Floaters

by Konrath, J. A.

More silence.

  “Look, I’ll be sure and let Carter know this came from Bulldog. I’ve already written it down. Now, while it still matters, where is this going to happen?”

  He gave Chapa the address, but it was hard to believe that anything criminal could be happening in that corner of Chicago’s suburbs. It was a place populated by folks with membership cards to clubs, and close ties to their church affiliations, living in color coordinated houses on clean, freshly resurfaced streets.

  “It’s about that missing girl, Annie Sykes.”

  Chapa knew the case. A week ago, on the evening of October 7, the ten-year-old had gone missing after she walked into Rudi’s Foods in West Chicago and was never seen walking out.

  “They found her?”

  “Not exactly. She sort of found them, more or less. Escaped from some psycho late last night.”

  “Last night?”

  “Yeah, she walked into some convenience store, and the owner called the cops.” There was a slight wheeze in Bulldog’s voice, leading Chapa to decide he was a long-time smoker. “Then she spent last night and all day today in the hospital for observation. The cops kept that under wraps. But now, tonight, about an hour ago, she led them to where the guy lives.”

  “You know what that guy’s name is?”

  “Yes, Grubb, Kenneth L. They got the house under heavy surveillance while they put a team together.”

  Across the room, Murphy yelled something about finishing a level, then, “You still on the phone, Alex?”

  Chapa nodded casually, rolling his eyes, feigning exasperation.

  “I’ll tell you what, Bulldog, I’ll talk you up to Carter, big time, if you forget all of this right now, and no other reporter gets a phone call tonight.”

  “You mean that?”

  “Absolutely.”

  Chapa hung up the phone, grabbed his jacket and tape recorder, and headed for the door like it was nothing at all.

  “You got something, Alex, or just making a food run?”

  “Maybe something, we’ll see.”

  “I warned you.”

  “That you did, Murph.”

  Chapa sprinted across the parking lot and into his car. He pounded the accelerator of his old Honda Civic, tearing down country roads, quickly narrowing the distance to the address Bulldog had given him, while keeping an eye out for any squads.

  Can’t afford to get a ticket. Can’t afford to lose time, either. The house was only a few miles away, but the minutes seemed to be passing by faster than the darkened Midwestern landscape.

  Once he crossed Route 59 and the Grandville city limits, Chapa let rip and did fifty down quiet residential streets, confident that every available cop in town would be part of the team gathering to storm a sleepy, well-manicured neighborhood.

  Chapa pulled into the Pleasant Highlands subdivision less than twenties minutes after he’d left the newspaper office. Grubb’s house was at the far end of a labyrinth of short, narrow streets near the middle of a longer center drive. Chapa tried to get as close as possible. But the cops had blocked off both ends of the wide, curving street and he had to park around the corner and a block and a half down from the house.

  Choosing his palm-size notebook instead of a larger more conspicuous one, Chapa grabbed a couple of pens, took a calming breath, and stepped out of his car. He decided to try the most direct path first, and walked down a street that ran parallel to the one he needed to get to. Folks in nightgowns and sweats drifted like moths in the direction of the police activity, only to be turned away before they could get near enough to see what was going on. Chapa couldn’t afford to be turned away, couldn’t risk drawing that much attention to himself. He needed to find another way.

  As he walked with a smattering of half-awake neighbors who were quietly speculating on what all the fuss was about, Chapa kept looking around for a way in. He was getting closer to the police barricade than he wanted to be, when he spotted a small park nestled between a cluster of houses.

  Ducking away from the would-be gawkers, he cut down a driveway, and through a backyard, drawing a response from a set of motion sensors that rousted security lights. Ignoring the sudden unwanted attention, Chapa slipped past a row of bushes and emerged on the other side, no more than twenty yards from a jungle gym.

  The park was quiet, empty. A lone light post illuminated the area around the swings. Chapa thought about the children who played in this park. Wondered if their parents would ever again feel safe there. Or if the place would now have a taint.

  Locating the paved path that led from the park to the sidewalk beyond, Chapa eyed the street where all of the heavy action was going down. He knew he wouldn’t fit in with any group of officials at the scene. His faded jeans, the fabric starting to split at the cuff, and University of Iowa sweatshirt couldn’t pass as anyone’s official uniform. Except maybe that of recent college grad trying to make it as a reporter. But Chapa just played it cool, like he had a hall pass in his back pocket, and strolled down the sidewalk and past huddles of heavily armed officers.

  “How the hell did you get here?”

  Officer Steven Zirbel’s voice startled Chapa, but the reporter was already working on his response before realizing who was talking.

  “Steve, you’re out late tonight.”

  “And you’re where you don’t belong, Alex.”

  The two men had gotten to know each other a couple of months back when Chapa spent the night with a police detail at a roadside checkpoint. Zirbel, who oversaw the operation, liked the way the story turned out, and though he was always cautious, the lieutenant had become somewhat of a source Chapa could rely on.

