Who She Was

by Braylee Parkinson

  No offense was taken, but it was interesting to see how antsy the subject made him. He was not necessarily a racist, but someone who was uncomfortable with race. I considered what he was telling me. So, there had been a time when Liza had had an interest in the type of man Detroit typically produced. Had a deadly craving led to her demise? Were the gang attacks at Ali Mansu’s store somehow tied to Liza?

  “Do you know anything about Carson and Liza’s relationship? Did you sense that they were happy when you saw them?”

  Peter’s top lip twitched before he spoke. “I’m not a fan of Carson. He’s a stuck-up punk who wants to control everything.”

  “Is there anything else you can think of about Liza, her marriage…anything that might help me find out who killed her?”

  “I ain’t got much to say. We weren’t close. It was her choice as much as mine.”

  “Did Liza have any enemies?”

  “Probably. She was strange. Not real warm and fuzzy. Kind of a loner.”

  “When was the last time you saw Liza?”

  “I think it was Memorial Day. It was right around the time Abigail and I started trying to work things out.”

  “Was Liza herself? Did anything seem off?”

  “She was a little quiet and she looked distracted, but she was in the kitchen with the girls, my mom, and Abby most of the day. I was out with my brothers-in-law—Abby’s brothers—on the boat. Carson breezed in and out, claiming he had to work.”

  “You mentioned that Liza was rebellious during high school. Was she ever estranged from the family?”

  “Yeah…she ran away in high school and was gone for years. Eventually, she showed up on my parents’ doorstep.”

  “Did she ever talk about where she was during that time?”

  “Nope, she just left and stayed away for years. I was pretty pissed at her for putting Mom and Dad through that shit; didn’t really talk much to her when she returned. Eventually, Abby encouraged me to make amends.”

  “Do you think your sister had any ties to Brightmoor?”

  “The place where she was killed? Well, I figured she had to know someone there. I’ve never been there, but I hear it’s pretty slummy. She could have been having an affair, but there’s really no telling what Liza was up to over there. She wasn’t always the best judge of character…Could even have done something stupid, like offered a ride to someone.”

  “Do you know her friend Madelyn?”

  Peter’s face softened.

  “Yeah…I know Madelyn. She’s a good person.”

  “That’s what I’ve heard. What is your relationship with her?”

  “We don’t have a relationship, but I’ve met her a few times. She used to come to my parents’ house every now and then. She and Liza would take trips together, hang out at the house…She was a good influence on Liza—helped her get her shit together.”

  Peter’s face was calm and pleasant when he talked about Madelyn. Could there have been a twisted sibling love triangle? Peter loved Madelyn…Liza loved Madelyn…so someone had to be taken out of the picture?

  “When was the last time you saw Madelyn?”

  “Well, let me…Hey, what is this? Why you asking about Madelyn? I thought you wanted to know stuff about my sister.”

  The waitress returned with our food. She set the plates down cautiously, noticing that Peter was becoming increasingly agitated.

  “I just want to make sure I have a clear picture of who Liza was. For that to happen, I have to know about her friends and family.”

  “Well, all you need to know is that Madelyn was good to her. She was an amazing friend, so no need to go barking up that tree.”

  “Okay. Did you know that Ms. Price lived in Brightmoor for a time? She lived about two blocks from where Liza’s body was found.”

  “No, I didn’t know that, but I don’t see how that could be relevant. I know that Madelyn lives in A2 and has for several years.”

  Yes, I was reaching, but I’d investigated too many murders to believe in coincidence. What did it mean that Madelyn had once lived so close to the murder scene? It meant something; I just wasn’t sure what.

  “Did Liza have any skeletons in the boyfriend closet? Men who might be angry that she left them behind?”

  “Sure—like I said, she dated bad boys.”

  “Do you remember any names of men she dated?”

  “Not really. Like I said, we weren’t close. In fact, the less I knew about Liza’s shenanigans, the better. I gotta get back to work soon.”

  I ate as fast as I could and thanked Peter for meeting with me.

