Chapter 1

November 1, 2019

Adam Waters, Denver CO -

It was another crummy day in paradise I thought as the alarm on my nightstand reverberated throughout my head. A careless swing with my right hand delivered enough of a glancing blow to knock it to the floor and miraculously turn itself off. Getting out of bed was not the easiest thing in the world to do not to mention my muscles and bones ached as a leftover present from my accident five years prior. Perhaps more exercise should be the order of the day but things always seemed to get in the way. The mirror revealed just how badly my 35 year old body had fallen out of shape since the accident. Maybe today will be the day to pull myself out of the pit of despair that had become my norm for far too long. Extra time was spent in the shower trying to work the charley horse that seemed to take up permanent residence in my left shoulder. The fateful night of the accident has been the fuel for my nightmares and even turned up in a few daymares. Ever since my wife and daughter died at the hands of a drunk driver five years ago, life had begun steadily slipping a descent into oblivion. The rumbling of thunder outside triggered a brief bout of PTSD to kick in reminding me of the busting glass and shrieking steel as my late model Toyota Corolla was t-boned by a fancy red BMW i320 traveling at a high rate of speed. A desperate grab on the sink slowed my fall towards the tile as my knees gave way. Today was the first day of November 2019 and the five year anniversary of their death was rapidly approaching. Dory, my wife of fifteen years died instantly in the crash from a broken neck as the bumper of the speeding car climbed up the B pillar of the passenger side of the car and caught her just above the shoulder. I was thankful it had been quick death but our ten year old daughter Bethany, suffered before passing out only to never awaken again. Her lower torso was wedged into the frame and to make matters worse, parts of the BMW’s engine and transmission were smashed against her upper arm causing the flesh to be cooked off. Adams legs were tangled up in the debris and his seatbelt was jammed so all he could do was watch and listen to his little girl die a painful death. As it sometimes is with these types of things, the drunk driver walked way from the scene virtually unscathed, that is until the lawyers got ahold of him. There were enough witnesses present I had no problems getting a $100 million dollar judgement in Civil court, but he used his money and connections to avoid doing any hard time and get his license reinstated six months later. Yes, I hated Novembers these days since death seems to permeate it with a vengeance.

When the garage doors opened up, there were two police cars blocking my path. Two officers and a detective got out of a squad car and approached me in my garage. “I’m detective Merriweather, may we step into your garage Mr. Waters?”

“Yes, please. Get out of the rain. What can I do for you?”

“Mr. Waters” the detective asked, “Where were you on the night of October 28th?”

“I work most nights until seven or eight and then come home.”

“Do you have any way to prove it?”

I didn’t like the way this was headed. “Detective Merriweather, what’s going on? I’m a little confused here.”

“Mr. Waters, Harry Finkle, the man who hit you five years ago was found dead in his house yesterday. He was murdered ... in a rather gruesome way. We haven’t seen the likes this kind of savagery in a long time. May we take a look at your hands?”

I shrugged and held them out where Detective Merriweather took hold of them and examined them inside and out noting my fingernails as well.

“What are you looking for?”

“I’m looking for bruising or any other telltale sign of a struggle, of which you have none. Frankly, we didn’t expect to find anything since this bears a resemblance to some 1979 Florida murders, but we have to do our due diligence.”

Then it hit me, they think I did it. “Detective, I assure you that while it hasn’t gone through my mind, I would never act on that sort of revenge. I did not do it and I hope you catch whoever did it.”

Detective Merriweather nodded his head and replied: “If you need to leave town, please check in with us first, but I’d advise you to not leave town. It just wouldn’t look right. Expect to see us again when we have more leads. It might be a good idea to touch base with your lawyer ... just in case. That’s all I have to say. Thank you very much for your time, Mr. Waters.”

The three men turned around left as sudden as they had shown up in my life.

Not even his new Corvette Stingray convertible seemed to alleviate the heavy mood his mind was currently wallowing in and to make matters even more interesting, he was sure someone had been following him for the last week or so. The drive into work was uneventful and the deafening roar of music chipped away at the darkness that haunted him. Adam was an award winning recording and sound engineer specializing in Heavy Metal music spurred on by his late wife who had been a musical genius. As the result of touring European recording studios as a part of their second honeymoon, his interests (helped by the push of his late wife) took him into the Symphonic wing of the genre. Before that, he worked with as both an engineer and consultant for some of the biggest hard rock and heavy metal bands in the world. Nightwish was one of his favorite bands due to the overall talent and professionalism of the band not to mention the song writing being brilliant. Most of their songs had multiple layers that could be used as a separate song not to mention the unpredictability of how the arrangements were done. They briefly ran into the person who started the band, Tuomas Holopainen, in Finland on the tour and had a quick introduction. Tuomas kept looking at his wife and finally said:

“I’m sorry, do I know you? You look very familiar.”

