by Frank Zafiro
“Futon?”
“Yeah. She had a futon.”
“Where’d that go?”
“The van,” Fred said. “I burned it in the van.”
Browning nodded. “How did she die, Fred? What happened?”
Fred let out a long, wavering breath. “Nancy did it,” he said. Before Browning could ask another question, he rambled on, “But you have to understand. She’s sick, and she wasn’t taking her pills. She loved that little girl. Deep inside, she loved her even more than her own mother could love her. She’d never hurt her.”
“Did you ever hurt her?” Browning asked quietly.
“No!” Fred said. “I…I loved that little girl. I tried to make it comfortable for her. I gave her love, even when Nancy was angry at her.”
“Why was Nancy angry?”
Fred shrugged and looked away. “She just gets that way. It’s her illness.”
“What did she do when she was angry, Fred?”
Fred swallowed and continued looking at the floor. “She hit her.”
“With what?”
Fred didn’t look up. “A hammer,” he muttered.
“Did you see her do it?”
“No!” Fred’s eyes snapped back to Browning’s. “I just heard the yelling and then a scream. Then Nancy came back downstairs.”
“Did she say anything?”
“No. She just went to the bathroom and locked the door.”
“What did you do?”
“I went upstairs.” Fred’s lips trembled and tears sprang to his eyes. “And I found her.”
“Was she dead?”
Fred wiped tears away. “She was gone, yeah. I tried to help her, but…”
“You did your best,” Browning said, feeling his stomach recoil at the sympathetic tone of his own words.
“I did,” Fred sobbed, his voice choked. “I tried so hard to save her.”
“I believe you,” Browning said. “Fred, how long before the officer came to talk to you and Nancy did this happen?”
Fred blinked. “Huh?”
“A couple of police officers came to your house. One was in uniform and one was in plainclothes. Do you remember that?”
“You mean the first time?”
“Yes. The officer’s name was Kopriva and he had a uniformed officer with him. Nancy yelled at both of them. Do you remember that?”
“Of course, but…”
“How long before that officer arrived did Nancy hurt Amy with the hammer?” Browning asked.
Fred shook his head. “You don’t understand. When that officer came to the house, she was still upstairs. She was still alive.”
0843 hours
“Son of a bitch!” Crawford said in a low voice.
Tower’s Styrofoam cup slipped from his fingers and fell to the tiled floor. Coffee splattered against the wall and across the floor.
“Shit!” Crawford said.
Tower ignored him. He stared through the one-way glass, his stomach sinking. Amy Dugger was alive in the attic when Kopriva came to the house.
She was alive. And Kopriva refused Nancy’s invitation to search the house.
“He would’ve found her,” Tower muttered, shaking his head. “She’d still be alive.”
“Son of a bitch!” Crawford repeated and stalked from the observation room.
0844 hours
Browning fought down the bile in his stomach and maintained a professional demeanor. Fred had responded well to his calmness and to his sympathy. He couldn’t abandon them now.
“When did she hurt Amy with the hammer?”
“Last night,” Fred said. “Before dinner.”
“How did she end up in the field?”
Fred lowered his chin to his chest and began to cry again. “She made me.”
“She made you do what, Fred?”
He balled up his fists and slammed both onto his own hips. “She made me do everything after. I had to take care of everything.”
“The van?”
“She made me burn it.”
“And Amy?” Browning asked. “Did Nancy make you put her in the field?”
Fred nodded his head. “She said they couldn’t be connected.”
Browning sat back and took a deep breath. Then he reached into the small drawer in the interview table. He removed a notepad and a pair of white Bic pens. Both pens were missing caps. He slid the pens and the pad across the table to crying man.
“Write it down, Fred,” he said. “Write it down so everyone will know the truth.”
Fred nodded, blinking at the notepad through tear-filled eyes. He reached for the pen and pulled the pad toward him. “What do you want me to write?”
“Everything,” Browning said.
