The Ninth Life

by E. H. Reinhard

  “This last week?”

  “That’s what she said.”

  “Did you call the office for this place?” I asked.

  “I did but didn’t get an answer—the voice mail said that the sales office opens at ten. I left a message. I kind of figured I’d just go over there and meet with this woman to see what’s what. By the time I wrap up with that, the sales office should be open for me to stop in if I need to.”

  “Did you get something set up to meet with her?” I asked.

  “I told her that I’d be right over. I was just going to grab a couple of the patrol guys and check it out. Unless you wanted to come.”

  “I’ll go with you. What did you get from anybody else? Ed or the PD up north?”

  “Ed hadn’t started the autopsy on the woman yet, but I told him that we didn’t get a match on her prints and would be going with dental records. He said that in his preliminary, he found that the woman had a broken neck.”

  “Broken neck, huh? To go along with her broken arm.”

  “That’s what he said.”

  “Okay,” I said. “The PD?”

  “I talked to a sergeant at the Fitchburg Police Department. Um, what was his name…” Hank snapped his fingers. “Havel. Sergeant Havel. Anyway, I sent him over a copy of the arrest warrant. He said he would make a few calls and then get back to me.”

  “All right. You’re ready to head out now?” I asked.

  “Yup.”

  “Give me five minutes. I need to make a call real quick, and we’ll head out. Go get a couple of guys from patrol to come with us.”

  “Sure,” Hank said. He left my office.

  I jammed the last of the crumb cake in my mouth, washed it down with a big gulp of coffee, and dialed the number for the management company that took care of my condo. I got an answer after a few rings.

  “Sunset Properties and Management,” a woman answered.

  “Hello, Lieutenant Carl Kane. I’m a resident at the facility on West Bay Street. I need to speak with someone regarding the security footage for the condos.”

  “Can you hold on for me for just a second?” she asked.

  “That’s fine.”

  I waited on the line a few minutes before a man came on who introduced himself as simply Doug.

  “Lieutenant Carl Kane,” I said. “Are you who I need to talk to regarding security footage at my building?”

  “I am. I actually just listened to your message from earlier this morning. I apologize we haven’t got back to you yet. You wanted to get access to the footage due to a crime, correct?”

  “A body was left outside of the complex last night,” I said. “We need to see what if anything was caught on the footage.”

  “Okay. I just sent off a message to the company that we contract with to handle that. If you want to leave me a direct number, I’ll get back to you as soon as I hear back from them.”

  “What’s the company that you contract through?” I asked. “I’ll just contact them directly. They may want some paperwork to release the video to our department.”

  He gave me the name and a number, and I clicked off. I dialed the place but got an answering system telling me their hours, and they wouldn’t open for another half hour. I clicked off, took the piece of paper that I’d written the security company’s information on, and walked next door to Bostok’s office.

  He sat at his desk on the phone and gave me the signal that he’d just be a second. I waited as the captain finished his call. It sounded as though he was talking to someone from the press since he kept repeating the phrase active investigation. He hung up and gave me his attention. “What’s up?” he asked.

  “Hank just took a call. We have a woman that says Eve Kleeman lives in her condo complex just off of Bayshore. So, just up the street. The woman said that she saw Kleeman there this week.”

  “Did you get ahold of anyone at this place and see if she’s a tenant?”

  “Hank tried. I guess the sales office doesn’t open for an hour or so. We’re going to grab a couple of guys from patrol and take a quick ride over there to check this woman’s story out. We’ll walk into the sales office to see what’s up after that.”

  “Okay, let’s get some progress made today. The phone lines are starting to heat up with news outlets looking for updates and sound bites.”

  “Doing what we can,” I said. “I got the name and number for the security company that handles my building. They don’t open for a bit, but I’m going to drop it off to Terry down in tech and see if he can get on it while we’re checking out this woman and her story.”

