Unconditional (8 page)

It had been nearly three years since I'd been inside the police station, and I'd never been to Detective Miller's office. During the investigation into Billy's murder, he'd always met me at my home or at a downtown coffee shop. The first couple of times was to share with me what the police knew about the killer—the red hoodie, the mechanic's rag. The final time was to say the case had gone cold. That there were no further leads. Nothing concrete to tie any one person to the man who'd shot my husband. Who'd taken away my life.

But now,
I
may have uncovered something. I could feel it in my bones. Now all I had to do was convince someone in authority.

Detective Miller's office was located on the second floor, where the odor of stale coffee and smoked cigars lingered like the smell of dirty socks in a laundry hamper. I approached a female officer behind a tall counter where she stood slipping pink pieces of paper into case files.

“Can I help you?” she said without looking up.

“I'm hoping . . .” I cleared my throat. “I'm hoping Detective Brent Miller is in this evening.”

She looked up. One eyebrow arched quizzically. “Miller?”

“Yes.”

“You're in luck. He walked back in not ten minutes ago.”

I wrapped my fingers around the straps of my purse and squeezed. “Could you tell him Samantha Crawford is here, please?”

“Will he know what this is about?”

“I think so, but . . . if not, you could tell him I'm Billy Crawford's wife.” It felt odd—
good
—using the title again. “My husband was killed down in the Commons about three years ago and I—”

The officer closed the top of one of the folders, added it to a stack leaning against the corner of her work station. “Three years ago?”

I cleared my throat again. “Detective Miller worked the case, and I think I might have some information.”

“Mm, okay.” She pointed to a spot behind me. “Just have a seat over there, and I'll get him.”

I sat down in the waiting area. Across from me were two adults—one male, one female. They clutched each other's hands and looked anxious. The knees of the woman bobbed up and down. She muttered, “I cannot
believe
she's gotten herself into this mess. Never in my life . . . No one—do you hear me?—
no one
in my family has
ever
been arrested.”

To which the man replied, “Just hold on. We don't know anything yet.”

I glanced to my right. A young man no more than twenty or twenty-one slouched in a chair, head dropped into his hand. Shaggy blond hair fell over his face. His breathing indicated he was asleep, as if he'd been there so long he'd finally given up and nodded off. I wondered if I should have called the front desk for an appointment after my failed attempt to reach Detective Miller directly.

But moments later I heard my name. Looking past the still-sleeping young man, I saw the man I remembered from three years ago. He hadn't changed much. Still slightly overweight, his silver hair combed back in a Conway Twitty style, though not quite as thick as it had been. His clothing hadn't changed all that much either. He still wore dress pants, white dress shirt, simple sports coat, and a tie.

I stood. “Hi. Detective Miller, I was wondering if I might have a minute of your time?”

For a moment I thought I saw annoyance register in his eyes. But just as quickly, it changed to compassion. He looked at his watch before saying, “I've got some time, sure. Come on back to my office.”

I followed him, past the high counter, through makeshift offices that had been formed in the corners along the wide hallways. Detective Miller stepped aside as we neared the opaque glass door where his name and title had been professionally painted. I couldn't help but think of how different the letters looked from the ones on Joe's mailbox.

“Come in,” he said.

The office was small. One wall was brick and glass, the windows looking out at the well-lit, white-brick courthouse that stood proudly behind the lawns of the public square. A nondescript office desk dominated the middle of the room. Two office chairs were in front of it, plaques and framed certificates mounted on the wall behind it. A coffee mug filled with pens and handheld flags from various police organizations stood at the top right-hand corner of the desk. On the left was a file tray neatly filled with manila folders and a flip-top Landscapes of America calendar. In the center was a chrome desk lamp, which cast the only light in the room other than that which came from the outside. Detective Miller was obviously a man of order, which was good. I needed him to see—to understand—what I now knew. If it made sense in my mind, then surely it would in his.

