Powers of Arrest

by Jon Talton

  Sitting still and stewing was not an option. She tended to fill any vacuum that appeared. It made her a good nurse. Sometimes it made her supervisors crazy. More than once an evaluation had used the words “bull in a China shop.”

  She shut off the music and dug through her class files to find the information cards she asked each student to fill out at the beginning of the semester. They included emergency contacts. She sipped the glass of Chardonnay too fast, carefully studying Holly and Lauren’s cards, putting them on the side table, picking each up in turn. She walked to the kitchen, poured another glass, came back to stretch out on the sofa, and picked up the telephone.

  Holly’s mother answered on the eighth ring. Cheryl Beth identified herself and told the woman how sorry she was. Nursing had taught her to be a master of the difficult conversation: the terminal diagnosis, the failed surgery, and the too-many things that went wrong in hospitals. When the doctors had said their lines and left, it was up to the nurses to stay with the patient and the family, pick up the pieces of mortality. Still, this was inexplicably difficult. She told the mother what a good student her daughter was, what a fine person, quick to help her classmates, and to make a joke. By the end, they were both crying.

  Lauren’s parents lived in Kettering, a suburb of Dayton. When the phone was picked up, the voice on the other end sounded young and businesslike.

  “My name is Cheryl Beth Wilson and I’m calling for Mr. or Mrs. Benish.”

  “They’re not available and you news people are horrible for harassing us at a time like this.”

  “No, I’m not with the news. I know this is a terrible moment for you all.” She heard her voice lapse into y’all. “I was one of Lauren’s nursing instructors at Miami, and I felt I should call. I wanted to let you know how sorry I am, and ask if there’s anything I can do. Anything.”

  After a pause, the woman’s tone softened. “I’m sorry. The TV people have been calling nonstop. I won’t let mom and dad pick up. I’m scared to death they’ll just send a camera crew to our front lawn. Cheryl Beth, my name is April and I’m Lauren’s big sister.” She choked a moment. “Was.”

  “April, I am so sorry. Lauren was such a joy to have in class. I wish I would have had a chance to get to know her better.”

  “Thank you,” the woman said. “At least they caught the monster who would do such a thing. Thank God.”

  “Yes.”

  They made small talk for ten minutes. April inevitably asked about the origins of Cheryl Beth’s accent. Then, “I’ve been so afraid something like this might happen. I told myself not to over-react, not to be the overbearing big sister…”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Lauren thought she was being stalked.”

  Cheryl Beth sat upright.

  “It started about a month ago. She told me this creep came onto her in a bar and she tried to give him a nice brush-off and he wouldn’t go. She finally ended up leaving, getting in her car, and driving off with the guy standing on the curb watching her. Then she started seeing him on campus. He’d follow her at a distance, but she knew he wasn’t walking there by accident, if you know what I mean. It wasn’t a coincidence. This happened twice.”

  “Was he a student?”

  “I don’t know. Lauren said he definitely didn’t fit in with the college crowd in the bar. He was older, she said, but he was in good shape. Oh, he was completely bald. She said he looked like Mister Clean, you know?”

  That didn’t describe Noah Smith.

  April said, “In the bar, he’d been all friendly and funny, but when he wanted to take it further and she said no, he got all weird. Then the stalking.”

  Cheryl Beth asked if Lauren had notified the police.

  “No,” April said. “She was forever blaming herself for things. She was afraid she’s been too provocative and flirty in the bar. Then she thought maybe she was imagining that he was really following her. But she was afraid. I can tell you that. I was about to come down there and make her go to the campus police when this happened.”

  “Did you tell all this to Detective Brooks?”

  “I don’t know who that is,” April said. “My parents got a call from the university and had to go down and…” A sniffle broke her control, “…identify Lauren’s body. They didn’t know about this. Lauren wouldn’t tell them. They’re very protective and she wanted to be independent. It makes me want to throw up.”

