by Dave Daren
“You’ve done nothing wrong,” she assured me as another pained expression crossed her features. “I won’t feel better until this case is over anyway. Are you leaving to investigate them?”
“Ronan and Yura?” I questioned.
She nodded.
“I’ll get to them soon,” I answered. “I need to speak to Mr. Marniq first since he’ll be on a fishing trip with you and Ms. Tash tomorrow.”
She sighed in defeat but nodded as if the interview was inevitable. She attempted to smile, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes.
I reached out to the door handle but then stopped. Her lack of interest in Austin’s innocence still nagged at me, and then there were her odd comments in defense of the crew. She’d also said she would feel better when this case was over, but nowhere in that claim was there a suggestion that the case needed to end in her husband’s favor. I turned around to face her, and her expression shifted to one of confusion as I stared at her.
“I doubt anyone has asked you this,” I said with a chuckle. “But do you think Mr. Morris is innocent?”
She arched her eyebrows at me and dropped her arms to her sides. She stared at me in silence, and I considered the possibility that she could physically and mentally break from the accusation. Her eyes dropped to the floor and looked around as she searched for something in her head, and when she found it, a humorless laugh escaped her. If I’d forgotten I was in a town of sleep-deprived, brain-fried inhabitants, I was certainly reminded of it then.
“You know what, Mr. Brooks?” she began with another laugh. “If Austin were to commit a murder, it would go exactly like this. He would be the only suspect, and he would get caught right away.”
She made eye contact with me, and the power of her gaze did more than just seduce. There was something oppressive about her stare that did not match her brittle nature, and her body understood this. The more intense her stare became, the more tired she appeared.
“You’ve met my husband,” she continued. “He’s a fool. But because he’s a fool, I know he didn’t kill Vann. My husband is the kind of murderer who would accidently kill the ones he loved. Something out of a comedy. He’d… He’d be holding a… a pole, and when he turned, he’d accidentally knock someone overboard and kill them. That’s the kind of killer he would be.”
She laughed, but she was too exhausted to appear or sound genuinely amused.
“So that’s a no?” I tried to clarify.
“Austin would never kill Vann,” she insisted. “And if he had, he wouldn’t have drowned him. Looking someone in their eyes as you held them underwater and watched the life drain out of them? My husband? Doing that?”
She shook her head and then winced from the action. She managed to pull herself into a soldier’s stance and stared at me with one of her all-devouring looks.
“Never ever,” she whispered.
She searched my face for something before she reached over and opened the door for me. She shivered at the cold air that rushed in, but she didn’t back away from the door.
I stepped outside and looked at her one final time. I was treated to a royal wave before she quietly closed the door in my face. It had been a bizarre interview, and as I bounded down the porch steps, I tried to sort through everything she had said and not said. All I had wanted were a few simple yes or no answers, especially on the issue of whether Diana believed Austin had killed Vann, but instead I’d gotten a monologue on the inner workings of Austin Morris.
I shook my head as I put my truck in reverse and turned onto Cakeatter Road. I drove in the direction of downtown, to the docks since it sounded like Yura and Tash were still going at it. My mind was still picking apart Diana’s words and behaviors as I drove, and I found myself agreeing with her description of Morris as a killer. If Morris did kill someone, it was more likely to be an accident rather than some planned event. But Morris was surrounded by people who were good planners, and I started to entertain the idea that if Morris had taken part in killing Vann, he wouldn’t have been the mastermind behind the plan.
I quickly dismissed the thought as my mind returned to Diana though, and I decided that the women of Utqiagvik were proving to be more interesting than I would have expected. I hadn’t imagined I would encounter such outlandish ladies when I had accepted the case, and I wondered what Marniq and Ronan had in store for me. I had yet to even lay my eyes on Ronan, as far as I was aware. I recalled the sheer rage on Marniq’s face when he talked about the broken net. How could Diana see that and not consider the possibility of him being a killer?