I walked to a chair but didn't sit, choosing to remain standing with my hands clasped together.

Detective Miller strolled to the other side of his desk. I noticed he still walked with a limp. “Please, sit.”

I did, dropping my purse to the floor. “Detective Miller,” I said, my voice barely audible. “I was down in the projects today—the Commons—and I think I may have found something . . . someone . . . linked to my husband's—to Billy's murder.”

Detective Miller chose, for whatever reason, to remain standing. “What in the world was someone like you doing down there, Ms. Crawford?” The tone of his voice was gentle. Fatherly. Not as Anthony's had been earlier to Macon, but what I would have expected from my own sweet dad had I told him where I'd been that day.

Or the night before.

“I was checking on a couple of kids I helped get to the ER—”

“Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. The hit-and-run last night. Girl from the projects. I heard about that. Happened near Murphy's. That right?”

I nodded. “Mm. Yes. Well . . . while I was in the Commons, I saw this guy. He matched your description of Billy's killer.”

Detective Miller folded his arms over his chest. “I don't remember giving a description.”

“Maybe ‘description' isn't the right word. What I meant was . . . this guy had a red hoodie. And I'm pretty sure he's a mechanic. He, um . . . he had a red mechanic's rag.”

The detective looked toward the ceiling briefly before his eyes came back to mine. He pressed his palms onto the top of his desk and leaned forward. “So you're a detective now? You do understand we questioned every mechanic and chop shop operator in a five-mile grid.”

I wasn't about to tell him how to do his job any more than I would have expected him to tell me how to write a children's book, but I had to make him understand. At the very least, to know what I knew. “He had a red
hoodie
,” I said again.
And a red mechanic's rag.

Detective Miller shook his head. “Here's a news flash for you:
All
the bangers wear red hoodies down there.”

I felt my breath catch in my throat.

The gentleness in the detective's eyes returned. “You're grasping at straws, Ms. Crawford.”

“But . . .” I shook my head just enough to shake loose my own thoughts. I
couldn't
be grasping at straws. If that were the case, then chances were, Billy's killer would
never
be caught. Would never be brought to trial. He'd never serve time behind bars. At least, not for
this
crime. For
Billy's
murder.

Detective Miller arched his back so that he stood to his full height. He sighed deeply. “You have no idea, Ms. Crawford, how many investigations are ongoing in that neighborhood. Yours isn't the only one. And I'm sorry to say, nothing much really gets solved out there.” He sighed again as he shoved his hands into his pants pockets. “Look. I'm no racist, but I
am
a realist.” He glanced over his shoulder to the window and the world outside it. “We're talking about the
Commons
. They throw a party if a boy makes his twenty-first birthday because he's defying the odds.”

My heart hurt. I thought of Macon. Of the boys I'd met today—Snuffy and Bernard and the others—of their smiling faces and how, if what Detective Miller had just said was true, these boys may never reach adulthood. Simply because of where they lived.

Detective Miller rolled his chair around to the side of the desk nearest to me. He sat, rested his elbows on his knees, and looked me in the eye with as much compassion, I suppose, as a man could who'd put in the same length of time in his line of work. “Did you ever play with pit bull pups, Ms. Crawford?” I could smell tobacco and mint gum on his breath. “So cute and cuddly.” His brow creased. “But then they grow up. And they become what nature intended them to be.” He shook his head. “They can't help it.” He looked out the window again. “I think about those kids you picked up . . . and I wonder.” His eyes, sad and washed out with disappointment, returned again to mine. “What might they become someday?
If
they make it.”

I could hear my own breathing, could feel my heart pounding in my chest. I reached toward the floor without taking my eyes off his, stretching my fingers until they found the strap of my purse. I drew it up, clutched it to my roiling stomach.

I hadn't eaten all day. But more than that, this meeting had left me nauseated.

“Ms. Crawford . . . you've lost so much. I know. And I'm sorry. But you stand to lose a lot more if you keep going into the Commons. For
any
reason. Trust me.” One brow rose. “Take solace in this fact: The man who killed your husband? He's probably already dead.”

