* * *
The McDonald’s at 4th and Lyman needs an upgrade. It’s old, worn, and sits at a crazy angle to the street requiring driving customers to make a U-turn to get into the parking lot. The place is empty, save for a table of four small children. One is asleep, her head on her hands, the other three seem to be doing their homework. A woman appears behind the counter; she’s young and obese. My guess is that she’s been eating up the profits, feeding her little family french fries and burgers. Cheap, but filling. Fish and vegetables cost as much as steak these days, if you can find them. East Kenilworth is a food desert, nothing but bodegas and liquor stores. You have to cross the freeway to Kenilworth to find a head of lettuce or a bunch of bananas.
“May I help you?” she says, looking, not at me, but at her children, raising her two finely stenciled eyebrows as a warning to be quiet, although I can’t imagine how much more quiet they need to be. I wonder if they live here, sleeping on the plastic benches, curled up next to the deep-fat fryer.
“I’m looking for Darnell. Is he here?”
She looks at me, a hard challenging look, and shakes her head. I notice for the first time how haggard she is, premature lines crisscross her face and small sacs bulge beneath her eyes.
“Do you know where he is or when he’s scheduled to work?”
She shakes her head again and turns back to the kitchen area. She’s got me pegged. I’m not here to eat. I’m here to ask annoying questions.
“Perhaps someone else in the kitchen might know.”
She turns back to me. “He didn’t show up for work now for a week. No phone call, no nothing. For all I care, I hope the fucker’s dead.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The chief looks exhausted. Even Pence seems worn down. The entire management staff looks like they could use a good night’s sleep. It’s been nearly a month since Randy’s murder. Between the investigation and keeping an eye on the continuing public demonstrations, all leaves have been canceled and everyone is buried with work. Chester Allen is still leading the charge to rid KPD of police brutality, but without Randy as a target to consolidate public anger, the crowds are smaller and Ms. Gibbs is keeping a low profile, privately grieving and, I suspect, keeping an eye on Omari and Rashan.
There isn’t much for me to do beyond a psychological debriefing, and that was preempted by the chief and Pence. I’ve asked several times if I can go ahead with it, and the answer is always the same—a flat “no, we’re too busy to spare anyone.” Hard to imagine an hour or two making that much difference, but evidently it does. I’m just a consultant here, I don’t have the authority to make any decisions and it’s clear that Pence, especially, wants it that way.
“Good morning, everyone,” Pence says. “Time to start.” Chief Reagon has been letting Pence run more and more Monday staff meetings. The chief is dressed in her usual non-uniform uniform; plain suit, nylon shell and flat shoes with no jewelry except her watch. She bends over her notes. Pence turns to Manny who is scheduled to give an update on the ongoing investigation.
“Nothing new on the ground, Captain. If there were any witnesses they’re not talking to us. Chester Allen is glued to the Gibbs kids like white on rice.” Somebody chortles at the ineptness of his metaphor. The chief raises her head, clearly not amused. Manny sits down.
“That’s it?” Pence says.
“Yes, sir, sorry, sir, wish I had more. We’re working on it.” His report finished, he starts to leave the room.
“What about Darnell Taylor?” I ask. All heads turn to look at me.
“What about Darnell Taylor?” Pence asks.
“He’s missing, isn’t he?”
“How do you know this?”
“He hasn’t been to work in a week. And there’s no one home where’s he’s living.”
Pence steps around his side of the table and is in my face before I realize that I’ve just told the entire management staff that I’ve been nosing around a police investigation, without permission or authorization.
“How exactly do you know this?”
“A friend told me.”
“What friend?”
“I can’t say. It’s really not a friend. It’s a client. I can’t talk about my clients or tell you their names.”
Pence bends over me, so close I can smell his hair gel, a nauseating confection of tropical fruits.
“We are working day and night to find this kid. If you know something, you need to tell us.”
“How come the newspapers haven’t said anything about his disappearance?”
