Frozen Stiff

by Annelise Ryan

“Glove time,” Hurley says.

  After donning our respective gloves, Hurley opens the door to Callie’s apartment and we enter a large open area that serves as living room, kitchen, and dining room space. The main décor is minimalist and distinctly modern, but there are children’s items scattered about that clearly don’t fit: a high chair in the kitchen, a playpen in the dining room, and a swing in one corner of the living room. There is also a laundry basket full of toys at one end of the couch, several of them spilled out onto the floor. The place appears very clean and well organized, yet there is evidence of disarray in the crooked couch cushions, drawers that aren’t completely closed, and a pile of disorganized papers on the desk. Though I suppose these subtle bits of sloppiness might be attributable to Callie’s lack of housekeeping skills, there is a reckless, pitched-aside quality to it all that suggests the place has been searched.

  “Are you looking for something specific?” I ask Hurley, who has zeroed in on a glass-topped desk in one corner of the dining room.

  “Anything that might give me some answers.”

  “It looks like the place has been gone through already.”

  “It has. Callie was an extremely neat, organized person.”

  Score another point for the ex-girlfriend.

  He continues looking through the papers on top of the desk and then opens up a side file drawer that looks jam-packed. Figuring it will take him a while to sort through the contents, I head for the doors at the other end of the living room, guessing correctly that they will lead to the bedrooms.

  In the smaller of the two, which is obviously little Jake’s room, there is a child’s bed shaped like a sports car, a large toy box painted in bright primary colors, a dresser that doubles as a changing table, and a menagerie of stuffed animals in a bright red hammock strung up in one corner. It’s a cute room but other than the changing table area, it has an empty, unused look to it.

  As I enter the master bedroom, the initial impression is that it’s Callie’s room. There is a queen-sized bed covered with a white, down comforter that is slightly mussed as if it was pulled down and then carelessly tossed back into place. The pillowcases have lace tatting along the edges, and the curtains on the window, which overlooks the street, are also trimmed in a lacy pattern. The bed’s headboard, the bedside table, and the dresser are all done in a French provincial design, painted white with small lines of gold trim. All that whiteness would feel cold and sterile were it not for several scattered splashes of color: a handful of throw pillows on the bed done in rich jewel colors, a royal blue throw draped over the foot of the bed, a large barn-red rocking chair in front of the window, two bright green hanging plants, and a bookcase filled with a wide assortment of colorful tomes—everything from writing manuals and a legal reference, to paperback novels.

  Though the bulk of the room clearly belongs to Callie, in a corner near the bathroom there is a crib. It, like the other furnishings in the room, is painted white but this blandness is offset by a colorful baby quilt, bright blue sheets, and a multicolored mobile of birds attached to the headboard.

  A tremendous sense of sadness fills me as I look at the crib and think about little Jake growing up without his mother—wondering about her, hearing stories about her, seeing pictures of her, but having no real memories of her, just an aching persistent hole in his heart that he’ll never fully understand or be able to fill. I know because that’s how I feel about my dad. And Jake has no second parent to step in since no one seems to know who his father is.

  Could it be Hurley?

  I head for the bedside table, a place where people often keep intimate things, and open the top drawer. It’s filled with an eclectic mix of items: an eye mask, several paperback books, a bunch of loose change, a bottle containing an over-the-counter sleep aid, several notepads and pens, some lotion, some foot cream, and a pacifier.

  After flipping through the notepads and discerning that all they contain are shopping lists and scribbled reminders, I close that drawer and open the bottom one, which sticks a bit. The only things it contains are dozens of pairs of socks. I rummage through them all, giving each pair a squeeze to make sure there isn’t anything inside them. As I push them back down into the drawer so I can close it, something odd strikes me. I pull open the top drawer again, look inside, and then step back to look at it from more of a distance. Even though both of the drawer fronts appear to be the same size, the top drawer is much shallower than the bottom one. Curious, I go back to the top drawer and poke around inside it, pushing on its bottom. When that yields no results, I take the entire drawer out and flip it upside down on the bed, letting its contents spill out.