Flashing blue and red lights drew me away from my thoughts as I neared the docks in front of Osaka Restaurant, and I saw three police cars were parked side by side on the beach while a large crowd of people stood at the entrance of the dock. It wasn’t until I pulled up directly next to the beach that I realized the crowd of people were not just milling around. A brawl had broken out, and police officers struggled to bring order.
There were no spots open in front of the restaurant, so I pulled onto the beach instead as I tried to sort out the sides. As I hopped out of my truck onto the sand and then watched someone be pushed into my truck, I wondered if Tash, Yura, and Marniq were still here.
I took a step toward the brawl and wondered if interviewing Marniq was worth the trouble. But the way the case was going so far, a brawl seemed like a perfectly natural place to have an interview. I sighed and prepared to step into the fray.
Chapter 8
I looked ahead to the dock that housed the Arctic Wizard as I walked toward the mayhem before me. I wanted to make sure Marniq was still around before I joined the fray and put my well-being at risk.
A man was pushed into me as I scanned the docks, and he instantly whirled around with a raised fist. He had to look up to see my face, and that act alone made him lower his fist and back away from me. Rather than take this as a sign he should stop fighting, he turned away from me in search of a man closer to his size and lunged at him, and I shook my head and sighed.
I scanned the docks once again and found Tash being held back by an officer. Her hair was a tangled mess strewn across her face, and a rip snaked up the right side of her shirt.
Marniq sat on the dock behind her with his arms resting on his knees. He appeared unscathed, but every time he moved, he winced, and his hand hovered around his right side. He looked tired, but anger flared on his face occasionally at the memory of something. His anger morphed into sadness when he looked out to the men fighting on the beach, and then he closed his eyes and lowered his head in shame.
I looked for the target of Tash’s ire and discovered Yura on the other side of the dock also being pushed back by an officer. Her face was twisted in what looked to be both agony and hatred. She screamed around the officer at Tash, and blood gushed from her busted bottom lip every time she yelled.
A man paced behind her as he balled his hands into fists and then stretched his fingers. He did this over and over again, but I couldn’t tell if it was a nervous tic or if he was trying to keep himself from throwing a punch. He was tall, likely close to me in height, and lean. Brown hair struck out from underneath his hood across his forehead, and he sported a scruffy mustache. Was this Ronan?
The sight of Marniq and a man who was potentially Ronan spurred me onwards through the rowdy men. I maneuvered around flailing limbs and falling bodies as I moved toward the dock, but another man, this one wearing a red knitted cap, was pushed into my side. I shrugged him off and tried to move forward, but he mistook the action as an attack from me.
He immediately pivoted and swung a fist at my face, so I ducked out of the way and tackled his legs. Sand flew into the air as we fell to the ground, and I squeezed my eyes shut to protect them from the dirt. The last thing I needed in a situation like this was to be temporarily blinded.
I climbed to my feet while my assailant was still struggling to get his feet beneath him, and I gave him my best angry glare. He flinched away from my stare and scuttled a few
feet across the sand on his butt before he pulled himself to his feet and ran off.
Satisfied that the man in the red cap was done fighting for the day, I turned back to the mob scene and the dock just beyond that. I started to push my way through the bodies again and had nearly made it to my destination when someone tackled me from behind. We both went down on our knees, though my assailant was still behind me.
His arms slithered around my neck, and I felt him start to squeeze. I tried to pull his arm from my neck, but he was strong, like most of the fishermen I’d seen. There was a ringing in my ears, a sure sign that I needed to free myself or risk passing out.
With one last heave, I pulled myself to my feet and dragged my attacker along with me. His arm loosened when I was at my full height, so I knew he had to be shorter than me. Able to breathe again, I grabbed his arm with both hands and swung him over my back as I leaned downward.