Dory tried to control her fidgeting and nervously replied “I don’t think so.”

“You resemble a lady I met back in the States when I was an Exchange student. She handed me a box full of music and said it was my property. It was very strange. Are you sure? It’s a moment I remember very clearly.”

“Uh, no. I would’ve remembered doing something like that.”

“Well, if I ever do meet her, I’d like to thank her for inspiring me to be a musician.”

Dory smiled demurely, “I’m sure she knows, wherever she is. It was nice meeting you Mr. Holopainen.”

He took one final look and a said “Yes, I’m sure she knows now.”

It was all Dory could do to keep her composure as they walked away. After a failed attempt to redirect the conversation, Adam asked her about the odd exchange only to be rebuffed.

As usual, Adam was the first one into the studio because it was the time of day he was most creative and gave him the quiet time he could work uninterrupted. The early morning hours also helped gave him a jump start on scheduling rework. The core office hours were 9am to 4pm so the majority of people started rolling in around 9am but when you’re dealing with musicians, there’s no telling what might be going on at any given time. He was in the finishing stages of an album for an up and coming rock n roll band who had completed the majority of the recording a month ago and was currently elbows deep into the post-processing and final mastering process so his schedule was fairly steady. When you had a band in the studio, it wasn’t unheard of to work all hours of the day and night to get things down. The next band wouldn’t be through for several weeks so he was hoping to get the finishing touches done in time to have several days off.

Adam had been fixated on a song for several hours when the flashing light indicated someone was at the front door. Somewhat irritated at being interrupted at such an unusual time, he paused the song and trudged through the doorway and down the hall to see who was responsible for breaking his concentration. Upon opening the door, he was somewhat taken aback to see a tall skinny blonde girl standing there looking apprehensive.

“Can I help you?” Adam asked.

In heavily stilted English, she replied “My name is Karina Øyen and I has appointment” while holding out a business card with some writing on it. It had the logo of the recording studio, a hand written date but the name Tony Alfonzo is what stood out to him. Tony was fired six months ago for multiple ethics violations. Re-reading the card it became obvious what the problem was.

“I think there has been a mistake” he said gently, “you must’ve gotten the date mixed up and read it from a European perspective and not an American one. The date on the card is 01.11.2019 which was back in January, today is November 1st or 11.01.2019. I’m very sorry, but I think you missed your appointment by almost a year, besides; Tony doesn’t work here anymore.”

It took a minute for her to understand what had been said before tears welled up in her eyes and she began speaking excitedly in Norwegian as her hands flailed wildly in the air. Her foot deftly blocked the door as he tried to close it and she began to plead.

“I nowhere to go, no money until home” she said holding up an airline ticket dated three weeks into the future. “He mis-truthed me, please help?”

A smile came cross Adam’s face as he tried not to laugh at her faux pah. “OK, come in and I’ll see what you can do.” She entered shyly into the building and furtively glanced around as he led her back to the mastering room he had been working in. A closer look showed her to be tall, muscularly lithe with blonde hair down to her mid-back. Her movements were refined and graceful as if she’d grown up with with money but her clothes said otherwise. If he were a betting man, he’d guess her age to be 17 or 18 but who can tell these days? They made some small talk and it appeared that Tony had promised her some work doing background vocals as a studio artist with the possibility of recording a song herself. Being on a self imposed tight schedule, Adam showed her to the couch and excused himself and got back to work and trying not to think too much of the blonde beauty who sat behind him. There was something about her that was compelling and wondered what to do about her. The strange thing was she sounded almost identical to Dory when he first met her.

When lunch rolled around, Adam came up with a test. He sent her out with some money to bring back lunch. It was a simple Subway order and he even wrote it down on a piece of paper to make it easier for her, but if she came back it would show she was probably sincere and if she disappeared with the money, his problem was solved. The flashing light twenty minutes later gave him all the info he needed, she wasn’t going to run off, at least not with $20.

Karina carried two bags with her into the break room and started laying out the food. She ushered him into the chair, scooted it up, laid out the napkin and arranged his food.

“I got you drink, yes? Coca-cola? You like? The sign says to enjoy Coke and smile, you enjoy. Yes? And smile. Must smile.”

Adam laughed and felt a warmth radiate through his body as she smiled and nodded his head wondering how she knew. Must’ve been a lucky guess. When he was taken care of, she pulled out a foot long sandwich for herself and wolfed it down in a quarter of the time it took Adam to eat a six inch sandwich.