Silenced Girls

by Roger Stelljes

  “I kept trying,” Westlund replied, “repeatedly.” Then he gestured to Eddie. “I said don’t answer, don’t respond, don’t say a word, this is over, let’s go. I said all that repeatedly. I did that. Again, and again and again. But Eddie just kept talking and talking and talking.”

  “You what?” Warner exclaimed, looking over to Eddie angrily. “Will you ever fucking learn? How many times have I told you that when your lawyer tells you to shut up, you needed to shut the hell up?”

  “I didn’t do anything!” Eddie railed back. “Tori is standing there thundering away at me, accusing me of killing all of these women. Begging me to tell her where Jessie is buried. I don’t know what happened to Jessie Hunter.”

  “Clearly, she thinks you do,” Kyle asserted.

  “No! I don’t!” Eddie yelled back at Kyle and then looked to Warner. “And that’s what I told her. That’s all I told her. I didn’t admit jack shit.”

  “Other than having sex in the backseat of a dead woman’s car,” Kyle griped.

  “Move on, big brother.”

  Warner leaned back in his desk chair with his arms folded. “I’m a little surprised they didn’t arrest you. Shocked, really. But since they’re serving search warrants everywhere, I can only assume it’s only a matter of time.”

  “There is one thing,” Westlund said after a moment.

  “What’s that?” Kyle asked.

  “When we were leaving. When I finally had Eddie moving out of the room, he said something to the effect that he didn’t kill anyone. He said he didn’t kill Jessie Hunter and then, he kind of…took a shot at her, at Agent Hunter.”

  “I’m not following you, Ben,” Kyle asked, perplexed.

  “He said she abandoned everyone around here…what did she care what she did to Eddie, to you, to the town. I think that last part actually got to her a little bit.”

  “To who, Tori Hunter?” Kyle asked.

  “Yeah,” Westlund replied somberly, nodding. “She was all fire and brimstone and then at the end she couldn’t look Eddie in the eye.”

  “Huh,” Warner snorted, “maybe she had some doubts, then? Is that what you think, Ben?”

  “I don’t know,” Westlund replied tiredly, slumping back in his chair, exhausted from his unexpectedly intense day. He looked over to Eddie. “You and Agent Hunter were friends. That seemed to hit her when you said that.”

  “I wasn’t feeling a whole lot of warmth from her, I’ll tell ya,” Eddie bitched.

  “But Ben, you think she had some reservations?” Warner asked, turning his gaze from Kyle back to Westlund. “That could prove helpful in Eddie’s defense if we can get an admission of that uncertainty.”

  “I don’t know, Jeff. I don’t know if it was doubts, angst, betrayal, sadness, who knows. Maybe it was shock. Shock that twenty years ago her sister went missing and she thinks it was Eddie who did it.”

  “Would you quit fucking saying that?” Eddie demanded, screaming at Westlund. “Jesus Christ, Ben, I didn’t kill anyone!”

  “Well, they might not have arrested you just now, but you can bet it’s coming. And we’re dealing with search warrants, demands for company records, all kinds of issues,” Kyle replied.

  “Oh, you’re all heart, big brother,” Eddie snorted.

  “No, I’m not,” Kyle retorted. “I’m all about the business of protecting you and my business. Right now, you’re in deep shit again, little brother, and the company will follow. From now on, I’m making the calls here. And the first call is you’re going to go home, after the police have left, of course, and stay in the house and start shutting the hell up and listening to your lawyers.” He looked over to Warner. “Jeff, we need some options for his defense and we need them fast and I don’t want to go through your firm to handle this. I don’t want to mix this with business.”

  “No, I agree with you on that,” Warner affirmed. “We need to protect the company, too.”

  “Gee, thanks, Jeff,” Eddie bitched.

  “You aren’t the only one exposed here. I’ve got fifteen, sixteen years of my life invested in the company, so your cavalier behavior has my balls in a vise here too, so damn right I’m looking out for my backside.” He turned to Kyle. “The firm shouldn’t handle it, but I can certainly use my contacts within it to get the best around to handle the defense. And I’ll probably need to use the Mannion name to get interest from the right people.”

