Polar (Book 1): Polar Night (3 page)

Chapter 3

Danny drummed his fingers on
his steering wheel as he sat waiting at another red light. He glanced at Tessa, who was sitting in his passenger seat.

“Thanks for coming back here with me,” he said.

“It’s not a problem. Except that Mr. Clancy’s gonna think I’m nuts for showing up at his office twice in one day. And I don’t think he’ll be too thrilled.”

“I don’t give a shit if he’s thrilled or not. I wanna see if he reacts at all to being asked about Anna.”

The light turned green and Danny pushed the accelerator a little too hard. He was edgy, and anxious to get to Clancy’s office.

“I told you I don’t think he’s involved with Maria’s disappearance. I believed he was telling me the truth.”

“Yeah but that was before you knew about my discovery that Anna and Maria are connected.”

“You haven’t proven that. You know that, right? The fact that they look alike and they disappeared on the same day isn’t quite enough.”

“It’s enough for me. I know they’re connected.” He turned right on Clancy’s street, and began to look for a parking space near the office. “You think the winter solstice is just a coincidence? Come on.”

“I’m not saying I’m not intrigued. I wouldn’t be here with you if I wasn’t. But it is possible it’s a coincidence. You know that as well as I do.”

Danny parked the car and turned off the ignition, immediately sorry when the heat turned off along with it. He shivered and pulled his coat tighter around his neck, bracing himself to go back outside.

“What I know is that this is not a coincidence,” he said. “You mean to tell me you never had gut feelings in all those years in the military PD?”

Tessa followed Danny up the sidewalk to the offices of Wilson and Clancy, attorneys at law. It was a small firm, with only the two partners, and she could see the receptionist watching her and Danny arrive. She wasn’t surprised to see her pick up the phone, no doubt to let Clancy know the police were back.

“Of course I’ve had gut feelings. You can’t arrest someone based on a gut feeling though.”

Danny stopped as they got to the front door. “I’m aware of that. I also don’t plan on arresting Mr. Clancy. I think you’re right that he’s not involved. But I just want to make sure.”

He opened the door and held it open for Tessa, gesturing for her to walk through. “Ladies first,” he said.

Tessa rolled her eyes. “First time I’ve known you to have manners.”

“You bring out the best in me.”

Tessa walked to the receptionist’s desk and flashed her badge.

“I was here earlier today for Mr. Clancy,” she said. “Detective Washington.”

“Right, I remember.” The receptionist glanced at Danny.

“And I’m Detective Fitzpatrick,” he said. “Pleased to meet you.”

“We need to speak with Mr. Clancy again,” Tessa said. “If you’ll let him know, please?”

The receptionist nodded. “Of course.”

She picked up the phone again, and relayed the message. Within seconds, Nate Clancy entered the lobby. He was about Danny’s height, with a medium build, and black hair peppered with strands of grey. His green eyes stood out on his drawn, pale face. He adjusted his cufflinks as he walked towards Danny and Tessa, his expression a mixture of anxiety and irritation.

“What can I do for you, Detectives?” he said.

“We need to ask you a few more questions,” Tessa said. “This is Detective Fitzpatrick.”

Danny extended his hand for Clancy to shake. “Sorry for troubling you, Mr. Clancy. Can we talk in your office?”

Clancy scowled, and instructed the receptionist to hold his calls. He gestured for Tessa and Danny to follow him back to his office. As they entered, he shut the door behind them.

“Do you have information on Maria?” he asked. “Some of our friends are planning a vigil for her tonight. I’d love to be able to share some good news with them.”

“I’d love that too, but we don’t have anything new at the moment,” Danny said. “Except for the fact that I’m now involved in the case as well.”

“Okay. What can I do for you?”
Nate asked again.

“I understand you told Detective Washington earlier that you and Ms. Triebel weren’t getting along too well lately.”

Nate pulled a chair out from his office table and sat down, motioning for Danny and Tessa to do the same.

“I wouldn’t put it that way,” he said. “We were just getting close to breaking up.”

“You were breaking up, but you wouldn’t say you weren’t getting along?”

“Not if you mean we were fighting all the time, we weren’t. It was more just that we knew this wasn’t going anywhere, and we’d been spending less and less time together.” Nate ran his hand through his thick dark hair. “Look, I didn’t do anything to Maria. I don’t know where she is.”

Danny smiled. “I didn’t say you did, Mr. Clancy. I just want to get to the bottom of this.”

“So do I.”

“Good. We’re on the same page.” Danny paused. “You say you and Maria weren’t fighting all the time. But you knew your relationship wasn’t going anywhere.”

“Right.”

“Was there anything specific that made you feel that way? Anything strange going on with Maria, or something she did you didn’t approve of?”

Nate shook his head. “No, nothing like that. Really we hadn’t been spending that much time together since we went on a trip at Thanksgiving. We got on each other’s nerves that weekend so since then we’ve just drifted apart somewhat.”