  Bostok gave me a nod. I turned and walked to the bull pen. Jones stood behind his chair at his desk. He pulled his suit jacket from off the back of his chair and put it on.

  “Did you meet with Erica Osweiler’s parents?” I asked.

  “I just wrapped up a little bit ago.” Jones pushed his chair back under his desk.

  “How did that go?”

  “About how you’d expect. They couldn’t give me anything in terms of something that would help the investigation, unfortunately. They left a little bit ago to go over to the medical examiner’s office. I was actually just going to come find you and let you know that I was taking off.”

  “What do you have going on?” I asked.

  “I have an appointment at Billie Webber’s hotel to meet with a…” Jones took his notepad from his jacket pocket, flipped a page, and stared down at it. “Sandra Pettigrue. I’m supposed to be there in a half hour. Then over to the mall to meet with the manager of the clothing store that Erica Osweiler worked at. I guess there were two women in the video from the Irish pub that were with Erica Osweiler. I’m going to do what I can to find out who they were. I guess Donner had some stills made from the video footage.” He flipped his notepad closed and stuffed it back into his jacket pocket. “When I talked to Donner this morning, he told me about what went down last night. Anything new on that front?” he asked.

  “Nothing on the woman, but we just had a call in that Hank and I are going to check out.” I filled him in on the caller that claimed Kleeman lived at her complex.

  “If you need me to go out there with you guys, I can try to reschedule these appointments.”

  “Go do what you were going to do. That’s going to need to be done either way. The sooner the better. We don’t really know how much merit there is to this caller’s story yet. If she actually has something, I’ll give you a call.”

  “Sure,” Jones said. “I’ll call with an update if I get anything on my end.”

  “Sounds good.”

  I left Jones to go to his appointments and found Hank. We dropped the security company’s information off at our tech department and left the station—Officers Troyer and Hersman followed in two patrol cars.

  We made a right off of Bayshore Boulevard at the corner where Fred Ball Park was and drove down the tree-shaded, narrow two-lane road. At the stop sign, Hank’s navigation told us the condos were ahead and to our right. A black Dodge Challenger pulled to the crossing street and stopped just as we did. Through the dark tinted windows, all I saw was a hand waving for me to proceed. I gave the car a wave and pulled through the intersection. Through the old trees on both sides of the street, I could see the complex coming into view on the passenger side of our car. The left side of the street held another set of apartments or condos, but from the architecture, they didn’t appear to belong to the same facility. Each building on our right, where the address we were heading toward was located, looked to be three stories with a garage beneath. One building would be pink, the next a shade of teal, and the next yellow. The condos appeared to have been built in the early eighties. The main entrance gate came up on our right. I turned into the lot and drove through the open gates.

  “It says it’s up here on our left,” Hank said. “Which building on the left, I don’t know.”

  I waited for a red convertible to pass and pulled into an area designated for visitor parki
ng near the building and killed the motor. The two patrol cars pulled in beside us.

  “Grab the radio in there, Hank.” I pointed at the car’s glove compartment.

  Hank popped the latch and let the door drop. He stuck his hand inside and came back with a radio. “Got it,” he said.

  We stepped from the car and looked over at the buildings—none of which had any address numbers that I could see.

  “Why don’t you call her, Hank, and tell her that we’re here?” I said.

  “Sure.” Hank punched away at the screen of his phone and then started to the side of the building. He appeared to be looking for any kind of visible address.

  I walked to the two cruisers that had pulled in beside us.

  “Did you want us to be present when you meet with this woman?” Officer Hersman asked as he stepped from the driver’s side of his patrol car.

  “Sergeant Rawlings is trying to get her on the phone right now. Let’s see what she says. I may just have you guys do a little pavement pounding until we figure out what the situation is.”

  “Sure,” he said.

  Officer Troyer left his car and joined Hersman and me at the noses of the cars. Troyer sat on the push bar attached to the front of his cruiser. The two patrol officers chitchatted about schedules. I tuned them out and brought up a photo of Eve Kleeman on my phone.