  “Do that,” Kyle replied. “But keep in mind, we need a defense lawyer that will play around here. I want someone that will make George Backstrom and Anne Wilson quake in their shoes. That is, if they are the ones to try the case.”

  “On it. I’ll start making some calls to Minneapolis and Chicago and get moving on this.”

  Kyle glanced over to Westlund. “Ben, no offense, but we’re going to get ourselves lawyers who specialize in this kind of case.”

  “No offense taken,” Westlund answered as he stood up from his chair. “And since I’m not going to be Eddie’s lawyer, the less I know at this point, the better.”

  “Agreed, come on. I’ll show you out,” Kyle said, putting his arm on Westlund’s shoulder as the two of them walked out of Warner’s office, past the reception desk, out the double doors and into the elevator lobby. “Now, send me a bill for your time today. Just send one for the whole day and I’ll take care of it. And if you get sucked into this thing further for some reason, bill your time and send me the bill.”

  “Sure thing,” Westlund answered.

  The two of them stood quietly waiting for the elevator.

  “Do you really think Tori Hunter has doubts?” Kyle asked.

  Westlund shrugged. “Maybe.” After a moment he turned to Kyle. “Look, I’m just a little country lawyer, so take this for what it’s worth.”

  “I need all the insight I can get at this point.”

  “That map, the newspaper clippings, the details on how those women were murdered or disappeared around the time of the restaurant openings and that Eddie was there every time.”

  “Every time?”

  “He was there every time, Kyle.” Westlund grimaced and slowly shook his head. “I don’t think a jury of his peers will believe it’s just a coincidence. The disappearances or murders were all tied to those openings and they had photos from newspapers with Eddie there cutting the ribbon, giving speeches. I mean, he was there and I’m sure that warrant they’re serving on your company will reveal records that verify all of that.

  “And then there’s the woman in Brookings. Eddie was with her, had sex with her two nights before her disappearance, and now she’s missing. Eddie admits to sex with Sarah Craig and now she’s dead. It’s…not good.”

  The elevator doors opened and Westlund stepped inside. Before the doors closed, he added, “Kyle, I’d be very worried about your brother if I were you.”

  Braddock and Tori drove to Eddie Mannion’s house. Steak was overseeing the search. “We’re going through room by room,” Steak reported. “The forensic team is hunting for fiber evidence, particularly for Sarah Craig, although I’m dubious.”

  “Why?” Tori asked.

  “Even he wouldn’t be that dumb to kill her here. And there isn’t much information in his home office relative to business records. I expect that he does most of that work at the company office. How’s that going?”

  “The BCA is there now, as is Cal,” Braddock answered. “The warrant was served. Kyle sent Warner over there. Warner read it and said they had to comply. The restaurant business is in its own building on that corporate campus. The BCA is inventorying the records and securing the computer system. I suspect there will be more to come on that.”

  “From Warner?”

  “Him and whoever they hire to represent Eddie. I’m sure Kyle will hire a high-powered, flesh-eating criminal lawyer,” Braddock replied. “And whoever that is will put Backstrom and Wilson through their paces.”

  “Kyle won’t hesitate to spend,” Steak nodded in agreement.


  “Right,” Will replied, “I don’t need to tell you that we…could use more evidence.”

  “Well, on that point,” Steak started and handed Braddock a folder. “That’s his first divorce file.”

  “And?” Tori asked.

  “There are pictures of his first ex-wife in there with a couple of black eyes and a swollen lip.”

  “Really?” Braddock flipped open the folder, thumbing through the pictures, shaking his head.

  “Turned out like Irv,” Steak noted angrily. “I remember his first wife. I remember them getting a divorce and her moving away,” Steak stated. “I don’t remember anything about this. Eddie kept it quiet.”

  “More likely Kyle,” Braddock muttered, closing the folder. “Good work.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” Steak replied with a drained sigh. “There are days this job sucks. I’ve known him since I was eight.”

  “Me too,” Tori said quietly.

