by Thomas Laird
I’ll outwait them. They can’t expend all that manpower indefinitely, and when I think they’re good and tired and that their resources are depleted, I’ll drive west and then north to my own personal tundra.
This one says her name is Sandy. She’s younger than Betty, probably by fifteen years, but she’s been out here a long time by the look of her. I tell her I want a blowjob and I say that it’ll have to be a backseat number because I can’t afford the room, and Sandy, a dark-haired Mexican broad who has a slight accent from south of the border, says it’ll take $40. I agree, but I know she’s a $20 cocksucker if I ever saw one.
I take us out to the forest preserves in the western ‘burbs, and I can see by her olive-colored face that she’s getting nervous.
“I don’t do alleys, Sandy. It’s nice out here,” I say as I park in the lot.
The lot closes at 11:00, but it’s only 10:00.
“Ain’t this romantic?” I tell her.
“I need to get back,” she says, her voice a little broken and shaky.
“Don’t worry about anything. I’m not going to hurt you. All I want to know is where Betty is.”
“Who the fuck is Betty?”
I have the idea that she’s not lying.
So I describe Betty down to her turquoise toenail polish.
“That ain’t no Betty. You’re talking about Louise.”
“Louise?”
“How old are we talking, here?” she asks.
“Forties, maybe.”
“If you mean someone who looks like that, that’s Louise. I heard she was in the hospital. St. Luke’s. I don’t know what happened to her. Nobody said nothing, but I heard she got hurt. Why you want to know?”
“Bitch stole my wallet. She owes me money.”
“Don’t go tellin’ her I said nothing.”
“Nah. I appreciate your help.”
We sit quiet for a minute.
“You ain’t gonna hurt me, are you?”
“Fuck no. Let’s get you back.”
“What about the blowjob?”
I go into my pocket and grab two twenties. She tries to snatch them, but I pull them back.
“Hey!” she protests.
“I’ll give these to you for the information, but if I hear you said anything to any fucking body about me or if you drop a dime on me to the police for asking about her, I’ll find you, Sandy. I surely will. You hearing me all clear?”
She gulps and nods. She’s looking right into my eyes.
“I won’t tell nobody.”
“You’re sure? Real sure?”
She nods slowly, one more time.
I hand her the cash. I see the fear in her eyes still remains. There’s no one else in this parking lot right next to a public slough, and I figure she’s thinking about how cold that water in front of us might be in January. Slight wisps of snow are floating to the ground, now, and I remember I still don’t have a place to crash.
“You got an apartment, Sandy?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“Got a roommate?”
“Why you want to know?”
“I’ll give you fifty a night to stay with you for a couple of days.”
“Make it a hunnert.”
I smile at her.
“You bargaining with el Diablo, sweetie bump?”
She shakes her head. I don’t want her pissing her pants in my old man’s Buick. I kinda like this new ride.
“All right. A hundred a night, and it’ll only be for two or three nights. You gonna throw in a free poke or two for that price?” I laugh.
She doesn’t see the humor in my last remark, though.
*
Sandy snores. She only has the one bed, and it’s just a double. She has roaming legs, too. I wake her up once or twice and she rolls over onto her side. She gave me the complimentary pop when we got into bed. She rode me on top, and even though she’s nothing much to look at, she knows how to rodeo. I finally fall asleep at 3:50 A.M.
She makes coffee for us at nine.
“When do you hit the pavement?” I ask her.
“Not ‘til about ten tonight.”
“You don’t have great hours.”
“I’m finishing my GED and then I’m going to the junior college out on Cicero Avenue, Southwest JC.”
“You sound like a real go-getter, Sandy.”
“You want another pop?”
I smile. Then I hear a thump on her door. She’s on the fifteenth floor of this hovel high rise. Public housing, it looks like from the outside and the inside.
“The hell’s that?” I ask her about the whump on the door.
“Newspaper. Some old guy delivers it to the building. He must be eighty years old.”
“I hope my fucking car is still there when I get outside.”
“I looked out the window. It’s still there. They musta taken the night off, huh?”
She opens the door and grabs the paper and then shuts the door behind her and locks the deadbolt.
She sits down and sips her coffee. I’m sitting across from her at the table. She sure hasn’t got much from all that pavement-pounding she does every night.
After she studies the front page, I see her brown face turn white.
“What’s the matter?” I ask
“Nothing,” she says hoarsely.
She folds the Tribune over, but I grab it from her.
I look at the photo on the front page, and then I read the brief story underneath.
The headline reads: INTERSTATE MANHUNT. My picture is beneath the headline, and I wonder where they got this old photo of me. The story talks about the usual SOP the cops are going through in trying to nail me, and then I lay it down on the kitchen table.
“Sandy, Sandy,” I whisper. “How does your garden grow?”
“Please,” she begs.
Then I stand up in front of her and my shadow darkens her face.
