The Girl on the Bridge

by James Hayman

  “Not at first. He came into the bar late. Nine-thirty or so. Sat over there.” She pointed at a stool around a corner at the far end of the bar. “Ordered a vodka martini and we started talking. Is he a criminal or something?”

  “Nothing like that,” said McCabe. “What were you talking about?”

  Andie shrugged. “Just stuff. He asked my name. Said he was here on business and asked me a bunch of questions. Like did I work here full-time or did I also do something else. I told him I’m studying nursing at USM but needed bartending money to help pay the bills. After we got past the preliminaries, he started hitting on me.”

  “Oh yeah? Hitting like how?”

  Andie shrugged. “Nothing nasty. He just asked me what time I finished up and would I like to go over to the Regency and have a drink with him there. Said their bar closed later than we do, which I know is true because I used to work there.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  Andie gave a sheepish smile. “Honestly, I was thinking about it. I don’t have a boyfriend at the moment and this guy was definitely good-looking.”

  “Did you notice if he was wearing a wedding ring?”

  “Yeah, I noticed. He wasn’t.”

  “Okay. So what happened?”

  “Nothing. Before I even had a chance to say yes or no, he dumped me for another woman.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, really. Like, ten minutes after we started talking this good-looking blonde walks in, dressed in big bucks . . .”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Louboutin shoes for one thing. The ones with the red soles. They go for a thousand dollars a pop and I don’t think they have an outlet store in Freeport. Fancy gold watch too.”

  “Keep going.”

  “She sits at the bar a few seats down from Thorne. Orders a vodka martini made with this expensive but kind of obscure vodka called Double Cross. If she was trying to catch his interest, it worked. While I’m making the martini for her, the two of them start talking and after about a minute he slides down and sits next to her and calls me over and says, ‘I’ll have what she’s having.’”

  “You mean like the line from the movie?” asked McCabe.

  “Yeah. Except the funny thing was he’d never heard of it.”

  “Sounds like you could hear everything they were saying.”

  “I could. The place was dead quiet. Only other customers were a young couple sitting where we’re sitting now and they left a couple of minutes after the woman came in. Anyway, after he moves in next to her, I was kind of curious if he’d have the nerve to ask her if she wanted to go to the Regency.”

  “And did he?”

  “He sure did. I mean, like right in front of me. Hands her exactly the same—excuse my language—bullshit he was handing me.”

  “Did she tell him her name?”

  “Not her last name.”

  “How about her first.”

  “Yeah. She said it was Norah.”

  Chapter 13

  MAGGIE TAPPED HER computer to life and entered a Google search using the words “Charles Loughlin,” “Insurance,” “Holden College” and “Connecticut.” A couple of hundred hits popped up but the first one looked the most promising: a website for Northway Insurance/Loughlin Agency located at 921 Farmington Avenue in West Hartford.

  Maggie clicked on a sublink titled Meet Our People. At the top of the new page was a head shot of an ordinary-looking guy wearing a dark suit, checked shirt and a red tie. He was gazing at the camera with what could only be described as a forced half smile. Probably didn’t like having his picture taken. He looked to be about the same age as Josh Thorne. His sandy hair was brushed forward in an unsuccessful attempt to cover a receding hairline. Light blue eyes peered out from behind a pair of rimless glasses. He didn’t look much like an ex–football player, but she supposed Division III football players probably didn’t look much bigger or tougher than anyone else. On the other hand maybe Loughlin was bigger in person than he looked in the bio pic.

  He didn’t look much like a rapist either, but that didn’t mean anything. Maggie knew from experience rapists came in all shapes, sizes and temperaments from bulldozers to choirboys. Or, for that matter, priests. The picture was captioned Charles Loughlin, CEO. Beneath that were office and cell numbers along with Loughlin’s business e-mail address. His bio followed.

