The Last Friend

by Harvey Church

  Donovan watched him clear the table and run the dishes under the tap before slotting them under the counter, probably into a dishwasher that was concealed from view.

  If the big window’s blinds had been closed, Donovan wasn’t sure what he’d have done during the hour or so between those cigarette breaks on the front porch.

  Once Roger finished in the kitchen, he walked to the blinds and closed them.

  It was natural for Donovan to fear he’d been caught spying on the perverted man who lived in unit 360G. But he didn’t think that was the case.

  As it started to get really dark, Donovan noticed that none of the second-floor windows had closed blinds, but they also didn’t show any signs of life. So Donovan wondered if he might be able to see what Roger was up to if he took a walk and headed around to the back of the town house complex.

  Getting out of the Impala, Donovan stretched his arms and legs to loosen them up before shutting the door and thumbing the button on the fob that engaged the locks. It was a nicer neighborhood than his own, which both annoyed and unsettled him because it seemed unfair that a man like Roger should enjoy a better quality of middle-class life than an ex-professor whose daughter had been abducted and whose wife had killed herself.

  After crossing Central, Donovan slipped between the corner unit at 360E and the detached home next to it. He could tell from the beaten-down grass that pedestrian traffic traveled through this opening regularly, probably elementary school kids shortcutting it to class or to the playground.

  At the back corner of 360E, he stopped and surveyed the parking lot. There was a courtyard in the middle, a small space with one of those covered swings with benches facing one another. It clearly belonged to the town house complex, and he wondered whether the tenants used that swing or if neighborhood teens stopped in after their late parties to sober up or make out or do whatever else teens did these days.

  Stepping out from the corner, Donovan counted three units to the left, identifying Roger’s. At the back of each unit was a double-car garage; all were closed except for the second unit that faced Prairie. Inside that open garage bay was a Jaguar coupe.

  He walked to the swing set that seemed best suited to the gardens at a retirement home. With none of the other tenants waiting in line to have a turn, Donovan helped himself and sat down over a scratched-out inscription that read “OW2,” which he knew to mean OW + OW. Two lovers with the same initials.

  More importantly, he had a great view of Roger’s unit. He was able to see that one of the two back windows on the second floor was aglow from a light. It was a frosted window, which meant it belonged to a bathroom.

  When the bathroom light flickered off, the next window lit up. Donovan couldn’t see anything through the curtains, but he assumed Roger was getting ready for bed. And when the light in that window faded to black, Donovan decided it was time for him to head home, too. He rose to his feet, stretched again, and decided he would wait to hear from Agent Klein about the results of the DNA match before he confronted this chubby bachelor who seemed to live a richer life than any typical CTA employee could afford—unionized or not, this was clearly outside a man like Roger’s pay scale.

  Unless Roger wasn’t a CTA employee.

  As Donovan started back toward the path between the town houses and the neighboring single detached home, he heard the motorized chugging of a garage door opener. He counted the units from the right and confirmed the garage bay was the one at 360G. Roger’s garage.

  Inside was a Dodge Ram—Rodge Dam?—a large but relatively popular pickup truck. It was newer than his Impala; he could tell because the LED brake lights seemed crisper than his lights, and the paint seemed to have that new-vehicle shine. Sliding into the shadows of a tree, Donovan watched as Roger backed his Ram out of the garage. Once he was in the clear, the door started closing.

  “Dammit,” Donovan cursed under his breath as the adrenaline rushed back and launched him into a mad sprint. He passed through the dark, narrow path between the town house and the detached home, crossed Central to his car on the other side, and jumped inside. The intersection of Central and Prairie was visible, less than a couple dozen yards, but he needed to get there to see where Roger was headed.

  Luckily for Donovan, he reached the intersection in time to watch Roger’s Dodge Ram make a left onto Prairie. Donovan made a left as well and followed the Dodge at a safe distance. But because Prairie wasn’t a main road, it was difficult to go undetected. Still, Donovan followed, doing his best to keep a casual distance between them and not purposely rear-end him to instigate a confrontation.

