After Burgos was executed, those of us who put him away divvied up the items. There were all kinds of photographs and memorabilia in the evidence room, and we ransacked it like looters after the Rodney King verdict. Over a dozen members of the team have at least one item from evidence. I think some of them are on eBay now.
I was the luckiest, probably because I was considered unofficially the head of the Burgos team. I have the original note Burgos wrote, with the lyrics of that stupid song that he used as a blueprint for his murders. There are two photographs of him being led in, and out, of the courtroom during the trial. An article, featuring a photo of me, from Time magazine. A photograph of the bathtub where Burgos drowned Maureen Hollis. A transcript of the interrogation where Burgos incriminated himself to Detective Joel Lightner. And, front and center in the montage, two of the weapons in Terry Burgos’s arsenaclass="underline" First, the knife that Burgos used to remove the heart of Ellie Danzinger and to slice Angie Mornakowski’s throat-an ordinary kitchen knife with a five-inch blade. Second, the machete that Burgos never got around to using. My personal favorite. A heavy-duty, twenty-six-inch, high-carbon spring steel machete.
I blow out a long sigh. That was a real time. Chasing bad guys, putting together links in a chain to prove the case, grabbing beers with the coppers after. Now I’m wealthy beyond my wildest hopes, I have a governor itching to make me a federal judge, and here I’m pining for the past. You spend so much time looking to move up, you forget how much you enjoyed the climb.
I rip a piece of cardboard from one of the unpacked boxes, find some packing tape, and do my best job patching up the hole in the basement door. It doesn’t fix the problem but it provides some temporary relief. Now I need the same thing for the pain in my head and my hand. I decide on a particular medicine, one that is served in a conical glass, I don’t care if it’s past three in the morning, and head upstairs.
17
LEO SITS in the coffee shop, back to the wall-never show them your back-eyes on the store window and the door. He pretends to read the paper but looks over it down the street. His eyes feel heavy. His movements are slow. It was a late night-more accurately, an early morning-with Riley and the one in the alley.
He watches each person who enters the café. None of them pay him attention. But that’s exactly what they’d want him to think. They’d want his guard down.
They underestimate him. He knows they could be anywhere, they could be anyone.
He touches his stomach gently, begging the acid to stay away, knowing that the more he obsesses, the more likely, and ferocious, its arrival.
A young, thin, blond-haired woman in a tank top, with sunglasses perched on her head, pushing a baby in a carriage and holding a bottle of green tea, takes a lounge chair three feet away from him. She pretends to tend to the baby but her head turns and she looks in his direction, casually, oh so casually, like it’s not on purpose.
Talk to the lady. Test her.
He tries. He doesn’t do so well with words. Doesn’t say them right. I like your baby, is what he wants to say.
The woman turns and smiles at him “Thank you.” Looks at him like she feels sorry for him. “This one kept me up all night.”
He tries to smile. Long night.
At night, I think about dark things.
Try again: How old is she? He does okay with that.
The woman answers-“She’s ten months”-and Leo breaks eye contact, but he can see her reaction, she picks up her child and holds her close.
Leo winces at the stabbing in his stomach. The woman gets up quickly and walks toward the counter. He looks out the window just in time to see Paul Riley’s car in the alley, his car backing out into the alley, behind his house.
The woman is looking in his direction, he pretends not to notice, but he’s smarter than her. He can watch her without letting her know he’s watching her.
I know you’re staring at me, you little bitch. I could rip your eyes out without breaking a sweat.
Leo puts on his baseball cap and leaves the café. He looks back. The woman is staring at him through the window, caressing the baby’s head. Bad baby. Fake baby.
Leo jogs to his car. He drives miles away and then turns back toward Riley’s street, entering from a different direction. He keeps north of Riley’s house for a long while, parked by a curb, watching the rearview and driver‘s-side mirrors. Nothing. No vehicle traffic. Nothing. Nobody.
He drives to the next block over and parks. This street is like Riley‘s, expensive houses, high gates and small, elaborate landscapes, fancy lawns, perfect houses, perfect people, shiny and happy. He removes his gym bag from the trunk and walks to the corner, turning in the direction of Riley’s street, stops midblock and turns down the alley.
He finds Riley’s detached garage and the gate into his backyard. He uses Riley’s house keys from last night. First one doesn’t work, second one fails, third time, he’s in.
There’s a sliding glass door on his patio, but it’s not opened by a key. No. Down a stairwell is a door under lock and key that leads to the basement. He stands at the foot of the stairwell, five feet below ground. One of the panes to the basement door window has been shattered and replaced with a piece of cardboard.
Leo slips another key into the door, the first one doesn’t take, second one does, he heads inside with his bag. Good. Good.
Twenty minutes later, he emerges from the house and locks the door behind him, walks back up the stairs and looks up into a vibrant sun. He admits it, yes, it feels good, feels good, but it’s a weapon they use, the weather, turning everyone into smiling, shiny, happy people. Happy, smiling, shiny, ignorant robots.
I can live in your world. I can live in yours and mine at the same time. That’s the difference between me and you. That’s the difference between me and Terry.
He calmly marches back to the gate. Once back in the alley, he picks up his pace, eyes darting about because this would be a time, when it’s nice and shiny and warm, not a care in the world, right, not a care in the world and I’ll be whistling to myself and then you’ll come, then you’ll come when I don’t expect it-
But then he’s on the sidewalk, back to the car, safe, start the car. Calm now, heartbeat normalizes, breathing exercises, blast the air-conditioning, breathe in, breathe out, cold against his wet shirt, try to smile. He passes by the coffee shop, his hat pulled low, and looks through the window, to where he was sitting not a half hour ago.
The woman with the baby is gone.
He looks in the rearview mirror at the cars behind him. He quickly pulls over, forcing the other vehicles to pass him by, the drivers to show themselves, but none of the drivers are thin, blond-haired women with a baby in the back, but then, they wouldn’t be that obvious. He waits, one-two, one-two-three, a break in the traffic, and he pulls the car into a quick U-turn. Turns left at the first street, then another left, then another, driving in a square, eyes on the rearview mirror at all times. Looks okay. But, to be sure, he repeats the process twice more. He’s gotten this far. No reason to let up now.
Tonight, he will know for sure.
18
JEREMY LARRABEE crosses his leg after completing a brief summation of the facts of his case to Judge Landis. His client, Josefina Enriques, was an administrative assistant in one of the suburban plants of Bentley Bearings. She’s a fifty-two-year-old Latino woman who filed a workers’ comp claim for carpal tunnel syndrome a year earlier. Three months later, she was fired by my client, Bentley Bearings. The lawsuit Jeremy Larrabee filed on her behalf included claims for discrimination based on race, gender, age, and workers’ comp retaliation. He’s given notice to the court that he will seek to certify a class of all employees who fall within these categories.