Chapter 31
Jimmy Parisi, Present
When Doc died, it felt like I was split in half and his half was gone from me. We were that close. When Erin passed away, it was like my heart was cut out of me, and my soul, too. I had never known what emptiness was like until I lost her. When you lose people, it’s simple subtraction. They take a piece of you with them when they go. There are no replacements, later, just additions. Like Red, Natalie, and the twins. Erin and I had our two children together, and they’re still close to me, and they’ve taken on Natalie as their “extended” mother and the twins as full-blood siblings. As far as family goes, I’ve been very lucky.
Then this cancer scare with Natalie comes along and I was thinking I won’t be able to get back off the canvas, this time. It would’ve been too much to bear. It seemed like Erin was my limit, but Red helped me survive it. But there’s only so much anyone can take of loss. Then you become like the dog that’s been kicked one too many times. I get this feeling I’m meant to stick around for a while longer. My second wife was the key to that notion. Since she’s been restored to me, I guess I have to press on with it. Whatever it is that takes you away hasn’t gotten around to me, yet.
I went out to Karen Quinn’s burial site, yesterday. I put some carnations on her mound, next to the headstone. I prayed for her, and then I drove over to the cemetery where Doc lies, and I repeated the ritual, except for the flowers. He was allergic to most flowers, so I wouldn’t want him hacking and coughing on my account. I spent a little bit of time in cemeteries, in my profession. You go to them for the victims’ services just to see if the son of a bitch who killed them shows up, as they have a habit of doing. I did it because I figured it was the least I could do for them after they were gone since I never knew them while they were above the ground.
I do not visit the graves of any of the killers I have arrested, whether they died at execution or whether they croaked on account of natural causes. They don’t deserve anyone’s time, except for the guy with the pitchfork who’s hopefully taking target practice with their asses.
All those perpetrators will have to get along without my presence. If the Church is wrong about the afterlife, then we’ll all wind up the same, good and bad, which is an unhappy, unsatisfying resolution to this existence.
The good news is I’m still here, and so are a lot of the people I care the most about, and as for my losses, they’re never really gone. As long as I remember them, they’re with me.
*
Jimmy Parisi, 1981
Another one of those “storm of the centuries” is headed toward Chicago. It’s supposed to hit on late Friday, and today is Wednesday. We’re only in early January, and winter is still in its infancy. Spring seems like years away, not three months.
We have both airports covered with police, and the railway terminals are overflowing with plainclothesmen and uniforms. The State Police and the County cops have all the major highways backed up with checkpoints stopping up traffic looking for Casey. He won’t get out of Cook County very easily, at least.
We found his old Chevy at a crooked lot that sells undocumented and usually stolen cars. We arrested the proprietor, and he promptly IDed McCaslin as the owner of the trade-in Chevy. We got the license and the make of his newest purchase, but I know he’ll unload the new ride as soon as he can. He’s not likely to get caught because of a car. We know how sly he is about transportation. Even though we can’t locate his Mustang yet, we’ve got an all points on the Pony. If he feels like taking a tool around the city in the Mustang, his ass is deep fried.
Doc thinks he’ll go for Mary O’Connor. We know he broke Barry Gold’s arm because he was jealous of Gold and Mary, and it’s likely that he’s sorry he ever let her get away. He’s probably figured out who Louise is, even though her name has not been released to the media. McCaslin knows who works and lives on the streets where he grabbed those six girls. He knows it might very well be a pro who spied him carting them away in that Mustang.
It’s difficult to ID the woman on the floor, but at least the killer left something to get fingerprints from. Other than those digits, he’s sliced this poor female to pieces, quite literally. He hasn’t separated any of her limbs from her torso, but he’s cut her throat so deeply that the head is barely connected to the back of the neck. And he’s stripped most of the flesh from her face. All that’s intact is the chin. The blood is everywhere in this cheap, public housing apartment.
The ME says it was done with a very sharp instrument—like a razor.
Now I know that he was here. It’s his MO, and it’s likely that this victim was a working girl, and Doc and I think he got a name from her, or tried to. We’ll never know if she gave up Louise’s identity now, obviously.
When we get the results from fingerprints, we know this Hispanic woman was indeed a prostitute. Now we think it’s likely that McCaslin is thinking he wants to get rid of one final witness that can snare him at a trial. He already dealt summarily with the bag lady. So we double the guard on Louise and also on Mary O’Connor.
*
We have to house Louise now that she’s out of the hospital. We set her up in a duplex in Oak Lawn. The duplex is big enough to keep her and her two bodyguards comfortable and off the streets. Doc and I drive over to see her. We have to be careful we’re not being followed by Casey McCaslin because he knows we have her by now.
It looks clear behind us as we take the thirty minute drive to 95th Street and Wade Avenue where we have Louise parked with her two new boyfriends.
We park at the curb, and there’s an unmarked squad across the street. We wave acknowledgment toward them, take a look up and down Wade Avenue, and then we enter the duplex. Jack Moran opens the door after we identify ourselves. His partner is Billy Shamanski. Both of them are Homicides, and Doc and I know them pretty well, and we know they’re very competent, too.