  At Livingston, Prairie turned into a one-way street, and it wasn’t the way they were headed, so the Dodge made a left down a quiet, sketchier street. Donovan considered abandoning his pursuit at that point—it was just too obvious—but then he decided to take a calculated risk.

  Idling at the stop sign, Donovan watched the Dodge Ram stop at Green Bay and then make a right. Once the Ram was out of sight, he hit the gas and followed the same route as the pickup truck. And, on Green Bay, he was able to fall back into pursuit with three vehicles separating him from Roger.

  What struck Donovan as odd was that a few intersections later, they hit a red light and the Dodge eased into the left turning lane. The intersecting street was Central Street. Roger lived on Central Avenue. With two Centrals so close to one another, Donovan wondered if it was just a wild coincidence that Roger was making a left there.

  When the traffic light turned green, he made a left and followed the Dodge underneath the train tracks. The scenery changed almost immediately. With Northwestern University nearby, there was a lot more pedestrian activity on Central Street than even Central Avenue in the middle of the day.

  A couple of blocks later, just past the new large apartment building across from the Arts Center, the Dodge made a right onto a quiet side street. Donovan slowed down, creeping through the intersection as he stared out the passenger window and watched the Dodge slip into the building’s controlled-access covered parking facility.

  It wasn’t a coincidence, then.

  Once he lost sight of the pickup truck, Donovan drove to Ryan Field, turned around, and made another pass without any luck. The Dodge was locked up in the safety of the building’s parking garage.

  Donovan wondered if Roger had seen him, but even if that were the case, he couldn’t have accessed the parking facility without some kind of right to it. Maybe Roger knew somebody who lived there. Maybe he rented a unit there; it certainly seemed possible, given the confusion he could cause if he had multiple addresses with similar street names.

  As Donovan navigated back to the highway to get home, he tried to figure it out. None of what he came up with was compelling enough to make sense.

  Tomorrow, he would return for some answers.

  And a conversation with the man who had two addresses.

  CHAPTER 35

  Thursday morning, the knocking downstairs shattered any hope Donovan had of falling asleep. Snapping the sheets away, he stepped out of bed and hurried downstairs. He expected to find Monica in the peephole’s fish-eye view, so when he saw Agent Klein, he was a little surprised.

  The federal agent was smoking a cigarette, which struck Donovan as odd because Klein knew that he couldn’t smoke inside the house. Normally, he flung his cigarettes into the gutter before starting up the walkway; if he waited in the backyard, like last time, he’d have finished before climbing the deck.

  When Donovan opened the front door, Klein stepped back. “What the hell happened to your face?”

  Lifting a hand to his tender eyes, Donovan shrugged. “Fell down the stairs.”

  Klein laughed hysterically before shaking his head. “Come on, you can tell me all about it on the drive.” His voice was coarse, probably from the smoking.

  “Where are we going?” Donovan tried to sound casual, undisturbed, but his voice came out as high-pitched, anxious.

  Klein was one step off the porch when he
glanced back, studying Donovan in his pajamas. “You were right about your girl.”

  “So she was kidnapped.” Then…what? Once she escaped, Monica had clearly used a fake name, which meant Klein knew that already, and maybe even knew her ral name. “Did she tell you how she escaped?”

  Angling his head to the side, Klein scrutinized him a little harder. His face looked as soft as it ever had, softer even than the night Donovan had found Amelia in the tub. “No. I’m sorry. The DNA match came back positive, Donovan.”

  Swallowing the lump in his throat—Donovan thought they’d been talking about Monica—he reached into his pajama pants pocket. Hearing that the remains belonged to Elizabeth crushed him, but it also offered him something of a confirmation that what he planned to do to Roger was indeed justifiable. Still, the reality that his daughter was never coming home sunk him as he reached for a cell phone that wasn’t there.

  “I’m sorry about the DNA,” Klein said. “It’s not the outcome I was expecting, or hoping for.”

