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Jane sipped a glass ofbeer as she sat at her kitchen table, reading the Boston PD report of Amy Antrim’s hit-and-run accident. The accident report was a far shorter document than the pages and pages of documents that a homicide case usually generated, and Jane quickly absorbed the essentials. Two months ago, at approximately 8:38p.m.on a Friday, a male witness saw Amy Antrim step into a crosswalk on Huntington Avenue, right in front of Northeastern University. She had taken only a step or two when she was struck by a black sedan moving west. The witness said the vehicle was moving at high speed, perhaps fifty miles per hour. After hitting Amy, the driver did not even slow down but sped away in the direction of the Massachusetts Turnpike on-ramp.
A day later a black Mazda, matching the witness’s description and caught on video by four separate CCTVs in the area, was found abandoned just outside the city of Worcester, forty-five miles away. Damage to the front bumper, along with blood thatmatched the victim’s, confirmed it was the vehicle that hit Amy. The registered owner of the Mazda had reported the vehicle stolen two days before the accident. The thief was never identified.
And probably never would be, thought Jane. She took another sip of beer and leaned back in her chair, stretching the stiffness from her shoulders. Tonight it was Gabriel’s turn to give Regina her bath, and judging by the happy squeals from the bathroom, they were having such a splashy good time that Jane was tempted to close the laptop and join them. Or at least bring a few extra towels to sop up the water before it seeped into the floorboards. Was she wasting her time, reviewing an accident that was probably not relevant to the Sofia Suarez murder? Maybe it was just bad luck that had placed Amy in that crosswalk at that particular moment. Maybe the man in the gray raincoat who’d struck up a conversation with Amy at the cemetery was just another unconnected incident that had nothing to do with Sofia Suarez’s murder.
So many distracting details. So many ways to lose sight of the killer.
Bath time was over; she could hear the tub draining and suddenly four-year-old Regina scampered into the kitchen stark naked, her skin slick and rosy from the bath. Gabriel was right behind her, and judging by his soaked shirt, he’d caught the brunt of Regina’s splashing.
“Whoa, baby.” He laughed, trying to corral their daughter with a towel. “Let’s get ready for bed. Mommy’s working.”
“Mommy’salwaysworking.”
“Because she has an important job.”
“But not as important as you are!” said Jane, and scooped her wet daughter onto her lap, where Regina sat wriggling, as slippery as a seal. Gabriel handed her a towel and Jane wrapped her daughter into a snug little Regina enchilada.
“Any breakthroughs?” asked Gabriel as he uncapped a beer for himself.
“More like alleys. Lots and lots of blind alleys.”
He leaned against the kitchen counter and took a swig from the bottle. “So. A normal day, then.”
“All these things feel like theyshouldconnect to the case, but I don’t see how they can.”
“Maybe they don’t connect. It’s normal for humans to see patterns in random events. Just like when we look at the surface of Mars and see random hills and valleys, we think we see a face.”
“I’ve just got thisfeeling.”
He gave her his maddeningly impassive smile. As usual he was Mr. Calm and Logical Special Agent who did not believe in gut feelings, only in facts. Who once told her that when a cop relies on his instincts, it too often leaves him blind to the truth.
After Gabriel coaxed Regina off to bed, Jane turned back to the accident report, which was still nagging at her. What was it about Amy and the accident and the man at the cemetery? She looked up the responding officer’s contact information and reached for her cell phone.
“Officer Packard,” he answered. Jane could hear the buzz of conversation in the background and a woman’s voice calling out:Number eighty-two! Order eight-two!He was on his dinner break, and for a hungry cop, mealtime was holy. She’d make this short.
“I’m Detective Rizzoli, following up on a hit-and-run that you responded to back in March. It happened on Huntington Ave. Victim’s name is Amy Antrim.”
“Oh yeah.” Mouth full, chewing. “I remember that one.”
“You ever ID the driver?”
“Nope. Asshole hit her and just left the poor girl bleeding in the street. She was in pretty bad shape. I wasn’t sure she’d make it.”
“Well, I just saw Amy yesterday and she’s doing fine. She’s still using a cane, but not for much longer.”
“Glad to hear she pulled through. I heard she had a ruptured spleen and her mother was really freaking out ’cause the girl needed a lot of transfusions and she’s got some kind of rare blood type.”
“I don’t see a lot of details here in your interview notes.”
“That’s because I couldn’t talk to her until a few days after her surgery, and she had no memory of the accident. Didn’t even remember stepping into the crosswalk. Retrograde amnesia, the doctor said.”
“She didn’t remember anything about the driver?”
“Nope. But there was a witness who saw it all. Homeless guy, standing right behind her on the sidewalk. He said the light turned green, she entered the crosswalk and slipped on the ice. He was about to help her when that car came roaring down the street.”
“You trust the word of a homeless guy?”
“It was caught on surveillance camera. Everything he said checked out.” There was the sound of more chewing and in the background, a voice called out:Number ninety-five! Junior Whopper and fries!
