A Smudge of Gray (13 page)

Chapter 19

The living room of apartment 1009 was
lifeless. Three games and two controllers were missing from the video game
system as the scent of meatloaf lingered. Not even a light was illuminated for
the man whose name was on the lease. Suddenly, the sound of the metal lock
filled the unconscious room. Brian pushed open the door and slid inside. He
locked up gently, and then lurked through the dark like an uninvited visitor.
And to a certain degree, he was. Brian walked on instinct, but without the
light, he felt unsure of what lay in front of him.

The smell of microwaved meat reached his
nose. Brian crept into the kitchen. His shoes hit the linoleum. The regretfully
un-devoted family man felt for the light switch. He tapped and slid his hand as
if it were his first time in his home. Finally, he felt the plastic and flipped
the switch. The bright bulbs bathed him in light as his sluggish pupils took a
few moments to adjust.

Brian checked the side trash. He saw the
empty box and microwavable cooking tray of a meatloaf and mashed potato entrée.
The picture looked scrumptious to him, but even the cardboard box seemed
appealing. Brian moved to the freezer as his eyes bypassed the collage of
photographs. He cared only about feeding his belly, not his eyes. Brian opened
the device as the frozen frost flowed out. Inside, a collection of TV dinners were
offered like a menu at a halfway house. Brian rummaged through them.

“Lasagna… No.” “Stuffed cabbage… No.”
“Meatloaf and mashed potatoes… Yes.”

Brian opened the box, slit the plastic cover
on the cooking tray, and changed the microwave from the time, “2:35,” to the desired
cooking time, “5:00.” He pressed “Start.” The machine engaged and nuked the
frozen brick. As the device spewed radiation at his meal, Brian studied its
rotation through the window.

The countdown reached four minutes
as the dull ache in his gut had become a bothersome twinge. Brian knew exactly
what he needed. He opened the cabinet above the kitchen counter. Various sizes
and shapes of plastic Tupperware lined the three shelves. At first glance, the
cabinet seemed like a place to store reusable containers, but Brian was not
concerned about preserving his puny four-bite meal. He reached on the third
shelf and parted the two bowls filled with bowls. Then, he moved his hand
toward the back. Brian went on touch, as the top shelf was even too tall for
his eyes. At last, he felt the object that was not plastic, and then unearthed it
from its tomb—“Jack Daniel’s Old Tennessee Whiskey.”

Brian grabbed a glass from the next
cabinet. He broke the seal on his poison. As if he were already drunk, Brian
poured with an uncontrollable shake to his hand. He beheld the liquor, and then
sucked it down. He felt it coat his stomach, as the twinge subsided. Brian
poured himself another glass, and then wandered around the kitchen.

The family picture on the table lay face
down. Brian grabbed it, as the smiling faces of the Boise family, his family,
had no effect on him. He placed it back on the table, but it fell over face forward.
He tried once more, but it slapped off the table again. Brian took another gulp
of alcohol and left the picture. He glanced at the microwave—two minutes left.
Brian meandered toward the refrigerator to amuse himself with the photo collection.
He saw the familiar picture of his family at the beach. He didn’t smile this
time as he studied it. He didn’t crave for the feeling again. He didn’t even
flex his facial muscles into a grin of desire. Brian simply stared at it like a
stock picture of a trite family already in the frame. The detective scanned his
son’s drawings. They all seemed familiar to him. Everything looked as he
remembered, but his eyes detected something different on the freezer. Near the
handle, he saw two new photographs. One showed his wife and son standing next
to another woman with her arms around two kids. He figured they were the
Malloys. In fact, he knew it was them after the basketball game. But the other
picture stopped his breathing. Brian grabbed it from its magnet and looked at
his exhausted expression.

“Do I look that bad?” Brian mumbled.

As he held the 4 x 6 inch picture in his
hands, he studied the man next to him, the handsome man named Trevor. He was the
same height, his hair perfectly parted to the left, his face cleanly shaven,
and his smile devilishly radiant. The man whom Brian had just met stood in
contrast to him, a before and after photograph of a bum wearing wrinkled
business clothes to a gentleman wearing a tailored outfit. The photograph of
that moment in time, now permanently frozen in pigments, filled Brian’s mind.
Fragments from that day erupted from the trenches in his brain.