The air left my lungs. I stood. Numbness overwhelmed me. At the same time, a new sort of anger coursed through me. “Thank you for your time, Detective.”

I turned toward the door. I willed my legs and my feet to move forward, keeping my focus on the corridor before me. After I passed the chairs where the man continued to sleep and the couple continued to lament, I began to walk faster, more determined than I'd been when I'd walked in.

More so than I'd even been last night.

If Detective Miller couldn't find the man who killed my husband, then
I
would.

Chapter Eight

I immediately returned
to the Commons, rolling Billy's truck to a stop at a darkened curb, positioning myself between two of the buildings. I killed the engine, huddled down in the seat, and pulled the hood of my green sweater over my head. Raking my teeth over my lower lip, I turned my head toward Anthony's apartment. There, beneath the streetlamp, I could see three mechanic's rags hanging on a wire that had been tied between one of the bars on the front window and a porch post. Two were white.

One was red.

My eyes wandered left to where Mattie sat in the shadows beside her front door. The crimson glow of a cigarette singed in the cold air. Her porch light wasn't on, but I could see the outline of her face whenever she drew on the cigarette. She looked older and more tired than she had even this morning. After one more draw, she flicked the cigarette into the air. It landed in the grass a few feet away, and within seconds it had burned out. With that, Mattie stood and staggered to her front door and into the dark apartment.

The sound of breaking glass caused me to look out the other window. Across the street four black men sat in folding lawn chairs around a makeshift bonfire built in the rusty remains of a patio grill. They all held cans of beer or bottles hidden in brown paper bags. Just like Mattie's.

These men were already drunk. Past drunk. Unable to sit up straight. Laughing at . . . nothing. Could one of these men have been Billy's killer? And while he lay cold in his grave, was his murderer sitting around a warm fire, laughing and drinking as though life was just peachy? As though nothing in the world was wrong?

Or was I right in my suspicions about Anthony? This man Macon and Mattie called T. I'd seen his anger. He'd been mad enough earlier today to do something murderous. But what would Billy have done—
could
Billy have done—to infuriate Anthony to the point of murdering him? Billy's wallet had been left beside him, and nothing was missing from it. If robbery wasn't the motive, if the attack hadn't been provoked and brought on by anger, then what could have caused someone to murder my husband? Or could it have been random, as Detective Miller once suggested to me?

I sat up, cut my eyes over at Anthony's front door once more. Somehow I had to get inside that apartment. I had to see for myself what Detective Miller refused to look into.

And I would. Somehow.

I swallowed hard, started up the truck, and drove home.

With the exception
of a few trips to the barn to care for the horses and other animals, I stayed in bed the entire weekend, nearly unable to move. Unable to think. Unable to eat more than a few bites of food. Unable to do anything but sleep, covers pulled high over my head. I dreamed about Billy. About red hoodies and red rags and red blood spilling onto the street.

Sometimes I dreamed of fires and men sitting around them, laughing and drinking.

Other times I dreamed of the campfire Billy had built shortly before he died. I could see his hand clutching a pine branch, poking at the embers, stoking the fire. Stirring up my love for him with every breath we breathed together.

In one dream I read to him my story about little Firebird and, when it was done, he leaned back and kissed me. The moment was so real, I could taste him. Smell him. I woke feeling magical, as though the dream had been real. And when I realized it was not, that such a moment would never happen again, I cried so hard, my sobs forced me out of bed. To the bathroom, where I vomited into the toilet before returning to bed.

A few days later I managed to drag myself to the shower. I dressed. I ate a bowl of cereal. I went to the barn, spent time feeding and talking to the livestock, and took a short ride on Cricket. Another one on Penny. After un-tacking both, I got in the car and drove back into the city. Back to Joe's to tell him I was sorry for the way I'd walked out on him without explanation.