When I saw his body that day, it made me physically ill. I had walked three houses away and thrown up on the neighbor’s front lawn. The local pastor, Bishop Charles Moore from Mt Moriah Church put his hand on my back as I threw up and then sat me on the curb. I quickly shooed him back to Mrs. Cecelia Baltazar, Alexander’s grandmother. I sat alone unmoving for what seemed like hours.
Arkansas had more than its share of racial violence and tension in its history. In some areas, there was still deep-rooted racism that persisted, but it was still a shock to me. Eventually the cops took witness statements, the medical examiner came and went, the forensics team did their job and other reporters left.
The community rallied around Mrs. Baltazar. She told police that when she heard the gunshot, she ran to the front yard from the back yard where she was hanging the wash, but by then, Alexander was dead. She couldn’t see anything but the back of the pickup truck.
As residents returned home and the cops cleared the scene, I was still sitting on the curb at the side of the road. Luke had walked over to me and checked to see if I was okay. I don’t even remember the conversation we had. He tossed my keys to one of the other officers and drove me directly to Billy’s Tavern. There, we sat and talked about what occurred and how enraged and sickened we both were feeling.
I didn’t realize then why he was being so nice to me, but he gave me the only quote law enforcement gave on the story that night. There would be many more exclusives after that on that case and others. It was the start for Luke and me.
My story ran in the morning edition of the paper. It was a story I covered until the three defendants – three white teens from a neighboring county – were all convicted of first degree murder and sent away for life. It was little vindication for Alex’s family and friends, but at least some justice had been served.
Through the case, I became friends with Bishop Moore and Alex’s grandmother, Cecilia, who I came to love as my own family. They grew to trust me through my compassion for the case and fair reporting.
My insistence on covering the drug angle of Maime’s case was a little self-serving. I had grown to know the neighborhood and had sources that would give me the truth. And I wanted to see people I cared about while back in town.
CHAPTER 45
I PULLED UP IN FRONT OF MS. CECELIA’S house just as she was walking, with a watering can in hand, to water the flowers in her front yard. After Alex’s death, for the longest time, she couldn’t bear to be in the yard, but she said she grew tired of that. As she put it, she decided to reclaim her home. She made a lovely garden around a beautiful white stone with Alexander’s name on it. Since then, she tended to the garden in the way she would have tended to him, with grandmotherly love and compassion. She definitely had a green thumb, something I definitely didn’t. I couldn’t keep a cactus alive.
During the criminal case, she was at the courthouse every day. She wasn’t allowed in for the proceedings because she was a key witness for the prosecutor’s case. But each day she came to court and each day we had lunch together. Conversations moved from reminiscing about Alexander as a little baby, to her son and daughter-in-law and my work to more personal stories about each of us. She grew up poor in the segregated south. She told me stories that I knew were true but still found hard to fully grasp.
Eventually, I told her about George, the move to Little Rock and even a little bit about Luke. She adored Luke, and I think really hoped things would work out for us. After the case, we would visit weekly. She’d feed me like I’d never eaten before. When she was feeling up to it, I’d take her shopping or to the movies, and occasionally, I’d even be able to pry her out of the kitchen and take her out to dinner. She was one of the people I didn’t mean to hurt when I left so abruptly. We still talked by phone, but this was the first I would see her in almost two years.
As soon as she saw me standing on the edge of her lawn, she dropped her watering can and moved down the yard with her arms outstretched with a smile full of joy.
“There’s my girl,” she called to me. “You’ve been away for far too long.”
After a long hug, she pulled back and looked me over and said, “You’re too thin. Haven’t you been eating?”
I loved this woman.
She ushered me into the house, placed a quick call to Bishop Moore and went about fixing me lunch. I filled her in on my family, my business and coming back to Little Rock. She had been following the news and was as shocked and saddened by the dead and the missing as everyone else.
