Lady Elect (28 page)

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Authors: Nikita Lynnette Nichols

BOOK: Lady Elect
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Arykah looked up at the white ceiling above her. She closed her eyes and pictured her surroundings and where she was standing when the doorbell rang. “I'd say that I had gotten to my vanity table when I heard the doorbell.”
“Her vanity is halfway between the nightstand and the shower,” Lance offered.
“So, between ten and maybe fifteen feet?” Detective Rogers asked Arykah.
She nodded her head. “That sounds about right.”
The detective jotted down more information on the notepad, then took her cellular phone from her interior pocket. “Let's try something.” She gave Arykah her telephone. “Lay the phone down on the bed and I'm going to start walking toward the wall across the room. This is a small room, and it won't take me long to reach the wall. I want you to stop me when you think that enough time had passed from when I start to walk and time you think you heard your doorbell ring.” She looked at Arykah. “Got it?”
“Yep. Got it.”
“Whenever you're ready.”
Arykah laid Detective Rogers cellular telephone on the bed next to her. The detective started walking toward the wall across the room while at the same time watching her wristwatch.
“Ding-dong,” Arykah chimed when she felt that enough time had passed.
Detective Rogers stopped walking and turned around. “Thirteen steps. Two more and I would've gotten to the wall.”
“What does all of this mean, Detective?” Lance was curious.
“It took nine seconds for Arykah to stop me. I'm wondering if nine seconds was enough time for Mother Pansie to have called whoever rang your doorbell to report that Arykah was home alone.”
“If it happened that fast, then the guy was already waiting on the porch,” Lance stated.
“And Arykah didn't give Mother Pansie a chance to ask if you were home. When she heard Mother Pansie's voice, Arykah immediately announced that you weren't home and that she should call you at the church.”
“And that's when she hung up on me.”
“And nine seconds later your doorbell rang. Coincidence? Maybe; maybe not.”
“This is unbelievable,” Lance said.
Detective Rogers began writing on her notepad again. “Okay, Arykah, you put your robe on and what happened next?”
“When I was a few feet away from the front door, the doorbell rang again. I asked who was at the door, and the guy said that he had a delivery for me. I thought it was Rafael, and I yelled to him that I was at the door.”
Detective Rogers wrote the name down on the notepad. “Who is Rafael?”
“Her young Puerto Rican boyfriend that brings her secret packages that she thinks I don't know about.”
Arykah's light complexion turned crimson red. She had been caught. “What are you talking about, Lance?”
“I'm talking about bags and boxes that are hidden in all of the closets throughout the house.”
Arykah could do nothing but chuckle. She felt her stitches pull when she smiled.
“Rafael is the delivery guy that is assigned to my area. He drives the UPS truck.”
Arykah looked at Lance. “I admit that I'm a shopaholic.” Then she looked at Detective Rogers. “Rafael comes about two to three times a week.”
“So, you didn't look through the peephole?” Lance asked.
“No,” she was ashamed to admit. “I assumed it was Rafael because it was always Rafael.”
“Except that time it wasn't him,” Detective Rogers stated.
“Nope. It wasn't Rafael on the other side of the door, and I found that out when I opened it and got hit in my nose.”
Detective Rogers could see Arykah tensing up. “What happened next?”
“I fell back on the floor. The guy came inside and kicked me in my left side. I heard the front door slam, and the next thing I knew I was being dragged by my arms into the living room. I was kicking and screaming and scratching. I remember getting hit in my right eye, and he told me to shut up. I'm not sure at what point my lip got busted. But the more I screamed, the angrier and stronger he got. He used his fingers on me at first—then he shoved himself inside me.”
Lance twitched in his chair. That was the first time that he'd heard in detail what happened to Arykah. Listening to her describe the torture she suffered made him want to go out and buy a gun.
“Arykah,” Detective Rogers started, “can you remember anything particular about him. What was he wearing? Did he have any visible tattoos? Was he light or dark skinned? Was he a short man or a tall man? Anything at all.”
“I couldn't see his face,” Arykah said.
“Did he wear a mask?”
“I don't think he wore a mask. I got hit in the nose as soon as I opened the door, and I fell down. He kicked me and ran around my head to drag me inside. At some point I got punched in the eye, and I just couldn't get a good view even when he was on top of me. But I do know that he was a bald man because I was scratching at his face and head and I didn't feel any hair.”
“Was he wearing any cologne?”
“He was funky,” Arykah remembered. “He smelled horribly, like he hadn't bathed in months, and his breath was foul.”
“Did he say anything to you?”
“I remembered screaming for Lance, and the guy said that the bishop couldn't save me.”
