by Lolah Lace
“Please pull over!” Latanya yelled, hoping this time her boyfriend would listen.
“Turn the music off, I can’t think!” Her boyfriend was in a panic.
“Stop yelling at me!” Latanya clicked off the car radio. “Come on dumb ass, pull over!”
Suddenly the driver pulled over to the side of the road. He stopped the car and put it in park. The police squad car almost rammed them from behind it had been following so closely.
“Get out of the car with your hands above your head!” A police officer’s voice roared from the rear of their vehicle.
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! Three gunshots rang out in the dark of night.
Everything went black. ~~
*****
“Nooooooooooo!”
Tami woke violently from her nightmare. Sweat poured down her face. She sat up and gazed down at her side to notice Mike lying beside her. Mike’s eyes were wide open.
“Are you okay?” Mike quickly sat up beside her.
Tami took a minute to catch her breath. “Yeah I just a—”
“Had a bad dream.” Mike finished her thoughts.
“Ye-ah.”
“These nightmares happen a lot.”
“Yes I guess so.”
“What were you dreaming about?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Maybe you need to see someone.”
“Someone like who?” She tensed. “I’m not allowed to have any stress in my life?”
“This is not stress. This is an obsession.” Mike glanced over at a glass of water sitting near the bed. “You need some time off. You need to relax. You are letting this case consume you.”
“It’s not consuming you?”
Mike disregarded her question. “Thanksgiving is almost here. I thought that we could go to my mother’s this year. You know, spend the holidays together. You know she’s alone since my dad died. She would love to meet you.”
“I have plans for Thanksgiving already.”
“What?” Mike frowned.
“I have plans already.” She repeated.
“Without me?”
“We never spend the holidays together.”
“Yeah, but things are different now.” Mike believed he was building a future with Tami. This was a complete blow to him. “What are your plans?”
“I’m taking Misty over to my grandmother’s.”
Mike’s face conveyed his angst. He was trying to merge their lives together and not keep them separate. “First, you don’t bother to invite me, and you’re ditching me for a teenager?”
“She needs me.”
“I need you. You’re my girlfriend, fiancée. She has parents. You would rather spend time with her than me on the holidays.”
“She needs me.”
“You said that already. She doesn’t need you. I think you need her.”
“Okay Dr. Phil. What does that mean?”
“You tell me. I asked you to marry me months ago. What about us? Every free minute you get you spend it chasing that drunken pothead teen.”
“What an insensitive thing to say. Her sister was murdered, her twin sister.”
“Okay now you have something in common. She has a dead sister and we have a dead relationship.” Mike hopped out of the bed and stormed toward the bedroom door. He slammed it on his way out.
Tami was in a shock. She couldn’t move. All her fears of abandonment had just bubbled to the surface. She didn’t want to be so cold and hard. She had built up this tough exterior as a shield to get her through the pain. It was difficult to open up and change the person she had become. Her issues had never plagued her much until Mike entered her life. Then suddenly a distraction had turned into so much more. She had denied her feelings for Mike for so long that she had gotten used to lying to herself. She was in love with him early on and that was why she given him so much grief. She knew it was cruel, but she hadn’t learned to love a man. Her father had died, and there were no other men in her life growing up.
There was no way Tami was going back to sleep after their argument. She sat alone in the dark and thought about what he said. Was she really using Misty to fill a void in her own life? Maybe she just wanted to help her in a way she felt she had never been helped.
After an hour of tossing and turning alone in bed, Tami got up. She ventured downstairs and walked over to the couch where Mike was sound asleep. She knelt down and watched him. His lips were in a firm frown. His eyes were calmly closed, but his face was not at ease.
She was the cause of his uneasiness. She wished she could be this perfect woman he dreamed of. He was the best boyfriend she ever had. He put up with her mood swings and tantrums. He would be a great father, but the issue lay within her. Would she be a good mother, a decent one? A great mother, never, but could she fake it?
CHAPTER 25
It was after midnight. On the other side of town, a burgundy midsize car pulled up to the closed garage of a duplex. Inside the car, Nicole sat in the driver’s seat. She had just turned twenty-four. She turned to smile at her three-year-old daughter Brooke in the backseat.
Brooke smiled back at her mother from the security of her toddler booster seat.
“Mommy needs a garage door opener.”
“Yes mommy need garage.” The sleepy child chanted words she had heard her mother say many times. “Brookie sleep in mommy bed.”
“No, Brookie you have to sleep in your own bed.”
“Mommy bed.”
Nicole opened her car door. She got out and lifted the garage door with her hands. She shuffled into the garage and hit the light switch.
Nicole hurried back to her car closing the door. She slowly pulled her car into the one-car garage. She turned off the engine and removed the key from the ignition. She opened her car door and accidentally banged her it against the garage wall.
“Shit!”
“Mommy don’t say bad word.”
“I’m sorry. You can take off your seat belt.”
“Okay, mommy.”
Now she had to start the long process of trying to her daughter out of her toddler seat, in the house and ready for bed.
Nicole stepped out the car and slammed her door. She opened the back door for Brooke and reached inside the car to help her daughter undo the seatbelt buckles.
