by TG Wolff
“Well, not every time.” He pointed at his friend’s barrel belly. “Besides, it’s my phone. Keep eating.” He pressed answer. It was the news he was waiting for. “All right…thanks.” And he ended the call. “Christopher Parker’s prints were on the chair in Uncle’s house.”
“Only his?”
“His were only on the chairs that were impaled on the stove and straddling the kitchen sink.” Cruz cut into his steak. “Want to pay Parker a visit?”
Cruz held the storm door open and knocked on the closed front door. He knocked a second time, and the door opened slowly. Both he and Yablonski held their badges up.
“Mrs. Parker? It’s Detective De La Cruz. Do you remember me?”
Hayley Parker was down five pounds she couldn’t afford to lose. Her eyes were sunken with dark circles beneath; her cheek bones were more prominent. One was red, swollen, visible even through the veil of hair hiding her face. “I remember.”
This was one of those times he wished he’d been wrong. “Are you hurt, Mrs. Parker?”
Her eyes grew as big as quarters. “No. No, I’m fine. I just, uh, fell. I was g-getting something. From a shelf. That’s when I fell.”
The lie was so pathetic it didn’t qualify as a lie. If she wouldn’t press charges, there wasn’t much Cruz could do. At least about domestic violence.
“Fuck, Hayley, it’s cold,” Christopher Parker shouted from inside the house.
“Mr. Parker,” Cruz said, raising his voice. “Police.”
“What the fuck are you doin’ here?”
Hayley Parker was jerked backward, the door ripped from her hand. Parker pushed into the space, running into Cruz.
Cruz pulled Parker out the doorway and planted his shoulder blades around a porch column.
“No! Christopher!” Hayley reached for her husband, but Yablonski’s figure was a solid obstacle.
“What the fuck is goin’ on!”
“You’re under arrest for assaulting a police officer.” Cruz spun him and cuffed him.
Parker squealed when the cuffs locked on his wrists. “I didn’t.”
“I witnessed it,” Yablonski said. “He assaulted both you and his wife. Do you want to press charges, ma’am?”
Hayley cowered in the doorway. “What? No. Let him go. Christopher?”
Parker grunted as his chest was pressed into the cold wood. “Fuckin’ cops. Go inside, Hayley. Don’t say nothin’ to nobody. Fuck!”
“Extensive vocabulary you have, Mr. Parker. What is this?” Cruz pulled a gun from the waistband of the jeans, hidden under a baggy sweatshirt.
“Protection. This is a rough neighborhood.”
Cruz handed the gun to Yablonski. “You have a concealed carry license?”
No answer.
“Let’s take a ride downtown.”
Cruz walked into the interview room with the case file in his hand and Yablonski on his heels. Damn, it felt good to have the bald-headed bastard on his side again. Cruz turned on the recording device, said the obligatory identification, re-read Christopher Parker his rights.
Parker looked at Cruz with narrowed eyes filled with contempt. “This is because of Hayley? She fell, man. Not my fault she’s fuckin’ clumsy.”
“Do you understand your rights, Mr. Parker?” Cruz asked again.
“Yeah. Whatever. I didn’t hit her.”
Cruz and Yablonski sat opposite Parker at a gray steel table bolted to the floor. Parker was bolted to the table, thanks to the assault charge.
“Sunday, November fifth, you went to the house of Alvin Hall—street name Uncle.”
“No. I was home Sunday night,” Parker said, cutting him off. “Ask Hayley.”
“You were not home. I don’t need to ask your wife. I have your fingerprints.”
“I mighta been to his house but it wasn’t Sunday. Whatever you think you found was, like, old.”
Cruz took two photos from the case folder. “These chairs had your prints on them. Not Uncle’s. On the bottom side of the seat. Where you would put your hand to throw a chair at someone.”
“So what? I missed. That fucker is faster than he looks.”
“Sunday, November fifth, you went to the house of Alvin Hall. What time did you arrive?”
“I don’t know. It was dark. He opened the door and let me in. I didn’t break in. He has those dogs.”