  Charles Loughlin is President, Chief Executive Officer and Senior Partner of the Northway Insurance/Loughlin Agency. In addition to sales, Charlie’s responsibilities include agency oversight and strategic management, information technology oversight and financial forecasting.

  He began his career in 2002 as a Commercial and Personal Lines producer for the Northway/Peterson Agency. In 2006 he became Agency Manager and Lead Commercial Lines Producer for Northway/Peterson, the largest agency in the Northway Insurance group. He also holds the Certified Insurance Counselor Designation. He was named CEO in 2009.

  Charlie earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Business from Holden College in 2002 where he was also a standout wide receiver on Holden’s football team.

  Charlie serves as President of the Rotary Club of West Hartford and the United Way of Hartford County. Charlie and his wife, Heather, are the parents of two handsome sons, Josh and Cameron. Charlie and his family enjoy hiking, mountain biking and skiing.

  All in all a portrait of the ideal family man. Maggie wondered if son Josh had been named after Joshua Thorne. She also wondered if Charlie’s wife had any inkling her standout wide receiver husband also stood out as an accused rapist. Be interesting to find out what, if anything, he’d told her about that. Maggie decided to try the office number first. At four-thirty on a Wednesday afternoon that seemed where he’d likely be.

  “Northway Insurance. This is Anne Bailey. How can I help you?”

  “I’d like to speak to Charles Loughlin, please.”

  There was a brief silence on the other end before Ms. Bailey responded. “I’m afraid that won’t be possible. May I ask who’s calling?”

  “Can you tell me where I can reach Mr. Loughlin?”

  There was an audible sigh on the other end. “I guess you haven’t heard the news. You can’t reach him.”

  “Why not?” Maggie had a feeling she already knew the answer.

  “We sent out notices to all of Charlie’s clients. I guess you didn’t get one.”

  “Has he left his job?”

  “In a manner of speaking, yes. Mr. Loughlin is dead. He died last week in a terrible accident. We’re all still in a state of shock.”

  “You say this happened last week?”

  “Yes. On Monday. About ten in the evening. While he was on his way home from a dinner meeting. Would you like to speak to . . .”

  Maggie didn’t wait for the woman to finish. She broke the connection, turned to her computer and found the website for the West Hartford Police Department. Clicked on the Detective Division. Thumbprint-sized photos and direct numbers were provided for each of the dozen detectives in the department. Changing over to her landline so caller ID would identify the call as coming from the Portland PD, Maggie tapped in the number for a Detective Antoinette Bernstein, one of the three women listed and the one who looked more experienced than the other two. Maggie usually found female detectives more willing to help their female counterparts than a lot of the guys. Especially in cases involving rape.

  A woman with a husky smoker’s voice answered. “Bernstein.”

  Maggie kicked off her shoes and leaned back.

  “Detective Bernstein, this is Detective Margaret Savage of the Portland Maine Police Department.”

  “Okay. How can I help you?”

  “We’re investigating the disappearance and possible murder of a man named Joshua Thorne.”

  “By possible murder do you mean the death might have been an accident?”

  “No. What I mean is the guy’s missing. We haven’t found a body yet, but I’ve got a strong feeling it won’t b
e long.”

  “What do you need from me?”

  “During the course of our investigation the name Charles Loughlin came up.”

  “The same Charlie Loughlin who just happened to end up dead here last week?”

  “One and the same.”

  A few seconds passed before Bernstein asked, “Are we talking coincidence or connection?”

  “Connection. Loughlin was an old friend and fraternity brother of the guy who’s gone missing here.”

  “Now I’m interested. How did you know the Loughlin case was assigned to me?”

  “I didn’t. I picked your name from the list on your department’s website.”

  “Well, you picked the right name. I’m the one looking into Loughlin’s death.”

  “Can I ask you a few questions?”

  “Long as I can ask you some.”

  “Fair enough. The woman who answered the phone at Loughlin’s office said he died in what she called a terrible accident.”

  “Well, so far that’s the party line. The one his family and colleagues are handing out as well.”

