Killing Red (6 page)

As far as Chapa was concerned, using the word
beater
to describe his car, as Dominic Delacruz had, was a little unfair. The late 90’s Corolla wasn’t rusting out yet, and it ran just fine. In fact, the car had not begun to show its age until some punks in Aurora got pissed off about a story he did on the video game culture and broke the driver’s side mirror. He found it dangling by the cables, and duct taped it back into place as best he could. More than a year had passed since then, and the money from the insurance claim was long gone, spent on things other than the mirror. But he’d get it taken care of one of these days.

Having received little in the way of useful information from Dominic Delacruz, Chapa was tempted to go work on something else, or maybe call up a buddy and see if they could get together for lunch. His common sense was telling him to get away from this story and all of the baggage that came with it. One call and it would become the feds’ problem.

But his instincts were telling him something else, and he couldn’t shake the memory of that craven smile on Grubb’s face, or how sure of himself the killer had seemed. So instead of ringing up a friend or going into the office to grab another story, Chapa turned north on Route 59 and headed toward West Chicago. Though it had been more than a decade, he still remembered the Sykes’ street address.

That area had grown up over the past several years as farmland gave way to subdivisions and strip malls. It was hard to imagine, but Grubb might’ve had something to do with the growth.

He’d been born Kenneth Lee Dresder in a rural Kentucky town to a mother who could never be entirely certain about the identity of the boy’s father, and the man she’d coaxed into marriage four months earlier. At age sixteen he ran away for the third time, winding up in a dusty corner of Arkansas. He drifted back home a little over a year later. By then, the man he’d long hated calling “Dad” was dead. His mother had taken back her maiden name, and also changed his younger brother’s to match. So Kenny asked his mom to take him to court and change his last name as well. It was his way of shaking free from the man who had brought him nothing but violence and pain. The change made him feel like a new person, at least for a little while.

When he was in his midtwenties, Grubb got his realtor’s license at the urging of his mother after she saw a commercial about it while watching her stories. A few months later, the realtor who was handling the development of several new subdivisions in DuPage County took a chance on him.

By all accounts, Grubb was the kind of realtor who could sell a new house to a man in hospice care, and he experienced a great deal of success in his new profession. But what Grubb really liked about the job was how people would let him walk through their homes, sometimes unattended. When the police searched his house after arresting Grubb they found a large plastic bin of children’s clothing and small toys. There were photos, too, each with his nickname for the child written in marker on the back.

He lost his job after one client too many complained about the amount of attention Grubb paid to their child. At first, he figured that he would hook on with another realtor, but that didn’t happen after word quickly spread throughout the industry. Grubb tried to make a go of it as an independent, but all of the established realtors made that tough to do. The only steady job he could get was delivering baked goods to various businesses in the area.

That job also came with its own set of what Grubb considered perks, in the form of three elementary schools and one junior high on his route. He collected candid snapshots of many of the kids at the schools. When police found the photos they assumed that Grubb was stalking those children and had plans for several of them at the time of his capture. The pictures themselves were not lurid, but the fact that he had them at all, tucked neatly into a photo album, was enough to keep any parent up at night.

Annie Sykes was a student at one of those schools, but hers was a crime of opportunity. Driving down some of the same streets that Grubb once cruised as a predator, Chapa thought of how many easy opportunities a creature like that must have had.

As Chapa turned north off busy Roosevelt Road, he was surprised to see colored lights flashing in his side-view mirror. A tap of the patrol car’s siren punctuated the moment.

“What the hell?”

It had been some time since Chapa had been pulled over. Then again, he hadn’t been in this area for a few months. Chapa’s tense relationship with the local police dated back to his coverage of the Grubb case, and had just grown worse over time. He watched the cop get out of the cruiser, and shook his head when he recognized him.

Chapa rolled the window down.

“License and registration, Mr. Chapa.”

“What’s the matter, Tate, you get all worn out from not catching the bangers who pulled off that carjacking a couple weeks back?”

“Don’t need a conversation.”

