Land of Shadows

by Rachel Howzell Hall

  “Napoleon Crase has a son?”

  She nodded. “Vincent.”

  “Crase?”

  “No. He uses Lorraine’s—his mom’s—last name, Yates. And he got in trouble a long time ago, so he goes by his middle name now and that’s ‘Maxwell.’ He was visiting that week when Tori disappeared—during the school year, he usually stayed with Lorraine in Chicago. But then, she’d send him out here whenever he’d get into fights or flunk a class.”

  “You have a picture of your cousin?” I tried to smile nonchalantly as I added, “I have pictures of you, Golden, Cyrus … Just trying to put all the players onstage for that day.”

  She hesitated for a moment, then said, “One moment.” She hurried down the hall and made a left, out of my view.

  Heart racing, I turned to watch the old people move their limbs slowly through space.

  “Here you go,” Kesha said, back in the doorway. As she thrust the picture at me, glass crashed to the floor somewhere in her house. The dog barked as though the house was on fire.

  Kesha whirled around and shouted, “Ryan, what happened?”

  The boy shouted back, “Nothing.”

  Another glass object broke.

  The dog barked again.

  Ryan shouted, “Ollie went number one on the rug!”

  Kesha apologized, told me she had to go.

  I thanked her, then quick-stepped back to the car. With trembling fingers, I looked at the picture she had given me of her cousin.

  Those eyes. His smile. Teeth like … white Chiclets.

  Barely breathing now, I slowly typed Vincent Yates into the computer.

  One hit.

  The Chicago DMV’s picture of Vincent Yates loaded.

  I stared at the image of the man who had been with my sister on the last day of her life.

  And possibly, probably, had been with Monique Darson as she breathed her final breath.

  58

  I called Zucca’s office but no one answered. I paged him—still no answer. I called his office again, this time leaving a message. “I know you’ve been calling me and calling me, but I’m here now, and I need you to run something for me. That fingerprint off Monique Darson’s underwear. See if you can get into Chicago’s DMV files so you can compare it to a ‘Vincent Yates.’ I think he’s our man.”

  Shit. Shoulda called Zucca earlier. But earlier today, I didn’t know the truth behind the names.

  I called Macie Darson next.

  Macie didn’t pick up.

  I called the Darsons’ home phone, hoping that even Cyrus answered—especially since he had been at the store on the day Tori was taken.

  Angie answered, though, sounding brighter today than she had all week. “I left you a message at the station,” she said. “We wanted to invite you and Detective Taggert to Monique’s service. This coming Thursday, eleven o’clock, at our church. And then, we’re having supper at the house. Think you guys can come?”

  “We’ll be there,” I said. “I’m trying to reach Macie. Is she there? Or Cyrus?”

  “No. I haven’t seen that girl since yesterday. And Cyrus is out running errands for the service.” She paused, then asked, “Is something wrong? Oh, Lord, what happened? I can’t take anymore.”

  And just like that, Angie’s mood darkened. Good job, Lou.

  “Nothing’s wrong,” I said. “Everything’s fine. I’m just following up on something.” I said this carefully, as though I had been creeping through a glen of bear traps.

  What to do now? Sit on all of this or go talk to Napoleon Crase now to get more information about his son’s role that day at the liquor store? He wouldn’t have his lawyer with him, which meant anything he said to me now could be thrown out of court tomorrow, which then meant my career as an LAPD homicide detective would be …

  I sped out of Kesha’s neighborhood, radio to my lips as I called Colin and told him about my newest discovery. “The last known address for Vincent Yates a.k.a. Max Yates is in Long Beach.” Twenty miles south of Los Angeles.

  “I’ll have units to roll out there,” Colin said. “And I’ll meet you at Napoleon Crase’s house right now.”

  As Colin signed off, Zucca’s voice came over the Motorola. “Got your message,” he said, “and good news: it looks like a match, but I need the tech to confirm it. She’s working on it now. Stay put.”

  “Yeah,” I said, even though I was not staying put. In fact, the world was rushing by in a blur as I charged into Baldwin Hills.