  “Any reason to think Loughlin’s death might have been anything else?”

  “There is. The ‘anything else’ possibly but probably not being suicide, or maybe, just maybe, murder. At the moment my boss and I are the only ones who think murder’s the most likely. I’d like to pursue it but the chief keeps telling us not to start down that road without a damned good reason, aka hard evidence. Which means, of course, he’d let us go after it if that hard evidence happened to fall in my lap from an unexpected source in, oh, for argument’s sake, let’s say Portland, Maine.”

  Maggie smiled and decided she liked Bernstein. “Okay,” she asked, “what makes you think Loughlin’s death might not be the accident everybody else is saying it is?”

  “Well, for starters, if it was an accident it was a damned peculiar one. The guy pulls his car off an empty road he had no reason being on onto a scenic overlook at the top of a sixty-foot drop-off with nothing but rock face below. It was a little before twelve o’clock at night.”

  “A little dark to be admiring the scenery.”

  “Especially on a freezing cold, overcast night. Temps down in the teens. Anyway, Charlie gets out of the car, walks to the edge and then either falls, jumps or maybe gets pushed over the edge.”

  “No guardrail?”

  “An average-sized one . . . thirty-four inches. More than high enough to keep him from falling over it accidentally.”

  “Could he have tripped over it in the dark?”

  “Possible since he was drunk as a skunk at the time, but given the height of the rail I have a hard time buying it. However it happened, his body was found the next morning at the bottom of the ravine. The fall fractured his skull and severed his spine. According to the ME he died immediately.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Yeah. Like I said he was drunk. An empty bottle of Maker’s Mark bourbon with Charlie’s fingerprints all over it and his saliva on the rim was found in his car. He had a blood alcohol level of .22, which, in a hundred and eighty pound male, suggests he’d knocked back pretty much the whole bottle. I’m surprised Charlie could even walk when he went over the side.”

  “So he had to be drinking the bourbon as he was driving.”

  “Or after pulling off the road to admire the view. His wife denies it, but his friends and clients tell us our boy liked his booze. The general opinion is that the fact that he was drunk explains his tumbling over the guardrail.”

  “Do they have any explanations about what he was doing at the overlook in the first place?”

  “Their most popular explanation is that he pulled over and got out of the car to take a leak. Thought it might be fun to piss over the side but being drunk he wasn’t too steady on his pins. He supposedly slipped on some ice and went over while peeing. His fly was open with his pecker hanging out when they found the body. That’s the accident theory. The one the DA’s subscribing to as well. At least until we can prove otherwise.”

  “What about the suicide theory?”

  “That one goes he drank the booze to give himself the courage to take the leap.”

  “Can anyone think of any reason he might want to kill himself?”

  “Nope. And that’s a problem. The question that comes up whenever anyone mentions the word suicide is motive. What would make a guy like Charlie Loughlin kill himself? People who knew him insisted he was a happy guy. Pretty wife. A couple of good-looking kids. A fancy house. A successful business. Living the American dream.”

  “Except for the fact he was a drunk?”

  “Yeah. Except for that. And the fact that a couple of people who used to work for him told me that underneath Loughlin’s smiley-face salesman’s persona, the guy was a selfish, demanding prick. The kind of sweetheart who chose Christmas Eve to fire two of his salespeople who weren’t producing the way he wanted them to. One who had a wife dying of metastatic breast cancer and probably wasn’t producing because he was spending too much time taking care of her and their kids. Apparently stuff like that didn’t count with Charlie. Bastard couldn’t even wait till the wife died, which she did the second week in January, before dumping the guy. But hey, nobody’s perfect.”

  “Not exactly the kind of tormented soul you’d figure who’d off himself.”

  “Not to me. Which is one of the reasons I think murder is the most likely possibility.”

  “Does the fired husband have an alibi?”

  “Yeah. He was home with his sick wife.”

  “Alone?”

