Hollow's Eve

by Hannibal Adofo

  Riley nodded, his eyes on Vincent. If it weren’t for Vincent, Riley could be making stupid, even dangerous decisions.

  “Okay,” he said, patting Vincent on the arm. “I’ll let you take the lead on this one. I’ll go around to the mayor’s house and inform her of what’s going on.”

  And with that, Riley walked back to his cruiser.

  Vincent shook his head. “Unbelievable…”

  Seconds later, Detective Brandt approached Vincent. “They’re ready to take pictures.”

  “Good. Tell them to start with the lower part of Travis’ torso, where the note is sticking out, so we can retrieve it. I want to see what that thing says ASAP.”

  5

  Once forensics was done taking pictures and collecting evidence, except for the note Vincent found in Travis pocket, the coroner arrived, made their way into the park and began preparing to remove Ethan Travis body.

  Vincent opened the note and began to read it

  “What’s it say?” Brandt asked, as her and Vincent slipped on a pair of latex gloves and moved toward the headlamps near a cruiser to read the note. It was a small slip of paper, ripped off from a pad, with a message in pen scrawled along the front:

  ONE. TWO. SOMEONE’S COMING FOR YOU!

  Brandt squinted. “I don’t get it. What does it mean?”

  Vincent thought about it as he reread the note several times over, scrutinizing the pressure points of the penmanship, the style of the writing, and even the exclamation point on the end.

  “Not sure,” he said. “But we need to get this thing dusted for a print.”

  “Do we have that stuff on hand?” Brandt asked.

  “We do now,” Vincent said, remembering the new equipment, policies, and procedures that he had implemented during his short tenure as chief, after the last string of murders in Hollow Green.

  But that was a different story altogether.

  Minutes later Smith and Brackett approached Vincent. “Park is clear,” Brackett said. “We did a few rounds. Swept the area three times. Can’t find anything out of place.”

  “Okay,” Vincent said. “Do it one more time. I want to be thorough.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  They moved away.

  Vincent grabbed Brackett by the arm. “Hey,” he said. “You all right?”

  Brackett nodded, solemn but alert. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m better now.”

  Vincent looked the young officer in the eyes and sent him on his way once he was convinced that he wasn’t going to faint.

  “What now?” Brandt asked.

  “We head back to the station first,” Vincent said, taking a plastic evidence bag and slipping the note inside. He then took a pen and marked on the bag that he was the person who retrieved it. “Try to see if we can lift a print off this. After that, we’ll go to the morgue and deal with the body.”

  “Morgue is at the funeral home, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “Okay. What about the other officers?”

  “I’ll keep them canvassing the town and making sure that the area is secure. This is a small town, Brandt. We don’t have CSI techs or anything like that. The PD has to handle multiple tasks when something like this happens.”

  Brandt pointed at him. “Word is that you helped streamlined all that when you were chief.”

  Vincent shrugged. “Just doing my job.”

  Over on the corner, about thirty yards from the crime scene, Vincent spotted three youths on bikes watching from a distance and dressed in ghoul costumes, their cell phones out and recording.

  Oh, boy, Vincent thought.

  Let the games begin.

  6

  Not long after the body of Ethan Travis had been discovered. Vincent had delegated the handling of the prints to one of the more qualified officers, the evidence was being logged away with all the photos, and Vincent now stood in the lobby of the station, with Detective Brandt listening in.

  “We need to go notify Ethan Travis’ family,” Vincent said. “His mother, over on Perlita Avenue.”

  Brandt nodded solemnly. She’d had to do that task several times back in San Francisco. “You want me to go?” she asked.

  “I’ll go,” Vincent said. “It’s no problem.”

  “I’d like to be there. If that’s all right.”

  Vincent nodded and smiled. “Yeah. Yeah, of course it’s all right.”

  She’s a good cop, Vincent thought. Whatever happened to her in San Francisco must have been horrible.

