by Matt Goldman
“I believe I do.”
“He’s headed back to LA today. He doesn’t know anything about Maggie. All he knows is I’m in medical school. He brought divorce papers. I signed them. He and that creepy private detective are out of my life forever.”
I transitioned off 35W and onto 62 West, where we drove straight at the wall of gray in the sky. “Looks like we’re getting more snow,” I said.
“Nice night for a fire.”
“Wish I could. I have plans.”
There was a long silence filled only by the buzzing of my snow tires on the clean highway.
“What’s her name?” said Ansley.
“Andrew Fine.”
“Maggie’s boyfriend?”
“Yes. He invited me to a party. I accepted for obvious reasons.”
“It’s not so obvious to me. Do you mean because you’re investigating Maggie’s murder and he’s a suspect?”
“Yes. That’s exactly what I mean.”
We cloverleafed onto Highway 100 South and I stayed in the right lane to exit on 70th.
“And you can’t bring a date to this party?” she said.
“It’s not a good idea.”
“Because whoever you’re working for will get mad at you for mixing business with pleasure?”
“Whoever I’m working for fired me.” The moment it came out of my mouth, I regretted saying it. But it was out, and I had to deal with it.
Ansley adjusted her seat belt and turned sideways in her seat, drew her knees up, and faced me. “But you’re still going to the party.”
“I’m still on the case.”
“Working for?”
“I’m just on it.”
“Then let me hire you.”
“It’s too late for that.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m in too deep now. There are things I can’t tell you. Not because it’s you. But because other law-enforcement agencies are involved.”
She said nothing for a while. I exited on 70th and turned left under the highway.
“I know what’s going on,” she said.
I said nothing and turned left onto the drive of Christ Presbyterian. The church is made of red brick with white columns. A steeple towers above it, and dormers cut the roofline. Arched stained glass windows line the sanctuary. The place looks like it belongs more in Colonial Williamsburg than in Minnesota.
“You’re not going to tell me but I know,” she said.
“You couldn’t possibly know. Again. Nothing personal.”
“So you say. We’ll see.”
I parked the Volvo toward the back of the lot so I could scan the cars for Andrew Fine’s Porsche while walking to the building. You’d think a big white Porsche would be easy to find, but the lot was crowded with Range Rovers and Escalades and Lincoln Navigators. Some believers burn incense as part of their ritual devoting themselves to God. The members of Christ Presbyterian burn fossil fuels.
We got out of the car and, when we met in front of it, Ansley towered six inches above me. I said, “The underside of your chin is beautiful.”
“Shut up,” she said. We started walking. “You’re not balding. That’s good.”
“You’re so shallow.”
“You started it.” We walked a few more steps, then she said, “So are you here for me or are you working?”
“To be honest, a bit of both.”
“Thank you for your honesty.” I squeezed her hand. She squeezed mine.
“Did you know Maggie went to this church?”
“She never talked about it.”
“I don’t get the sense she was conservative.”
“She wasn’t.”
“Status-minded?”
“A little, yeah. She joined the Edina Country Club.”
“Did she ever invite you for lunch there? Maybe a dip in the pool?”
Ansley looked down at the asphalt parking lot and said, “No. She didn’t.”
I spotted Fine’s Porsche between a Chevy Suburban and Mercedes G550. “Ansley, listen. If I have to leave the funeral, I’ll cover the cost of your Uber.”
“What are you talking about? Why would you have to leave?”
“It’s a possibility. Just in case, okay?”
She looked at me from somewhere far away, and I placed my hand on the small of her back. We entered the church, and I helped Ansley with her coat and hung it on a hanger. The rack was full—I had to pry a space open to hang it up. We looked into the sanctuary. It was crowded like Easter morning.
“Wow,” said Ansley.
“You okay sitting in the balcony?”
“I guess.”
“Good. It’s where they make the Jews and blacks sit anyway.”
She swatted the side of my head and we headed for the staircase.
