The Silent Hour

attorney present, Linc. That shouldn’t surprise you.”

It did. It surprised me because it didn’t jibe with the Parker Harrison who’d given up on his letter campaign and come to see me in person, the Harrison who’d gazed at me with a mixture of sorrow and intensity as he implored me to find Alexandra Cantrell. Of course, Harrison hadn’t mentioned he knew Joshua Cantrell was dead, either.

“The guy took a sentence for murder,” Graham said. “If there’s one thing he’s not anxious to do these days, it’s talk to a homicide detective. Does that imply guilt? Not necessarily, but it doesn’t exactly clear his good name, either.”

“How much did you push?”

“Interviewed him a few times, and it was an absolute bastard because he had this attorney with him, telling him exactly what to say and when to say it.”

“You asked about the phone calls, though? And the burial?”

“Phone calls, yes, burial, no. Like I said, we decided to sit on that. We were hoping for a physical link between him and that grave. Didn’t get it, but we’re not done yet, either. Sent some of the stuff in for DNA testing months ago, still don’t have results. You were on the job, you understand that.”

“Cold case, out-of-state case, and a mile-long wait list at the lab.”

“Check, check, and check.”

“How about the phone calls?” Ken said. “What was his response?”

“Says he called Sanabria after the couple took off, hoping to get in touch with them. Then, after the body was found, says he was merely doing the same thing, checking in again for an update. I pointed out that was a hell of a twist of timing, waiting twelve years to check in and then doing it the same damn week the body was found, but of course he and his attorney refused to go down that road.”

“Sanabria confirm that?” I asked.

Graham’s face went sour. “Through his attorneys, yes, he did. It’s too perfect, man, too rehearsed. They remember these phone calls like they’re looking at a transcript.”

“Still,” I said, “seems to me you’ve got something to work with there.”

“No shit, Linc? Seems that way? Well, hell, buddy, I’m glad to hear you think so. Now let me remind you what my superiors have to say—”

“I get that,” I said. “At least I get it from the Pennsylvania side. I’m amazed you haven’t stirred somebody with the FBI up about Sanabria.”

“That’s another part of the problem. I did, but they didn’t stir in the way you are thinking and I was hoping. Didn’t come into the game looking to help. Instead, they came in warning me that we’d have a nightmare on our hands if we hassled Sanabria. They took their run at him, hard as they could, back in the nineties and didn’t get much to show for it. A couple years on a bullshit charge—and they were looking at the guy for, what, five, six murders? Who knows what else? Sense I got from the boys who worked on him back at the time, Linc, was that they didn’t want any piece of it. They’ve kept tabs on him, shit, maybe kept surveillance on him, and he hasn’t stepped wrong in fifteen years. If he killed his brother-in-law or had him killed, they don’t seem to care. There’s one guy who felt different, but he’s retired now, and what he says doesn’t carry water.”

We fell silent. Graham got to his feet and walked to the window and stared down at the street.

“If I find Alexandra, it will be put to rest,” he said. “That simple. I’m sure of it.”

“You’ve looked for her? Pushed hard?” I said.

“Yes, I’ve pushed hard,” Graham snapped, “and so did your buddy here and a lot of other people before us. Nobody found her. Not me, not anybody else. Right?”

He was looking at Ken, who didn’t answer, just stared back at him as if waiting for more. Graham turned away and went back to staring at the street.

“Fact is, I was pretty well distracted from it until today. Got us a couple of dead girls a few months back. Raped, beaten, strangled, and dumped off the highway. Two in two weeks. One was hitchhiking, one a runaway. Two in two weeks, both on my highways . . . yeah, ain’t nobody talked about Mr. Cantrell in quite a while.”

He turned from the window. “Now you call, and I don’t know what the hell to do with what you’ve got. Don’t know yet. All I do know is I’m going to think on it, going to get back in touch, and when I do? I’m expecting cooperation.”

He was looking at me, not at Ken. Had himself one hell of a stare. I braved it for a few seconds before I had to nod.

The day after I’d thrown Parker Harrison’s check in the trash and promised myself that would be the end of it, I stood in the parking lot below my office and assured a Pennsylvania police detective I’d be willing to cooperate with his investigation if he asked it. I hoped he wouldn’t. If he did, I knew my cooperation would amount to baiting a psychopath. It would be a game in which Graham would man one side of the board and Harrison the other. Me? The pawn shuffling around in the middle. Yeah, wouldn’t break my heart if he decided not to pursue that avenue.

“I’ve got to head home tonight,” Ken said as we watched Graham’s Ford Explorer pull onto Rocky River. “How about we grab a bite to eat first?”

It was closing in on four, and we hadn’t eaten any lunch.

“We can do that,” I said, “and now that you’ve managed to involve me in the police investigation, I’d say it should be your treat.”

We went to Sokolowski’s University Inn in Tremont. It was one of my favorite places in the city, a third- generation family-owned restaurant with an exceptional vantage point of downtown. When I was still with the police, Joe and I would stop in and sit at the bar and admire the view. Today, Ken and I walked directly to the back dining room and found a quiet, dark corner.

“Four different varieties of sausage on the menu,” he said, dropping his tray onto the table. “This is Cleveland’s idea of gourmet?”

“Shut up and taste it.”

He bit into the bratwurst and raised his eyebrows. “Okay. Point made.”

I’d gotten perch, but the lingering hangover dulled my appetite. Ken, on the other hand, seemed to make a full recovery at the first smell of food.

“Hell of an interesting talk with Graham,” he said. “Got more out of him than I’d expected.”

“Yeah, it was fantastic. Can’t wait till he calls me and asks me to commence the game playing with Harrison.”

“I don’t know that he will.” He cut into his potato pancake, forked about half of it into his mouth. “He gave us some starting points, that’s for sure. I’d say it’s safe to focus on Harrison.”

I sipped some ice water and watched him eat, wondering if he’d stop when he got down to bare plate or just keep right on going until the tray was gone. I’ve known some people who could chase a hangover away with food, but I’m sure not one of them. Just watching him was making me queasy.

“Safe for him to focus on Harrison.”

He finished the potato pancake, wiped his mouth with a napkin, and looked at me. “I’ve already told you. I want this one.”

“Then talk to Graham about it.”

“I intend to. You heard him bitching about how difficult this is for him when his other active cases are in Pennsylvania, how he’s not getting the support he’d like. I think the man would appreciate the help.”

“He also would have appreciated a phone call as soon as you heard from Sanabria. So if you’re so eager to help him, why’d you wait on that?”

“I already told you, I wanted this one.”

“So you’ve said. Yet you haven’t done anything on it.”

His face darkened. He looked at the table and slid a thumb along the edge of his knife. “I had some other things going on in my life at that time. Distractions.”

“Like?”

“Like losing my daughter,” he said and looked up. “My divorce was finalized in January. The ex had a new husband—and my daughter a new stepfather—by March. You do the math on that, Detective.”

I nodded, drank some more water, waited.