The System - A Detroit Story - (18 page)

Elena opened the heavy door and walked in slowly, looked around and saw an open wooden folding chair near a clanking radiator. She sat in the chair and shivered, absorbing the radiator's heat.

A short black man in worn preacher clothes saw her as soon as she walked in the door. He strolled over to Elena, looking her up and down. He'd seen a tidal wave of hookers during his time at the mission- meth hoochies, crack whores, smack addicts, some formerly from the suburbs, all with the same hollow, vacant look. All with bad teeth. This one certainly was different.

"My, my," he said. "Who are you? Where did
you
come from?"

Elena sat with her arms wrapped around her, shivering. 

"Looks like you could use a blanket," said the Preacher. He walked to a storage cabinet and pulled out a coarse green army surplus blanket and wrapped it around her.

"Thank you," said Elena.

"You're welcome. Sorry about the blanket, but that's all we have," he said. "What are you doing here?"

"I had an accident," said Elena. 

"Accident? Did you call the police?" he asked.

"No. No police, please." Elena looked up at the Preacher.

The Preacher looked at her suspiciously. "All right," he said. "No police."

"Do you have a telephone I could use?" said Elena. She had Chris's cell number burned in her memory.

"Let's see now," he said, crossing his arms and stroking his graying goatee with his fingers. "That's really against the rules, lending my phone out. I shouldn't do this," he said. "By protocol I should call the police and report you. You didn't have no accident."

"Please," said Elena. She gazed up at him, eyes pleading. She felt a sharp pain in her head and her skin began to itch. She shivered, a deep tremor running through her from withdrawal and the cold.

The Preacher watched her shake, and pulled a thin, older cell phone from his pocket. "Tell the truth, the police been nothin' but trouble for me," he said. "Here." He flipped open his phone and held it out to Elena.

Elena looked at the phone. "Please," she said. "I don't know how to use that kind."

The Preacher, surprised, said "Say what? You can't use a cell phone? Girl, what planet you from?"

"Could you please dial for me?" she asked. 

The Preacher shrugged. "I guess so," he said.

Elena said the number slowly and the Preacher dialed and held the phone to his ear. Hearing it ring he handed the phone to Elena.

*   *

Chris was looking at his road atlas, flipping through the map pages from Detroit to Miami. Straight shot down I-75 all the way. His cell phone rang, startling him. He answered on the fourth ring, not recognizing the number.

"Hello?" he said.

"Chris, Chris," cried Elena. "Oh God, please help me. It's Elena."

"Hey, calm down," he said. "What's the matter?"

"Miri. It's Miri. Help me. I don't know where I am," she said. "He's trying to kill me. Please come get me."

The Preacher frowned. 

"Wait a minute," said Chris, looking at his packed duffel bag. "Slow down. What's going on? Who's trying to kill you?"

"It's Miri. Please come get me before he does," said Elena.

"Okay, okay," said Chris. "Where are you?"

Elena looked up at the now stern-faced Preacher.

"Where is this? Please." 

"This is the Motor City Mission on Woodward," said the Preacher. "By the New Center."

"Mission, Motor," said Elena. "Woodward. New Center."

"I know where that is," said Chris. 

"Hurry," said Elena. "Please hurry."

"Just sit tight," said Chris. "I'm on my way."

*   *

Chris pulled in front of the mission. Elena, standing at the front door, turned and briefly took the Preacher's hand. "Thank you, thank you," she said. She ran out to the street toward Chris on the Harley. 

"What the hell is going on?" said Chris.

"Vlad," said Elena. "He made us go to a party, but it wasn't a party. Only two of them there. One of them was very important. The other, he killed Miri." Elena buried her face in her hands and started crying. "Then he tried to kill me."

"What?" said Chris. "Who was it? Who tried to kill you?"

"His name is Lincoln, I think. I don't remember names so well," she said. "All I know is he is a friend of Vlad's."

"Who was the other guy, the important one?" said Chris.

"I don't know," said Elena, shivering.  She looked at Chris and held on to her arm. Chris took off his leather jacket and gave it to her.

"I cannot go back to Vlad," she said. "Please."

