Now I found myself in another strained relationship and I hadn’t even seen it coming. Like the previously destroyed marriage, I had been blind to the simple needs of a reasonable woman. Unable to see or hear the messages until it was too late, or so I worried, as I continued the drive home in silence, no radio or phone conversations with my partner to distract me. No thoughts about Susie or Tawny or any of the other unsolved cases that plagued me. Just me, alone with my memories and worries, marinating in regret and apprehension.
Turning onto my street, I eased past the well-manicured lawns of a middle-class neighborhood. I watched children play in the presence of normal parents who were home with their families in the evening, not visiting crime scenes or chasing killers or drinking with their partner in Chinatown, celebrating another near-miss with death. One or two waved as I passed, and it occurred to me that they likely envied my career. The big-time homicide detective who parked an unmarked cop car in his driveway, wore a gun on his hip, and had all of the exciting stories. It was all perspective, I guessed.
I turned into an empty driveway with a heavy heart, my mind racing as I imagined the possibilities of what awaited me beyond the warm, red door of our previously predictable and safe abode. None of which could compare to what I actually walked in to.
26
I STOOD AT the threshold of my front door, scanning the living room, the dining room, the visible portion of our kitchen. Everything seemed to be in place; even the coffeemaker sat in its assigned position on the counter. She wouldn’t leave and not take the Cuisinart, I reasoned, if for no other reason than revenge.
“Honey?” I called out, though somewhat tentatively. I placed my briefcase, jacket, and hat on the dining room table, and walked into the kitchen expecting a note or a letter, anything for a clue. I set a bottle of wine on the counter and turned toward the hallway. “Honey?”
No reply.
I walked down the hall in the direction of our master bedroom, aware of faint noises coming from the back of the house. Stepping cautiously into the doorway, I noted a light on in the master bath. There was a strong scent of perfume, and it wasn’t one with which I was familiar.
Feeling unsettled about the peculiar presence in my home, I placed my hand on the pistol at my side and moved toward the bathroom, I scanned the bedroom for luggage of an unexpected guest or anything out of the ordinary. Val’s sister from Tacoma came to mind, but the room lacked evidence of overnight company.
Before turning into the master bath, I paused at the trickling sound of stirred water. I held my breath and cautiously peered around the corner.
A woman with fiery red hair stood with her shapely backside toward me, lowering herself into the oversized tub full of bubbles. She had a glass of wine in one hand and a highball glass filled with ice, a clear liquid, and a wedge of lime in the other. She settled into the bath and placed both drinks on the tub’s ledge.
I couldn’t recall knowing a single woman with red hair, much less one who would be lowering herself into my tub.
Setup! I thought.
Could Valerie have planned to leave me, and this woman was the decoy of a private investigator, sent to lure me into an adulterous act? That’d be a sure way to get half of my retirement without much of a battle, I thought. Stories of contentious divorce cases were common grievances among cops.
With slow gentle strokes of her hand, this redhead in my wife’s tub pushed the bubbles around in front of her body, the motion revealing an occasional glimpse of glistening skin. I assumed it had to be unintentional; she couldn’t have known I was standing behind her. But then she startled me by speaking in a low and nonchalant tone, her back still to me. “Care to join me?”
As I stood dumbfounded and speechless, this lady slowly turned, spiraling through the water like a mermaid until her back and bottom floated above the waterline, the bubbly water receding from skin. She kicked her heels up behind her and rested her chin on the side of the tub.
I stood aghast.
“Gin and tonic?” she asked, wrapping her fingers around the moistened glass, her red nails drumming the side. “I hear it’s one of your favorites.”
She was gorgeous. Stunningly beautiful. Playing the part all the way, continuing her seduction. “Well, Detective, are you going to join me or stand there holding your pistol?”
I pulled the knot out of my tie and began unbuttoning my shirt, kicking off my shoes at the same time. Then I pulled my belt from my trousers, catching my badge and gun and carefully placing those items on the bathroom countertop. I tugged at a sock while hopping on one foot and leaning against the doorway. My heart pounded with excitement as I cast all caution to the wind.
