a message: Talk to me, Lis.

That had been their little game when they were kids. They would lie in their beds in the darkness and try to hear what the other was thinking. People said that only identical twins experienced a kind of telepathy between them, but Noah knew that wasn’t true. He and Lisa had it, too. Throughout his life, there had been moments where he was all alone and he would hear Lisa say something, as vividly as if she’d been standing next to him. There were other times when he didn’t hear words but simply felt a torrid rush of emotion, whether it was joy, or anger, or grief, or fear. And he knew in those moments that something was happening to his sister.

He’d never even told Lisa that it was the telepathy that had finally driven him away. It was one thing to live with his own grief, but he’d had to deal with hers, too. When she felt the pain, so did he. When she cried, so did he. The combination had been too much, like a weight on his chest so heavy that he couldn’t even breathe. He needed to find a way not to share it all with her. Yes, he’d been a coward. Yes, he’d run away. But the alternative would have been to take his life, like their father, and when he’d gone so far as to put a gun in his mouth, he knew he had to run. It was that or pull the trigger.

But he wasn’t a fool. In running, he’d severed the bond between him and his sister. He’d felt a rush of fury in his head like a lightning bolt while he was on the road, and he knew — he knew — that Lisa was reading the note he’d left for her. Since that moment, there had been nothing. No voice in his mind. No emotion. They’d become two separate people for the first time in their lives.

Until last night.

Last night, he’d felt her come back.

Noah drank his beer and stared with empty eyes at the busy street. Darkness hadn’t fallen yet, but the rain and cloud cover made the city look like night. The lights of the cars were on. Inside the crowded taproom, the noise and laughter of dozens of drinkers made it possible to stay in his own bubble somewhere far away. He sat and listened, waiting for Lisa to talk to him again. He could feel her reaching out from wherever she was, and he wondered if she could feel him reaching back.

I’m here, Lis.

Right now, what he felt from his sister was an emotion deeper than anything that had ever passed between them, like an eruption from the sun. He had trouble even defining what it was, and the closest word he could find was despair.

“Knock knock. Anyone home?”

Noah started, as if awakening from a bad dream. He was back in the real world in Fargo, and he wasn’t actually alone in the taproom. His fiancée, Janie, was with him.

“Sorry,” he told her.

“Seventeen minutes.”

“What?”

“Seventeen minutes,” Janie said. “That’s how long since you said anything.”

“I didn’t realize.”

She stroked his cheek with a hand tipped with lavender fingernails. She had long, straight brunette hair and green eyes that made him think of an Egyptian Isis. She was very tall — taller than him — and skinny as a rail.

“I don’t mind you being gone,” she said. “I like staring at your face. But I don’t like seeing you so troubled.”

“I know.”

“I have to ask. Is it us? Are you rethinking things?”

“No, definitely not. I’m not rethinking anything.”

And he wasn’t. He’d only known Janie for six months, but after a lifetime assuming there was no such thing as a soul mate, he’d found his. Janie was to him what Danny had been to Lisa. They were the same age, almost forty. They’d met in the unlikeliest of places, a car dealership, when Janie had sold him a used Ford Explorer. She was Janie Swetland, car salesperson by day, hospice volunteer and cat lover by night. She was also a reader and knew his sister’s books, which was the first thing they’d had in common. After dating for only a week, he’d confessed his biggest sin to her, about running away from Lisa when she needed him. He’d assumed that would be the end of his relationship with Janie. No one could ever love anyone who was as selfish as he’d been. Instead, Janie had kissed him and told him that he was going to have to forgive himself someday for being human, even if his sister never did.

“You want to talk about what’s going on?” Janie asked him.

“I do, but I’m not sure I’m ready yet.”

“That’s okay. Keep drinking. IPAs are like truth serum. Sooner or later, it’s going to come out.”

“After three beers, I know what has to come out,” Noah said.

He got off the stool, feeling wobbly. He made his way through the crowd to the men’s room, which was empty, and he got rid of as much beer as he could. When he was washing his hands, he found himself staring into the mirror, getting lost again. It wasn’t his own face he saw staring back at him. It was Lisa’s. For fraternal twins, they looked a lot alike. The same deep-brown hair, with a slight curl to it. The same prominent nose, a little more prominent than either of them liked. And the same wide, curious eyes that were like a polygraph, giving everything away. No one looking at them would have missed that they were brother and sister.

