by Stacy Green
“What about Bailey?”
“They wouldn’t let me talk to him.”
Nikki glanced up from her notes. “John was home?”
“Took the rest of the week off,” Miller said. “I asked if he’d be willing to get fingerprints done so we could rule him out for Janelle’s murder. Slammed the door in my face. And we don’t have enough evidence to obtain his fingerprints if he doesn’t want to give them up.”
“Whoever tortured Madison hated her,” Liam said. “And so far we don’t know anyone who did.”
“John Banks is the common denominator between the three victims,” Nikki said. “And I don’t trust Amy’s story. She’s already lost her child. I think she’d do anything to keep the rest of her family together, and that includes convincing herself John is innocent.”
“But what’s John’s motive for killing Madison and Kaylee?” Liam asked. “It’s got to be more than just the threat of exposing his affairs. One of them must have had something so strong on him he felt trapped. And he takes it out on Madison, because he feels betrayed.”
“Why let her freeze to death and suffer?” Nikki said. “Even if he’s angry enough to kill her, it’s hard to imagine him wanting her to suffer that badly.”
“She may have been unconscious when he put her into the freezer,” Miller said. “Maybe he thought she’d just slip away peacefully.”
“Or he’s a selfish, sadistic asshole.” Liam rested his elbows on the table and looked at Nikki. “We know he approached Kaylee at the bar during the summer. What if he was having a relationship with her? He might not be the same person you knew twenty years ago.”
Nikki glared at him. “I know exactly who he is, Liam. Head back into the city and pay a visit to Roan Pharmaceuticals. Take your time and talk to the people who work closely with John and try to figure out how they really feel about him. The company CEO is a major Vikings supporter. Attends training camp, has his own box, has dinner with the owner. Football’s your in. Show them pictures of all three girls—see if anyone recognizes them.”
“You’re the boss.” Liam grabbed his things and hurried out of the room.
Miller cleared his throat. “He didn’t say it very well, but I understand his point.”
“So do I.” Nikki glanced at her watch. She had thirty minutes to make her appointment. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“You sure you’re all right, Agent Hunt? If you need to talk about anything—”
“I’m just tired, like everyone else.”
And it was time to stop running from her past.
Thirty-Five
Nikki checked her coat and bag at the front gate of Oak Park Heights. She’d locked her gun and wallet in the car. After the metal detector showed she wasn’t hiding any other weapons on her person, the guard put her things in a locker.
In her early days with the Behavioral Analysis Unit, Nikki had the distinct honor of being the only junior agent chosen to attend prison interviews with serial predators. Every visit reaffirmed Nikki’s lifelong belief that schools really were like prison. Oak Park Heights had only the essential architecture, with white walls and the speckled beige floors she remembered from middle school. Stairwells provided a pop of green, but the next floor featured the exact same design. The only thing that changed was the security level. Despite Mark Todd’s incarceration for double homicide, good behavior over the past two decades had earned him a cell in the lower-security area on the first floor.
She followed the guard past the cell block and down a wide hall that led to a common area.
“I heard the resort killer writes to you from prison,” the guard said; his gruff voice made the question sound more like an accusation, but Nikki gave him a pass on manners. Prison guards had one of the hardest jobs in law enforcement.
“Every once in a while,” Nikki confirmed.
“Think you’ll ever catch Frost? I heard he’s very smart.”
“He’ll make a mistake one day. They always do.”
The guard stopped at an open door. “We’ve never had a problem with this guy, but I’ll be out here. The door is unlocked. I’ve been told that thirty minutes is the most I can give you.”
“Thanks.” Her hands were clammy and sweat dampened the back of her neck, but there was no turning back now. She held her head high and walked into the room.
Mark Todd stood as she approached, a nervous smile on his face. He looked the same as Nikki remembered, but he’d gained twenty pounds of muscle and a head of gray hair. Nikki could see a prison tattoo covered part of his thick forearm. “I couldn’t believe it when they told me you were here,” he said. Nikki’s heartbeat accelerated at his friendliness. He made eye contact easily, showing her that while he was nervous, he wasn’t intimidated.
She pulled a chair a little bit away from the table and sat down. “What does the blue uniform signify?” Nikki asked, trying to start the conversation off lightly. She was used to seeing prisoners in orange uniforms, but she was often visiting the most violent of them.
“My job. I work in welding. Got my associate’s for it in here.” Minnesota’s prison education program was among the best in the nation, and the state had experienced a small but consistent drop in repeat offenders among those who earned a certificate or degree, but Nikki was surprised Mark had done this. “I’m going to work for Rory when I get out.” He spoke softly, as though trying to explain himself carefully.
“He’s very loyal to you,” Nikki replied.
Mark nodded, running a hand through his short, gray hair. “You’re the big-time, huh?” he said, motioning at her badge.
“I’m just an FBI agent.”
“Not what I’ve heard,” Mark replied. “You know gossip travels faster in prison than it does in high schools. Couple guys you’ve arrested said you’re relentless. One said you mind-fucked him—his words. He called you an ice-cold bitch.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Use some vitamin E on that or it might scar.” The concern in his eyes was unsettling.
