All Things Hidden

by Judy Candis

  Thus, Jael successfully passed her test with time and plenty of police cases to earn the trust of her colleagues, finally becoming “one of the boys” the day she joined the prank and taped her own words, THE LORD SMILES EVEN ON THE MENTALLY CHALLENGED, in a borrowed cup on the coffee counter along with six blowup cigars. The joke got a good laugh and a few pats on the back. Since then she’d kept her own cup in her bottom drawer—after bleaching it to death—whenever she was away from the office.

  Over the past two years, though never preachy, she presented her faith in many ways. Though several coworkers edged away from her, others would come to her for counsel about certain decisions or with questions in a debate about whether the Bible really stated certain things.

  Those new avenues eventually led to a budding Bible study group that met each Wednesday at the station after normal work hours. Though members changed on a regular basis, several remained faithful, and Jael thanked the Lord for the chance to witness and bring another to Christ. She smiled now, as she glanced up at the handwritten plaque one of her former coworkers had taped over the top of her computer. THE SUPER CHRISTIAN CRIMEFIGHTER. It was a gift she cherished, and she found it could lighten her day at the worst of times.

  Feeling around for her shoes under the desk, Jael was about to head to the break room for some stale coffee with lots of cream when a shadow crossed her shoulder.

  “Don’t you think you should be down there as part of the questioning team?”

  Jael looked up into the ruddy face of Officer Ernest Billups. A familiar wave of annoyance coursed through her veins. She frowned. Billups had continually declined her numerous offers to participate in their Bible study, a reminder that she could only plant the seed, not convert the sinner. He was a walking testament to the fact she was not the Super Christian, knocking down every stronghold; in Billups’s case, she knew, only prayer and God’s divine will would prevail.

  Looking at him from the corner of her eyes, she answered, “I thought drug dealers were low on your priority list, Billups. But since I happen to be the lead detective on this assignment and can do what the heck I want, I’ve assigned Officer Sills to handle that. He’s as capable as I am.”

  “I know that’s the method you used to make detective in the first place, but you don’t get to work your way to lieutenant by shifting your responsibilities onto others. Affirmative action doesn’t cut it in this arena.”

  “Excuse me, but I don’t remember asking for your advice about how to handle this case.”

  “You don’t have to cop an attitude. Just trying to help a fellow officer keep things in perspective. It won’t hurt your image to ask for advice from a seasoned officer every now and then.” He reached up to push a few strands of hair back on his balding head, exposing a sweaty half moon beneath his armpit.

  Jael’s lips thinned into a straight line. She felt the tension tighten her jaw, and clenched her teeth. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  “We’re a team here, Reynolds. We succeed by working together. Everyone carries their own weight.”

  Jael rolled her eyes as Billups walked away, her coffee forgotten. Yeah, right. Like you have the slightest idea what the word “team” means, she thought.

  She turned back to her computer and began typing with sharp, precise strokes. It was times like these that made it difficult to remember she was a Christian. Billups’s remarks were nothing more than an opportunity for him to take another unwarranted jab at her. One step beneath her in rank, he obviously resented her presence on what would otherwise have been his crime scene at the crack house, and rarely masked his anger at her possible promotion to lieutenant over him.

  Peace, be still, she whispered to her mounting anger as she jabbed at the keys.

  An office loner, Billups had declined every offer by coworkers to participate in various activities; some had even suggested joining them at the nearest watering hole after work, hoping that would loosen the man up. So far, no one had ever piqued his interest. The only pleasure the man seemed to get out of his job was jabbing at her.

  She couldn’t let Billups get under her skin. She knew what she was doing and knew how best to handle her watch. She also knew her men would not chance her displeasure and would meticulously document and label every piece of evidence carefully; they would be at the scene with the crime technicians for hours.

  As for her, she would review the crime scene videotape before leaving, if she was lucky enough to have it on her desk before finishing her report. She wanted to have as much done as she could by the time she sent her report to the homicide sergeant. Since the dead man was black, she had to be extra careful to see that everything was done correctly. Because he was a dealer, few would care enough to push for justice on his behalf. As always, it would be on her shoulders to see that someone did care.

  Confiscating so much money off the dead man’s body could help. Jael wrote herself a note to have all prints found near the alley matched with those of the vagrant. Of course, there would be numerous prints found at a drug site such as this one. It would be like hunting for a clean needle among a stack of addicts.

  Jael picked up her phone. “Forensics, please.” She drummed her slender fingers on top of her unchecked messages.

  “Forensics.”

  “This is Detective Reynolds, Homicide. May I speak to Larry?” She waited several minutes. “Hi, Larry. Jael.”

  “Don’t start, Jael; I haven’t even had a chance to review the body. I have other corpses here too, you know. And your boy’s body bag just came in.”

  “I just need to know one thing: Which bullet was responsible for the actual cause of death?”

  “That’s going to take a while. The report says he was hit three times in the same area.”

  “Yeah, but what is that to an expert like you? You know you’re rarely off base, Larry. Just one look, please, and I’m in your debt forever.”