0846 hours
Officer Jack Willow had watched as Detective Browning exited the interview room earlier. The rooms were relatively soundproof, but he’d heard Detective Tower’s voice get loud earlier and then the detective had stalked out of the room. As he passed Willow, Tower had tipped him a wink and the officer understood. They were playing the oldest gambit there was-good cop/bad cop.
Now, as Browning approached him, he wondered whether the ploy was successful or not. From the grave look on Browning’s face, he didn’t think so.
“Jack, I need you to stand guard here,” Browning said. “The guy in there is not to leave. Understand? He’s a collar.”
Willow nodded and changed his mind about the interview. If the guy was under arrest, something must have gone right. But that didn’t explain the expression on Browning’s face.
Tower slipped out of the observation room and joined them.
“Right now,” Browning continued instructing Willow, “he’s writing up a statement. If he gets thirsty, have one of the secretaries get him some water or soda or something. Don’t ask him any questions and don’t tell him anything. If he gets antsy, you tell him he needs to wait for me to come back. If he asks when that’ll be, just tell him it’ll be another ten minutes, no matter how many times he asks. Okay?”
“Okay,” Willow said.
Browning turned to Tower. “Let’s go find her.”
Crawford appeared from the other side of the room, walking purposefully toward his office with Kopriva in tow. The young officer limped slightly as he struggled to keep up with the heavy-set lieutenant.
“El-Tee,” Browning said. “We’re going out to look for Nancy Henderson.”
“Find her,” Crawford said gruffly. He paused at the door and waited for Kopriva to enter his office. Then he stepped inside and closed the door loudly behind himself.
Tower turned to Willow and tapped him lightly on the arm. “Always follow your gut, kid. You got that?”
Willow nodded.
“Let’s go,” Browning said, and they left a bewildered Willow standing near the interview room.
0912 hours
Crawford’s words hung in the air like the stench of a burned out building. Kopriva shook his head in disbelief.
“She was there? Amy was there?”
“Yes, you stupid son of a bitch,” Crawford spewed at him. “She was upstairs in the attic, where you would have found her if you had taken the time to search.”
Kopriva shook his head again. “She was still alive?”
“Are you deaf?” Crawford roared. “She was alive. She was upstairs. You should have searched the goddamn house when that crazy woman offered.”
“But she was crazy,” Kopriva muttered, his head spinning. “We were looking for a black guy and a Mexican. I just thought-”
“You didn’t think! You fucked up!” Spittle flew from Crawford’s mouth in a spray as he yelled. “Why didn’t you search? I want an answer to that, officer. I want an answer to that right now!”
“I…I…just thought it was nothing.” Kopriva gave his head a hard shake to clear it. “Oh, Jesus. She was there? Alive?”
There was a short silence. Kopriva’s head was spinning and his mouth was dry. He could hear the hum of t
he air system and Crawford’s labored breathing.
“Oh, Jesus,” he muttered. “I killed her.”
“You’re fucking right you did,” Crawford barked. “And you are relieved of duty. Go home and don’t come back until the Chief calls for you.”
Kopriva looked up at Crawford and met his dark eyes as they bore into him. His stomach lurched and he gagged.
Crawford looked at him in disgust. “Don’t you puke in my office, you piece of shit.”
Kopriva gagged again, but forced it down.
“Get the fuck out of my office,” Crawford said.
Kopriva turned and left. When he opened the door, he saw Officer Willow look over at him, and his stomach heaved again. He fought down the gorge once more and walked as quickly as could out of the Major Crimes office and down the hall to the bathroom.
Once inside, he knelt in front of the toilet. His knee screamed at him in protest, but was overruled by his stomach. He heaved again, and this time held nothing back. He threw up his breakfast, then his coffee and then there was nothing left except the dry, hard contractions.
Slowly, the dry heaves subsided. He spat into the toilet several times, and then flushed the mess. He stared at the water and the vomit as it turned and whirled and sank down the drain.