  “No. There was a hospice nurse there and three of the wife’s good friends dropped by at different times during the evening to visit. They all vouch for him.”

  Maggie thought about that. Loughlin definitely didn’t sound like the type to jump off a cliff out of remorse because a woman he raped twelve years earlier in college had herself recently committed suicide. Just wouldn’t happen. More importantly, given the coincidental timing of their deaths, the idea that both Loughlin and Thorne were killed, one after the other, as payback for the twelve-year-old rape and subsequent suicide was beginning to seem a whole lot more likely.

  “Hey, Savage, you still there?”

  “Yeah, I’m here. I’m just trying to wrap my head around all this.”

  Bernstein went on. “My personal theory is that somebody who had a bone to pick with Charlie forced him, maybe at gunpoint, to drive to the overlook, guzzle the booze and walk to the edge. That’s when they gave him a shove.”

  “But you say your department isn’t buying that?”

  “My department’s buying it. My boss is buying it. The chief is buying it. But so far the DA isn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Just looking out for himself. He’s a young guy with major political ambitions. The rumor goes he’s planning on running for attorney general in November and the last thing he wants or needs is an unsolved murder of a successful businessman he doesn’t think we’re likely to clear before the voters go to the polls. He’s not willing to call it murder unless and until I find something or somebody that provides the kind of incontrovertible proof that’ll lead both to a quick arrest and the kind of slam-dunk conviction that’ll make him look good to the voters come election day. Like I said, I’m kinda hoping you might be the somebody with the proof.”

  “Well, to tell you the truth, I just might be,” said Maggie.

  “Okay. I think it’s my turn with the questions. Why don’t you start by telling me why you think Loughlin’s death could be connected with your missing person?”

  “A couple of months back, right after the holidays, Loughlin called our guy, who happens to be an old teammate and fraternity brother of his . . .” Maggie went on and told Toni Bernstein everything Rachel Thorne had said about her husband’s disappearance and Josh and Charlie Loughlin’s involvement in the Holden College rape. She also told her about the Christmas Eve suicide of the woman who had been raped. H
ow she suspected the suicide might have been the trigger that led to the disappearance and possible murders of Loughlin and Thorne.

  “The motive being revenge for the rape?” Bernstein asked when Maggie had finished.

  “Yes. And also for the suicide. Possible suspects might include the dead woman’s husband or lover if she had one. Her parents. Possibly her siblings or close friends. Anyone who might have been brooding about the rape and/or the suicide and looking for payback.”

  “The frat boys waited their turn and climbed aboard, huh?”

  “That’s how Thorne described it to his wife.”

  “And a good time was had by all.”

  “I guess. Except for the victim.”

  “Funny. Even mean as he was, I wouldn’t have guessed Charlie would’ve been involved in something as ugly as that.”

  “Well, maybe he wouldn’t have without Thorne’s encouragement. When they played football together Josh was the quarterback.”

  “And the quarterback calls the plays? Still it all happened quite a while ago.”

  “Twelve years. But it’s only been about three months since the rape victim killed herself. This is all pure conjecture on my part but what seems likely to me is that PTSD resulting from a vicious gang rape, even that long after the event, could have been haunting her ever since and ended up triggering her death. At least, I want to look into that possibility. Talk to her shrink if she had one. Her family. People she worked with.”

  “Seems like a long time after the event for her to have had that kind of reaction?”

  “It happens. Just look at the suicide statistics among vets suffering PTSD years after leaving the combat zone. Nearly happened to my own kid brother a couple of years after he got back from Iraq. Rape could easily lead to the same ending. Suicide among rape survivors is not uncommon.”

  “I guess. How come Loughlin, Thorne and the others were never prosecuted?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve got to talk to the people at the college about that. What Thorne told his wife after she bullied him into talking about it was that he and Loughlin and four other guys, currently nameless, did have sex with the girl. But he insisted that the girl was drunk and the sex was consensual.”