  “It’s a kick in the balls, I know,” Braddock stated. “Keep searching,” he encouraged, handing the folder back, clasping Steak on the shoulder. “Do the job. Take your time. Be thorough.”

  “On it,” Steak answered, turning to head back inside the house.

  By mid-afternoon Tori and Braddock made their way over to the parking lot at Cuyuna Golf Club, the parking lot that Mannion claimed he and Sarah Craig drove to after leaving The Serpent Bar. There were perhaps twenty cars sprinkled around in the long narrow parking lot with people out on the golf links for the overcast and humid afternoon.

  Braddock inspected the lot, taking a long look and walk around the area where Eddie said they’d parked, which was in the northwest corner. The location was far away from the clubhouse and tucked back between the two course maintenance sheds.

  “If they parked here, nobody could see them from the highway, that’s for sure. Not that anyone would be looking at that time of night. For anyone else to have seen anything Eddie and Sarah Craig were doing, they’d have had to drive back here, don’t you think?” Braddock asked.

  When he didn’t hear a response from her, he turned around to see Tori at the far edge of the parking lot, staring off in the distance out over the lush deep green hues of the golf course. He slowly walked over to her. “Are you thinking you want to go out and play a quick nine?” he asked.

  “I’m sorry, what?” Tori replied, snapping out of her trance.

  Since they’d finished with Mannion she’d been quiet and distant, deep in thought and hardly speaking on the half-hour drive over from Manchester. “What’s on your mind?”

  Tori shrugged her shoulders. “I understand what Cal and Backstrom said. It’s hard to argue, but I can’t stop thinking about Eddie, about what he said.”

  “I see. Is it the ‘I didn’t do it’ part or the ‘what do you care what you do to us’ part?”

  “More the former than the latter. I mean, I keep running it around in my head. Why does he kill Sarah Craig? Why? Why here, and then leave the body in her car in Holmestrand? I think about it and it doesn’t make sense.”

  “Sometimes a murder doesn’t have to make sense.”

  “No, not for these killings, Will. Not for these. Twenty-five women and not a clue, a forensic speck, anything. And now he has sex with her in the backseat and leaves semen and DNA behind. Then he kills her, stuffs her in the trunk and then parks the car in a place for it to be found. Tell me you’re not asking yourself this question. I mean, at least a little, right? I go from he did it to he didn’t, to he did and then back again.”

  Braddock nodded. “I figured that was what was on your mind. But I think there’s another way to interpret this morning.”

  “Which is?”

  “Serial killers almost always get caught. BTK, the Boston Strangler, Son of Sam, the list goes on. Sooner or later, unless you’re the Zodiac, the police, the FBI, catch them because they make a mistake. In some cases, they get caught almost because they want to get caught, because they want to talk about it. Talk about the game, how they played it, how they were so good at it.”

  “You think Eddie wanted to get caught?”

  “I think there was some truth in what Cal and Backstrom said. About twisting the knife. He wanted you to catch him, so he could stab you with that knife.”

  “Me?”

  “Yeah, maybe you’re the why, Tori. Tori Hunter, the sister of his first victim. A renowned, brilliant, relentless FBI special agent obsessed by her career and her sister’s case. He sent you the article when he took Lash on the twentieth anniversary, to draw you here. And it worked. He takes Katy after you see her to torment you, to be able to show that he could torment you. And it worked. He set up Gunther Brule, supposedly his good friend, to have you get the wrong man—again to torment and maybe even embarrass you. That almost worked.”

  “What about the shots at me?”

  “Did he hit you? Or did he miss just scare the hell out of you?”

  “What about trying to blow you up?”

  “I got lucky, but how would you have felt had he succeeded?”

  “I don’t want to answer that,” Tori replied quietly, looking away. “I don’t even want to think about that.”

  “What impact has Katy’s disappearance had? Nothing but guilt, right?”

  Tori nodded lightly.

  “You know what I believe?”

  “What?” Tori asked, looking back to him.

  “The evidence.”

  Tori looked down, picking at the tar with her shoe, slowly nodding, understanding where Braddock was going, which was always to the basics.

