by Dave Daren
I was interested in why he had suddenly become anxious before setting his face in neutral, and I realized he must have been thinking about the answer to my question. Wherever he had been, it was not somewhere good, but was it related to the murder?
“I was at home,” he said.
Was home a scary place? Why would he be anxious about that? I was certain he had lied to me, and if he had lied, then that meant he was somewhere related to this case. He might have even been on Vann’s boat, enjoying a glass of Vann’s wine, before he disappeared into the night on Vann’s jet ski.
“Anyone there that can confirm that?” I asked as I tried to keep the excitement out of my voice.
“Unfortunately, no,” he answered as he shook his head. “But it doesn’t matter because I didn’t kill Harrison. I had no reason to.”
No known reason anyway.
“Of course,” I said. “Thanks for your time, Ronan.”
“Sure,” he said as he eyed me wearily.
He then walked past me to cross the road, and this time, I let him go. More than anything, I wanted to corner him and pressure him into revealing what he was hiding, but I couldn’t accomplish that in an open area like the beach. No illusion of being trapped existed here, and so I knew I was better off catching him off-guard at his house.
Maybe he hadn’t lied, and maybe there actually was something at his home that he wanted to keep hidden. A thousand ideas flitted through my mind, but speculation wouldn’t help me until I could corner Ronan at home. In the meantime, I needed to follow up on Tash’s alibi before she left for her fishing trip, which meant a trip to her favorite bar.
I trekked across the sand to my Ford. Although Northern Peak was within walking distance, I didn’t want to leave my truck parked on the beach. The last thing I wanted to worry about was a towed rental.
Just as I placed my hand on the door handle, my phone rang in my pocket. Only one person had been calling me all day, and so I answered my phone without checking the caller ID.
“What do you have for me, Cassandra?” I asked as I opened the door of my truck.
“Bank statements!” she gushed. “Pingayak gave me copies, and guess what? The police have expanded their search. I have statements for everyone involved, not just Mr. Marniq and Ms. Tash.”
“Why’s that?” I asked as I started the engine. “What’s made them want to look into Ronan and Yura as well?"
“Couldn’t tell you,” she sighed. “Unfortunately, I don’t get to sit in on those conversations anymore. Ansong has gone as far as closing the workroom door every time she’s at the station.”
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s meet at Northern Peak and look over those statements. I’ll see you soon.”
“See you there,” she declared and then hung up.
I put my phone away and then rested my hands on the steering wheel. My mind wandered to the bank statements, and I found myself trying to work out why the police had requested so many. Why would Ansong want bank statements from Ronan and Yura if they weren’t murder suspects? What had she discovered that had suddenly turned them into people of interest?
I wondered if she had grown suspicious of Ronan in her conversation with him like I had. Or if she had reached a dead-end with Marniq and Tash and thought looking into everyone’s financial habits might present a new lead? As I pulled onto the road in the direction of Northern Peak, I was just glad she’d changed her tune. It made my job that much easier.
Chapter 9
The storefront of Northern Peak sported large windows that nearly stretched from ceiling to floor, but a thin space of wall between both ends prevented this from being a reality. The windows gave passersby a good view into the bar, and a good view of the shore across the street to those inside. The name of the bar was etched into an oval-shaped wooden slab hanging over the entrance along with the image of three snow-capped mountains side by side. A fluorescent light acted as the sign’s spotlight for when night fell, but the light was off for the season, and I knew it would remain off until night finally fell two months later in August.
I climbed out of my truck, and I felt the gaze of the drinkers inside as I passed the bar’s large windows. Those stares persisted when I entered the building, though I ignored them just as I had ignored all the other stares I’d encountered that day.
The inside of the bar was stuffy, and I felt uncomfortably warm within seconds of standing by the entrance. I shrugged off my parka and folded it over my arm while I studied the room. Across from where I stood was a long, oak counter with a glossy top acting as a buffer between the bartender and the customers. Ten wooden bar stools with red cushions framed the counter, and four of them on the far left were currently occupied by tired men waiting for their drinks.
Three of the men had watched me enter the bar, and they stared openly with interest as I approached the counter. They all had weathered faces, waterproof overalls, and rubber boots, and they could have easily been mistaken for one another.
I felt sure they were fishermen, and judging from the exhaustion on their faces, they must have just returned from a long, arduous trip. This would also explain the curiosity they had at my arrival. No doubt, they’d heard about Vann’s death and Morris’ lawyer as soon as they docked, but they probably didn’t know the full details of the case. As a result, they likely weren’t sure if I was the rumored lawyer or just a tourist keen on experiencing Utqiagvik in the summer.
I wasn’t sure how long these men had been out to sea, but their visible exhaustion suggested at least over a week. Rather than head home to see loved ones, catch up on the sleep they desperately needed, or enjoy their first hot shower in ages, they had come straight to the bar, and I interpreted this as a sign that either the men had no loved ones at home to welcome them, or the bar symbolized the actual end of a safe, successful fishing trip. They’d hardly be the first crew to consider a trip to the bar to be a necessary conclusion to a sea journey.
