Let It Burn Read online

  “That’s a long way from Detroit.”

  “You said it, ma’am.”

  She stood up slowly. She was wearing sandals, and you could see every year of standing and walking and hard work in her feet. She took the plate from me, put it on top of her own, and took them to the kitchen. I waited for her, looking around the room, seeing all the little touches she had added, trying to make this a real home, even if the floor was damaged and there were God knows how many other problems with the place if you bothered to look for them. On top of the television set, there were pictures of her three kids when they were young. No pictures of a father. Another woman trying to do her best, all by herself. Such a sadly common story in this city.

  But she was still here, in this same house. She was still trying. That said something about her.

  She came back from the kitchen and showed me out the front door. I thanked her again for the cake. When I got in my truck, she stood there on the front porch watching me. I was about to pull away, but she waved at me to stop.

  She came down the stairs, slowly. She came to my window. I rolled it down. She put her hand on my arm.

  “I bet you had a lot of people try to lie to you when you were a cop,” she said. “I bet you got pretty good at telling the difference between a lie and the truth.”

  “Yes,” I said. “As a matter of fact, I did.”

  “My son did not kill that woman.”

  I just looked at her. The day was getting hotter. There were insects buzzing away in the tall weeds on either side of her house.

  “That’s a bone fact,” she said, squeezing my arm harder. “That’s the bone truth.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  To this day, I still don’t know how the news stations do it. Maybe they have somebody sitting around, listening in on the police band radio, but somehow they always seem to know when something significant is happening, anywhere in the city.

  Now, a murder was not significant. Not in a city that would see over five hundred murders over the course of the year. During that hot summer, we’d see two or three a day, easy. But those were usually results of the gang wars, casualties in the fight for control of the drug trade. One black man killing another, whether you want to come right out and say it or not … That didn’t make the six o’clock news with Bill Bonds.

  But a white woman from the suburbs, found dead in the abandoned section of the old train station downtown … That was worth scrambling the trucks for. Which is exactly what Franklin and I saw as we came back down the tracks. Channel 2, Channel 4, Channel 7, they were all there. There were remote newscasters standing in front of cameras and lights, and there was crime scene tape strung all across the parking lot, from the station to the tracks, to keep everyone away from that back door.

  Sergeant Schuman was still on the scene. He already looked a little frazzled and ready to tee off on the next reporter who asked him a question.

  “McKnight,” he said as soon as he saw me. “Get down to the station ASAP.”

  “That’s where I was heading.”

  Nobody asked Franklin or me any questions as we ducked under the tape and headed out to the parking lot. They probably figured we were just two officers helping to secure the crime scene. Nothing special here, let’s go bug the sergeant again.

  I followed Franklin to our car. I sat in the passenger’s seat while he got behind the wheel. He didn’t say anything as he started the car and headed out to Woodward.

  “Tell me what kind of world we live in,” he finally said, “where a woman gets killed just because she’s wearing a diamond bracelet.”

  I shook my head. Did it even matter now? Was there a better reason that would make more sense?

  “They call those eternity bracelets,” he said. “Those bracelets with all the diamonds. They’re pretty expensive.”

  I shook my head again. I didn’t know anything about expensive jewelry. I’d come to find out that it was, in fact, an eternity bracelet, bought for Elana Paige by her husband on their five-year anniversary. A couple of years later, Chris Evert would stop a tournament to look for her bracelet, and that’s how they’d come to be known as “tennis bracelets.” But that summer they were still eternity bracelets, and if Elana’s husband thought he’d have anything resembling an eternity to spend with his wife, he was horribly mistaken.

  The sun was going down when we got to the police station. It was already feeling like the longest day of my life. Sergeant Grimaldi was still there, and when he saw me he put his hand on my shoulder and asked me how I was doing. It was a small gesture, but it meant a lot to me. It would be something I’d remember even after I left the police force.

  “You’re gonna be pulled in about five different directions at once,” he said to me. “But first things first. We’ve got all the current mug shots ready for you. You need to look through them carefully. If we’re lucky, you’ll spot the guy and we’ll have him in custody before the night is over.”

  He led me to one of the interview rooms. The mug books were there waiting for me. Four faces per page, each face shown from the front and then from the side. I’d led my share of arrestees to the same wall against which these shots were taken. Now it was my turn to go through a tall stack of them. The hope was that the man I’d chased today had been arrested in the past. And that I’d be able to recognize him.

  Franklin came in after a while and asked me how it was going.

  “Nothing yet,” I said, pausing to rub my eyes.

  “You need some coffee?”

  “That would be great, thanks.”

  I went back to the mug shots. He brought my coffee. Then he sat down across from me with his own cup.

  “You don’t have to stay here,” I told him. “Your family must be wondering where you are.”

  “I called them. They know I’m working on something important.”

  He wasn’t really working on anything, of course. He was just keeping me company. But I didn’t call him on it.

  “You should talk to your wife, too,” he said. “Let her know what’s going on.”

  “I will. Next time I take a break. I think she might have class tonight anyway.”

  A few minutes later, Sergeant Grimaldi stuck his head in. “Any luck?”