Brian watched the event replay inside
his head as if he were a specter given the opportunity to observe without its
presence known.

“Whoa! Watch the
shoes,” Trevor yelped as the boy in blue stepped on his polished prize.

“These are special import from Italy,”
Trevor continued as he buffed his shoe with his handkerchief.

The Brian inside the kitchen saw another
burst of images as the Brian inside the gymnasium talked to his new
acquaintance.

“I keep work and family separated as
well. It’s easier that way,” Trevor commented.

“What do you do?” Brian asked.

“I own a consulting service,” Trevor
replied.

Brian studied the photograph in his
hand. He painted Trevor’s face with his finger. A light bulb exploded inside
his mind. He was in an aura. But then, the feeling in his gut raised its ugly
head. Brian realized the sensation was his subconscious telling him that this
man, the man who had rubbed him the wrong way, could be the killer he had so
desperately sought. Brian thought about the odds, but then he realized that
anything was possible. He clutched the photograph and marched out of the kitchen
a new man, a man with a clear lead to follow.

The microwave beeped, but nobody was
there.

Chapter 20

The darkest part of the night surrounded
the city, the part when it was too late to call it night, but too early to call
it morning. The portly doorman outside Janice’s condo building saw the prowl of
a slippery woman inside the warm climate-controlled lobby. The young lady was
the mistress to the surgeon in the penthouse, the mistress whom he helped escape
when the surgeon’s wife was out of town.

“Good evening, ma’am,” the doorman said,
as he opened the door and stole a sniff of her sexiness.

“You mean, good morning.” She hugged
herself from the blast of cold, dead air.

Brian’s SUV slammed to a stop in front
of the building. The detective thrust from his machine and darted to the dazed
doorman.

“Remember me?” Brian asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“This man, does he look familiar?” Brian
queried as he offered the photograph.

The doorman analyzed it, and then
squinted his eyes. “Uh, yeah. That’s
you
.”

“I know that I’m in the picture.”

The doorman handed the photo back to
Brian. “Well, you know what. I never saw the guy’s face. I know that for a
fact. But I’ve been thinking about that moment that I saw Miss Davis, the last
time I’d ever see her again. And I keep replaying that moment over and over.” A
gust of cold air entered the doorman’s ear and swirled inside his head. He felt
the coldness grasp his entire body, and at the same time, he felt that memory
surface of the shadow that had slithered into his building right after Miss
Davis, that memory that had been buried deep inside his brain like a virus
hiding amongst healthy cells. He remembered the clothes and the movement of the
man whom his eyes had received for just a glance, yet long enough to burn into
his neurons. “And there’s something, or rather someone, in that memory that
stands out.”

“What is it?” Brian pressed.

“The dress clothes, the dark gray shoes,
the man. He walked in right after Miss Davis. There was something odd about
him, too cool…”

Brian looked down at the
photograph. The doorman had just described the man next to him, the man named
Trevor Malloy.

“You’re sure?”

“Yeah, I’m positive,” the doorman
reiterated. “Hey, why did you show me that photo?”

Brian’s mind popped. “Thank you. You’ve
been a great help.” Brian hustled toward his double-parked SUV.

The detective shifted into high gear,
his overstretched muscles fueled by adrenaline. Thoughts of his family rolled around
inside his mind as he shifted the truck into “Drive” and punched the gas. While
he dodged the early morning traffic, he realized the camera that had captured
the suspected murderer had also captured his wife and son. Brian reached for
his cell phone and dialed the number he needed to dial more—his home.

Inside the master bedroom of the Boise
residence, Anne Marie slept alone in the fetal position with a pillow between
her legs. She was off in a distant land, the place where we went when we were
not here. The phone on the nightstand rang. The noise sucked her back to her listless
world. Anne Marie jarred awake. Her heart stopped beating for a moment—a moment
in time where she was no longer living.

“Hello?” her groggy voice rasped.

“Honey, I need you and Jonathan to stay
in the apartment,” Brian blurted.

“What? What time is it?”

“It’s late, but keep Jonathan home from
school, and don’t call or speak to
anyone
but me.”

“What are you talking about?” Anne Marie
asked as she sat up.

“It’s a long story—”

“Jonathan’s not here.”