Pence’s face turns red. “Do not talk to Jack Shiller. Not a word. Do you understand? One word and you’re fired. No leaks.” He stands. “That goes for everyone in this room. We want the public to think we know where he is. We want him to get sloppy. Show his face. We have a dead cop. We have to look like we’re on top of this.”
“That’s enough, Jay. Sit down.” Chief Reagon speaks for the first time. Pence glares at me and walks back to his seat. “As of yesterday, I have negotiated with the city council to offer a $10,000 reward for information about Darnell Taylor’s whereabouts. It will be in tomorrow’s paper.” There’s a murmur of approval from the staff. “Our hope, of course, is that someone who knows Darnell will choose money over friendship.”
Pence shifts in his seat. “Why don’t we just put Dr. Sherlock on the case? She seems to know more about Darnell Taylor than we do.”
“I doubt that,” I say, “but this may help.” I hand the flyer to the chief. “I can’t tell you how I got this, but it is my understanding that Darnell Taylor sometimes works for this group as a bouncer. He may be at their next concert.”
The room drops into silence as Chief Reagon looks at the wrinkled flyer. 1704T stares into the camera, their faces sultry and pouty, as though daring—not inviting—people to come to their show. “Who are these young men?”
I shrug my shoulders.
“Do you see adolescents in your practice?”
I shake my head no.
“If they aren’t clients, then how do you know them?”
“As I said, I can’t tell you.” Not without admitting I’ve actually gone looking for Darnell. I’ve already thrown myself under the bus big time. No profit in making it worse than it already is.
“I’d like to keep this, if you don’t mind.” She studies the flyer for a minute and then passes it to Pence. He scowls as he reads, deep lines furrow his forehead. He hands it on without looking up. A murmur follows the flyer as it circulates around the table until it gets back to Pence.
“This stays in the room,” he says. “Does everyone understand, and I mean everyone?” He turns to me. “Darnell Taylor is a very dangerous man. I have officers out looking for him 24/7. If you talk to anyone, you’ll put my officers at risk and put yourself at risk for interfering with a police investigation, which, let me remind you, is a criminal offense. Do I make myself clear?”
The chief doesn’t wait for my response. “Dr. Meyerhoff, I don’t understand your motivation to get involved in something for which you are totally ill equipped. But, whatever you do and for whatever reasons, I need you to stop. For your sake and ours. My officers need to focus all their efforts on looking for Darnell Taylor. They do not need to use their time rescuing you if you find him.” She turns back to the others. “Captain Pence, we’ll need an organized team to attend this concert. You’ll have to use mutual aid to do it. Get some officers from the county-wide task force to demographically match the concert goers. Make sure they have not had any previous contact with the criminal element in this part of the county and are in little danger of being recognized. Thank you everyone, we have a lot of work to do and not much time to do it in.”
Everyone gets to their feet. Pence is first out the door.
“Chief,” I say, “I need to talk to you.”
She looks at me and at the door, pulled in two directions. “I have a lot to do.”
“Just a minute, that’s all I need.”
She turns back to me. Her shoulders drop slightly and she expels a long breath, as though settling in for a long, boring speech.
“I thought I was being helpful giving you information about Darnell Taylor. In no way did I mean to create trouble or make anyone’s job more difficult or dangerous than it already is. I feel helpless. All of you are working so hard, and I don’t seem to have a role to play.”
The chief is not my friend, not even my colleague. She moves through my life like a phantom, totally opaque, unreachable, deflecting every attempt I’ve made to reach out to her. And yet here I am apologizing. She places her hand on my shoulder. “We all tried to help Randy. Each in our own way. None of it worked. Sometimes, no matter how good our intentions are or how hard we try, the outcome is not what we were hoping for. It is painful to confront our own limits. And admit our own mistakes.” She bends to gather her papers. “All we can do is show up to do the next right thing.”
