Not Even Past Read online

  Closing his eyes, Donne thought back to his brother-in-law, another kidnapping victim. So many people were involved then: local police, state police, the FBI. Who took the lead? The FBI—they always took the lead, pushing cops off the trail, using their massive budget to track people down.

  That’s who Donne needed now.

  FBI headquarters was a thirty-five-minute drive up the Turnpike, with no traffic. Easier than calling. If he called, he’d bring two agents down to his home and just worry Kate.

  He walked back to his apartment. His car was parked across the street. Kate’s was parked right behind his. She’d noticed he was gone, and if he didn’t call he’d worry her. She picked up on the second ring.

  “Where are you?” No hello, no smile in her voice.

  “I’m outside, but I have to take a ride.”

  “Where?”

  Donne looked up at his apartment window and saw the curtains part. He waved and saw Kate wave back.

  “Newark campus’s library.” Not a total lie. Well, maybe a total lie, except for the location.

  “Why?”

  “An article for Siva’s class. I need it for the exam.”

  “You can’t get it on campus? Or on the Internet? Like normal people?”

  “It’s in one of those journals you can’t find online. I missed class the week he handed it out.”

  Kate sighed. “You need to make some friends.”

  “I need someone to cheat off.”

  She paused, squinting. Then she grinned.

  “Be safe,” Kate said. “Be quick.”

  The drive was quick. The roads were mostly clear, and he hit green lights on the way there. He found a parking lot just two blocks from the FBI building. This wasn’t like walking into a police station. People didn’t just call the FBI about a kidnapping. There was procedure. Call the police, and eventually the FBI would be brought in. He knew the drill. He hadn’t been out of the game that long.

  Claremont Tower rested along the Passaic River at Newark Dock, on the outskirts of the city. Donne imagined few people actually knew what was inside the tall, unmarked building. It looked like any other office building but without corporate logos. Donne crossed McCarter Highway and walked down a side street to the front of the building. He could smell dead fish and gasoline rising off the river and wondered if that made agents ornery on a daily basis. They did have a reputation to uphold, anyway.

  Donne pulled open the glass door and a security guard waiting by a metal detector stared at him. The lobby looked like the TSA line at the airport.

  “Can I help you?” the guard asked.

  “I need to see an agent.”

  The guard picked up his iPad and touched the screen a few times. “Which one?”

  Donne exhaled and said, “The one you report a kidnapping to.”

  The guard looked up. “Excuse me? Did you call the police?”

  “I’m a former private investigator. I know the routine. It’s easier to go right to the source.”

  The security guard put down the iPad and unbuttoned his suit jacket. Donne kept his hands at his sides.

  “How long has this person been missing?”

  “I’m not sure,” Donne said. “For the last six years, I thought she was dead.”

  SPECIAl AGENT Fullbright’s office was overdecorated. The guy wanted you to know he was from New Jersey. There were framed autographed pictures of Fullbright with Martin Brodeur, Yogi Berra, and Jon Bon Jovi. Next to those were vinyl copies of Springsteen’s Born to Run and Darkness on the Edge of Town, also framed and autographed. Sports pennants for the Devils, Seton Hall, and the New York Giants hung from the ceiling. His desk, though, was clear. No memorabilia. No photos. Just files and a desktop computer.

  Fullbright, sleeves pushed up, tie loosened, stood behind his desk. Donne sat across from him, feeling completely underdressed in his jeans and Pearl Jam T-shirt.

  “Do you have the email?” Fullbright asked when Donne was finished telling him the story.

  “I do.” He pulled out his phone and handed it to Fullbright, with the text message open. “And the text message.”

  Fullbright looked at the text. “Can’t do anything with this. Where’s the email?”

  “I need to access it on your computer.”

  “Like hell. Just pop it up on here.” Fullbright shook the phone.

  “It’s Outlook. Doesn’t really work well on the phone.”

