Polar (Book 1): Polar Night

by Julie Flanders

  “Anna is an athlete,” Marilyn said from behind him. “She runs cross-country.”

  Danny wondered if Marilyn would ever be able to refer to her daughter in the past tense. He knew all too well how difficult that was.

  “Do you mind if I look through her desk, Mrs. Alexander?”

  “Of course not. As I said, you’re more than welcome to look at anything. I’ll leave you to it.”

  Danny sat down on the Nanook cushion that lined the desk chair, and grabbed a pair of latex gloves out of his coat pocket. Regardless of how old this potential evidence was, the last thing he wanted to do was spoil it.

  Rifling through the top drawer of the desk, Danny found what he supposed was normal for any college age girl. Her cell phone, which was almost certainly her prized possession and had been searched by the same forensics team that had searched her laptop, photos of a smiling Anna with friends, ticket stubs from movies and concerts, and various pens and colored pencils all fought for space in the drawer. Danny found nothing of interest.

  He moved on to one of the side drawers and came upon notebooks with scribbled class notes mixed in with high school yearbooks and a few dog-eared paperbacks. It was apparent that Anna had not been a particularly organized person. Danny liked that about her. He opened another drawer and found a brown leather journal tied closed with a long strand of multi-colored yarn.

  Danny picked up the journal and gingerly removed the yarn. He opened the pages to reveal Anna’s flowery penmanship, full of exaggerated loops and crossbars. He didn’t remember anything in Cobman’s notes about a diary, but perhaps that was because he hadn’t believed it contained anything noteworthy. That was something Danny would need to decide for himself.

  He skimmed through the pages of Anna’s writings, reading about her cross country exploits and decision to try out for the swim team in the upcoming spring. He read about a former boyfriend she wished she hadn’t broken up with, and a professor who regularly put her to sleep. He was feeling a bit drowsy himself until he turned another page and a folded brochure fell out of the journal onto the carpet.

  Danny reached down and picked it up. The brochure was for the Snow Creek resort in Coldfoot, Alaska. Danny hadn’t heard of Coldfoot, but in his experience every town in the state deserved that name. He went back to Anna’s journal and read the page where the brochure had been tucked away.

  Monday, December 1, 2009

  Our Thanksgiving weekend in the Arctic was so much fun. I’m so glad I let Sara talk me in to going. What a crazy experience! We stayed at a haunted asylum and the guy who runs the place was so fucking hot. It was creepy as all hell but I’d go back in a minute just to see more of him. From there we went to Prudhoe Bay and...

  Danny stopped reading as his meeting with Nate Clancy flickered in his mind. Clancy had mentioned a trip he and Maria had taken to Prudhoe Bay over the Thanksgiving weekend. Could it really be a coincidence that Anna had taken the same trip a few weeks before she disappeared? He didn’t need to read more of Anna’s recollections to find out. He didn’t believe in those kinds of coincidences.

  As he’d been a detective long enough to know to never go to any sort of crime scene without being prepared, he pulled the evidence bag he had brought with him out of his pocked, and placed the journal and brochure inside it. He quickly perused the rest of the drawer but felt certain he’d already found the link he’d been looking for when he decided to visit the Alexander house.

  Danny removed his gloves and walked out of the bedroom to rejoin the Alexanders.

  “I need to bring this journal and brochure back to the station,” he said to Ted and Marilyn, who had risen from the couch the second Danny walked back into the living room.

  “Why?” Ted asked. “What have you found?”

  “I’m not sure,” Danny said, truthfully. “But I need to find out more about a trip your daughter took the Thanksgiving before she disappeared. Apparently she went up to the Arctic with friends. Do you remember this?”

  “Of course,” Marilyn said. “Anna had wanted to go to Prudhoe Bay and see the Arctic Ocean for ages. They also went to an old asylum in Coldfoot. Anna loved it there.”

  “That was the Snow Creek, right?” Danny asked.

  “Right. Why do you ask? Do you think someone on that trip had something to do with all this?”