  “I understand you guys are about to bring in a very bad guy.”

  “And how do you know that?”

  Chapa smiled and shrugged as Zirbel moved in close.

  “Look, Alex, you need to move on,” he said, his voice measured. “I’ll give you a call in the morning after the smoke clears.”

  “That’s no good, Steve. I’m holding up page one right now. I’ve got to have something.”

  Zirbel looked away, in the direction of the house, then to where a group of men from various jurisdictions had assembled. When he focused his attention back on Chapa the reporter could almost hear the wheels turning inside the cop’s head.

  “You keep my name out of it, unless I call you and tell you otherwise,” the officer jabbed an index finger at Chapa, who nodded. He knew Zirbel had been angling for a promotion and the right story could put him over the top. The wrong one might knock him back to the overnight shift at the evidence desk.

  Zirbel laid out how twenty-four hours ago Annie Sykes walked into Dominic Delacruz’s store and everything that followed and how she had led them here.

  “You’re going in awfully hard on one girl’s word, Steve.”

  “She’s a very convincing little girl.”

  Chapa followed Zirbel’s eyes to the three people standing by a cruiser’s open door. He recognized Roger Sykes, a man in his mid thirties who dressed like the middle manager that he was.

  “Is that her?” Chapa asked, pointing to the small redheaded child wedged between her parents.

  “They insisted on being here when we take him. We told them to stay in the car, but they weren’t too interested in anything we had to say.”

  A guy decked out in protective gear called for Zirbel.

  “Go back to where you came from, Alex,” Zirbel said, then walked over to a group that looked like it was primed to go into battle.

  Cloaked in as much confidence as he could conjure, Chapa walked down the sidewalk in the direction of the Sykes family. He nodded to a uniformed who was staring at him, but didn’t break stride. Making sure Roger Sykes saw him as he approached, Chapa pulled out the small notebook and a pen, then introduced himself.

  “My wife and I have appreciated how the newspapers publicized Annie’s disappearance, but not the way you guys came after me and her mother.”

  “I know my paper
may have been off base, but—”

  Michele Sykes cut Chapa off. “It was those incompetent jerks in the police department.” She was pleasant looking in a fresh, rural Illinois way. “They couldn’t find our daughter, and I still don’t know how anyone could have thought Roger was involved. That was just a terrible thing for us. People should be ashamed of themselves.”

  Annie Sykes had been looking up at Chapa the entire time. When he returned the attention she took it as a cue that it was her turn.

  “I’m looking forward to going home,” her tone strong, voice driven with determination. “But first I want to see the police get that terrible man.”

  “You got away from him, didn’t you?” Chapa asked, kneeling to meet her at eye-level.

  She nodded, “I wasn’t afraid, not too much,” and almost smiled.

  “How did you recognize the house from the outside?”

  “I remembered some of the streets that he turned on when he brought me here in his van.” Then she pointed to an area of fencing that Chapa could barely make out in the darkness. “And I remember seeing that through a window in the basement. I have a really good memory.”

  “It’s been a horrible time, and we’ll be talking to our attorney after all this is over,” Roger said, then put a protective arm around his daughter, as though it could shield her from everything. “But we’re just thankful that Annie’s back and we can put all this behind us. I love Annie very much. She’s a strong person, and she’s my little girl. I don’t care what anyone said about me, I’m just so glad she’s back.”

  A shot exploded inside the house. Now the police were rushing around like scattered ants, ordering each other to get down, get back, get ready. Chapa got shoved aside as Annie and her parents were hustled into the squad car. He made his way around to the back of the vehicle so he could get a decent view of the house. Leaning on the trunk of the car, Chapa quickly took notes as the police rushed the house.

  A chaotic minute passed. Then a guy wearing a flak jacket over a gray suit appeared on the front porch. “It’s all over,” he said, then signaled for paramedics to move in.

  Chapa was also on the move. Getting as close as he could without drawing attention, he stopped just beyond the reach of a streetlight. He waited there until Zirbel walked out of the house and was crossing the front yard.

  “Steve, who got shot?”

  “Didn’t I tell you to get out of here?”

  “And I was doing just that when I heard the shot. You can’t hold this back now.”

  Zirbel appeared to take stock of the situation.

  “I assume one of your officers shot the suspect, let’s start with that, Steve.”

  “One shot, in the chest.”

  “So the suspect was armed?”

  “When we entered the house we found Kenneth Lee Grubb in the dining room. The moment the suspect saw us, he put down a piece of bread he was eating and appeared to reach for a weapon even though he’d been told to remain still, that’s when the officer fired.”

  Chapa’s hand was racing across the yellow tablet, as he made certain he didn’t miss a word.

  “What kind of weapon?”

  Zirbel hesitated for a moment as he surveyed the immediate area.

