“I think so…”
“I think right now you’d miss this Geri very much if he left and you weren’t able to see him again. I realize I don’t know him well, but I do know people, and I think he’d miss you too, even though you boys just met a few weeks ago. Now, I want to ask you something important and I want you to answer me truthfully. Do you like this boy?”
“What do you mean, Grams?”
“You know what I mean! I’m not blind and you aren’t stupid. Do you like – I mean really like – this boy? Maybe even enough to love him a little one day?
Toby’s heart hammered in his chest, but he’d promised he’d answer truthfully. “I think I might…like him. A lot. I’m not sure about loving...” He was a little bit afraid, and a little bit heart-busting happy at the admission. He was afraid to look at her.
“I think you will be, Toby. I think you will be sure one day.”
He looked up her and saw her wiping tears from her eyes. “Grams, I’m…I’m sorry!” he was horrified at what he’d caused. “I didn’t mean to make you upset. I’ll quit liking him, I swear! Just don’t be mad. I didn’t mean to make you ashamed of me.”
She gave a little laugh, which sounded more like a sigh, and brushed the tears out of her wise, old eyes. “Toby-boy, I’m not one bit mad. And, you better darn well know nothing you can say or do could make me truly ashamed of you. I might get mad as a hatter, but I love you, child. Did you think I didn’t know, or at least hadn’t suspected, your nature? Your Gramps loved you and he wouldn’t be ashamed either if he were sitting with us right now. And you know your momma wouldn’t be ashamed. You’ll learn soon enough you can’t just stop the kind of feelings, and longings you’re beginning to have.”
“Then, why are you crying, Grams?
“Toby, I’m crying because my heart is split and that causes it to hurt like nothing you can yet imagine. One side is so very happy you’re discovering the joys of love and life, and that you have a special friend. The whole wide world is waiting for you right now. The other side is grieving; because it knows the way that same world works. The plain truth is, the world isn’t always very loving or accepting, and people are hard and judgmental, even those who know better. There are dangers and temptations and threats everywhere, Toby; some of them you’ve likely learned about it school, and some we’ve talked about. There’ll be bad days, but if you’re strong and brave, and careful and clever and learn to be just a little bit wise – and learn not to sass so much,” she gave him a wink “you’ll be fine.” She stood up and gave him a hug. “It’s time for us to call an end to the day, young man. I’m tired, and based on all the planning going on over dinner, you have a big day ahead of you. I only have one more thing to say.”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“You be careful, Toby, of your heart, your mind and your body.” He nodded. “And, for Heaven’s sake, use protection!”
Toby laughed, although he was embarrassed, and then stood and looked at her – really looked at her – like a man looks at the woman who has raised him, and loved him, and scolded him and pushed him, and accepted him because he was who he was and, most of all, because he was a child, dear to her heart, in all the ways possible.
“Good night, Grams. I love you.”
“I love you too, Toby.”
Toby brushed away his own tears and walked through the living room and opened the French doors. He stepped out on the terrace, remembering what came next.
The next day he met Geri at the pool. Under the mid-summer sun, they splashed in the water, shared their ideas and dreams while sitting on the lounge chairs, and they napped in heat. Geri grinned with his very white teeth and reached for his towel. His hand brushed Toby’s hand. Looking into Geri’s green eyes, and knowing it was alright if he did, Toby Bailey fell in love.
He looked up at the stars, and saw one bright light trailing across the sky. “Is that you, Geri?” After a while, he went inside and eventually fell back to sleep. If he dreamed again that night, Toby didn’t remember.
♦♦♦
At the same time Toby let himself into his apartment, Reightman and Jackson were headed down to their boss’s office. Both expected to get their ass thoroughly chewed by Chief Kelly.
Nancy had tracked them down earlier and had matter-of-factly informed them that the Chief would see them at 6 PM on the dot. She popped her gum. “And don’t be late. I’ve got kids to feed and a diet club meeting to get to.” She then turned on her heels and left.