  “Not yet,” I said.

  “Detective Bateman would like to steal you for a few minutes,” he said. “The family’s still here, and he’d like you to talk to them.”

  I looked over at Franklin. The night was about to get even tougher.

  *

  If you work in a police station in the heart of one of the most murder-prone cities in the country, you’re going to see your share of devastated families. They get led into the room with that same look on their faces, helpless and drained of blood. They sit down. They hardly ever accept anything. No coffee or even water. They just sit there and wait for the nightmare to end. But it doesn’t. They get shown a photograph, taken at the crime scene. A close-up of the face, from above. The eyes usually open.

  You need to prepare yourself for what you’re about to see. That’s the standard line, as if it’s even possible. They take the photograph. Something goes out of them, like a sail losing its wind. There’s no longer any doubt, but they still have to say it. They have to give you the verbal identification. Yes, that’s him. That’s my boy. Nine times out of ten, it’s a male.

  I’m sorry for your loss. The next standard line. They hardly ever break down when they’re in the station. They must save that for home. While they’re here they summon up the strength to keep it under control. It never fails to amaze me.

  The sergeant led me to another interview room, just down the hall from where I had been going through the mug shots. He opened the door, and I stepped into that drywall box of absolute misery.

  The husband was sitting on one side of the table. He was wearing a golf shirt, and his hair was pressed down where he’d obviously been wearing his golf hat. I pictured two cops having to go out onto the course and find him. Interr
upting him right in the middle of his round to give him the news. Or maybe he was already done. Heading for home, heading for dinner with his wife. Now he was here in this room, looking down at a clear plastic bag on the table. I recognized the pieces of the diamond bracelet I had found. He was framing the bag with his hands, like he wanted to pick it up. I was sure the detective had told him not to touch it. Not until it had been processed for fingerprints. He kept staring at the bag, not even blinking when the door opened.

  The father and mother stood together behind him. The father was wearing casual clothes that looked expensive. The mother, too. I didn’t get a good look at her at first, because she stood with her face against her husband’s chest. He stroked her hair, and otherwise had the same faraway look as his son-in-law.

  A young man sat in the corner, by himself. More nice clothes, another blank stare. He was working his hands together, like he was getting ready to hit somebody.

  That left Detective Bateman. He was sitting at the far end of the table, writing in a notebook. He looked up as the door opened.

  “Officer McKnight,” he said. “Thank you. I’d like you to meet Tanner Paige, Elana’s husband. These are her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Grayson. And her brother, Ryan.”

  The husband and the father looked at me. The mother kept her face hidden. The brother kept working at his hands and ignoring everything else in the world.

  “You saw him,” the husband said to me. “The man who did this.”

  I looked at Detective Bateman. He gave me a slight nod.

  “I saw the man who we believe is the suspect,” I said. “We’re going to do everything we can to find him.”

  The husband wanted to say more, but he seemed to be struggling to find the right words. I was waiting for him to lash out at me. To ask me why I hadn’t caught him.

  “Can you tell me…” he finally said. “I mean, why would anyone do something like this? For a diamond bracelet?”

  “I don’t know, sir. I’m sorry.”

  “I told her not to wear this down here. It was just asking for trouble.”

  I noticed the brother glancing up for one moment. He stared at the husband, then closed his eyes and went back to working his hands together.

  “You need to find him tonight,” the father said, still stroking his wife’s hair. “He could be a thousand miles away by the morning.”

  “Yes, sir. Like I said, we’re gonna do everything we can.”

  “It’s something we don’t usually have,” Bateman said. “A police officer who’ll be able to give us a positive ID. When we catch him, and we will catch him … it’ll be an airtight case.”

  “Like that will do any good,” the brother said, finally speaking up. “Some gangbanger goes away for life. Is that going to bring her back?”

  His mother looked at him, taking her face away from her husband’s chest. Her face was ruined with tears, and there was a great stain on her husband’s shirt.

  “Ryan, please,” his father said. “Of course it won’t bring her back. But at least…”

  “At least what?”

  “He has to pay. Whoever did this. I’ll spend the rest of my life making sure he pays for this.”

  The brother waved this away, getting to his feet and starting to pace up and down his side of the room like a caged animal. I watched him, waiting for him to punch the wall. Or something. I wouldn’t have blamed him for anything at that point. I honestly could not even imagine going through what these people had to go through that night.

  “This isn’t happening,” the husband said. He was still staring at the bracelet in the plastic bag. “I’m going to wake up and she’ll be right there next to me.”

  “It’s happening,” the brother said. “It’s happening because you can’t even walk down the street in this city anymore. Why the hell would you even let her take a class at Wayne State, for God’s sake? Some ghetto school in the middle of the worst city in the world.”

  The husband was looking at him now. In about two more seconds, the brother would launch himself over the table and we’d have a full-blown melee on our hands.

  “This is not helpful,” Bateman said. He stood up and put himself in the brother’s way. He grabbed both of the young man’s shoulders and looked him in the eyes.

  “Let go of me.”

