Thief River Falls

by Brian Freeman

She tried to decide how much to tell him. To get answers without scaring him any more than he was. “I talked to a girl who was in one of the town cemeteries two nights ago. That was the night you came to my house. She says she saw someone in the cemetery, and she thought they were burying a body. I was just wondering if that stirs any memories for you. You know, like the boy in my book who was put underground.”

  His brow furrowed. “No.”

  “Nothing at all?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Lisa didn’t sense any deception from him this time. Purdue didn’t remember what had happened to him, and if he’d been injured—if someone had struck him—then the trauma had blacked out his memories. So maybe he’d been at the cemetery and maybe not. There was no way for her to be sure.

  “I’m going to say a few names to you,” Lisa said, “and I want you to tell me if you’ve ever heard any of these names before.”

  “Okay.”

  “Fiona Farrell.”

  Purdue shook his head. “No.”

  “What about Nick Loudon?”

  “No.”

  She hesitated. “Denis Farrell. What about him?”

  “I don’t know any of them. Who are they? What do they have to do with me?”

  “Well, I don’t think they had anything to do with you. Not until two nights ago. After that, I’m not so sure.” Lisa reached into her pocket for the photographs she’d taken from Fiona’s house. She took the wedding picture of Fiona and Nick, and she extended it to Purdue with her thumb covering Nick Loudon’s face.

  “How about this woman?” she asked. “Do you know her? Have you ever seen her before?”

  “No.”

  Lisa moved her thumb away from the photograph. “What about him?”

  Purdue’s face changed instantly. He squeezed his eyes shut, as if he couldn’t bear to stare at the man, as if his picture brought back memories of blood and death. Lisa knew. She’d suspected all along, ever since she’d heard about the murder of Fiona Farrell, ever since she’d found out that Nick Loudon was missing.

  “That’s him, isn’t it?” she asked softly. “The man by the river? The one who looked like a football player?”

  Purdue nodded.

  “He’s the one they tortured and killed?” Lisa asked.

  The boy nodded again. He still hadn’t said anything.

  Lisa had one more photograph in her hand. It weighed hardly anything, and yet it felt heavy. “There’s one more picture I want to show you, Purdue. I think this one may be hard for you to see, but I need you to look at it, and I need you to tell me if you know this man. If he was there by the water that night.”

  Still the boy said nothing.

  She took the picture, and she covered up Gillian’s face so that only her husband was visible.

  Denis Farrell.

  The county attorney of Pennington County.

  She held the picture in front of Purdue’s face and watched terror crease his features, washing away his innocence, bringing back that night as if he were in the midst of it again. As if they were holding him as he struggled to escape.

  He knew the face. He knew Denis Farrell.

  “Purdue?” Lisa murmured as the silence stretched out. “You have to say it out loud.”

  He pointed at the photograph with a trembling finger.

  “Kill the boy.”

  30

  “It was this man?” Lisa said.

  She got off the sofa and shoved the photograph back in her pocket. She found herself moving restlessly around the room, touching all the little objects that made up her past. “He was the old man in charge? He was the one who told the others what to do?”

  Purdue nodded. “Yes. He found me by the water. He pretended to be nice, but he wasn’t. He asked me all sorts of things about who I was and where I came from, but I didn’t trust him. He said the police were going to take me somewhere safe, but then I heard him say it to the others. Kill the boy. He didn’t think I heard, but I did. He said it like an order, and then he walked away. He had a limp. I remember him limping when he left the others behind with me. That’s the last thing I remember.”

  “Thank you, Purdue. I know that was hard for you.”

  “Who is he?”

  Lisa asked herself how she could describe Denis Farrell to someone who didn’t know him. Her judgment was colored by the fact that she’d never liked him. She resented the power he’d had over Danny and the way he’d tried to control both of their lives. Obviously, he’d done the same thing to Fiona. Denis expected the world to bow to him, and when it didn’t, he needed to lash out at whoever stood in his way. For most of the past twenty years, that someone had been Lisa. The weight of his grief had fallen on her.

