The next morning, Rachel was out at her office, doing her therapy thing with her patients. I confirmed a few details about the wedding, and then I got a second cup of coffee and forced myself to call my clients. I wasn’t sure how they’d react to the idea that their son had been killed with psychokinesis.
Evelyn answered; her husband was out picking up some medicine from Walgreens. She took the theory better than I expected: “That’s certainly not—well, even after watching that, that video . . .” Her voice shook. “But that’s what we saw. And you—you saw it. You felt it. Are you okay? Are you in danger?”
“I hope not.” I crossed my fingers.
“What can we do now? Anything?” She sounded hesitant, guarding against too much hope. Which was good, because I didn’t have a lot to give her.
“I have to be honest,” I told her. “Even if I come up with any kind of evidence about this person”—I hadn’t given her Holtz’ name—“I’m not sure we’ll ever be able to take this to court. The best we can hope for is to understand what happened. And maybe try to prevent it from happening again.”
Evelyn DiTocco was silent for a long time. Then she sighed. “Nothing will bring him back. I suppose we have to settle for whatever we can in this life. Are you going on with this?”
“If you want. I’m curious. But you can call me off if you want to, any time.”
“I’ll talk to my husband. But keep going, if you can. Until you can’t, I guess. Call us.”
We hung up. My brother had sent an email about hotels that I had to take care of, and I checked off a handful of RSVPs from friends of mine, mostly people I’d known when I was a reporter.
My phone buzzed. Unknown number, but I have to answer those, even at the risk of being telemarketed to. “Tom Jurgen speaking.”
“Jurgen? It’s Finn. You know, Finn?” As if he wasn’t sure I’d remember him.
“Yeah, Finn. Hello. What can I do for you?”
“Look, about that thing last night . . . I’m sorry. That shouldn’t have happened.”
This was surprising. “You mean pushing me off my bar stool with your mind? Yeah, that hurt.”
“I got mad. It’s just—can you just forget that happened? It would be better for everyone.”
I tried to think through the case quickly. “Specifically for Ross? Is that what’s going on?”
He groaned softly. “Look, it’s—complicated. Can we get together? I’ll explain everything to you, and then you’ll see nothing bad is going on.”
I hesitated, mostly to let him stew in worry for a moment. “All right. Where?”
“Uh, how about the same place? Six?”
“The bar? Sure. I could come downtown sooner—”
“No, this is better. Six or so, okay?”
“All right.”
We hung up. I texted Rachel. She called back a few minutes later, mostly to negotiate about dinner but also to remind me not to get killed right before our wedding. Considering how long we’d both put this off, she was getting strongly invested in the whole idea of getting married. Although she was clear she’d never change her last name to mine. Some things are beyond discussion.
So I spent the rest of the day on other cases. At 5:45 I was in the Uptown bar, Bad Canyon, with a beer in front of me, watching the door. It was a different bartender from yesterday, so I didn’t have to worry about being remembered as a falling risk.
I nursed my beer until 6:10. Then I ordered a second one. At 6:30 Finn still hadn’t showed. I sent him a text. No answer.
I sent another text at 6:50, waited until seven, then paid my tab and went home.
Rachel was on the couch with the TV on, going over some notes from work. “You can make yourself a grilled cheese if you want. What happened?”
“I waited an hour. Texted him. Nothing.” I was irritated. And worried. But mostly hungry. So I grilled myself a sandwich and took it out to the living room to sit with Rachel.
She was watching another reality show, Sleeping with the Alien, where men and women compete to seduce an actor dressed up like a Venusian or something. I ignored it as best as I could while eating, and then my phone buzzed while I was taking my plate back to the kitchen. Finn’s number. “Tom Jurgen speaking.”
“Juuuurrrnnn . . .” The voice was hoarse, gasping. “Hurrrrrrnnnn mmmaaa . . .”
What the hell? “Finn? What’s going on? Are you hurt? Are you okay?”
“Hepppp . . . hellllll . . .”
“Hang on.” I put him on hold to call 911. I gave them what information I could, hoping they could track down his phone. When I came back, Finn was gasping incoherently, and didn’t seem to hear or understand anything I said.
Rachel appeared in the kitchen door. “What’s going on?”
“I’m not sure,” I told her. “The guy I was supposed to meet—Finn! Are you still there? It sounds like he’s having a seizure, or been shot, or something. I called 911. I hope they can get to him.”
Rachel sat down with me and we waited, listening as Finn groaned and gasped. I kept trying to talk to him, not because I expected an answer, but just hoping to keep him going until help arrived. But his grunting faded until all we could hear was shallow breathing, ragged and raw, and then even that dropped away.
Rachel and I looked at each other. I couldn’t bring myself to hang up, but there was nothing to say.
After 15 minutes we heard voices from a distance. They closed in, and I someone shouted Finn’s name. A second voice said, “Start him on . . .” while voice No. 1 kept repeating the name.
“Hello?” I called. “Hello?”
The first voice, a woman, came in close. “Who’s this?”
“Finn called me. I called 911. Is he all right?”
“What’s your name? You a friend? Relative?”
“Tom Jurgen. Just a—an acquaintance. Is he all right?”
“I’m gonna put you on mute, Tom. Stay on the line.” I heard the phone drop, then nothing.
I groaned. “It doesn’t sound good, does it?”
“What do you think he was calling about?”
I shook my head. “Whatever he was going to tell me at the bar. Maybe. I don’t know.”
“You want a beer?”
I nodded.
After 10 minutes the phone came to life again. “Tom? Give me your name and number. Someone’ll be in touch with you about Mr. Finlay.”
“Is he—okay?”
She hesitated. “I’m sorry to tell you that he—he did not make it. I don’t know what happened, and I can’t say any more than that, sorry.”
“Where are you?”
“It’s an office building downtown. On Dearborn Street.” She hung up.
Rachel put a hand on my arm. “You okay?”
I’ve watched people die when I couldn’t do anything about it. It never gets easy. “Fine.”
“What now?”
I stood up. “Right now, another beer. Tomorrow—I think I’m going to have to go talk to Holtz again.”
“He killed Finn? And your client’s son?”
I sipped my beer. “I’m not saying that yet. We don’t know why Finn is dead. We don’t know a lot of things.”
She smirked. “We, kemo sabe? I’m just getting ready for a wedding. On top of my other two jobs.”
“You wouldn’t want to come with me tomorrow, would you? It would help to have your awesome psychic powers handy.”
“Oh, I get to be junior-assistant-detective again?” She punched my arm. “Okay. I don’t have to go into the office. Just don’t mention the wedding when you introduce me. I don’t want to jinx it.”
“Deal.” I rubbed my arm. “Let’s go watch TV.”
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