  Fullbright shrugged. “Apple sucks anyway. Listen, Mr. Donne, you don’t have much to go on here.”

  Donne’s nostrils flared. He knew where this was going.

  “Let me show you the email.”

  Fullbright nodded. “Our tech guys will take a look if your forward it to me. Just don’t send me a virus.”

  “This isn’t funny.”

  Fullbright put his hands in his pockets. “Jeanne Baker, by your account, has been dead for six years. There is a record of that. The medical examiner signed the death certificate. We have it on record here.”

  “I saw the video. I saw Jeanne.”

  The special agent nodded. “Someone is messing around with you, Mr. Donne. Someone with a sick sense of humor.”

  “If—”

  “Forward me the email, Mr. Donne. I promise you I will look into it.” Fullbright went into his desk, came out with a business card. Slid it across toward Donne. “Has my email on it too.”

  Donne took it and stood up. He left without thanking Fullbright. Why thank a guy you’ll never hear from again?

  FORTY-TWO MINUTES later, Donne was parked in front of his apartment again. He looked up at his building. Kate wasn’t looking out.

  There was one contact Donne hadn’t lost track of. He got out of the car and walked south on George Street. Traffic eased the closer he got to the theaters. It was the midpoint of New Brunswick. Here, the fancy restaurants and college pubs faded. Houses with faded siding and broken windows started to appear. Only residents and campus buses traveled this part of town. The city was expanding, and expanding in this direction, but the gentrification was slowed by the economic collapse. The university and Johnson & Johnson had been unable—or unwilling—to jump-start it again.

  Eyes were on him because he didn’t fit in. Even if they couldn’t see his face, they could see his skin color. He was either buying or busting.

  It took only five minutes before Donne heard his name being called. He whirled to his left to see Jesus Sanchez limping up Dumont Street.

  “What the hell are you doing here, man?” Jesus asked as he crossed the street to Donne.

  Jesus had ascended the ladder. After some cops had knocked off his boss, Jesus took over and now wasn’t a street dealer anymore. That was three years ago. Sanchez apparently had an eye for business, or the cops had an affinity for him. He probably gave his boss up to the cops.

  Jesus shook Donne’s hand. He didn’t say anything, just waited for Donne to explain.

  The story of the email and Jeanne came easily out of Jackson, like a waterfall. He spat the words out, and when he was done he was out of breath.

  “Holy shit,” Jesus said. He wiped at his nose. “Why are you here?”

  “Where else would I go?”

  Jesus shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans and turned away from Donne. He headed up Dumont toward Douglass College. He stopped after a few steps.

  “Go home, Jackson. I don’t know shit.”

  For an instant, Donne believed him. He ground the heel of his shoe into the sidewalk and started to turn. But something tickled at the back of his neck. Maybe just a spark of his old instincts trying to fire up again. He froze.

  “You’re lying,” Donne said.

  Jesus tilted his head. “What you say?”

  “You heard me.”

  Now Jesus’s head started to shake. Back and forth slowly.

  “Don’t do this, Jackson.”

  “Do what?”

  Jesus turned back toward Donne, but he was looking further down th
e road. He waved. Donne turned his head. As he did, his gut tightened. A black car rolled toward them. Tinted windows, shiny rims.

  “I like you this way, Jackson,” Jesus said. “The new you. You’re happy, and this new girl, she seems good for you.”

  “How—”

  Again Jesus shook his head. “The old you rushed into things. Didn’t think. Fuck. You should be dead.”

  Donne didn’t say a word. The car rolled up and stopped at the curve.

  “I didn’t like the old me either. Scared. Talkative. Not no more. I buried him.” Jesus pulled the passenger door of the car open. “You should do the same. Old you comes back, it ain’t gonna be for long.”

  “It’s Jeanne,” Donne said. “They have her. And they said I have to help her.”

  “You don’t even know who they are. And you’re better off that way. Go home. Study.”

  “She might die.”

  Jesus got into the car and shut the door. He rolled the window down.