Once I reached the counter, I claimed a stool in the center, threw my coat on the stool next to me, and waited for the bartender to finish her conversation with the fishermen. Her black hair was pulled back into a bun that allowed a view of the earrings that dangled almost to her shoulders. She wore a black apron with the words Northern Peak in white letters across the two front pockets. The defined crow’s feet and laugh lines identified her as a middle-aged woman, but the light makeup she wore made her seem younger. She smiled in my direction as a greeting before returning her attention to the fishermen. Their voices mingled with the low volume of the TV mounted on the wall behind the bar.
On either side of the TV was a snowshoe made from rawhide, and I found the decoration odd since such footwear was useless in the tundra. But maybe that was exactly why they were being used to decorate the walls of a bar. On either side of the shoes were four shelves lined with bottles of various alcohol, and the shelves were illuminated by a soft, blue light. On the far wall to the left, someone had hung paintings of the arctic landscape and sepia photographs of Inuit people. There were also more recent pictures of people I guessed were from the town. One picture featured the mature bartender with a younger woman wearing the same branded apron and a man wearing an apron covered in flour. They stood side by side with their arms around each other while they smiled for the camera.
A door to the right of the bar opened, and a woman who appeared to be in her twenties stepped out holding a notepad. It was the same woman from the photograph, but her hair was different. Her dark blue hair was cut short so that the ends curled inward just below her jawline. She smiled at me and began to walk toward the fishermen until she realized they were engaged with the older bartender. So instead, she moved behind the counter, placed her notepad in the front pocket of her apron, and reached down to grab something from behind the bar. She pulled out two laminated menus and placed them in front of me.
“Welcome to Northern Peak,” the blue-haired woman greeted and smiled again. “Here’s a menu for our drinks and another for our
meals. I’ll give you a moment to look at them.”
“Actually, I have a couple of questions,” I said to stop her from walking away.
The older bartender walked over then and touched the shoulder of the blue-haired woman to direct the younger’s attention over to the fishermen. Without having to be told anything, the young woman nodded and walked toward the fishermen as she pulled her notepad from her pocket.
The older woman turned her attention to me and leaned forward to rest her forearms on the counter. Her earrings swung like pendulums, and now that she was closer, I could see crescent moons were attached to their ends. The smell of vanilla rolled off her toward me, and it mixed with the smell of food, particularly fish, being prepared somewhere.
“You have questions?” she asked.
“Was a woman named Marleen Tash here at the bar last night?” I asked as I tapped the counter.
“I had a feeling this was related to the murder case,” she said. “That makes you Austin’s lawyer, right?”
The heads of the fishermen snapped up upon hearing this, and they stared at the bartender in astonishment. They looked at me, and I met their gazes to find anger and surprise on their faces. They immediately looked away from me to turn toward each other and speak in hushed voices.
I turned my attention back to the waitress, and I saw the concerned look that flashed across her face as she watched the fishermen. She must have felt my stare, though, because she turned back to me and offered a reassuring smile.
“Marleen was here last night,” she replied. “I don’t remember what time she arrived, but--”
“It was around nine,” the young woman answered as she squeezed past the older woman.
She went through the same door she had passed through before, and from the brief glimpse inside, I could see it was the kitchen.
“Oh, that’s right,” the older woman agreed. “Yeah, she showed up around nine and hung around until two. Maybe even later than that.”
“Two?” I questioned as I remembered Tash’s testimony. “Don’t you mean midnight?”
“Is that what Marleen told you?” she laughed and waved her hand to dismiss the idea. “That’s the time she wants to be home by. Every time she comes, she promises she’ll only stay for a couple of hours and won’t cause trouble, and every time, one of her friends shows up to convince her to stay out a while longer.”
The blue-haired bartender returned with a tray of food in her arms. She walked around the counter to where the fishermen sat and passed out their meals to them individually. When she was done, she held the tray under her arm and looked around on the counter. She gave the older woman an exasperated look.
“Where are their drinks?’ she demanded as she moved to the other end of the counter to enter the space behind it.
“I’m busy talking to the lawyer,” the older woman answered with a gesture in my direction.
“Can’t you multitask?” the young bartender asked with an exaggerated roll of her eyes as she pulled out glasses and set them on the counter. “I guess your age is catching up to you.”
She laughed when she said this, and the older bartender playfully smacked her younger co-worker on the arm. The older woman shook her head and looked back at me.
“I brought her into this world, and now that she’s all grown up, she thinks she can sass me,” she said with a laugh, and I smiled at her. “Anyway, Marleen did technically leave here at midnight, but she and the other patrons crossed the street to dance and sing on the beach. They were all drunk. The bar closes at two, so when my husband, daughter, and I closed up to head home, we saw all of the partiers still having fun on the beach. Marleen was still there, too.”
“Thank you,” I told her as I got up from the stool.
“Of course,” she replied.