They arrived at precisely 5:59 PM. They slunk into the office and positioned themselves in front of the big desk, hands clasped behind their backs. Reightman was uncomfortably reminded of her one and only visit to the principal’s office back in her elementary school days. She hadn’t liked the chewing she got then, and suspected she really wasn’t going to like it any better now.
The Chief was seated in his rolling swivel chair, head down, working his way through the huge folder of paper and forms needing his signature. “Well.” He said, looking up at them from underneath his bushy brows. “That went to hell in a handbasket.”
Reightman decided she’d best agree. “Yes, sir, it did.”
“The old lady was right about the knife, and the alibi. We jumped the gun, and but good.”
“Yes sir, we did.” Jackson was going to take his beating like a man, right beside her.
Kelly leaned back and Reightman winced when the chair gave a small squeak. “We’re all to blame here –there’s plenty to go around. We all saw what we expected to see. You two did, and so did I. Even the DA’s office failed to raise a fuss during their review. We all formed a conclusion and didn’t think it through. She was right about that too.” Reightman let out a little of the breath she was holding, as the Chief continued, “We haven’t had a murder like this in a long time. Now I grant you, we’ve had the occasional shooting, and a bar fight or two which got out of hand. Usually, when someone gets killed it’s a case of domestic violence or a family squabble. Sometimes it’s a drug deal gone bad, or an attempted robbery that got out of hand. Plenty of witnesses and evidence to wrap things up, nice and neat. This here situation is different, and we are going to up our game and put in some serious work.” He looked at her from across his desk and drummed his fingers. “Reightman?”
“Yes, sir?”
“I’d like you to summarize where we are now.” He waited for her to speak, and then snapped impatiently, “For God’s sake, both of you stop standing there like kids caught stealing candy, and put your butts in a seat. This may take a while.”
Reightman and Jackson settled their asses on vinyl. “Sir, here’s the current situation: We have a victim, presumably killed by multiple stab wounds to the neck and chest, which resulted in extreme blood loss.”
Kelly held up a hand to stop her. “You said it’s presumed the stab wounds were cause of death. Why presumed?”
“The coroner hasn’t signed off on official cause of death yet, sir.”
“What the hell has Lieberman been doing? Playing with himself?”
Jackson jumped in, “Coroner’s been out all day, Chief. Riley said he’d be in later today when I called and checked this morning. I followed up a few minutes ago and was told Lieberman called in sick for the rest of the day. Stomach virus or something.” Reightman’s look of disbelief caused him to add, “The man’s entitled to sick leave, Reightman – city policy, and all.”
“Sick leave, my ass,” Kelly muttered under his breath, “Recovering from a late night binge, more likely.”
When Kelly cleared his throat and looked at her expectantly. Reightman continued. “The victim was a partner in the Time Out Spa. Mr. Toby Bailey is the other partner. The stabbing was accomplished with a large knife – a hunting knife, I believe – currently in custody. There’s an identifying name on the case. It’s been established the knife doesn’t likely to belong to Mr. Bailey.”
“Do you think the knife is his, Reightman?”
She chose her words car
efully. “I’m going to work under the assumption it isn’t until proven otherwise.”
“Good enough. Continue.”
“We know that there’s a lot of history between Mr. Bailey and the victim. I got the thumbnail sketch during my initial interview with Mr. Bailey. I have a feeling there’s more to the story, but the relationship appears to have been stable, and there’s no indication there were any hard feelings between the two of them. Certainly on the surface there’s nothing to indicate motive for murder, but I intend to dig deeper to be sure.” When neither the Chief nor Jackson interrupted, Reightman finished up, “The techs have finished with the crime scene, and we’ve placed an officer on premises for the time being. At this juncture, we have no idea how the killer entered or exited the room. No motive’s been established. There are no current leads or additional suspects.” She looked to her partner. “Feel free to add anything you’d like, Jackson.”