  Even so, she felt sorry for him. Deep down, he was a sad old man caught up in his grief, and she of all people knew that grief could change someone. Turn them into someone new, twist around their minds until they didn’t even recognize themselves. It didn’t excuse what he’d done, but she wouldn’t have wanted to walk in his shoes.

  “He was Danny’s father,” she told the boy.

  “Your Danny?”

  “Yes.”

  “But . . . why would he hurt that man? Why would he hurt me?”

  “Because that man hurt his family, and he was angry,” Lisa said. “I understand that. I know how he feels. But Denis crossed a line, and now I have to find a way to stop him.”

  “How?”

  “I need to go out again,” Lisa told him.

  Purdue got off the sofa and ran to her. “No! No, Lisa, don’t do that.”

  “I have to.”

  “If you go out, we’ll never see each other again. I know it. Something will happen. Don’t leave me alone!”

  “I won’t let anyone hurt you, Purdue.”

  “But I want to stay together. I want to stay with you. Let’s go away! Let’s go to Canada! Both of us. Take me there, take me away from here, and we’ll be safe. We can cross the street and hop on the train. Just like I did.”

  Lisa shook her head. “Denis won’t let us leave. If we go, he’ll keep looking for us. Sooner or later, he’ll find us—he’ll find you—and I won’t let that happen. I need to stop him. I need to put an end to this. That’s the only way to protect you.”

  The boy buried his face in her chest and hung on to her. She could tell that he was crying silently. She held him, stroking his hair, trying to comfort him. Then she felt his little body stiffen with resolve, and when he separated himself from her, he looked older than his ten years. He had that serious, quizzical face again, the face that seemed to understand the world better than she did.

  “I told you that I would never be able to leave this place,” he said.

  “Don’t talk like that. Nothing bad is going to happen to you. I won’t let it.”

  “Something bad already did happen. I’m only here to run away from it.”

  “I can’t change what happened to you before,” Lisa said, “but I can fix this. I just need to gather more evidence against Denis. He’s a powerful man, so I need something that will make people listen to me. Things I can take to Will at the FBI. I need to be able to prove what really happened.”

  “So where are you going?”

  “I’m going to find the place where you were hiding two nights ago. I want to see if they left anything behind. Anything that proves what they did to that man.”

  “How are you going to find out where I was?”

  “Well, actually, I’m pretty sure I already know. Denis owns a cabin by the river. Danny and I used to sneak in there all the time. I’m sure Fiona knew about it, too, and if she did, then so did Nick Loudon. I’m betting that’s where he went.”

  Purdue nodded, but his voice was sad. “Okay.”

  “I won’t be long. I promise.”

  “Okay,” he said again.

  “It’s almost dark. Are you scared of the dark?”

  “No. I’m not scared.”

  “Good. Remember the plan
, okay? If you hear anything outside, you go back down to the crawl space in the basement. Stay there. Wait until I get back. I will come back for you. Nothing will keep me away. You got that?”

  “Okay,” he said one more time, but his voice had the strange artifice of a robot, the way it had in the very beginning. He sounded detached now. He was separating himself from the fear of what was going on, digging a hole for himself.

  Lisa hugged him tightly. “Thank you, Purdue.”

  “For what?”

  “For showing up at my house. You may not understand this, but I needed you every bit as much as you needed me. Sometimes things happen for a reason. I really believe that. It’s not an accident that we found each other.”

  She turned for the back door, but the boy called after her.

  “Lisa?”

  “What is it?”

  “If I’m not here when you get back, it’s okay. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. Really.”

  “Purdue, do not leave this house. Understand? You stay right here.” She went back and knelt in front of him. “Are we clear about that? I don’t want you getting any foolish ideas in your head, like hopping on a train and leaving me behind. Got it? You don’t need to protect me. That’s not what this is about. Adults protect kids, not the other way around.”

  “Not always.”