“We know you didn’t break in. We know you and he fought. You ended up on top. He ended up dead.” Cruz improvised, processing Parker’s home spun information to fit the facts of the case.
“Wh-what? Uncle is dead?” Parker lost the cocky mask for ten seconds. “Shit, no, you just playin’ cop games.”
“Uncle is dead,” Yablonski said, speaking for the first time. “And we got you for his murder.”
Parker and Yablonski locked gazes, then Parker burst like a festered boil. “No, man. Uh uh, no way, no how. I didn’t kill him. He was hit by that van. I saw. I’m like a fuckin’ witness or some shit.”
Cruz leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms, and gave Parker the rope to hang himself. “Let’s hear it.”
“I went over, like you said. To talk. That’s it.”
“After what happened on Halloween? You didn’t go there to talk.”
Parker’s eyes hinted he was more dangerous than the scrawny, white guy packaging let on. “He needed to be convinced to stay away from my house.”
House, Cruz noted. Not family. Not wife and son. “How did you convince Uncle?”
“He wanted something from me.”
“Your territory?”
“He wanted me to work for him. He went into the kitchen. I said no with a chair or two. He ran.”
“Uncle was a fighter.”
“He was all talk. When he saw I wasn’t havin’ it, he took off. I chased that fucker through yards. I was comin’ down a driveway when puhhh.” His fingertips touched and then sprung wide in explosion. “This van nailed him.”
“A van.”
“It was, like, a work van. No windows. Dark. Black or somethin’.”
“Did the driver stop?”
“Yeah.” He wiped his mouth. “He went around the front, but Uncle wasn’t there. He came out the other end.”
“Was Uncle alive?”
“How the fuck do I know?” Parker’s voice climbed a few decibels. “All I cared about was getting out of there.”
The story was just messed up enough to be the truth, or as close to it as Parker could come. Adding to it, the damage to Uncle’s head could have been done by a vehicle.
“What did you do next?” Cruz asked.
“I went back to my car. I went home.”
“You’re going to stay as our guest while we check out your story,” Cruz said. He ended the interview and signaled for Parker to be taken to holding.
Cruz and Yablonski stood in Hall’s yard, looking for the route Uncle and Parker took.
“Straight is fastest,” Yablonski said and climbed the first fence. Cruz followed, crossing through to the street behind Uncle’s. Slowly, methodically, the pair searched, speaking with residents as they progressed. Two streets over, a woman in a boldly flowered housedress leaned over the railing of her porch.
“Cleveland police, ma’am.” Yablonski help up his badge.
“I have something for you.” She came down the stairs and shoved a yellow dish towel into Cruz’s hands.
From the shape and weight, he knew what it held. He carefully unwrapped the gun. “Where did you get this?”
“In the landscaping. I found it Monday.”
“Do you know how long it was there?”
“Could be a week. Mighta been a day. Someone trampled my mums.”
Cruz didn’t see Parker caring about ruining someone’s flowers, but wouldn’t he have noticed losing a gun? “Did you see a traffic accident here? Sunday night, after nine p.m.?”
She shook her head. “I was watching a show on that History Channel. You ever watch it?”
“O
ne of my favorite channels,” Yablonski said grinning. “What was the show?”
The woman’s eyes lit in surprise, then she smiled. “Churchill. He was a bastard wasn’t he? Smart man but a real bastard.”
While Yablonski interviewed the woman, Cruz searched the street. One house away, a dark stain on the street had a splatter pattern. He dropped to his hands and knees for a worm’s eye view. Against the curb was something that shouldn’t have been there.
“What is it?” Yablonski asked.
“A shoe.” Cruz held up a size fourteen, top of the line Nike. “I’ll call crime scene.”
Yablonski’s phone rang. He listened, his gaze flashing up to Cruz. “I’ll be there.” He stowed the phone. “Gotta run. Customer of my own. Suspected overdose.”
November 8
A girl died today. I heard her sister’s cries. I knew them because they were mine.