“Then why are we having one at all?”

Streaks of gray were shuffled in with the cop’s naturally auburn hair. They weren’t there the first time Chapa had tangled with him. Or the second. Neither was the solid beer gut that was beginning to encroach on Tate’s waistline.

“Maybe I’m cleaning up the streets of my town by dealing with a low-rent, shithole, waste-of-space journalist like yourself.”

“See, that’s probably why we never got along. You don’t understand that part of my job is to protect the rest of us from abuse by anyone in a position of power.” Chapa leaned out the window and lowered his voice, like he was about to share something special with the officer. “Actually, Dan, it’s the part of my job I like best.”

Tate shrugged.

“So why was I pulled over? Think fast.”

Tate pointed to the duct taped side-view mirror. “You have a broken piece of safety equipment, and if it should fall off it could present a hazard to other motorists. Now, I’m not asking you again.”

Chapa turned over his license and proof of ownership, and Tate walked back to his squad car. He returned ten minutes later with a pink slip of paper in his hand.

“You understand I could let you off with a warning, but this time I just went ahead and wrote you a ticket. Sign here.”

Chapa scribbled something approximating a signature, then Tate tossed a pink slip of paper into Chapa’s car.

“Not that it matters, officer, but that mirror isn’t going to fall off anytime soon.”

Without taking his eyes off Chapa, Tate raised his left arm, his hand forming a fist, like he was going to punch himself. Then Tate slammed his left elbow down on the mirror. The duct tape put up little resistance. A piece of Chapa’s car was now dangling by a cable, and his ability to mask his anger was quickly waning.

“Like I said, you gotta get that thing fixed.”

Chapa knew the smart move was to say nothing and just drive away. Go to the first place he found and have a new mirror installed. Quiet. Uneventful. Smart. He knew that was the thing to do, even gave it a moment’s consideration.

And instead, he went with, “Is that what the doctor said to your mother on the day you were born?”

Tate’s forehead turned nearly as red as the hairs that lined it. He took a step back and unsnapped his holster.

“Step out of the vehicle, now!”

Chapa undid his seat belt, pausing a moment to show Tate that it had been buckled, then slowly got out of his car. As soon as he emerged from the vehicle, Tate rushed him, and in one well-trained move spun Chapa around and pressed his chest against the side of the Corolla. Before Chapa could make a sound, Tate grabbed the reporter’s left arm and yanked it up until his wrist was just below his shoulder blades.

Pain raced across Chapa’s back, shoulders, and up into his neck. Even more when Tate let his considerable weight push in against him. But except for an involuntary grunt, there was no way he was going to let Tate know how much this hurt.

“When I saw your shitty little car, I thought, oh happy day.”

“Didn’t know you cared so much, Dan,” Chapa said through teeth that were grinding with every breath.

Tate pressed even harder, jamming Chapa’s left shoulder into the metal frame of the rear driver’s side window.

“That’s
Officer Tate
, asshole.”

His breath smelled like Doritos. That, combined with the pain, was starting to have an effect on Chapa’s stomach.

“Maybe it’s just me, but whenever I’m screwing someone I insist they call me by my first name, Dan.”

Tate let up a little, but the relief was only temporary. Chapa knew things were about to get worse when he heard the clanging of handcuffs.

“This is going to be fun,” Tate said, and abruptly yanked Chapa’s left arm down, then moved in with the cuffs.

But the sound of a woman’s voice coming through the speaker-mic attached to Tate’s shoulder ruined the officer’s mood.

“We’ve got a four-car collision at the intersection of Sunset and Grand, please respond, Officer Tate.”

Tate grunted, then pressed a button on the small device.

“Janet, this is Dan, have we got anyone else who can get to the scene?”

“Sorry, Dan, but it’s bad. How soon can you be there?”

Tate sighed.

“I’m on my way.”

With that, he pulled the cuffs away, gave Chapa one last shove, then tossed his registration on the ground, but pocketed his license. Chapa didn’t take the bait, didn’t squat just inches from Tate’s knee, didn’t even look down.