  “Well, maybe not always, but this time, that’s the way it has to be. I’ll be back as soon as I can, and everything will be okay. The only thing you need to do is not go anywhere. If you disappear on me, I’m going to be very upset. We’re in this together, you and me.”

  “You and me,” Purdue agreed.

  Lisa kissed the top of his head. She framed the boy’s face in her memory, just in case he was right, just in case something happened to her and all her promises were made of sand. Then she grabbed Madeleine’s coat and headed for the backyard.

  Keri McDonnell had read Thief River Falls.

  Actually, she’d read it twice. First she’d read it for herself, and then her book club had read it, too. It was probably her favorite book ever. So when she’d found out that the house she and her husband were renting was the same house in which Lisa Power had actually written Thief River Falls, she thought it was the coolest thing ever.

  She remembered an interview in which Lisa had talked about writing the book out in the backyard next to the kiddie pool and the jungle gym. Whenever she was sitting out back with her seven-year-old daughter, she thought about Lisa in this same place, typing words into her laptop. It made her feel as if there was a connection between them.

  Keri knew that Lisa’s parents had died, and she knew that Lisa still owned the house next door, although it had remained empty for the past year. Sooner or later she assumed that Lisa would show up, if only to start getting the place ready for sale. She wanted to be there when she did, so she could talk to her. It wasn’t that Keri was a creepy fan, but Thief River Falls was a mother’s book, and Keri was a mother, too. She wanted the chance to tell Lisa how much it had meant to her.

  The women in her book club thought she was crazy, but most of them had already met Lisa at the library. Keri worked evenings and weekends as an EMT, so she was rarely able to go to events.

  Today, she’d kept a close eye on the house next door. She had a feeling, she just had a feeling, that someone was there. Once, when she glanced at the windows, she thought she’d seen the blinds moving. And outside, in the back, there were footprints in the snow. That didn’t mean anything, because kids were always sneaking around the neighborhood yards playing games, but Keri was paying extraspecial attention to the house anyway.

  Her kitchen smelled of chocolate chip cookies. She’d been baking for two hours, because her daughter, Emma, had a party at school the next day. Emma had been helping with the baking process, but her help usually consisted of sneaking spoonfuls of cookie dough when Keri wasn’t looking. Now her daughter was in the family room, dancing with Elmo and running around on a sugar rush.

  Keri checked her watch. One last batch of cookies was in the oven, but she needed to hurry. Her shift would be starting soon, and she still needed to shower. As she waited for the timer to ding, she grabbed one of the cookies off the cooling rack and munched it while gazing through the window at the neighboring house. She felt sad for empty houses. Houses were supposed to be lived in. They were supposed to have kids. She wished that Emma had a next-door neighbor she could play with.

  Keri’s eyes narrowed as she watched the house.

  Was that a shadow? Was that someone moving around inside? She leaned over the sink and took a closer look, but she decided that her eyes were playing tricks on her. It was getting dark, and the wind kept throwing sheets of snow across the glass that made it hard to see.

  Ding.

  The cookies were done. She took them from the oven and moved them to the cooling rack, and then she washed her hands and switched into high gear. She didn’t have much time. She flew into the family room, where her daughter was playing, took a few seconds to do a little dance with her and Elmo, and then said, “I have to take a shower, okay?”

  “Okay!” Emma said.

  “We need to go soon. I’ll drop you off at Mrs. Allen’s, and Daddy will pick you up when he’s done with work. Are you ready to go? Do you have everything in your backpack?”

  “Okay!” Emma said again, which meant she wasn’t listening at all.

  “Emma? Are you ready to go to Mrs. Allen’s?”

  “I’m ready!”

  No, her daughter wasn’t ready, but Keri just shook her head. Some battles weren’t worth fighting. She headed for the bedroom at the back of the house and took the world’s fastest shower. When she was done, she blow-dried her blond hair and shivered as she found fresh underwear in her dresser. Her uniform was laid out on the bed. She was half-dressed when Emma strolled in, carrying Elmo.

