Брайан Фриман - Alter Ego

Jack got out of the chair. He hesitated for a second to see what Stride did, and when Stride did nothing, Jack laughed and strolled out of the interview room. Stride sat there alone and waited. Not long afterward, Maggie and Cab joined him. They’d been watching the interview from the other side of the one-way window.

“He’s right,” Stride said as they sat down. “We’ve still got squat. We can pin everything on John Doe, but we can’t connect Doe to Jack or Casperson. All we’ve got is a burner phone that doesn’t lead anywhere. We need more.”

“Jack didn’t even bother lawyering up,” Cab said. “He knows we can’t touch him. This isn’t his first rodeo.”

“So what do we do?” Maggie asked.

“The strategy hasn’t changed,” Stride said. “We need to tie Jungle Jack to John Doe and not just with a meeting in the parking lot. If we do that, we can get Jack to flip on Casperson.”

Maggie shook her head. “Those two are thick as thieves. Jack owes everything to Casperson. He’s never going to rat him out.”

“He will if it means getting a deal on a murder charge.”

“Except like you said, it’s still all smoke,” Maggie pointed out. “With John Doe dead, Jack’s in the clear. We can’t tie them together.”

There was a long silence in the room. Then Cab Bolton spoke.

“No, Stride’s right,” he said. “We’re forgetting something.”

“What?” Maggie asked.

“We think Jack was John Doe’s local contact, right?” Cab said. “He had to be the go-between who was using the burner phone. Well, we know the go-between made one mistake.”

Stride thought about it, and so did Maggie, and they both blurted it out at the same moment.

“He ordered a pizza.”

Aimee Bowe was quiet as Serena drove her back to the rental house from the hospital. She looked better and stronger, but Serena could see her anxiety as they neared the house overlooking the lake. When they got there, Aimee made no effort to open the car door.

“You know, you’re welcome to stay with me and Stride,” Serena told her. “You can pick up a few things and come home with me.”

“Thanks, but I don’t do well with other people. I’m better on my own. It’s not for much longer. Chris thinks we should be able to wrap up the filming tomorrow, and then I’ll be out of here and back to Los Angeles. No offense, but I’m not going to miss Duluth.”

“I’ll walk you inside and check the house again,” Serena said.

She got out of the Mustang and came around to the passenger door. She made sure Aimee was secure walking in the snow that led to the house. There had been flurries throughout the afternoon, giving the yard a fresh look and brushing it clean of footprints. No one had been there.

Serena stopped and looked up at the sky, which was dark and starless under a low swath of clouds. She’d lived in Minnesota long enough that she could taste snow in the air. They’d be buried tomorrow. The wind was still, as if holding its breath in anticipation of a storm.

“Everything okay?” Aimee asked.

“Fine.”

The actress studied the open yard and the surrounding trees. “Where did you find me?”

Serena pointed. “Down there, near the band of spruces.”

Aimee looked as if she wanted to remember, but she didn’t.

They reached the house, and Serena went in first. Aimee came in behind her and took off her coat as Serena checked each of the rooms again, making sure the place was empty. Nothing had changed since her earlier visit. The back door was still blocked with a chair wedged against the doorknob. Aimee wandered around the living room, studying the photographs of the family who owned the house. She picked up one picture frame and dusted the top with her fingers.

“Do you know the people who live here?” she asked Serena.

“No.”

“I suppose not; why would you? They look nice. Cute couple, cute kids. I have a sister with that kind of life. She lives in the suburbs of Cleveland. Three kids, two, four, and seven. All boys. It’s funny. As things started taking off for me, I felt a little bad for her. There I was jetting around the world, making more money than she’d ever see in her lifetime. I wondered if she was jealous. And then last year, out of nowhere, she told me how much she hated the kind of life I led. No roots, no husband, no kids. She said she would never want that for herself in a million years, and she couldn’t believe I chose it.”

“We all want different things,” Serena said.

“Well, it was an eye-opener for me. It made me more humble.” Aimee sank down into a sofa opposite the brick fireplace. “I don’t suppose you know how to light a fire, do you? I’ve been staring at this thing every evening, and I have no idea how to get it going.”

Serena smiled. “Jonny gave me lessons.”

She opened the flue and stacked several of the wood logs piled near the hearth in a rough pyramid in the grate. As she did, she disturbed a black spider that skittered away across the old ashes. She crumpled several sheets of newspaper and wedged them under the logs, and then she found a book of long matches that she used to start the fire. Everything was dry. The logs caught quickly, warming the room. Serena took a seat next to Aimee. The crackling, dancing fire had a hypnotic quality that entranced them both.

“Do you want a drink?” Aimee asked after they had sat in silence for several minutes. “I need some wine.”

“No, thanks.”

Aimee got up and then looked down at Serena. “You can’t drink, can you? You have a problem with it.”

Serena shook her head in puzzlement. “How do you know these things?”

“I wish I knew, Serena. I dated a scientist in college who said I picked up on things without consciously spotting the clues. You weren’t drinking at the party when I first met you. And there was something in your tone of voice just now.”

“I guess I can believe that,” Serena replied.

Aimee went to the refrigerator and uncorked an open bottle of Pinot Grigio. She poured herself half a glass and returned to the sofa and sat down. “It’s not just you. My thing scares a lot of people.”

“I’m not scared. Just skeptical.”

“Have you ever used a psychic on any of your cases? It happens more than you think. The CIA had a whole program for it.”

“I’d like to see Jonny’s face if I suggested that,” Serena said, smiling.

“Well, most are charlatans, but if even a handful produce results that are impossible to explain, doesn’t that make you wonder?”

“I don’t really think about it.”

Aimee sipped her wine. She hesitated, as if she had things to say and didn’t want to say them. “You probably don’t want me to tell you this. I think your husband is wrong about the Art Leipold case.”

Serena stared at her. “What?”

“Someone else put those women in the box.”

“What are you talking about? The evidence against Art Leipold was overwhelming. Fingerprints, DNA, soil samples, connections to the victims. The jury took less than an hour to convict him. It was an open-and-shut case, and there aren’t many of those.”

“I know. I read all about the case when I was preparing for the role.”

“I’m sorry, Aimee. Jonny doesn’t make mistakes about that kind of thing.”

“Everybody makes mistakes.”

“Not like that. What do you base this on other than intuition?”

“It’s not intuition,” Aimee said.

“Then what is it?”

“I told you, I don’t know. But it’s real. Look, you don’t have to listen to me and you don’t have to believe it. All I’m telling you is what I feel.”

Serena didn’t say anything for a while. She remembered what Aimee had told her the first time they’d met. Don’t trust anyone.