The man sailed over me, and when I looked up, I saw him crash into a police officer. The officer jerked away and then pushed the man onto the dock. I realized that I knew the police officer, then, and I felt a twinge of fear as I watched Jackson scan the crowd while he brandished his baton.
I could have ducked into the crowd then and scampered back to my truck. But I was never one for backing down, and a moment later, Jackson and I locked eyes across the sea of bodies. With my chin up, I pushed my way closer to the dock.
“I didn’t think I’d find you here, Mr. Lawyer,” Jackson said as he pushed his way toward me. “And attacking a cop? I thought you’d know better.”
He swung the baton at my left side without giving me a chance to respond. I managed to side-step out of the way, but this was tricky. He wasn’t justified in attacking me. I knew that. He knew that. He also knew I couldn’t fight back unless I wanted to be charged with resisting arrest among other bogus charges.
All I could do was dodge his attacks and try to make my way to the dock at the same time. I also needed to dodge the fighters around me, and I realized I could use that to my advantage.
Jackson swung the baton to my right side, and as I dodged out of the way, I accidently fell on top of a man wearing a flannel coat. He whirled around to attack me, and I grabbed him so that his arms were pinned to his sides. From the corner of my eye, I saw Jackson raise his baton to strike me again, and so I threw both myself and the captured man to the ground. I released him, rolled away from Jackson’s position, and then scrambled to my feet. Jackson was almost on me by the time I got my bearings.
I backed away from him while also moving toward the dock. I was able to position myself so that several fighting men acted as a buffer between me and Jackson. Jackson glanced to his sides to ensure no one took him by surprise before breaking out into a sprint toward me. He effortlessly weaved around the men, and I felt dread at this display of his agility. I realized careful evasion was not going to be useful in this situation, and so I turned around and ran.
I wanted to reach the dock because my suspects were there, but I had convinced myself that Jackson would also leave me alone the moment I reached the dock. I had no evidence for this other than a sneaking feeling he wouldn’t blatantly attack me in front of Marniq and the others.
As I ran, I tried my best to avoid the angered men in my path, but since I was also preoccupied with escaping Jackson and his baton, my shoulders occasionally collided into the shoulders of others. I watched one man trapped in a headlock manage to free himself, but in doing so he stumbled backwards into my path. I tried to pivot out of the way since I couldn’t stop my momentum, but the action came too late. The uneven landscape of the beach also didn’t help, and so we collided. I fell on top of him, immediately lifted myself to my knees, and checked the condition of the man under me.
He wasn’t injured, but his shocked eyes searched my face and widened at the sight of something behind me, and without checking to see what it was, I jumped to the left to avoid it. I sat up just in time to watch Jackson swing his baton down on where I had just been, but instead of connecting with his desired target, the baton struck the shoulder of the man still laying there on the ground. The man screamed out in pain, and I winced at the sound of his yell. Jackson stared down at the injured man while wearing an apologetic expression.
“Attacking a defenseless civilian?” I sighed as I got to my feet. “I thought you’d know better.”
Jackson shot me an angry glare, but he had no intention of abandoning the man he had attacked. I watched him crouch down and speak to the wounded man before I turned away and raced to the dock. I was almost there when another police officer stepped into my path. He started to reach for his baton, but he paused at the sight of me. His eyes widened with recognition although I had never seen him before.
“Are you the guy who’s working with Cassandra?” he asked as he pointed at me.
I opened my mouth to answer when the sound of a gunshot rang through the area. The crowd stilled instantly, and people started to look around for the source of the sound. All eyes eventually turned to the dock, where Ansong stood with her gun pointed at the sky. When she saw that she had everyone’s attention, she slowly lowered it while she glowered at the crowd gathered nearby.
“In my twenty-seven years of being a cop, I’ve fired my gun exactly six times,” she announced to the quieted brawlers. “How many of them do you think actually hit a person?”
There were a few murmurs from the crowd, but no one actually spoke up. And as Ansong continued to glare at them, most people suddenly found the ground to be very interesting. I took advantage of their sudden guilty consciences to ease closer the dock.