She watched as I finished disrobing and made my way to the tub, her bright eyes seeming to twinkle just a little, the corners of her mouth turned up in a coy smile.
She handed me the gin and tonic after I settled into the roomy tub and rested my back against the opposite end. The hot water—almost too hot at first—instantly soothed my tired body and I felt the tension dissipating. Our legs touched beneath the bubbles, the softness of her skin luring me further into temptation. She sat up and slid toward me, closing the space, and leaned in to kiss me lightly on the mouth. Her breath was warm, fresh, and inviting.
She kissed me again and then pulled back, but just a few inches. She stared deeply into my eyes and whispered, “Maybe you should come home early more often, Detective.”
For the first time in two days, I felt good again, the domestic worries now erased from my mind. I smiled back at the sexy lady, the redheaded stranger in my tub, and said, “I’ll make an honest effort at it. You can count on that.”
“Everything okay at home?” Floyd asked when I slid into my desk chair late the following morning. “I tried to call you last night,” he said, now turning his chair to face me, posturing himself for an interview, his partner now the one to be grilled. “You didn’t answer at home, your cell was turned off, and you ignored your pager all night long. I damn near deployed myself on a mission to locate a missing Dickie.”
I didn’t respond, just busied myself moving some papers and files around on my desk, opened and closed a couple drawers with no real purpose.
He persisted: “Dickhead, I’m speaking to you. What the hell’s going on at home? How are you and Val?”
“Good.”
He crossed his arms and frowned. “That’s it? Good?”
“Which is exactly why I ignored you last night, and why I’ll be ignoring you for the next several days. You and every other asshole in this place.”
“That’s not very Christian-like, Dickie.”
“Also,” I said, rising out of my chair, “I’m leaving early today, and if anyone tries to stop me, I’ll shoot my way to the door.”
“I’ve seen you shoot, Dickie; I’m not even a little nervous.”
Ignoring his comments, I continued, “Valerie and I have plans for the weekend, and nothing’s going to stand in the way. Got it?”
I looked over, finally giving him my attention. He leaned back in his chair, folded his hands behind his head and grinned, no doubt enjoying all of it.
I nodded in the direction of the kitchen. “C’mon, asshole, I’ll buy you a cup.”
Floyd stood from his desk and followed me across the squad room, through the front lobby, down the hall past the captain’s office, and into the kitchen. All along the way asking me what happened, where was I going for the weekend, what did I do to make things right with Val, did I get the wine like he suggested and slap her on the ass? I ignored his continued interrogation, greeting various detectives along the way, smiling, shaking the occasional hand, likely making a few of them wonder what happened to the real Dickie, the guy who’d normally give you a grunt, maybe a nod, or just an up yours. I had even greeted the captain, to a degree, a very slight nod through the window as we had walked past his office. Even somewhat of a smile, or maybe a grin. I wanted him to wonder what I was up to, maybe be a little concerned
.
“What the hell is up with you?” Floyd asked, the two of us now stopped at the coffee pot.
I picked up the pot and poured him a cup, then helped myself. “Nothing. I just had a nice evening. It was good to be home.”
“So, things are okay with you and Val?”
“Better than okay. We had a great night, something that’s been way overdue. You ready?”
Floyd stood there, a cup of coffee in one hand, the other gripping his hip. He cocked his head to the side and squinted. “Ready for what?”
“We’ve got shit to do,” I said, glancing at my watch. It was 10:39 a.m. “You pick, Charlie Wright or Donna Edwards, one or the other. I’m leaving at two, I don’t care if we’re in the middle of a gunfight. Got it? I’ll toss you my spare ammo and tell you good luck, let me know how it goes. You can tell me all about it later, exaggerate the story like usual.”