  “You need to calm down. You need to respect everyone else in this room. And you need to let us try to solve this horrible crime.”

  The brother seemed to run out of steam then. He dropped his head and brought one hand to his face. He started to cry.

  Bateman hugged him. It was not something you were supposed to do in a case like this, but as soon as he did I could see it was the right play. The brother cried for a while, and then he stopped. He sat back down in the chair.

  “Officer McKnight,” Bateman said to me, “I know you have work to do. I’m glad you got the chance to meet the family. The next time you see them, I hope it’ll be when we tell them we’ve made an arrest.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” I said to everyone else in the room. One of those standard lines you say, but I couldn’t think of anything else.

  Then I went back to the mug shots.

  *

  Franklin left for home eventually. I thanked him for everything he’d done that day.

  “Just doing my job,” he said.

  I kept looking through the mug shots. Detective Bateman came in a while later. His tie was loose. His eyes were red. It was the first time I’d ever seen him looking like something less than a human dynamo.

  “I take it you don’t have an ID yet,” he said to me. He sat down in the chair Franklin had just vacated.

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “Then we need to get the sketch artist in here. Get this down on paper while it’s still fresh in your mind.”

  “I can’t believe this guy hasn’t been in the system before,” I said, flipping through more pages. “He gave me a pretty stone-cold look on the other side of that fence. Like he was about to laugh in my face.”

  “Jeans and a gray shirt. Nothing on the shirt? No logos or anything?”

  “No. Plain gray. He did have an Oakland Raiders hat on.”

  Bateman nodded. “That’s how you do it if you’re street smart. No markings, no weird hair. A hat you can throw away in a second. Just blend right in.”

  “Are you telling me he’s so smart we’ve never had him in the system before?”

  “That would be just our luck,” he said, rubbing his eyes.

  “Why cut her up so bad?” I said, the scene at the station coming back to me, whether I wanted it to or not. I knew it would be there in my head forever.

  “What do you mean? He wanted her dead.”

  “This is way beyond wanting someone dead. This guy destroyed her.”

  He thought about that one. “We’ll never know why he did that. Not until we catch him. Even then…”

  “Any idea why Elana Paige was at the train station in the first place? That’s a long way from the college.”

  “Her car was in the parking lot. The crime scene guys found a camera bag about ten feet from the body. Nice camera inside, but it was damaged when it hit the floor.”

  “Why leave the nice camera if you’re already stealing her jewelry?”

  “Too hard to carry, I guess. Or too obvious if you’re trying to blend into the crowd.”

  “So she was a photographer, you’re saying.”

  “Well, she was taking a photography course at Wayne State, at least. Maybe she figured she could get some great shots at the old train station.”

  “I though you handled things well with the family,” I said. “The brother was about to go off.”

  “You realize,” he said, “that you belong to me now. Until we catch this guy. I’ll clear it with your sergeant.”

  “Anything I can do. Of course.”

  He nodded. “I’ll let you keep looking. Let me know if you get a hit. I’m not going anywhere.”

 
; Neither was I. Another hour passed. Maybe two. It was hard to tell at that point. I had gone through all of the mug shot books. I hadn’t found my man. They got the sketch artist in, and we worked out a sketch. Problem was, although I could still picture him exactly in my mind, the sketch came out looking like a young black man with high cheekbones and a short afro. In other words, like half the male population in the city.

  We tried refining it, but in the end we had to send out what we had. Five foot ten, 170 pounds, muscular build. Jeans, gray shirt with a torn right sleeve, basketball shoes. Last seen fleeing north on Trumbull Avenue. We sent it to every precinct in the city, and to every neighboring suburb. We sent it to the Michigan State Police. We sent it to the FBI.

  Elana Paige had now been dead for six hours.

  *

  It was going on eleven o’clock when I finally left the station. I had processed an official statement, describing everything I had seen and done. I had tried to eat some dinner. I had gone back over the mug shot books. Detective Bateman told me to go home, to get some rest, and to be back at the station early the next morning. We’d see if we picked up any hits on the bulletin overnight and then go from there.

  “We’ll start working the neighborhoods,” he said. “Somebody saw this kid. I promise you that.”

  “I hate the fact that he’ll sleep in his own bed tonight.”

  “Let him sleep. Let him believe he got away. If he does, he won’t leave town. Or he won’t hide. Either way, we’ll get him.”

  I said good night to the detective, and to all of the four-to-midnight-shifters I saw on the way out. They were almost done with their day. Mine had lasted fifteen hours.

  I got in my car. I had an eight-year-old Chevy Celebrity back then. About all I could afford on a Detroit cop’s salary, with a wife who had quit her job to go back to school. I started driving down Woodward, to hit that freeway that would loop me back through the city and then west to Redford, but then I blew right by the on-ramp and cut over to Corktown. I drove by the stadium one more time. A dark gray monolith now. I drove up Trumbull, daring my man to be outside walking around in the night air, confident that he’d gotten away with his crime today. I slowed down whenever I saw someone. Usually two or three of them at a time, smoking cigarettes, drinking beer, staring back at me in my civilian car. I didn’t see the man I was looking for.