  Vincent hadn’t heard the story. Brandt played her cards really close to the vest.

  But he knew that he’d eventually find out.

  Brandt and Vincent arrived at the Travis household ten minutes later, the streets were still very much alive with trick-or-treaters and the flicker of light from the jack-o’-lanterns in the distance.

  The Travis house was smack dab in the middle of the block. It was a modest house, one story with a manicured yard and a single light emitting from the living room.

  Vincent took the lead, Brandt following alongside him. They approached the door quietly and waited for a moment before Vincent knocked twice.

  “Who is it?”

  “Hollow Green PD, ma’am,” Vincent said.

  “Chief Vincent? Is that you?”

  Footsteps approached the door. A chain was removed. A lock was twisted. The door was opened to reveal a sweet, auburn-haired woman draped with a cardigan and greeting both Vincent and Brandt with the warmest of smiles.

  Mrs. Travis.

  “So good to see you, Chief Vincent,” Mrs. Travis said. “How are you?”

  “I’m well, ma’am,” he said. “And it’s just Detective Vincent now.”

  She waved him off. “Oh, hush with that bit of nonsense. I sure prefer you over that new guy and the way he’s been running things. Bit of pushover, if you ask me.”

  The feeling is mutual.

  “Can we come in, Mrs. Travis?” he asked.

  She motioned for them both to come inside, closing the door behind them as they walked into the living room.

  Mrs. Travis lowered the volume on the television.

  Vincent took in the decor. The home was warm. Managed with care. Soft comfortable furniture, the walls full of family pictures and a number of trophies from Ethan’s many athletic accomplishments.

  Vincent felt something tighten in his gut.

  The kid was one hell of an athlete…

  That’s a shame.

  The good die young as they tend to say.

  “I’m just waiting for Ethan to come home,” Mrs. Travis said. “That boy stays out later and later every night, it seems.”

  Brandt looked to Vincent with concern.

  “Uh,” Vincent began, “we need to talk to you a moment, Mrs. Travis…”

  Mrs. Travis’ upbeat demeanor and tone shifted to a nervous gaze. “Is everything all right?”

  Vincent took a moment to get his words straight. “Mrs. Travis,” he said, “it brings me great pain in telling you this, but…Ethan’s body was found in Millennium Park a little while ago... He’s dead, Mrs. Travis.”

  Mrs. Travis stood by the television for the longest of moments, a dull, grayish quality overcoming her skin as she bobbed her head slightly and moved toward a chair. “No,” she said. “No, that’s not possible. Ethan is just out late. That’s all.”

  “I’m afraid it’s true, Mrs. Travis. I was able to ID him. He also had his student ID card in his pocket.”

  Mrs. Travis said nothing. Seconds later, her eyes started to water. “No,” she said. “This can’t be right. It can’t be!”

  “Mrs. Travis,” Brandt said, “if you’d like to—”

  “No!” Mrs. Travis shouted. “I said no! It’s not true! Don’t you tell me these lies!”

  She began sobbing uncontrollably. Vincent moved toward her, got down on one knee, and rested his hand on top of hers. “Mrs. Travis,” he said, “I can’t imagine what you’re going through right now. This is a
lot to take in, I know.”

  Mrs. Travis continued to sob as she collapsed onto Vincent’s shoulder and mumbled incoherently for a minute. “I…don’t understand,” she said. “How…how did this happen?”

  Vincent held her tight with one arm and took a quick look in Brandt’s direction.

  It never is easy.

  7

  They were seated in the conference room of the station, Mrs. Travis with a mug of hot coffee in her hand and her eyes focused on nothing. Vincent was in front of her, a digital recording on the desk with the red light turned on. “We can take our time, Mrs. Travis,” Vincent said. “And if you don’t remember something, that’s all right. I just need you to go through Ethan’s entire day for me. Where he was. Where he went. To the best of your knowledge, okay? If you need a break at any time, let me know, and I can step out of the room.”