  The wood panel that serves as the drawer’s bottom is set into grooves along the front and sides of the drawer, but the back panel has no grooves and is shorter than the others, allowing the entire bottom piece to slide out. I do so and hit the jackpot. Hiding inside this secret space is Callie Dunkirk’s diary.

  Chapter 19

  I start to holler to Hurley about my find but something holds me back. A quick scan of the diary’s contents shows dates going back nearly two years and a last entry from just four days ago. After half a minute of self-debate, I decide to hold off until I have a chance to look through the book myself. For one thing, I’m dying to know what’s in it and I’m not sure I can count on Hurley to share once he has his hands on it. For another, if there is anything in the diary related to Hurley, he might try to destroy it. I stuff the book inside the waist of my pants and pull my sweater down over it to hide it. Then I quickly reassemble the drawer, put the contents back, and replace it in the stand. I walk over to the bedroom door and look out into the main room to see what Hurley is up to. He is still seated at the desk going through files.

  I do a quick search under Callie’s bed and through her dresser drawers and closet. I get excited when I find a couple of storage boxes, but all they yield are story clippings from her newspaper days, some old tax returns, and a bunch of manila envelopes filled with business-related receipts.

  Next I head into the bathroom, which is spotless. I do a quick survey of the medicine cabinet, vanity drawers, and towel closet, all of which have that slightly out-of-kilter look like the rest of the house, but I find nothing of interest.

  Next I do a cursory inspection of Jake’s room for the sake of being thorough. I don’t find anything of significance, but the dresser drawers filled with little boy clothing give me pause. The sight of tiny OshKosh overalls, little button-down shirts, and baseball-themed pajamas triggers a painful lump in my throat, rousing some dormant maternal instinct within me.

  I head back out to the main part of the apartment and find Hurley sorting through the kitchen drawers and cabinets. He is making no effort to be subtle in his search, stirring things around, tossing stuff aside, and banging doors and drawers closed when he’s done.

  “Shouldn’t you try to be quieter?” I say to him. “We don’t want to attract attention.”

  He whirls on me, looking angry, frustrated, and ready to tell me to mind my own business. But before any words leave his mouth, his expression saddens and his shoulders slump. In an instant the no-nonsense, tough-as-nails cop I know is gone and Hurley becomes the epitomic image of a man defeated.

  “There’s nothing,” he says miserably, raking his fingers through his hair. “Not a frigging clue of any kind.”

  “Did she keep a date book of any sort?”

  “If she did, it’s not here,” Hurley says. “She might have had one at work.”

  I glance over at the desk where some disconnected wires are snaking along the surface. “Did she have a computer?”

  Hurley nods. “She had a laptop, but I suspect the local cops confiscated it as evidence.”

  “What about a file for important papers, you know, things like her passport, or a birth certificate?”

  Hurley starts to shake his head but then he stops and his face lights up. “Of course!” he says, snapping his fingers. “How could I ha
ve forgotten?” He pushes past me and heads into Callie’s bedroom. I follow and find him standing in front of the bookcase scanning the titles on the shelves. When he gets to the bottommost shelf, he squats, pulls out a fat book with War and Peace running down the spine, and says, “Here we go.”

  As soon as he opens the cover I see that the book is just a façade. Inside is a small metal storage box. Hurley opens it, revealing a stack of papers. I stand and watch over his shoulder as he sorts through them and hold my breath when he comes across a birth certificate for Jake.

  Callie’s name is typed in the slot for the mother’s name but where the father’s name should be, all it says is “Unknown.”

  “Damn it!” Hurley says, tossing the certificate back into the box.

  I place a hand on his shoulder and squeeze gently. “Maybe we can find out something by talking to her family,” I suggest.