24
The sanctuary of Christ Presbyterian Church has white walls and red floors made either of carpet or stained cherry, depending on the area. A couple thousand people were in attendance, maybe a few hundred legit mourners and the rest rubberneckers or press. Ansley and I sat in the first row of the balcony, which was sparsely populated, nearly all of the funeral-goers wanting to be on the same level as the casketed body of the woman whose picture they saw on the local news.
Ansley looked down at her grandparents and uncles and aunts and siblings. She pulled a tissue from her purse and wiped her eyes. “I should be down there with them. They should know me.”
“You should be with them, and they should know you. Do you want that to happen today?”
She shook her head. “Not today,” she said, “but soon. Very soon.”
The service began. While Ansley mourned the death of her mother and best friend, I identified heads below. Robert Somerville and his two children sat in the front row with four septuagenarians, most likely Robert and Maggie’s parents. Younger adults sat in the same group, probably Maggie and Robert’s siblings. Chief McGinnis was there, sans scarf, with a woman I assumed to be his wife and, most likely, the scarf giver. Beth Lindquist sat toward the front, head tilted down. Her husband, Perry, had his arm around her and held her tight. I saw him turn his head to whisper something in her ear—his face was red—he wiped away a tear on her shoulder. I doubted he cried for Maggie but rather for his wife’s pain in losing her friend. There was a man who’d found the love of his life.
Ellegaard sat with a few other detectives, representing the Edina police department and, if they were doing their jobs, keeping their eyes open.
When you’re five foot nine on a good day, it’s almost impossible to accumulate the ten thousand hours necessary to become an expert at identifying people by the tops of their heads. So when I saw a head of dark curls, a dozen rows back from the front, I couldn’t place it. I knew it. I just couldn’t recall from where. I shut my eyes and tried to see that head in other places, but nothing came. I waited for the man to turn around and show his face, but the head didn’t turn. I moved on, hoping the face would come to me. I knew it would. Maybe not during the funeral or even that day, but the next day or the day after that, the way a forgotten song name comes a day or so after I hear it, when I’m showering or shoveling the driveway or in half-sleep.
I scanned the pews for blond heads and spotted Andrew Fine toward the front, but on the very end of a side section. He was effectively sitting in the wings, next to the choir, and watching the funeral in profile. He appeared to have come alone. He wore a black suit and black tie with a white shirt and his hair seemed more orderly than usual.
The pastor spoke in platitudes. Hymns were sung. We stood and sat. Stood and sat. Then Maggie’s eleven-year-old daughter went up on the dais and read a poem about her mother. The weeping in the pews made it difficult to hear the girl’s small voice. Ansley dug another clump of tissue from her purse. I put an arm around her and held her and then, in my periphery, saw someone get up and walk toward the exit.
It was Andrew Fine.
I reached into my jacket pocket, grabbed a couple o
f twenty-dollar bills, and put them in Ansley’s purse. She looked at me. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’ll call you.” She was too bereft for my departure to sting. Keeping her relationship with Maggie a secret had isolated her, and my leaving left her in a place she knew too well.
I got up, exited the balcony, and descended the stairs. When I neared the lobby, I stopped on the staircase. If Andrew Fine had hung up a coat, I would run right into him. I listened and heard nothing. I bent down to look at the coatrack—no one was there. I continued down the stairs, into the lobby, and approached the glass doors facing the parking lot where I saw Andrew Fine walk toward his car, hands in his pockets. I went back toward the stairs and exited a door on the other side of the lobby. I stepped onto a shoveled walk that hugged the building for thirty feet then turned right toward the parking lot. If I followed the walk, I would have headed straight toward Andrew Fine where he most likely would have seen me. Instead, I climbed a four-foot snowbank and skidded down the other side to a field of snow. I ran through virgin white powder into a wooded area that paralleled the parking lot. Snow wedged into my shoes and up my pant legs. The cold stung and my back ached as I hunched in hope of avoiding Fine seeing me.
