Where are our Children: A Novel: Complete and Uncut
Chapter Twelve
Xavier Prince lacks the will necessary to stomach a prolonged engagement with you, Serena. You need to exploit him on this.
-The Caretaker’s private conversation with Serena Tennyson 13 weeks before the former’s death in September 2010.
Chris
Christopher Prince’s residence, Wendy Hill Road, 20th Day
Denise’s people started arriving in mass soon after 10:00 am.
Special Agent Christopher Prince’s house had started smelling of fried chicken, collard greens, macaroni and cheese, black eyed peas and sweet potato pies hours since the crack of dawn. There were four of Denise’s female family members cooking in his kitchen, the food to be served in traditional family after her homecoming service scheduled for 1:00 pm. Yet, it didn’t take a half an hour of her people’s arrival at his home before things went to hell from there. Denise’s fraternal grandfather, who looked as if his suit had been tailored for someone else, knocked a decently expensive vase to the tile floor ten minutes ago. Two of her cousins learned upon their arrival here that they were sharing the same boyfriend. His ex-wife’s beached whale of a nephew abruptly left the premises, with a chicken leg in his hand, after he learned it was his other Aunt Denise that died.
A half of dozen of her former co-workers spoke to him with tears in their eyes. Her oldest living uncle blew his nose into a handkerchief, patted Chris twice on the gut, commented on what a fine young lady his niece was and asked Chris if he had any liquor in the house. Her toothpick of a brother, who had just been paroled for whatever his latest arrest was, hugged Chris around his neck and apologized to him for all the drama his older sister put him through. And then he asked him if he thought she or Erica would have any money left off of the insurance policies after the funeral expenses to pay his bail bondsman. Finally, her cleavage revealing cousin Bonnie whispered in his ear that she fucking knew in her spirit that he had thrown Denise out of that window. She was still praying about it. And if the spirit would allow her to prove such a thing she’d fucking spit on him right now. But she knew he was in bed with them Roosters and they would protect his ass.
Hope and memory wasn’t on his side. He knew he was a dolphin swimming in an ocean full of sharks.
Maybe now he understood why he never got a long with these people.
A trusted high school buddy of his, who still wore his hair in a ponytail like a girl, was greeting his guest as they walked through the door. Chris saw him point in his general direction in the living room when Tabitha Blue, his partner showed up.
“Hey partner,” Blue said, not quite knowing to do with her hands. She was dressed in a black blouse and matching trousers. She had her hair untied and it hung down to her shoulders. She wore a touch of blush on her cheeks and less lipstick than that on her mouth. This was her equivalent of being dressed up. Chris couldn’t ever remember seeing her so…pretty before.
“Tabitha,” he kissed some of the blush on her cheek. “Hey, thanks for coming.”
Chris noticed how uncomfortable his partner looked. She shifted in her stance and buried her hands deeper in her pants pockets. Social calls weren’t his partner’s calling. And although Chris knew there wasn’t a racist bone in her body, he was sure that Blue had never been around these many Black folks without having her gun drawn.
“Uh…” She started to say something. “Agent Sheridan’s been trying to reach you.”
Chris nodded and checked his private cell phone for messages. “Sheridan should have known to call me on my business cell.” He spoke up to be heard over a room full of Denise’s friends and family. He also saw that he missed yet another call from his doctor. The man must think that I am purposely ducking him. “I’ve been trying to tie up a million loose ends over here. You know, statements to the police, dealing with the insurance companies, and calling Denise’s family.”
“I understand.” She patted his hand and that drew a sneer from Bonnie. I told you that you were in bed with them Roosters…he could almost hear her thinking aloud. “I’m sure that our boss understands too. He apologizes for missing this. He’s trying to tie up some loose ends of his own as well. He told me to take all of the time that you need.”
Chris knew that his superior would have meant just that under normal operations and caseloads. The last 19 days hadn’t qualified for anything near normal however. “I appreciate the sentiment.” He smiled because he thought that his partner needed to see him smile. “I’m okay, Tabitha, really. Denise had been my ex-wife for a couple of years now. We weren’t in love anymore. That part of our relationship had deteriorated a long time ago. I’m okay.” He lowered his voice and beckoned Blue closer. “Talk to me about our cases.”
She relaxed a bit…well, at least as much as Tabitha Blue ever relaxed. Chris knew that he was retreating into a far more familiar territory with this line of questioning. “A fifth and sixth child had been reported missing in the past 24 hours.”
“Damn.”
“We found another staged scene. You’re doctor friend helped me investigate it and pick it apart.”
Chris lowered his voice any further as he saw that Bonnie was still looking on. “Tell me about it.”
Special Agent Tabitha Blue told him that Keaton or whoever had placed another action figure, or doll if you may, in a tightly fitted area about 20 blocks from where we found the first one. Most of what Angel said sounded like the psycho gibberish that she shared with them all at the other crime scenes: The action figure was Black, was supposed to represent a minor in his pre-teens and definitely male. He had slash marks around his throat and a real bullet lodged in his head as well.