It never stops. It doesn’t matter what mayors say or cops do or people think. It never stops. It doesn’t care if you’re rich or poor or young or old. It doesn’t care if you’re black or white or Asian or Hispanic or whatever.
Everything would be good if drugs didn’t exist.
Drugs are like….are like…A PLAGUE Yes! Ripping through the city like some…some…I need a word.
A pestilence.
A calamity.
Merriam-Webster know what they’re talking about calling it black death.
I feel helpless, just like that day and every day since. The black death surrounds me. Is there really nothing that can be done to stop it?
They need to be warned. They need another sign.
Chapter Five
Saturday, December 16
Six weeks led nowhere on Uncle’s case. His head had been released to his mother. Cruz ignored recommendations and attended the service filled with people who loved Loretta Hall. He hadn’t given up, but the trail had gone cold. Cruz’s case load, on the other hand, had heated up, pushing Uncle to “second shift.”
He and Yablonski had breakfast a couple times a week. They didn’t talk shop, not much. He liked having a friend again. When Yablonski asked him to throw darts for the fifth time, he finally agreed.
So here he was, palms sweating, legs trembling as he crossed the parking lot. Becky’s on East 18th served food—damn good food—but it was a bar. Before that first AA meeting, he hadn’t understood there wasn’t a cure for addiction. For the rest of his life, he would be battling his monsters.
You can leave. He had to do this sooner or later. Doesn’t mean today. He had to face the monster in his own territory.
Cruz pulled the door open and crossed the threshold. Hometown rock ’n’ roll slapped him in the face. The sticky, sweet scent of stale alcohol hung heavy in the air, calling to him like a lover, promising to make everything better.
His demon reared, diamond-tipped claws ready to render his ass into sausage, to turn him into a pulpy memory of what he had become.
He took a deep breath, one meant to fortify but instead suffocated. He wasn’t strong enough to do this. Turning tail, he had to get the hell out before he fucked up.
“Cruzie!” Yablonski’s grating voice cut through the crowd and had every head turn his way. Cruz had a hand on the door when Yablonski crushed him in a one-armed hug and shoved a glass into his hand.
“Son of a bitch. You know I don’t drink.” He shoved the glass away as if it were a live grenade, stepping back until the door frame knocked his head.
“I thought you just gave up alcohol. How do you take a piss?”
His heart pounding in his ears, Cruz looked at the cocky grin on Yablonski’s face, then at the red, fizzy drink. “Wh-what is it?”
“A Brass Ball. 7UP and cranberry juice.”
Cruz took the glass, sipped it. 7UP and cranberry.
“My sister’s husband drinks this. He’s recovering, too. I named it, though. Any alchy who has the balls to be in a bar deserves showing what he has—big, huge, brass balls that ring when he walks. But that was too long, so I called it Brass Ball.”
Cruz laughed. Deep down, core deep. The demons were chained for the night. He took the drink. “Just what I needed.”
“Let’s play some darts. I think you know most of the guys. You picked a good day. It’s Vinnie’s birthday. Free wings.”
December 16
I found a paper on the sidewalk yesterday. It had the picture of an angel in a breast plate with his wings spread wide. He held the scales of justice in his left hand and readied a long sword in his right. Under his foot was a large creature with human head and shoulders, black wings, and a serpent’s body. He is straining, trying to escape. The angel’s face was calm. He wasn’t angry. He was just doing his job, ridding the world of the demons infesting the earth.
On the back was the prayer to St. Michael, the Archangel. They are the most powerful words I’ve ever read.
Saint Michael the Archangel, defend me in battle. Be my protection against the malice and snares of the Devil. Through me, may God rebuke him, I humbly pray. And do Thou, o Prince of the Heavenly Host, by the power of God, thrust into Hell Satan and all evil spirits who wander through the world for the ruin of souls
I have a serpent in my sights. Today, I take up Michael’s sword to end the ruin of souls.