  “I can’t say, Mrs. Alexander. I’m sorry,” Danny said. “But it’s something I’m going to look into more.”

  He walked to the door and grabbed his parka from the coat closet. “I need to get going,” he said.

  “But what’s going on?” Ted asked. “You can’t just walk out now without telling us anything.”

  “I don’t know if there’s anything to tell you. I’ll be back in touch as soon as I know something though, one way or the other. I promise.”

  “What the hell’s going on?”

  Danny zipped up his parka and stepped outside. “I hope I’ll have an answer for you soon. Thank you.”

  He ignored Ted’s repeated questions and got back into his car as quickly as possible. His pulse quickened as he started up his car and drove away from the Alexander home. He couldn’t wait to talk to Nate Clancy.

  Chapter 17

  “It’s no coincidence these two both went up to the Arctic before they disappeared, Tessa,” Danny said into his phone.

  “I’m not disagreeing with you. I’ll meet you at Clancy’s.”

  Danny turned the corner of Hampton Street and dropped the phone as his car started to fishtail in the snow. He straightened the vehicle, then grabbed his phone from the floor.

  “You still there?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Sorry, I dropped my phone.”

  “Why don’t you just put it on speaker?”

  “Because I hate that damn echo.” Danny cradled the phone on his shoulder and used both hands to steer his car through the snowy streets. “Anyway, you don’t have to meet me. It’s Christmas.”

  “I’m aware of that. But this is my case. You shouldn’t have to handle it on your own.”

  “There’s not a hell of a lot to handle right now. All I want to know is where Clancy and Maria went up there in the Arctic. There’s no reason for you to have your holiday screwed up.”

  It was obvious Tessa didn’t take much convincing. “Are you sure you don’t mind? And you’ll get back with me as soon as you talk to Clancy?”

  “What, are you worried I’m going to steal your case?”

  “No, no, it’s not that…”

  Danny interrupted. “Kidding. I’ll get back to you, I promise. And no, I don’t mind.”

  He tossed the phone onto his passenger seat, and focused on driving. If he wasn’t careful, he’d end up in a ditch before he ever got anywhere near Nate Clancy.

  Relieved when he finally got to Clancy’s house, he parked his car and once again trudged through a snow-covered sidewalk. His already cold feet turned freezing, and wet. He really needed a better pair of boots.

  Just as Ted Alexander had, Nate opened his front door before Danny had a chance to ring the bell.

  “Detective Fitzpatrick,” he said. “What are you doing here?”

  “What are you, psychic? How’d you know I was out here?”

  “I was walking past my front window and saw you get out of your car. What is it? Have you found Maria?”

  Danny shook his head. “Wish I could say I have, but no. I just need to ask you some more questions.”

  “On Christmas Day?”

  “Criminals don’t take holidays.”

  Nate’s face turned red. “I know, I’m sorry. It’s just that I was about to leave for my parents’ house…”

  Danny held up his hand. “I won’t take up too much of your time.” He shivered as a gust of wind blew across the porch. “But can I please come inside? I’m freezing my ass off out here.”

  Nate held the door open and stepped aside to give Danny room. “Of course. Please, come in.”

  He walked ahea
d, and led Danny into his sparse but stylish living room. He motioned for Danny to have a seat on his black leather couch. “Make yourself comfortable,” he said.

  Danny sat down and slid out of his parka while Nate took a seat on a black recliner. He didn’t recline, but instead sat forward in his chair, his posture tense.

  “What questions do you have?” Nate asked.

  “I need to know exactly where you and Maria went when you visited Prudhoe Bay last month.”

  “You mean, our hotel? That’s easy. There’s only one there.”

  “What is it?”

  “The Reindeer Inn.”

  Danny resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the name. “Alright, what else did you do there? What about restaurants? Tourist attractions?”

  “The tourist attraction is going to the Arctic Ocean, and seeing the oilfields. That’s it, honestly.”

  “Restaurants?”

  “The Reindeer Restaurant is connected to the Inn. We ate there.”

  “So you went all the way up there to see the ocean and some oil drills?”

  “I told you I wasn’t thrilled about the trip.”