“Why don’t you two go out for lunch for an hour?” I tell them.
They leap at the chance. They’ve already been cooped up in here for a twelve hour shift. They won’t get off for another eight hours because our manpower is spread thin.
“Supposed to be a bitch of a storm headed our way,” Moran smiles as he goes by us with Shamanski. “No offense, Louise, sweetie,” Moran points to the woman on the couch.
“None taken,” she smiles back.
The two Homicides are down the stairs and out.
Doc sits on a stool in the adjoining kitchen.
“How you doin’, Toots?” Gibron smiles. He opens a newspaper on the table and begins to peruse it.
“Toots? That the best ya got?” she laughs.
“How you feelin’, hon?” I ask her.
“A goddam sight better than I did when he got done workin’ me over.”
“We’re going to get him, Louise. Very soon. Every cop in the galaxy is after him.”
“But you don’t have him, actually, right?”
“Right,” Doc says from his paper.
“But he doesn’t know where you are, and he won’t see you until it’s in court,” I tell her.
“Why don’t you just shoot him? If you catch him, Jimmy, just shoot him.”
Doc smiles and turns the page.
“I’m not kiddin’. If you two guys have the chance, kill him. I don’t want him to have any more chance than the one he gave me when he danced all over me. I thought I was dead, you know that. Really dead. If he’d have known who I was, if he’d known I saw him—“
“But he didn’t, and now you’re here. You getting cold feet, darlin’?” Doc asks.
“I could have Patton’s army in here with me, and I’d still be scared shitless.”
Doc closes the newspaper and looks over at her.
*
We like where Mary is, and we don’t want to relocate her. The more you make moves, the more chance you have to be spotted in transition. Casey knows this city; he knows the southside, and he has connections to guys on the street who are good for information at very reasonable prices.
We have guys outside the YWCA and we have a guy inside, in the vacant room next to hers.
We take Mary O’Connor out to lunch on a Saturday. She doesn’t get out much, now that we’ve forced her to leave the bakery until we have her ex in jail. The city is picking up her tabs, but it’s no joy for a young woman to be barricaded in this high rise all the time.
A uniform follows us as a precaution, but Doc and I take her to one of these five dollar burger joints in Oak Park. She deserves it. It’s the Comeback Inn, and they card at the door, and under-agers can’t come in without a parent. My badge suffices as an entry at the door.
“Go nuts,” Doc tells Mary. “It’s on us.”
She orders a double cheeseburger, fries, and a Coke, hardly an extravagant request.
“It’s on the city. Can’t you try harder than that?” Gibron says.
She laughs. She’s a beautiful girl when her face erupts into a smile. I’m thinking I know why McCaslin didn’t kill her. He was probably thinking he finally got really lucky, just once in his fucked life he got lucky.
“When you going to find him?” she asks as she bites into her sandwich.
Doc laughs.
“You tell us, sweetie. I wish I could tell you. But it’s not that we don’t have a lot of talent out there looking for him.”
The Comeback Inn is aimed at a young crowd. You don’t see mommies and daddies in here, much. It’s college age and up to the thirties, maybe, a meat market for young people. People younger than I am, it looks like. The lighting is dim, and the tables are like park benches. You could get splinters in your hands if you’re not careful. And the patrons get free shelled peanuts, and the shells all get tossed on the floor. You could also slip, fall, and break your tailbone, in this joint. But it’s very chic and fashionable, and this kid deserves much better than fast food slop. Doc and I are both kind of pulling for her to survive this shit and have a real life. Maybe a life with Barry Gold. Maybe with someone else who’s lucky enough to grab hold of her and hang on.
“Th
e longer he stays out there, the more frightened I get,” she says as she moves on to the mountain of fries in the red, plastic basket.
“Yeah, I know. But you’re gonna be covered every second until we do find him. I promise.”
She looks at me and smiles.
“Why’re you two being so good to me?”
Her words make me blush just slightly. Doc laughs after he takes a belt out of his Old Style Draught. We’re not supposed to drink on shift, but I won’t rat him out. I have a Coke, and I’m the one driving.
“Why don’t you understand who you are?” I ask her.
“Who I am?”
“Yeah. You ever take a good look in the mirror?” Doc asks her.
“Yeah? And what if I was ugly?” she grins.
“We would’ve thrown you to the sharks, naturally,” Doc teases her.
“You have great worth, kid,” I tell her.
“How do you know that, Jimmy? I did some terrible things out on the street.”
“You’re not capable of doing terrible things. You just survived, is what you did.”
“How about dessert?” Doc asks her.
Before she can refuse, Doc hails the waiter, whose attitude I’m not crazy about, and he orders her the triple chocolate brownie dessert.
“You want to make a fatass out of me?”
“You look like you have a healthy metabolism,” Gibron shoots back.
The waiter goes off for the ice cream.
“He still scares me, Jimmy, Doc.”
She’s on a first name basis with us, now. Not very professional, I suppose, but neither Doc nor I give a rat’s ass.