  He returned Klein’s narrowed stare, focusing hard on maintaining his composure. But he and Klein weren’t cut from the same cloth. Klein was 100 percent leather; Donovan considered himself denim but was actually more like cotton. “It’s fine. And the email I sent yesterday. About the girl I told you about . . .”

  “She’s the one who brought you to the bones, right?”

  He nodded. “She could tell you . . .” He considered telling Klein about Roger, the alleged abductor. But then he remembered why Monica hadn’t gone to the authorities in the first place—that information was more valuable to Donovan than the authorities. He’d keep that nugget to himself, at least for now.

  Agent Klein sucked back on his cigarette and climbed back onto the porch. “Go ahead, Donovan, tell me what’s on your mind.”

  Shaking his head, he forced a smile and wondered what it looked like to Klein—a smirk? “The girl I emailed you about—”

  “The one with the purple hair that you left at Barney’s?”

  “Yes, she can tell you all about her experience with my daughter.” He gave an affirmative nod. “The fact that your DNA test on my daughter’s remains says they’re hers—”

  “There’s actually a one point five percent margin of error.”

  Donovan pointed out, “Ninety-eight point five percent likelihood seems compelling enough for you to be standing on my front porch.”

  “It is,” Klein said, staring down the length of the porch. He was thinking about something, the way his eyes narrowed. “Go get yourself changed into something more appropriate. You’re taking me to these bones.”

  What? Donovan had other plans for his day. He’d hoped to do a better job of stalking Roger, following him to work from whichever Central Avenue or Street property where he’d happened to spend the night. He’d thought about it all night while staring at the ceiling.

  He’d also worried about Monica, curious about which of the two men would reach her first—Agent Klein or Leo Fletcher. It looked like it wasn’t Klein.

  “Monica Russell could’ve shown you the site. And she could’ve told you so much more.” Donovan shook his head; he’d been cheering for Klein to get to her first, mostly on account of what Leo might do to her now that he had firsthand experience of what the lion-tattooed man was capable of. Plus, if Klein had taken her in for questioning, maybe she could have helped with another type of lead, namely one that could identify where any other young girls were being held captive. That information was useless to Leo Fletcher.

  Agent Klein shrugged. “I was too busy to chase it down, Donny. And now that I’m here, and you’re here, and you’re going to take me to the grave anyway, it doesn’t matter. So go get dressed because I don’t have all day.” He hitched a thumb over his shoulder toward the black Ford Taurus parked on the street. “I’ll be waiting in the car.”

  * * *

  Once Donovan settled in the passenger seat, he told Klein to drive out to Twilight Creek. The way Klein glanced at him, Donovan wasn’t sure if he was surprised in a good way or a bad way. Yes, Wisconsin. Yes, it was one heck of a commute, but it would all make sense once they arrived.

  Before they reached the Chicago city limits, Klein had already opened his window and lit up a cigarette. Donovan opened his window, too, because the smoke was bothering him, and all Klein’s open window achieved was to ensure the smoke circulated in the cabin instead of through it.

  Half an hour later, with traffic lighter and Klein finishing his second cigarette, the federal agent closed the windows, hit the AC, and broke the silence.

  “The girl,” he said. “Is she the reason for all of this?”

  He wasn’t sure what “all of this” meant. “My face?”

  “And the other ten thousand you withdrew this week.” With his hand hanging lazily over the edge of the steering wheel, Klein glanced over. “You don’t seriously think I wouldn’t have heard about that, do you?”

  “The money was returned. All of it. But to answer your question, it’s all been because of her. That’s why I sent the email. I figured if she can do more in the two weeks or so that I’ve known her than what the FBI can do in fifteen years, she’s probably someone you should have a conversation with.”

  Donovan watched Klein’s face flush red. If he was angry, the red cheeks were the only indication, because the rest of his body looked like it normally did. “How’d you meet this purple-haired girl, Donny?”