Bishop Moore arrived, and trailing in behind him was a sullen looking boy who made his way into the kitchen. Dressed in jeans, a tee-shirt and old ballcap, I guessed he was about fifteen years old. He got a look at me and said, “You’re white.”
Cecelia flipped his hat off his head. Bishop Moore rolled his eyes at him as he wrapped me in a hug.
I stuck out my hand to the kid and said, “Really, I hadn’t noticed. I’m Riley.”
“Bobby,” was all he said in response.
“Nice to meet you,” I said, sitting down at the table.
“Bobby works down at the church after school and helps out Cecelia with chores now and then. He lives with his dad down the street. He’s a good kid, usually,” Bishop Moore explained with a smile. “What brings you back to town?”
I caught all of them up with the information I could share about the case and my part in the investigation. I explained the possible drug connection and that I was trying to find Orlando Knight, the drug dealer.
“You don’t want to mess with him. He’s bad news round here,” Bobby said in between bites of Cecelia’s chicken salad sandwich.
“What can you tell me about him?” I asked.
Bobby looked down. I suspected he was afraid of talking in front of Bishop Moore and Cecelia.
“It’s okay, you can tell us. You won’t get in trouble. In fact, what you know will probably help me.”
He looked to Cecelia and then to Bishop Moore, and they both nodded in agreement to what I said. Bobby looked back to me and said, “He’s always trying to sell us drugs. He talked my friend Marcus into stealing stuff out of a car last week. I don’t like him.”
“Ever see a white lady come to buy drugs from him?”
Bobby seemed to think for a minute. I didn’t know if he was debating telling me or what, but then he dropped a bombshell right at the table. “Nope, not to buy drugs, but last week a white lady drove her truck down the alley on the side of my house. Then got into a car with some white guy and left.”
“When did she drop the car off? Was it during the day or at night?”
“It was at night. I was waiting for my friends who come to the window. I was waiting on them and heard a noise and looked out. But it wasn’t them. Just some lady parking her car,” Bobby said and then went on. “I remember it was Friday night. I only remember cause my dad always has friends over to play cards on Fridays. You’re not going to tell anyone that I told, are you?”
“I don’t know if I have to tell anyone or not. But this might be real important to what I’m working on. It’s really good that you told me. Could you take me to see the car?”
“I can show you, sure. I don’t know what you want to see it for - it’s all burned up.”
CHAPTER 46
AFTER A FEW MORNING ERRANDS, Cooper made his way to Maime’s office. He hoped they were working. It was Veteran’s Day and some places were closed. If they were working, his plan was to sweet talk her coworkers into telling him more than they told Luke when he interviewed them.
Luke said they hadn’t told him much, just that Maime’s work was slacking off and that she left Friday afternoon around three. Everyone in the office assumed Maime took her car, but when they closed shop around five in the afternoon, her SUV was still there. Her vehicle had not been recovered so the assumption was Maime went back to work sometime after five.
Maime worked for a pharmaceutical company that had its headquarters in North Carolina. Maime sha
red an office in West Little Rock with three female coworkers. It wasn’t a large building, only one floor, but it looked like they were the only occupants. The other office spaces were dark and no names were on the glass doors.
“Good mornin’, ladies,” Cooper said, grinning as he strode through the front door of their office. The office was one big open space with four desks, some filing cabinets and a room to the side Cooper guessed was used for meetings. Three of the four desks were occupied. The fourth he guessed was Maime’s. All of the women looked exactly like Cooper imagined female pharmaceuticals reps looked – blonde, big-breasted and wearing short skirts. Cooper’s kind of woman.
“Mornin,” the three of them chimed in unison.
“I was hoping you’d be able to help me out. I’m looking to find some information about your coworker Maime Brewer. I know y’all talked to the police, but I thought maybe there were some other things you could share with me.”
“You a cop?” asked Linelle.
“No, ma’am. A private investigator,” Cooper explained with a smile.