“Sooner or later. It could be city, county, or state, but one of us is gonna make it very bad for you.”

As the cop returned to his cruiser, Chapa tried to casually shake the sting out of his shoulder. He leaned his aches against the battered Corolla as Tate sped by. Once the squad car was out of sight, Chapa picked his registration up off the street and tucked it in his wallet, then did what he could to put the mirror back into place.

Chapa was cold and numb except for the throbbing in his back. Defiance had become natural to him in situations like this, but he paid a price for it. His hand was trembling just a little, which pissed him off most of all.

Before pulling out into traffic, Chapa reached down and snatched the ticket up off the floor, then tossed it in his glove compartment with a dozen or so others of different colors and sizes. Chapa would have a close friend in the Chicago branch of the FBI make a phone call in the next couple of days and the whole thing would go away. Until the next time. His license would arrive in the mail within a week.

Turning left onto Annie’s street, Chapa was struck by how little it had changed. The area appeared much as it had more than a decade and a half before, as though the people there were waiting for something to happen before they could move.

The Sykes lived near the end of a long block of upper middle-class homes. Chapa recognized the white house with the stone front and blue window boxes that once cradled flowers. The paint on the windows was all but chipped away, and moisture had crept in and started to warp the frames. A late model Taurus sat in the driveway, making it a safe bet someone was home.

Chapa parked along the curb, kicking up a swirl of dead leaves. Sensing that an October wind was stopping by for a midday visit, he grabbed his brown leather coat, then stepped out of his car and into the past.

“I’ve seen you before.”

She looked like she had seen too much and remembered more than anyone would want to.

Chapa was doing his best to connect the woman behind the dented screen to the one that he had met years before. He remembered Michelle Sykes being attractive, but found it hard to imagine how the person at the door could have ever turned a head.

“We met many years ago, I’m Alex Chapa.”

Her facial expression changed, first to recognition, then to something less than approval.

“My daughter left a long time ago. What do you want?”

He put on his most reassuring reporter’s face.

“Just to catch up a little. I was doing a story on Grubb and got to wondering if you folks were okay, and how Annie was doing.”

He followed that up with an empathetic smile and hoped it would do the trick. She hesitated for a moment, studying the reporter’s face, then relented.

“Come on in, but please wipe your feet.”

Chapa sat down on a couch that was almost as worn as the carpeting. The faded photos on the wall, old furniture, and even older television and stereo made him feel like he was sitting in a time capsule. She offered him something to drink and retreated to the kitchen to get it, then returned a moment later with a cup of coffee.

“Annie is not here, if that’s why you came by.”

“When did she move out?”

“The last time we saw her was a little over a year ago. Only heard from her once since then. She called last Mother’s Day.”

Chapa took a sip of the lifeless coffee, set the cup down, and pulled out a small spiral as though it were nothing at all.

“Where does Annie live now?”

“Don’t know, probably somewhere in Chicago. Her name isn’t Annie anymore, it’s Angela.”

“She changed it?”

“I don’t know if it’s legal, you know through the courts, but that’s what she wants to be called.”

Chapa wrote down
Angela Sykes, Chicago
.

“Does she have a job? Is she going to school? Is she dating anyone?”

Michelle Sykes shrugged, then slumped down a little and Chapa thought if the woman remained still long enough she might fade into the wallpaper.

“She draws really well, and she mentioned something about working as an artist.”

“Do you know who her friends are?”

“She’s talked about a friend, but I don’t think it’s a romantic thing, other than that I have no idea, wish I knew. She and her brother Tyler, he’s gone away too. They’re my only children. I lost the baby I was carrying, not long after Annie was taken.”

“I never knew that.”

“Why would you? I never showed much, didn’t get the chance to, and it wasn’t something the press needed to know about.”

Chapa tucked the notebook back into his coat pocket.

“And how is your husband doing?”

She started to drift away, but then reached across the timeworn coffee table and picked up Chapa’s cup.