  Frowning, Donovan swore he’d already told Klein about her, the mysterious and unexpected knock on his door. “Told you. She was kidnapped with my daughter. And you told me there was no record of her ever being kidnapped.”

  Klein raised an eyebrow. “I don’t recall that conversation.”

  He started to explain that they’d been out for coffee when Klein had shown him his phone and the search results that said Monica Russell wasn’t in their database. But then he realized that the database in question was Google, and the conversation had been with Eric. Confused from his lack of sleep, Donovan rubbed his eyes and stared out the passenger window.

  “Are you okay, Donny?”

  Nodding, he kept staring out the windshield. He told Klein about Monica knocking on the door.

  “Yeah, yeah, I remember that part. And I’m surprised she returned that money.” Klein glanced over again, his eyes wide with warning. “That’s not how these things usually end up, I’ll tell you that. And she’s the one who brought you to the grave, huh?”

  Before Donovan could comment, Klein was opening his window and using a butane lighter to get his next cigarette lit. Donovan opened his window, and they drove with the wind in their hair for a few miles while the traffic got thinner and thinner. Once he finished and the windows were shut, he stepped right back into the conversation without missing a beat.

  “Any idea why she needed the money in the first place?”

  “None.”

  “Uh-huh.” And then silence. “You sure you got all that money back?”

  “I counted it.”

  “Uh-huh.” More silence. “And if she knows where your missing daughter’s remains are, what does that tell you about her character, who she really is?”

  Not happy with the insinuation, Donovan snapped his attention to Klein. “For starters, it tells me she’s not only a tough survivor, but she’s smarter than the team of monkeys working in the Chicago field office.” Donovan prayed she was tough enough to survive Leo’s wrath.

  Klein grinned. After a second, he let out a quiet chuckle. “Touché, Donny. Touché. But here’s the way I see things. Girls like Elizabeth, the ones that never come back? They don’t escape. And if they do, they don’t get far.” He cleared his throat, loosening up some phlegm or nicotine mucus. Opening his window, he spat it out onto the interstate.

  “This girl is different,” Donovan said, looking away with a wince. “Calculating. I’d say she’s methodical, adaptable. I’d go so far as to say she’s violent, too.”

  “Violent enough
to commit murder?”

  Still staring out the passenger window, Donovan wondered how much Klein knew but wasn’t sharing. Had the body of her Detroit Roger, one Gerald Tepperman of 132 Oneida Way, Saginaw, Michigan, caught the FBI’s attention already? Or was Klein just sniffing for clues?

  “Donny? What do you make of this girl of yours? Would she murder her abductor? And if so, why hasn’t she already?”

  It was a good question. “With all due respect, you could’ve asked her yourself.”

  Klein shook his head. “I’m asking you. I’m curious what you think about this calculating, methodical, and adaptive woman, who seemingly showed up out of nowhere, knocked on your door, and brought you to your daughter’s remains, something the FBI hasn’t been able to do for you in fifteen years.”

  That was the better question. “She’s a good person, Mike. If she did bad things to the man who hurt her, I’d say she was justified.”

  “And if she hasn’t done ‘bad things’ to the pedophile who abducted her?” He wasn’t letting go, was he? Almost like he knew she’d brought him to Roger’s town house and had barely managed to drag herself out of his car.

  “I’d think it’s normal. Stockholm syndrome—isn’t that what your criminologists call it?—or just plain, absolute terror, the kind that immobilizes you.”

  Klein grunted.

  “So she’s probably still afraid of him.” Donovan stared out the window. Along with the thinning traffic, everything else seemed to become scarce. Fewer houses, fewer commercial buildings at the side of the interstate. “But she’ll get there. She’ll build up her strength. And that rage, it’ll brew.” When he glanced over at Klein, Donovan saw that the federal agent was still letting his hand dangle over the top part of the steering wheel, acting relaxed, but the wheels were turning inside his head if the clenching jaw muscles were any indication. “She’ll become unstoppable, if she isn’t already, and that’s something no agency like yours could ever hope to be.”