The ladies returned the smile, shared a look with one another and over the course of the next ninety minutes spilled everything they knew. By the time Cooper left, he’d had two cups of coffee, got a little dirt on Maime and even landed the only single woman’s phone number.
The women explained that Maime had grown quite erratic in the weeks leading up to her disappearance. Her work had slacked off, her sales plummeted, and she was about to be fired. Some suspected a drug problem, although they couldn’t be sure what. The drug samples she had access to at the office were mostly women’s drugs, treating everything from prenatal care to menopause symptoms. There was nothing she sold that would really be the kind of prescription pill she’d get hooked on.
They also shared that Maime took late lunches at least a few times a week with a man they didn’t know. He would often pull up right to the front office door. She would leave with him, and as the women said, return later in the day looking “like that cat that ate the canary.”
The more they described him, Cooper thought it sounded a lot like Dean.
The Friday of her disappearance the women said Maime skipped her usual lunch and left late in the afternoon for a sales appointment or at least that’s what she told them. No one really bothered to watch her leave but were all surprised when they left at five that Maime’s SUV was still there. They assumed she would have taken her own car for a sales meeting. They suspected then that she had lied, but no one really thought much of it until the news report that she was missing. It really hit home Monday when she didn’t show up for work.
By the time Cooper left, he was feeling pretty good as he walked across the parking lot to his truck. He got a pretty girl’s number and good confirmation that Maime was definitely having an affair. As Cooper got to his truck, he noticed there was a car wash just across the side street. He wondered if the car wash employees ever paid attention to the pretty girls from Maime’s office. He made his way across the street, and to Cooper’s delight, they were more than willing to talk. The cops had never bothered.
They told Cooper that they noticed all the girls. They’d have to be blind not to. Maime, they said, left most days with a dark-haired guy in a silver BMW 5-series sedan. The Friday she went missing one of the guys noticed she walked to her SUV, climbed in and waited a few minutes. He noticed because she sat there and talked on her cellphone. The same BMW pulled up, Maime climbed in, kissed the driver and they left together. They never saw her return. Her SUV was still in the lot when the car wash closed up at seven that night.
It was all Cooper needed to hear. He was almost a little excited about his next stop.
CHAPTER 47
COOPER PULLED THROUGH the wrought iron gates of the Little Rock Country Club. He made his way up the tree-lined hill to the Georgian style main house with its huge, white round columns lining the front veranda. The house looked like it belonged on a true southern plantation rather than as the main building for the club. The house was built in 1917, made especially for the club and never served as anything else. Cooper was sure it was the replica of some plantation house somewhere, but he never did pay that much attention to history.
He drove his truck through the main parking lot and parked his truck among brand-new BMWs, a few Jags and even more luxury SUVs. Cooper paid a pretty penny for his club membership, but it was the only advertising money he needed to spend. Anyone who was anyone belonged to the club. He picked up most of his clients, especially the law firms, right on the club’s greens, golf club in hand.
Walking through the main house had a way of making you feel more important than you really were. It was the only time Cooper had that feeling – other than solving a case.
Cooper said hello to the trophy wives and their husbands as he headed straight back to the bar area. There he found just who he came to see. Cooper walked up to the bar, ordered a Jack and Coke and took a seat right next to Dean.
“Who let you in?” Dean asked without turning to look at Cooper. They made eye contact through their reflections in the mirror in front of them. Dean had a cigar in hand and brandy in front of him. “This club is for members only.”
“Funny thing, I’m a member and you know that because you’ve seen me here before. Let’s cut through the bull,” Cooper said, watching Dean straight ahead while rolling the ice around in his glass.
“I told you everything I had to say last night. Don’t you have anyone better to question?”
“Nope. See, I think there are a lot of secrets you have rolling around in your head. I think you really want to tell someone. I thought I’d give you that chance.”
Dean didn’t speak for several minutes. Then he turned to Cooper and said aggressively, “I’m not someone you want to mess with. Whatever you think you have, you don’t.”