  “You’re already up to your neck in ‘debt forever’ to me. What’s another eternity?” Jael heard her friend sigh. “Hold on a second.”

  After a few lengthy minutes, filled with the sound of zippers and plastic fumbling, she heard the phone being picked up again.

  “Of course, this is off the record. You’ll get my full report like everyone else. But my preliminary assumption is that it was the bullet that penetrated the myocardium.”

  “I thought so. You’re a pal, Larry. You know you’re my boy.”

  “Yeah, yeah, but just because you’re determined to work your butt off all the time doesn’t mean the rest of us are willing to devote twenty-four/seven to our jobs.”

  Without his offering a good-bye, the phone clicked in her ear. Jael smiled. Her buddy wasn’t fooling her. Larry was just as much a work fiend as she was.

  It took almost an hour and a half to complete her supplementary report. She needed to insert her personal impressions while they were still fresh in her mind. She would then add the coroner’s report and collected evidence as the information was released to her, and all of it would be added to the Homicide Division’s preliminary. For a moment, she thought about heading down to the interrogation room to see how things were going, but immediately realized that would give Billups the pleasure of thinking once again that he knew it all. He was wrong in all his assumptions

  She was a darn good officer, and knew it. She had solved nearly 98 percent of all her assigned cases. And as far as she was concerned, the 2 percent of cases she hadn’t solved were still open. She did everything strictly by the book and with little or no unnecessary harassment. She was pushy only when she had to be, and when she had to be, even the assisting officer knew to stay back.

  She’d proven herself more times than not, sacrificed more than she cared to admit. The men in her unit knew it too, even Billups. So, for now, she put him out of her mind. She had to get home, and it would still be at least another fifteen minutes to break down the initial call and log in the times and first condition of the body. At home over the weekend, she woul
d add the coroner’s complete report, evidence found by the last officer on the scene and the witness’s statement. In most cases like this, it could take weeks if not months before they even had a solid lead.

  She reached for the phone again. “Yeah . . . this is Reynolds. Get me Sills.”

  “One moment.”

  She waited.

  “Sills here.”

  “How’s it going?”

  “As expected. He denies having seen or heard anything. He’s been searched and questioned about who his dealer was and who else came through there. You know the routine.”

  “Think I should come down?”

  “Naw, we were just about to let him go anyway. I’ll hit the streets tomorrow to make sure we didn’t miss anyone who might have seen anything. The initial call came from a little old lady two doors down. I’ll visit her again. Otherwise, we’ve got everything covered, so stop bothering me. It’s Friday—go home and play with your kid. Forget this place for a while. Don’t you have the weekend off?”

  “Yeah, that’s something that hasn’t happened in a while.” “So stop hanging around here and go home. If anything comes up, I’ll call you.”

  “Okay, Rick, see you Monday morning.”

  “Have a great weekend.”

  Which for Jael would not be the case by any stretch of the imagination.

  Chapter

  4

  Ah, shoot!! Shoot, shoot, shooooot.” Jael slammed the brakes just before pulling her ’96 Bronco into her driveway behind her ex-husband’s Mercedes C280. How could she have forgotten he was to pick up Ramon for the weekend? Screwing up her nose, she hissed through her teeth as she backed her car up and parked in front of her small colonial-style home at the mouth of a cul-de-sac.

  This was the last thing she needed—another confrontation with her ex. Before she was out of the car, Virgil was storming from the house, ready for the attack. Jael braced herself with a prayer for calm and patience.

  “It’s about time,” he yelled, hands on his hips, Samurai warrior-style. “I’ve waited over an hour and a half. Unlike yours, my time is accountable.”

  Turning off her engine, it occurred to her how Virgil loved any opportunity to engage in this familiar dispute in front of his old home for all their neighbors to witness. And, of course, he never thought her time was as valuable as his. If she sat in her car, he would just come toward her yelling at the top of his lungs; better to let him vent inside.

  Jael stepped out of the car as Virgil marched down the pathway toward her. He wore his usual style of loose dark pants, white shirt with tie and suit jacket. His hair was still cut in the same close crop, and his deep-set brown eyes, once so adorable, were now pinched at the center of his brow, flaming in anger. Stoking his anger just a notch higher, Jael moved past him without a word.

  “I don’t even want to ask why you’re late again,” he barked. “Is it possible that for just once you could have my son ready on time?”

  “I forgot you were coming.”

  “Forgot! I’ve told you twice I would be here by seven P.M. It’s almost eight-thirty and you’ve left Ramon here alone again with that . . . that . . .”

  “His name is Terrell. You know that.” Jael continued toward the house and moved as fast as she could to the door.

  Sometimes it was hard to believe that she had actually prayed to win this man’s heart. Well, not prayed in the sense that one requests a specific blessing from the Lord, since at the time she had little to do with spiritual things. But she had wished, and her wish had been granted. Be careful what you wish for, Rhonda, her cousin, had told her at the time. Cuz had seen through him even then.