  “What about Coldfoot? Did you go to Coldfoot? A place called Snow Creek?”

  Nate nodded. “That’s where the tours stop on their way to Prudhoe Bay. We stayed overnight there. That’s the old psychiatric hospital I told you about. It’s a tourist attraction now, that’s where we stayed. The asylum is a hotel now and there’s a restaurant there, too. We went on the haunted tour with the guy that owns the place. I think his name was Alex, or Alexi, something like that.”

  Danny remembered Anna’s excited ramblings about the “hot” owner of the asylum.

  “Was he good looking?” he asked.

  Nate shrugged. “I didn’t exactly notice. But Maria thought he was. She teased me about it, said since I was being such a grump that maybe she’d just dump me for the Snow Creek guy.”

  “Did she have a lot of interaction with him?”

  “Not really. He just took us on the tour of the place.”

  Danny put his hands on his knees and stood up, anxious to get going and find out more about this asylum and its caretaker. He knew he was on the trail of something now, he could feel it. And it wasn’t going to end with a crazy woman and a vampire tale.

  “Thank you; this is just what I needed.”

  Nate stood up next to him. “You think that guy or somebody else up there in the Arctic had something to do with Maria going missing?”

  “I don’t know, and I couldn’t tell you even if I did.”

  “Will you let me know if you find anything out about her?”

  He was talking to Danny’s back, as Danny had pulled on his parka and walked to the front door before Nate could finish his question.

  “You know I will. Merry Christmas to you.”

  Danny returned to his car and felt a surge of adrenalin that was even better than coffee for curing his hangover. He couldn’t wait to call Tessa and share the news. And most of all, he couldn’t wait to take his own trip up to Coldfoot and Prudhoe Bay.

  Chapter 18

  “Danny, you can’t go up there by yourself,” Tessa said.

  “I’m not going by myself. Do you think I’m crazy? I’m meeting Sergeant Yazzie at the airport. He’s the lucky stiff who gets to be my back-up.” Danny struggled to hold his phone, drive, and look at his directions to the airport all at the same time. He thought back to the day he bought his Subaru after deciding to stay in Fairbanks. Why the hell hadn’t he bought the model that had the built-in gps?

  “But it’s dark. You should wait until tomorrow.”

  “It’s dark almost 24/7 in this god-forsaken place. I could be going at two in the afternoon and it would still be dark. What the hell difference does it make?”

  “I’ll come with you too.”

  “No, no, no. I don’t want you walking out in the middle of your Christmas party. I already told you, I’m fine with doing this.”

  “But…”

  “I’m not talking about it anymore,” Danny said. “I’m almost to the airport and I still need to call Judge Shriver and get my warrant approved. On top of all that, I have to figure out where to find my charter.”

  “This seems dangerous. What about the snow?”

  “I checked with the pilot when I made the arrangements. He said Coldfoot is fine. We’re not going to Prudhoe Bay today because he doesn’t think he can land in the weather up there right now. But I don’t really care because I know it’s the Coldfoot place we’re interested in.”

  Danny pulled around the back of the airport and found the Arctic Charters hanger.

  “I’m here now,” he said. “I’ll call you when I get back to Fairbanks.”

  “Call me from Coldfoot if you learn anything interesting.”

  “Demanding, aren’t we?”

  “Well I just..”

  “I’m kidding,” Danny said. “If I have a signal, I’ll call you. Hell, I’ll call you during the ride up if it would make you feel better to hear my voice.”

  “That would mean the world to me. In fact, it would make my whole Christmas.”

  Danny chuckled and ended the call. He paused and searched his contacts for the number of Judge Anthony Shriver. He knew Shriver wouldn’t be thrilled about having his holiday interrupted, but Danny couldn’t have cared less. Life was tough like that sometimes. He leaned back against his headrest, noticing Teriaq Yazzie pulling up beside him in his battered black pick-up truck. He gestured for Yazzie that he would be with him in a minute and waited for Judge Shriver to answer his phone.