“What is different from the other four previous scenes,” Blue added smoothly, “Is that this doll was turned on his hands and knees.”
“In a sexual sense I know that could be looked at two ways.”
“That’s what Doctor Hicks-Dupree said as well. She also said that it could be looked at from a non-sexual context as a missionary stance. Anyway, I was there when she told Sheridan, Deputy Director Rice and some other higher ups that these boys were only days from being molested.”
Chris watched his partner hesitate…her monologue paused while she figured something else out. He asked her: “Is there something else, Tabitha?”
“This doll had black marker marks all over his naked torso, and the theory made the rounds that the markings represented these children being burned.”
“Angel concluded this as well?”
Blue glanced away. “Actually, I did, Chris. But the doctor seconded my opinion and presented it as such to our superiors.” She shifted her weight, just as uncomfortable talking about her person as she was about her manner of appearance today. “Angel’s conclusion is that this phase of abductions and kidnappings is drawing to a close and like we said…a more physical element is coming.”
“I believe I guess the rest,” Chris added. “The flame markings on this last doll’s torso are a representation of these children being offered to Serena Tennyson’s Dragon…them dying in a fiery manner if Keaton is disturbed in any way.
Blue nodded and had to push her thin hair out of her eyes. Chris could see a clear image of children screaming…and…dying, but he did not know whether the image was from days past or night still to come.
I abandoned the first captives…but I swear that I won’t rest until these little boys are found.
Blue looked as if there were still more for her to reveal. He patted her on one of her skinny shoulders and urged her to continue.
“The doctor believes that something has changed.”
“How so?”
“This last scene looked sloppy and lacked the care and attention to detail this time around. She hypothesized that either this was an entirely different person who put this together or this time the person from the other scenes was extremely rushed or stressed.”
Before Chris could respond intelligently, he saw another woman greet his high school chum and walk through hi
s front door. He was slightly embarrassed because he couldn’t shut his mouth. He wasn’t the only one who watched the woman make her way towards where he was standing. She was wearing a short but tastefully cut black dress with pearls around her neck. She wore her hair long and straight. She donned enough eye shadow to highlight the darkness in her brown eyes. There were a pair of diamond stud earrings in each ear and her watch gleamed in the morning sunlight shining through Chris’ windows.
Roxanne Sanchez hugged Chris tightly before she said her hello.
He gathered himself the best he could…and introduced this splendid looking woman to his partner. They greeted one another with a professional handshake.
Blue must have felt the heat between his partner and the latest entry in an overly crowded room. “I should go. I’ll see you later, Chris. Turn you phone on.”
“I will.” He said to Blue yet never took his eyes off of Roxanne. At this moment no one else existed in this room. Only one other woman had ever garnered his undivided attention like this before. And it wasn’t his ex-wife who they were going to bury a short time from now. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“If I’m making you uncomfortable—“
“No, of course not, Roxanne,” Chris grabbed her hand almost as a reflex. He then gave it a squeezed. “I want you to stay. I need you to stay; I just thought after we’d said our goodbyes on the phone the other night after you informed me of Erica’s discovery that I might not see you again.”
“Why would you think such a thing?”
“You had concluded your investigation.” He lowered his voice again. “You found Erica.”
Roxanne looked at her shoes. “I felt the need to pay my respects to Denise. “She lifted her chin. Her eyes were so dark yet so amazing. It was like he was seeing them…seeing her for the very first time. “I knew your ex-wife only for a short time, but I respected her…liked her even. Will you be burying both of them today?”
“Yea,” Chris gave his rapidly filling up house a once over. “I tried to think of her family, you know, having to take off from work twice in a very short time frame. Denise was born and spent all of her youth in Tennessee. Most of these folks had to make anywhere from a four to six hour drive here into Atlanta to attend their funerals.”
“Sure, that was very thoughtful of you.”
“Look, Roxanne,” Chris finally realized he was still holding on to her hand. He let it go, but she only smiled and held his instead. “I never fully thanked you for finding Erica for us. You honored Denise.”
“No…don’t thank me, Chris.” Roxanne’s eyes lost some of its brilliance. She was a professional investigator again…hard…and unrelenting. “I did my job. I gave my word to the two of you to bring Erica home again.” She took a full step towards him and whispered in his ear so that no one else would hear her words. “I am still doing my job, Chris. Erica’s killer has yet to be apprehended. And have the APD said anything to you about whether Denise was alone when she jumped out of her window?”
It was a curious question…but one that he had asked himself actually. He passed on what the APD told him: They were investigating any and all angles of what surrounded the final hours and minutes before Denise Prince’s death. They were certain that it was a suicide. But someone had to drive Denise downstate when she found Chris and Angel alone in that hotel room. Chris was still trying to recover from her latest verbal assault and emotional outbreak when he finally peered out of his door—to see only the taillights of the car she’d ridden in speeding off in a pile of dust and burned rubber.
Chris thanked Roxanne again and they finally let go of each other’s hand. He also thanked her a second time for coming to his home and paying her respects.