“Where’d you go on this trip?”

“Prudhoe Bay.”

Danny raised his eyebrows. “Prudhoe Bay?”

“Yeah. I know it’s nuts, but Maria loves all that frozen tundra shit. She wanted to go to Deadhorse and the Arctic Circle. He paused and shook his head. “Look, I grew up in Fairbanks so I don’t give a rat’s ass about the tourist stuff. But Maria’s from California, she didn’t come to Alaska until she went to college. She’s never gotten all the Wild Alaska bullshit out of her system, and she’d never been to the far north. So we went up there for the weekend and did the tourist crap.”

“I take it you didn’t enjoy the trip.”

“Not really. I froze my ass off and looked at the Arctic Ocean. Went to some supposedly haunted psychiatric hospital and stayed in a crappy hotel. Not my idea of fun. But Maria loved it. She was fairly pissed at me on the way home.”

Danny nodded. “Have to say I think I’d be in agreement with you. Sounds like hell to me.”

“It was.”

“Other than that, you haven’t had any squabbles?”

“No, nothing. She stayed at my place the night before she disappeared.”

“Right. And she told you about the photography job?”

“Yeah. She was excited about it. She loves the Solstice crap, too.”

“Sounds like she’s an enthusiastic person.”

“She is. She loves just about everything. It doesn’t take much to get her excited.”

“I’m getting the feeling you’re not that way.”

Nate laughed. “I’m not, I admit it. At least not in the winter.”

Danny leaned back in his chair. “So Maria’s an adventurous type. You think she could have just decided to go off on a trip on her own, something that seemed fun to her?”

“No. Not without telling people. And she wouldn’t have stood the Solstice people up. I’m telling you, she was thrilled to have that job. Plus, it’s Christmas. Maria loves Christmas and she has a party planned for tomorrow night. She wouldn’t just walk away from that.”

Danny nodded. “I understand. Tell me, have you ever met a woman named Anna Alexander?”

Nate looked puzzled at the change in subject. “Anna Alexander?”

“Yeah. You know her?”

“I don’t think so. Should I?”

“There’s no should or shouldn’t. I’m just asking if you do. Does that name ring any bells for you?”

Nate shook his head. “No. Why?”

Danny watched him, looking for the obvious signs of deception. There was nothing in Nate’s body language to suggest he was anything but confused.

“No reason,” Danny said. “Just trying to put some puzzle pieces together.” Danny sat up straight and put his hands on his knees. “You’ve been very helpful. I appreciate you taking the time to talk with me when you’d already been so cooperative with Detective Washington.”

“I don’t have any reason not to be cooperative. I want to find Maria, too.”

“I believe you do.” Danny stood up and put his card on the table. “You’ll call us if you think of anything more that might help?”

Nate stood up and walked Danny and Tessa to the door. “Of course I will.”

Danny and Tessa headed for the lobby, zipping up their parkas and putting on their gloves as they walked.

“Will you let me know when you learn anything?” Nate asked. “I’m really worried.”

“I know you are, Mr. Clancy,” Tessa said. “We hope we’ll have good news for you soon.”

Chapter 4

Danny leaned back in his chair
and put his feet up on his desk. He drummed his fingers on the metal surface as he turned the cases of Anna Alexander and Maria Treibel over in his mind. He was certain they were connected, but he hadn’t found a damn thing in Anna’s case file to tie her to Maria Treibel. And he and Tessa hadn’t learned anything that gave them a single clue to Maria’s disappearance.

He glanced around the now empty office. He was the only detective who remained, as everyone else was either out on a case, or gone for the Christmas holiday. He had volunteered to cover the Christmas shifts, figuring it was the least he could do. It wasn’t like he had anyone to spend the holiday with anyway.

He put his feet back on the floor and ran his hand over the stubble that was well on the way to becoming a beard. He really needed to shave tomorrow. Right now though, he had other things on his mind.

He had already searched every file he could find on Anna Alexander, but he knew he was still missing something. He wanted to go back to the day or we
ek she disappeared. Back to 2009.

Danny loved online newspapers, but there was no question their archives were severely lacking. If he wanted to see all that was going on in Fairbanks in December,
2009, he needed the print copies. He looked up at the clock on the wall. 5:00. There was still time to make it to the library.

A few minutes later, Danny was driving down Cushman Avenue, away from the police department, and towards Cowles Street and the public library. He didn’t have to worry about his eyes adjusting to the sun now, as the sun had set more than two hours ago. Fairbanks was lucky to see four hours of daylight in December.

Danny pulled into the library parking lot, unsurprised to find it nearly empty. This was hardly a busy time for the library, as most people were busy preparing for Christmas. And most people weren’t digging up ghosts.

Danny walked inside and headed for the reference desk, where he asked the librarian for the Fairbanks Dail
y News-Miner from December, 2009.

