Look Closer

“Hanged,” says Jane, ever the grammarian. Andy throws her an elbow.

“. . . not to compromise the investigation by releasing details,” says Chief Carlyle. “We can say it was a homicide. I’d rather not go further.”

“Well, do you have any leads? Is it true he was wearing a costume?”

“Again, ma’am . . .”

“God am I glad I’m not in there,” says Andy. “Remind me to never be chief of a police force.”

“My name is Donald Fairweather. We’re hearing that it was some gang initiation thing like we had a couple years ago with the carjackings. Is that true?”

Jane covers her eyes with her hand. Three summers ago, the Village did experience a rash of car thefts and carjackings tied to a west-side gang, an initiation ritual. It took coordination from four different western suburbs and Chicago P.D. to finally crack down on it.

“Well, I think we’d all like to know if some Chicago gang has decided to come into our town and start killing people!”

“Sir—Mr. Fairweather—we are confident, as we’ve said before, that this murder was a domestic issue. It was unique to the Betancourt family.”

“Does that mean you’re close to solving it?”

“That’s what I was afraid of,” says Jane. Shit, what do these people want? A sloppy rush to judgment or good, hard detective work?

“People are rattled,” says Andy. “They’re not used to this.”

“Are you increasing patrols around the Village?”

“We don’t believe that’s necessary,” says the chief. “We don’t believe there’s a continuing threat to the community.”

“But that”—President Galanis opens his hands, looks at the chief—“that’s something we could do, right, Chief?”

Oh, great. The chief’s gonna love that. Sure, Mr. President, give us the funds and we can do all the patrols you want.

She checks her watch. She and Andy are due downtown to meet with Sergeant Cheronis of Chicago P.D.

“Then why haven’t you made an arrest, if you’re so sure?”

“We moved here to get away from violence in Chicago,” says another woman, whose name Jane missed. “Is it coming here now? Is this a new normal?”

For at least the fourth time, the chief says, “We do not believe there is a further threat to the community. We believe this crime was personal to the Betancourt family.”

And then, decorum and protocol be damned, a number of residents shout at once, all variants of the same question:

“So when are you going to solve it?”

91 Simon

Thursday morning. Day three of the investigation, day three of November.

I was supposed to meet with Jane Burke last night. Got myself all steeled up, practiced and ready, and then she canceled on me.

Why, I don’t know. Did they find Christian’s body and the green phone? Pretty good chance of that. And maybe that will be that. It really should be. Christian has the phone that was texting back and forth with Lauren at regularly scheduled times. He has the Grim Reaper costume and the muddy boots in his apartment. It’s hard to see coming up with any different story: Christian was sleeping with Lauren, she dumped him, he couldn’t handle it, he came to her house and killed her.

At some point soon, if not already, they’ll have the CSLI from both phones. And if they’ve already found Christian, they’ll know that all the texts were sent from either his house in Wicker Park or his office downtown.

That’s gotta be game, set, match, right?

I’m home today, alone at my house. I could’ve gone into work, but Jane wasn’t sure what time she wanted to talk to me, and I didn’t want her coming to my law school for the interview. So I told her I’d work from home and she could come whenever. Felt like a casual, innocent-y way to handle it.

I leaf through the morning paper I fetched from a convenience store on Division. The Tribune story doesn’t say much new about Lauren’s murder. Too early, I presume. Nothing about Christian Newsome at all. One of many people who die in the city every day.