“I think you’ve summed it up pretty well.” He pulled out his notebook and reviewed what they knew. “We may be working with an angry customer, although it seems unlikely. Not many folks kill someone because they didn’t like their hot stone massage or seaweed wrap. There may be a financial motive, but we haven’t even started digging through the business files.”
“Where are the files now, Jackson?”
“Still at the scene, sir.” The Chief frowned at that, so Jackson reassured him. “We have officers in the building round the clock. They’ve been there since last night.”
“Alright. That should suffice, but we need to get to those files sooner rather than later.” Kelly rubbed his chin, and the stubble rasped against his hand. “So to summarize your summary, Detective Reightman, we have a dead man who was killed somehow, although death by blood loss due to multiple stab wounds is the front runner right now. We have a murder weapon with no proven owner. We have a crime scene with no clues as to how the murderer made it into or out of the room. We have no identified, or suspected, motive. We have no leads at this time. Sound about right?
“Sounds about right, sir.”
“Then we’ve got a hell of a lot of work to do and we need to make some progress ASAP. The Mayor and the DA aren’t exactly happy right now. We haven’t been hammered by the news teams yet, but that's bound to change; especially now the suspect’s been released. What kind of resources do you figure you’re going to need, Reightman? Things are pretty tight in terms of departmental headcount, but I might be able to free up a couple warm bodies from somewhere.”
“Chief, if you could find a person or two to help analyze the files it would be a big help, and it would be extremely useful if we could get the final reports from the coroner. I just hope Lieberman gets back to work soon and confirms cause of death.”
“Lieberman will be in bright and early tomorrow morning if I have to go pick him up and drive him here myself.” Lieberman was not on Kelly’s list of favorite people either. “Do you think Mr. Bailey will cause us any problems? He doesn’t have much reason to be feeling warm and fuzzy towards any of us right now.”
“No, he doesn’t, sir,” Reightman agreed. “However, his attorney has assured me of Bailey’s full cooperation. I‘m supposed to call her tomorrow morning to set things up.” She had a sudden thought, but hesitated to bring it to his attention. After thinking it through, she decided it couldn’t hurt. “Sir, do you think we can arrange to get official assistance from her and Bailey?” To her surprise, the Chief didn’t immediately shoot her down.
“Why do you ask?”
“Well,” Reightman spoke carefully, not wanting to set him off until he heard her out. “As you’ve said, sir, Zhou Li is well connected and she’s incredibly shrewd. I’d rather have her working with us instead of putting roadblocks up at every opportunity.” She also thought Zhou Li would enjoy being in the thick of things and might end up being a powerful resource, but didn’t mention that part of her thinking. “As for Bailey, bringing him inside the tent, so to speak, might also be helpful when it comes to getting information from the rest of the spa staff. He knows the business and the client list better than anyone and can probably help us make progress faster than if we tried to shift through those files on our own.”
“Not a bad idea, but I’ll have to get approval from up the chain. I’ll try to get you a decision first thing in the morning.”
“Thanks, Chief.”
After a small amount of additional logistical discussion they wrapped up. Reightman and Jackson stood to leave. “Jackson, I need a few additional words with your partner. She’ll catch up with you when we are done here. Close the door on your way out.” The Chief couldn’t have given a clearer dismissal if he tried. After Jackson left the room, the Chief addressed her. “Reightman, you lost it earlier today when you figured out the game Zhou Li was playing. However, you pulled it together and handled yourself well during the interview.” He held up one finger to forestall her objection. “Yes, the interview went to the crapper, but you didn’t let the old bat push you around. Tomorrow, you need to be a focused, capable Detective, regardless of what’s going on with you right now. Hell, I’ve got a feeling before this is done you’ll need to be the best detective this city has ever seen, bar one.” He studied her for a minute more before dismissing her and turning back to the stack of files.
On her way to the door she stopped and turned back to him. “You said, bar one. Who was the one, Chief?”
He leaned back in the chair and put his big hands behind his graying head of hair. The chair groaned. “The best Detective this city has ever seen, bar none, is sitting on his lard ass in this here chair, right now.”