Chapter Six
Friday, December 22
Cruz leaned against the table at Becky’s sipping his usual. This was the third time he’d stepped through the door. He looked forward it to now, having Yablonski waiting for him, a Brass Ball in one hand and darts in the other. Each time Cruz left—no matter the score of the matches—he won. With the help of AA and a stubborn friend, Cruz was reclaiming the life alcoholism had stolen.
Yablonski carried their team, making up for Cruz’s lack of skill. That ended tonight. After his last ass kicking, he had bought tungsten tipped darts that felt like they were made for his hand. He practiced every night, no matter how late he got home.
Yablonski frowned as he scored Cruz’s throw. “You put a little something in your Brass Ball? ’Cause I’m not cool with that.”
“Nothing but 7UP and cranberry.” The grin on his face went ear-to-ear, and he didn’t care how stupid it looked.
Yablonski took his glass and sipped. Then he clapped his hands and spun to face his opponents. “Gentlemen. What do you say we make this interesting?”
Every dart went exactly where Cruz wanted. The moaning after he let each one fly eased the sting to his credit card.
Yablonski jawed as he raked in the winnings and shoved half at Cruz. “Do you need another lesson, boys?”
Cruz’s phone rang. “Hold on, Yablonski. Dispatch.” He walked to a quieter corner, then signaled the dart throwing portion of his night was over. He ended the call and went back to the table for his coat and to kick in for the tab.
“Whaddya got?” Yablonski asked.
“Another head.”
“Like Uncle?”
Cruz shrugged. “I’ll find out.”
“We’ll find out. I’m going with you.”
At 9:30 p.m. at the end of December, I-90 westbound at the Cleveland-Euclid boarder was a brutal choice for a crime scene. Winds whipped easterly, using the highway as its personal expressway, oblivious to the straggling traffic fighting up wind. Small, icy flakes of snow were tossed in the air. They went left, right, north, south. All depending on the mood of the fickle wind—a wind that didn’t just chill, it froze.
Five black and whites lined the interstate shoulder. Officers from the fifth district stood in the cold, a human barricade against rubberneckers and social media hounds. The area glowed like a radioactive snow globe under the light spillage from a nearby Honda dealership and the spinning lights of the cop cars.
“He came from over here,” one of officers on the scene said as he pointed. “There’s boot prints.”
Excited by the possibility of evidence, Cruz hurried to the head. Markers delineated the route the killer took. Treadless prints stepped over
the slop left by the snow plows, then bee-lined to the post planted in front of the Cleveland Corp Limit sign.
“Crime scene been called?”
“En route, sir.”
Satisfied, he moved to the head mounted on another generic post, inside the fence, facing on-coming traffic. The victim was Hispanic male with chin length, black hair much like Cruz’s own when it wasn’t braided tight against his head. The wind whipped wet strands around the unfeeling face. The eyes were closed, the mouth opened.
“What time was it reported,” Cruz asked.
“Ten minutes before nine,” the officer marking off the prints said.
Cruz looked at the road below where his car sat idling to the line of cars on the highway. A van would screen the killer from on-coming traffic. Drivers would have to look behind them to see and at full speed, with the icy flurries, most wouldn’t. If they did, what would they see in the one or two second glimpse? He signaled a uniformed officer. “Go to the dealership and check out their security. It’s a long shot but see if they caught the killer on security.”
Yablonski stoked his beard as he studied the head. “I know him.” His gaze left the familiar face and found Cruz’s. “His name is Martinez. He was arrested a week ago for possession after his girlfriend OD’d.”
“I want to know everyone he knew, Yablonski. Get me names.”
Saturday, December 23
Cleveland Police Chief Edwin Ramsey played defensive back for the Ohio State Buckeyes for four years before going pro with the Cleveland police. The time on the force, the years behind the desk hadn’t diminished the physical presence that was Win Ramsey. The chief leaned forward, his forearms on the polished dark wood of a desk as large as the man who occupied it. Behind him, the flags for the United States of America, the State of Ohio, and the City of Cleveland stood as sentries, symbols of the thin blue line between civilization and chaos.