  When the phone rang a little after seven, Cheryl Beth thought it might be April calling her back. She answered on the first ring and could hear the anxiety in her own voice.

  No one spoke. She could hear a background of voices and telephones ringing, then a hand muffling the receiver. The peculiar dread of a mysterious call sanded her nerve endings.

  Finally: “Cheryl Beth?” A man’s voice. A nice baritone, vaguely familiar.

  “Yes. Who’s this?”

  “I’m not sure you remember me. My name is Will Borders. I was a patient at Cincinnati General when you were the pain nurse…”

  She felt a catch in her throat and hesitated. Then, “Of course I remember you, Will. Tell me how you’re doing?”

  “I’m doing well. I’m back at work, on the force.”

  “I’ve seen your name in the paper and hoped you were all right.” She could hear more voices and phones in the background. “Where are you?”

  “I’m in homicide right now. Detective Dodds sends his best.”

  A deeper voice called, “Hello, Cheryl Beth!” and laughed.

  “Tell him ‘hi’ back.”

  She heard a rustling and Dodds came on. “Are you still as beautiful as the last time I saw you?”

  “Hello, Detective Dodds.” She laughed. “The last time you saw me I was beaten up and bloody.”

  “You were the most beautiful beaten up and bloody I’ve ever seen. Anyway, I’ll give you back to Mister President.”

  “Sorry,” Will said. “He gets very enthusiastic.”

  “I can see that. Why does he call you Mister President?”

  “Long story.” He paused. “Anyway, I’m walking. I use a cane. But I’m walking.”

  “That is so great. I prayed for that, Will.” She blurted that last part out suddenly and then worried if she had gone too far.

  After a long pause, Will said, “I hope I’m not calling at a bad time. I’ve wanted to call and check in. There’s no excuse for not doing it sooner.”

  She smiled and said nothing.

  He said, “I wonder if you’d have a drink with me sometime? It’s okay if you say no. I understand. I know this out of left field…”

  “Will,” she interrupted, “I’d love to.”

  Chapter Ten

  “God damn you.”

  Will glared at Dodds as the entire homicide unit erupted in applause and laughter.

  “I didn’t even know who you were dialing at first.”

  “You may call me J.C. the matchmaker,” Dodds said, a smug grin on his face. “You were too much of a chickenshit, so I had to do it for you.”

  “Asshole. And stop that ‘Mister President’ shit. Now where do I take her?”

  “Palm Court,” came one suggestion behind his back.

  “Too formal,” Will said. “What will that make her think?”

  “I dunno,” Dodds said. “Like you have class? How about the Precinct? Historic old police station, cop motif, all that.”

  “Across the river,” Lieutenant Fassbinder said. “Nice view of the city.”

  It felt good to be back in homicide again, in the fifth-floor offices leased from the county in the art deco tower at 800 Broadway that once housed the Cincinnati Times-Star newspaper. The old energy, the familiar faces, now everyone fueled with the adrenaline to catch whoever killed Kristen Gruber. Her name was written in red capital letters on the big white board that tracked the progress of the year’s homicide cases: unsolved. Immediately above it, also in red, was Jeremy Snowden, the cellist. That call early that morning seemed like a
lifetime ago. In fact, the board had half a dozen names in red. All unsolved cases. The unit was already stretched.

  Still, everyone was eager for a piece of this case. It was a murdered cop and, thanks to the television show, also a dead celebrity. Will went through the same briefing he had given the commanders before their press conference. Much was being held back, including that Gruber’s purse or wallet, cell phone, badge, and gun were not on the boat. Her keys were missing. The divers brought out sonar to search the river bottom for the firearm. Her clothes were aboard, neatly folded, but her panties were missing.

  “Maybe a trophy taker,” Slamowitz theorized, picking his teeth as usual.

  “Maybe she didn’t wear panties.” This from Kovach, who was one year from retirement and smiling for the first time Will could remember.