Lance stood and walked to the window and looked out of it. What Arykah had just said pierced his soul. The rapist was right. Lance wasn't there to save his wife.
Detective Rogers frowned at Arykah's last statement. “Do you generally call your husband ‘Bishop'?”
“Huh?” Arykah didn't understand the question.
Lance turned around fast. He knew exactly where Detective Rogers was going with her question. “Oh my God,” he said out loud.
Detective Rogers saw the look on Lance's face. She knew that he was reading her mind. “Mr. Howell, don't say anything.” She concentrated on Arykah. “When you're talking to your husband, what do you call him?”
Arykah looked at Lance and wondered why Detective Rogers ordered him not to say anything. “What's going on?”
“Just answer her question, Cheeks,” Lance said.
“What do you call him?” Detective Rogers asked a third time.
“I call him ‘babe,' ‘honey,' ‘my love.' I have lots of pet names for him.”
“Do you ever call him ‘Bishop'?”
Lance came and stood at the foot of Arykah's bed. His blood was running hot through his veins. He and Detective Rogers were on the same page.
“Of course I call him ‘Bishop' sometimes. Especially when we're at church. Or when I've asked him to do something and three hours later the task still isn't done, I may call him ‘Bishop.' And sometimes I call him ‘Bishop' when we're playing.”
“Playing?”
Arykah tried to smile. “You know. Playing.”
Detective Rogers knew what Arykah meant. “Oh, playing. Playing with each other. I get it,” she smiled. “But what I wanna know is when you were calling out for your husband while you were being raped, what name did you call?”
“I was screaming his name.”
Lance exhaled. “What name, Cheeks?” He was losing patience.
Detective Rogers looked at him. “Mr. Howell, please. Don't make me ask you to leave the room.”
Lance nodded his head. He understood that he couldn't put words in Arykah's mouth.
He folded his arms across his chest and waited for her to say exactly what he and Detective Rogers needed her to say.
“Arykah, what name did you call out when you were screaming for your husband?”
“I was screaming ‘Lance.' I was calling for Lance to come and save me.”
Detective Rogers looked at Lance again. “Not a word.”
He stood motionless.
“Arykah,” Detective Rogers said. “You didn't scream ‘babe,' or ‘honey,' or ‘my love'?”
Arykah looked at Detective Rogers like she was nuts. “What kind of question is that, Detective? Why would I call out any of those names? My husband wasn't making love to me. I was being raped by a stranger.”
“I know that, Arykah. And the reason I asked you what name you called out is because you stated that when you called out Lance's name, the rapist told you that the bishop couldn't save you.”
“Yes, that's right,” Arykah said. She wasn't putting two and two together.
Lance could no longer keep quiet. “How did the rapist know that I was a bishop?” he blurted out to Arykah.
Detective Rogers scowled at Lance, but she didn't say anything to him. “Whoever raped you, Arykah, knows you personally. Or he has ties to someone else who knows you personally.”
Chapter 18
When
Arykah awakened from her nap on Thursday afternoon, she walked into her kitchen and found Myrtle standing at the stove making her famous homemade chicken noodle soup. Earlier that morning, Arykah's doctor had released her from the hospital with plenty of medication and strict instructions. She was not to overextend herself in any way, and she was ordered to get plenty of rest.
“Hey, Sugar Plum,” Myrtle greeted Arykah by carefully giving her a hug and a kiss on the cheek. Myrtle knew that Arykah's ribs were broken, and she didn't want to squeeze her too tightly. “Are you hungry?”
With Myrtle's help, Arykah slowly walked to the kitchen table and sat down. “I didn't know you were here, Momma Cortland. Where's Lance? I remembered him lying down with me when we got home from the hospital this morning.”
“Lance called me and said that you were sleeping. He asked if I could come and sit with you because he had some business to tend to. He sent a cab for me. He must've been in a hurry because as soon as my cab got here, the bishop was already backing out of the driveway.”
“Really?” Arykah asked. She wondered what Lance was up to. That morning at the hospital, he told her that he would be taking a month off from the construction company. And he assigned Minister Weeks to conduct Bible class on Tuesday nights, but Lance would still take charge of his pulpit on Sunday mornings.
“He told me to reach him on his cellular telephone if I needed him, and he also told me to not let you out of my sight.” Myrtle went back to the stove.
“He didn't say where he was going?” Arykah asked.
“Nope. And I didn't ask. It wasn't my place.”
Arykah looked at the clock on the wall. It was almost two
P.M.
“And he's been gone since this morning?”
“Yep.”