  Hank returned a moment later. “I guess she’s at the pool. We’re supposed to meet her there.”

  “Which is where?” I asked.

  “She said by the clubhouse, which I’m assuming is that,” Hank said. He jerked his head at a stuccoed tan building at the end of the parking lot. Large palm trees jutted up from the building’s corners. It didn’t resemble any of the condo buildings and had commercial looking sliding glass front doors.

  “Right,” I said. I turned my attention to Troyer and Hersman. “Why don’t you guys have a look around? We’re looking for either Eve Kleeman or the BOLO vehicles.” I turned my phone to the two officers and expanded the woman’s face on the screen. “She’s big, over six foot, so she should stick out. Do you guys remember what the cars were?”

  “Black Dodge truck and black late-model Audi,” Officer Troyer said.

  “Okay, we’ll meet back here at the cars in a bit. If you spot either car or the woman, radio us.”

  “Okay.” Troyer nodded, and he and Hersman walked off.

  “All right, let’s go.” Hank and I headed for the building at the end of the lot. We entered the tile-floored clubhouse.

  Hank pointed straight ahead, through the building, at the pool area visible through the back glass of the clubhouse.

  We walked through and outside. A couple of older people sat around on the pool’s edges with their feet dangling into the water. Off to our left was a pair of small outdoor couches and patio chairs in front of a covered bar—there was no bartender. I figured the bar area to be used only for gatherings. A flat-screen television was affixed to the stone-faced wall above a fireplace. A single woman sat at the bar with what looked like a cup of coffee.

  “Is that her?” I asked.

  Hank shrugged and headed for the woman. I followed.

  “Judith Parker?” Hank asked.

  The woman, mid-fifties and a couple of pounds overweight, turned on her chair and faced us. “Just Judy is fine,” she said. She wore a purple blouse and a pair of cream-colored shorts. Some kind of large purple sun hat covered the short brown hair on her head.

  “Sergeant Hank Rawlings.” He reached out and shook her hand.

  The woman looked up from her chair at me and held out her hand.

  “Lieutenant Carl Kane,” I said. “You claim that you’ve seen Eve Kleeman at the facility here?”

  “She lives here somewhere,” Judy said. “Said she was just moving in.”

  “And you’re certain of this?” I asked.

  She lifted her coffee cup from the bar and brought it to her lips. The woman took a drink. From five feet away, I could still smell the booze in the coffee cup.

  She set the cup down. “I’m positive.” The woman rummaged through the bag hanging from the top of her chair and came back with a cell phone. She set it before her on the bar’s top and clicked away at the screen. “Is there a reward for information on her?”

  “Not at the moment,” I said. “Aside from us being grateful and you being a helpful citizen.”

  “I was hoping for something more of the monetary variety,” she said. “Oh well. Here.”

  She held her phone out. I took it in hand and looked at the photo of a group of women at the pool that we stood at. The woman on the right was clearly taller than the rest. She was blond, and the woman’s face looked the same as the photo I had on my phone—Eve Kleeman. But she wasn’t what was capturing my attention. The woman directly beside her was dark haired and wearing an orange-and-white-striped dress.

  Chapter 22

  If she had pulled to the intersection a split second before Kane and the two patrol cars following him, they would have seen the Wisconsin tag on the back of her father’s car. Eve sat in the parking lot of the condo complex. She stared over at the pool and Kane and the other detective with him. The pair spoke with a woman seated at the bar.

  “Shit,” Eve said.

  She had made a trip to her storage unit to drop a couple of things off when she realized that she’d forgotten her book. The photo of her and Larry was too important to leave behind. Eve looked over her left shoulder, out of the driver’s side window. A pair of uniformed patrol officers seemed to be canvassing the complex.

