“Go on, drive,” I say. “I’ll play you the audio on the way.”
Gio reverses the van. We exit the parking lot and enter a stream of traffic. Gio puts on the wipers as the ever-present rain of the Pacific Northwest begins to fleck the windshield.
I connect the audio to the van’s speakers via Bluetooth, and we listen in silence as he drives.
He remains silent for a long while after the interview ends—Clayton’s last words, his laughter, ringing inside our brains. We’re entering the City of Vancouver now. Anticipation is awash inside me. And as we get a little closer to Twin Falls, something else surfaces in my heart. A whisper of fear perhaps. Of the unknown—of what I will find. But that should be a good thing. I should feel the fear and do things anyway. That’s supposed to be my mantra.
As if he’s thinking out loud, Gio says, “He did it. He had to have done it. It’s absurd to think otherwise. We’ve seen all the transcripts, the photos of evidence, the crime lab results. It all adds up. The evidence matches his confession.”
“Apart from the things that don’t add up.” I turn in the seat. “There are dropped threads. There are still unanswered questions.”
“Because he confessed. Why pursue the investigation if . . . well, if it was a wrap? The bad guy said he did it, and he told the cops exactly how, blow by blow.”
“Still, there’s his story about the jacket, which sounds . . . off. That locket. The facts around that were never resolved. The rest of Leena’s journal has never been found. Why were pages ripped out of it? And even if he did do it, the crime was so violent, so brutal, with so much apparent rage, it’s hard to imagine that the once seemingly benign man cracked to that extreme. It’s . . . like he’d have to have done it before. Built up to this. There could be others.”
“Oh, now you’re being sensationalist.”
I grin broadly and lean back in the seat. “Maybe. Yeah. But it makes for great podcast material.”
We head over the bridge. Below us tankers skulk on the gunmetal-gray waters of the Burrard Inlet. Puce clouds tumble down the North Shore mountains. Another hour’s drive along the highway that twists and turns above the waters of the sound, and we will be in Twin Falls. Finally. After all my research, I get to visit it in person. I will interview as many people as I can find who were part of the case, or who knew the main players. Between interviews we will head back and forth to the prison with further questions for Clayton Pelley. And during it all, we will air the episodes.
In my mind I test out script ideas for the various episodes. In addition to the first session with Clayton, we already have an earlier interview in the bag, with one of the police divers who discovered the body. We did that interview in Toronto before flying out west. Perhaps I will start with the discovery of the body, and feed back into a segment that asks: Who was Leena Rai?
RACHEL
THEN
Monday, November 24, 1997.
“Was . . . my daughter raped?” Jaswinder Rai can barely utter the words, but his need to know outweighs his fear of knowing. He sits close to Pratima on a floral-patterned sofa opposite me. Luke has taken an ornate chair to my right, and he dwarfs it in a fashion that would be comical if our news wasn’t so awful. I feel him observing me. It’s just past noon, but we’re tired. At least I am. It was an early start, and we drove directly from the morgue to deliver the cause of the Rais’ daughter’s death in person.
“There are signs of sexual assault, yes,” I say gently.
“What do you mean, signs?” Pratima asks. Her voice quavers. Her whole body is shaking, and it makes the chiffon scarf over her hair tremble about her cheeks.
“Some . . .” I clear my throat. “Some vaginal tearing that indicates rough intercourse.”
Pratima covers her mouth with her hand. Her eyes glisten. Her husband places his hand on her knee. His eyes, coal black and fierce beneath his red turban, bore into me. Barely bottled rage pinches his face.
“And then after she was assaulted, she was bludgeoned, kicked, and drowned in the river?”
“We’re not sure yet of the exact sequence, but yes, the cause of death is drowning. I’m so sorry.”
“So this . . . this was the motive for the attack?” Jaswinder asks. “Rape?”
“We’re working on that assumption right now,” I say. “Given the timing, the fact that Leena was alone and vulnerable, it was likely a crime of opportunity. Your daughter could have just been in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“Why, why?” laments Pratima. “Why my Leena . . . How could anyone do this . . .” She begins to rock back and forth. A moaning sound starts low in her throat. Animal. Raw. I feel a visceral response in my own body to her maternal reaction. I don’t know what I’d do if it had been my baby girl, my teen, my Maddy. I glance at the framed photos on the mantel. Family groupings. A cute picture of Leena’s six-year-old brother, Ganesh, in a canoe. One of Leena herself. Gazing at the camera with a belligerent expression. Her complexion is darker than her mother’s or father’s. Her black eyes are set close, on either side of a large nose that seems to dominate her face. A mole marks her chin.
Pratima’s gaze follows mine. Tears slide silently down her cheeks. And I feel her unspoken words.
We should have watched over her better, been more strict, more careful.
I also feel a wash of guilt at my relief that it’s not my child in that morgue. Because it could have happened to Maddy just as easily. Or to any of the girls in town.
I clear my throat.
“Would it be okay if we ask you some more questions? It will help with our investigation.”
“You will find who did this,” Jaswinder says. It’s not a question. I meet his fierce gaze.
“Yes. We will. I promise.”
Luke shifts in his chair, and I sense admonishment. He probably would not have made a promise he might not be able to deliver on. But what else can I tell these parents? “We’ll do everything in our power to get justice for Leena,” I say as I remove two photos from the folder on my lap. I set them on the coffee table and turn them to face the Rais.
They are glossy images of the silt-covered cargo pants and panties that the divers found near the body.
Leena’s mother makes a choking sound. She nods. “Yes, yes, those are Leena’s. The underwear . . . Fruit of the Loom. From Walmart. They . . . they come in a three-pack. I . . .” Her voice breaks on a sob.
“Yes,” says Jaswinder, taking over from his wife. “And those camouflage pants, Leena wore those nearly all the time. She liked the pockets on the sides.”
“Can you confirm which jacket Leena was wearing when you last saw your daughter?”
We have not yet located the jacket that everyone claims to have seen Leena wearing at the bonfire. The divers did not find it in the river, and the crime techs and search parties did not locate it along the banks of the Wuyakan.
“It was a big khaki-colored jacket,” says Jaswinder. “They call them military surplus jackets. Lots of zips and pockets, and some kind of numbering on the front pocket. It wasn’t Leena’s. When I asked her about it, she told us she’d borrowed it.”
“From who?” asks Luke.