Missed Connections

by Alexandria Clarke

  Once clear of Minerva, the rest of Simone City was wide open land. Mountains loomed in the distance. One year, Mom saved up for the two of us to go on a ski trip out there. Neither one of us knew how to ski, so we ended up spending the majority of our time drinking hot cocoa by the fireplace in the lodge. If you drove the opposite way, you eventually hit the coast, which I’d never been to. I’d never seen the beach before. That post-college desire to get out and see the world never hit me. All I wanted was to be a real Simone City cop as soon as possible.

  The prison was equidistant from the mountains and the coast. It sat in the middle of a thick forest where the trees were always gray instead of green. The prison was gray with all of its cinder block construction, and no matter the weather forecast on the day you visited, the sky always managed to be gray too. Visiting Slickwater Regional Prison was like slipping into a colorless dimension, where the only hue allowed to exist was the sunshine yellow of the inmates’ uniforms. I drove through the gray gates, parked in the gray parking lot, and said hello to the guards in gray outfits. I’d called ahead to say I was coming in to speak with Wallace Bauer. They set us up in a private room instead of the regular visitors’ center. When I walked in, Wallace was handcuffed to the table.

  “Hello, Detective,” he said. “I don’t believe we’ve met before.”

  Wallace Bauer had sad eyes and deep lines around his mouth. His thick hair, once all black, was now as gray as the rest of the prison. The paleness of his skin contrasted harshly with the bright yellow jumpsuit, and the fluorescent lighting made his cheeks sallow. He looked healthy though. There was some bulk beneath his clothes that hadn’t been there before he’d been put away. Even restrained, there was a fluidity to his simplest of movements, like crossing one ankle over the opposite knee.

  “Sheila Arden,” I said, flashing my shield. “I have a few questions for you.”

  “Regarding?”

  I shooed the guards from the room and took the seat across from Wallace. He smiled kindly back at me. It raised the hair on my arms. “I’m working on a new case. I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but four of your prior acquaintances—”

  “Are dead,” he finished.

  “You know?”

  “We get the news in here too, Detective.”

  “Then you know that the killer is still on the loose.” I popped open a briefcase and pulled out a few things, starting with the photos from the charity gala. “Every single one of these men—Phillip Beatnik, James Honey, Karl Murphy, and Kyle Fisher—attended the Bauer Tech Charity Gala on the night of the, er, incident.”

  “You mean the night I murdered my wife and child.” He was not cold or calculating. He was merely stating a fact. “That’s the incident you’re referring to, is it not, Detective?”

  I struggled to meet his eyes. They were warm, honey brown. Far too similar to Veronica’s for my taste. “Yes, that incident.”

  “What do you want to know, Miss Arden?”

  I leaned over the table and lowered my voice. I’d requested privacy with Wallace, but the guards were never far away, eavesdropping on every conversation. “Wallace, I want to know why the killer is targeting these men. You’re the connection. Every single one of them has dealt with you on a business or personal level.”

  Wallace remained impassive. “I don’t understand. Are you accusing me of something?”

  “It’s difficult to accuse you of murder when you’re sitting in prison,” I said. “But I am curious.”

  Wallace leaned forward too. I resisted the urge to back up, but his expression changed from stony to earnest, so I remained where I was. “Detective Arden, I can assure you I have absolutely no idea as to why someone is targeting these men. I have not spoken to any of them in over twelve years.”

  I put away the photos of the murdered men and took out a new one. It was blurry, a still captured from the security camera footage in the Arts Center, but the woman in the red dress, knife in hand, was plain to see. The long, dark wig obscured her face, but stance and posture were more than enough to identify someone. “Wallace, do you know who this is?”

  He glanced at the photograph. “No. Should I?”

  I placed another picture on top of the first. Wallace blanched and lifted his hands to cover his eyes. The handcuffs rattled, jerking his wrists back to the table. “Why would you show me that?” he whispered.

  “Because you supposedly did it.” It was a picture of the Bauers’ apartment. At the time, it had been a crime scene. Blood was splattered across the white leather couch. Vivian Bauer’s body lay splayed out for all to see. Veronica, however, was nowhere in sight. “When the cops arrested you that morning, you immediately confessed to murdering Veronica and Vivian,” I went on.

  He bowed his head and cupped his face more carefully so as to not jostle the handcuffs. “Don’t, Detective. Please don’t.”

  “Because of your confession, the police did not bother to further their investigation,” I said. “But I often lie awake wondering what would have happened if they had.”

  Wallace’s mouth, the only part of his face that I could see, quivered. He took in a deep breath that rattled in his lungs.

  I flipped over the photo, unable to bear his grief. “Why would you cover for them?” I asked him. “The men who really did this?”

  He stayed stoic and quiet.

  “Okay, fine. I’ll talk,” I said. “I don’t think you killed your wife and daughter. I was there that night, Wallace, but you weren’t. There were footprints in the hall. Two sets. Veronica’s and someone else’s, but if someone was forcing your daughter down, then who was restraining your wife?”