“If only,” I say, “I knew what that was.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
I stand outside police headquarters buffeted by a cold wind, mortified that the chief needed to console me, not the other way around. Helping people through hard times is supposed to be my job. I get into my car and drive to Fran’s. The least I can do is see how she’s doing.
It is lunchtime chaos. No telling which is louder, the clatter or the chatter. I take a seat at the counter, four stools away from three KPD cops. Eddie and Fran are both working behind the counter. It’s a comic ballet watching these two enormous people squeezing past each other while balancing plates heaped high with hot food, never spilling a drop. The speed at which they work along with the heat from the griddle coats their faces with a greasy gloss. I envy the tangible rewards they reap from satisfying people’s hunger, the most basic and simple of human needs.
Fran looks better than she did when I saw her last and gives me a big smile. She bends over, placing her palms on the counter, stretching her back like a cat and grimacing. “This is a young woman’s job, Doc. I envy you: nice cushy office, not on your feet for hours, no grease under your fingernails. Education, that’s the thing. I should have stayed in school.”
“Not cushy lately,” I say.
“Of course not. I’m sorry. You’ve probably been working night and day.”
“And you?” I say. “How are you doing?”
“I got triggered. It happens. But I know how to deal with triggers because someone in your line of work taught me.” She smiles and I feel a wave of warmth from and for her. “How are the families doing? Must scare them to death, having one of their own murdered. Same when BJ died. No one could believe it. Stuff like that happens in New York and LA but not Kenilworth.”
“I’ve gotten a lot of phone calls from concerned families. They’re all worried, of course.”
“What are you doing about it?”
“Not much I can do. Listen. Reflect.”
“What about a debriefing?”
“Admin doesn’t want to spare the time, not until there’s a suspect in custody.”
“I don’t mean for the cops. I mean for the families. Get them together, let them talk about their concerns. I’ll come if it would help and I can get some other older wives to come with me, too. What happened to me is their greatest fear. If they can see that I survived it, maybe that will give them hope.”
I want to slap my hand to my head and yell “Duh.” Why didn’t I think of this? Families need reassurance—they need a chance to vent, to be acknowledged for their fears and all the other challenges that come with being married to a cop: missed birthdays, canceled vacations, overtime for court, living life in a fishbowl. It’s a long list. I stand up, lean over the counter, and give Fran a big hug.
“What was that for?” she asks.
“For showing me the next right thing.”
* * *
Eddie chases me out to the parking lot and grabs hold of my car door before I have a chance to close it.
“Where’s my hug?”
“I don’t hug clients. Especially when they’re all sweaty and covered in tomato sauce.”
“Didn’t keep you from hugging Fran.” He feigns disappointment.
“You look happy, Eddie. Working with Fran seems to suit you.”
His face falls into a grimace. “Are you kidding? Where’d you get your license to practice, off the back of a matchbook cover? I’m just biding my time until the chief brings me back. I’m going crazy here, Doc. Police work is not what I do, it’s who I am. Look at me. I’m the fuzz that was. I can’t stand it. Flipping burgers for all these young cops, listening to them talk. What do I have to say? Want your burger rare or well done? The whole fucking department is overworked looking for the creep that killed Randy. I can help. Talk to the chief. I’ll work for free, I don’t care. Just get me back on the job.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Fran was right. The response to my invitation to a family debriefing has been overwhelming. The chief actually volunteered to kick off the meeting and then leave so that the families would not be intimidated by her presence. Pence, on the other hand, was not nearly as gracious. The minute the invitations went out, he was on the phone to me, clearly irritated that I had reached out to families without his permission. According to him, the department has no business interfering with officers’ private lives. He knows what happens when cops’ wives get together—it’s a gabfest. All they’re going to do is gossip. I tell him, in the most polite way possible, that if I had put invitations in the officers’ mailboxes, most of them would end up in the wastebasket.
“That’s the officer’s choice, then,” he says.