Unexpectedly, someone ran up and grabbed Nicole from behind. Nicole screamed right before the attacker placed his gloved hand over her mouth.
Nicole fought for her life. The force of the struggle pushed her and her attacker into the open car door. She stabbed her attacker in his thigh, jabbing him with the car keys she had in her hands. They fell into the backseat. The attacker’s hands slipped off of Nicole’s mouth.
“Brooke get out the car!” She yelled to her small daughter.
Brooke started to cry and tried to exit the rear passenger door but was stopped by the child safety lock.
“Go in front! Go in front!” Nicole managed to yell, as she was being flailed about the backseat.
Brooke climbed from the back seat to the front passenger seat. The rumbling around made a loud smacking sound against the leather seats.
The assailant tried to pull Nicole out of the backseat, but she was too wild to control. The intense struggle forced Nicole back, and she accidentally slammed her head into the toddler seat. The attacker pulled her halfway out of the car. She clawed at the seat in an attempt to stay in the car. She tried desperately to kick him out.
The sound of Brooke crying uncontrollably filled her ears. The attacker overpowered Nicole forcing her out the vehicle and on the garage floor. Nicole broke free and lunged back into the backseat. She reached on the floor and grabbed a green Tubby Turtle laptop toy.
She grasped the handle of the toy and swung it backward hitting her attacker hard in the face. He was stunned, knocked senseless and off balance.
Nicole took the opportunity to knee him in the groin and wage a full-on fist of fury upon him. He stumbled backward and staggered away fro
m the garage.
Nicole’s wrath willed her to chase him. Soon she realized she had to care for her hysterical daughter. The fear on her face was now replaced with a vicious rage. She wanted to hurt this man. She wanted to kill this man.
*****
As dawn broke, Detective Mike Crane entered the kitchen of Nicole Zampino’s duplex. He briefly glanced over at Tami. They drove separate cars to the scene.
The barely injured Nicole sat at the table wrapped in a United States Postal Service sweater. Her work identification badge was still hanging around her neck. She was happy he never grabbed it. He could have strangled her with it. Her eyes teared up as she thought about it.
Tami tried to train her eyes from sneaking peeks at Mike. John Turner stood nearby and uniformed officers were spread throughout the house.
“It all happened so fast.” Nicole said as she recalled the vicious attack.
“Did you say he had on a ski mask?” John asked.
“Yeah I think so.”
“Did you see his eyes, Ms. Zampino, the color?”
“No, he was behind me the whole time. When I had a chance to turn all the way around he ran off. I was really just thinking about my daughter.”
Nicole peered through the doorway to the living room where an older White lady held Brooke on her lap. She was so glad nothing had happened to her daughter. She was also grateful that her mother rushed over as soon as she called her.
Nicole was questioned thoroughly. She would probably never know just how lucky she was. Clearly, she was the one that got away from a killer. She didn’t have any ex-boyfriends or man that wished to do her any harm. It had to be the Zebra Killer. This attack matched his modus operandi.
*****
After a long day, Tami finally made it home and planted her butt firmly on the couch. The sound of the television was faint. She stared blankly at the TV screen.
Mike was moving around upstairs. She could hear him and wondered about the noise. He finally appeared in the living room with his coat in one hand and his huge packed duffel bag in the other.
Mike headed for the front door. He didn’t talk to Tami. He didn’t look at her. He disappeared when the door slammed behind him. Tami turned to look, but he was gone. Could she blame him? She was constantly doing things to push him away. Now he had gone away, maybe this time for good.
It was hard for Tami to sleep that night. She woke early in the morning and ventured downstairs. The townhouse seemed so empty with Mike gone. He hadn’t taken his ring back. It was still sitting upstairs in the jewelry box on the dresser in her bedroom.
Tami’s cordless phone rang and she answered.
“Hey girl.”
Tami grabbed a gray coat out of the closet by her front door and slipped it on as she opened her front door. The frigid late November air rushed in and took her breath away. Tami held her cordless phone up to her ear and used her other hand to hold her wool coat together.
“Jesus it’s cold.” Tami said into the phone. “It’s starting to snow again.” Tami looked down at the snow that had lightly covered the grass and sidewalk. “I hate going to this mailbox.” Tami shivered as she walked down the sidewalk toward her mailbox. “No, I didn’t finish all my Christmas shopping. When are you going? Yeah … Woodfield Mall is so far away.” Tami reached into her mailbox and pulled out three letters and a postcard. “I’m not driving to Schaumburg.” Tami thumbed through the envelopes that were mostly bills.
Her eyes focused on a postcard. The card had no postage, no return address, just words.
~~That 100 pound bitch was as strong as a man.
She went postal ha ha ha, next.
XOXO Zebra Killer.~~
“Hey Patricia.” Tami’s heart dropped. “Let me call you back in a few minutes okay?” Tami didn’t wait for a response. She hit the talk button and dropped the portable phone in her big coat pocket. The air didn’t seem as cold as before. The chill gave way to a wave of heat.