"Don't worry about it," said Chris. "Stay with me."

"Do you mean that?" she said.

"Sure. At least until we can figure this thing out. Hop on," he said. 

Elena held on to Chris as they tooled down Woodward toward the Cass Corridor. 

*   *

Lincoln cruised down Woodward in the black Tahoe driving slowly in the right lane, guessing where Elena could have gone. He stopped and parked on the west side of Woodward. If she went south she would have ducked into any safe place she could have just to get out of the cold and the drizzle.

Simple time and distance, he figured.

He got out of the car and walked toward the RenCen, looking into the abandoned storefronts, through the black wrought iron gates covering the broken windows and doors. Lincoln stopped in front of the only place that had any signs of life- the Motor City Mission. He walked inside.

The Preacher saw him. "Can I help you?" 

"I hope so," said Lincoln. "I'm looking for someone."

"Oh?" said the Preacher.

"Yes," said Lincoln. "A woman. White. Foreign accent. Might have passed through here last night."

"I see," said the Preacher. "We usually don't discuss the people we help here. Privacy and the law, unless you're a police officer." The Preacher looked at Lincoln. "Are you with the police?"
"No," said Lincoln. "This is a private matter."

"Then I can't really say anything," said the Preacher. "I'm sure you understand."

Lincoln nodded and looked around. "You get much support here?" he asked.

"Not as much as we'd like."

"What about support of a more personal nature?" 

"Very, very little, unfortunately." 

Lincoln pulled a hundred dollar bill from his pocket. 

"I'd like to make a donation, brother," he said, handing the bill to the Preacher.

"This is much appreciated," said the Preacher, taking the bill and putting it in his pants pocket.

"Like I said, a white woman," said Lincoln. "Foxy, dark hair. Exotic."

"A white woman?" said the Preacher. "Oh, yes. Was in here last night. Had a hard time understanding her," he said. "Hardly had anything on." 

"What happened?" 

"She was scared to death. She said she had an accident, but I didn't buy that for a minute. She talked about someone, Mirror, Miriam, something like that. Kept on saying her name," said the Preacher.

"Oh yeah?" said Lincoln. "Is she still here?"

"No. Some white dude picked her up. On a motorcycle."

Lincoln nodded. "How did she get a hold of him?" 

"I let her use my phone," said the Preacher.

"Still got the number she called?"

"Might still be in my cell phone." 

"Can I see it?"

The Preacher smiled and looked at Lincoln's pocket. 

Lincoln looked squarely at the Preacher. "In my experience," he said, "there's always something goin' on in a place like this. Runnin' hos, gambling, fencing shit, whatever. Someone's always dealing something out the back door. Got some friends at the DPD," said Lincoln. "And City Hall. One phone call…" 

The Preacher looked up at Lincoln, pulled out his cell phone and handed it to Lincoln. 

Lincoln flipped open his phone and navigated to the dialed calls. There was only one listed. Lincoln wrote down the number and looked at the call's time stamp: 12:45pm. He flipped the phone shut and handed it to the Preacher.

"You've been very helpful," said Lincoln. "And I was never here."

*    *

Lincoln drove in the Tahoe and called Andre Davenport. Davenport answered.

"Hey," said Lincoln.

"Hey yourself," said Davenport. "Sup?"

"I need a little favor."

"Oh? What's that?" said Davenport.

"Can you run a phone number for me?"

"Cell or land line?" said Davenport.

"Don't know."

Davenport grabbed a pen and a scrap of paper. "Doesn't matter. Shoot."

Lincoln rattled off the number and turned left on Randolph, toward City Hall.

"Call you back," said Davenport.

Chapter 31

Miri Washes Up

The two little girls, six and eight, were playing where they shouldn't, near the canal seawall below the dock. There were fun things to do there, especially when the brought their dolls. Sometimes they could see little fish being chased and eaten by bigger fish. Their dolls would be pirate princesses, threatened by sharks. Sometimes they saw bright green frogs and thought if their dolls kissed them the frogs would turn into princes, but they could never quite catch one.