  It was almost six o’clock when I rolled past 73881 Don Tomaso Drive, an elegant Georgian home of red brick, white shutters, and stately weeping willows that edged the brick walkway. Napoleon Crase, in sweatpants and a sweatshirt, held a garden hose and watered a perfect lawn.

  I made a U-turn at the end of the block and parked fifty yards away, in front of a ranch-style house still trimmed with Christmas lights.

  Neighborhood men were washing cars, their radios turned high to sportscasts or R&B. Teens skateboarded as joggers and walkers moved up and down the sidewalk. The sun hung high in the sky. It was Sunday evening, the first weekend of the summer. Everyone was out and about.

  Colin wasn’t here yet. Just Napoleon Crase and me.

  My radio squawked and Zucca’s voice came back on the line. “Alexa just finished with the analysis.”

  I closed my voice and said, “And?”

  “And: it’s a match. I’ll fax it to the car.”

  A second later, the Crown Vic’s telefax whirred and spat out side-by-side photographs of two thumbprints left by Max Crase a.k.a. Vincent Yates.

  I didn’t smile as I headed toward Napoleon Crase, fingerprints in hand.

  He didn’t look too thrilled seeing me, either.

  “I’m looking for your son,” I said.

  He let the garden hose splash water near my boots. “Pardon me? My son?”

  “Vincent or Max, whichever name he prefers today.”

  He stared at me as his eyes twitched. “Why do you need to speak with my son?”

  I held up the fax and watched his eyes scan the fingerprints there. “We have reason to believe that Max is involved in Monique Darson’s murder.” I paused, then swallowed. “And that he’s also involved in my sister’s murder.”

  Crase dropped the hose and stared at me with sad eyes. “Those fingerprints could have been planted. Or … or…”

  “I also have several witnesses that placed him at the liquor store that day,” I added. “Witnesses who stated that my sister was with him after you let her go.”

  Crase swallowed, but lifted his chin in defiance. “None of this proves anything.”

  “We have the DNA results from my sister’s case,” I said. “And we have DNA from Monique Darson’s case now, too. And they match.”

  Crase’s eyes filled with tears.

  “We need to end this, Napoleon,” I said, my own eyes watering. “It’s been too long.”

  He opened his mouth to speak, but dropped his head instead. His shoulders slumped and he slowly exhaled. Finally, he met my eyes. “I think we should talk about this inside.”

  I nodded, plucked my radio from my hip, and toggled the mike. “Hey, Taggert.”

  “I’m not too far,” Colin said.

  “I’m going inside to talk with Mr. Crase. Copy?”

  “Copy that.”

  I left the one-way audio on so that Colin could hear everything being said.

  I followed my nemesis into the dark foyer, where the heavy air stank of sweat and cologne. Heavy curtains kept natural light from reaching the inside of the house. But my eyes slowly adjusted to the lack of light, and now I could make out shapes. Empty, green bottles of Excedrin littered the floor alongside soiled and bloody cotton swabs. Each step I took left behind a trail of crushed pills.

  “Elouise Starr.”

  I turned to my right and toward the man’s voice. I could see two forms sitting in an armchair.

  In the dim light, Max Crase’s eyes glistened like a w
olf’s. He held a backpack shotgun (short-snouted but deadly), now pointed at me.

  I immediately pulled my Glock from its holster.

  “My mom said you called.” It was Macie. She stood near the living room window and sounded too damn cheerful to be sitting in a filthy, dark living room, next to a man with a gun.

  “Yes, Macie,” I said, gun trained on Max. “And I need you to come with me.”

  Crase turned to his son. “She claims to have proof, Vincie.”

  “Fuck her proof,” Max said. “Tell her to talk to my lawyer.”

  Max and Macie laughed as she crept toward me.

  I cocked my head. “Will shit be funny when you take your stainless-steel ride to Hell? Cuz that’s what I’m talking about here if you don’t cooperate, Max. Death penalty.”

  I had a choice: look at Macie or keep my eyes on the shotgun trained on my chest. I chose number two.

  Max and Macie laughed louder. Standing beside me now, Macie slowly lifted her right arm—she held a .22 and had it pointed now at my right ear.