  Mrs. Travis nodded with a sluggish shrug, still lost in a sort of half stupor.

  “What time did Ethan leave the house this morning?” Vincent asked.

  Mrs. Travis thought about it. “Six,” she said. “For football practice. They had a game tonight. Ethan was upset that they lost.”

  “What time was the game?”

  “Seven o’clock.”

  Vincent made a note of key things that she said and of the timestamp on the recorder. “Were you at the game?” he asked.

  “I was,” Mrs. Travis said. “I drove my car there. Made it just before the game got started. Ethan played well. I remember that. Could tell he was distracted, though.”

  Interesting…

  “What do you mean?” Vincent asked.

  “Well…” Mrs. Travis straightened up. “When he left this morning, he seemed in a good mood. He went to practice, went to school. Everything was okay.”

  “Did he talk to you at all during the day? Texts? Phone calls?”

  “Just one, when I wished him good luck for the game.”

  “Did he reply?”

  “He did. He just said, ‘Thank you.’”

  Vincent made another note. “Keep going.”

  “He stopped by home right before the game,” she said. “And that’s when I noticed he looked…upset.”

  “Upset. How?”

  She shrugged. “He just looked a little grumpy. I figured it was because he hadn’t eaten. So, I made him a sandwich, I kissed him on the cheek, and then I left to go get groceries. He was gone when I got back. He had gone back to the school, I’m assuming.”

  “Do remember what time that was at? When he came home?”

  She thought about it. “Five, I think.”

  “And the game started at seven,” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “Do you happen to remember what time it ended?”

  “Ten thirty. After that, I saw him on the field to tell him he did a good job. Then he left.”

  “Where did he go after that?”

  “He said he was going to his friend’s house to play video games. Josh, I believe.”

  “What’s Josh’s last name?”

  “Adrian.”

  Vincent took more notes. “Did you hear from him after that?”

  Mrs. Travis took a moment. Tears falling from her eyes. “I’m sorry, detective,” she said, wiping them away.

  “It’s okay, Mrs. Travis,” Vincent said, reaching out to touch her hand. “We can stop if you want.”

  She waved him off. “It’s all right. I’m okay. I just…”

  She didn’t know what to say.

  What could she say?

  “I want to go back for a moment,” Vincent said, sitting back. “To when Ethan came home. When you made him a sandwich. You said he looked upset.”

  “I had just figured he was hungry, like I told you before.” Her tone was depleting to barely above a whisper. “But when he was at the game, he still looked angry. He kept looking out at the bleachers, like he was searching for someone.”

  Vincent sat straight up in his seat. “At the bleachers?”

  “Every few moments. You could tell he was distracted. They lost the game by two touchdowns. Ethan looked upset about that, but he was still focused on whatever it was that was bothering him. I could tell.”

  “Which side of the bleachers?”

  Mrs. Travis thought about it. “The left side. Closest to the gym. Yes, that’s right—he kept looking at the left side.”

  Thoughts swam through Vincent’s mind as he continued to scribble more notes.

  8

  Later Vincent, along with Brandt was in his office, the other officers scrambling about outside.

  “Looks like Ethan Travis might have had someone following him tonight,” Vincent said.

  Brandt raised her eyebrows. “Really? Who?”

  “Not sure. But Mrs. Travis said he kept looking out for someone in the bleachers during tonight’s game at the high school. She said he had been distracted all day about something. Well, most of the day.”

  “What do you think it means?”

  “I think it means that someone crossed paths with Ethan Travis and he was on the lookout for that person for the entirety of the day. And that same someone was at the game watching him.”

  “Where do we start looking?” Brandt asked.

  “To the place he went after the game,” Vincent said. “Apparently he went to his friend’s house—Josh Adrian.”

  “Do you know him?”

  “Yeah. He’s a junior at the high school. Played with Ethan on the football team.”