I heard his Porsche start and looked over. There were too many SUVs in the lot for me to see if he’d pulled out yet. I took a chance and ran toward the lot. When I reached the pavement, I sprinted to the Volvo, got in, started it, and pulled out into the lane. I saw the back of Andrew Fine’s Porsche turning right onto 70th. I hung back, hoping his eye was on the westbound traffic. When he made his turn, I stepped on the gas. A hundred yards later, I reached the end of the church drive and followed Andrew onto 70th, where I caught the back end of his Porsche accelerating up the entrance ramp onto Highway 100 North. If he was headed home, he would’ve stayed on 70th, but it appeared he was going to the call center.
He exited onto Excelsior Boulevard, as I expected, but stopped at the Jiffy Car Wash. It was the drive-through kind of car wash where you stay in your car. Nothing unusual about getting a car washed, especially with the weather warming. There was a line of half a dozen cars. I parked on Kipling Avenue where I had a clear view of both the cars waiting and the cars exiting. I reached under the passenger seat to grab the Nikon with the telephoto lens.
Andrew Fine sat patiently in line. He didn’t seem to be on the phone. He didn’t seem to be doing much of anything except taking an occasional hit of tobacco vapor off his lightsaber. Nor did he seem upset. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and checked himself out in the mirror and messed up his hair. It was all ho-hum waiting-in-line-for-a-car-wash behavior. Nothing unusual whatsoever.
But when Andrew Fine exited the car wash something had changed. He went in alone. He came out with a passenger. She looked different without the hijab, but I was certain it was his assistant, Khandra Aden. She wore her hair down and covered her eyes with sunglasses. On a cloudy day. She flipped up the collar of her shearling coat and sunk low in the Porsche’s passenger seat.
I looked for the car that had entered in front of Fine’s, which was most likely the car that dropped Khandra off in the car wash, but it was gone. Its driver and Fine must have coordinated getting in line. Or Khandra was already in there, waiting. Fine took a right onto Excelsior Boulevard. I pulled a U-turn and followed. I had assumed Fine showed up to Maggie’s funeral because to not would have looked suspicious. And I had assumed Fine bolted the funeral because it had become too intense for him. Either sadness or guilt or both. But leaving Maggie’s funeral and then picking up Khandra in a car wash implied Fine left for logistical reasons. How long could she hang out inside a car wash where the only other person was an attendant who took your token and handed you a damp rag to wipe down your dash? My guess was not long. She either was in the car in front of Fine’s or one damn close to it, and she knew the attendant. Fine must have left because he received a text telling him to. Either that, or he’d always planned on leaving mid service.
Fine entered the ramp for Highway 100 South. I held my position a few cars back. Then Ellegaard called. I answered.
“Ellie.”
“Where are you?”
“Tailing Fine. Is the service over?”
“Yes. I thought about following him but saw you get up and figured it’d be too much if we both left.”
“Can you do me a favor? Search Facebook for Khandra Aden in Minneapolis.”
“Hold on. I got to pull over.”
Fine stayed in the right lane on Highway 100. I was pretty sure where he was going so I dropped back another car.
“How do you spell her name?” I pictured the nameplate on her desk and spelled it for him. “What does she have to do with Fine?”
“Just see if there’s anything on her page that would indicate how old she is.”
“Hold on.” Fine exited to Highway 62. It looked like he was taking Khandra to his house. “Okay,” said Ellegaard, “looks like she’s a junior at Washburn.”
“Jesus Christ.”
“What is it?”
“Fine’s fucking a seventeen-year-old.”
“You got to be kidding me.”
“Call Gabriella. See if she can pull Khandra’s records from Washburn. I want to know if she’s in the work-study program.”
“On it. Where’s Fine now?”
“He’s about to exit from 62 onto Tracy. He’s headed home. Khandra Aden is with him.”
“So what do we do?”
“Usual spot during the layoff?”
“See you there in thirty.”