  “Mr. Abernathy, if you remember anything else, please let me know.”

  “Yeah,” he said, pushing away from the table, cigarette pack already in hand.

  “Thank you,” I said, but Peter was almost at the door.

  Chapter Seven

  The meetings had produced mixed results. I wasn’t sure if we were further ahead, behind, or exactly where we’d started before the interviews. I turned on my Bluetooth and called Martin.

  “Progress is slow on this end. How are things going for you?”

  “This isn’t going to be an easy one. I haven’t come up with much, but I’m headed to St. Bart’s to talk with Liza’s old coworkers. She was a substitute teacher who landed a long-term sub position. The school couldn’t find a permanent teacher for the spot, so she made it through the entire year. Doesn’t sound like it was a good experience for the principal.”

  “Okay. Well, get whatever you can from them, and we’ll meet tomorrow morning. I’m heading to the office to do some super-sleuthing.”

  “Internet?”

  “You got it!”

  “10-4.”

  Since I didn’t have a suspect, I decided to search for information on Madelyn and Peter. He was a bitter sibling with his own problems, but his anger about her teenage angst may have been more about his temperament and less about how he truly felt about Liza. Madelyn, on the other hand, had worked hard to present a picture of complete stability and calm; however, she was very guarded when I asked about her life, and she had once lived in the neighborhood where Liza’s body was found. At this point, everyone was a suspect, but Madelyn and Peter didn’t really fit the profile for suspects. Peter didn’t have a motive unless it was bitterness, and the anger could simply be part of his disposition. Recovering from alcoholism was no small feat. If Madelyn had a motive, it involved Carson, but a romance between Carson and Madelyn was unlikely. It would have been an obvious avenue for the police to investigate. Even so, if it was a theory, it didn’t hold much weight. Basically, none of the information I had gathered so far really amounted to leads or suspects. I needed something plausible.

  Madelyn Price had been less emotional than I’d expected her to be, but in time, any grieving person learns to cope by pushing the pain into a tiny space in his or her heart. It wasn’t that they weren’t upset and missing their loved one, it was more the fact that one can’t be actively mourning and still function successfully. Even so, it was strange that Madelyn had lived in Brightmoor. The odds of her knowing more than she was willing to share were good.

  Tracking down address information online isn’t difficult, so I decided to embark on the mindless, easy task of tracing addresses. I started with Peter. He had lived in Livonia, East Lansing, Farmington Hills, and Plymouth. The most recent address was in Plymouth, a nice quiet neighborhood on the edge of Canton. A quick search of Peter’s social media revealed short, basic posts such as, “So cold out here” and “Missing my girls. All four of them.” He seemed to post every couple of months, but, like Liza, he didn’t really seem to be into social media.

  Next, I decided to search Madelyn’s address history. She’d lived on Dolphin Street between 1992 and 1994, which meant she had moved there when she was about fifteen or so. Liza would have been sixteen in 1993, when she lived in Brightmoor—not exactly an age when most young people move out on their own, or have a house in their name. It
was odd that both women had left home so early. Was it possible that the two had been emancipated youths? The Detroit address was in Brightmoor, but it wasn’t the same as Madelyn’s. Liza had lived on Dacosta Street, which was very close to Dolphin. I pulled up the address and verified that Dacosta was just one street over, and the address where Liza had lived was adjacent to the alley where her body had been found…Interesting, but not proof of anything other than the fact that both Liza and Madelyn had lived in Brightmoor.

  I went back to the list of Madelyn’s addresses. She had lived on Oakman Boulevard, which had been a fashionable street back in the 1980s and early 1990s. Mid-sized homes, middle-class families, and a relatively low crime rate for Detroit had made the area desirable for the city’s successful residents. The fact that Madelyn had moved to Brightmoor was strange. Perhaps she’d had trouble with her parents and went to live with an aunt and uncle, or a cousin.

  Why would two sixteen-year-old girls who weren’t originally from the area be living in Brightmoor? It didn’t make sense. Next, I pulled up Madelyn’s address and saw that it was within a one-block radius of Liza’s former residence.