He felt emotion from Lisa again, the same as the previous night. That sense of despair as white-hot as the sun.

And then he heard her voice. Harsh, bitter, unmistakable.

Go away, Noah.

He left the bathroom and returned to the table near the window. Janie was waiting for him, and she read his eyes, the ones that always told the truth.

“You ready to talk?” she said.

He drained the last of the beer in the glass. “Yes, but this will sound strange.”

“Okay.”

“Something terrible is happening to my sister.”

Janie took his hand with concern. “How do you know? Have you spoken to her?”

“No.”

She stared at him with only the briefest moment of confusion. Then she read his eyes again, and somehow she understood what he was saying. He didn’t need to explain how he knew. They were twins, and that was enough.

“Then you should go to her,” Janie said.

Noah stared out at the rain. Somewhere out there, Lisa had gone silent, building a wall around herself and keeping him out. “Well, there’s a problem with that. I’m pretty sure I’m the last person on earth that my sister wants to see.”

Will Woolwich grabbed his raincoat from the hook on his cubicle wall. He could see through the building window that the rain was still coming down. He had more work to do, but he could do it at home. His apartment was only a few blocks from the FBI main office in the Minneapolis suburb of Brooklyn Center. He opened his briefcase, grabbed several file folders from his desk, and then closed and locked it. He was about to leave when he noticed the yellow pad near his phone.

That was where he’d made his notes about the query from Lisa Power.

It had brought up old feelings to talk to her again. Crushes like that never really went away, no matter how much time had passed. He could still picture her face when he thought about her, although that wasn’t fair, because he’d seen it on book jackets over the years. A lot of water had gone under the bridge in the ten years since they’d met, but even so, he remembered how much he’d liked her.

He decided to call her back. Just a routine follow-up. Just to see if she was really okay. There had been something odd in her voice as she’d hung up the phone. She’d sounded upset, maybe even scared. And the whole nature of her call, about a police manhunt that wasn’t taking place at all, didn’t make sense to him.

With his coat still on, Will sat back down at his desk. Before he could even reach for the phone, it began to ring, and he scooped up the receiver.

“Special Agent Woolwich.”

He heard a man’s voice on the other end, a little squeaky and young. “Special Agent Woolwich, this is Matthew Baines. I’m an assistant county attorney in Pennington County. You called our office earlier today. I’m very sorry for the delay in getting back to you. The county attorney would have called you himself, but he’s had a death in the family, and he’s out for a few days.”

“I’m sorry to hear it. I appreciate the callback, Mr. Baines. I was able to get my questions answered, but in fact, I was just about to do some additional follow-up. Maybe you can help me.”

“I’m happy to. What is this about?”

“I received a civilian report that law enforcement in your area were mounting special activities today regarding human trafficking operations. It involved some kind of fugitive manhunt.”

“A manhunt?” the attorney replied with surprise. “No, I don’t know anything about that. I’m sure we’d be in the loop if it was happening.”

“Yes, it looks like there was nothing to it,” Will said, “but I know the source personally, so I said I would check it out. I already let her know that there appeared to be no substance to the rumors.”

“Do you mind if I ask who your source was?”

“I don’t think there’s anything confidential about it at this point. I imagine she’s sort of a celebrity up there. It was the writer, Lisa Power.”

“Ah.” Something in the man’s voice changed. “Yes, we all know Lisa.”

“Well, her call was a little strange. I just want to make sure she’s okay.”

“That’s kind of you, but I don’t think you’ve got any reason to be concerned.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, I don’t know anything about these manhunt rumors, but I do know the police already talked to Lisa this afternoon. The county attorney actually knows her quite well, and he sent two sheriff’s deputies to follow up with her. If there were any kind of problem, I’d have heard about it. As you say, she’s pretty well known in these parts.”

“Well, that’s good to hear,” Will replied. “I’m glad the locals have things under control. If I can help from my end, don’t hesitate to get me involved.”

“I’ll pass that along to my boss.”

“Thank you,” Will said. “By the way, I hate to admit this, but could you remind me who the county attorney in Pennington County actually is? I don’t remember the name off the top of my head.”

Will heard a smile in the voice on the other end. Rural counties probably got that query all the time.

“He’s been the county attorney here for almost thirty years,” the man replied. “That makes him kind of a legend in Thief River Falls. His name is Denis Farrell.”