They walked to the rear of the deep, neatly mowed lot behind the massive Grosse Ile three-story white stucco house. It was an easy climb down the dock ladder to the narrow strip of sandy shore. The older girl went last, looking back at the house. Their mother was inside on the phone, and would be for at least an hour. She always was on the phone and hated to be bothered. Plenty of time for the pirate princesses to explore and pretend…

They first saw the red hair, matted and tangled, thick as a rope. They looked at the swollen body, bloated and gray, eyes open, black and looking at them but seeing nothing. The younger girl screamed and ran to the ladder. The older girl backed away, bumped against the seawall and jumped a foot in the air. Both girls ran toward the house.

*    *

Ann Peabody was shocked at the number of unclaimed bodies at the Wayne County Morgue, so much so she made a comment to the assistant medical examiner.

"I've been around," she said. "But I've never seen bodies stacked like this." She looked at Washington. "Not even in New York."

"Business as usual," said the examiner, dressed in a white lab coat and regulation green scrubs. "Even the storage rooms where we keep chemicals and cleaning supplies are full," he said. "Gets to be a real problem in the summer, keeping them cold."

Peabody imagined the smell. There was no mistaking the smell of death- it was always the same, only to different degrees. Peabody smelled an excess of death here.

They followed the examiner to the main morgue, then to drawer twenty one.

"Twenty one," said the examiner. "Jane Doe." He pulled the drawer all the way out and pulled the gray sheet back revealing Miri.

Peabody stared down at her. She must have been pretty once, natural red hair, green eyes, now lifeless. One finger missing.

"Cause of death appears to be strangulation," said the examiner. "Two little girls found her washed up on Grosse Ile, right in their back yard. What a shocker for a couple of rich kids."

"Time of death?" asked Peabody, still staring at Miri.

"Looks like a little over twenty four hours ago. Approximately," said the examiner. "Best guess. When we find them in the water it can go either way, plus or minus a day or two, depending on the state of the body."

"Positive on the cause?" asked Washington. He thought about the bank president who disappeared a few years ago. Found him two weeks later. After the autopsy, the coroner officially reported the cause of death as drowning. A private autopsy showed he took a bullet to the base of the skull. How the hell did they miss that?

"Certainly appears that way," said the examiner. "Bruises on the neck, crushed esophagus. Didn't breath in any water. It seeped in. She was dead before being dumped in the river."

Chapter 32

Chris and Elena

Elena, deeply chilled from riding on the back of the Harley, stood in the shower for a long time. Chris watched her through the half-open door and opaque shower curtain. He sat at a small kitchen table, the television on, counting the TradeWind money. One hundred and twenty five thousand wasn't nearly enough, but it didn't seem important now. 

What was the woman's name? What was she like? What was her daughter's name? How was the little girl feeling- right now? Who would take care of her? Chris sat blankly staring at the television, in his mind seeing the woman hit the car. Split second eye contact, then
clunk
. Slow hard bone yielding against harder, faster metal. Pinwheeling, lying dead in the street…and he killed her. Killed her. Chris Wolfe killed her.

Elena walked into the living area of the small studio apartment, naked, drying her hair with a towel. Chris looked at her.

"Feeling any better?" 

"Yes, thank you." She sat on the bed next to him. "No. Not really," she said, the skin on her arms and legs forming goose bumps. Elena shivered and scratched her itchy flesh, feeling like insects were crawling inside her.

"I need a pill," she said.

Chris got up and walked to the bed. He sat and put his arms around her. When was the last time a beautiful, naked woman sat on his bed? He couldn't remember, but it didn't matter. The last thing he felt like was sex.

"I'm going to Florida," he said, looking at her. "Come with me." He hugged her, his cheek to hers.

"I cannot," she said. 

Chris pushed back and looked at her. "Why not? We can ditch this fucked up life and maybe have a real one."

"You would want me?" said Elena.

"Yes I would. And I do."

"After all the men?" She looked away. "I'm used. Damaged."

"That doesn't matter. How can I hold something against you that you were forced to do?"

Elena smiled and shook, her muscles cramping. Chris held her.

"You can beat this," he said. "You're tough and strong. Stronger than you think."