by Bell, David
“What’s going on now?” her dad said.
“She found something, Dad. Something about Justin.”
He didn’t say anything. He just looked even more confused.
Ashleigh drank the entire glass of water and took two deep breaths. “I’m okay,” she said. “Really. I’m sorry.” She looked around the room at everybody. “I just kind of lost it for a minute. It’s been a crazy day.”
“It’s okay,” Kevin said. “We don’t care.”
“Why don’t you just tell us what happened, honey?” Janet said. “Start from the beginning. You said you found something out about Justin…”
“I didn’t find something out,” Ashleigh said, her voice, even in this time of great stress, still laced with the contempt only a teenage daughter can have for her mother. “I found him. He’s alive.”
A stillness fell over the room. Janet moved over to the couch and sat down next to Ashleigh. She took the girl’s hand in her own. “Why don’t you tell me about it?”
Ashleigh looked around the room at the other expectant and curious faces. Janet could read her mind—cop, emotionally distant grandfather, friend, and mother. Did she really want to tell the story to this eclectic cast? But Ashleigh had always been a brave girl. Not particularly effusive or outgoing, not always even warm. But she was brave. So Janet watched as her daughter took another deep breath and said, “Remember that guy who came to the door in the middle of the night?”
Janet felt her mouth fall open. “How do you know about that?”
“I saw it. I heard you talking to him, so I came downstairs and saw the whole thing. I looked at him carefully and remembered him.”
“And you found that man?” Janet asked.
“He’s Uncle Justin,” Ashleigh said.
“Hold on a minute,” Stynes said. “I’m a step behind here.”
“Me, too,” her dad said.
And Janet saw the trap she herself had stepped into. In order for Ashleigh to tell her story, Janet was going to have to admit the secret she’d been holding back from the police, in particular Detective Stynes. Rather than let Ashleigh stroll through that minefield alone, Janet stepped forward.
“Okay,” she said. “I think I need to provide a little background about this, before Ashleigh goes on.”
So she did. She told Stynes and her father about the visit in the middle of the night by the man claiming that Justin’s death hadn’t happened the way everyone thought it did. She told them that she’d wanted to call the police, but the man told her not to, so she didn’t.
“Did he threaten you?” Stynes asked.
“No, he didn’t,” Janet said. “I mean, not directly. He may have been coming around the house other times. During the night.”
“During the night?” her dad said.
“Just let me explain,” Janet said.
Janet went on to tell them about the months she’d waited for the man to come back—and that he finally did come back, just a few days ago on campus. But the man refused to say who he was or what he really wanted.
“He just said we knew each other in the past and that he knew something about Justin’s death. Something that no one else knew about the way it happened.” Janet swallowed. She felt the eyes on her, especially Stynes and her dad. “I have to be honest. Ever since that first night he showed up here, I’ve had a…wish, I guess you would call it. No—more than that. A belief is what I think it is.”
“A belief about what?” her dad said.
His voice surprised Janet. It was unlike him to speak up about something so deeply personal in front of people he didn’t really know.
But could she really say he felt anything about Justin deeply? Did he?
She looked at her dad when she spoke. “I’ve started to believe that he is Justin. That Justin is still alive, and he didn’t die in the park that day. And now he’s back.”
Her father simply looked away. He turned his eyes to the floor and didn’t speak.
It was Stynes who filled the quiet space.
“Leaving aside the question, for now, of why your mother didn’t call the police and notify us about this man,” he said, “I’m curious to know how you, Ashleigh, came to believe that this man is your uncle. Did he tell you this?”
“I went to his house—”
“You went to his house?” Janet said.
The gust of fear that swept through Janet in that split second almost forced her to reach out and grab hold of Ashleigh, tuck her into her arms, and hold her tight. Her daughter, out in the world, chasing after a strange man. A man who’d made Janet uneasy in a bright, public place. No matter who he was, the thought of Ashleigh’s exposure to the man, her vulnerability in such close proximity to him—or someone like him—terrified Janet.
But she swallowed the fear, and the impulse to grab her daughter. She listened, her hands clenched in her lap, while Ashleigh told the story of tracing the man through the comic store and the restaurant he worked at to the first apartment complex and then the ratty apartment complex a few miles away.
“He says his name is Steven Kollman,” Ashleigh said. “That’s the name everyone knew him by.”
Stynes looked at Janet. She read the look on his face. Does that name mean anything to you?
Janet’s mind swirled. Did it? Was there familiarity there? Or was it like the man’s face—a place she saw familiarity because she wanted to?
Janet shook her head.
“How did you come to decide this man was your uncle if he used another name?” Stynes asked.
Ashleigh looked over at Kevin. Something passed between them, an unspoken understanding. Kevin nodded his head to Ashleigh. Go ahead, he was telling her. It’s okay.
Janet’s clenched fists grew tighter while Ashleigh spoke of going into the abandoned apartment. She heard the words about the court summons with Justin’s name on it, but when Ashleigh told the next part of her story, the part about the man’s hands on her body—touching her, groping her, assaulting her, for the love of God—Janet felt a sharp pain at the base of her neck. She placed her hand back there and rubbed.
