Heart of Ice (22 page)

“Yeah.”

“How many wrinkles do you have to draw?”

“A hundred and twenty-two.”

“Danny, can you stop for a moment and please come to the bars?” Troyer asked. “I’ve brought you some chocolate fudge.”

Like a robot reacting to a command, Danny set his pad aside and came to the bars. Troyer gave him a square of fudge. He ate it in two bites, licked his fingers, then wadded up the paper and gave it back to her through the bars.

Troyer leaned close to Louis. “When I met with him last night I had a box of fudge in my purse to take home,” she whispered. “When he didn’t respond to me I’m ashamed to say I used it to get him to talk.”

Louis held up the open sketchbook to Dancer. “Danny, can you tell me the name of this girl?” he asked.

Danny was still licking his fingers, eyeing Troyer. Finally, he looked at the drawing.

“Summer,” he said.

“Yes, I know. Can you tell me her name?”

Danny shook his head.

“Danny, listen to me,” Louis said. “Can you tell me if you ever saw this girl with Julie?”

Danny reached through the bars and touched the drawing, tracing Rhoda’s jawline with the tip of his finger.
Louis sensed he was remembering and he stayed quiet.

“Cold,” Dancer said.

“What do you mean ‘cold’? You said it was summer.”

Danny formed a V with his fingers and put them on the eyes of Rhoda’s drawing. Still he said nothing.

Louis watched him, remembering how Dancer had captured emotions in the drawings he had done of Joe and Rafsky and himself. He looked at the sketch of Rhoda, and he suddenly saw what Dancer had seen.

“You mean she was cold on the inside,” Louis said.

“Eyes like ice,” Danny said. “Heart like ice.”

Louis leaned closer to the bars. Danny quickly took a step back, but he didn’t walk away, interested in Rhoda in a way Louis had not seen from him before. There was some sort of connection.

“Danny, someone told us this girl’s name might be Rhoda,” Louis said. “Do you remember anyone named Rhoda from when you were a teenager?”

Danny’s eyes were glazing over. Louis started flipping through the notebook to keep Dancer’s attention.

“Danny, look at this guy’s picture,” Louis said, showing him another face. “Do you know this person’s name?”

Danny shook his head.

“What about this one?” Louis asked, trying another unknown.

As if his batteries had died, Danny returned to his bunk and picked up his pad. He started mumbling again.

“Ninety-six, ninety-seven . . .”

Louis watched him for a moment, then closed the sketchbook. He had worked complicated cases before, but
this one was driving him crazy. A skeleton with no skull. A cop shot for no good reason. Hundreds of possible witnesses in the sketchbooks but only one name.

“You okay, Mr. Kincaid?” Troyer asked.

“Frustrated.”

“I understand,” Troyer said. “But I can’t allow any more interviews with Danny until we get a psychiatric evaluation. I also need to speak with the prosecutor about a possible plea on the attempted murder charges. I’m sorry.”

Now the lady grows a pair,
Louis thought. Not that it mattered. For the first time in his career he was okay with a cop shooter taking a plea that might land him in a hospital rather than a maximum-security prison.

And Julie Chapman’s case?

The DNA test on her bones could take months. Anyone who might recognize Rhoda’s face was already gone from the island. Rafsky’s team had finished searching the cabin, even opening some walls. The cadaver dogs had alerted on nothing inside the cabin or the yard, and the teams were now working their way deeper into the woods. No one was willing to say it to Rafsky’s face, but it was becoming clear that Dancer didn’t have Julie Chapman’s skull.

Louis looked at the barred window, where the snow was starting to pile in the corners. Things were fast going cold.

And the truths they needed to know about Julie Chapman’s murder were very possibly trapped inside Danny Dancer’s enigmatic brain.

I
t was past midnight when Ross put the key into the front door of the cottage and slipped inside. The parlor was dark except for the glow of a dying fire in the hearth.

Ross hung up his coat and pulled off his scarf. He stood for a moment, eyes closed, holding the scarf to his nose. Her smell was still there in the cashmere, and so was his memory of the scarf draped between her bare breasts. It had been only a few hours since he had made love to her, but his desire stirred again. It was as powerful as it had been that first time five years ago when they began their love affair.