  Hurley closes the box and the book cover, and puts it back on the bookcase shelf. “They won’t know anything. Callie was a very private person. Plus, she didn’t always get along that well with her mother and sister, so I’m pretty sure she didn’t share much with them about her life, particularly something as significant as this.” He sighs and stands, letting my hand fall from its spot. “I think we’ve discovered all we’re going to here. Let’s go.”

  I follow him out of the apartment and back to the car in silence, managing to slip Callie’s diary into my purse along the way. There is a lonely sadness about Hurley—the slump of his shoulders, his shuffling walk, his hangdog expression—that touches me. I want to say something to him, to somehow reassure him, but I have no answers, no clever bon mot that will make it all better.

  When we get into the car, I break the silence to tread into dangerous territory. “Did you know Mike Ackerman at all when you were dating Callie?”

  “I knew of him. Hard not to if you live in the Chicago area. He’s married to one of the richest women in the country, a pharmaceutical heiress. He’s always been a mover and a shaker. I know Callie was pretty excited when he expressed an interest in her work and she hoped he might bring her over to Behind the Scenes. She got her wish, but by the time it happened she had already broken things off with me. Why do you ask?”

  I shrug. “I don’t know. There’s something about him that bugs me.”

  “How so?”

  “He’s a little too good-looking.”

  Hurley shoots me a sidelong glance. “And that’s a bad thing?” he asks, his voice rife with skepticism.

  “Well, not in and of itself, but I get the feeling this Ackerman guy uses his looks. He exudes sex appeal like some gold-digging woman, and it’s clear that the women he works with are blinded by it.”

  “But you weren’t?”

  I shrug and smile. “I have to admit, he’s not hard on the eyes. But he came across as a little too slick for me.” Hurley nods, but says nothing. “Don’t you think the timing with him, you, and Callie is more than a little coincidental?”

  Hurley’s brow furrows. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean you and Callie seemed to be doing fine and then all of a sudden Ackerman appears. Then Callie inexplicably dumps you, ends up pregnant, and the next thing you know, she has her dream job.”

  “Are you implying she slept her way into it?”

  Hurley’s face is a mass of thunderclouds so I choose my next words carefully. “Not exactly, but what if she fell for Ackerman’s considerable charms in a weak moment, and then found herself pregnant? Ackerman is married. Maybe he offered her the job on Behind the Scenes as some sort of hush money.”

  Hurley’s expression goes through a kaleidoscope of change: defensiveness, anger, thoughtfulness, denial, and then sadness.

  “Maybe she broke up with you out of guilt,” I go on, “because she was too embarrassed, or too ashamed to admit she strayed. And then later she realized she’d made a mistake, and that it was you she really loved.”

  With that Hurley looks so wounded, I want to lean over and hug him. Instead I try to appeal to his investigative instincts. “If you had the love of the woman he wanted, the woman who bore his child, it might have made Ackerman mad enough to want to get revenge on you. He strikes me as having the kind of massive ego that would fit that profile. And if he does, he might have killed Callie to shut her up and then framed you for it so he could exact his revenge on his chief competition.”

  Hurley ponders the idea for a minute, and then shakes his head. “I don’t know. Maybe. Let me think about it.”

  We ride in silence for a bit and when I realize we’re heading south of Chicago I ask, “Where are we going now?”

  “To a town just outside of Joliet.”

  “Why?”

  “Because that’s where Stateville Prison is located. You are I are going to visit the one man who I know hates me more than anyone else: Quinton Dilles.”

  Chapter 20

  Hurley gives me a primer on Stateville Prison as he’s driving. The realization that we are going there spooks me a little, not only because I’ve never been to a prison before, but because I’m afraid I may end up in one by the time all is said and done. Stateville is a Level One facility, which means it serves as home to some of the worst criminals. Though no executions are performed there these days, there have been in the past—as recently as 1998—and the roster of murderous luminaries who have died there includes the likes of John Wayne Gacy and Richard Loeb of Leopold and Loeb fame, though Loeb was murdered by another inmate. As if the presence of thousands of hardened, vicious criminals isn’t scary enough, the facility is also rumored to be haunted.

