Andrew Gross - The Dark Tide

Hauck nodded. “Okay…”

“But then I thought of it in light of all that’s come up, and it began to gnaw at me. So I went out to see him while you were gone. To New Jersey. To see him. I didn’t know where he worked now, and all I had was this address from when he worked for Charles, with a private number. I just took a chance. His wife answered the door.” Karen’s eyes turned glassy. “She told me the most horrible thing.”

“What?”

“He’s dead. He was killed. In a cycling accident, a few months back. What made it all a little creepy was that he’d been scheduled to give a deposition in some matter related to Harbor later in the week.”

“What kind of matter?”

“I don’t know. But it wasn’t just that. It was the way he was killed. Coupled with the way your Raymond kid was killed, who had Charlie’s name on him.”

Hauck put down his glass, his antennae for these sorts of things beginning to buzz.

“A car hit him,” Karen said. “Just like your guy. It was a hit-and-run.”

A group of office people seated next to them suddenly grew louder. Karen leaned forward, her knees pressed together, her face a little blank.

“You did good,” Hauck said, showing he was pleased. “Real good.”

Some of the color returned to her cheeks.

“You hungry?” Hauck asked, taking a chance.

Karen shrugged, casting a quick glance at her watch. “Alex has a ride home with a neighbor. I guess I have a little time.”

On the way home, Hauck rang up Freddy Muñoz.

“LT!” his detective exclaimed in surprise. “Long time no hear. How’s vacation?”

“I’m not on vacation, Freddy. Listen, I need a favor. I need you to get a copy of the file on an unsolved homicide in New Jersey. Upper Montclair. The victim’s name is Lauer. L-A-U-E-R, like Matt. First name Jonathan. There may be a parallel investigation by the Jersey State Police.”

Muñoz was writing it down. “Lauer. And what do I say is the reason we need it, LT?”

“Similar pattern to a case we’ve been looking at up here.”

“And which case is that, Lieutenant?”

“It’s an unsolved hit-and-run.”

Muñoz paused. In the background there was the sound of young kids shouting, maybe the Yankees game on TV. “Jesus, Ty, this becoming an MO with you now?”

“Have someone drop it off at my home tomorrow. If I was active, I’d do it myself. And Freddy…” Hauck heard the sound of Freddy’s son, Will, cheering. “This stays just between us, okay?”

“Yeah, LT,” the detective answered. “Sure.”

NEW LEADS, HAUCK was thinking.

One definitely ran through Charlie Friedman’s trustee, Lennick. Karen trusted him. Almost like a member of the family. He would have known about Lauer. Did he know about Dolphin and Falcon, too?

Did Charlie ever mention he was managing any accounts offshore?

The other ran through New Jersey, this second hit-and-run. Hauck had never been one to have much faith in coincidences.

As he drove, his thoughts kept straying back to Karen. Off the top of his head, he came up with ten good, solid reasons he should stop now, before things went any further between them.

Starting with the fact that her husband was alive. And how Hauck had made a pledge to find him. And how he didn’t want to cause her any more needless hurt by holding things back than she had already been through.

And how she was rich. Used to different things. Traveled in a totally different league.

Jesus, Ty, you’re not exactly playing the strongest hand here.

Still, he couldn’t deny that he felt something with her. The electricity when their hands brushed once or twice at dinner. The same sensation coursing through his veins right now.

He pulled his Bronco off the exit of 95 back in Stamford. It occurred to him why he couldn’t tell her. Why he was holding back the whole truth. That Charles had returned to Greenwich after the bombing. That he had a hand in killing that boy. Maybe the other one, too.

Why he didn’t want to bring the police into the matter. Get other people involved.

Because Hauck realized that for the last four years he’d been essentially rootless, alone. And Karen Friedman was the one thing he felt connected to right now.

There was a knock on the door the following afternoon, and Hauck went over to answer.

Freddy Muñoz was there.

He handed Hauck one of those large, string-bound interoffice envelopes. “Hope I’m not bothering you. Thought I’d bring it up to you myself, Lieutenant, if that’s okay?”

Hauck had just come back from a run. He was sweaty. He was in a gray Colby College T-shirt and gym shorts. He had spent most of the morning working on the computer.

“You’re not bothering me.”

“Place looks nice.” The detective nodded approvingly. “Needs a bit of a woman’s touch, don’t you think? Maybe make a little sense of that kitchen over there?”

Hauck glanced at the dishes piled in the sink, a few open containers of takeout on the counter. “Care to volunteer?”

“Can’t.” Muñoz snapped his fingers, feigning disappointment. “Working tonight, Lieutenant. But I thought I’d just hang around a minute while you took a look through that, if that’s okay?”

Buoyed, Hauck opened the envelope’s flap and slid the contents on the coffee table, while Muñoz threw himself into a cushy living-room chair.

The first thing he came upon was the incident report. The report of the accident by the lead officer on the scene. From the Essex County PD. Details on the deceased. His name, Lauer. Address: 3135 Mountain View. DOB. Description: white male, approximately thirty, wearing a yellow biking uniform, severe body trauma and bleeding. Eyewitness described a red SUV, make undetermined, speeding away. New Jersey plates, number undetermined. Time: 10:07 A.M. Date. Eyewitness report attached.

It all seemed to have a familiar feel.

Hauck glanced through the photos. Photostats of them. The victim. In his biking jersey. Hit head-on. Severe blunt trauma to the face and torso. There was a shot of the bike, which had basically been mangled. A couple of views in either direction. Up, down the hill. The vehicle was clearly heading down.

Tire marks only after the point of impact.

Just like AJ Raymond.

Next Hauck leafed through the medical examiner’s report. Severe blunt-force trauma, crushed pelvis and fractured vertebrae, head trauma. Massive internal bleeding. Dead on impact, the medical examiner presumed.

Hauck paged through the detectives’ case reports. They had mapped out the same course of action Hauck had up in Connecticut. Did a canvass of the area, notified the state police, checked with the body shops, tried to trace back the tread marks for a tire brand. Interviewed the victim’s wife, his employer. “No motive found” to assume it might not have been an accident.

Still no suspects.

Muñoz had gotten up and gone over to a canvas Hauck was working on by the window. He lifted it off the easel. “This is pretty good, Lieutenant!”

“Thanks, Freddy.”

“May get to see you at the Bruce Museum yet. And I don’t mean waiting in line.”

“Feel free to help yourself to any you like,” Hauck muttered, flipping through the pages. “One day they’ll be worth millions.”

It was frustrating-just like his. The Jersey folks had never found any solid leads.

It just came down to a coincidence, a coincidence Hauck didn’t believe, one that didn’t lead anywhere.

“Strike you as reasonable, Freddy?” Hauck asked. “Two separate 509s? Two different states. Each with a connection to Charles Friedman.”