“They said some kid ran a stop sign and hit Frank. He had to take the rental back and didn’t get another one. He took a car back to the hotel. They were trying to get in touch with the kid that hit him. I guess they haven’t heard from him. Jerry Caldwell. I got his contacts from the rental place.”

“LA address?”

“That’s right.”

“Born in Singapore?”

“What do you know about him?” Casey asked.

“I know he doesn’t exist,” I said.

Frank didn’t kill himself. I was sure of it now. I knew it just by the name of the guy who hit him. I knew all about Jerry Caldwell. It was an identity Frank had invented for Froehmer to use. Froehmer had asked me if Frank would do it; he never explained what for. He had a bank account, credit cards, a driver’s license, maybe even a passport. Frank made a few of them for Froehmer, but I remembered Jerry Caldwell, because Frank was happy with that one. He thought it was clever, a name he took from someplace else (and didn’t tell me). Every time Froehmer used the name Jerry Caldwell, Frank got a kick out of it. It was a joke he had over Froehmer. Only Froehmer had passed the joke on to somebody else.

—

I tried to remember if I’d seen the kid who’d been driving. I must not have. I couldn’t see his face. He was slumped over in the wheel, I thought. It wouldn’t have mattered. I didn’t know many of the guys who worked for Froehmer. Maybe he didn’t work for him at all. Maybe he only did that one thing. And that one thing was to follow us, or to hit us, on purpose. But why would he crash into us? There were easier ways to stop us, if that’s what he was trying to do. I thought it was probably the former. Froehmer wanted to make sure we had done the job. And whoever he got to watch us botched their part. Did that make sense? I wasn’t so sure. I couldn’t talk to anyone about it. I had to figure it out on my own.

“How do you know about Jerry Caldwell?” Casey wanted to know.

“It’s a fake name, like the ones Frank and I used.”

“You’re going to have to do better than that,” Casey said.

She was right. I told her she was right and to give me a minute. She waited while I tried to figure out where to begin and how to explain it. I thought it might be the last time we talked to each other, and I wondered if that wouldn’t be better, better for her, I mean. Things could only get worse for me.