 
 
“Thanks for coming in, Mr. Howell. How's Arykah doing? She was released from the hospital this morning, right?” Detective Rogers shook Lance's hand and invited him to sit in a chair. They were in a small office at the rear of the Burr Ridge Police Department.
“Arykah's getting better by the day, Detective. Thanks for asking. Yes, she's home resting.” Lance was curious why Detective Rogers had called and asked him to meet her at the police station.
“That's good,” she stated. “Please let her know that I'm thinking of her.”
“I certainly will,” Lance responded.
Detective Rogers sat in a chair next to Lance with a remote control in her hand. “Well, I called you in to take a look at the surveillance tape that I confiscated from the security booth at the entrance gate of your complex.” She pointed the remote control to a flat-screen high-definition television that was mounted on the wall in the office. As she pressed the play button, she said, “Check this out. This surveillance is from the morning of Arykah's attack. I think you'll find it quite interesting. Pay attention to the time of day it was on the bottom right-hand side.”
Lance couldn't believe his eyes when he saw a bald black man walk right past the guard and into his complex at 8:27
A.M.
Monday morning. “What the heck? Who is that guy, and where was the guard?”
“I interviewed a guy named Dwight Alexander, the guard that was on duty that morning.”
“Yeah, I know Dwight.”
“He said that someone in a car had driven up on the street, just outside the entrance of the complex, and asked him for directions. Dwight claimed that he left the booth, unattended, for about two minutes to give the person directions. I figured that was the moment this bald guy slipped passed Dwight without being noticed.”
“Do you think the person that asked for directions was an accomplice?”
Detective Rogers shook her head from side to side. “No. Not at all. Dwight said the person asking for directions was an Asian lady with a screaming infant strapped in a car seat in the backseat of her vehicle. I believe the guy had been lurking around the security gate waiting for an opportunity to get past the guard's booth undetected. It was just perfect timing when the Asian lady drove up to distract Dwight.” Detective Rogers pressed the rewind button on the remote control. “Take another look at this guy walking into your complex. After he passed the booth, he looked over his shoulder to make sure that he hadn't been seen. The camera mounted on the roof of the booth captured a good view of his face.”
Lance leaned forward in his chair and looked closely at the man's face. He appeared to be about six foot two. He wore a short black leather jacket with dark pants and dark shoes. Both of his hands were in his jacket pockets, and his pace was quick.
“Do you recognize him at all?” Detective Rogers asked Lance.
“No. I've never seen him before.”
“Are you sure? You've never seen him in your complex before? Maybe visiting a neighbor.”
“Nope.”
“What about church? Have you ever seen this guy at church?”
There were close to 500 members at Freedom Temple. While the women certainly outnumbered the men every Sunday, Lance couldn't place the man's face at church. “Not that I can recall.”
Detective Rogers pressed the power button on the remote control and stood from her chair. “I'm expecting a call from the forensic scientist sometime today. Hopefully the fingerprints lifted from your doorbell will come back with a positive identification.”
“And what if there are no matches? Then what?”
Detective Rogers saw the concern on Lance's face. “We'll get him, Mr. Howell. This is personal for me.”
Lance cocked his head to the side. “Really? How so?”
The detective exhaled. “I'm a rape victim too. I was fourteen years old coming home from a friend's house trying to beat my curfew. I took a shortcut and walked through the alley behind my house. A guy jumped out from nowhere and grabbed me.”
“My Lord,” Lance said.
“He was never caught. That's why I'm making Arykah's case my priority. I'm determined to get justice for her and any other woman that predator may have attacked.”
Lance was pleased to know that Detective Rogers was in his wife's corner. She wasn't just putting time in to receive a paycheck; she was passionate about the case. “I appreciate that, Detective.”
“Please call me Cortney.”
Lance smiled. “Okay, Cortney. And you can call me Lance.”
“I'll be in touch as soon as I hear about the fingerprints.”
As soon as Lance stepped outside of the police department, his cellular telephone rang. He saw his home number flashing on the caller identification. Immediately his heart started to race. “What's wrong, Mother Cortland?” he asked in a panic.
“Hi, babe. It's me.”
“Cheeks, are you okay?”
Lance was riled up. Arykah feared that every time he left her presence he'd constantly worry about her. “Yes, I'm fine. Momma Cortland is here cooking up a storm. She's got a pot of chicken noodle soup on the stove. She found your Cornish hen in the freezer. It's in the oven with a pan of macaroni and cheese. Right now she's making her famous pineapple upside-down cake. Momma Cortland is giving you a run for your money, babe.”
