“Good. Want a quick debrief on a lead we got in Cleveland?” Kozak said.
“Put it aside for now,” Becker said. “Get over to Erie County for a dying declaration from Sellwin while there’s time.”
“On our way,” Kozak said.
* * *
Walking through the barracks, Kozak and Carillo were approached in the hall by Melinda Hyland, the lead data analyst assigned to the Jennifer Griffin case.
“There you are. Do you have a sec for me to update you?”
“Walk with us to our car, Mel,” Carillo said.
“Okay.” Hyland, who was in her twenties, and had a tiny, silver loop nose ring, nudged her black, square-framed glasses.
“What do you have?” Kozak asked.
“Nothing so far proving that Sofia Ann Korvin gave birth to any other children besides Jennifer.”
“We gave you her Social Security number, right?” Carillo said.
“Yes, and we have records for Sofia giving birth to Jennifer, but here’s the thing. I’ve been working with vital records in Albany and county records. In some cases, over the years at some hospitals across the state, fires, moves, and water damage hampered complete collections of records. It’s slow going. We’ll also take our search outside the state.”
“Start with Ohio and Pennsylvania,” Kozak said.
“Keep working on it, Mel,” Carillo said.
They passed through the doors and were outside.
“What about your analysis of tips, statements, reports?” Kozak asked.
“Working on them as they come in and also going back, double-checking, cross-referencing,” Hyland said.
“Thanks, Mel.” Carillo opened the driver’s door of their Taurus.
“Keep us posted,” Kozak said.
* * *
“This case is like one of those Russian nesting dolls, Claire,” Carillo said as he drove.
“How so?”
“Greg Griffin, his girlfriend, Jennifer seeing a shrink for some past trauma, DNA, phantom relatives, now Sellwin. So it’s like we open up one doll, there’s a smaller one inside, open that one, and there’s another, open that one, then we find something else.”
“That’s the way it goes, Ned. Cases get complicated.”
Carillo rubbed the back of his neck as he drove. Starting in Cleveland that morning, it’d been a long day and it was far from over.
“I could use a coffee,” Carillo said.
“Me too.” Kozak was texting her sons when her phone rang.
“It’s Becker,” she said to Carillo before answering.
“Forget the hospital,” Becker said. “Sellwin never recovered. He’s deceased.”
Kozak took a second.
“All right. That’s that.” Then to Carillo: “Sellwin’s dead.”
Carillo shook his head. “We keep opening nesting dolls.”
“Soon as we can,” Becker said, “we’ll get warrants and move on his house, office, everything for anything linked to her. Head to the crash site and see what the crime scene people find in his car.”
“Will do.” Then to Carillo: “Get on ninety, and head east.”
* * *
Traffic inched its way around the cluster of emergency vehicles, their lights flashing, on the shoulder of the westbound lane of I-90 between Batavia and Buffalo.
People rubbernecked at the overturned vehicle, half submerged in the culvert. As forensic people worked on the wreck, K-9 teams and a drone swept the immediate area.
Kozak and Carillo observed from the embankment, pleased when the forensic team recovered a flashlight and a roll of duct tape. Then Becker texted Kozak, alerting them that Sellwin’s cell phone had been recovered from the emergency medical staff and was seized as evidence.
But a couple dozen yards from Sellwin’s car, under three feet of murky water thick with rushes and reeds, was Sellwin’s burner phone.
The one no one knew existed.
Its charge weakening, the phone was dying, taking all of Sellwin’s secrets with it.
Seventy-One
Buffalo, New York, Trailside Grove
“Deepest Condolences.”
“Thinking Of You At This Time”, “Our Thoughts And Prayers Are Of You.”
Dozens of old sympathy cards were on the kitchen table where Greg and Kat continued trying to determine if Jenn had relatives.
The cards were still in envelopes, addressed to Jenn’s grandmother. Using the senders’ names and return addresses, they’d worked to locate people who knew Jenn’s parents. They went online, consulted street maps, directories. Kat got a colleague to check her courier company’s databases. They did all they could to pinpoint names, then make calls.
Greg and Kat’s work had yielded a few leads, but they dead-ended. It had been thirty years. People had died or moved. Those they’d reached couldn’t remember many details about the lives of Sofia and Leo Korvin, except for the tragic way they’d died.
“We need to go to her old neighborhood, ask around there,” Kat said.
Greg agreed.
They went to Vince.
“Kat and I need to go check something in Jenn’s old neighborhood,” Greg said. “Stay here with Jake and don’t talk to anybody, okay?”
Vince nodded but Kat and Greg caught something swirling behind his eyes, sorrow and fear, as if his concentration had taken him elsewhere, like the time their mom died.
“Are you okay, Dad?” Kat said.
Vince touched his jaw. “Got a sore tooth.”
“Sore tooth?” Greg and Kat traded a quick look. Then Greg said: “Want to go home, Dad? I can get someone else to come over.”
Vince’s focus shifted. He’d returned, looked at them, and shook his head.
“No. I’m good. Jake and I will be fine,” he said.
Media people were still waiting outside, shouting questions as Greg and Kat got into her Jeep. She reversed slowly, easing through the pack as Greg waved them off before Kat shifted into Drive and sped away. Then he watched his side mirror.
“Some of them are following us.”
“I’ll lose them.”
They got onto Sentinel Trail, with its four lanes running through the suburb’s commercial stretch. Kat threaded through the traffic. Some news vehicles had quit the chase. Then Kat turned into a Burger King drive-through but veered from the lane, using the parking lot’s rear exit to get onto another side street.