1121 hours
They waited for two hours, parked up the street under the shade of a huge oak tree, watching for the blue Taurus. When it appeared at the end of the block, both men sat up. Browning started the car.
“Think she’ll run for it?” Tower asked.
“Who knows?”
“I hope so,” Tower muttered.
The Taurus pulled up in front of the Henderson house and stopped. Nancy Henderson exited the driver’s seat and walked toward the trunk. Even from a distance, it was obvious that she was talking to herself as she pulled a bag of groceries from the rear of the car.
“Punch it,” Tower said.
Browning agreed and gunned the engine. The Crown Victoria roared and in less than two seconds, the detectives screeched to a halt just five feet from Nancy Henderson.
The look of surprise on her face quickly melted to anger as the two men exited the police car.
“Are you sonsabitches out of your minds? You just about hit me!”
“Nancy, you’re under arrest,” Browning said.
Nancy snorted. “No, I’m not. Fuck you.” She turned and walked toward her house.
“Enough of this shit,” Tower said. He sprinted to her side and reached for her right hand. Browning moved toward her left side.
“You can’t do that,” Nancy told him matter-of-factly.
Tower’s hand closed on her wrist.
“No!” she yelled and twisted her torso away.
“Give me your hand!” Tower told her.
“No!”
Nancy twisted again, flinging the grocery bag into Tower’s chest. The bag bounced off him and fell to the ground. Several cans rolled out.
Tower reached for her wrist again.
“I said, no!” Nancy screamed. She whipped her left arm toward Tower, throwing the other grocery bag at him. This time, the detective raised hands and brushed it aside. He heard the distinct sound of glass breaking when the bag landed on the pavement.
Browning took advantage of her distraction and snatched her left wrist into his grasp.
Nancy’s gaze snapped to him. “Let go of me, nigger!”
Tower followed suit, grabbing her by the wrist and elbow. Together, both detectives slammed her to the ground with an arm-bar takedown. Nancy grunted loudly as she landed on the sidewalk. Her cheek bounced off the concrete, splitting the skin. Blood flowed from the small injury.
“You fucking bastards! This is police brutality!”
Tower said nothing, transferring into a prone-cuffing technique. He knelt across the back of Nancy’s neck to keep her still. Browning pinned her other arm to the ground.
“Rape!” Nancy screeched. “The fucking cops are raping me!”
Tower slipped he handcuffs onto her fat wrist and lowered it to the small of her back. Browning forced her other arm to where Tower held the cuffs.
“Call the cops!” she yelled. “Police brutality! You fuckers!”
Tower finished cuffing her and they rolled her onto her side, then into a seated position.
“You need to sit up on your own,” Tower said through gritted teeth.
“Fuck you!”
Tower sighed and looked at Browning. Browning grabbed her underneath the opposite arm and they lifted her to her feet. Nancy struggled with them as they walked her over to the police car.
“Help! Somebody help!”
“Enough with the hysterics,” Tower muttered.
“I’m going to sue your asses!” Nancy screeched into Tower’s face.
“You’ll be doing it from prison,” Tower told her.
Nancy stopped cold. “Prison? What the hell are you talking about?”
“You can drop the act,” Tower told her as Browning began to search her pockets. “Fred confessed to everything.”
“Everything? What everything?”
“You don’t quit, do you?” Tower shook his head. “Everything, Nancy. The van, the abduction, the murder. Everything.”
Nancy bit the inside of her mouth. Her eyes darted wildly around.
“You’ll never prove it,” she said. “You’ll never prove any of it.”
Tower shrugged. “We’ll see.”
Nancy’s shot him a look of pure rage. “Well, did he tell you that he fucked her, the disloyal son of a bitch?”
1130 hours
“What’s going on?” Georgina asked, handing the can of Coca Cola to Officer Willow.
Willow took the soda from the secretary. He jerked his thumb toward the interview room. “He was involved in that case with the kidnapped girl.”
“Really? The one they found this morning?”
Willow nodded.