“You don’t get it do you?” She folded her arms. “I had to come here today. I had to see for myself if you were okay.” She turned her head ever slightly to the left away from most of the crowd…Chris following her gaze to the corner of his dining room that approached his bedroom. He had a sketch of Hoshi Givens sitting at nearly an impossible angle for anyone standing where Roxanne stood to see it. “What a lovely portrait,” She said and he had to follow her over to where it was. Roxanne ran her manicured fingernail underneath Hoshi’s even darker eyes and around the curve of her thin lips. “There is no doubt she was a beautiful woman…she’s an American but of what descent?”
“Hoshi’s father was from Singapore and her mother was from Malaysia.”
“The texture of the canvas is very smooth. The background colors the artist chose blend in especially well with her skin tone.” She took her eye off of the drawing long enough to look into his eyes. “You’re the artist aren’t you, Chris?”
Chris shifted his weight. He was as uncomfortable with this area of conversation as Tabitha Blue had been on social levels minutes ago. “She was…” He tried and failed to keep emotion out of his response. Damn, does the pain of losing you ever go away, Hoshi? Roxanne, you should meet Hoshi Givens. She died in an accident many years ago soon after the two of us became engaged.”
Accident was a slight proclamation of what truly happened to his first true love.
Hoshi had wrapped her Audi around a poll 30 minutes after a heated parent teacher conference at the elementary school where she taught third grade. The parent had cursed her and threatened bodily harm to her if his son’s grades didn’t magically rise over the remainder of the semester. Special Agent Christopher Prince would have called himself a bold faced liar if he claimed there wasn’t times during his career that he wanted to use his badge and his resources…to engage in behavior that ventured outside the law.
The man who helped aid in the death of his beloved came closest to witnessing that…behavior first hand.
He never liked to talk about how Hoshi had died…or that his father was taken from him in an automotive incident as well…killed by a drunk driver while he was returning home from duty.
Besides…I know there is enough death here today without me digging up graves from the past.
“You must have loved her deeply.”
“I did.” And Chris unclutched his fist as he admitted as much to Roxanne.
“I can tell.” Roxanne said. “I see how much attention to detail you paid when you drew her. The texture of the canvas as I mentioned before, the hues and colors that you chose. No matter how still she may have sat, the areas around her mouth and eyes wouldn’t have been the same each day you went back to work on her portrait. Some of your strokes were generated from memory.” And then she faced him down. “And I know love in a man’s eyes when I see it.”
“Do you?”
Now it was Roxanne’s turn to whither under the fire of his gaze. Two more guests walked up to Chris and greeted him warmly. He acknowledged them one at a time and returned his attention to Roxanne after they moved on to other family members.
After some of people in his house had begun to file out Roxanne said: “I also came today to speak with you about another matter. It’s important.”
“I’m listening.”
“It’s about your friend. There is something that you should know about Dr. Hicks Dupree—“
“Angel?” Chris asked. “How do you know her?”
Before Roxanne could answer his question Chris noticed a hush over the remaining crowd as his high school bud ushers someone of his own race into Chris’ home.
Angel had arrived.
The crowd parted like the red sea in that old Bible story as she limped past them in route to reaching him. Chris could hear all of the hateful mutterings and comments and sure that his childhood friend could hear them loud and clear.
Rumors could be a vicious thing. Lies were worse still. Chris had seen his name attached to both before. Now he knew that despite all of the help she’d been giving the bureau, that Angel was being persecuted in the court of public opinion for her brief involvement in Pandora.
And now Roxanne Sanchez, a woman who otherwise fascinated him like know woman had since Hoshi
Givens, was going to join in with the persecutors for one reason or another. And that angered him some.
“Christopher,” Angel hugged him fiercely. She was wearing a cream button up blouse with a knee length black skirt and flats. Heels only tired her leg out faster. She reeked of a beer keg. She was off duty, he told himself, and she had been there for me when I told her the entire truth about Keaton’s kidnapping of me all those years ago. She turned to Roxanne and the younger woman’s gaze would have charred though Angel if only Roxanne had an igniter.
Angel must have noticed the bad vibes reverberating off of Roxanne. “Have we met?”
“My name is Roxanne Sanchez.”
Angel nodded. “The Private Investigator,” Angel reached out her hand but Roxanne folded one arm across the other and stood on her heels. “And yes…I think we have met before actually. Your name rang a bell with me when Christopher mentioned you before.” Angel folded her own arms and stood her ground preparing for whatever sparring came next. “Once again, Roxanne, I’m very sorry that your sister’s…case ended the way that it did.”
Roxanne said: “And once again you refuse to take any responsibility for your part in her demise.” She exhaled audibly through her nostrils. “Listen, I don’t want to discuss my sister with you, not here.”
“Sister,” Chris asked. “What are you two talking about?”
Roxanne glared at Angel a moment longer. “Why don’t you answer your friend’s question, Doctor?” She made the last word as if she had cursed her. “Why don’t you answer all of his questions, even the ones he doesn’t know he has for you yet. In speaking of questions, Doctor, how is your husband?”
“My husband is my business and none of yours.”