“I’ll refill this, you look like you could use a little more.”

He wasn’t going to point out that it was only a couple of polite sips away from full. She walked to the kitchen, but stopped in the doorway.

“My husband is doing fine. Thank you for asking.”

Chapa watched her drift into the kitchen. He stood up from the sagging couch, which wasn’t easy, and wandered over to a row of photos along a far wall. Several had yellowed, all were at least a decade old. Either that, or Michelle Sykes had aged faster than most presidents do while in office.

Annie was in almost every photo. Birthday and Christmas settings breathed life into scenes of parties and family gatherings that appeared to be among the oldest on the wall. Miscellaneous relatives, who resembled one parent or the other, leaned in and smiled. It was all there on the wall, captured inside plastic frames.

Chapa focused on a row of Annie’s high school pictures. She’d grown up in a hurry, though there was always a hint of the little girl. Tyler got the same treatment, and Chapa detected a certain consistency to the photos. It didn’t matter if Annie was smiling or not, she always had a faraway look. Tyler, on the other hand, usually appeared angry, or frustrated, or like he wanted to be anywhere else.

Through a narrow opening in the kitchen door, Chapa caught a glimpse of Michelle standing at the sink, staring out a window. He considered walking over to her, or asking if everything was okay, then thought better of it.

He remembered his first visit here when the wallpaper was new and the paint on the trim was fresh. The house was full of energy then. The Sykes were not just willing, but anxious to get their story out, and Chapa obliged. Maybe he should have warned them back then that trying to clear Roger’s name and assign blame to the police could bring even more unwanted attention. But Chapa had sensed there was more to it. That perhaps Roger Sykes had a mass of guilt he couldn’t get free of. Now he wondered if Roger had been the only parent knotted up by dark feelings they could not shake.

Chapa spotted a stack of papers that had been carefully placed on a small side table. Sliding the first one off the top, he saw that they were all the same. Christmas letters, the kind families send each other in hope of giving some meaning to the year that has come and gone.

Glancing over to the kitchen again, and seeing that Michelle had not moved, he picked up one of the letters.

“Our Christmas message, I try to put on a good face, no one wants to hear about your problems.”

Chapa had not heard her come back into the room and felt a bit guilty about reading the letter.

“It’s sad how the number of letters I need to send out seems to shrink each year,” she said, handing him the refilled cup of coffee.

He pointed to the bottom of the paper and what appeared to be a crude family crest with a fancy “S” in the middle.

“Tyler drew that a long time ago, before he got so angry about everything.”

Chapa returned the page to the top of the small stack.

“And the part about Annie?”

“I didn’t want to tell everyone that I don’t know where she is or what she does with herself. They would just think we’ve done a terrible job as parents.”

“What about your husband? Did he get hurt, or sick?”

She shook her head.

“There’s nothing physically wrong with him. He’s one of the fittest men I’ve ever known.” She motioned for Chapa to sit down and he chose a rocker over taking another chance with the couch.

“I think he kept hoping it would all get back to how it was before. It never worked out that way.”

“What do you remember about the night Annie disappeared?”

“More than you would want to know.”

She looked into his eyes with a long gaze that Chapa knew he could not penetrate. Sensing his time there was through, he took one last, long sip of coffee, mostly to be polite. He gave her his card and the standard, “Give me a call if there’s anything else that you can tell me,” though he knew he’d never hear from the woman.

He thanked her, and said goodbye as they walked out onto the front porch. But she suddenly grabbed his arm, then recoiled a little, as though physical contact had become alien to her.

“I never blamed my husband, even though everyone else did.”

“I’m sure you didn’t, why would you have?” Instinctively, Chapa reached into his coat pocket and wrapped his hand around his recorder. “Would you like to talk a little more about that?”

She shook her head, and Chapa responded with a nod, then reached up and squeezed her shoulder in a way he hoped would be reassuring. He was halfway to his car when he heard the screen door open behind him.

“I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but please don’t come back.”

Chapa didn’t turn to look at her, and didn’t take it any way at all.