He hung up the scarf and went to the liquor cabinet in the parlor to pour himself a drink.

Love affair? No, that’s not what it was. There wasn’t a shred of love between them. It was all sex. Sex and professional favors. She needed an interview or some gossip at the state capital, and in exchange he needed . . .

Sandy Hunt. Sophisticated, intelligent, and gorgeous—one of the most familiar faces in the Michigan media. Her public reputation was as a street-smart woman playing hardball in a man’s world. But privately Ross knew what people thought of her. He had heard what the other reporters said, the jokes they made and the names they
called her in Stober’s bar as they watched her on TV. Sandy the slut . . . that was the kindest one.

Ross drank the Hennessy, letting it burn its way down his throat.

A few hours ago he had been in her Lansing apartment, listening to Sinatra croon from the other room. It was a drizzly day, the kind of day that lulled a man toward sleep, and her bedroom had been a grotto of silver-blue shadows.

He had lain there, wondering why the fuck he kept coming back to a woman he couldn’t trust, wondering how he was going to get his attack ads on the air when he didn’t have the money to pay for them, wondering about—

The memory of Sinatra’s voice momentarily interrupted his thoughts.

“Today the world is old. . . . You flew away and time grew cold.”

He shut his eyes. Sandy had sensed something was wrong, because she started to stroke his chest, a tender gesture that she seldom offered. Her voice had the smoothness and burn of brandy.

Too bad your father doesn’t just fly away one night in his sleep, then you would have everything you need to be the man you were meant to be.

I love my father, Sandy.

Uh-huh. Right.

She rolled away from him, smoked a cigarette, and fell asleep. Soon after, not wanting to be near her anymore, he slipped from her apartment and chartered a flight back to the island. On the way, he made a decision. He would
tell his father that he wasn’t going to sit out the campaign waiting around the island for news about Julie. And he was going to demand that his father unlock an untouched trust left to Julie by their grandfather and give him the money he needed to win this election.

She was dead, damn it. His father had never been willing to admit it. Five years ago, Ross had finally petitioned the court to declare Julie legally dead. After his father saw her death announcement in the newspaper, the last of his father’s affection for him seemed to disappear.

Ross rose and went upstairs. As he passed Maisey’s room, he paused to make sure she was snoring, then moved on to his father’s room, stopping at the open door.

His father was sleeping, frail-looking in the enormous four-poster bed.

Ross went to the bed and stared down at his father. For several months now he had known Dad wouldn’t make it much past the New Year. While Maisey was already grieving in her own way, he had felt so little he often wondered what was wrong with him.

I love my father, Sandy
.

But he had known since he was about twelve that it wasn’t the kind of love a son should have. It was obligatory, forced, sometimes offered desperately in the hopes of getting a splinter of the affection his father saved for Julie.

As Ross grew older he gave up on love, becoming instead the consummate actor playing the role of a loving son, because that’s what people expected of the Chapmans. And even as his father grew sicker and more distant, even as Ross had his own children and made a name for himself in Lansing, he continued to play the same role.

Decades of pretending.

And now, as he stood there and looked at the old man who had once been the indomitable Edward W. Chapman, he was stunned to feel an ache in his chest. It was the ache of needing love from someone who didn’t love you back, and it was real. He knew because he’d felt it once before.

Ross looked down at the oxygen tank, at the gauge that monitored the flow rate. A tiny red needle quivered over the number two. The voice of Dad’s doctor in Bloomfield Hills drifted to Ross, like a cold breeze from a crack in the window.

It’s important the oxygen flow stay consistent. Too much or too little could be fatal in a matter of minutes.

Ross shut his eyes, trying to erase what he was thinking.

Wouldn’t it be nice if your father just flew away?

It would get him the money he needed to finish his campaign. It would buy the bigger house Karen wanted. It would allow him to set Sandy up in an apartment in D.C. And he could get rid of Maisey.

Slowly Ross reached down and turned the dial on the oxygen tank up to four.

His instinct was to watch his father’s face, but he forced himself not to look, afraid that his father’s eyes would open and he would see his son standing over him.

Ross listened for some indication that death had come, but the seconds passed so slowly he began to count them in his head. Still, he heard nothing but the hiss of the oxygen growing louder and louder and louder.