  “Macie,” I whispered, “you don’t want to do this. Put the gun down, okay?”

  She slowly reached for my Glock and took the gun from me.

  I kept my hands up.

  A tear tumbled down Napoleon Crase’s face. “Vincie, I’m too old for this shit, all right? I’m tired of cleaning up after you and … It’ll be okay. You’re not well. They can’t kill you for something you have no control over.”

  The old man turned to me. “We will tell you the truth, Elouise, and you will work something out for all of us.” He chuckled and waggled his head. “I mean, you still need information from us. And we won’t talk about it unless it is for the good of all of us. Of course.” Even though he had regained some of his swagger, he still swallowed a little too hard, seemed a little too eager.

  “Are you fucking crazy, Napoleon?” Max shouted, his eyes blinking hard now.

  Crase whirled around and pointed at his son. “Shut up! Now.”

  Macie giggled as she placed her gun and mine on the couch cushions. “Baby, your dad talkin’ to you like you a punk.”

  “I’m done,” Crase shouted at him. “You think you can handle—?”

  “I didn’t ask you for shit!” Max yelled back.

  Macie sneered. “You done, Napoleon? Be done, then.”

  This little tête-à-tête was getting a little too loud now. “Let’s just calm down, all right?” I said with forced calm. “We can talk about all of this—my sister, Monique, deals with the DA—later, okay? I would just like Macie…” I motioned for Macie to leave her boyfriend’s side and to walk toward me.

  Max grinned. “I think not.”

  “I’m staying,” Macie said with a smile.

  I stared at the young woman—there was no fear in her eyes. “Well, then. I will come back and we can discuss all of this later.” Live to fight another day, as the saying went.

  “I think not,” Max repeated.

  I squared my shoulders. “You’re holding me against my will?”

  He kept that grin.

  The doorbell rang. “Open up, Max. Police.” It was Colin.

  “Oh, shit,” Macie said. “Another cop?”

  Crase raised his hands. “Let’s … let’s … We don’t want…” He turned to me. “We’ll cooperate, Detective Norton. We don’t want this thing to escalate—”

  Max cocked the shotgun. “This bitch gotta go.”

  Crase cried, “Vincie, don’t!”

  Colin kicked at the door.

  Max took two steps, then stopped.

  BAM!

  He missed me—Lord only knows how he missed me—and the slug exploded against the front door, sending shards of wood flying through the air.

  Colin shouted in pain.

  I heard a loud thump—my partner was down.

  “Fuck,” Max shouted, where light now streamed in through a pancake-sized, splintered hole.

  As the gunshot rang in my ears, I quickly pressed the emergency button on my radio so that Dispatch would send backup.

  “What the fuck did you just do?” Crase yelled.

  The grin on Macie’s face dimmed and she gawked at me.

  I took a step toward Max, my hands flexing, hot air venting from my lungs.

  Max pointed the shotgun at me.

  I stopped in my step.

  “What the fuck did you just do?” Crase yelled again.

  Max squeezed shut his eyes. “Will you just—?”

  “Just what?” Crase screeched. “You a cop killer now? You want us all to die?”

  “Max,” Macie said, “maybe—”

  “I need to think. I need to think.” Max’s smog-colored eyes were now all black. His facial muscles and fingers twitched. The tendons in his neck stood out against the skin and his pulse pounded like a metronome set on supersonic.

  “Vincie, please,” Crase pleaded. “Just tell her what happened. Just tell her about Monie, about Tori, and the others. Let’s be done with this.”

  “You keep talking,” Max said, his voice high-pitched. “Just … just…”

  “If I was you,” Macie said to Crase, “I’d—”

  “Shut. Up!” Max screamed, his finger flexing on the trigger.

  Napoleon Crase, crying now, held out his arms to me. “You don’t understand, Detective. He’s sick. He needs help. He had a tumor in his brain.” His finger pointed at his forehead. “When he was little, it was the size of a nickel. We had them take it out, but … but it came back. He’s sick. He ain’t right. He doesn’t mean it—”

  Napoleon Crase pivoted and grabbed for Max’s shotgun.

