“I don’t remember exactly, but that sounds about right.”
“Yeah, sixteen. Tried as an adult. It’s been a real thing in the court lately, going back over those cases with youthful offenders.”
“Like what, we were supposed to just send him home with a warning because he was a minor? Stop killing people or we’ll take away your allowance?”
“Hey, I’m just the messenger here, Alex. You’re preaching to the choir.”
“Sorry, it’s just…”
“I know, I know. Believe me. I’ve seen a few other cases like that. Maybe not as bad as this one. Bottom line, the kid’s spent his whole adult life in prison. I don’t know where he’s going to live, what he’s gonna do, but I do know he’ll be out in a few days. Not that I expect him to come looking for you or anything.”
“No, probably not. Good luck finding me, even if he wanted to.”
The sergeant laughed at that. “Yeah, what, you’re where, in Paradise? I gotta be honest, I had to look up where that is before I called you.”
“It’s a long way from Detroit,” I said. “I don’t think I’ll have to watch my back.”
“No, like I said, I don’t expect this kid to do anything. I keep calling him a kid, I realize, and he’s not a kid now. But you know what I mean. You just need to let people know.”
“I understand. So you called me…”
“And Detective Bateman, yes.”
“Wow, Arnie Bateman,” I said. “Another name I haven’t heard in a long time.”
“Yeah, he’s off the force now, too. Left right around the same time I did. Things were just getting a little too crazy in the department. More and more politics every year.”
“Okay, so me and the detective. I assume you’re letting the victim’s family know, too?”
“The court system does that. Certainly won’t be me, and no thank you, anyway. That would be a whole different thing.”
“I can’t even imagine,” I said. “I remember talking to the husband. It’s been a long time, and maybe he’s moved on with his life. Gotten married again, I don’t know. But in a way it probably feels like it just happened, you know?”
“Exactly. Now they’re telling you the guy who killed your wife is going to walk free.”
“I still can’t believe it,” I said. “Was it first degree murder in the end?”
I wasn’t there for that part. I was in the hospital when the trial took place, or maybe I was already out of the hospital and off the force and living through my lost year.
“Second degree, I think. After they cut that deal or whatever they did. But still. It’s not right.”
“Well, I appreciate the call, Sergeant. It was good to hear from you.”
“Tony, damn it. And you know what? We have to have a drink sometime. You ever get down this way? I live in Plymouth now.”
“Plymouth? Really?” Last I saw it, Plymouth was a little town in the middle of a cornfield or something, twenty miles west of Detroit on the way to nowhere.
“Yeah, you wouldn’t recognize the place now. Look who’s talking, anyway. At least you don’t have to look up Plymouth on the map.”
“Fair point.”
“But I mean it, Alex, I should have called you a long time ago. It’s not right to lose touch like that. You gotta get down here so we can catch up for real. We’ll have that drink, and your money’s no good down here.”
“Next time I’m downstate. I promise.”
“You’d better, Officer. That’s an order. You take care of yourself, all right?”
I promised him I would. Then we both hung up, and I’m not sure either of us really thought we’d ever see each other again.
An hour later, I was still thinking about the call. That name, Darryl King, which had been so important to me, so long ago. To the whole city of Detroit, really, in that one hot month of June. I had done my small part to bring him to justice, and then my own life had gotten turned upside down, just a matter of days later. I had had no reason to ever think about him again. Until now.
I was in my truck, rolling down to the end of the logging road, past four empty cabins. The family in the second cabin had just left that morning. That left only the couple in the last cabin, the same couple I had seen that evening, down at the Glasgow. The lights were on when I pulled up. I could see that they were inside.
I took an armload of firewood from the bed of my truck and stacked it next to the front door. Then the door opened and the man was standing there, looking out at me.
“Don’t mean to disturb you,” I said. “It’s just getting a little cold tonight, so I thought I’d leave some wood.”
“It’s August,” he said, with some kind of fake outrage. “It’s not supposed to get cold.”
He thought that was pretty funny. When he was done laughing, he thanked me for the wood.
“This has been such a great week,” he said. “We really love it up here.”
“Well, I’m glad to hear that.”
“It’s not even that cold in here, but I think I’ll start a fire anyway. It really gets Gloria in the mood, if you know what I mean.”
I just nodded at that one. Definitely more than I needed to hear, but what the hell. You’re lucky enough to be alone with someone who loves you, in a nice cozy cabin at the end of the road in the most remote place you could ever find yourself in. Your real lives, all of your responsibilities and all of the demands, they’re all back home, three hundred miles away. Why not pretend you’re newlyweds again?
“You have a good night.” I got in my truck and drove back down that lonely road to my lonely cabin. I had already made the decision by the time I got back inside.
I called back my old sergeant, surprising the hell out of him, I’m sure. I told him I’d be coming back downstate to take him up on his offer of a drink.
Then I made one more call.
CHAPTER TWO
Another summer, the one that would turn out to be my last wearing a uniform. Half my life ago. Detroit, back when Detroit was still on its feet. It was a wobbling prizefighter, holding on to the ropes with one hand, but nobody was counting it out yet.
Seven thirty in the morning, on the first day of June. I remember that part because the first day of any month was hell for most Detroit police officers, on account of something they called MAD. It was a three-shift system for patrol officers, M for midnight, A for afternoon, D for day. You did one month on one shift, then you switched over to another. If you were lucky, you got a day off on the switch day, but of course you can’t give everyone the same day off, so most of the time you had to do a quick turnaround. Day-shifters going home and grabbing a few hours of sleep before reporting back at midnight, midnight-shifters going home in the morning and then coming back for the afternoon shift, which started at 4:00 p.m. Or on that particular day for me and my partner, coming off the afternoon shift at midnight, stumbling home, and trying to get as much real sleep as possible before that alarm went off and you had to be right back for morning roll call. The smarter criminals in Detroit had a rule-never mess with a cop on the first day of the month.
Sergeant Tony Grimaldi was doing the roll call that day. He was about as Italian as the name would suggest, an eastsider from Warren, where a lot of the Italians seemed to come from. He had been a high school baseball star who went on to play for a small college, so he took a natural interest in my minor league career, and it was obvious he thought both of us had come one inch from making it to the majors, even though he never even got a tryout. It was harmless, of course, and he was a sergeant. So I let it slide.
“All right, listen up,” he said, standing up there by the chalkboard. “Welcome back to the daylight, Officers. Hope you all have some coffee in you. Before we get to the announcements for the day, I’ve got a special guest star who wants to say something to you.”