  Fassbinder told LeAnn Skeen, the only woman in the unit, to be on the first morning flight to Myrtle Beach to interview the parents. Will knew he was reasoning, from experience, that a female detective would be better at coaxing information out of a grieving mother and father.

  “Take your bikini,” Dodds said.

  “I’d use one of yours, J.C., but your man-boobs are too big,” she said.

  “Meet me at the Hustler store, baby.” He smiled lasciviously.

  “Stop it, children,” Fassbinder said, “or I’m going to have a sexual harassment claim on my hands, probably filed by Dodds.”

  “Always keeping the black man down,” Dodds said in mock severity.

  For these minutes the unit had the snug feel of the old days. Amazingly, his old desk across from Dodds was empty, too, as if waiting for him. Dodds still had the homey needlepoint sign on the cluttered desktop that said, “Our Day Begins When Your Days End.” But everything had changed. Will had spent ten years in this office and now he felt like a stranger. He was off homicide and his real desk was over at headquarters. And even though he had received a round of applause when he walked in tonight, his first appearance there since getting out of the hospital, he knew they no longer really considered him one of them. He was the PIO, the guy on television, the one who walked with a cane. He sensed that at least some of his former colleagues wondered why the hell he was the lead on this case. He wondered the same thing. But he had cleared too many murders for this to be anything but an awareness leavened deep in the collective consciousness of a group used to working together.

  With Covington detectives checking Gruber’s phone records, Fassbinder sent Kovach and Slamowitz to interview the other two officers featured on LadyCops. “Find out if they know whether she had a boyfriend,” Will said and regretted it. They knew that.

  Schmidt was dispatched to the Seven Hills Marina, where Gruber moored the boat. Would her car be in the parking lot? Someone would need to look into cases she had worked. Will volunteered. But first, he set off for the home of a dead cop.

  ***

  Kristen Gruber lived in a high-rise condo at the end of a long cul-de-sac that ran off McMillan Street. It was on a palisade overlooking the Ohio River at the edge of Walnut Hills, a short drive east from downtown. Walk a few blocks and you’d be in the heart of a ghetto. But this street was quiet, empty and framed by trees, the remnants of the thunderstorm still dripping off the leaves. The storms had moved east, leaving the air smelling of rain. Will sat in his unmarked car, driver’s window open to the damp night air, waiting for the Covington detective. Cheryl Beth Wilson was way too much on his mind. He had been so nervous he hadn’t even asked what she was doing now that the hospital had closed. Did she think he was rude? And what if something did develop between them? His body was different now. Could he perform as a man? He gently pushed her face out of his mind, flipped on a flashlight, and began reading Kristen’s personnel jacket.

  She was thirty-four years old, five-feet-seven, one-hundred-thirty pounds, single. She had joined the force ten years ago after graduating from the University of Cincinnati. After four years on patrol, she had joined Central Vice, then became PIO. The jacket held a slick folder used to promote LadyCops. Inside that was a color eight-and-half-by-eleven photo of Kristen, wearing a black T-shirt, black flack vest emblazoned with “POLICE,” and a smile with perfect teeth and seamless confidence. The other two officers on the show were uniforms, one white with brown hair, the other black and average-looking. Neither had the fine looks of Kristen.

  Gruber’s record looked almost too clean: No excessive force complaints, no shootings, not even an accidental firearm discharge. She had plenty of commendations. Will flipped through the supervisor reviews: “proactive,” “highly effective,” “diffused dangerous situation,” “dedicated,” “tough,” “unrelenting.” Will knew some of these sergeants and lieutenants, and a few were still back in the Stone Age about female officers. They would be much more likely to grade her hard. Yet she uniformly won them over. That and the all-American-girl face: an Ivory Soap complexion for Ivory’s hometown. He remembered her from the academy: even then she seemed like a comer.