Tami scanned the area of her home for something, anything unusual. She noticed two kids attempting to rollerblade down the sidewalk in the snow.
A car drove by slowly. Tami followed the car with her eyes. A gray-haired old man was driving the car. Tami looked back at the rollerblading children. The killer knew her, and he knew where she lived. She knew she should be scared, but all she felt was rage. This so-called Zebra Killer was becoming more bold and brazen with his actions. This could be his downfall, and Tami knew it.
*****
Tami stood at the front podium of the restaurant. The hostess was nowhere in sight. She looked out at the cluster of tables and spotted the first person questioned in connection with the Zebra Killings.
Matthew Mathers motioned for her to join him at his table. Tami walked over and took a seat in the booth across from Matt.
“Where’s Misty?” she asked.
“She’s in the restroom throwing up. She’s drunk, and she’s completely outta control.”
“She’s having problems.” Tami felt the need to cover for the troubled teenager. “She’s doing the best she can.”
“Don’t make excuses for her. You’re a cop. You should get her some help.”
“She’s trying. She’s getting better. She just needs our support.”
“Why did she call you?” Matt’s question was laced with hostility. “You need to find out who killed my girlfriend. Or did you forget? Misty would stop acting out if you had someone in custody.”
A young waitress interrupted Matt as he scolded Tami and the entire Hinsdale Police Department. The waitress placed a glass of lemonade and a cup of coffee on the table in front of them.
“The food will be right up. Can I get you guys something else?”
The waitress hadn’t even noticed that Tami was a completely different person.
“We have an extra person so we need a menu. There are three of us.”
“Okay, I’ll be right back with that menu.” The waitress left the table just as Misty arrived. Matt stood to let Misty slide into the booth.
Misty’s hair was a mess, and she had dark circles under her hazel eyes. She was barely recognizable. She looked like a broken young girl, a shell of her former self.
“Tami, I’m glad you came. Can I crash at your place tonight?” Misty slurred as she asked.
“I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
“Are you serious? What, you have a boyfriend or something?”
That question stung because Mike was gone.
“No, it’s not that. I don’t think my place is safe.”
“Why not? You’re the police.”
She knew she shouldn’t be disclosing this information to them but under the circumstances she made an exception.
“The man that killed your sister knows where I live. He has been to my place when I wasn’t there.”
“What?” Misty squinted as she tried to understand.
“He has made threats. I don’t want anyone near my house. I think he’s been—I know he’s been watching me.”
Matt shook his head. “So he’s been watching you, and you still haven’t caught him yet?”
“Matt we are doing everything we can.”
“Yeah right. Misty you can stay with me.”
“There is no way I’m going to stay next door to the place I hate. Don’t worry about it. I can find somewhere to go.”
Tami and Matt exchanged a look of worry.
CHAPTER 26
~~The early eighties music drifted from the car radio. Police sirens shrieked in the background. Latanya clicked the radio off.
“Pull over!” She yelled and this time, he listened. The driver suddenly pulled the car over to the shoulder of the road. The police squad car almost crashed into them from behind.
“Get out of the car with your hands above your head!” The cop’s voice rang loud from the rear of the vehicle. There was a long pause while Tami, Latanya, and their dates tried to figure out what they were going to do. The passenger door swun
g open. Latanya stepped out. Her prom dress hung inside the open car door.
Tami saw a flash of light when Latanya went to put her hands above her head.
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! Three gunshots rang out loud in the darkness.
A lone bullet shattered the back car window. Blood splattered on the passenger window and landed on the inside of the car.
Latanya’s body hit the pavement along with her shiny silver eyeglass case. She still held the case tightly in her palm although her body was without any signs of life.
The driver jumped out and ran away. He left Tami and her date crouched down in the back seat. ~~
*****
Tami startled awake from her dream. She looked for Mike to be next to her in bed. He wasn’t there. She remembered that she alienated him for the fifth, maybe sixth time, since they’ve known each other. Maybe this time, he’s gone for good. But he didn’t take his ring back. What, if anything, does that mean?
After much pleading, Tami agreed to go to the mall with Patricia. She didn’t really want to go Christmas shopping. Mike and she were still on the outs. She was too stubborn to call him and beg for him to come back. She thought about it, but she didn’t know how to make the words come out of her mouth. He wasn’t staying with her anymore, but she knew he was around. He had shoveled the snow a few times. She recognized his boot print on her path in front of her townhouse.
Mike knew the post card Tami received hadn’t produced any prints. Still, there were a few more patrol cars Tami noticed cruising down her street. That was how Mike showed his concern. He knew there was a crazy killer out there, and he was trying to make sure she was protected.
After more shopping than Tami had planned Tami was hungry. The restaurant at the mall had an Island Tropical decor. Live tropical animals were part of its splendor. Exotic birds’ sounds replaced the music that filled the restaurant. Tami, her friend Patricia and Brittany, Patricia’s stepdaughter, sat at a small quaint table. Their shopping bags surrounded them. More bags took up the one empty chair.
“Are you going to get Mike something for Christmas?” Patricia popped a piece of pineapple from her fruit salad into her mouth.