  Wallace dipped his face into both hands, rocking back and forth. He made no effort to join in on the conversation.

  “Victor Dumas put the wrong person in prison, didn’t he?” I whispered. “These men are at fault, aren’t they? Someone’s hunting them down out of revenge. Someone close to your family. Here’s the thing, Wallace. This isn’t the way the law works. I can get you out of here, but you have to be willing to help me.”

  “Why would I want to leave Slickwater?” Wallace said, looking up from his hands at last. His eyes were red, but there were no tears. “I have nothing to go back to. My business is gone. My wife and daughter are dead, and it’s my fault. It’s my fault.”

  I slid the picture of the woman in the red dress toward him again. “Vivian is dead, yes, but the police never found Veronica’s body.”

  He traced the outline of the woman’s hidden face with the tip of his index finger.

  “Please,” I said. “If you know something, I need you to tell me. Anything at all would help. I just need to get a handle on this investigation.”

  He lifted the photo. “Can I keep this?”

  “Yeah, sure.” I collected the rest of the pictures to put back in the briefcase. It looked like Wallace didn’t feel like sharing, so I stood up and signaled the guards that we were finished with our conversation. “I’ve got copies.”

  “Gerald Cain,” he said out of the blue.

  “What?”

  He looked up from the photo to make eye contact with me. “Gerald Cain. That’s all I’ve got.”

  I nodded. The name was familiar, yet another wealthy millionaire in Simone City. “Thank you, Wallace.”

  “Be careful out there, Detective.”

  The guards and I switched places. As I left, I heard them complaining about something. One of them said to Wallace, “Sorry, Mr. Bauer. You’re going to have to hang tight here for a while. The city’s doing electrical repairs in the area, and our entire system is offline.”

  Wallace replied politely, “Not a problem, sir.”

  Chapter Seventeen - Vee

  I followed Detective Arden for as long as I could, but when she turned off the interstate and the traffic died down, I let her take a few miles to herself. On that route, there was only one place that she could have been going to anyway. There was nothing past Minerva until you reached t
he campgrounds in the mountains or the coastal town in the opposite direction. The only thing that lay between them was Slickwater Regional Prison, where my father sat in a jail cell. When I saw the green road sign that spelled out the name of the institution in reflective white lettering, I hit the brakes so quickly that the bike skidded to a wobbly stop and tipped forward on the front wheel.

  My father’s confession and incarceration were mysteries to me. That night, my mother and I had left him at the charity gala. Every year prior, he stayed there for hours on end until all of his business transactions were closed in drunken handshakes and empty whiskey glasses, but when the police investigated his case, my father had no alibi. No one had seen him at the gala after my mother and I left. The darkest thought in my mind was that my father had been one of the masked men, but I would have recognized my father’s posture and gait even if his face was covered. Besides, he was not that kind of man.

  I was sure that Arden had plenty of reasons to visit Slickwater Regional Prison, but there was no use in denying the obvious. The detective had connected the dots. This was Bauer family business, so she went straight to the source. I couldn’t bring myself to wait on the side of the highway until her squad car reappeared from the trees. I was closer to my father than I had been in years. I turned the bike around, revved the engine, and shot off in the opposite direction. The good thing about Arden heading out of town was that it gave me plenty of time to gear up for my next hit.

  P0lt3r6315t: Ready for next target.

  P0lt3r6315t: Hello?

  P0lt3r6315t: Where are you?

  With a frustrated groan, I clicked out of the IM window. P3n173nc3 was unusually absent from the message board. Generally, if I logged on and sent him a message, he replied within the minute. It had been an hour since I’d sent my first message to him. He should have been excited. After nearly a month, our mission was back on track. I wanted someone else to take down, but I needed a name. If P3n173nc3 wouldn’t get me one, I’d find it myself.

  Hours later, when Li Hui retired from her self-appointed job of taking care of me, I sorted through hard drives, old photos, and information regarding that night. I was at a stalemate. Without P3n173nc3’s help, I couldn’t be sure of anything. Dozens of men attended the charity gala that night, all of them with a connection to my father. I made a list of those I suspected to be involved, but there were more than thirty names on it. I couldn’t pick one at random. What if I chose wrong, and the man was innocent?

  In the end, I rode to Juno around ten o’clock in the evening. This was a different kind of mission. I found a name, one that was as familiar to me as my own, and wanted answers from the man it belonged to. When I got close to my destination, I parked my bike in a dark alley and walked the rest of the way, head bowed beneath my hood. A few blocks later, I arrived at the Ivory Hotel. It was taller than I remembered, but less grand. Gold exterior paint peeled off the once immaculate front doors. The doorman was different too. Long ago, he was a young man with a neat mustache that made my mother laugh. Now, it was a different man whose many chins protruded over the tight collar of his uniform. I supposed I should’ve been pleased—it was almost too easy to distract him and slip into the lobby—but I missed the handsome doorman from my childhood.