  He was not. His body was giving out on him after working the longest straight shift since he had gotten out of the hospital. He usually took a break in the middle of the day and laid down. Not today, and even the gift of adrenaline was starting to run out. His back was catching fire with pain. His right leg felt wrapped around itself with muscle spasms. He had been off pain meds for months now. Nothing to do about that except take Advil back at home. He popped his two Neurontin on time, washing them down with bottled water, and wished he could go upstairs by himself. But jurisdictional niceties must be observed.

  “Can’t quit,” he mumbled, waiting for the pills to kick in and lessen the spasms.

  He saw the headlights behind him and a dark Ford Crown Vic slowed. He waved and started the car, pulling up to the building’s main entrance. The Covington detective met him at the door. Her name was Diane Henderson, and she was also a thirty-something strawberry blonde, but she was shorter and lacked the youthful dazzle and fit build of Kristen. Henderson was still in the black jeans and white top she had worn when he had first met her and the other Covington cops that morning.

  “You have a search warrant?” she said.

  Will nodded. With a murdered police officer, the Hamilton County judges had been lined up to sign.

  They approached the concierge, a middle-aged black man in a blazer and tie, who exuded a studied dignity. He examined Will’s badge and identification a long time. Will’s shield still lacked the black band of mourning. He’d have to fix that later. Then he read the search warrant. They asked if he had a master key.

  “I’ll let you in,” he said. “Terrible thing, what happened to that girl.”

  “Yes, sir,” Will said, and asked if the concierge worked there regularly. He did, every night except Monday and Tuesday. All visitors had to check in at his desk. Unfortunately, a log of names wasn’t kept. The concierge called the tenant and then the visitor was allowed to go up.

  “Did Ms. Gruber have a boyfriend?” Will asked.

  “Hmmmmm. Couldn’t really say, detective.”

  “Which means?” Henderson said.

  He stared at his shoes. “Which means, ma’am, that she kept male company, but I don’t know which were her boyfriends. I’m not paid to pay attention to things like that. She was a good tenant.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” Will said. “So you’re saying she had more than one boyfriend?”

  “She was a normal young woman,” the concierge said.

  Will asked, “Did she have a lot of men or a few men? Regulars?”

  “She was young and attractive. She was burnin’ rubber, if you know what I mean. And I don’t mean anything more than that. She was a good tenant, like I said. I can remember some men who came a few times. Some once or twice.”

  They started toward the elevators, Henderson and the concierge sprinting ahead of him, or so it seemed. Will walked as fast as he could and they slowed down. “So they stayed the night? These men?”

  “Some did.”

&nb
sp; “Five in one year?” Will asked.

  “Sounds about right.” He stared at Will. “Detective, I don’t get paid to keep track of tenants’ personal lives. In fact, I get paid to do the opposite, as long as they follow the rules.”

  They stepped in the elevator and started to the fifteenth floor.

  Henderson spoke. “What about women?”

  “She had women visitors, if that’s what you mean.”

  “Any stay the night.”

  He paused. “I noticed one. Not my business to know more. Kids today are different.”

  The elevator doors slid open with the sound of a whoosh and an electronic bell, and they stepped out into a carpeted hallway.

  “We may be back in the next few days to show you photos,” Will said.

  “I’ll try to help, but to be honest all you people look alike to me.”

  Nobody laughed.

  “So her visitors were all white?”

  “That would be so.”

  He led them to a door and used the master key. It didn’t open easily. He had to jiggle it and pull the door up slightly before it opened.

  “It automatically locks, so please close up when you’re done.” The concierge disappeared quickly.

  “‘All you people look alike to me.’” Henderson let out a low laugh.

  The condo was spacious, with hardwood floors and new contemporary furniture.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever had a neat-freak who was a vic,” she said, and it was true. They turned on lights, and the place looked immaculate. Everything was in its place. The kitchen seemed unused. The refrigerator held three bottles of Chardonnay and half-a-dozen individual containers of plain yogurt. The cabinets had a few dishes, pots, and pans, but this was not a woman who cooked.