  Max was quicker and took one side step. He turned the shotgun on his father and pulled the trigger.

  Boom! Another deafening explosion shook the room.

  Macie shrieked.

  The old man, his guts spilling onto the floor, crumpled where he stood. The smell of gunpowder mixed with the odors of warm urine and feces as Napoleon Crase’s dying body voided itself. He gurgled and frothy red bubbles dribbled out of his mouth as he took his last breaths.

  Outside, sirens wailed. A helicopter thundered above the house. The flickers of red and blue strobe lights brightened the living room walls.

  Max gaped at the shotgun in his hand—the game had changed now. The explosion had yanked him from his rabbit hole. No more tremors. No jerky motions. He clenched his jaw, though—he was making great effort to control something within himself. His gaze finally met mine, and he croaked, “I see darkness, and I see you.” He grabbed Macie and jabbed the shotgun’s barrel against her jaw.

  “You don’t understand,” Macie was saying to me, tears in her eyes. “You don’t understand.”

  “Help me to understand, then, Macie,” I said, eyes trained on Max.

  “It’s not his fault,” Macie cried. “It was Monie—she made him do it.”

  “Put it … shut … down,” Max demanded. “Can’t … nothing now.”

  He sounded like a scratched vinyl record, skipping and dropping words.

  “We talked about our sisters, remember?” she said, desperately. “But I didn’t tell you everything. About how Monie really was, for real. I’ll tell you, and then you’ll see. You’ll see that it wasn’t Max’s fault.”

  Max’s finger flexed on the trigger again. Perspiration glistened on his forehead and a bead of sweat slipped into his left eye.

  “Monique stole from me,” Macie said, arms at her sides, hands clenched into fists. “Shoes, money, purses. And she stole my mother and father away from me. And she was trying to steal Max, trying to steal the love of my life, and I wouldn’t let her…” Tears in her eyes, she shook her head. “I didn’t see it at first, and I’d always bring her along whenever me and Max went to the movies or to dinner. We called ourselves the Three Musketeers cuz our names … Then, I noticed that she would try and hold his hand. She’d kiss him every time she saw him. She started calling him, throwing herself—”

  “She w
asn’t doing any of that alone,” I said. “Max—”

  “No.” Macie closed her eyes. “No.”

  “I have proof, Macie. I have phone records and text messages. And your sister kept a handkerchief—”

  “No,” she shouted. “She made him give her clothes, money, that car. And she told him that she’d tell everybody that he raped her if he didn’t break up with … We had to do something. It wasn’t right what she was doing to him. What she was doing to me.”

  Max stroked her face with the barrel of the shotgun.

  Macie’s mouth opened and closed and teardrops rolled down her face. “I … wanted to catch her so we left Temecula and Max told her to meet him at the trailer cuz that’s where she always met him and … I waited in the car … he went up and he came back and told me … She started fighting him and … he squeezed too hard. He didn’t mean to.”

  “It was an accident then,” I said. “We can work this out, Macie. We—”

  “I was so scared,” Macie whispered. “But he didn’t mean to.”

  “Okay, Macie,” I whispered. “Okay. Just…”

  “You love me, right, baby?” Macie asked Max, her eyes closed as the business end of the shotgun grazed her right temple. A sob escaped from her chest. “We’re partners, right, baby? To the end, right?”

  “Max,” I said, shaking my head, “please let her go.”

  “You promised to take care of me,” she said to Max with a lovesick smile. “Remember? You said that, remember, when I was clipping her fingernails? You said that you would make it up to me.”

  Max kissed the top of her head. “Ssh … Ssh … Ssh.”

  Macie closed her eyes as he comforted her. But Max kept his eyes on me.

  I shook my head. “Max. Please don’t. Just—”

  His shark eyes hardened as he fired again.

  BOOM!

  The gunshot echoed through the house.

  Macie was dead before she hit the floor.

  Max’s skin and hair were now slick with sweat and his lover’s blood. “Feel better,” he said with a sigh. “Too … noise. Hard … think.”