Marleen’s alibi not only checked out, but it also covered her for the time of Vann’s murder. I was astonished she had ‘misremembered’ something so important, but I realized it was just another night in Utqiagvik for her, nothing special. How could she have known that Vann would be murdered and that the memory of last night would be crucial in proving her innocence today?
Besides, it sounded like the source of her poor memory had been a large intake of alcohol, and I jokingly thought that the days of her liver were numbered. I chuckled, which drew a curious stare from the older woman, but before I could explain, I heard the front door open again, and someone entered the bar. The young bartender looked up from her drink to see who had entered, and a happy smile crossed her face.
“Hey, Cassandra!” the young bartender greeted her.
“Hi, Lia,” I heard my paralegal reply.
I turned around and found Cassandra shrugging off her coat as she approached me with another manila folder in her hand. She flashed a wide smile at me and then at everyone else in the room. Even the fishermen who had scowled at me just moments before were caught off-guard by her potent exuberance and found themselves returning her smile with their own before they could think to scrutinize who she was.
Their smiles drooped when she handed me the manila folder and it became clear that she was working with me. Even so, they were reluctant to show her malice, so they turned away to mutter among themselves.
She started to sit at the bar, but I shook my head at her and gestured toward the booths lined against the wall with the large windows. She picked up the menus from off the counter and then moved to the closest booth by the window. She slid onto the leather cushioned seats, placed her jacket next to her, and then looked over the menus.
I slid into the seat across from her.
“Want a pizza?” she asked as her eyes scanned over the menu.
“Sure,” I answered as I opened the folder. “When did you come here?”
“What?” she responded with her eyebrows raised. “I’ve never been in here before.”
“And yet you and Lia know each other,” I said as I nodded my head toward the young bartender still behind the counter.
“Oh, that?” she said as she glanced in the bartender’s direction. “The hotel next to this bar is the one we’re staying at, and when I went to drop off your jacket, I ran into Lia in the lobby. I think she was delivering food that someone at the hotel had ordered. Or maybe the bar provides catering to the hotel? I don’t know. Anyway, I saw her hair, and I went over to tell her it looked fantastic. This led to introductions, and then a long conversation about hair styles and hair products. I asked her for some tips and the best brand to use because I want to dye my hair one day. She thinks I’d make a sexy redhead, and I find that absolutely hilarious. The problem is that my hair is so dark. I’ll have to…”
I tuned her out at that point and began inspecting the bank statements that were in the folder. I flipped through them to see what date range I was working with, and I saw that all of the statements began on the first of January and ended with the current date. So I had six months of information to work with for each person.
Morris’ was the first one in the pile, and I already knew what to expect. A list of withdrawals repeated down the page, interrupted by deposits sparingly. Just as Diana had mentioned, thousands of dollars had been spent last month for upgrading the kitchen while hundreds of dollars had been spent sporadically throughout the year on what I assumed were ships in bottles and whatever other collectibles Morris had been obsessed with.
“Someone has a spending problem,” Cassandra muttered as she leaned her head forward to get a closer look.
She’d noticed my lack of attention faster than I expected, and I reminded myself not to underestimate her again.
“Are you two ready to order?” Lia asked.
Cassandra and I flinched at the sound of her voice, and we snapped our heads up to stare at her. Lia gave us an apologetic smile and started to tuck her pad back into her apron.
“Didn’t mean to scare you guys,” she said. “I can come back later.
“No, no, you’re fine,” Cassandra reassured her. “We’re ready to
order. We’ll have a pepperoni pizza, and… two beers?”
The young paralegal looked over at me for confirmation, and I nodded at her. After everything I had accomplished today, a slice of pizza with a beer sounded like the perfect way to end the day.
“And two beers,” Cassandra announced with confidence.
“Coming right up,” Lia promised as she collected the menus from our table.
“Thanks, beautiful,” Cassandra said as the young woman backed away.
We directed our attention back to the bank statements. I flipped through the rest of Morris’ statement with little interest, and when I was done, I set it off to the side. Cassandra immediately snatched it and began to look through with a concentrated expression.
“Why is this married couple just throwing their money away?” she asked in a low voice. “I mean, I can see that Mr. Morris is bringing in the big bucks with his fishing, but still. Imagine how much money they’d be sitting on if they had put it away in a savings account. They could have been operating a whole fleet of boats by now if they wanted.”
“Diana has nothing to do with the spending,” I told her. “Mr. Morris is the one making a lot of purchases. You see the expenditures for last month? All for upgrading his kitchen.”
“Well, she can’t be too upset by that,” the paralegal responded.
“Right,” I confirmed. “But she’s not a fan of the collections.”
“Collections?” Cassandra said under her breath as she flipped through the rest of the statement.
When her curiosity had been satisfied, she returned the document to the bottom of the pile and then randomly pulled out another from in the middle. She started to inspect it when her eyes widened with realization of something, and she lowered the papers from her view and then directed her gaze and attention at me.