Nikki pulled her hair over her ear to cover the still aching welt. “You should have your attorney here. The security camera doesn’t record audio.”
Mark shrugged. “I trust you.”
What was it with the Todd men and trust? Nikki thought.
Nikki set her phone on the table and turned on the voice notes app. “I want this on the record. I’m protecting myself. Rory said I needed to ask you about the party,” she began. “He said he wouldn’t tell me himself, that it’s your story to tell.”
“Sounds like Rory.” Mark nodded. “Do you remember drinking and then going to sleep it off? And then waking up to what you thought was me attacking you.”
Nikki’s nightmares had returned in full force over the last few days, but they were longer this time, with hazy images she never made out. Nikki was afraid the murky images from her decades-old nightmares had been trying to tell her something she didn’t want to know. “Yes, but I’ve only recently been made aware that I can’t trust what I saw. I was told I was sober enough…”
Mark ran his hands over his face. “I can’t believe no one’s told the truth in twenty years.”
“Mark, what is it you think I need to know?”
Mark sighed. “You were out cold. Like a limp doll and John was laughing and trying to wake you up. He tossed you over his shoulder and carried you down the hall. Before he shut the door, he sticks out his tongue and gives everyone in the room this look. He comes out ten minutes later and asks if anyone wants to have a turn with you.”
Nikki’s damp hands slipped on the metal chair.
“He said you wouldn’t wake up for a while. He’d taken your clothes off and you didn’t even flinch. We didn’t believe him at first, but he had a Polaroid camera, and there were… pictures.”
The sound of the Polaroid camera ejecting a picture had been the odd buzzing noise that haunted her dreams for so long. Such a distinct sound, and yet Nikki had never allowed her
self to recognize it. Did John still have the pictures he’d taken of her?
“Did he… do anything to me?” Nikki gripped the side of the chair.
“He said he didn’t, but he wanted to see what happened if someone else tried. I convinced them that I’d known you the longest so I should get to go first.”
“You did what?”
“It was me or John’s buddies, who all seemed to think it was a great idea. I had to play along, so I locked the door and said I was going to take my time. Then I started trying to wake you up. Every now and then, you would mumble something, but I couldn’t get you coherent. I went to pick you up so I could sneak us out of the window. John started knocking and yelling. Then you started screaming, and I went over to tell you it was all right, and your eyes opened and you thought…”
Nikki hadn’t had vodka in years, but she tasted it now, her senses overloading. “Why would you do that?”
“Because it was the right thing to do. I should have had the guts to stand up to him in front of his friends and call the cops instead of trying to hide from him. Anyway, you know what happened after that. John kicked my ass and I ran.”
“His friends never—”
Vodka vomit on the grass. Shouts and laughter. John’s angry voice rising above the others.
Nikki had been so angry, screaming at John. Had she smacked him? Or someone else?
“His friends had his back and covered their own asses, but they never touched you,” Mark said. “I was at your house that night because I wanted to tell you what happened, even if you didn’t believe me. I wanted you to know what John was really like.” Mark shook his head. “I made a mistake waiting until you came home. I didn’t care what you thought about me, but I wanted to make sure you were safe. I waited in your old barn, but I’d been hurt pretty badly by John and I passed out. The gunshots woke me up. I had to bust the glass in your front door to get inside. I heard her crying.” He paused. “I’m sorry.”
Nikki’s heart was in her mouth thinking of her mother, but she had to keep going; this was just another interview, just another suspect. “I’m fine,” she said, and Mark nodded.
“I ran up the stairs and found your mom. She was bleeding from her side, but she was still alive. I tried to stop the bleeding and stepped in the blood. It must have got her lung because she was spitting up blood and trying to talk.”
Nikki tamped the image of her mother down and focused on Mark. “What was she saying?”
“I couldn’t understand her, but I think she was trying to warn me he was still in the room. He came up from behind me and hit me in the head. I woke up with the gun in my hand. Back of my head was busted open. I went downstairs to find the phone. Then you came inside.”
“Did you touch anything?”
“Downstairs? Probably. My head was ringing, and I couldn’t walk straight.”
Just as she’d feared. His blood trail had never been mentioned, much less photographed for evidence.
“What motive would I have for killing your parents?” Mark said.
“You wanted to punish me for what happened at the party.” Nikki felt like she was coming apart from the inside. It’s the motive she’d held onto for years. “You climbed in the window I’d left open.”
“There wasn’t a stitch of trace evidence linking me to your room because I wasn’t in it. My DNA isn’t going to be on the clothes that are being tested.”
“If that happened with John at the party, why didn’t you say something to the cops?”
“I did,” Mark said. “But Hardin didn’t believe me, said I tried to take advantage of a girl blitzed out of her mind. I knew he wouldn’t listen, since I’d been with his wife. Dumbest mistake of my life. After John’s friends backed him up, I knew I had nothing. I was just a kid, Nikki.”
“What were their names?”
“Who?”
“His friends?”