Angel and Roxanne engaged in an endless game of stare down until Roxanne seemed to have enough, said her goodbye to Chris and turned to leave them where they stood.
“What in the hell was all of that about?” He asked Angel after Roxanne showed herself out.
Angel frowned. “It’s complicated.”
“Try me, Doc, you and I have done complicated before.”
“You’re new friend is the younger sister of Maria Sanchez.”
Chris searched his professional memory banks for the file with that name located inside of it. Shit. “Sanchez.” He felt his hairless brow rising on his forehead. “The female serial killer you aided the bureau in capturing a few years back?”
“One and the same,” Angel replied. “And ‘bringing her in’ might be the greatest understatement you make this year, Christopher. You don’t know how I damned wish that the case would have ended far simpler…and less messy than it actually did.”
“Alright,” Chris said after he thought about it at a deeper level. “Maria Sanchez did die under controversial circumstances while in the bureau’s custody.”
“She did,” Angel told him. And Angel made a point to stare long and hard at his front door where Roxanne Sanchez had showed herself out. “And I’m sure that she blames most of it on me because ultimately, I was the one who talked Maria into surrendering herself over to the FBI.”
Xavier
Evolution Baptist Church (Cafeteria’s Bathroom), 20th Day
Too much ginger ale has that effect on you Bro.
Xavier Prince followed his older brother into the cafeteria’s bathroom and locked the door behind him. There were two ‘out of order’ signs and a plain clothed Peacekeeper between the two brothers and Denise’s family and friends who were dining on the far side of the building. A House in Chains Number One couldn’t help but grin knowing that his disguise had gotten him this far undetected by either friend or foe. He wore clothes two sizes too big, his hair was a chariot of fire and his teeth were on golden pond.
Chris, on the other hand looked good, in fact he was looking more like their father every day. He had gained some weight around his middle, but he was far from unhealthy looking. Xavier was thankful for the extra layer of skin attached to his own nose because this bathroom stank as if hadn’t been cleaned in months. He guessed that the cleanliness is close to Godliness didn’t apply to a church’s bathroom. He kept his distance while Chris handled his business, using the extra time to remove his brim, shades and false facial hair. Hopefully his pimp manner of walking hadn’t given him away. A man couldn’t change his DNA, his fingerprints or his walk no matter how much he had practiced the night before.
“Xavier?”
“Hello, big brother.”
Chris turned his clean shaven head ever so slightly to be sure he wasn’t seeing ghosts. “Is that really you? What are you doing here?” Chris scanned the dirty bathroom. “How did you get in here?”
Xavier turned on his shame face. There had been no other way of guaranteeing he’d get to see his brother; even wearing the disguise. “I’ve been riding with you all along.”
“There was a bit of delay when the cars lined up to drive to the church. I don’t remember seeing you get in either family car.”
“You’re hearing me, Chris, but you’re not listening.” Xavier said slowly, letting the other man catch up to his meaning. “Like I said before, I rode in the hertz with you all along.”
“Don’t tell me you were in the goddamn casket, Xavier,” Chris paced within a small area of space. And then he let out a burst of uncontrollable laughter. “You know shit like that lowers our chance of getting into heaven.”
Xavier laughed with his brother…stopping long enough to put his ear to the door, unnecessarily listening for anyone coming. The Circle had worked out an arrangement with the funeral home and had securely…and respectfully buried Denise in the plot that she and Chris had picked out when they were still married. The face and the upper torso that his brother and everyone else saw earlier inside the church was a finely detailed mannequin. Grace Edwards had contracted the work out to several individuals who specialized in that kind of thing and the three men had worked on the model from the time the news had broken of Denise’s unfortunate demise.
Xavier then told Chris that he had been smuggled into the casket when Denise’s actual body had been removed. Chris frowned at that. The younger brother reminded him that desperate times dictated just as desperate measures.
“I had to see you, Chris.”
The older brother’s facial expression bounced from anger to disbelief to hardened resolve then back again.
“All of this trouble that you went through,” Chris said. “I appreciate you coming here.”
“It was a beautiful ceremony. Denise and Erica would have been pleased with how you have honored their memories.” He feigned a punch to his brother’s gut. “Look at you, Bro; you’ve put on a few pounds.”
As soon as he said it, Xavier wished he could have taken his sentiment back. I see that you’ve become sensitive about the weight thing. “It’s been a long time.”
“It has been too long, Xavier.”
They finally embrace for long time, tears stinging at the corners of Xavier’s eyes. When they release one another the younger brother can tell that his older sibling shares his sentiment.
“Xavier, you know what all this reminds me of?”
Xavier didn’t and told his brother so as he pulled a toothpick from his plastic bag and stuck it in his mouth.
“I should have attended your mother’s funeral. The woman took me in…she accepted me when she didn’t have to. In the little time that the four of us lived under her roof she always treated me as if I were her biological child.” It was Chris’ turn to look shamefaced. “Yet, I wouldn’t attend her funeral. I came to all the other outside stuff but—“
“My mother loved you, Chris.” Xavier said. “She told me that on her deathbed. But you were only 14 years old man…and you’d lost your own mom four years earlier. And then we both knew you had to deal with our dad’s situation between our mothers. And finally you were abducted by Louis Keaton. She understood all of your anger and frustration…and confusion. She understood, Chris and so did I.”
