by Kipjo Ewers
After four years in prison, Shareef converted to Islam recruited by Sister Ailia Assad the original leader of the Sisters of Islam. Sister Ailia would turn the mantle over to Shareef making her leader after finally making parole for good behavior for a thirty-year prison term on a narcotics conviction.
Her older sister Marcia willingly took in her two children raising them as her own along with her husband Martin. Michael her oldest son, refused to forgive her for killing his father especially in front of him. When he became of age, he stopped seeing her all together and distanced himself from the rest of the family; he also refused to believe that his father molested Rebecca.
Stephanie goes to see her whenever she can; it is harder now that she goes to Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia.
As for Rebecca, she eventually overcame the ordeal, graduated top of her class studying law becoming one of the youngest District Attorneys for the state of Austin, Texas, as well as an activist fighting for better laws to protect women and children. She is happily married with two children of her own; and every month she makes a trip to Gatesville to visit her.
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“If Sophia killed Buck,” bit back Sister Shareef, “Trust me…he deserved it and then some….and as far as whatever plans she might have had, she didn’t mention any on the count that she was supposed to be dead. But good luck to you when you do find her, because judging from what I just saw…” She gave off a snide smile, “You’re gonna need it. Now…unless you have anymore “questions” for me, may I go now?”
Armitage seeing that this interview was officially going nowhere got up and knocked on the steel door for the guards to come in and escort Sister Shareef away.
Mark stopped her for one final question, “What do you mean Officer Wilford got what he deserved and then some?”
“I find it very ill to speak of the deceased,” Sister Shareef returned sarcastically, “But if you did some “real” F.B.I work, you’d find out that the dearly departed Wilford wasn’t only a husband and a father…”
As the guards escorted Sister Shareef back to her cell, Armitage sat back down on the table, feeling a migraine setting in due to the apparent pointlessness of these interviews, he massaged the bridge of his nose.
Dustin doodled in his notepad and muttered, “Guess she told you…”
Mark turned looking at him as if he wanted to pull out his service piece and shoot him.
Dustin feeling the negative vibe his partner was emitting toward him raised his head in bewilderment, “What?”
“Get off your ass and get me Officer Wilford’s file of his entire career,” barked Mark, “And not just the bells and whistles.”
Before Mercer can get up the door opened as a blonde haired green eyed female agent in her mid-twenties popped her head in, “Um…sir…we have a new problem…”
“What is it?” Mark dryly asked not in the mood for more problems.
“The Warden just informed me Ms. Dennison’s parents just called,” said the Agent, “They’re here in Gatesville, asking when they can take possession of her body…”
Mark literally grabbed his own skull as if to crush it in his own hand.
Dustin let out a sarcastic chuckle, “Just keeps on getting from bad to worse.”
CHAPTER FIVE
September 3, 2008, 0200 AM in the morning, Cypress Texas, twenty-seven minutes away for Houston and three hours and five minutes away from Gatesville driving. Sophia actually made it in less than an hour and a half despite crashing and burning in Birch Creek State Park at a steady pace of an estimated seventy miles an hour taking the woods and back roads in order to stay ahead of and under the radar of local law enforcement on the hunt for her. She stayed in the woods on the outskirts of town until nightfall as the town died down; moving whenever she felt a patrol was coming her way. With her newfound speed, it was easy for her to cover ground and keep distance between her and anyone coming in her direction. It was all too clear that the word was out that she had escaped, but the patrol was light probably believing there was no way she could have made it from Gatesville to Cypress on foot covering that amount of distance without getting caught.
She quickly learned to use lighter steps while moving, although she made a couple of necks snap and dogs bark. Eventually if she kept this up, someone would catch her, and for now she wanted to avoid getting into any forms of confrontation, at least until she figured out what was happening to her. The first thing she needed to do was get out of her tattered blood soaked river drenched prison gear, and find some clothes that would make her inconspicuous. After about another ten minutes of ducking in and out of alleyways she came upon the only Goodwill store in the town.
“Well… there’s no one more in need of goodwill than me…” she shrugged.
As she made her way to the back alley of the building the first thought was to rip the door off the entrance, but she could not chance setting off the alarm if it had one. She considered going for the roof when she noticed the large Goodwill drop box at the side of the building.
“Jackpot…,” Sophia whispered as she cautiously trotted over to the box.