He shook his head, turned, and headed down the hallway with me on his heels. “Charlie Wright,” he said without looking back. “That’ll be the best shot I got at screwing up your weekend. Maybe this time I’ll start the fight.”
“You sure this is a good idea?” Floyd asked as we stepped out of the gray Crown Vic. We had parked on the street in front of the Inglewood apartment complex, a place enclosed by wrought-iron fencing that gave it that warm, cozy feel of prison. Floyd tapped a finger on top of the car, pulling my gaze his way. “In case you forgot, dickhead, the last time we were here, they torched my car. Then you started a fight, and now Internal Affairs is on our ass. This doesn’t go well, it will seal our fate.”
“They torched our car after the fight, and how is it I started it?”
He closed his door and turned toward the apartment complex. “You know.”
No thugs out front this morning, too early in the day I supposed. I felt a little relief, not wanting to report another car fire or riot.
Before we had left the office, I mentioned to Lieutenant Jordan we were going back out to talk to Charlie. He asked why we couldn’t call Charlie on the phone, ask him to come in for an interview. I told him that wouldn’t work and walked away, not having the time nor inclination to explain why.
Upstairs, standing to either side of the doorway to Apartment 201, Floyd and I exchanged glances and nods, communicating to one another we were ready. I reached toward the center of the security screen door and rapped my knuckles against it.
Leilana Wright opened the door and scowled at me. “What the hell y’all want?”
“Ma’am, we need to speak with Charlie,” I said.
“Don’t you mean you want to whoop up on him again?” she asked. Then she looked at Floyd, still squinting beneath lowered brows. “And you, saying you was gonna shoot his ass, I didn’t hand you them handcuffs. Y’all can kiss my ass now, Mista Po-lices!”
“Ma’am,” I said, removing my sunglasses and pushing my hat up to reveal more of my face, “we don’t want to make this a big deal, just ask Charlie a few questions is all. We never did get a chance to talk to him last time, with all the commotion. I hope you can understand, maybe accommodate us a bit. I’d hate to have to go see a judge, get a Writ of Habius Grabbus for Charlie.”
“Hay—be what?”
“It’s a court order, gives us the right to grab Charlie, take him to the station. Habius Grabbus. Usually, a judge issues one of those, he’s inclined to include an Order to Ramshackle, or just O.R. as we call it. Then we’d have to tear your place up, ramshackle the apartment searching for evidence of a crime. Now we don’t want to have to do that, not to a nice lady like yourself. All we want is to talk to Charlie, real polite like, man to man. Right here through the door is fine, ma’am; we don’t want no trouble and we’re not looking to take anyone to jail.”
She turned her confused look back to Floyd. He held up his hand, his index finger and pinky pointed upward, the two middle fingers curled into his palm along with the thumb. The sign of devil worshipers, heavy metal fans, or maybe a catcher signaling two outs to the rest of the team. I had no idea what the hell it meant.
He said, “Scout’s honor.”
After another moment of studying the two civilized-appearing thugs standing at her door, she sighed and said, “I’ll get him up.”
I glanced at my watch: 11:42.
27
CHARLIE WRIGHT STOOD inside the closed security screen door, the whites of his eyes a contrast against dark skin. “I ain’t got nuttin’ to say to all y’all, them’s my rights.”
Floyd shrugged with a tightly closed mouth, essentially giving me the nod.
“Charlie—”
“Don’t you Charlie me. We ain’t buddies, remember? What’d you say, ‘I ain’t never seen you at the dinner table?’ Yeah, that was it . . . you remember that, Detective Jones? Well, now you gonna talk to me, you gonna ‘dress me as Mista Wright.”
“Mr. Wright—”
“Tha’s mo’ like it,” he said, his chin rising a bit with the new posture.
“We don’t have to be buddies—”
“We ain’t.”
“—or even like each other—”
“We don’t.”
“—but we do have something in common here,” I said, pausing but receiving nothing beyond his gaze.
Floyd stood to my side, his hands on his hips, scanning the apartment complex behind us more than looking at me or Charlie. As usual, he had our backs.