  “Shit,” Eve said again. “Son of a bitch!” she shouted. She slammed her fist down on the top of the steering wheel. Eve’s book, with the photo, sat inside the condo on the living room coffee table. Eve mumbled more profanities under her breath. The photo was the one item that she actually cared about, the one thing that she hated the thought of leaving behind. Eve sat up in the driver’s seat and looked for the officers. She didn’t see either of them. She looked back over at Kane, the detective, and the woman. The woman—who Eve thought to be the one from the night she’d spent at the pool, judging by the stupid hat—pointed at Eve’s building.

  “You bitch,” Eve said. She looked back at the front door of her condo. The two patrol cops came back into view, walking just a building away from her. Eve started the car and pulled from the lot. She dialed Larry. He didn’t answer. Eve left a message that they’d found the condo and continued driving. A moment later, the light on her phone flashed that she had a text message. Eve pulled down a side street and to the curb. She clicked the car into Park and checked her phone. The message was from Larry.

  Larry: I can’t talk. They keep coming in my room.

  Eve scrolled to the next portion.

  Larry: Destroy your phone. Find another phone and text me the number. I’ll call or message you on the new number when I can.

  Eve swiped her finger to read the last section of the message.

  Larry: I love you, and we’ll be together for eternity at the master’s side. Let nothing stand in your way of finishing.

  Eve responded: Understood, I love you.

  Chapter 23

  I went to the woman’s shoulder and placed her phone back on the bar before her. “Who is this?” I asked. I pointed at the phone screen and the woman in the orange-and-white-striped dress.

  “That’s Phyllis,” Judy said. “She lives over in building three. Though I think she probably spends more time at the pool here than at home. She’s always trying to get everyone gathered up. We have a couple of drinks and gossip. Sometimes we take a dip.”

  “Phyllis what?” I asked. I pulled my notepad from my pocket to write the name down.

  “Phyllis Boucher,” Judy said.

  “Hank, call over the radio and get that name circulated,” I said.

  Hank nodded and walked away from the woman and me to make the call.

  “Which one is building three?” I asked.

  She pointed over he
r shoulder at a teal building across the parking lot from the pool.

  “Do you know what unit number is this Phyllis’s?” I asked.

  “Um. The number, no. It’s that one there.” She pointed to the farthest door to the left. “See it there?”

  I could see the door that she spoke of. “Yup. Got it,” I said. “When was the last time that you saw Phyllis?”

  “A day or two ago. I actually expected her to be here this morning. She’s always at the pool in the mornings.”

  Hank walked back up. “The ID is out.”

  “Why do you want to know about Phyllis?” Judy asked.

  I dodged the question to get one answered. “Are you and this Phyllis close?”

  “I don’t know if I’d say close. She’s another resident. We chat at the pool. Have a drink over here together from time to time.” She paused for a second. “Are you going to answer my question?” she asked. “Is she in trouble? Did something happen to her?”

  “I guess there’s no easy or right way to tell you, but we found a woman last night, deceased, that matches this Phyllis’s description.”

  “Oh, God,” she said. “What do you mean deceased? Murdered?”

  “This was foul play, yes,” I said.

  She placed her hand over her mouth and sat quiet for a moment. She sniffed and then took a drink of her spiked coffee. She set her coffee down and wiped the corner of her eye. “You think this Eve woman may have killed her?”

  “That’s what we’re investigating,” I said.

  “But why Phyllis? I mean, she was harmless.”

  I didn’t have an answer for her. I tapped on the bar next to the phone with my fingertip. “When was this photo taken?” I asked.

  “Maybe a week ago,” she said. “It could have been a little less than that.”

  “Tell me about what was going on here,” I said. I looked down at the photo. The four women in it were posing for the camera—each holding a shot glass. “Seems as if you were celebrating something?”

  “Us girls were hanging around the pool, and then this Eve woman walked up. It seemed like she was just out for a walk. Anyway, we got to talking to her and whatever. She said that she’d just rented a condo. She hung around for a little bit. The photo was of us girls doing a shot to welcome her to the community.”