Brian slammed on the brakes. His SUV squealed
to a stop. The car behind him screeched. Another car blared its horn.

“Where is he?” Brian asked with wide eyes.

“He’s staying the night at the Malloys
with Kevin.”

Brian looked up and stared at the chaos
of headlights in the oncoming lane. His body froze, but his mind raced. The
sound of the deafening horns surrounding his parked SUV had no effect on him.

“I’m sure he’s fine with Laura and
Trevor,” Anne Marie’s voice said sending a shiver through Brian’s body.

“I’m going to get him,” Brian said.

“Are you crazy? It’s three a.m.,” Anne
Marie said as she stared at the red digits next to her showing “2:56.”

“Anne Marie, if there is
one
time
I need you to trust me, this is it. Please stay put. I’m getting Jonathan and
bringing him to you. I love you,” Brian pleaded.

The agitated family man flipped his
phone closed and focused on his laptop. Cars still whipped by as Brian’s SUV
sat dead in Drive.

“Asshole!” an enraged driver shouted,
navigating around the parked SUV.

The obscenity breached the
detective’s window and entered his ears, but he didn’t care. All of his
attention was on his son, the real reason he worked so hard, even if it
appeared otherwise. Brian clicked a few times on his laptop’s touchpad trying
to pilot through the arcane screens. Finally, he maximized the query window to
the DMV database. Brian pounded the keys to form the name of the man he had just
met. He entered “Malloy, Trevor” and clicked “Execute Query.” Then like that,
the location of the killer, and the location of his son, stared back—“529
Placid Rd.”

Brian knew the street, a road nestled in
the heart of the city’s affluence. He turned his steering wheel all the way to
the left, and then inched out. Cars zipped by as horns trumpeted. Brian saw an
open spot, and then nailed the throttle, launching his vehicle into a tailspin.
He U-turned in the middle of the downtown.

The detective sped through the wee hours
of the morning. While bodies rested and minds wandered, Brian cut through the
dead of night. As he left the city in his rear-view mirror, the traffic became
sparser. Gone were the night dwellers that filled the downtown as the
professionals in the suburbs all slept softly in their beds. Brian entered the wealthiest
district as the yards expanded with the square footages of the homes. This was
a place Brian rarely drove through, a place he envied, a place in which he should
have been raising a family. But just as he passed the cobblestone driveways and
the 20-foot Roman-inspired pillars, Brian knew that an ugly duckling hid amongst
swans, an ugly duckling that was a killer.

The V8 engine launched Brian past “Hot
Springs Road,” and then “Stormy Meadows Lane.”

“Where is it!?” Brian yelled inside his
cockpit. Then, he saw the flicker of his headlights off the approaching street
sign. “Placid Road!” Brian said as his machine screamed from the turn’s force.

A parked Audi blocked his path. Brian
turned harder. The SUV shrilled. Inches away, Brian cleared the European vehicle.
He tried to straighten his SUV as he fishtailed. Brian held the line as he saw
“527” on a mailbox. He shifted his focus from the brown house with the Cadillac
parked in its driveway to the one directly next to it, the one he was
approaching at forty-miles an hour, the one he knew was “529.”

Brian took in its two stories, its
sterling white siding, black shutters, and black roof. It was a home that he would
do almost anything for, except kill. Brian popped the curb, slammed on the
brakes, and stopped halfway on the open driveway. He hopped out as the cold air
surrounded him, but it did little to cool the fire flowing through his veins. He
saw the oversized front door with two tall stained-glass windows. He pressed
the only light emitting from the structure—the doorbell. Brian heard a chime
fill its belly as he waited, and waited. The stout structure looked deceased.
In fact, the whole street looked as if a plague had hit. Brian held back his
fervor as he looked through the stained-glass windows, but they did their job
at preventing his view. He pressed the button again, and again. As he rested
his hand on the doorknob, a light illuminated inside.

