Winter of the Wolf Moon

by Steve Hamilton

  “She had a bag,” I said. “A white duffel bag.”

  “She must have taken it with her,” he said. “Or he did, I mean. This Bruckman guy. You say you played hockey with him a couple of nights ago?”

  “Yeah, I did.” It felt like a lot longer.

  “He a big guy? How easy would it be for him to take her out of here?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “He’s a lot bigger than her, but I can’t imagine her going with him without a fight.”

  “So why is the door unlocked?” he said. “She must have opened it, right? There’s no sign of forced entry.”

  “It doesn’t make sense,” I said. “She wouldn’t have opened that door if she knew it was him.”

  “Maybe he comes to the door and says he just wants to talk to her. Then when he’s inside he starts busting up the place.”

  “Impossible.”

  “You said you were a cop once. You’ve seen these situations, right?”

  “I know where you’re going,” I said. He was right, I had seen it before, more times than I could count. The man begging for forgiveness, the women caving in. “But I just can’t see it here.”

  “Then why did she open the door?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “The way she talked about him last night, I just don’t know.”

  I looked down at the table leg that had been broken off, almost bent over to pick it up before I stopped myself. Then I noticed something else.

  “Look at this floor,” I said.

  The troopers stopped and looked at me.

  “There’s too much melted snow here,” I said. You could see the faint imprints of snow puddles all over the room.

  “She had to walk through snow to get here, didn’t she?” the man asked.

  “Yes, of course,” I said. “And I did, too. I even had to go around back and turn the water on. But I remember thinking about the floor as I came back in. I always try not to track too much snow in here. The white pine, it gets dirty fast. I’m sure there wasn’t this much snow on the floor when I left. Not all over the place like this.”

  “So he did come in,” the man said. “She definitely had company.”

  “I can’t believe it,” I said. “I can’t believe she’d let him in here.”

  “How would Bruckman know to find her here, anyway?” he said. “Does he know where you live?”

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “Even if he did, how would he know which cabin she was in?”

  “Could he have been following you?”

  I tried to remember, tried to put myself back in my truck that previous night. Were there lights behind me? “I’m sorry,” I said. “I can’t say for sure. I didn’t notice anybody following me, but I can’t swear that it didn’t happen.”

  “Could it have been somebody else?” he said. “Maybe she called somebody.”

  “There’s no phone here,” I said. “And she couldn’t have called anyone from the bar before I got there. She hadn’t even met me yet. Although …”

  “What is it?”

  “At the bar,” I said. “I remember having this funny feeling. Like we were being watched.”

  “Bruckman?”

  “No. I would have noticed him. But maybe somebody else was there. One of his hockey goons maybe.”

  “Well, let’s call in what we’ve got,” he said. “Whatever little that may be.”

  The brief window of sunlight had disappeared. The sky was clouding over again and it suddenly felt twenty degrees colder. From behind the cabin we could hear the whine of a snowmobile. It grew louder and louder as the machine came closer.

  “A snowmobile,” I said. “That’s how he could have gotten here.”

  “How do you know?”

  “There’s a trail that runs right behind these cabins,” I said. “On the state land. That’s why there were no tire tracks this morning.”

  “Makes sense,” he said. “Let’s see that trail.”

  I walked them around the cabin, deep into the pine trees. We had to work hard at it. In spots where the snow had drifted it was almost up to our waists.

  “Here,” I said, fighting to catch my breath. The trail ran parallel to my road. As long as he had a general idea where I lived, he could have done it this way. Maybe he didn’t even know which cabin she was in. Maybe he just skipped mine, started with hers, and got lucky.

  The deputies looked up and down the trail. “Lot of tracks out here,” the woman said. “We’d never know which one was his.”

  At that moment a snowmobile came through the trees. I winced at the noise. The driver slowed down when he saw us. Both of the deputies raised their hands for him to stop.

  “What’s the problem, guys?” he said after flipping his visor open. “I wasn’t going too fast, was I?” I recognized the man. He was staying in the farthest cabin with a few other guys from Saginaw.

  “Were you on this trail last night?” the male deputy asked him.

  “Yes,” the man said. I could hear the apprehension in his voice. “But I was taking it easy, I swear. I know there are cabins nearby.”

  “There’s no problem,” he said. “We’re just wondering if you saw any other snowmobiles. Like around …” He looked over at me.

  “Any time between, say, one A.M. and this morning,” I said.

  “We got back a little after one,” he said. “I don’t remember seeing any other machines on this trail. Besides the guys I’m with, I mean.”

  “We should probably talk to the rest of your party,” the deputy said. “Are they in the cabin right now?”

  “Most of them, probably,” the man said. “We’re supposed to be leaving today. Some of them might still be out on the trails.”

  We made our way back to the car, wading through the snow again. We spent the next hour going to each of the cabins, asking the renters if they had seen anything suspicious.

  Nothing. No leads, no information at all. I started to feel tired and hungry, sitting in the back of the car. And now that we had done everything we could possibly do, I could feel the despair gathering inside me. It was hopeless. Dorothy asked me to help her get away from him. And I let Bruckman or his buddies or whoever it was just come and take her away. They could be anywhere now. I knew the sheriff was looking for her, but what could he do? Find out where Bruckman’s living, go check it out. If he’s gone, then what? Put it on the wires. Keep working on it for a few days, then file it away.