She gave a quick look around, stooped down a bit and proceeded to try to slide her hand between the gap of the locked door, the fit was tight until she gave it a bit more force and realized that the metal was actually bending like clay underneath her hand. She took a deep breath bracing her other hand against the box and slowly began to pull. The thick steel locking mechanism creaked and groaned as she stretched it like taffy. She could have easily ripped it off with a yank but feared the popping sound would attract attention, besides she was fascinated at how she was feeling no pain from the harsh metal against her fingers, and how the metal literally gave in to her strength. Questions of how strong was she exactly flooded her mind as the lock finally gave in snapping in two. She exhaled with a half-nervous laugh which she halted by covering her mouth refocusing on reality. Aside from a small bag of paisley slippers, the box was empty; she muttered a curse realizing she had no choice but to break into the store itself.
Noticing the fire escape ladder at the side of the building, she began to form a plan. Looking around to make sure no one was coming by; she quickly gripped the entire extremely large and awkward drop box.
“Lift with your knees…,” she breathed deeply remembering what her father told her.
As she rose to her feet the steel box that had to weigh at least over fifteen hundred pounds went up with easy. She was literally shaking with a flood of emotions. Her mind was not playing tricks on her, and this was not some freaky unexplained adrenaline rush; what would have taken a forklift to lift, she held in her hands like a paperweight.
“Focus girl…focus…,” she told herself.
Now was not the time to be amazed, she did not know when a patrol would be coming her way and spot her. As quietly as possible she carried the drop box over to the fire ladder placing it underneath it, she then hopped up on top of the box with relative easy.
She took another breath rubbing her hands together, and leaped from the box to the ladder. The force of the push off left a relatively big dent in the top of the box, but it was now the ladder that became her predicament as the impact of her catching the rung of the ladder literally bent it in half.
“Aw shit!” she whispered praying it did not snap under her weight.
She quickly scampered up the ladder in a panic for the platform section, which not only shook, but also felt like it was going to rip off the concrete wall itself; pulling herself up she finally made it to the platform thinking she was safe until she heard the snap of steel. Diving to the platform she managed to catch what was left of the ladder before it hit the drop-box below echoing her position to everyone in the town. However, the force that she hit the platform with pulled the steel bolts that held the ladder against the wall half way out bringing the structure a bit closer to the Earth. Sweat added to the blood and river water that soaked her tattered clothes. She was now ti
red of taking deep breaths as she pulled the piece of broken metal ladder up, catty cornering it through the box entrance of the platform before laying it down. She began whispering every prayer her mother taught her as she moved up the rest of the ladder which felt as if it was about to rip off the wall at any minute crashing down with her. Thankfully, she made it to the roof of the building with no further incident. Now she had to move extra fast, the mess she left at the side of the building would surely draw attention to her.
Door and skylight window, all with warning signs of a security alarm waiting to go off if tampered with. No, go there. Sophia stomped with frustration unknowingly creating a footprint in the dry concrete of the roof. Realizing what she just did, she smiled stooping down low to remain undetected coming up with another idea. She thought to herself that there was no way the charity Goodwill would rig the entire roof. She stomped down with her heel making a sizeable hole that only a jackhammer could rival. She stomped repeatedly making the hole bigger and bigger. A few more stomps and she would break through, creating an entrance big enough for her to climb down.
“Oooooooooooooh shiiiiiiiiiit!” She now screamed, her perfect plan had a snag…on the fifth stomp a portion of the roof underneath her gave way. She came through the ceiling, falling a good twenty feet smashing through some racks full of clothes at the bottom.
It sounded like the drop-box outside dropped off the roof. She laid there for a minute due to her wounded pride, not pain or injury, which she no longer felt or sustained. She waited to see if police lights would be shining through the windows, if Cypress’ finest would be breaking down the doors drawn to the ruckus she made.
Two minutes passed and apparently, she was in the clear. Slowly she rolled to her feet looking around, no security guard or night watchman. A couple of security cameras but she doubt they patched into the nearby police station, seeing as how they would have been there already. She remembered from movies that if she found the tapes and destroyed them they would not have any footage of her to go on while she would be long gone.
First thing first was to clean up. It took her awhile but she found an old rag and towel set, made her way to the bathroom, peeled off her butchered prison garb, and used the sink to wipe off the reminisce of blood and funk that was on her. As she went through the task of cleaning she also took the time to examine her body. Except for the original scars and birthmark she had, there was not one bullet wound or scratch on her body. She then ran her hand across her now washboard stomach, where once was a little pouch. Her eyes watered up, a flood of emotions washed over her, she was actually still alive and breathing when she should be dead. She quickly dismissed it, enthralled with how solid and muscular her body was now. She shuddered when she finally realized that she went from being 5’6” to a near six-footer.
“I’m Sasquatch…,” she said to her reflection.