“Let’s not make it double digits,” she threatened as she swept her eyes over the crowd.
Her eyes met mine, narrowed, and then continued past me.
“Go home!” she ordered the crowd.
Everyone obeyed without any fuss, and some of them even stopped to help the person they’d just been pummeling a moment earlier. Although an ambulance had just arrived to offer medical assistance, none of the men approached the vehicle. To be fair, none of them appeared seriously injured anyway.
The battered men moved off the beach toward the road, and so I was forced to move against the tide as I took those last few steps to the dock. Surprisingly, no one went out of their way to bump into me. Their thirst for blood had been immediately quenched by Ansong’s threat, and so they were careful not to make any moves that might be construed as the start of another fight.
The crowd thinned, the murmurs died away, and I finally reached the dock. Yura and Tash were no longer lunging at each other to draw blood, but they were still separated by the police officers. Yura and Tash were talking in a very animated fashion to the closest officer, while another officer spoke to the man I assumed was Ronan. Marniq, meanwhile, was left to his own devices, so I made a move toward him. Unfortunately, Ansong blocked my path before I could reach my target.
“I hope you had nothing to do with this,” she said as she approached me.
Jackson walked past me, sneered in my direction, and then approached Marniq.
“I just arrived,” I told the middle-aged officer. “What happened here?”
“This crazy bitch came here accusing me and Luke of being murderers!” Tash answered as she pointed at Yura.
I knew that part of the story, of course, but I couldn’t figure out how half the town had become involved. I turned to Ansong again, but Yura suddenly shoved the officer she’d been talking to out of the way. He tried to grab her, but she ran out of his reach and approached me with a wild look in her eyes.
“No one came,” she cried in a hoarse voice. “No one showed up with his keys. I waited, and no one showed up. That’s when I knew.”
She turned around to face Tash and Marniq, and her face twisted with rage as she looked between the two of them.
“I know one of these fuckers killed Harrison and took his jet ski,” she continued. “One of you helped Austin, and now you think you can get away with murder!”
“You psychotic bitch,” Tash spat out.
Yura tried to lunge at her, but Ansong grabbed her and pulled her away. With the help of another officer, Ansong dragged the animated woman away toward the road. Yura finally stopped resisting when they reached the police SUV, and though I couldn’t hear Ansong, I could imagine she was threatening to arrest Yura on the spot.
“What happened after she arrived?” Jackson asked no one in particular.
“She talked some shit, and then this idiot showed up,” Tash answered as she pointed over at the mustached man.
He narrowed his eyes at her and folded his arms across his chest.
“I heard yelling, I saw it was Yura, and I came over to see what was wrong,” he explained. “I didn’t think the muscled leprechaun over there was going to get in my face over the stupid fishing net. It’s been two weeks, but he came at me like I just destroyed the net right in front of his eyes.”
Marniq stood up suddenly with his chest heaving, and whatever pain he’d been feeling was apparently forgotten. I also noticed that the earlier exhaustion and sadness had been replaced with shame and anger.
Jackson placed a hand on Marniq’s chest as though to hold him back, but Marniq never took a step forward. And frankly, I didn’t believe Jackson could have stopped him even if he wanted to.
“Ronan, you and Yura spit on Harrison’s grave by showing up here with accusations while showing no remorse for our fishing net,” Marniq stated in a voice far calmer than the expression he wore.
“First of all, don’t bring Harrison into this,” Ronan demanded with a vicious shake of his head. “Second, I didn’t accuse you of anything. I didn’t know anything about a fucking jet ski. I didn’t know what the hell Yura was talking about. And third, last time I checked, the police hadn’t found any evidence of me, Yura, or Harrison fucking with your net.”
“Okay, okay,” Ansong said as she returned to the dock. “Who started the fight?”
“Ronan did,” Marniq answered without hesitation.