&nbs
p; They let the past; the silence and the stench of the bathroom have their own separate and collective moments.
Chris broke the hush by saying: “After all we’ve been through together; it hurts me to know that we are on the opposite sides of the fence on this one.”
Xavier pushed the toothpick from one side of his mouth to the other with his tongue. “Are you absolutely sure about that?” Xavier raised his brows and scratched his sideburns. “I think we are a lot closer on the issues at hand than you think, Bro. I know first and foremost that we both want the safe return of Keaton’s kidnapping victims. Look Chris, is there anything you can tell me on that front without you compromising yourself or your people within the FBI?”
Chris shook his shaven head. “No, not really; and if Grace Edwards is still a House in Chains Intelligence Coordinator or whatever title you’ve given her, then you already know what I know…maybe more.”
“Alright then, let’s say for arguments sake that both of our organizations share some of the same theories.”
“About what,”
“Your people believe that Louis Keaton is the answer to today’s glaring question.”
“We both know that he is.”
“Well then the next obvious question is this,” Xavier said. “Is how long do we have to find him before he begins to molest these children?”
“I would say that day soon approaches.” Chris shared Angel’s running theories about where she thought Keaton was from various aspects of his thought processes without mentioning her specifically by name.
“I’m inclined to be more concerned with Serena Tennyson’s influence over him. We both know that that woman is more than capable and willing to pull strings to get what she wants.”
“Yea, I know that. I also know that if history is to repeat itself, she will order these children killed…the same exact way that the Caretaker had those poor boys who had been abducted along with me killed if she feels Keaton’s position and his mission is compromised in any way.”
“Yea,” Xavier couldn’t mask his discomfort with the direction this conversation had drifted towards. “Yea, I guess you would know a little something about that, Chris.”
“I would.” Chris shook his head while he said it though. You’re stronger than you give yourself credit for, Bro. You may not have been molested by Keaton, but no child was more abused during your time with him. “Xavier, look, tell me that you’re not going to do anything stupid are you?”
Xavier stood flatfooted and pulled the toothpick out of his mouth. “I hope that you don’t believe that using the Peacekeepers to defend a community of people from of our race against an extreme criminal element or preparing ourselves to engage Pandora if and when the time calls us to bear arms as stupid then I guess so.”
“And what if Thomas Pepper produces evidence and tells our people a part or all of the three things that they want to know the most.”
“Pepper is acting on the request of our former mayor, a woman who you should now know was my Number Two in the Circle, and a respected member of our House. The reporter’s findings are sure to weigh heavily on my decisions moving forward.”
“What are you hoping to accomplish, Xavier?”
“You know, Chris, I understand better than most what has transpired in your personal life over the past few days and weeks.” Xavier said in a matter of fact tone. “I just hope that you haven’t forgotten the 411 attacks. You were there from what I’m told. You and I both were targeted. Pandora massacred our people. Now Serena has unleashed an unstable man to once again to kidnap our children. Her actions cannot go unanswered.” Xavier lowered his voice to barely above a hiss. “I may not be the leader that our father was…I may not even be the leader that you would have been, but Serena’s crimes will not go unpunished. I can promise you that.”
“You’re bluffing, Xavier, I know you.” Chris said carefully. “You won’t order any type of true offensive against Pandora.” Instead of allowing himself to waste precious time and energy getting angry, Xavier told his older brother: “I hope my enemies mistake my finesse as weakness as well, Big Brother. I guess you slept through of capture of those twins who were terrorizing some of the neighborhood stores, or our victory at Calhoun Prison and maybe…just maybe you’ve already forgotten the Peacekeeper’s incursion and liberation of Carver.”
“Don’t talk to me about beating up damned thugs, drug dealers and gang bangers.”
Xavier raised his voice a tone. “I didn’t see you sacrificing people to better the situations in any of those places.”
“Xavier, when you are talking about taking on Pandora head on you are speaking about unleashing collateral effects that are potentially beyond anything that we have ever seen before.”
“And by saying that, I assume that you believe that all of the losses, all of the casualties will belong to a House in Chains. Do you believe that only People of Color will die in any conflict?”
“Serena has nearly unlimited resources.” Chris planted his fist on his hips in exasperation. “Hell, I belong to a licensed government agency and we’re struggling to match her blow for blow.”
Xavier cracked a disingenuous smile. “I’d be inclined to believe that none of your concern about all of this is about my strategy, resources or manpower. You’re not concerned about a House in Chains…it’s all about me. My big brother doesn’t think I’m up for the challenge.”
“Xavier—“
“Do you,”
Chris said, “My overriding concern is that you have failed to see a no-win scenario when it is flashing all of the warning signs in front of your face.”
Xavier snorted. “Then you might want to tell your bureau friends to do their damned jobs, my man. Perhaps we will all be spared knowing whether I am over my head or not.”
After a tense silence Chris said: “And I want you to know something, Xavier,”
“What’s that?”