  “Let me tell you something else. I’ve been trying to understand the psychology of this too, but I come at it from a different perspective.”

  “What’s that?”

  “I’ve observed Eddie Mannion from afar for five years. He’s a Mannion, a man about town. He seems like a good guy, but also kind of a wannabe if you ask me. I’m torturing The Godfather analogy a bit here, but to me he’s Fredo Corleone when you compare him to Kyle’s Michael. Kyle is the older brother. He took over the family business and becomes the mogul. He runs the family empire. He’s beloved locally, has a nice family, a pretty wife, a bunch of cute kids, is a generous giver to his community and church. He’s the All-American hero.”

  “And then there’s Eddie.”

  “Eddie is the antithesis of Kyle. Twice divorced, out partying and carousing all the time and generally comes off as irresponsible. Kyle props Eddie up. He sends him off to do the light lifting of opening new bars and restaurants and being the life of the party. That’s the public image and Eddie seems okay with it.”

  “But what if he’s not?” Tori asked.

  “Yeah, what if the arrangement where Kyle is the boss, the brains of the operation and gets all the glory and probably a lot more of the money, cuts at Eddie? Eddie thinks he’s smart. He wants respect. He doesn’t get it from his brother. He doesn’t get it from people around town who see him riding big brother’s coattails. Nobody understands he’s smart, that he’s…brilliant, really. He’s done this thing, killed these women without getting caught and nobody even knows it because he’s been so good at it.”

  “But to get the respect he wants, to have his brilliance acknowledged…”

  “He had to get caught,” Braddock finished. “If you don’t get caught, nobody will ever know it was you. And he had to get caught by the best. By you. It had to be in a confrontation with you. That’s what I see. And as he gets to demonstrate his brilliance to us, who does he get to hurt in the process?”

  “Kyle.”

  “Right. He’s going to make us work for it, no doubt. And we might have to prove it at a trial. I mean, what would be the ultimate for Eddie?”

  “To go to trial and…”

  “Walk. That would be the ultimate, to pull off the murders then skate away because we can’t prove it, because you can’t prove it. We need to keep grinding on this thing and lock it down, lock down the Sarah Craig case. We do that…”

&nb
sp; “The rest can fall.”

  “Yeah.”

  Tori looked away in the distance, thinking about what Braddock had to say. It made sense, especially if you believed the evidence.

  “I can’t walk in your shoes on this,” Braddock noted, reaching for Tori’s right hand, holding it lightly in his. “I know he was your friend and right now, you’re trying to figure out if you should feel betrayal or shame, right?”

  Tori nodded.

  “Trust the evidence.”

  Braddock’s phone rang. “Braddock.”

  “Will, it’s Corbin Hansen. Son, you better get up here. And you better bring Tori along.”

  Braddock sped north with his siren blaring as he approached Mannion’s hunting property, the anonymous entrance marked by a Cass County sheriff’s Explorer parked at the end of a dirt road. The deputy pulled forward and Braddock drove ahead, following the winding road to a grouping of three other Cass County vehicles parked at a small doublewide trailer.

  Sheriff Corbin Hansen was waiting for them.

  He had them get into his truck and he drove them along a different tight, winding road deep into thick woods, passing two deer stands mounted up high in the trees along the way. Hanson eventually turned right, along an even tighter path with the branches of trees brushing along both sides of the truck. As he slowly turned to the left, two of his men were visible ahead, standing next to an old aqua-colored Toyota Camry and a green tarp lying to the left side.

  “That, my friend, is Gail Anderson’s car,” Sheriff Hansen declared. “The car Katy Anderson took the night she went missing.”

  “And Katy?” Tori asked.

  Hansen exhaled a breath and then led them to the trunk of the car and opened it. Katy’s dead body was inside. “I’m sorry.”

  “Oh my God,” Tori croaked, her hand going to her mouth, Braddock wrapping her in his arms.

  “I’m sorry, Tori. I’m so sorry,” he whispered, holding her tightly. “I’m so, so sorry.”

  Gail Anderson was surrounded by friends when Tori and Braddock stepped inside the house. Gail took one look at Tori and knew.