She gently closed the door.
When she got back to her desk, she gave Sam a quick update and then gathered her things and left for the day. She started up her car and pulled out of the lot. She took a quick look at her watch and decided to stop at the grocery store on her way back home. She was almost certain the carton of old leftovers in the fridge had passed the safe-to-eat date. She parked and quickly made a mental list of supplies as she rushed toward the automatic doors. While looking down to dig out her wallet, she collided with a shopper exiting with the store. She lost her footing and fell right on her butt, breaking a heel off her shoe in the process.
“Dammit!” She scrambled around on the concrete on her hands and knees frantically gathering up her scattered belongings.
“You better watch your step, Detective,” a voice whispered. “You might be headed for a fall if you miss a clue.” She started to turn, but a foot shoved her flat on her face. Disoriented, she blinked her eyes, focusing on the shiny row of silvery shopping carts. She lifted her head and turned to identify the source of the words. The voice sounded scared and seemed almost familiar. She picked herself up off the concrete and looked around. The only people in sight were an elderly couple struggling to return a buggy with a wobbling wheel, and a young woman towing two small toddlers into the store.
A store employee knelt down to help gather the last of her things, joined by a few concerned onlookers. “Are you okay, ma’am?”
“Yes, I’m fine.” She bent down and began shoving items haphazardly into the purse. “Did you see who ran into me?” She felt a hint of moisture on her check, and reached up to check. She hissed as her fingers made contact with a pretty good scrape.
The young woman handed her the broken heel and pulled a mostly clean paper napkin from her store apron and handed it to her while shaking her head. “No ma’am, I didn’t. Are you sure you’re alright? I probably should take you over to customer service to file an accident report.”
Melba daubed at her face, figuring all the employees had been trained to try to get any slip and falls on the record to avoid unpleasantness later. “I’m perfectly alright. The only thing hurt is my dignity.” “And my butt and my face,” she thought, “and my shoe.” “Thanks for your help. I think I’ll do my shopping another time.” Melba hobbled back to her car, tossing the broken heel onto the passenger seat. “That was re
ally weird.” She backed out of her space and headed home, never noticing the worried man watching her from across the street, hidden in the dark interior of his car.
♦♦♦
The morning sun shining through the window inched its way across the bedroom and until it shown directly on Toby’s face. He woke, blinking at the bright, shimmery glare. He closed his eyes for a minute more and lay in the warm nest of covers, thinking about the day ahead. He sat up and stretched and then padded his way across the wooden floors to the bathroom to take care of his morning business. A few minutes later, coffee in hand, he opened one of the French doors and stepped on onto his rooftop terrace. The patio had been one of the apartment’s strong selling points, along with its proximity to his business, and the very reasonable lease terms. It wasn’t huge, but was plenty big enough for a small table and chairs, a couple of sun loungers and a few big pots of plants. An enclosed privacy railing encircled the space, cutting most heavy wind and screening any curious eyes in the area. Not that there was anyone to see him up here, three stories above the ground. His was the tallest building in the immediate area, with the exception of the units across the roof from Madame Zhou’s shop. He occasionally saw the drapes move in one of them, but had no idea who lived there. If they wanted to spy on whatever he was doing, he hoped they enjoyed the show.
Toby sat in the sun, sipping his coffee and enjoying a temporary, peaceful moment. Soon, it would be time to start the day, and the first unpleasant task awaiting him was calling Grams. He regretted the sorrow and horror he’d have to share with her as he relayed the news and circumstances of Geri’s death. She’d be devastated. She’d grown to love Geri too. He reached for his phone and realized he still hadn’t found it. “Add another thing to the list for today.” He grabbed his empty cup and went inside to call from the apartment phone. She picked up on the third ring and he could tell by her breathing that she must have raced to the phone.
“Grams?”
“Toby Bailey, you’d better be calling to tell me you’re alright! And why am I just now hearing your voice?”
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