  “And how is that different from what you thought yesterday?”

  He rolled the window up as the car pulled away from the curb.

  THREE MINUTES.

  The parking meter had been expired for three minutes. The driver, who had exited the car thirty-three minutes ago, was nowhere in sight. Bill Martin tapped twice on the steering wheel, exhaled, and allowed himself a smile.

  Time to go to work.

  He grabbed the summons and got out of his car. After straightening his tie, he crossed the street and stopped at the Volvo—one that belonged to a Mr. Shaun Smith. Smith—Martin loved the alliteration—couldn’t be more than a sophomore and was probably getting used to parking on campus. And by getting used to it, Martin meant not doing it. The university had one of the largest private bussing systems in the country. Don’t try to goose the meter.

  People like Bill Martin were watching. And he was going to do his job.

  After writing down the license plate number, Martin started to fill in the rest of the summons. The scratch of pen against paper made his smile grow even wider. None of this newfangled computer crap. Pen and paper—the right way to do things.

  “Hey! Hey, wait!”

  Martin looked up from the pad. Shaun Smith was running away from College Avenue toward him. Two pieces of change flew from his hand and clattered against the sidewalk. The kid stopped for a second, looked at the sidewalk, and then gave up—rushing again toward Martin.

  Martin let his arms fall to his side, still gripping the pen and pad.

  “Officer, please!” Smith skidded to a halt in front of Martin. “I’m just—wait a second. Are you even a cop?”

  “I’m writing you a ticket, aren’t I?” Martin asked.

  “Where’s your uniform?”

  Martin shrugged his shoulders. He pulled his sports jacket open and flashed the badge on his belt.

  “I’ve been around a long time. Wearing a suit on the job is a perk for me.”

  Smith opened his mouth, closed it. Then said, “You can’t give me a ticket.”

  Here we go.

  “Why not, son?”

  Smith ran his hand through his shaggy blond hair. “Because I was just coming back to feed the meter.”

  “But you’re three minutes late.”

  The kid looked behind him, then back at Martin. “I dropped my quarter back there, but I have the cash.”

  “Cash for the next half hour.”

  Smith nodded. “Come on, I have an exam. I’m going to be late.”

  “But you didn’t pay for these last three minutes.”

  Smith shoved his hands in his pockets, feeling around for another coin. Behind them, a campus bus rumbled by. Martin figured it was headed to Busch Campus. That one seemed to be on schedule.

  He went back to writing.

  “Come on, man, don’t be a dick.”

  Martin shook his head. “I’m not. I’m doing my job.”

  Smith exhaled. “Is this fun for you? Torturing college students?”

  Martin tore the piece of paper away and handed it over to Smith. The kid took it and read it over. He shook his head.

  “This is a blast,” Martin said.

  He turned around and went back to his car. As he crossed the street, he heard Smith call him an asshole.

  “Don’t forget to feed the meter in another thirty minutes,” Martin called out.

  Another stream of curses followed. Martin couldn’t hold the smile back any more. Great start to the week.

  Just a year after his promotion, after the shakes started, they demoted him to this job. They wanted him to retire.

  And miss out on all the fun?

  Hell, no.

  Time to go back to the office to drop off all the tickets he’d written.

  DONNE HEADED back toward home. Off to the north, some thunderclouds hung over Piscataway, threatening a midday storm. It felt like it was too early in the year to be expecting a heat-breaking thunderstorm, but it was already early May. Time passed quickly when you weren’t paying attention.

  Jeanne had already been gone six years, cut down in a car accident with a drunk driver. She was coming home from work, only a few weeks after Donne had left the force and started his own private investigator business. Someone came too hard around a curve and slammed into her. She was dead before the ambulance got on scene. The driver of the car had run off, leaving the car and several liquor bottles behind.

  Now, as he passed the theater district, he tried to remember the days that followed. They were fuzzy, blurry—no, that was wrong. They were nonexistent. The weeks following Jeanne’s death were a black hole of alcohol and drugs, exactly what he’d promised his fiancée he’d give up for her once they decided to get married.

