I nod. That’s something, but it’s not the same as figuring out who actually did it.
“Justice lied about cremating the body,” she says. “What else did he lie about?”
“Maybe everything.”
“He and the cops and the prosecutors have lots of ‘’splainin’ to do,” she says.
195
What happens next happens fast.
Anna and I walk back home.
I call Reggie and explain to her what we have.
“Son of a bitch, John,” she says. “I mean fuck.”
“I know.”
“Good work, though,” she says. “I mean it. That’s what matters most. The truth. Justice. Protecting the innocent. Finding the guilty—speaking of, do you know who actually killed her?”
“Not yet.”
“Okay. I’ll deal with Bay County. I’m sure they’ll have questions. I’ll need you to meet with them. Will let you know.”
“Thanks.”
“No, thank you. I mean it. Outstanding work. The little jurisdictional headaches and the embarrassment to Bay County is nothing compared to finding her body and bringing her home to her family. Nothing. I’ll be in touch.”
I call Merrill next and tell him.
“How long ‘’for this all blow up in the media?” he asks.
“A few days at most.”
“So we need to keep watchin’ Justice ’til then.”
“Yeah. You need help?”
“Got a couple of guys helping me,” he says. “He ain’t changed his routine or done anything suspicious.”
“When we meet with Bay County I’ll let them know where he is. I’m sure they’ll want to talk to him.”
“’Cause that shit went so well last time.”
I laugh.
“You gonna be cool with just turnin’ this back over to them?”
“Don’t have a choice,” I say. “Unless . . .”
“’Less what?”
“We turn up something else or figure something else out before they reopen the investigation.”
“I’a see what I can do.”
I call Ida next.
“Thank you, boy,” she says. “You can’t know what that means to me. And to her poor parents. Do they know yet?”
“I’m about to go tell them now.”
“Bless you, boy. Bless you for what you’ve done. I’ll see you in a few days. Gonna hug your neck so hard, squeeze the breath out of you.”
After kissing Anna and Taylor goodbye, I head to Panama City to talk to Buck and Kay Diaz.
On the way I call Kathryn.
When I tell her she bursts into tears and for several miles I just listen as she cries and is unable to speak.
“Sorry,” she says, eventually.
“Don’t be.”
“I’m just . . . I’ve waited so long for this. Qwon has been inside for eighteen years. No one would help. No one would even take us seriously. I’m just . . . overwhelmed. Does he know yet? Does Ida?”
“Ida does. He doesn’t. I’ll tell him later this afternoon when I go to the prison. Right now I’m on the way to tell Angel’s parents.”
“If I can get him on the phone, would you mind if I tell him?” she says.
“Not at all. I had planned to have him come to my office and I was going to call you so you could. But go ahead and tell him if you can. If not, let me know and I’ll have him call you this evening when I get there.”
“Thank you, John. Thank you for everything.”
196
I meet with Buck and Kay Diaz in their small home on Jenks Avenue not far from downtown—the same house they had raised Angel in.
Like the childless parents who dwell inside it, the house is shrouded in sadness, its muted colors and general state of neglect signs of grief, evidence of mourning.
Buck meets me at the door and welcomes me in.
Kay serves us coffee in the small living room where a plethora of framed photos of Angel are displayed.
The photographs show an only child growing up in nothing less than complete and utter adoration. Sadly, even the most recent of the pictures are aged and dated and beginning to fade, the image they hold that of a teenager on the verge of adulthood who will never grow any older, who will never be photographed again, who will never be pictured graduating or with friends or her spouse on their wedding day or her children on Christmas morning or grandchildren at an Easter egg hunt.
Like the girl in the photographs, the house itself seems trapped in time, and I wondered if anything has been changed since the night Angel never came home.
Or did she? Amber and Kathryn saw her car here on their way home that night. What does that mean—especially in the light of what we know now? Did something happen here? Is this where she was killed? Had one or both of her parents done it and covered it up?
Buck sits in an old, worn recliner, his wife on the couch. Unlike the first time I met with them, there seems to be distance, even coldness between them.
In the corner, which holds what can only be described as a shrine to Angel—with pictures, candles, and other mementos—sits a chair that must have been hers, given the way they both directed me away from it.
“Is this another interview,” Buck says, “or do you have news?”
“Just let him say what he wants to,” Kay says.
“I have news,” I say. “It may be of some comfort to you but it will also be difficult to hear. You need to take a moment to prepare yourself to hear it.”
In unison, they set their coffee cups down, sit back in their seats, and take in a deep breath.
Across from them in a small, uncomfortable chair, I too put my coffee cup down.
“We’re waiting for positive scientific confirmation,” I say, “but we believe we’ve found what really happened to Angel’s body after her death.”
Kay breaks down.
“You believe?” Buck says. “What does that—”
“I wouldn’t be here if we weren’t fairly certain,” I say. “But we have to wait for confirmation before we can be absolutely certain. I just didn’t want you to hear it another way.”