  Security was lax. The girl at the front desk who was meant to check in all visitors chipped paint off of her nails. The actual security guard, who usually stood by the elevators to survey the lobby, begged for the front desk girl’s attention. I walked right past them, got in the elevator, and hit the button for the top floor. The elevators smelled like lemon cleanser. I used to hate the smell when I was a kid—it stung my nostrils—but now I took comfort in it. The elevator dinged as it came to a halt, and the doors opened into the hallway of the top floor.

  There was a single door, one with a keypad and a blue fingerprint scanner, at the end of the hall. The lush carpet ate my footsteps. A security camera blinked its red dot at me from the ceiling. I made sure my mask was in place. The fabric squeezed the bridge of my nose, making it hard to breathe. Then, my mind blank of common sense, I placed my finger against the keypad scanner. It lit up, and a thin line of light read my fingerprint. I tensed, expecting the pad to turn red and sound the silent alarm inside the penthouse, but it turned green instead, and the lock clicked open.

  “Welcome home, Veronica.”

  The Smart Home’s familiar voice stopped me in my tracks. I froze in the doorway, completely exposed. Memories bulldozed me like thick waves before a big storm. The apartment was exactly the same and totally different all at once. Most of my family’s furniture was gone except for the dining room table. The new resident had retired the minimalistic look my father preferred. The home was warmer now, with a dark leather couch, intricate throw rugs, and tan walls instead of the blank white ones I once knew. It was messier than the immaculate home of my childhood. There were dirty dishes in the sink, muddy shoes kicked off by the front door, and high school report cards taped haphazardly to the refrigerator. A rumpled blanket was thrown across the couch, along with a few pieces of escaped popcorn. The apartment felt distinctly lived in.

  “So it is you,” someone said.

  Without thinking, I flicked a knife in the direction of the sound. It embedded itself in the drywall. A perfect stick. John Halco, my father’s best friend, didn’t flinch, though the blade had whizzed right past the side of his face. He stared at me with an unreadable expression. Eyes wide and shiny, lips parted as if he wanted to say something but couldn’t find the words. He seemed to look past my mask and all-black outfit.

  “My security advisor told me I should have reprogrammed the fingerprint scanner,” John said. He pried the knife out of the wall and examined it. Then he held it out as if to offer it back to me. When I made no move to accept it, John walked to the kitchen and laid the blade on the counter. “I asked him what the point was of doing that. Wallace was in prison, Vivian was gone, and you—” his chin wobbled “—the police told us you were dead.”

  One step at a time, I walked toward him, shoulders up like a prowling cat. His spine stiffened, but he didn’t move. He didn’t ask the Smart House to call the police. He just stood there by the counter and watched as I approached him. I lunged the last three feet, knocking the knife beyond his reach, bending him backward over the counter and putting the karambit to his throat. Something prevented me from placing the blade right up next to his skin. Tears leaked from his eyes.

  “I wasn’t there, Veronica,” he said, keeping his hands in full view for me. “If I was, I would have killed those guys. You know what your family meant to me. Your father was like a brother to me, and I thought of you as my niece.” He hiccupped and swallowed his nerves. “I looked for you afterward. I couldn’t believe you were dead. I wanted to find you and make it better. I talked with my wife. We agreed that if you were still alive, we would take you into our family. That’s what we hoped for, prayed for. I hired a team of private investigators to find you, but they never managed to get any decent leads. How did you do it? How did you disappear like that?”

  My mind flashed to that night. The pizza girl pulling me out of the wreckage, carrying me down the stairway and into her mother’s car. Falling asleep next to a total stranger who kept her promise of never giving me up to the police. It was because of her that no one tracked me down. No one expected Veronica Bauer to end up in the middle of the suburbs hours after the attack, especially when my father claimed to have dumped my body in Slickwater Lake.

  “Give me a name,” I said.

  John stuttered. “W-what?”

  “I believe you.” I let up on my grip but held him firmly in place just in case. “I believe that you had nothing to do with that night, but I need the name of someone who did.”

  “Veronica—”

  “Don’t call me that.”

  “It’s not right,” he said. “You can’t go around killing them.”

  My fingers tightened around the collar of his shirt. “You just sai
d that’s what you would have done.”

  “In the heat of the moment,” he clarified. “But this is going to take a toll on you. You may not realize it now—”

  “No, what’s taken a toll on me was what happened that night,” I said, volume rising. “This is fixing it, John. I’m fixing myself.” When his teeth clicked together, I realized I’d shaken him without noticing. He looked at me differently now. Not with pity or sadness, but with fear. “Give me a name,” I said again. “I don’t want to have to hurt you, John. Not after everything you’ve done for my family.”

  “I don’t know for sure who was involved, but,” he added when my knife neared his throat again, “I heard that Gerald Cain disappeared right after the attacks started. Rumor has it that his wife finally figured out what he’d been doing on his ‘business trips,’ but I think it’s something else. I think he’s scared, and I think he’s hiding. From you.”

  Chapter Eighteen - Sheila