  “Damnedest thing I’ve ever seen. A large animal collar with long metal spikes sticking out of it.” Zirbel leaned in close to Chapa and used his height advantage to cast a shadow over the reporter. “But I’d appreciate it if you kept that detail to yourself for the time being.”

  “I will, Steve,” Chapa said, drawing a large oval around the last part of Zirbel’s statement, then writing the word No in large letters next to it.

  “Do right by the department, Alex,” Zirbel added, then turned to a uniformed and told him to escort Chapa back to his car.

  Once he was back in his car, it took Chapa a moment to regain his bearings and find the fastest way out of the subdivision. Then he quickly drove away, stopped at a pay phone six blocks later, and called the office. It took some coaxing to talk Betty the Layout Lady into delaying the printing of page one, even more to convince her to do a redesign.

  “You got eight hundred words, young man, give or take a dozen, no more, and one hour to get them to me.”

  He thanked her, then dialed information and got a home number for Dominic Delacruz. The store owner didn’t sound like he’d been sleeping, but he wasn’t anxious to get media attention, either. Still, Chapa managed to squeeze a solid, if reluctant, quote out of him.

  Winded and running on high octane, Chapa had just sat down at his desk to write the story when he got a call from Zirbel, who gave him the okay to use his name, and filled in a few more of the details.

  “After we secured the rest of the house, we cautiously headed for the basement, and found evidence that someone had been kept down there,” Zirbel said. “We believe that at least one other child had been held there.”

  “Why, what did you find?”

  After another hesitation, Zirbel said, “Children’s snacks, a boy’s T-shirt, and a dozen or so comic books in a small room in the basement.”

  “There was more than one room?”

  “Several. Each appears to have been used for a different purpose. It’s going to take a while to sort everything out, but we believe that some of the victims may have started out in a makeshift guest room before being transferred to other parts of the large basement.”

  He told Chapa that the officers removed several bottles of a liquid that had yet to be identified.

  “We’re waiting for the lab results, but we’re reasonably certain the bottles contain whatever drug the suspect used on his victims,” Zirbel said.

  “So if there were other kids down there, where are they now?”

  “We don’t know yet. Grubb is considered a suspect in at least four other disappearances over the past three months,” Zirbel said. “But that’s the first question I’m going to ask him when the son-of-a-bitch comes out of intensive care.”

  The story came in at 844 words, and Betty the Layout Lady forgave him for that. It would be one of the last Chapa would ever write for the Tri-Cities Bulletin.

  The reporter didn’t sleep that night as he waited for the morning’s Bulletin to arrive. Sleep would become precious and uneasy in the days and months that followed. For a while he took comfort in the certainty that it would all pass in time. But he was wrong.

  Sixteen years and millions of printed words later, spanning hundreds of topics, the story that launched Alex Chapa’s career still dogged him.

  Henry Perez has worked as a newspaper reporter for more than a decade. Born in Cuba, he immigrated to the U.S. at a young age, and lives in the Chicago area with his wife and children. Killing Red is his first novel.

  Readers can visit him at www.henryperezbooks.com.

  J.A. Konrath

  Chicago: 1993 | Chapter 1

  Winter meant death in Chicago.

  Death to the homeless, turned away from overcrowded shelters and forced to stuff their ragged clothes with day-old newspaper.

  Death to the motorists, skidding on filthy, snow-covered highways into the paths of trucks and guard rails and head-crunching support posts.

  Death to the elderly, slipping on sidewalks and shattering brittle bones, and to the poor, unable to pay both the food bill and the gas bill.

  Death to Billy Chico.

  Chico was a small-time hustler and big-time loser who liked to bet the ponies and hit women. He was more successful at the latter. On his more reflective days—and there weren’t many—Chico figured he’d lost more than eighty thousand dollars in the ten or so years he’d been placing bets. He would have lost even more if the puta he married hadn’t sent the Man after him for child support. Chico knew the kid wasn’t really his. That child was bug-eyed, bare-assed ugly, and couldn’t have had any of Chico’s genes in his roly-poly body. Chico often compared himself to the ponies he loved to throw money after; sleek and muscled and hung, with a mane of gorgeous black and
eyes that could stare through you, sister. A thoroughbred if there ever was.

  Unfortunately, the thoroughbred just caught a bad tip, and couldn’t cover the bet he’d made with his very connected bookie. Two thousand bucks worth of bad tip, baby, five weeks of factory wages. A debt he couldn’t pay, especially since he had to fork out cash for rent, the bills, and child support for that skank and her ugly brat.

  Chico, in a word, was powerfucked. And getting more PFed by the minute, because his marker was due and Marty the Maniac had definitely alerted his goons to begin collection proceedings.

  Collection proceedings didn’t involve friendly chit-chat over coffee. They involved hurt. Lots of hurt. And Chico was far too fine to have anything broken, scarred, burned, or severed.