“Why was the lieutenant so mad?” Georgina asked. “He stomped into the Sex Crimes Unit and yelled at Kopriva to get into his office.”
Willow looked at the plump secretary. Everyone was going to know sooner or later, he decided. But he didn’t want everyone to know it came from him.
“You can’t tell anyone, okay?” he said.
Georgina smiled and made a cross over her heart.
“I promise,” she said.
1219 hours
Kopriva sat in his chair and stared at the wall. His eyes took in the bamboo wall hanging that his sensei had given him years before when he’d earned his black belt. The picture showed a pale moon, partially eclipsed by dust or tendrils of clouds. Beneath the moon was a tiger. Sensei Allen had called the piece “Tiger Under a Raging Moon.”
Looking at it now, Kopriva allowed his eyes to slowly blur. That day seemed like decades ago to him now. He was a different person now, no longer the tiger. The throbbing pain in his shoulder and knee seemed to agree with him.
He replayed the scene at the Henderson home over and over again in his mind. Now that he knew that little Amy Dugger was alive when he was in the house, the vision was like a macabre film. Every misstep he made rang loudly in his ears like an accusation.
“I killed her,” he whispered, his voice ragged from throwing up earlier. The taste of bile remained in his mouth and he made no effort to rinse it out. It seemed fitting that he should taste it.
There was a knock at his door. It was a tentative, soft knock and he knew immediately who it belonged to.
The knock came again and he made no move to stand or open the door. After a third knock, there was a rattle of keys and Katie MacLeod came into his apartment. She spotted him sitting in the chair and gave him a small, worried smile. “I called the office, but Georgina said you’d gone home.”
Kopriva stared at her and did not reply.
“Georgina…she told me what happened.”
He remained silent.
Katie’s worried smile faded into a frown. “Stef, are
you okay? It wasn’t your fault-”
“I’d like you to leave, Katie,” Kopriva said in an even voice.
She stopped suddenly. Surprise registered in her eyes. “Leave? Why?”
“I want to be alone.”
Katie was hesitant. “Okay…but are you sure you don’t want to talk about-”
“I asked you to leave!” shouted Kopriva, suddenly enraged. “Is that so fucking hard to understand?”
Katie jumped at his words, surprised. “Stef, I don’t think you should be alone if-”
“No one asked for your goddamn opinion,” Kopriva said, his voice gruff.
“Why are you talking to me like this?” Katie asked. “I’m just trying to help.”
“Then leave. That would be a big help.”
Katie said nothing, but she made no move to leave. Instead, she took a step toward Kopriva. “I know what you’re feeling,” she said to him. “I know what-”
“You don’t know shit,” Kopriva said.
Tears sprang to her eyes. “How can you say that after yesterday?”
Kopriva shook his head. “What happened on the bridge is nothing compared to what I did.”
“What?” Her eyes widened in surprise.
“You heard me.”
Katie swallowed hard and wiped away tears. “That’s the most horrible thing you could ever say.”
Kopriva didn’t respond.
“I know it hurts,” Katie said. “But it wasn’t your fault.”
“Leave me alone,” Kopriva said.
“I know how you feel, Stef,” she said. “I do.”
Kopriva looked up at her. His voice was hard and unfeeling. “You have no idea what I’m feeling. You couldn’t stop some guy from hurting a baby. Fine. Maybe you failed. I don’t know. But you didn’t kill anyone.”
“Stef-”
“I killed her!” Kopriva yelled. “Do you understand that? Now get the fuck out of my house and out of my life!”
Katie recoiled from his words, hurt and anger apparent on her face. Kopriva didn’t care.
Without a word, she turned and left, slamming the door behind her.
When the sound of the door slamming had faded into silence, Kopriva rose from his chair. He walked into the bathroom and opened the medicine cabinet. Reaching for the brown prescription bottle, he popped the top and shook three pills from inside. When he put the prescription bottle back in the cabinet, he stared into the mirror for a moment. Guilty eyes stared back at him.