Shame suddenly engulfed him.

Ross tightened every muscle and closed his eyes.

Fifteen, sixteen . . .

Then, as soft as if it had come from another room, he heard a cough.

Or had he?

Ross forced himself to look down at his father. Nothing about the old man had changed. There was no sudden gray hue to the skin, no flop of his head toward the side, nothing to confirm the horror of what he had just done.

Ross put a finger to his father’s neck, then to his wrist, holding it there for nearly a minute even though there was no pulse.

Ross turned the oxygen dial back to number two. Then he stepped away from the bed, feeling as he had with Sandy that afternoon—suddenly sickened by the thought of being there a moment longer.

He moved to the window.

It was pitch-black but the pale light behind him haloed his reflection in the glass. The image was almost transparent, defined only by patches of frost and slivers of light.

I have killed my father.

How had he become this man? A man who cheats on his wife, who drinks with criminals for donations, who lies to old women for votes.

“
You flew away and time grew cold.”

The tears came. He stayed at the window, letting them fall.

His only thoughts were, as always, for himself.

How did I become this monster?

T
he phone jarred him from a deep sleep. Louis knocked the receiver to the floor and lunged for it.

“Yeah?”

“Mr. Kincaid?”

He rubbed his eyes. The room was dark and cold. “Who is this?”

“It’s Maisey Barrow.” A long pause. “Mr. Kincaid, I . . . Mr. Edward is dead.”

Her words dissolved into sobs. Louis swung his legs over the bed and fumbled for the light, switching it on.

“Maisey, calm down,” Louis said. “Are you sure?”

Joe touched his arm. “Louis, what is it?”

He held up a hand to silence her.

“He’s cold, Mr. Kincaid,” Maisey said. “I went into his room a few minutes ago, and I found him. I touched him. He’s cold as ice.”

“Okay, okay, listen carefully, Maisey.” Louis rubbed his face. “Is Ross there?”

“I . . . yes, he came back last night. I think he’s asleep.”

“Go wake him up, but it’s important that neither of you touch anything.”

She was sniffling.

“Maisey? Did you hear what I said?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ll be there with the police as soon as I can.”

He depressed the receiver and dialed the police station. He directed the dispatcher to call Sergeant Clark and tell him that Edward Chapman was dead. Then he asked the dispatcher to send a car immediately to the Potawatomi Hotel. He hung up and turned to face Joe, who lay propped on one elbow staring at him.

“Edward Chapman is dead,” he said.

“Good Lord,” Joe said softly.

Louis reached for his jeans. “Get dressed. I’ll go wake Rafsky.”

*  *  *

Ten minutes later, Clark was behind the wheel of the police SUV waiting for Louis outside the hotel. Louis climbed in the front, Joe and Rafsky in the back. Clark was wearing a police parka, but Louis saw the striped collar of his pajamas beneath. No one said much as Clark drove through the dark deserted streets.

A pale smudge of pink was coloring the horizon over the lake as they pulled up to the Chapman cottage. The first floor was ablaze with lights, but the second floor was dark. The grass, hardened with frost, cracked under their shoes as they went up the lawn. Louis was surprised when Ross, not Maisey, met them at the door.

“I can’t get her to leave his room,” Ross said, gesturing toward the stairs as they went in.

Ross was wearing sweatpants and a rumpled black sweater. His hair, always so carefully styled, was a wild mess. His eyes were red, and his face was puffy. It was obvious
he had been crying, but the faint odor of liquor was also on his breath.

“She won’t leave him,” Ross said. “Please, you have to talk to her.”

Louis glanced at Rafsky and Joe. “Give me a minute with Maisey, okay?”

Rafsky nodded. “We’ll wait down here for the doctor.”

There was no way to get a coroner here quickly from the mainland without chartering an expensive plane, so Clark had called the island doctor who had been caring for Edward Chapman during his stay at the cottage.

Louis went upstairs. The door to the first bedroom was open, and the room was dark except for an orange glow. It took Louis a moment to realize what it was—a space heater positioned near the bed. As he ventured closer, Louis saw Edward Chapman lying in the bed, a small bump amid the snowy white mountains of blankets.