“We are on the same side.”
“Just like always,” Xavier replied in a more relaxed tone. “And sometimes I feel as if it seems as if it is never at all.”
“I guess it’s another day in the life and times of the Prince Brothers.”
They embrace again. Xavier can’t kill the thought that it will be a great deal longer before they see one another again. For the first time since he entered this bathroom, Xavier felt the urge to smoke a cigarette.
“Watch your back, Little Brother.” Chris’ warm breath filled Xavier’s ear. “I especially want you to be careful around Quincy Morgan. You must never trust him.”
“I don’t.” Xavier responded. “And Chris, I know how you feel about Angel. I know how much her friendship has meant to you over the years. I’ve always liked her…more than she thinks I do. I certainly respect her work from one professional to another, but I’m hearing troublesome things on my end—“
“I got you; I’ll handle Angel.”
Xavier excuses himself as he walked past Chris to the mirror. He methodically reattaches all of his makeup and attachments, unlocks the door and turns back to his brother before he opens it. “I’ve always wanted to ask you something I just never could figure out whether I should?”
“Shoot,”
“It’s not my business.”
“But you should ask it anyway, Xavier? We are each other’s keeper.”
A beautiful instrumental piece begins to pipe in the room through the speakers that Xavier can’t see. It sounded faintly familiar. “Yes, I guess we are each other’s keeper at that.” He said, his voice sounded muffled underneath the skin of the fake nose. “I know very few things in my time in this world, but I do know that you loved Hoshi Givens with all of your heart and soul. I also know for a fact that she’s the only woman that you’ve truly ever loved…including the poor troubled soul we just buried.” Xavier rubbed his lower lip in a faint attempt to mask that it was trembling as he spoke. “Was how you felt about her then, the memory of your love; was it enough to overcome losing her in al
l of the years that have passed since?”
“It was.” Chris Prince did not hesitate. “It is.”
Xavier stood in his stance long enough to listen to the melody in its entirety. After a time he opened his eyes and realized he had tears in them and he felt the biggest smile of satisfaction lighting up his dark face. Chris mirrored his look as well. “That was a wonderful composition wasn’t it, Bro?” I’m sure somebody out in that cafeteria has that track or the CD it came from on hand, how about doing me a big favor and getting me the name of the artist.” Xavier said, punched a cigarette out the pack, and thought the better of it for a dozens of good reasons. “I’ve been dreaming about Dad every night since I was released from Calhoun. Sometimes I wake up in a cold sweat. I never remember what the dreams are about but I know that he’s always in them and he’s… alive, Chris. He’s always alive and he’s trying to tell me something.” He lowered his eyes. “I have to admit the whole thing scares the hell out of me. I don’t know what it all means. I do know that if I die before you do I want to go listening to something as beautiful as what we just heard.”
“Of course I would, Xavier, I just wonder what ways we’ll be listening to music on all those decades from now.” Chris said in a suggestive tone that Xavier caught immediately. “And I guess it’s comforting for me to know that some things don’t change with you like your love of instrumental music and your craving for the smokes.”
“I know…they’ll kill me yet...the smokes I mean.”
“Did I ever tell you thank you for saving my life all of those years ago when you saw me walking past our house?”
“You tell me every chance you get, Chris.” Xavier matched his brother’s serious tone. “Perhaps you’ll get to return the favor someday…don’t be late.” Xavier began to slip out of the bathroom door into the hall that led the activity of the cafeteria. “I’ll see you around.”
Xavier’s people get him out through a secret, looping, preordained matrix of a route. It is troubling, tiring, it is time consuming and by an hour’s end, completely successful.
Another hour later he is standing at a location not of his choosing on the other side of town and finds himself lighting his third cigarette in the past 20 minutes. He exhales…and coughs. My God, these things will kill eventually kill me won’t they?
Xavier Prince hoped to sleep dreamlessly tonight and die of lung cancer one day many years from now.
Just let it be cancer, he thought, Chris will play that beautiful song for me at my funeral 30 years from now when I die of cancer.
Seth
New South Cemetery, 20th Day
Why won’t you answer my phone calls, Angel?
Dr. Seth Dupree clicked his cell phone off, rubbed the fingers of his left hand over the tombstone of Denise Prince and searched the heavens above for answers. So far the power’s at be had refused to answer him at all.
He’d waited patiently for Erica’s funeral procession to disband before he’d paid his own private respects to both women. He couldn’t run the risk of one of the triage center’s staff spotting him here and asking questions that he dared not respond to: When was the last time he had seen Denise alive? When was the last time he’d spoken to her? Besides he knew her ex-husband made his living off of being a professional investigator. He had attended both burials of course. So far the local papers were calling Denise’s death for what it really was—a suicide. But Seth knew that most figured that she was not alone when she threw herself out of that window. There was no need for him to chance any legal involvement in this.
The Gray man exhaled a long breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. He was thankful for that blessing at least. The prevailing winds had carried the brushfire odors well away from the city this afternoon.
“Your wife is responsible for all of this…and so much more, Doctor.”