I stayed a block behind Fine, which was close enough to see him pull into his attached triple garage. I didn’t believe Khandra was in any danger, so I kept driving, checking my rearview and side mirrors. No one was tailing me. I took side streets to the meeting spot, including driving half way around Lake Harriet, which is a one-way. Following the curve of the lake, I could identify eight cars behind me. When I turned off near the rose garden, none of those cars turned with me. I was confident I wasn’t being followed.
Half an hour later, Ellegaard and I sat in Matt’s Bar, home of the original Juicy Lucy, on 35th and Cedar. It was a long, narrow place. The bar ran along the right side and booths of brown vinyl ran along the left. Small tables occupied the space between the booths and bar. A cash machine told you how you’d be paying for your food and beverage. The walls were decorated with neon beer signs and framed accolades for the Juicy Lucy. And there was a big picture of President Obama from when he stopped by to try the famous cheese-on-the-inside cheeseburger. The place had become too famous for my taste, but year-round Christmas lights hung over the bar and there was a jukebox in front, and they saved it for me.
Ellie and I walked to the back and sat at adjacent sides of a small table so we could keep our eyes on the front door. Still wearing our suits, we looked like a couple of businessmen longing for our youth. They probably got a lot of suit-wearers in here doing just that. Responsible citizens pretending to keep it real. We each ordered a Juicy Lucy and soda with bitters from a kid who looked like he played a Flying V in a ZZ Top tribute band.
When the kid left, Ellegaard said, “Lay it out.” It was a game we played studying for our academy exams in that very bar fifteen years earlier.
“Andrew Fine doesn’t have an alibi for the night of Maggie’s murder,” I said.
Ellegaard said, “Andrew Fine owns an office park. It’s carpeted with the same fibers found in the vacuum cleaner–bag contents that covered Maggie Somerville’s body and her house.”
“Andrew Fine is a recovering substance abuser.”
Ellegaard said, “Andrew Fine owns a call center that employs Somalis.”
“Andrew Fine likes to sleep with his employees.”
“Andrew Fine employs a seventeen-year-old girl as his assistant. Her name is Khandra Aden.”
“Andrew Fine picked up Khandra Aden hidden from view inside a car wash. He then took her to his home.”
I said, “Andrew Fine
is a narcissist.”
Ellegaard said, “Andrew Fine is untouchable because he’s cooperating with the FBI in an antiterror investigation.”
I said, “Andrew Fine was accused of rape in college. The case went to trial. He was acquitted.”
Ellegaard said, “Maggie Somerville told her friend, Beth, that she and Andrew had a wild sex life.”
“Robert Somerville thinks Maggie Somerville was in love with Andrew Fine.”
“Andrew Fine is still legally married.”
“Yes he is,” I said. “Money is holding up the divorce.”
“Andrew Fine invited you to a party tonight.”
Ellegaard stared at me, hoping I’d provide another fact. But I was out. Neither of us said anything for a few minutes, then I said, “It’s muddy.”
“Yeah.”
“Something doesn’t track here. Something’s not adding up.”
We sat for another few minutes, then Billy Gibbon’s stunt double brought our Juicy Lucys. We ate in silence, then Ellegaard looked at me and said, “Motive. Tell me Fine’s motive.”
“Money. If Maggie told people about the sex and it got back to his ex-wife, she could use it as leverage to hurt his standing in the divorce.”
“But if that’s true,” said Ellegaard, wiping his chin, “then why would he sleep with a seventeen-year-old girl? That’s much riskier behavior. If he gets caught, money isn’t his biggest concern. Jail is.”
I squeezed ketchup on my fries, then said, “Or not.”
“Or not what?” said Ellegaard.
“If Andrew Fine’s untouchable for murder, then he’s definitely untouchable for statutory rape.”
The front door opened. Agents Delvin Peterson and No Chin entered.
“Fuck,” I said.
Ellegaard put down his burger. “Were you tailed?”
“Definitely not. I did the lake trick.”
“I did the parking-ramp trick,” said Ellegaard. “No way I was followed. They’re tracking our cell phones.”
“Technology’s making life a lot less fun, you know that?”