I said through the door, “You lost a child—your own flesh and blood—to a senseless murder. You may not like it, but the fact is we’re the ones who are trying to find out who did it.”
I held it there, waiting for a reaction but not getting much more than the continued glare.
Man, this guy was tough.
“Listen, Mr. Wright, it doesn’t seem right to us that you’re listed as a suspect in your son’s murder.”
He responded in a high-pitched voice. “I’m what? . . . How’m I a suspect? What kinda bullshit is that?”
“It just means you’re someone we have to eliminate from the list during the course of our investigation. You’re only on our radar due to some history, you being abusive toward Shane. Plus,” I said, and tried to soften my tone, “we heard you might’ve had some issues with Shane’s lifestyle.”
“Wouldn’t you?” he asked.
“I understand how you feel, Mr. Wright, but I also know you have a heart. You can’t tell me it doesn’t affect you he was killed.”
He looked down.
I stayed with it, saying now, “You do want to know who did this to your boy, right? You’re not going to let someone get away with this, are you, some asshole killing your son?”
“Y’all think I did it, apparently,” he said, his voice now calm, quiet. “Might as well lock my ass up, throw away the key.”
Floyd said, “We don’t want to lock up the wrong guy, Charlie. Can I call you Charlie?”
“I s’pose that’d be okay.”
Two old friends.
“We want to find out who did this to your son, Charlie,” Floyd said. “How he lived don’t mean he deserved to die. Not the way he died, Charlie. That was my son? I’d—”
Floyd held his tongue, not saying what it is he’d do. I knew, and he knew, and Charlie Wright probably had a good idea by now also, the two having been previously acquainted.
Charlie said, “True, man, true,” now looking at Floyd, the two of them on a first name basis. “How’s I s’posed to help y’all find out who done it? Y’all’s the detectives.”
“We have to eliminate you as a suspect, Charlie,” Floyd said, “that’s how we solve cases. We start with a list of people who might’ve done it, then cross off the names of the ones we can prove didn’t do it. We do that until we get to the last name. You can help us get your name off the list.”
“Just like that,” Charlie said, seeing how it worked, getting into it now. “So, who we got on the list, ‘sides me?”
Floyd said, “We can’t really tell you too much about that.”
>
“The list is secret?”
“Something like that, Charlie. See,” Floyd continued, “there’s some DNA—you know about the O.J. case, right?”
“Yeah, I seen it. The po-lice tried to frame the brotha. Nuttin’ new there.”
“The thing is,” Floyd said, “DNA can be real important in a murder case—”
“Maybe, if it ain’t planted by the po-lice,” Charlie added, thinking it all through, philosophizing.
“—and we happen to have DNA in this case,” Floyd said. “Whoever did this to your boy left some evidence behind. All you’d have to do, to eliminate yourself from our list, is give us a sample of your DNA. Let the guys at the lab compare it to our evidence.”
“If I trusted you, I’d might think about doing that. For my boy, Shane, God rest his soul.” Charlie looked toward the ceiling.
“Easy as pie, Charlie,” Floyd told him, pulling a sterile-wrapped swab and the accompanying cardboard container from his shirt pocket. “Just run this around in your mouth for us. Then, you put it in the box, like this here,”—showing him—“seal it yourself, making sure we can’t do nothing to it. You don’t need to trust us, since you do all the work.”
“And if I don’t wanna give you none of my D and A?”
“It’s up to you, Charlie,” Floyd said, stepping back from the door, giving Charlie room to open it.
Charlie stood still.
Floyd, still presenting the swab, said, “Help us out and we’ll be out of here, off your ass. C’mon, man, what do you say?”
“I don’t know, man.”
“Charlie, we know you didn’t have anything to do with this. Why make it harder for all of us?”
Charlie paused another moment before cracking the door open. “I hope this ain’t no trick,” he said, reaching a tentative hand through the small opening. “Now go on, give it here.”
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