  A knock at the door—one of the uniformed officers. Vincent waved her inside.

  “Got a print from that note,” the officer said.

  “You’re kidding,” Vincent said.

  “Running it through all the databases as we speak.”

  Vincent nodded. “Good work. Keep me posted once you find a hit.”

  “You got it.”

  The officer left. Vincent looked at Brandt now with a satisfied smirk. “This might be an easy one to crack, detective.”

  “Hopefully,” Brandt said. “I moved away from the craziness of the city to avoid this kind of trouble.”

  “I’ve come to learn that Hollow Green is a…special place,” Vincent said. “A lot more happens here than you think.”

  “Yeah,” Brandt said. “Seems that way.”

  Vincent was curious to sniff out more of the tale that had brought Brandt to Hollow Green. “You deal with lot of homicides in San Francisco?”

  Brandt exhaled like the memories were flooding back to her in full force. “More than my fair share unfortunately.”

  Vincent, taking the cue to leave the subject alone, grabbed his notepad and the digital recorder. “Let’s move,” he said. “Time is of the essence. I want to interview Josh Adrian, find out what he knows, then check out Ethan Travis’ body at the morgue. Chances are good that our killer is still wandering around here.”

  “You think so?”

  Vincent nodded. “If there’s one thing that has never failed me,” he said, “it’s been my gut, and my gut is telling me that whoever did this is still in town. The way Ethan Travis’ body was displayed, the note, all of it. Whoever did this is egging us to find them, and one thing I don’t like to do is disappoint.”

  9

  Brandt and Vincent arrived at Josh Adrian’s house several minutes after leaving the station. It turned out Josh was throwing himself a party. Music could be heard from the sidewalk.

  Vincent and Brandt had to knock on the door six times before they realized no one was answering, though they knew someone to be home from the level of the bass that reverberated off the walls from down in the basement.

  “What should we do?” Brandt asked.

  Vincent looked to the left, at the bottom of the house and toward the light shining out the small porthole window where the basement was located. “Follow me.”

  They walked over to the window, both of them crouching down and looking inside at four young men smoking weed and drinking beer, the basement thick wit
h smoke and laughter as Vincent removed his badge, held it up against the porthole window, and knocked loudly.

  The boys jumped in unison, shocked and wide-eyed as they turned to look at the badge and then to Vincent.

  “Open up,” Vincent said. “I’m not going to ask you twice.”

  Josh Adrian answered the door, out of breath and with panic on his face.

  “Please don’t tell my mom about the weed!” Josh said with a tremble in his tone.

  “Just get all your friends up here,” Vincent said inside the foyer. “Right now. And turn off the music, for Pete’s sake.”

  Josh complied, shutting off the music and rallying his friends upstairs in the living room in under a minute.

  “Is this about the weed?” the portly friend seated on the left side of the couch asked.

  “Shut up about the weed,” Vincent said. “Okay? We’ll deal with that later.”

  He looked at Brandt. You take the lead. She acknowledged with a dip of her chin.

  “Okay, guys,” Brandt said, addressing the four boys on the couch with their heads hung low. “We need to talk to you about what happened tonight.”

  “About the game?” the one with the backward cap on the right said. “Yeah, Ethan played like shit tonight.”

  “Shut your mouth, Lapinsky,” Vincent said, pointing a finger, knowing the kid and knowing him well.

  No one said anything for a second.

  “Do you know what happened to Ethan Travis tonight?” Brandt asked the boys.

  They shook their heads.

  “Ethan Travis was murdered,” Vincent said. “Someone stabbed him repeatedly and left his body in Millennium Park.”

  The boys were stunned. A couple of them looked ill.

  “Seriously?” a shaggy-haired one asked. He had bloodshot eyes and a look of guilt. “Ethan’s dead?”

  Brandt continued, “And I’m assuming he was with you boys before it happened, based on the amount of beer cans I saw from the window in that basement.”