Buck’s dark hair seems thinner and grayer now, as if grief is actually leeching life out of him, and after what I’ve just said, his dark, orangish complexion has drained to a clammy pasty pale.
I look over at Kay. Her pale skin is even paler, if possible, and her green eyes, wet with tears, have taken on the hue of the Gulf after a storm.
Instead of late fifties and mid sixties, both Kay and Buck appear to be in their late seventies.
“What happened to her?” Kay asks.
I tell them what we know.
“So she—her body wasn’t cremated?” Buck says.
Ironically it had been eventually, following Jacksonville’s inability to identify her and in the absence of any family claiming her.
“Not by Justice,” I say. “Not like he said.”
“That lying piece of shit,” Buck says. “He—his lies kept us from our little girl’s remains all these years. I’m gonna kill that nigger bastard. I swear to Christ I am.”
“Shut up, Buck,” Kay says. “You’re gonna do no such thing.”
He jerks his head over at her and their eyes lock. Neither of them say anything, but what passes between them is palpable.
Eventually Kay looks back at me. “Do you know who killed my baby girl?”
I shake my head. “Not yet. But we’re certainly getting closer and this is a big step in that direction. Looks even more like Qwon had nothing to do with it now.”
She nods slowly, wipes tears from her cheeks and the corners of her eyes.
“I’m so sorry,” I say. “I’m sorry this happened to Angel. I’m sorry you’ve had to live with all the unknowns and unanswered questions all these years. I’m sorry you had to hear this today.”
“How did she die?” Buck asks.
I hesitate a moment.
“Please,” Kay says.
�
��She was strangled,” I say. “But it looks like she was hit on the head first. She was probably unconscious after that so didn’t feel any . . . thing . . . or know what was happening.”
“Probably?” Buck says. “Probably?”
“Buck, stop,” Kay says.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
“You’re sorry,” Buck says. “Everybody’s sorry. So damn sorry. When can we get her remains? When can we bury our baby?”
I swallow hard and wish I was somewhere else, anywhere else in the world, at this moment.
“I’m sorry,” I say again, “but after six months . . . the city of Jacksonville . . . cremated her remains and . . . scattered her ashes in the Atlantic Ocean.”
Kay begins to sob. Buck jumps up and starts breaking things, beginning with his own hand, but continuing with the TV, a bookshelf, and several glasses and dishes in the kitchen. What he doesn’t break, or even come close to, however, even as out of control as he seems, is any of the pictures or mementos of Angel.
While Buck is wreaking havoc in his own house, Kay never looks up, never does anything but wail into her hands—the hands that had held and hugged and cleaned and comforted and fed her little girl. The little girl who is gone now. Utterly and completely and irrevocably gone. Ashes in the Atlantic. Out to sea. Never to return, not at any time, not with any tide.
197
The next day Merrill, Anna, Kathryn, and I meet with an investigator with the Bay County Sheriff’s department.
We give him everything we have. Everything. Hold back nothing. And in doing so I turn the case over to him, return it to the agency that investigated it the first time, giving them an opportunity at a certain kind of redemption.
The day after that Angel’s identity is confirmed by dental records.
Two days later the Bay County Sheriff and the state’s attorney hold a joint press conference.
Neither man was in the position he now holds when Angel’s investigation and Qwon’s trial took place, which makes what they do now all the more palatable for them. So does having scapegoats.
Both men apologize on behalf of their agencies and call out those to blame by name—a disgraced investigator who had long since been fired and the former state’s attorney who had been a bitter political rival of the current one.
“We are officially reopening the Angel Diaz murder case,” the sheriff says.
“And,” the state’s attorney adds, “dismissing the charges against and releasing Acqwon Lewis. I’ve filed a motion with the court and Mr. Lewis’s release is imminent. There’s also going to be an investigation into those involved in the case—specifically the investigator and prosecutor. We will get to the bottom of how such a grievous miscarriage of justice took place.”
The sheriff then finds the camera and looks directly into it. “And to the person or persons responsible for Angel Diaz’s death, know this—you may have gotten away with it until now, but your days are numbered. There’s a net and it’s closing in on you. Soon you will be in custody. You will pay for what you did. We will not rest until you are behind bars for good.”
As I’m watching the press conference in my office at the prison, my phone rings.
“Nice work on finding the body,” Randa says. “Using the mileage on the car like that . . . pretty impressive.”
I don’t say anything.
We have searched our home and vehicles for bugs and haven’t found any, so I assume she’s getting the information she has by hacking into computers and phones, but she consistently seems to know more than what she would learn just by hacking our devices.
“Couldn’t help but notice nobody mentioned your name at the press conference,” she says.
“Didn’t mention Anna or Merrill of Kathryn or you either,” I say. “No one thought they would.”
“Fine by me if they never mention my name,” she says.
“Feel the same way.”
“How’d you find Justice and the information about his arrest?” she asks.
“I didn’t. Merrill did.”
