But that missing suitcase…
If someone had packed a bag, that person had not been Carey Moore. No way she would have left this house voluntarily and left her daughter behind.
What the hell kind of kidnapper took a change of clothes for his victim?
Kovac could only hope that if that missing suitcase was in the possession of the kidnapper, it meant whoever had taken Carey meant to keep her alive.
He tried not to think about why.
43
CAREY FELT DIZZY and nauseated. The oily scent of exhaust was inescapable.
She had to hope the secret destination was near, or she would die of carbon monoxide poisoning. Then again, what lay in store for her at the end of this ride would be nothing good. She would probably wish she had succumbed during the ride.
She had moved her hands around the cramped trunk, feeling for anything she could use as a weapon-a tire iron, a wrench, anything. But she found nothing.
As she turned onto her right side, something rectangular pressed against her hip bone. She felt it with her fingertips and a quick burst of hope shot through her.
Cell phone.
She remembered sticking it in the pocket of her jeans after speaking to Kovac the night before. David had just stormed out of the house. She had called Kovac to tell him. He had been standing right outside her house, ready to come to her rescue.
When she had finally gone up to bed, she had been too exhausted to bother undressing. Or maybe it had been that she already felt too exposed and vulnerable.
Hands shaking, she fished the phone out of her pocket and punched a button to light it up.
911.
Fingers fumbled as she pressed the numbers. Misdialed. Tried again.
Her heart was banging against her ribs like a fist.
The only sound the telephone made was a series of beeps, then nothing. The lighted screen showed the message “No Service.”
No service.
No signal.
No help.
44
KOVAC CALLED AHEAD to the Edina police to send a unit to Ginnie Bird’s condo and not let her leave the premises, hoping to hell that that hadn’t already happened. Since arriving at his house, David Moore hadn’t been alone two seconds to make a call to his girlfriend. But whomever he had called for a lawyer-Edmund Ivors, Kovac suspected-could have given the Bird woman the heads-up to get out of Dodge.
Ginnie Bird had to be cut off from the pack. If he could get her alone, Kovac knew he would get her to talk. She wouldn’t know what to do without Moore or Ivors there to put words in her mouth. She didn’t have the backbone to stand up to him.
She was standing on the curb in front of her building when he pulled up, looking very unhappy to be facing two uniforms.
Kovac walked up to them. “Ms. Bird. Are these guys bothering you?”
“They won’t let me leave,” she said, anxious. “They can’t do that… can they?”
“Well, that would be my fault,” Kovac said. “I asked them to detain you until I could get here.”
Ginnie Bird looked up at him, suspicious. “I don’t have anything to say to you. I don’t know anything about what happened to David’s wife.”
“You knew he had a wife,” Kovac said. “That tells me right there that you make bad choices, Ginnie. I mean, bad enough to hook up with a jerk like Moore if he was single. Why go to all the trouble of having an affair with a guy like that? A sneaky, spineless, petulant liar-”
“I love him!” she said emphatically. “You don’t know anything about him.”
Kovac shook his head. “Honey, I know all about the David Moores of the world. Why don’t we go inside?” he suggested, gesturing toward her building. “I’m sure you’d rather not have your neighbors taking all this in.”
“Am I under arrest?” she asked.
“No. Should you be?” Kovac arched a brow. “Do you have something to hide?”
“No!” she insisted. She glanced surreptitiously at her building, checking to see who might be peering out their windows.
“Fine,” she said. “We’ll go inside.”
She liked her illusion of legitimacy. It was important to her that people around her believed she belonged in this tony part of town.
“No,” Kovac said.
Ginnie Bird had already started to go back to the building. She turned around and looked at him, puzzled.
“No,” he said again. “You know what? I don’t have time for this bullshit.”
“But-”
“There’s a woman missing. I think you know something,” Kovac said aggressively, stepping a little too close to her, his voice getting louder. “And you’d better spit it out, or we’ll be talking about this in an eight-by-ten room downtown.”
“I don’t know anything,” she insisted, but kept her voice down.
“You know who the blond guy was that met you in the bar Friday night,” Kovac said. “I want a name.”
“I don’t know his name!”
“Maybe you don’t know your own name, Ms. Bird,” Kovac said. “If I were to run your prints through the system, who would you turn out to be?”
Big tears filled her eyes, and her face tightened into an unattractive expression. She turned one way and then the other, not knowing what to do or say next.
“I want a name,” Kovac said again.
She put her hands over her face and started to cry.
“Nobody feels sorry for you,” Kovac said harshly. “You’re a junkie whore screwing the husband of a missing judge. Do you know what that sounds like? That sounds like motive. You couldn’t have what you wanted as long as Carey Moore was in the way. I have no doubt you know plenty of lowlifes who could do the dirty work for you.”
Ginnie Bird made a sound like a siren, her face still in her hands.
Kovac held his hands up and took a step back. “That’s it. I’ve had enough of this crap.”
He turned to the uniforms. “She’s going in, guys.”
“Donny,” she sobbed. “Donny Bergen.”
“How do you know him?” Kovac demanded.
She sobbed but didn’t answer.
Kovac got in her face. “How do you know him!”
“He’s my brother.”
45
LISKA HAD MANAGED to ferret out of the department computers the incident report from the death of Rebecca Rose Haas. Short and sweet. A detective named Rothenberg had gone through the motions of an investigation. He had retired six months later and moved to Idaho. She remembered his retirement party at Patrick’s, a cop bar strategically located halfway between the Minneapolis Police Department and the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office.
The situation seemed cut-and-dried. Rebecca Haas hadn’t had an enemy in the world. She had simply been one of many people who died accidental deaths in their own homes every year.
According to Rothenberg, a neighbor had spoken to her around two o’clock in the afternoon. Mrs. Haas had been excited at the prospect of taking in another foster child. Marcella Otis from Children and Family Services had been there earlier that week to go over some details.
Sometime between two-fifteen and four-thirty that afternoon, Rebecca Haas had apparently taken a header down the basement stairs. She had been found on the basement floor, dirty laundry all around her from the basket she had been carrying downstairs.
Liska pulled up in front of the Haas home, parked on the street again, and went up the sidewalk to the front porch. No one answered the door. Wayne Haas’s Chrysler was gone from the driveway.
She walked around the side of the house, thinking about Wayne Haas and his high blood pressure. Maybe he was inside, lying on the floor from having had a stroke.
Maybe he had decided to get the hell away from this place, chuck it all, and hop a bus to San Diego. Who could have blamed him?
She turned the corner to the backyard. Haas sat at a picnic table, his elbows on the table, his head in his hands.