  The deputies rode in silence down the access road from the farthest cabin, back to mine. I could have guessed what was in their minds. They weren’t talking about it, but they would be as soon as they got rid of me. Maybe she wasn’t abducted. Maybe her boyfriend talked his way into the cabin, made a scene, threw some furniture around, then got down on his knees and begged her to forgive him. He loves her so much it makes him crazy, but it’ll be different from now on, and all the usual crap a guy like that says. And then she leaves with him. It happens all the time.

  But I knew. I knew he took her against her will. And I knew it was my fault. I knew I’d lie awake all that night thinking about it.

  “We’ll let you know if we come up with anything, Mr. McKnight,” the young man said. He slowed down in front of my cabin.

  “Let’s take a ride down to the Glasgow Inn,” I said. “See if the bartender noticed anything last night. Or maybe somebody else did.”

  He nodded. “It’s worth a shot.”

  We went around the bend toward the main road. As we passed Vinnie’s place, I noticed that his car still wasn’t there. “Damn, that’s right,” I said. “I forgot about Vinnie.”

  “Is there a problem?” he said.

  “No, it’s just that my friend Vinnie hasn’t been home for a couple nights. He’s a member of the Bay Mills tribe, probably just spent the night there.”

  The other deputy looked out the passenger’s side window. “Vinnie,” she said. “Vinnie what?”

  “Vinnie LeBlanc,” I said.

  “Vinnie L
eBlanc,” she said. “That name rings a bell.”

  “There’s a lot of LeBlancs around here,” I said.

  “Yeah, I know, but I think I saw that name somewhere this morning.” She thought about it for a long moment, then picked up the radio. “I think I know where I saw it,” she said. She called in and asked for the front desk. When she had the man on the air she asked him if there happened to be a Vinnie LeBlanc on the premises.

  I heard the answer myself. But I couldn’t believe it. Vinnie was being held in the county jail on a 415, 148 and a 240.

  “Oh, is that the guy who—” the driver said.

  “Yeah, he’s the one,” she said as she put the receiver back. “I thought I recognized that name.”

  “What’s going on?” I said. “Those numbers, what are they again?”

  The deputies looked at each other again. That same look that had been driving me crazy. Now I didn’t care anymore.

  “I know I should remember,” I said. “It’s been a long time. Just tell me.”

  “A four-fifteen is drunk and disorderly,” she said. “A 148—”

  “Hold on,” I said. “That’s impossible. Vinnie doesn’t drink.”

  “A one-four-eight is resisting arrest,” she went on. “And a two-forty is assault, in this case assault against a police officer. Your friend the Indian who doesn’t drink put a Soo cop in the hospital.”

  I sat back in my seat. I didn’t know what to say. This whole day had become a nightmare.

  “Look at the bright side,” she said. “At least you know where he is now.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  I made the deputies turn around and take me back to my cabin, then jumped in the truck and gunned it for the Soo. I swore at myself all the way down M-28. Above me the clouds were growing darker, ready to dump more snow on the world. The wind rattling through the plastic in my passenger side window numbed the side of my face.

  And then, of course, I noticed that there was a single car behind me. A green sedan, two men in the front seat, following me all the way down M-28, through Strongs and Raco, all the way across Chippewa County to the Soo.

  This is great, I told myself. Now I notice when a car is following me. Of course, today it doesn’t mean quite so much. For one thing, this is the only highway that runs from east to west in the entire county. And once you start at one end, you’re not going to stop unless you really need to pick up some of that beef jerky at the Stop ’n Go. So yes, of course there’s going to be a car behind me all the way to the Soo. And besides, now that they’ve gone ahead and kidnapped Dorothy, there’s no more fucking reason for them to be following you.

  But apart from that, Alex, congratulations on your sudden powers of observation.

  I maintained this wonderful state of mind all the way into Sault Ste. Marie, crossing over the hydroelectric canal into what passes for downtown. The City-County Building is a giant gray shoebox, perhaps the ugliest building I have ever seen. Uglier than anything in Detroit, which may be the world capital of ugly buildings. It sits right behind the courthouse, which has just enough charm to make the City-County Building look like an architectural felony.

  The county sheriff’s office and Soo police department both share the building. As I pulled into the parking lot I saw the county cars lined up on one side and the Soo cars on the other. Next to the parking lot was an outdoor courtyard, no bigger than twelve feet square. There was a cage around the entire courtyard, making it look like a dog kennel, and then around the cage was another chain link fence with razor wire on top. A man sat on the one picnic table, the snow high enough to cover the seats. He was trying to light a cigarette, fighting a losing battle against the wind.

  I went in through the county entrance and right into the sheriff’s office. If there was a receptionist there trying to stop me, I didn’t even notice her.

  Bill Brandow was hanging up the phone when I opened his door. He looked up at me and then down at the pile of snow at my feet. “Look what you’re doing to the floor,” he said. “Didn’t your mother teach you to take your boots off?”

