“Hey, I’m just another taxpayer making sure I get my money’s worth. Public servants like you need to be kept to task, my dear,” I said.
“God, you’re such an ass,” she said.
“I want the Benjamin Collins file.”
She laughed outright. “Oh sure. A private citizen demanding police files—open cases, at that. What next? You want a shotgun? Borrow a squad car? Take a couple Kevlar vests for the kids?”
“The case is open?” I asked.
“Did I say that?” she said.
“Yeah, you did.”
“Well, I guess it is, then.”
“Had it been moved from the cold case files?”
She didn’t answer that right away.
“Come on, Ellen . . . it’s me, John. Your brother.”
This softened her just a bit, although she still didn’t say anything.
“Has Teddy started talking?” I asked.
Armbruster was busted in Chicago, trying to go undercover with his Mob friends, but he got caught on an FBI surveillance camera going into a house. He was brought back to Detroit the day before.
She shook her head. “He’s dummied up with the best Mob defense lawyer money can buy.”
“It’ll be a long trial,” I said.
She nodded.
I took a deep breath.
“I need that file, Ellen.”
“What are you going to do with it?”
I knew what she meant, but instead, I said “Go to Kinko’s and copy it . . . have it back on your desk in fifteen minutes. No one the wiser.”
She looked at me, really studying me. “Are you going to do anything stupid?”
“Of course I am. That’s my whole modus operandi.”
“I know, but something that will get you killed and leave Anna and those girls without a father?”
I shook my head. “Absolutely not. But now that I know Benjamin Collins was most likely a hit—a contract kill—that changes everything.”
She sighed and pulled the file out of one of her desk drawers. I knew she didn’t usually keep files there, so she’d had it ready for me. This was all a pretense—a warning to take it easy and take it slow.
I would do my best.
I took the file and said, “I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”
“Don’t bother,” she said. “That’s a copy.”
She smiled at that.
“Thanks,” I said.
“Just trying to keep the taxpayers happy,” she said.
Chapter Forty-Nine
It had all started with the lake.
I pulled my car off Lake Shore Drive, parked it on an opposing street, and walked down to the water’s edge.
It was a calm morning, the lake a sheet of blue-green glass. I had the file in my hand, and I sat down on the grass. The grass was cold and damp, but somehow everything felt good and felt right.
I felt like I belonged here.
They never found the man’s body. The next day, divers had gone down to my boat, which had broken up into a few hundred pieces. They found lots of debris: wood, pieces of the radio, and minutia from the boat’s cabin.
But they didn’t find a body.
I knew there was no way he could have survived being impaled and then taken underwater. He would have had to somehow swim to shore with a devastating injury in the middle of five-foot waves.
Impossible.
It didn’t matter to me, though.
He was alive now in my memory. And dead or alive, I knew he would lead me to the final answer as to what happened to Benjamin Collins.
That’s really all that mattered.
I looked at the file in my lap. This was going to be my chance to set things right. Redemption, I guess.
I took a deep sigh and ran my finger along the inside of the file’s cover.
I held my breath.
And opened the file.
THE END
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Afterword
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Also by Dan Ames
Death by Sarcasm
Murder with Sarcastic Intent
Gross Sarcastic Homicide
Dead Wood
Hard Rock
The Killing League
The Murder Store
The Circuit Rider
Killer’s Draw
To Find A Mountain
The Recruiter
Beer Money
Killing the Rat
Choke
Passion Key
The Garbage Collector
Bullet River
Dr. Slick
Head Shot
Hanging Curve
About the Author
Dan Ames is an internationally best selling crime novelist and winner of the Independent Book Award for Crime Fiction. You can learn more about him at AuthorDanAmes.com
www.authordanames.com