Seth darted around to put a face to the voice of the stranger who had walked up on him so mutely. “What was that? Do I know you, Miss?”
Seth found himself quickly over being startled…and struggling not to stare at this stunningly beautiful woman. She was a darker skinned, curvy Latino who was wearing a short but tastefully cut black dress, stud earrings, pearl necklace, and a watch on her wrist. She wore her hair long and straight and Seth couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d met her somewhere before.
“I know you,” She said, her accent only betraying the slightest hint of a Puerto Rican or Dominican ancestry. “Your name is Dr. Seth Dupree. You are one this region’s most renowned surgeons. You are very well respected by your professional colleagues and those who know you through your community. From time to time your friends have referred to you as ‘The Gray Man’ for your eye color, strands of gray in your hair and the attire you’ve worn over the years. I’m interesting in you for the reason your life is not so perfect—your marriage to another doctor, Angel Hicks-Dupree.”
“What could you possibly want with me or my wife? Are you some kind of investigator? “
“Yea, some kind…that describes me quite well actually.” She said and peered past a group of trees to their left. “I know that two funerals are taking place at this very moment over there for two separate teen aged boys who perished earlier this week from the injuries they suffered during the 411 attacks.”
Seth shifted his weight and didn’t understand why. He and Angel were still in Macon when Pandora launched its offensive against targets here in the city. Seth was finding himself, despite this woman’s beauty, quickly tiring of her company and her monologue. “Sorry. I hadn’t scanned the local headlines this morning.”
“No problem, Doctor, I thought that I would make you aware of the facts.” She looked downwards at Denise’s headstone. She kneeled long enough to mutter a prayer and crossed herself. When she opened her eyes again they appeared darker and more focused than they were even before she had closed them. “You’ve been preoccupied with other things—today it was the burial of Denise Prince and her daughter Erica Lovings.”
“How do you know all of this?” Seth heard his own voice raising. Whether it was from anger or fear he could not say.
“Are you absolutely sure you don’t know who I am, Doctor? Why don’t you take another look?”
Seth does just that. And he takes a second…and third a look as well, until…
“I do know you. You were sitting in a wrecked car downstate. You were parked near where Denise and I were outside of this hotel where Angel and Chris Prince were.” And then he remembered what the dead woman had told him before their next to last night together inside her apartment went to hell. The divorced couple had hired a private investigator—A Roxanne Sanchez to find Denise’s missing daughter.
Seth told the woman standing next to Denise Prince’s grave his hypothesis.
She said: “You are correct, Doctor. Now let me let you in on some things that you may not be aware of.”
Roxanne Sanchez gave him the short version of her dealings with a fugitive from both Pandora and the FBI named Joseph Champion. She told him that this Champion fellow and Seth’s wife, Angel, were sleeping together the night before the FBI recruited her to join them here in Atlanta. She spoke as if every sentence was being recorded during a deposition. She had dismissed emotion from the equation and just presented the facts—at least as she saw them, to Seth. This mole—as Champion had referred to himself, possibly…quite possibly was involved in the murder of Erica Lovings. Roxanne Sanchez couldn’t answer why he would murder her but went on to say that Champion was far more mixed up in the overall scope of what was going on within the sphere of influence of Pandora as well.
She then reminded him of Angel’s previous dealings and supposed therapy sessions with Louis Keaton. And if the Gray man wasn’t totally caught up with current events, Keaton was the monster that everyone in the free world believed was recently responsible for kidnappings of at least six Black children here in the city.
As painfully as it was for Seth to admit, this woman knew far too
many facts to making all of this up. “So are you going to base your next move simply on the word of a fugitive? I don’t quite understand all of this.”
“It’s no mere coincidence that the FBI snagged you’re wife as soon as all of this went down. Whether you see it or not—whether she sees it or not, they suspect her too to some degree or another. They were smart to keep her close. She’s involved at some level. I would bet my life on it.”
“Why do you care so much?” He ran his hand along the gravel of Denise’s tombstone again. It was a fine piece of structural design. “You found Erica in Carver. You did as you promised Denise you would do. Your job is done here.”
Roxanne got in his face. “Your wife is responsible for the death of my sister. She’s at least partly responsible for those two funerals over there that I pointed out to you a few minutes ago. Two more funerals for women who died during the Siege of the Fox Theatre will be held later on today as well.”
“I’m no lawyer, Roxanne,” Seth offered cautiously. “But I see you basing a lot of what you think you know on a ton of circumstantial evidence at best.”
“Call it what you will, Doctor.” Roxanne backed off just a little. “I do know for a fact that everything that your wife touches ends up in disaster. Lie to me and tell me that you haven’t thought once about what Angel said to Denise in that hotel room that finally pushed an already unstable woman over the edge.” Roxanne took her turn at caressing Denise’s tombstone. “Now I won’t lie. I didn’t know Denise very well or very long. I know enough to speculate that she was mentally and emotionally vulnerable to say the least. So I’m not the only one who saw Denise’s outbursts. But your wife deals with these types of personality’s everyday of her life. She should have known what not to say or do to set this woman off on her final path of self-destruction.”