The librarian was a tall and slender woman with wavy golden hair that fell in a curtain to her shoulders. She had fair, almost translucent skin, and large blue eyes.  Danny couldn’t help but think that her eyes looked as tired as he felt. He noticed a nametag on her berry-colored sweater. Amanda Fiske.

“Did you need specific dates?” Amanda asked.

“I’d like to get the whole month if I can. But I especially want the 21
st
. Or whatever day was the winter solstice that year. Isn’t it always the 21
st
or 22
nd
?”

Amanda nodded. “I can get you the whole month, just give me a minute.”

“Thanks.”

Danny watched as Amanda disappeared into the seemingly limitless back room that all libraries had. He sat down at one of the reading tables near her desk, and picked up a Time magazine someone had left on the table. Browsing through it, he tried to keep his mind from thinking about his own life in December
, 2009. He didn’t want to remember the warm living room decorated with red and green bows and garlands. He didn’t want to remember the smells of cinnamon and chocolate and apple cider. He didn’t want to remember the sound of Caroline’s laughter as she tripped over the pile of gifts on the floor and almost knocked over their Christmas tree. He didn’t want to remember anything at all.

Chapter 5

Amanda walked into the newspaper
storage room and quickly found the 2009 editions. She pulled out the December papers, noticing her hand shaking as she did so. She stepped back from the shelf of papers, and took a deep breath. She had to calm down.

She told herself that she was probably making something out of nothing. There could be any number of reasons why a police detective would want to go through newspapers from three years earlier. She wished she hadn’t even noticed the badge on his belt. If she hadn’t, she wouldn’t have thought twice about his request. People looked at old newspapers all the time. But she had seen the news coverage about another woman who had gone missing…

Amanda ran her fingers over the cross around her neck and admonished herself. She was acting ridiculous. When was she going to let this go? At some point, she had to put the incident in the past, and leave it there.

She clutched the cross again for good measure, picked up the stack of papers, and carried them out to Danny.

“Here you go,” she said as she put the stack on the table Danny now occupied. “It’s the whole month of December, but I put the week of the Solstice on top.”

“Thanks,” Danny said. “I appreciate it. How late are you open?”

“Until 7.”

“Great. Gives me plenty of time.”

Amanda nodded. “Let me know if you need anything else.”

Danny watched as she returned to her desk and couldn’t help but think that she seemed nervous and twitchy. Probably just his imagination. Or maybe she had noticed his badge. He knew by now that cops made a lot of people nervous.

He sighed and pushed a clump of hair out of his eyes. Damned if he didn’t need a hair cut again. Hadn’t he just been to the barber shop? He wondered why some men were so paranoid about going bald. He had enough hair for ten men and it drove him nuts.

Because this wasn’t the time to bitch about his hair, he forced himself to focus on the newspapers in front of him. He started with Sunday’s paper and skimmed through each day of the week. There
were lots of stories about the winter solstice event and listings of holiday closings. In addition, there were several articles about a fight over the display of a Nativity scene outside of the county administration office and Danny was fairly certain he had read about this fight in the current week’s news too. Apparently it was ongoing.

He continued through the pages, not finding anything he was looking for. But then, he didn’t exactly know what he was looking for. Just…something. He was sure he’d know it when he saw it.

He stopped when he came to an article about the disappearance of a young woman named Anna Alexander. He recognized the photo of the smiling Anna very well. But except for the day of her disappearance, he didn’t see anything that connected her to Maria Treibel. As he stared at the photo, he noticed someone standing over his shoulder. Startled, he jumped in his chair.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” Amanda said. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

Danny rubbed his eyes. “It’s okay. I guess I’m a little jumpy.”

“I’m sorry,” Amanda said again.

Danny turned to face her. Talk about jumpy. Amanda’s eyes darted back and forth, and she had the demeanor of a frightened rabbit. Her hands twitched as she clutched the silver cross on her necklace. Danny resisted the urge to roll his eyes. He didn’t have much patience for religious nuts.

“It’s really okay,” he said again.

“Did you find what you were looking for?”

“Not really. But then I don’t actually know what I’m looking for, anyway.”

“Can I help?”

Danny shook his head. “No, I need to figure this out on my own. But thank you.”

“If you need any other papers…”

Danny stood up from his chair before she could complete her sentence. “No, really, I’ve looked at everything I wanted to here. I’ll get out of your hair. Maybe you can close early and go get ready for Christmas.”

Amanda smiled. “I’m afraid I can’t do that.”

“I guess not. But at least you don’t have too much longer to work.” Danny smiled. “Have a Merry Christmas.”

“Thanks, you too.”

Danny nodded and walked towards the exit. “Thanks for your help.”

Amanda sat down in the chair he had just vacated, her hand still clutching her cross necklace. She looked down at the papers on the table, and stared at the photo of Anna Alexander smiling up at her.

She hadn’t been making something out of nothing. She had been right. Now, she just had to decide what to do.