  The building itself is quite daunting, with thirty-foot-high concrete walls topped with razor wire marking the perimeter. After driving through one set of guarded gates, we park in the visitor lot and head inside. Our entry requires us to show picture IDs—no fake identities this time—pass through two gates and a metal detector, and undergo a personal pat-down. Each time I hear a door clang shut behind me, it makes my heebie-jeebies worse.

  Our first stop is in a wing of offices, where we are led into one occupied by a gentleman who is dressed in street clothes rather than a guard’s uniform. Hurley makes the introductions, letting me know that the man before us, Maxwell Corning, is an assistant warden. Judging from the way Corning greets Hurley, I gather the two men know one another from the past. Though Hurley introduces me using my real name, he tells Corning I am his investigative assistant, leaving out mention of the fact that I work for the ME’s office.

  With the introductions out of the way, Hurley and I take seats across the desk from Corning.

  “So, do you have my list?” Hurley asks Corning.

  Corning shakes his head. “There isn’t one. The only visitor Dilles has had since his incarceration here is his lawyer, Connor Smith.”

  Hurley frowns at the news and says, “I suppose any conversations they’ve had have been privileged?” Corning nods. “That doesn’t help me much. Can you get me a list of his visitors from Cook County?”

  Corning leans back in his chair and eyes Hurley with curiosity. “What is it you’re hoping to find?”

  “Just a hunch I have regarding an ongoing investigation,” Hurley hedges.

  “Okay, I should be able to get that for you before you leave today,” Corning says, sitting up and scribbling a note.

  “What about the other piece I asked you about?”

  “Well, I do have better news on that front,” Corning says. “Dilles agreed to having you on his approved visitor list so if you want to talk with him today, you can.” Corning shifts his gaze to me and adds, “I’ll have to ask him about your assistant here, though. If he doesn’t okay her, she’ll have to remain behind.”

  Hurley turns to me and says, “What are your feelings on the matter? Do you want to wait in the car or do you want to come with me if Dilles okays it?”

  I’m not sure. On the one hand I’m curious to meet the man who has already caused Hurley so much grief. On the other hand, I�
�m spooked by the idea of coming face-to-face with a convicted killer.

  Sensing my hesitation, Hurley says, “We’ll have a Plexiglas barrier between us. The visitor area is completely isolated from the prisoners.”

  “Okay,” I say, my curiosity winning out. “I’m game if Dilles is.”

  Corning gets up and says, “Let me check with him then. Wait here and I’ll be right back.”

  As soon as Corning leaves, I turn to Hurley and ask, “What is it you hope to gain from this? Because if Dilles hasn’t seen or spoken to anyone other than his lawyer, it’s unlikely he’s behind all this other stuff, isn’t it?”

  “Not necessarily. He was denied bail and has been behind bars ever since his arrest, but he was housed in Cook County Jail during his trial and wasn’t moved here until after his conviction. So it’s possible he could have talked with someone then.”

  “And you think he hates you enough to go to all this trouble just for revenge?”

  “Hard to know. The fact that he’s willing to meet with me makes me think he’s still harboring a significant grudge.” He pauses and shrugs. “Maybe all he wants is a chance to tell me off one more time. I can get a better feel for where his head is at if I talk to him face-to-face. And I’d like to get your take on him, too. You have a good sense when it comes to sizing people up.”

  Corning returns as I’m basking beneath the glory of Hurley’s praise and says, “You’re in luck. Dilles has agreed to meet with the both of you. If you’ll follow me, I’ll take you to the visitors’ section.”

  Despite being behind bars, Quinton Dilles looks like money. His nails are well manicured, his hands are uncallused, and his body has a soft, spoiled look to it. His brown hair has grayed at the temples and though it is thinning on top, I can see plugs from a hair transplant. Despite being as tall as I am, he holds his head high, as if he needs to look down his nose at everyone. He’s wearing prison scrubs but if he wasn’t, I’m sure his clothing would be expensive tailored duds.