The Gray man had indeed wondered what was said or done when Denise had walked into Chris’ hotel room. Denise had never said. He even thought about the worst case scenario: That somehow Denise had walked in on his wife and her ex-husband in bed together. Angel had told him about her single sexual escapade with Chris before they were married. She had told Seth that it was a half product of a lifetime of curiosity, while the rest was the result of carry over emotion of the sudden death of Chris’ then fiancé.
There is a ton of emotion, most of it negative, in Chris’ life right now. Could history have repeated itself? What if Angel had ‘comforted’ him some more just as he and Denise had arrived? Seth felt his jaws reddening. Perhaps they would christen him the Red Man soon.
“So what are you going to do now, Roxanne? Are you on some type of vindication mission? Are you going to right all of my wife’s wrongs?”
Roxanne would not look him in his gray eyes for the first time. “I didn’t come here to seek your permission, Doctor. You should consider this short conversation between us as a courtesy call only.”
“What does that supposed to mean, Roxanne?”
“Your wife is killing people, Doctor. Maybe she isn’t doing it by any of the traditional means, but she is causing their deaths all the same.”
“What are you going to do?” Seth felt himself biting his bottom lip.
“Finding a missing person is the absolute worse job that any investigator can be tasked with doing. Too often in the past, I’ve been asked to inform a parent, or a child, a sibling, or a lover that I couldn’t find the one in their life who had gone missing, or if I did…that I found this person of their profound interest dead. I don’t think that there is anything more difficult than telling someone that their beloved is never coming home again.”
Seth nodded in understanding for two reasons. The first obvious one is he’d been present when the news broke that his older brother and Erica Lovings were both were found dead…and the anguish thereafter that occurred for all involved.
And then the second reason caused him to say to Roxanne: “I understand that responsibility as well, Roxanne.” He said calmly. “I’ve often had to reveal a terrible diagnosis to a patient’s family after surgery had been completed. I’ve had patients die on my table under my care.”
Roxanne looked away, frowned and then found his gray eyes again with her dark ones. “Then you should know that coming to my decision about Angel wasn’t an easy one.”
“What—“
“I’m informing you here and now that you’re loved one is never coming home again, Doctor. And I do mean never. Dr. Angel Hicks-Dupree deserves to die for all of the pain and misery and death that she’s caused. And I mean to kill her as soon as I find her again before she can inflict more.”
“I can’t let you do that…I’ll warn her. I’ll get the authorities involved.” Seth plucked his cell phone out of his pocket but seemed to go all thumbs while trying to dial up the combination to 911. And then he fumbled it, the phone landing in a bed of yellow roses near his shoes. Damn you man, you’re a surgeon for Christ sakes. He had saved lives with these hands. Why couldn’t he grasp this damned phone…and possibly save the most precious life of all that personally mattered to him.
“I don’t think that you mean that at all, Doctor. I don’t you will call the police. You can’t go to Chris Prince because you’re very presence here opens you up to questions that you are not prepared to answer.” Roxanne said. “And honestly, Doctor, I think that deep down in your soul you know that I’m right about this. You may even want to help me find her. Angel needs to be put out of all of our miseries.”
He neither says anything nor makes a movement to retrieve his phone. Roxanne must have taken this as a sign that it was time for her to move on alone. She turned away from him without looking back. The Gray man doesn’t move to stop her.
The wind has shifted and the burning smell had returned almost instantaneously. It nearly engulfs his senses. Is this what Hell smells like? Maybe I’m the one who died the other night? Maybe I’ve already died and went to Hell already for daring to consider this stranger’s offer as a viable solution to anything.
He looked around him. He was the only one alive in this dreaded place. At least these dead had some semblance of peace that he did not. He ran his fingernails across Denise’s tombstone again…and again…until his nails had broken and bled from the pressure he’d put on them. The gravel had cut into the sensitive skin at the tips of his fingers. I couldn’t save you, Denise. And then his memory cut into his soul, injuring it far worse than the gravel had hurt his fingers. I couldn’t save you Antoinette…or Clinton…or Sam. And it doesn’t look as if I’m going to save you from your life either Pam.
And Seth then decided that perhaps ‘saving others’ wasn’t his true calling.
Maybe doing quite the opposite…was where his destiny lay from this point moving forward.
Angel had denied him a simple courtesy by refusing to answer or return his phone calls.
Angel had dishonored her wedding vows time and again by sleeping with other men.
Angel had cast him aside for her one true love: Her adoration for her drinking.
Roxanne Sanchez had walked nearly out of site to where her wrecked car was double parked when she finally heard him calling out to her.
“Wait, Roxanne,” Seth yelled so she would not leave. And after he had recovered from his sprint and was standing behind her next to her Honda. “I’m going to spend the rest of my life regretting my decision right now. I know that a higher power will make sure I spend an eternity regretting it as well.” Dr. Seth Dupree told the dark eyed woman standing next to her car. “But if you are going to truly kill my wife…then I should be there at the end. Let me come with you.”
Episode 5 Zero Hour