  She had met Virgil at a card party, on the south side of town, right after graduating from the police academy. His wide, sensual smile, along with his tall, muscle-rippling body, had called to her as if she were a slobbering pup. She’d always admired a man who knew where he was going, and Virgil had his life completely mapped out. Even down to the number of children he wanted and where he intended to be financially when he retired at fifty-five.

  They had dated off and on for a while, not really making a serious commitment, until the day Jimmy, a former boyfriend of hers, stepped on the scene. She and Virgil had joined Rhonda and Rhonda’s current beau at Cuz’s house to watch the NFL playoffs. Jimmy dropped by unexpectedly, having just arrived back in town.

  Jael had been too naïve at the time to realize that when Virgil’s arm slipped tightly around her shoulders, it was more a sign of his true possessive nature than an act of undying love.

  She’d thought it romantic at the time, when Virgil proclaimed before the entire group that she was his woman and they were soon to be married. She’d beamed from ear to ear and thought how lucky she was.

  As time passed, she’d had to push him for a wedding date, and only got him to the altar on time when she threatened to pick up where she’d left off with Jimmy. But Virgil had been a lot of fun then, back when they both thought fun was the same thing. He was ambitious and proud to introduce her as the first African-American female to join the Criminal Investigation Division in the Dadesville Police Department. They worked together to have the best of everything. Because, boy, did Virgil love to boast.

  So, it really irked him that she had continued on without him, reaching every goal they had set for her career. He had expected her to fail, to be nothing without him there to direct her. He had no idea that the God she served had even greater plans for her life than the two of them could have ever imagined.

  During the divorce proceedings, Virgil reluctantly relinquished his half of the house they’d bought together, back in a time when life and love still had a promising new appeal. It was a modest three-bedroom home, among other well-manicured homes, with a nice-size yard for Ramon to romp around in. If not for Virgil’s timely child-support payments, Jael would have had to move out long ago. Naturally, she never had to worry whether she thanked him or not—he did enough of that for himself.

  “Is nothing more important than what you want to do? Ramon isn’t even packed! I had to get his things together myself, among what I could find clean.”

  Behind his back, Jael made an ugly face. She’d just bet he had a great time probing through her things, looking for signs to accuse her of mishandling the court-ordered custody of their son. Who, by the way, Jael wanted to add out loud, had also conveniently forgotten this was his weekend to spend with his dad. For Ramon’s sake, she wouldn’t include him in their argument.

  As she stepped through the door, she saw the two boys leaning against the wall that divided the living-dining room from the kitchen-den. Ramon shrugged his shoulders at her as if to say, “Sorry.” Terrell moved back into the den, knowing this was a private family moment.

  Virgil was right behind her, still spewing his usual belittling harsh words. For her, they had lost their sting long ago; she’d done her time, in more ways than one. Thankfully, when Ramon was around, Virgil held back from saying the hurtful things he didn’t think twice about saying in private. So she made sure she was rarely alone with him. Now, Jael ignored him as she bent before her son to give him a farewell kiss.

  “Do I have to go?” Ramon whispered.

  “Ramon, we go through this every time. You know you love these trips with your father. You just hate leaving Terrell behind, but he’ll be here when you get back.”

  “But we were into a great game, and Terrell just ordered a double cheese pizza with sausage,” he pouted.

  Jael rose and ran her palm across her son’s smooth cornrows. Though she’d fought Virgil and won about not letting her son play video games filled with violence, she had lost the battle to deny him video games altogether. Her pastor had suggested she play with Ramon and Terrell herself and use the time to teach them about violence and why such behavior was not acceptable for a Christian. She’d even enjoyed playing, once everything was in perspective.

  She’d also lost a smaller battle when Virgil went against her wishes and allow
ed Ramon to wear his silky, thick, black hair in cornrows, a style that reminded her of prisoners. At first she’d been livid, but couldn’t find anyone to back her up. Even her mother had said, “Let the boy be a boy. God’s not going to be upset with him because he braids his hair. Just don’t let him start wearing earrings, though.” The incident had made her wonder if maybe she was going a bit overboard, as Virgil claimed.

  After asking the Lord to show her how He felt about the matter, she finally gave in when Ramon showed her photos of several young gospel singers sporting similar styles, and told her that he’d copied his style from a member of the third-generation Winans Phase II.

  When the ladies of her Prayer Warriors group commented about how handsome Ramon looked with his new hairstyle and that he was growing into a fine young man, she’d exhaled a sigh of relief. Now she could snub her nose at Virgil, showing him one didn’t have to be a geek to be a Christian.

  She took a long look at her son now, who was small for his age. Ramon was nothing more than a pint-size sack of bones in baggy jeans and a Spiderman T-shirt. With a square chin and full nose and lips, he favored his father. But he had her huge rust-colored, oval-shaped eyes and screwed his mouth up like hers when he was forced to do something he didn’t want to do. An overwhelming and unexpected need to protect him surged through her. Yet, she knew better than to express it. Like most boys his age, he hated for her to mother him in front of witnesses.

  Virgil was still taking verbal shots behind her back. “I just can’t understand how you continue to place Ramon last on your list of priorities. I’ve asked you time and time again . . .”