  “Can Elmo come with me to Mrs. Allen’s?” she asked.

  “Sure,” Keri said. Sorry, Mrs. Allen.

  “Can I have a hot dog for dinner?”

  “You can have whatever Mrs. Allen makes.”

  “I want a hot dog,” Emma said.

  “Well, I’ll make hot dogs tomorrow.”

  “Okay,” Emma said. “Oh, you missed that woman.”

  Keri stared at her daughter. “What?”

  “The woman next door. The one you want to meet. She came out of the house while you were in the shower. I saw her.”

  Keri’s blouse was half-buttoned. She ran to the bedroom window and peered outside, but no one was in the yard. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long ago?”

  “I don’t know. A couple of minutes.”

  “I can’t believe it!”

  Keri ran for the front of the house, where she shoved her bare feet into her husband’s oversize boots. She opened the door and stomped awkwardly out into the yard. A leafy oak tree blocked her view of the street, but she hiked through the snow to the end of the sidewalk. Halfway down the block, she could see someone hurrying away on foot. Even at that distance, she recognized Lisa Power. She thought about shouting after her, but Lisa was already too far away. And she really didn’t want to be a creepy fan.

  Disappointed, Keri went back inside and kicked off the wet boots. Emma was waiting for her in the kitchen, eating another cookie.

  “Did you talk to her?” Emma asked.

  “No, I missed her.”

  “Maybe she’ll come back.”

  “Maybe,” Keri said. “Anyway, I need to get to work, and you need to load up your backpack.”

  Keri returned to her bedroom to finish getting ready. She saw her phone sitting on the nightstand, and on impulse, she grabbed it and dialed one of the women in her book club.

  “Hey, it’s Keri,” she said when her friend answered. “You’ll never believe it. I just missed Lisa Power. All year I’ve been trying to meet her, and I take a five-minute shower and blow my chance.”

  There was a long pause
on the phone.

  “You just saw Lisa?” her friend asked.

  “Yeah, she was back at her parents’ house. Emma spotted her.”

  “Was she coming or going?”

  “Going. I know you two are friends. Do you know if she’s back here for a while? I thought maybe I could leave her a note and see if I can bring over some cookies and coffee tomorrow.”

  “I really don’t know,” Laurel March replied. “I’ve been trying to find Lisa myself.”

  31

  Lisa heard her phone ringing as she walked down Conley Avenue toward where the Camaro was parked. She’d meant to turn it off, in case they tried to track her through the cell towers. She grabbed the phone from her pocket to power it down, but when she did, she spotted a name on the caller ID that she hadn’t seen in a long time.

  Noah.

  Her brother was calling.

  She stopped dead on the street, listening to the phone ring, feeling it vibrate in her hand. She made no move to answer it. When the call went away, she couldn’t even bring herself to push the button to shut the phone down. She stayed where she was. A minute later, she was still standing there, and the phone rang again.

  Again, it was Noah.

  Part of her wanted to take the call and ask him for help. Part of her wanted to take the call and scream at him. She didn’t do either. She simply stared at his name on the screen and then waited until it disappeared. Not long after, a bell chimed, telling her that she had voice mail.

  She didn’t listen to it.

  Lisa shoved the phone back in her pocket and continued to the end of the street to find the Camaro. It was dark now, and she didn’t worry about being seen. Lights had come on in the houses around the neighborhood, but if anyone looked outside, she was nothing but a shadow. She got in the car and drove, but she could feel the weight of the phone in her pocket, reminding her that Noah had left a message.

  The next band of snow arrived with the cold evening, falling in heavy wet flakes and gathering on the ground. She headed for the river, taking a roundabout route to avoid the main roads. She went east and south and then cut back toward the water on a rural highway. No other cars passed her coming or going. She thumped over railroad tracks and knew she was close to the point where Purdue would have climbed off the train in the pouring rain. Her headlights lit up the barren terrain he would have crossed. It must have been a long walk for a boy who had just lost his mother and had nowhere to go.