“Exactly,” she says. “Without that you don’t get to the car and the body, so . . . I’m afraid I’m gonna have to call off our little bet. You’re not doing all the work by yourself like I am. You’ve got a team.”
“You’re welcome to join it,” I say. “Let’s meet up and discuss it.”
“Always tryin’ to get with me,” she says. “Does Anna know about this?”
“Yeah, she’s all for it.”
She laughs. “I bet she is.”
I don’t respond.
“How’s your ego feeling, John?”
“Why do you ask, Randa?”
“Would you be able to handle it if I beat you twice in a row and once and for all?”
“Thought you just called off our little bet?” I say.
“We both know you never really agreed to that. That was just me having a bit of fun. You know . . . got to find it where you can. Anyway, so here’s the deal, if I solve the case right now you never look for me or Daniel again.”
“You can solve it right now?” I ask.
“Told you I’m a lot better at this than you.”
“Does Daniel want to stay with you?” I ask.
“Would I be able to keep him here if he didn’t?”
“At this point I believe you can do about anything.”
“That’s so sweet, John. Really is. Means a lot coming from someone like you.”
“If and only if Daniel himself tells me he wants to be with you—and convinces me that he really means it—and you really and truly solve the case . . . you have a deal.”
“I have your word?” she says.
“You have my word.”
“Then I’ll tell you what I’m going to do,” she says. “I’ll go ahead and solve the case for you now—and let you go ahead and save Qwon and make the arrest and all. Then a little later, after you’ve done all that, I’ll let Daniel give you a call and y’all can have a little chat.”
“Does Qwon need saving?” I ask.
“Yeah, I’m afraid so. So here it is. The cops were right about the ex. They just arrested the wrong one. It wasn’t Angel’s ex. It was Qwon’s. Zelda Sager was there that night. She may have even made out with Qwon and tried to rekindle things with him, though from what I hear he was so messed up . . . he probably didn’t know who he was making out with or what he was doing.”
I recall Qwon’s dream or fragments of memories that he had made out with an ex-girlfriend that night.
“She killed Angel,” she says. “To get Qwon back or because she’s just nuts. I don’t know. But . . . there you go.”
“That’s not evidence,” I say, “just accusation.”
“Maybe, but it’s still true.”
“Unless you’ve got more than that,” I say, “I wouldn’t call it solving the case.”
“Well, either I’m right or I’m not, but there’s another little piece of the puzzle you should know. Zelda’s husband is Troy Payne. And he’s a sergeant at your prison, isn’t he?”
I jump up.
“John?” she says, as I drop the phone. “John? You there?”
198
Jogging down the compound toward Confinement I’m acutely aware of how new I am to this institution.
I can’t call Merrill or Anna like I once could at Potter Correctional, and though I’ve made some friends and earned some respect here at Gulf CI, I’m not sure who I would call even if there was time to do it.
As I near confinement, a young African-American CO I don’t recognize falls in beside me, matching my pace, and says, “Everything okay, Chaplain?”
“Need to check on an inmate in Confinement,” I say. “You got a minute to help?”
“Sure,” he says.
“May involve stopping a sergeant who’s abusing him,” I say. “That gonna be a problem for you?”
“Who’s the sergeant?”
“Payne,” I say.
“Hell, nah,” he sa
ys. “That fuc—He’s a . . . No, sir. Won’t be a problem.”
We’re buzzed through the gate of the fence that surrounds the confinement building by the officer in Tower II, then through the door of confinement itself by an officer in the control room.
Through the glass of the officers’ station I can see that Payne isn’t inside it—just an overweight mid-thirties white guy slumped down in a small office chair.
I run over to it and speak to the officer inside through the document tray.
He rolls in his chair over to where we’re standing. Slowly. Apathetically.
“Is Sergeant Payne on duty?” I ask.
He nods.
“Where is he?”
He shrugs. “On one of the wings somewhere, I guess. Really don’t know.”
“Which cell is Acqwon Lewis in?” I ask.
He slowly lifts a clipboard and looks at it. “B-11”
“Can you buzz us through?”
“Sign in,” he says.
As I sign in, he looks at the young officer with me and says, “What can I help you with?”
“I’m here with the chaplain.”
“Huh? I can let the chaplain in. I can’t just let other random COs in.”
“Really?”
“Not without some kind of authorization. Ain’t about to lose this cushy job over not following procedure.”
I turn to the young officer. “What’s your name?”
“Jay Nobles, sir.”
“Go get the OIC or the Colonel, Jay, and bring them back down here,” I say. “Fast as you can.”
“Yes, sir.”
The officer in the control room buzzes me onto B block and Jay Nobles out the front door.
I run down toward Qwon’s cell.
The hallway is darker and quieter than usual.
As I near it, I see that Qwon’s cell door is open.
Inside I find Troy Payne beating a cuffed Qwon with a thick wooden officer’s baton.
Qwon is on the floor trying his best to gather himself in a fetal position and protect his head, even though his hands are cuffed behind him.
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