Chapter 3 - Both Ends of the Tunnel
Daniel Leach met Evelyn at a café in a medical office building, a public place with cameras and enough people to make his nervous glances seem almost ordinary. He had been Martin's supervisor when the stadium was built. Evelyn remembered him carrying a wreath to the funeral that hadn't happened, a memorial service held without a body. He had told Helen that Martin was a good man and left before the food was served.
"Why didn't you tell us about the keys then?" Evelyn asked.
Daniel spread his hands. "Because I thought I knew where he went. Turns out I didn't."
"Where?"
"Two passages. One for utilities, one for service access. They were supposed to connect by an emergency door. During construction, the city changed the plan to save money. The door never got certified. Your father refused to sign the test sheet."
Evelyn opened Martin's notebook to a page with two lines and a small blue square. Daniel tapped it. "That was the key cabinet. Two access cylinders, different numbers, identical blue tags. If anybody says your dad carried one, ask why they'd assume he didn't carry both."
"Julian Thorn knew one wasn't Dad's."
"Thorn managed the subcontractors. He would know the numbers."
Daniel went quiet when Evelyn told him Julian had been in her chair. "You shouldn't have told him who you were until police were ready," he said.
"I've heard that."
"Hear it again. People have been walking around this for fourteen years because every one of us wanted the story to go a certain way."
She had expected the old foreman to confess or accuse. Instead he handed over a list of former workers and told her which phone numbers might still be active. He agreed to contact Alvarez directly. He did not promise to speak at trial until he had consulted a lawyer about his own role in the test sheets.
Evelyn visited the stadium site that afternoon. The parking area was fenced off, its old painted lines still visible around the excavation. A construction worker said the west passage had been filled after the remains were recovered. Evelyn knew she couldn't enter. She stood at the fence and tried to picture Martin descending into darkness with two keys and a paper he had refused to sign.
Alvarez met her there after learning she had visited Daniel. "You're making yourself part of the case in ways I can't control," the detective said. "If you have names, give them to us. Don't interview witnesses."
"He called me."
"Then tell him to call me next time. We need independent accounts, not a conversation with the victim's daughter that defense counsel can characterize as pressure."
Evelyn stared at the fence. "He said there were two ends."
"We found evidence of access at the service side. We're verifying when the area was sealed. Please let us do that."
She wanted to ask whether the remains showed violence. Alvarez had already told her the medical examiner's findings were provisional. Time and construction activity had changed the site. A burial location was not a complete account of a death.
At the clinic the next morning, her assistant had packed Evelyn's personal possessions into two cartons. The incident review would take at least several weeks. She was permitted to retrieve her own belongings but not to use the office computer. Julian's attorney had requested that all footage of the procedure be preserved. Evelyn welcomed the request even as she feared it. The truth about her conduct would be part of the record.
Her colleague Aaron walked her to the parking garage. "You're not a monster," he said.
"I frightened a patient who couldn't freely leave."
"You also stopped treatment."
"Both are true. I don't get to choose the version that makes me feel best."
She carried the cartons home. That afternoon a representative from the professional board contacted her about a complaint. Evelyn arranged counsel before responding. She had worked ten years to enter a profession where people trusted her when they were afraid. The possibility of losing that trust, and perhaps the right to practice, frightened her more than the threats she imagined coming from Julian.
Helen came over with soup and sat among the cardboard boxes. She asked whether Evelyn had ever considered how Martin would have wanted his death investigated.
"Dad hated bullies," Evelyn replied.
"He hated shortcuts too. He used to make you redo your math homework when you got the right answer by guessing."
Evelyn laughed despite herself. Then she cried. She hadn't cried over his death in months because she had converted grief into a project. Now the project was larger than she could manage.
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The next day Alvarez called. A permit search had revealed that a temporary wall was erected across the west passage three days after Martin disappeared. The permit was signed by an inspector who later admitted the work had been backdated. There was a connection to Julian's firm, but another signature mattered more.
The contractor authorization bore Martin Voss's own name.