“Don’t their families have a choice? This job and Randy’s death affects them, too.”
“Then remind the chief that the vote of no confidence is still pending. This harebrained idea isn’t going to help her any.”
* * *
I call Rich Spelling to invite him personally. He did tell me never to call him again, but he was grieving and angry at the world. I don’t want him to find out that we’re offering counseling to the KPD families and that we didn’t include him. I expect him to hang up on me.
“Yo, Doc,” he says. “How’s things in the nuthouse?”
“You sound cheerful.”
“What other choice do I have? I can’t just lay down and die. Randy’s dead, not me.”
“You’ve had an enormous loss. You need time to grieve.”
“Not my style.”
“How’s work?”
“It’s okay except everyone looks at me funny, and I’m taking a lot of grief off the a-hole inmates. They make these little crying noises, or they chant ‘boo-hoo for the screw’ every time they see me.”
I tell him about the family debriefing and, as expected, he declines saying all he’ll get is pity if he attends, not something he wants.
“I’m not too cool about being around people right now. Randy’s family reached out a couple of times, but I don’t feel comfortable being around them. They look at me like they think I’m responsible.”
“How could that be?”
“I don’t know, Doc. You tell me. I’m still seeing Dr. Johnson for therapy every week.”
“How’s that going?”
“Okay,” he says. “Good.”
* * *
Fran is setting up the coffee service in the cafeteria, stacking paper filters filled with coffee next to an enormous stainless steel coffee urn. There are trays of cookies, four pies, and three layer cakes. Two older women, veteran wives, are distributing tissue boxes and small vases of flowers to each table. Fran’s brought enough food and coffee to feed an army. Eddie rumbles into the room pulling a dolly loaded with cold drinks and ice. He unloads the dolly, pours the ice into a cooler, and lifts it onto the counter with a theatrical grunt.
“Is that it? Anything else?” Fran shakes her head. “Then I’m out of here. If I stay any longer I’ll get estrogen poisoning.” He rumbles back down the hall dragging th
e dolly behind him.
The chief arrives first. I’m surprised to see that she’s dressed in the class-A uniform usually reserved for important ceremonies and funerals. She introduces herself to Fran and Fran’s friends, Irma and Lillian, as though it isn’t patently obvious that she is the police chief. She thanks them for coming and for the food and flowers, but declines to eat or drink anything. Outside, the night is gloomy. Our reflections stare back at us from the windows that line the wall along the street. Headlights from passing cars illuminate a fine drizzle. We sit and wait in silence listening to the coffee urn percolate and the clock tick.
Fran looks at her watch. “Has anyone checked? Is the outside door to the lobby unlocked? I’ll go.” She bustles out of the room.
If no one shows up, I’m going to have egg all over my face. I’ve finally latched onto to something to do and it’s a bust. I got fifteen “yes, I’ll be there” responses. They couldn’t all have changed their minds. A small movie plays in my head. The association president emailing the entire membership, telling them not to let their wives or their girlfriends come to this meeting. Warning them about gossip and God knows what else he thinks happens when a group of unsupervised women get together.
Fran comes back through the door, followed by a line of mostly young and mostly pretty women. “Someone forgot to tell the front desk people we were having an evening event.” She looks at me, the suspect “someone,” and I interpret her look to mean that I’m a total idiot.
Irma and Lillian jump to their feet and get to work greeting everyone. A small traffic jam builds at the doorway as each woman stops to fill out a name tag, shuffling raincoats, umbrellas, and handbags. The chief stands next to me. We shake each woman’s hand as she files by. The wives I’ve seen in therapy avert their eyes fearful that any mutual recognition between us would be a giveaway, a clue that all was not well at home. The only woman to greet me directly is MaryAnne Forester, Tom Rutgers’ girlfriend. I notice a small diamond ring on her left hand, perhaps because she’s waving it in my face. I do the right thing and acknowledge it.
The Right Wrong Thing Page 16