It’s okay, she told herself. You raised a strong girl. You raised a fighter.
And she did. Janet saw the hint of pride on Ashleigh’s face as she talked about fighting the man off, kicking him, punching him. That’s my girl, Janet wanted to say, but knew it would only embarrass her daughter. But she felt it. That is my girl, the fighter.
“Detective,” Janet said. “I trust that whatever else happens the police will be paying a visit to this pervert’s apartment.”
“Of course,” Stynes said, but he was clearly more interested in Ashleigh’s story about Justin. “You didn’t see anything else? Pictures, other mail? Anything?”
“That’s all. I wish I’d held on to the letter,” Ashleigh said, sounding almost apologetic. “If only I’d kept it.”
“That’s fine, Ashleigh,” Stynes said. “You did fine.”
“I guess that’s why I cried when I walked up here,” Ashleigh said. “I knew I’d found something important.” She looked at Janet, this time without the contempt or averted eyes that were the moody teen’s trademark. “I knew it was important to you, Mom. I was happy and sad at the same time. It was everything all mixed up.”
Janet couldn’t play it cool any longer. The emotion took control of her. She leaned in and took her daughter in her arms, wrapped her up the way she wanted to—not out of fear or anxiety, but out of pure, unadulterated love and appreciation for this girl.
“The detective’s right, Ashleigh,” Janet said. “You did do good. I love you, and I’m glad you’re safe.” She held on. “You’re a sweet, crazy girl.”
“It’s okay, Mom. Jeez.”
But Ashleigh’s voice, even muffled by Janet’s hug, didn’t sound annoyed or exasperated. She took the warmth and let her mom hold her as long as she wanted.
Chapter Twenty-seven
Stynes didn’t know what to think. He had come to the Man
ning home to investigate a loose end from twenty-five years ago. Why had there been a contradiction between the account of Manning’s whereabouts given by his wife and the account given by Manning himself? Was Bill Manning home that morning or not?
It had come up twenty-five years earlier, as he and Reynolds investigated the case. They had talked about it at length. In the end, Reynolds had told Stynes to let it go, to not worry about a small and understandable contradiction in one person’s story when there was enough evidence to convict someone else, someone much more likely to have committed the crime. Someone the wrong color, Stynes realized…
But there Stynes sat, still inside the Manning house, and Ashleigh Manning, a fifteen-year-old girl, had revealed what might just be the smoking gun.
Was Justin Manning still alive?
Stynes looked around the room and saw Bill Manning turn and leave. He disappeared down a hallway, probably toward a bedroom or bathroom. Overwhelmed? By guilt, or something else?
First things first, Stynes thought. Easiest thing first. He pulled out his phone and called in the assault on Ashleigh Manning committed by the apartment manager.
“You don’t know the creep’s name, do you?” Stynes asked Ashleigh.
“Nick something,” she said, then went on to give a solid description all the way down to the scent of his breath. Stynes also requested a crime scene unit be sent to the apartment formerly occupied by Steven Kollman/Justin Manning. He asked for prints to be taken and any evidence that remained to be tagged and inventoried. When asked if a warrant was in order, Stynes said, “The guy didn’t pay his rent and vacated the premises. We don’t need a warrant. Tell them I’ll meet them there in a little bit. And I need you to run two names for me.” He gave them the names of the two men he was—might be—pursuing. The two ghosts who were now permanent residents of his brain. Steven Kollman and Justin Manning. “Anything that pops, let me know.”
He put the phone away and sat in the chair Bill Manning had occupied earlier, back when Stynes believed in his gut the man was involved with the death of his own son.
And now?
He couldn’t believe that Justin Manning was still alive after all these years. He’d watched them remove the kid’s body from the woods, saw the skeletal remains and the wisps of blond hair still attached to the skull.
“Janet, can you tell me anything else this man said to you? Anything at all?”
He watched Janet think, her hand still clutching her daughter’s. “He told me that he lived in Dove Point, and he didn’t like it,” she said. “He said he was taken away from his family—he definitely said that. That’s one of the things that made me think he was Justin. Somebody took him away from his family.” She lifted her free hand to her chest. “My God, where has he been all these years? Has he been lost or homeless? I asked him if he needed help when I saw him on campus. He looked a little…ragged or dirty, I guess. Not dirty like he didn’t have a place to live, but just like he’s had a rough time. If it was Justin…he was there, right there in front of me.”
“But he didn’t tell you he was your brother?” Stynes asked.
Color rose in Janet’s cheeks. “I did something weird,” she said. “I called him ‘Justin.’ When he started to leave, I called out that name to see how he would respond.”
“And?” Stynes asked.
“He said something like, ‘Not yet.’ Whatever that means.”
Ashleigh looked at her mom and said, “So maybe he’s going to tell you soon. Maybe he can’t right now.”
“Why would he not be able to?” Janet asked. “Does someone want to hurt him?”