Lance chuckled. “Is that right?” Earlier that morning when he called and asked Myrtle to come and sit with Arykah, she told Lance that she'd be more than happy to help out in any way she could. Myrtle told Lance that she wanted to make chicken noodle soup for Arykah but hearing about the hen, macaroni and cheese, and cake was a pleasant surprise for him.
“Yep. You better get back here and claim our title.”
“I'll be home shortly.”
“Where are you? You slipped out on me.”
“I'm at the police station. I just reviewed the surveillance tape from Monday morning. Detective Rogers and I saw a bald black guy walk right past Dwight at about eight-thirty in the morning.”
“It could be him, Lance. The guy that raped me was a dark bald guy.”
“The camera got a good picture of his face, but I didn't recognize him.”
“I wanna see the tape.” Arykah didn't get a good look of the guy during her attack, but she knew he was dark and bald.
“I definitely think you should review the tape. I didn't recognize him, but maybe you will. However, your doctor has you on lockdown for now. Maybe in a week or two; when you're stronger.”
“So what happens now?”
“Hopefully the fingerprints lifted from the doorbell will find a match, but only if the guy has a criminal record.”
“But what happens if he doesn't have a record? Will he just get away with what he did to me?” Arykah was worried that her attacker would never be caught.
“Cheeks, don't worry. We'll get him. I promise.”
“But—”
“No ‘buts.'” Lance refused to allow her to become discouraged. “Have I ever broken a promise to you?”
Arykah couldn't think of one. “No.”
“And I won't start breaking any now. I'm on my way home. Can I bring you anything?”
“Yes, you can.” Arykah perked up. “A pint of Chunky Monkey to go with Mother Cortland's pineapple upside-down cake.”
 
 
At 7:30 that evening, Lance opened the front door for Monique and Adonis.
“Welcome, folks. Come on in.”
“What's happening, Bishop?” Monique stepped inside the foyer and kissed Lance on his cheek.
“All is well. All is well.”
Adonis followed Monique inside. “Evening. I heard there was food here.”
Lance chuckled. “Well, you came to the right place if you're hungry. Mother Cortland has been cooking all day.” He noticed that Adonis was carrying a small black duffle bag on his shoulder. “That's the smallest duffle bag I've ever seen.”
Monique brought her forefinger to her lips to quiet Lance. “Shh. It's a gift for Arykah.”
“You bought her a miniature duffle bag? One pair of Arykah's earrings won't even fit in that thing.”
“There's already something in the duffle bag,” Adonis smiled.
Lance shut the front door, double bolted it, then looked outside through the glass. He was looking to see if anyone was lurking around in the shadows of the bushes. Until Arykah's attacker was caught and jailed, he wouldn't rest.
“What are you looking at?” Adonis asked.
“Nothing.” Lance turned away from the door and led his friends into the living room where Arykah was sitting on the sofa.
“Hey, doll,” Monique greeted her best friend. “Look at you sitting pretty.” Monique sat next to Arykah, leaned over, and kissed her cheek.
“Not you too. Everyone is a liar these days.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I'm talking about Lance telling me that I'm beautiful and gorgeous. And you coming in here saying that I'm pretty. You are all liars.”
“No one is lying,” Adonis said, sitting on the sofa opposite of Arykah and Monique. “You
are
beautiful and pretty and gorgeous.” He set the small duffle bag on the floor next to his leg.
“Preach, brother, preach,” Lance encouraged Adonis.
“Well, if that's the truth, Adonis, why does my mirror show that I look like the elephant woman?” Arykah was self-conscious of her still swollen right eye. Her nose was off center, and the stitches in her top lip hadn't yet dissolved. The black, purple, and blue bruises on her face were a constant reminder of her attack just three days before.
“You need to return that mirror from wherever you bought it and get a refund because it's lying to you.”
Arykah looked from Adonis to Monique. “Please take your husband to an optometrist. Obviously, he needs glasses.”
Monique chose to ignore Arykah's comment. Evidently Arykah was looking to have a pity party, but Monique was not going to indulge her friend. She and Adonis stopped by to cheer her up and take her mind away from the event that happened on Monday. “Um, we bought you a gift.”
Adonis picked up the duffle bag and gave it to Monique. Monique set the bag on Arykah's lap.
Receiving gifts always cheered Arykah up. She slightly smiled. “Ooh, gifts. I like gifts.” She unzipped the duffle bag and was surprised to see a little Yorkshire terrier pop its head out of the bag. “Oh, how cute,” Arykah cooed.
“It's a Teacup Yorkiepoo,” Adonis said.
“A Yorkshire terrier mixed with a poodle. And it's called a teacup because it's the size of a teacup. She won't get much bigger than that,” Monique confirmed.

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