Brian took a step back and placed his
right hand on his standard-issue 9mm pistol holstered on his belt. He watched
and waited like a matador waiting for the bull to make his move. His breathing
rocked his body. He could feel his heart pounding inside his chest. A figure appeared
through the distorted light. Brian widened his eyes. He wanted to shoot it, put
it down before it could open the door into his world. But the detective knew he
had to do this by the book. The door unlocked. Brian unfastened his weapon. His
eyes centered on the strip between the door and the frame. He clutched his
pistol. The door creaked open. Brian squeezed the metal in his right hand as
his eyes adjusted to the light. He saw the barrel of a pistol peek out. Brian
kicked the door, sending it into the figure. He barged into the home and saw a
woman, Laura, lying on the ground in a bathrobe, unconscious, her head bashing
into the bottom step from his force. Brian saw the flashlight in her hands. He disarmed
her and put the misrepresented pistol inside his pants pocket as he checked her
carotid artery for a pulse.

“Dad?” Katie said as she peered from the
top step, but then she screamed at the sight of her fallen mother and ran back
into her bedroom.

“Jonathan!” Brian yelled.

“Dad? What are you doing?” Jonathan
asked wearing basketball-patterned pajamas. He ran down the steps.

“Is Trevor here?”

“What?”

“Trevor, the kids’ dad. Is he here?”

“No. He’s not here.”

“Are you alright, tiger?” Brian asked in
a voice not of a detective, but of a concerned father. Brian held his son’s
shoulders and studied his innocent nine-year-old.

“Yeah, we stayed up late playing
Nintendo.” Jonathan looked at the collapsed woman. “What happened to Kevin’s
mom?”

“Call 911. Tell them a woman has had some
head trauma at Five Twenty-Nine Placid Road,” Brian instructed.

Jonathan scurried back upstairs.

Brian left Laura’s side and turned
back into the detective. He ran upstairs and down the hall on the plush brown
carpet. The light from the hallway shined into the master bedroom. Brian
entered. He stopped just past the door and stood in the darkness. The smell of
coconut hit him as he fumbled for the light switch, but he did not care to
search for the origin of the fruit. Finally, Brian found the panel. It was not
a traditional control, but one with a dimmer. He pummeled it until the room
filled with light. Brian looked around his surroundings. A king-size bed sat in
the middle of the master bedroom, nearly double the size of his. The covers on
the right side of the bed were crumpled, but the left side remained flawless—the
resting place for the king of the house. Two huge walk-in closets filled both
sides of the room.

Brian continued toward the closet on the
same side as the made bed. He entered the room filled with suits. Over thirty
brown, navy, gray, and black suits lined the racks. Some had pinstripes, some
were double breasted, but above all, the color black dominated the collection.
Brian looked down at a rack of ten pairs of shoes. They were neatly tucked under
the suits with shoeboxes stacked on the sides forming a mini castle.

“Shoe polish,” Brian mouthed to himself.
The detective tossed shoes aside. Then, he shuffled through some shoeboxes.

“They’re on their way, Dad,” Jonathan
said.

“Good. Hey, I need to take you home. Go
grab your stuff,” Brian said as a father, feeling his son’s soft hair.

“Kevin and Katie are scared.”

“I know, son. They will be okay.
Everything will be okay.”

Jonathan followed his father’s
instructions.

Brian checked each shoebox. He flung a
pair of Burberry loafers to the side, the same loafers from Trevor’s mall
purchase. As Brian dug deeper, he came across the color yellow buried
underneath the castle. It was five yellow tins. Brian grabbed one and read the
top, “Fatto in Italia.”

The Italian words made Brian’s pores open.
He knew he had his man, now he had to find him. Brian shoved the tin into his
pocket and noticed a business card on the nightstand. He took one and saw “Trevor
Malloy – President – Malloy Consulting Service.” Brian ran from the room as
Jonathan met him in the hall.

“Ready?” Brian asked.

Jonathan nodded. As Brian and his son
clumped down the stairs, they saw Laura still lying unconscious.

“Is she dead?” Jonathan asked.

The sound of an ambulance entered the
house.

“No. She’ll be okay. The paramedics are
here.”

Brian looked at the auburn hair of the
woman lying on the floor, the woman married to a monster. Part of him felt bad,
but another part felt free. He and Jonathan poured into the night air as the
ambulance stopped in the driveway. Two sturdy men stepped out. Brian flashed
his badge.

“Detective Boise. There’s been an
accident. The woman hit her head. She’s still breathing, just knocked out.
Here’s my card. I’m tracking a murder suspect,” Brian said as he handed the
older of the two men his police card.