  The two women had both lived in Brightmoor, but that was close to fifteen years ago. What did this mean? Was it possible that I needed to adjust the timeframe of the investigation to include the late 1990s? I’d planned on waiting to check in with the senior Abernathys, but now it seemed imperative. I placed a call to Liza’s parents. After four rings, the voicemail came on. I heard a soft male voice, tempered with a hint of confusion, whispering into my ear.

  “You’ve reached the Abernathys. Uh…leave a message, and we will do our best to get back to you.” I left a message explaining who I was and asking if we could arrange a meeting. I repeated my phone number twice and disconnected the call.

  After the call, I considered strategic searches of the web that would help me decipher information about Madelyn. As a private detective, the internet is your friend. I was registered with all the pertinent social media and networking websites, and I considered which ones might have information on Madelyn Price. I settled on a website that allowed old high school classmates to find one another. Madelyn’s name was listed in her class, showing that she’d once registered and logged into the system. Overzealous reunion planners had scanned the yearbook and uploaded it to the website.

  Madelyn Price, it turned out, had been president of the French Club, a member of the Honor Society, and a teenage mom. She’d paid for a full page in the yearbook, but most of the page was taken up with photos of her daughter, Kara. She appeared to have been a toddler by the time Madelyn was in twelfth grade. I remembered how cautious Madelyn had been when I had asked about her past. Her daughter would be a teenager now. I clicked on another tab and googled Kara Price. Results from a gymnastic tournament popped up first. A lean, small-boned girl with a bright smile, Kara looked like a younger version of her mother. She had shiny eyes and thick, bushy hair pulled back into a cute bun like her mom’s, but, unlike her mother, Kara’s hair refused to be tamed. According to the results, she had finished second in the tournament and had gone on to compete at the state level. Another page showed Kara at the statewide spelling bee and stated that she was a student at an all-girls college preparatory school. I was familiar with St. Mary’s—the tuition fees were steep. In fact, some colleges were cheaper. Was a paycheck for a stealthy “hit woman” helping to fund little Kara’s education? It was far-fetched, but Carson had plenty of money to spare, and if he had wanted Liza dead, it would have been easy to lure her into a trap with her “best friend.” Of course, it wouldn’t make any sense to hire a PI to investigate a murder you’d orchestrated. I wondered just how much Madelyn was bringing in at the yoga studio.

  Madelyn didn’t have any social media accounts, but Kara had one that she seemed to use sporadically. Her posts were vibrant and intelligent. The teenager seemed to try, and succeed at times, to be introspective, insightful—and impersonal. The one exception was on April 22:

  Happy birthday to my beautiful mother who sacrifices so much for me! She is my inspiration and I will always strive to live up to her impeccable example! Love you, Mom

  Kara was respectful, enrolled at one of the best schools in the state, a standout athlete and a scholar…Madelyn had to be a proud mom. The only reason Madelyn wouldn’t mention Kara was if she thought her daughter might be hurt, or put in danger by something she told me. Or perhaps Madelyn didn’t want to share much because the less she shared, the less I would suspect that she was guilty. I went back to the yearbook website and printed out a picture of Madelyn Price. A teenage mom turned yogi, college professor, and counselor was a somewhat irregular path. I didn’t have statistics, but I was sure that Madelyn’s life represented the road less traveled.

  I jotted down Madelyn’s daughter’s name and birthday. After that, I ran Liza’s name through the system, but couldn’t find a trace of her. There was a chance that Liza had simply never signed up to the website, but I wondered if perhaps she hadn’t graduated high school. As a troubled youth, she might not have finished twelfth grade.

  I spent the rest of the day looking for gaps and holes in the narrative. I needed to reconstruct Liza’s life from the age of sixteen onwards. I spent some time searching online for more information; I dug further and found out that Liza had a GED, not a high school diploma, meaning that not only had she lived in Brightmoor, but was a dropout while she was there. I considered all the trouble she could have gotten into as a teenager with so much free time, and wondered what she’d done to keep herself occupied.