  Chapter 19

  A few hours later, Danny was on the ground in Coldfoot, grateful to have Teriaq Yazzie as company. With the exception of Tessa, Danny hadn’t bothered to get to know anyone in the Fairbanks police well, but he still liked what little he knew about Yazzie. The man seemed to abhor idle chitchat and was typically quite reserved, a quality Danny very much appreciated. What’s more, Yazzie encouraged the non-native members of the department to call him Terry instead of his Inuit name Teriaq. Something else Danny greatly appreciated, as it had taken no time in Alaska at all for him to discover that he was hopeless when it came to pronouncing the words of the native tribes.

  Danny and Terry shivered as they made their way from the hanger to their waiting driver. Danny knew he shouldn’t have been surprised, but the temperature was so low it made Fairbanks seem warm. And, he had to wonder what the conditions must be in Prudhoe Bay if his pilot had considered them unsafe, but had no issue with landing in Coldfoot. Danny’s hands still ached from gripping the passenger seat as the plane landed in what he would call a blizzard.

  The pilot had seemed completely unfazed, and so did their driver, Doug Matheson. Matheson had agreed to drive him to the Snow Creek asylum in his 4X4 Ford truck. Danny was glad to see the truck had studded snow tires when he got inside. He may not be used to Alaska but, as a Chicagoan, he still knew what it took to drive in heavy snow.

  “It won’t take us long to get to Snow Creek,” Matheson said, as Danny settled in next to him and Terry took the truck’s rear seat. “It doesn’t take long to get anywhere in Coldfoot. You go too long and you’re out of here and on your way to Prudhoe Bay.”

  “I gathered that from looking at the map,” Danny said. “Not much of a town.”

  “Not a town at all, really. Used to be a gold mining camp, did you know that?”

  Terry likely did, but he stared straight ahead out the front window without responding, all but ignoring Matheson’s chatter.

  “No,” Danny said.

  “Yeah, that’s how it got its start. The miners gave Coldfoot its name, for obvious reasons.”

  “How’d you end up here?”

  “I used to drive through here all the time on the Highway, I was a trucker. Got sick of driving and decided to stick around here. I like living in the middle of nowhere.”

  Danny nodded. “I can see the advantages.”

  Matheson
chuckled and pulled up next to a building that looked more like a military prison than a tourist attraction. Danny noticed the sign in the front.

  “This is Snow Creek?” he asked.

  “The one and only,” Matheson said. “You heard all the ghost stories about this place?”

  “I heard it’s supposed to be haunted.”

  “Yeah. Aleksei milks that for all it’s worth.”

  “Aleksei?”

  “Guy who owns Snow Creek. He’s the one that renovated it and re-opened it. Before that, this place had been empty for decades.”

  Danny remembered Nate Clancy mentioning a guy he thought was named Alex. “So this Aleksei gives tours of the asylum, right?”

  “Right. Big tourist thing. People love it.”

  “He’s the one we need to talk to.” Danny started to get out of the car, and paused. He glanced towards Matheson. “You sure you don’t mind waiting out here? It’s freezing.”

  Matheson shook his head. “I don’t mind at all. I’ll keep the heater running if you guys take too long.” He held up a paperback. “And I’ve got a book to read. So take all the time you need.”

  Danny nodded and slipped on the snowshoes that Terry had brought for him. Danny never would have thought of the shoes himself, and he really had no idea how to walk in them, but he assumed he’d figure it out. It couldn’t be that hard.

  “Thanks,” he said to Matheson as he got out of the car and shut the door. Terry had already exited the rear and was gliding across the snow as gracefully as if he was on skis.

  Danny’s progress was much more plodding, but eventually he got the hang of his shoes and headed towards the Snow Creek entrance. Noticing a small bungalow that had been added on to the original building, Danny wondered if their arrival had already been noted by the bungalow’s inhabitant. There was a light on, and Danny thought he saw a face in the window.

  Relieved to find the Snow Creek door open, the two cops walked inside to the lobby. It was dark, and no one seemed to be working at the front desk. Terry saw a buzzer attached to the desk, and pressed it.