  “What’s going on, Bill?”

  “I guess she didn’t teach you to knock, either.”

  “When did you start hiring high schoolers?” I said. “And better yet, why did you send two of them together? Don’t you even give your rookies experienced partners?”

  “Jerry is older than he looks,” he said. “And Patricia could dump you on your ass with one hand.”

  “Jerry and Patricia,” I said. “I can’t believe what I’m hearing.”

  “Alex, you got anything else for me?” He stood up and came around his desk. “Or did you just come down here to rip my deputies?”

  I stood there. He looked back at me with cool, patient eyes. “Bill, she’s gone,” I finally said. “And it’s my fault.”

  “Sit down,” he said. When I didn’t, he pulled the chair around behind me. “Sit.”

  I finally did. He closed his office door and sat on his desk facing me. With the door closed I could hear the wind rattling his windows.

  “Her name is Dorothy Parrish. She’s a member of the Bay Mills tribe. The man you saw her with is named Lonnie Bruckman. Correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “She was at your guest cabin last night. This morning she was gone. The door was unlocked. There were no tire tracks, although she may have left on a snowmobile.”

  “May have been abducted on a snowmobile,” I said.

  “Abducted,” he said. “Fine. We’ll assume she was taken involuntarily.”

  “You don’t have to assume,” I said. “She was.”

  “Okay, Alex, I hear what you’re saying. Now it’s your turn to listen to me.” He looked down at me from his desk, one hand on his hip, the other held out to me as if to beg for my attention. “We’re looking for them. Both of them. Okay? You gotta trust me here. Just let us do our jobs.”

  “Where does he live?” I said.

  “No,” he said. He put his hand on my shoulder. I could feel the strength in his grip. “No way. You’re not gonna do that.”

  “Tell me where he lives,” I said. “He’s not in the phone book.”

  “I’ve got every deputy out there. The state police are watching the roads. I’ve even asked the Soo police to help us.”

  I let out a long breath. “The Soo police,” I said. “That’s the other thing. You’ve got a friend of mine upstairs.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “Vinnie LeBlanc. Your deputies said he assaulted a Soo officer.”

  “Yes, we have him.”

  “They also said he was drunk and disorderly,” I said. “Which is impossible. Vinnie never drinks.”

  “No, I think it was a simple four-fifteen. Public disturbance. I saw him when he came in last night. He didn’t look drunk to me.”

  “Then why did your deputies say he was drunk?”

  “They made a mistake,” he said. “They got the code mixed up.”

  “It’s because he’s an Indian,” I said. “If he got in trouble, he had to be drunk.”

  “For God’s sake, Alex. You want me to call them in here so you can give them this lecture? Because I really don’t need to hear it right now.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s just … goddamn it. Where is he, anyway? Can I see him?”

  “He’s still in one of the holding cells,” he said. “We’re a little tight on space upstairs. You know, if he calls the reservation, they’ll come get him. Don’t you think he’d rather stay in that jail instead?”

  “Somehow I don’t think so,” I said. “You’d have to know him.”

  “Well, he busted up an off-duty Soo cop pretty badly,” he said. “Broke his nose, gave him a concussion.”

  “How did it happen?”

  “I’m not sure. The Soo guys brought him in. All I know is, it had something to do with a hockey stick.”

  “Oh God,” I said. “Will you take me to him, please?”

  “It’s a Soo bust,”
he said. “You gotta go through them.”

  “It’s your jail, Bill. The last thing I want to do right now is go see Chief Maven.”

  For the first time since I got there, he smiled. “I don’t blame you,” he said. “All right, I’ll see if I can sneak you in there. If Maven finds out, though, he’s gonna be all over you.”

  “Let him try,” I said. “This day can’t get any worse.”

  There were four holding cells on the ground floor, simple cages with benches running along the sides, single toilets against the back wall. The county jail itself was upstairs. These cells were mainly for suspects awaiting arraignment, although today there were four or five men in each cell.

  “What the hell’s going on here?” I said.

  “I told ya,” he said. “We got a full jail upstairs. A lot of them are Soo busts, drugs coming over the bridge. We already called the state prison in Kincheloe. They’re gonna see if they can help us out temporarily.”

  “Where’s Vinnie?”

  “Last cell on the end,” he said. We walked down a narrow corridor that ran the length of the cells. Above us the fluorescent lights were humming and flickering. There was no other light, no awareness of the outside world. “I’d appreciate it if you could talk him into posting bail. I really don’t need him here, Alex.”

  “What bail? He’s already been arraigned?”

  “Ten thousand dollars,” he said.

  “Jesus, Bill.”

  “He put a cop in the hospital, Alex. A thousand-dollar bond is all he needs. You know that.”

  “Didn’t he call anybody?”

  “Nope. He’s just been sitting there since last night.”

  “You gotta be kidding me,” I said. When we came to the last holding cell I saw him sitting on one of the benches, staring at the floor. He didn’t look up.

  “Vinnie,” I said.

  He was silent. There were three other men in the cell, a couple longhairs sitting together on the other bench, trying hard not to look scared. A very large, very ugly man in fatigues standing against the back wall.