Cooper knew he’d gotten to Dean for him to come off so defensively. They certainly weren’t going to have a friendly chat. Cooper hadn’t thought he would get the information so easily. He was just willing to give Dean the chance. He also enjoyed screwing with him. Innocent men were usually willing to cooperate. Cooper got the distinct impression that Dean was guilty of more than just an affair.
Cooper put his drink back on the bar and threw down a twenty that more than covered his tab. He got up close to Dean, leaned over him, and said in a low tone, nearly a growl, right in his ear, “Screwing your best friend’s wife and being too dumb to realize that there are at least four witnesses willing to testify that you picked Maime up Friday afternoon — making you the last person to see her alive — isn’t what I would call nothing.”
Undeterred, Cooper went on, “You might want to consider who you’re messing with. When you get done playing whatever game you’re playing, you might want to let all of us know where Maime is before we start to think you’ve killed her and a few other women, too. Wanting George’s life and his wife seems like strong motive to me.”
Dean didn’t say a word. Cooper strutted out happy he’d made his point. He didn’t look back. He was pretty sure he left that smug fool sitting there with his jaw hanging open. Right now, Cooper held all the cards. He wanted to keep it that way awhile longer.
More than an hour ticked by as Cooper waited in his truck for Dean to leave the country club. His plan was to follow Dean and see where he was headed now that he was spooked. That was exactly why Cooper hadn’t let on that he’d seen him and the cop the night before. He was giving Dean more rope to hang himself. Cooper wanted solid evidence of them meeting first. He thought the confrontation at the club would be enough to get them back together. He hoped he was right.
Cooper moved his truck far from any BMWs and waited. At least Cooper would be able to confirm what Dean drove, if he drove instead of walked. That was also a possibility, but Cooper was betting Dean was lazy. It was dark the other night, and Cooper couldn’t make out anything other than Dean’s car was a BMW. He didn’t know the model.
Cooper wasn’t r
eally sure what to make of Dean yet. While he confirmed the affair, he wasn’t really sure Dean could kill Maime. Not to mention how the other women would factor in. He had to agree with Luke that it wasn’t just a coincidence that all the women seemed to be connected in some way or another to George. If it wasn’t George, and Cooper couldn’t get past how strongly Riley felt it wasn’t, then it had to be someone close to him. He didn’t like George, but Riley seemed to know him better than all of them so he couldn’t totally rule out her feelings on the situation, even as naïve as he thought she was being.
Cooper watched Dean leave the club’s main house and walk through the parking lot to the silver BMW 5-series sedan in the corner that Cooper suspected was Dean’s. It was. Cooper gave him enough distance as he drove down the driveway and out to Country Club Road. Cooper was quick to follow behind. They snaked through the streets of the wealthy Heights neighborhood. Dean went straight back to his house. As they approached Dean’s house, Cooper pulled over to the curb blocks from the house and waited.
Almost a half hour ticked by and the same unmarked car pulled up. The guy parked in the road almost two doors down from Dean’s house. It was mid-day. With the angle of the sun, Cooper was able to use his telephoto lens to get a clear shot of the man as he exited his vehicle and walked up Dean’s driveway. From where Cooper was sitting, he could still get a clear shot of Dean opening the door and letting the man inside. Cooper clicked off a series of photos in rapid succession. Cooper decided to wait and follow the guy after he left Dean’s house. In the meantime, Cooper used the telephoto lens again to zoom in on the car tags. He copied the letters and numbers down and sent a quick text to Luke with the information.
Cooper didn’t like this whole situation. This wasn’t the simple missing person’s case he thought when he started. The more he followed Dean and interacted with him, the less he liked him. He was shady, too secretive, and what kind of man has an affair with his best friend’s wife. That right there in Cooper’s mind made Dean capable of just about anything. Several scenarios of what could be happening ran through his mind, but nothing seemed to stick.
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