“Was there anything else, Janet?” Yes, Stynes was more involved with this case than any other. He could admit that to himself. Then all the more reason to remain sharp, to not let the emotion of the Mannings possess him and interfere with finding out what he needed to learn. “Anything he said or did that might be pertinent?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did he talk about anything from your childhood? Did he ask about your parents or other family members?”
Janet swallowed. She lowered her voice. “He said his mother was dead. And that his father didn’t care about him.”
Even Stynes felt a chill on his neck when he heard that. The room grew quiet. Someone needed to break the tension, and to his credit, the kid, Kevin, did.
“Detective?” he said.
Stynes looked up.
“Didn’t you do a DNA test on the body you found in the woods back then? Or something?”
“We didn’t do DNA testing back then. I know it’s hard for you kids to understand, but it just didn’t exist.”
Ashleigh said, “I always hear about bodies being checked with dental X-rays.”
“Your uncle was so young when he died that he’d never had dental X-rays taken.”
“Then how did you know it was him?” Ashleigh asked.
Stynes resisted the urge to tell the two teenagers to keep their mouths shut and quit bothering the grown-ups. But they were right. People were going to be asking the same types of questions once the news broke. And it would break. Yes, it would.
“Justin disappeared from that park,” he said. “We found the body of a child in the woods near that park. The remains were the same approximate age and size as Justin Manning. We had a suspect. We had witnesses, including Janet here. That’s how we make a case.”
But the words didn’t ring true as they came out of Stynes’s mouth. He felt like an actor reading from a script he thought was terribly written. None of it made sense. None of it at all, unless Stynes believed that this Kollman/Manning guy was just a nutjob who wanted to harass the family of a crime victim.
But Stynes had never heard of such elaborate manipulation. If the guy was just a nut, he was so far out there the scale would need to be recalibrated.
Stynes stood up. “I have to go. We’re going to head over to this Kollman guy’s apartment, see if there’s anything else we can use to help establish his real identity. I suspect he doesn’t mean to do any of you any harm. If he wanted to, he would have done so already. But I’m going to ask the officers who patrol around here to keep a special eye on this house. You never know. At the very least, he’s probably guilty of harassment and identity theft. If he comes around, call us.”
Janet looked at Stynes. “What if he needs our help?” she asked. “Are you saying I should not have contact with the man who might be my brother?”
“I’m asking you to be careful, Janet. Just be careful.”
“Detective?” Janet said.
“Yes?”
“The other day with the reporter and then tonight—I was right, wasn’t I?”
“About what?”
“You don’t think Dante did it.”
Stynes couldn’t lie. But he wasn’t ready to admit anything because too many things were coming at him at once.
“Let’s just say, things appear to be in a state of flux right now. And do me a favor? Keep the doors locked. And if anything happens after I’m gone, make sure you share it with me this time.”
Chapter Twenty-eight
Janet went down the hall to the closed door of her father’s bedroom. Everyone else had left—Stynes to pursue evidence against both the man who’d assaulted Ashleigh and the man who might be Justin, Kevin back to his home and his family. Janet thought about leaving the old man alone, leaving him to stew in the bed-room with his own miserable thoughts, whatever they might be.
But she couldn’t just walk away from him. Something had changed, something profound. Justin might be alive. And in the wake of their earlier conversation, the one in which the darkest thoughts Janet had ever experienced about her father came to her mind, she felt a need to see her father’s face, to know how the news Ashleigh brought home affected him.
She heard the TV playing through the closed door. When she and Ashleigh had moved in, her dad had immediately gone out and bought his own television for the bedroom, something that allowed
him to retreat from the shared living space of the house and be alone. He’d done this with more and more frequency in the six months since he’d stopped actively looking for work. And until that night, Janet rarely disturbed him. She rapped lightly, expecting an immediate response. But none came.
She knocked louder.
“Dad?”
Still nothing.
She placed her hand on the knob but didn’t turn it. Even as a kid, she wouldn’t have gone into her parents’ room when the door was closed. She couldn’t bring herself to do it as an adult. And a part of her felt relief. If he wanted to lock himself away, that was his problem.
But she’d let him off the hook so many times, given him so much space just to make his life easier and less confrontational. And, Janet had to be honest, to make her life easier as well. She didn’t want to tap into whatever the old man was thinking, so she avoided it. But the time for avoidance was past.
She made a fist and used it like a club, rapping against the door. The volume on the TV dropped and the door opened. Her dad stood there, still dressed, but his hair mussed in the back.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I want to know what you think of all this now,” she demanded.
“Oh, Janet—”
“No, you can’t just turn away,” she said. “Tell me something about tonight. What do you think about the fact that Justin might still be alive? Just say something.”
“I think it’s unfortunate that all of this is stirring your fantasies,” he said.
He tried to close the door, but Janet put her hand out and stopped it.
“This isn’t going to go away, Dad. We’re in the middle of it now, and we’re going to know something. Finally. We can’t avoid it.”