Feeling clean for the first time in almost twenty-four hours, she timidly stepped back out into the store wearing nothing but a bath towel keeping low again searching for new clothes, which proved difficult because she had to work in the dark, and everything about her was bigger now. Underwear proved a problem especially for up top; in the end, she had to settle for a sports bra and thong bottom; the store filled with profanity as she ended up destroying two pairs of jeans that would normally fit her. Luckily, for her there was a pair of light blue jean leggings in an XL size. When it came to shoes, she was officially in the red, as she no longer wore a size six in shoes.
“Aw hell no!” she growled in disgust as her feet ripped through a pair of white Reeboks sneakers in her original size.
Realizing she was wasting too much time she sneered and reluctantly hunted for a bigger size coming across a pair of black and white Converse…size nine which fit perfectly. After going through several colorful shirts, she settled on a simple white tank top, and a weird black Goth style hood jacket that caught her eye. It was more like an oversized hood with just sleeves and midriff top with a small zipper, which fastened over her chest. The rings and studs on the arms gave it a unique look.
It was not practical but she liked it, and she figured if she appeared to stand out it would actually make her appear incognito. Her last accessory was a small black shoulder book bag she would use to carry her bloody prison gear, which she placed in a plastic bag. She knew that if she was going to find out what exactly happened to her, she would find it within the blood once she got it tested.
With new clothes checked, she went about the task of looking for money; the registers were open and empty; so she made her way to the main office in the back of the store.
On the way there she stopped in the small break room looking for something to eat, surprisingly she was not famished after going almost an entire day without anything but she felt a little hunger setting in. Inside she copped a can of Sprite, some French fries, half of a chicken sandwich, and half of a peanut butter and jam sandwich. She started with the P & J first, threw the rest in the microwave, while sucking down on the Sprite, she munched on the grease-saturated meal while heading to the main office. The door locked meant nothing for someone of her ability as she used a little force to push the door open breaking the lock and cylinder while cracking the doorframe. Once inside, she put the food down to case the office.
Luckily, the office had a window so she was able to search around via moonlight; she was careful to ensure she did not move anything out of place. The first thing she found was the video recorder linked to the surveillance cameras outside. She pulled out the tapes, and thought about destroying them but remembered seeing enough cop shows in her time to know they would find a way to view the footage regardless. She stuffed them within her bag taking them with her. The next thing she had to find was money.
Sure enough like all small towns, there was still some trust, a safe underneath the manager’s desk. Like the drop-box but with more confidence she ripped the door off the safe with ease. She pulled out the cash box and popped it open as if it never had a lock. It was full, probably all of the cash from last week and yesterday; as she pulled out the twenties, tens, and fives to count them her eyes glanced the picture of the manager on the table.
He was a stocky cheerful elderly man probably in his early sixties with white silver hair and some silver horn rim spectacles. There were pictures of him with his wife, children, grandchildren, and employees. In every picture she could feel the happiness pouring out, the sense of family even from the people who worked for him. Sophia sadly sat down in his seat riddled with guilt. Aside from the paddling she got from her mother for attempting to lift a stick of bubble gum from the local convenience store when she was six, she had never stolen anything in her life. She was accused and punished for many things up until now that she was innocent of; she was actually guilty of this.
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Her mind began to wander back to almost four and a half years ago, during the grueling trial, and the looks of disgust and hatred she had to endure. The district attorney wove a story to the court and those attending of how she was an evil conniving woman who grew tired of taking care of her badly injured mentally traumatized Veteran husband who served honorably for his country.
That she acquired a personal checking account a month before in the same bank her husband and she kept their joint accounts, which she had no knowledge of doing. Evidence namely video footage showed that she did in fact entered the bank and opened it. There was also evidence of the neurotoxin she smuggled from out of the experimental facility of the hospital she worked at that she used to drug her husband after making love to him, and then savagely murdering him while he lay both powerless and defenseless.
The District Attorney then accused her of transferring all the money in the joint accounts to the personal account, and purchasing a one-way flight to Brazil that same night while he lay dead in their bed. The IP address from her laptop was the additional damning evidence.
The next day she withdrew two thousand dollars cash from an ATM, an
d then drove all the way to Oklahoma checking into the Four Pointed Hotel near the Will Rogers World Airport using her credit card; tollbooth cameras also caught her and her Nissan Maxima during the drive there.
Aside from the DNA from the murder weapon, which was their wedding cake knife, she had to sit there and watch damning video footage of her doing things she had completely no knowledge of doing.
It was like watching another person who looked exactly like her wearing her exact clothes and jewelry down to her wedding ring doing those things. She almost came to believe she had gone crazy, because in her own mind the events she watched were a complete utter blank.