“I don’t remember their names, but I told Hardin who they were. They should be in the file.”
Nikki was almost certain they weren’t. Her head was swimming with all this new information, but for the first time she trusted what she was being told. And she was sitting across from an innocent man she’d helped to convict. Her family hadn’t been the only one destroyed that night.
“Do you think it’s possible John put something in my drink?”
“I’ve never seen anyone that out of it after a few drinks. So unless you were drinking straight vodka…”
“I wasn’t.” Drinking that much would have likely caused alcohol poisoning and she certainly wouldn’t have woken up quickly, but if her drink had been spiked with liquid ecstasy, the effects wouldn’t last nearly as long. Depending on the dosage, the drug could have started wearing off after a couple of hours. But it still would have shown up in her tox screen. “You told Hardin that, didn’t you?”
Mark nodded. “He told me I was a pathetic liar.”
Anger coursed through her. Ever since Rory told her about the paramedic’s statement, she’d wondered why John would bother to drug her since they were already having sex.
Now she had the answer. He’d offered her to his buddies and planned to take pictures. Liam was right. He was a sadistic son-of-a-bitch. And Mark Todd was sitting in prison for a crime he didn’t commit.
And if Mark didn’t kill her parents, she could think of only one other person with reason to come to her house—the same person Nadine heard racing down the gravel road.
Nikki couldn’t help but wonder if the photos of her were the ones that Bailey found. If Amy had seen them. That’s why she’d automatically hated Nikki.
Nikki stopped the recording and stood on weak legs. The guilt threatened to overwhelm her but wallowing in pity wasn’t going to help Mark. “Thanks for talking with me, Mark.”
“You know I didn’t do this, don’t you?”
Nikki could only nod. Mark was telling the goddamned truth.
Thirty-Six
Nikki didn’t remember driving back to Stillwater or even making the decision not to go home. She wasn’t sure she could have hidden her rage from anybody. Her stomach growled and she couldn’t remember when she had last eaten, but she wasn’t staying long, and then she’d treat herself to some greasy fast food before going back to St. Paul.
Rock salt littered the sidewalk and porch as she walked up to Rory’s house, but a fine sheen of ice still made the short walk treacherous. The curtain in the front window fluttered and the front door opened before she even had a chance to knock.
“What are you doing here?” Rory’s hair was slightly wild, like he’d been running his hands through it. His thin white T-shirt revealed several tattoos on his upper arms.
“I honestly don’t know,” she said and he opened the door to let her step inside.
An acoustic guitar was propped against the far wall. An eighties movie played on the muted television. Beige carpet, chocolate-colored furniture, a few pictures on the wall.
Common sense told her she shouldn’t be in the house, that she should have made her way back to work to find out what was going on, but it was too late for Nikki to speak to her team and Rory made her feel safe—even if Nikki had no clue why she was so terrified. Maybe it was because for the first time in her life she was facing up to what had happened to her.
This was the house Mark and Rory had grown up in. Nikki had been inside more than once, usually when Mark’s parents were already asleep and he brought three or four friends back after a party. They raided the refrigerator, and Mark’s dad always woke up and said that no one was driving if they’d been drinking. Nikki lived close enough to walk home, but plenty of kids had crashed in the Todds’ living room over the years.
“You want a drink?” Rory asked.
“Just water.” She followed him into the small kitchen. It looked just as she remembered, right down to the old flowered wallpaper and butcher-block counters.
Nikki took the bottled water he offered and sat down at the table. What was she do
ing at this man’s house, invading his life? It was selfish of her. If she wanted company, she had Tyler.
“What are you thinking?”
“That things have become a colossal shitshow.”
Rory sipped his beer. “Your investigation?”
“Everything. I went to see Mark.” He looked at her, surprised. “You’re right. He didn’t do it.”
Rory stared at her for several long seconds before draining his beer. The intensity in his eyes was so intimidating she looked away. “What exactly convinced you?”
How could she explain it without sounding like a stubborn fool? she wondered. “I’ve always thought of a murder investigation as a kind of patchwork quilt,” she started. “You don’t know the pattern at the beginning, but as the pieces come together, the pattern finds itself. It’s the clear way to make the quilt. That why cases built on strong circumstantial evidence get people convicted.”
“And the pattern in Mark’s case?”
“It’s a fucking mess. It doesn’t make sense that they were able to get him convicted. And Mark… I earn my living by understanding human behavior. I know a manipulative liar when I see one, and I didn’t see that in him.” Nikki swallowed the stupid sob working its way up her throat. “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t,” Rory said. “I wanted to hate you. Hell, I have hated you, even though Mark never blamed you, I did—”
“I can never make it up to your family.”
“We don’t want you to,” Rory said. “Not long ago, I would have said the opposite. But going through all of this with Mark and his attorneys helped me to understand that Mark was right about you being a victim.”
“Hardin told me this week, when the paper came out, that he had no idea I was under the influence. Shamed me for possibly putting the conviction in jeopardy. But he knew, because he knew what happened at the party. Mark told him what John tried to do to me. And I think he drugged me, just like Mark told Hardin that night.”