  A sober man may have gone on a quest, tracked down the drunk driver. But he just let it go. He let Jeanne’s parents handle everything. Never asked if they found the guy. Never asked if they’d checked the plates to the car and caught anyone.

  And then, just three years ago, her parents told him they never wanted to see him again.

  Now, somehow, Jeanne was back in his life and Donne had nowhere to turn. His phone vibrated again, and his fingers tingled as he reached for it. He expected another warning from the blocked number, but all it was only Kate asking where he was. A few clicks of the keyboard later, and she knew he was on his way. But Donne had to make one more stop. Only one place left to turn.

  If that car accident was faked and Jeanne was in danger, there was only one other person who could help him. It was not a place Donne wanted to go, not a place he ever wanted to walk into again.

  THE NEW Brunswick police station was a big, modern brick building off the beaten path of downtown New Brunswick. Kirkpatrick Street was buried behind a parking deck and was considered a small side road. Donne hadn’t walked down that side road in many years.

  When he pulled the glass door open and stepped across the threshold, it felt as if a boa constrictor had wrapped itself around his neck. Air caught in the back of his throat.

  He walked up to the reception desk, and the cop on duty looked up and did a double take. Maybe there was a picture of Donne in the break room and all the new recruits had to curse it out.

  “Can I help you?” The cop sounded like he’d swallowed a thornbush.

  “You know who I’m here to see,” Donne tried.

  “Because I’m psychic?”

  Donne closed his eyes. A tough guy act wasn’t going to work in the building where it was perfected.

  “My old friend, I know he’s still here.”

  “Well, I’m not about to announce you, so go find him yourself.”

  Clearly this guy knew Donne wouldn’t be able to walk two feet without being stared down by six or seven other armed men. He just crooked his neck and nodded Donne toward the back. Didn’t even check his ID.

  Sometimes being hated makes things a lot easier.

  Donne walked past the desk and into a series of cubicles. The police department always remin
ded Donne of a small-town business.

  Cubicles, coffee, and water coolers.

  The clicking of computer keys and mumbled chatter.

  He expected all that to stop as he made his way through the office, but it didn’t. He heard a few people mutter sounds of surprise, but the world didn’t end. The boa constrictor left, but a rat had nested in his stomach.

  He and Kate liked to joke about this when they went out for dinner. In New Brunswick, it was easy to walk to a restaurant, especially in the spring and summer. Kate knew about Donne’s history with the police, and knew if they had a few drinks and there was a beat cop around, he’d be out to bust Donne for disorderly. So she would whisper “beer goggles” to him as they walked back to his apartment. It meant “Keep your eyes open” when the cops were around.

  She’d be screaming “beer goggles” right now.

  He came to the corner he’d rounded three or four hundred times when he worked here. The office was at the end of the hallway. As he strode, the doors to other offices closed. In the age of texting, word travels fast. He felt like he was in a bad, old comedy and had walked in to the wrong bar. The only thing missing was the scratch of a record stopping.

  Donne reached the doorway and hesitated, his hand hovering over the knob. He used to have a key to this office, spent hours drinking coffee, reading files and sniffing cocaine. It was in this office that Donne had finally decided to go snitch, to give them all up.

  It’s also where he tried to protect his partner.

  The same partner who wanted nothing more than to see Donne completely ruined. And, three years ago, had almost succeeded.

  Donne turned the doorknob.

  Bill Martin looked up from his desk, blinked, and dropped the mug of coffee that was in his hand.

  It rattled on the desk, and the last sip of coffee dripped out on to the carpeted floor. The liquid seeped in, joining a multitude of other coffee stains.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” Martin asked.

  “We need to talk.”

  Martin blew air out of his mouth. Then said, “Like hell.”

  “It’s important.”

  “Like hell it is.” Martin turned toward his computer.