  Several other names came up in a search of possible relatives. Names that I expected popped up—Peter Abernathy, Liza’s parents, and Carson Stark—but there was also another name: Demario Masters. I typed “Demario Masters” into the computer and received several mugshots in the results. I opened another tab and looked for address information for Demario Masters. A few addresses popped up for him. One included Madelyn Price and Liza Abernathy was listed along with Masters, for another address. Liza and Madelyn had lived with the same guy?

  “Bingo!” I muttered.

  Next, I entered Demario’s name into the Offender Tracking Information System and found out that he had committed a few minor offenses in Michigan and Louisiana, but those were all dated crimes. He was currently serving four 15- to 60-year concurrent sentences for sexual misconduct. He also had acquired a felony as a juvenile and been locked up from the age of fifteen to nineteen. It looked like he’d been released in January 1996; Kara had been born in December 1996. That meant he had met Madelyn, who would have been fifteen when he was released, and gotten her pregnant almost immediately.

  Attempted murder at the age of fifteen was usually a sign of things to come. It wasn’t a stretch to think that Demario had committed the crime close to, if not within the boundaries of Brightmoor. My guess was that he had grown up in that area, and that was why Madelyn ended up living there. My former precinct was just outside the jurisdiction that held the now-defunct Redford High School—the school from which Madelyn had graduated, and I assumed Demario Masters had attended. I searched through a newspaper database using Redford High School and stabbing shooting for the search terms. Several hits popped up, but only one took place in 1993, the year Demario was incarcerated. Since he’d been a juvenile, no names were used, but the article described a gang fight and ended with one student being stabbed in the head. That definitely fell into the attempted murder category, but that area of the city had been teeming with violence at the time, due to the crack cocaine epidemic. Demario could have been the perpetrator, but so could any other violent youth in the area. I tried to think of old-timers on the police force that might be pining for a stroll down memory lane. The felony had occurred in the 6th Precinct, across the street from Redford High. I wondered if there were still guys around the 8th Precinct who remembered the stabbing, or the kid who had committed the crime. I sent Detective Cole a text asking if he’d heard of Demario Masters. My pho
ne rang a few minutes after the text was sent.

  “Hey, Cole. What can you tell me about him?”

  Cole was quiet on the other end. After hesitating and sighing, he said, “I’m busy for the next couple of days, but don’t move on this thing until we talk, okay?”

  “I’ll do my best. What can you tell me now?”

  “Slow down, Sylvia. Just wait for a few days and we’ll meet up.” A sharp edge of warning was in his voice. I heeded it.

  “Okay. Call me when you’re free and we’ll set something up.”

  After I hung up, my head started to spin with questions that were not going to be answered that evening. I closed my laptop, curled up on the couch, and slept until the next morning.

  ***

  The cold morning air brought light, fluffy snowflakes. I was snuggled under a beige-and-brown afghan, my head bent at a slightly awkward angle. Shaking off the crick in my neck, I went to the kitchen, started a pot of coffee, and headed for the shower. At 6:30 a.m., I slipped on a pair of black dress slacks and a red, button-down blouse. Next, I sent Martin a text telling him to meet me at the Blue Gill at 7:30 for breakfast. Just as I was heading out the door, Mr. Abernathy called and agree to meet at 10:00 that morning.

  Even though it was only seventeen degrees, I decided to walk to the Blue Gill. I bundled myself up in a knitted scarf and heavy cardigan and slipped on an overcoat and flat black boots. The snow was easy to traverse. My boots crushed the white powder, still fresh and un-shoveled, creating a slippery trail behind me. The crunch of the accumulated flakes echoed with each step as I trekked the three blocks to the restaurant.

  Martin’s long, lanky frame was folded into a booth at the back of the dimly lit diner. He wore a beige sweater, faded jeans, and brown moccasins.

  “Hey,” I said, sliding into the opposite side of the booth.