Page 76 of Jar of Hearts
“Ma’am, I—”
“Oh. Right.” Caroline Robinson’s whole body sags. “Oh, lord, I forgot. She’s… she’s not…” Her knees buckle, and Kaiser catches her before she can fall.
“I’m sorry,” she says, gasping. “On some level I braced myself for this day. Losing my daughter, losing my father, I thought I was prepared. But not for this. She was really trying to put her life back together.…” A sob escapes her lips, and she quashes it before it can grow. “I guess I have something to talk about in grief group this week.”
“Grief group?”
She straightens herself, shaking Kaiser off gently, and takes several deep breaths. Her glasses dangle on her heaving bosom. After a moment, she attempts a smile. It isn’t for him; the smile is for herself, self-reassurance that she’s got this, that she’ll be fine. He’s seen it before on other mothers, grandmothers, and sisters who’ve just been told the worst possible news.
“I’ve been going for twenty years,” she says. “I lead the weekly meeting at St. Andrews, the church three blocks away. It’s how I push through all this, Detective. It’s been one grief after another.”
“How do you do it?” It’s none of Kaiser’s business, but he honestly wants to know. He could kill Calvin James for a lot of reasons, and causing this admirable woman more heartache after everything she’s already been through is one of them. “How do you handle it?”
“I just do,” Caroline Robinson says. “Someone has to be alive to remember them. If they’re not remembered, then it’s like they never existed in the first place. And so, if not me, then who?”
She looks away for a moment, and then back at him. “Who?”
27
Kaiser was present in the courtroom the day the judge sentenced Calvin James to four consecutive life sentences, one for each of the murders he committed, including Angela Wong. Georgina was not there. She was already in prison, so she missed the big show.
After hearing several statements from bereaved family members of the victims, the sentence was read. The families cried. Justice was served, but in criminal cases it doesn’t feel like other victories. There’s no reward. At most, there’s a sense of relief, the closing of a chapter that never should have been written in the first place. But it doesn’t fix the wounds of the injured. And it doesn’t bring back the dead.
Kaiser comforted Angela’s parents that day in the courtroom. Candace Wong Platten hugged him tightly, whispered her thanks, and kissed his cheek, leaving a lipstick smear that would be rude to wipe away until after she left. Victor Wong had gripped Kaiser’s hand with two hands, pumping his arms.
“Our girl can rest in peace,” he said, tears in his eyes.
Kaiser could only nod. He believed that the dead were already at peace. It was the living who suffered.
Calvin James, clad in a suit and tie, looked over at Kaiser as the bailiff handcuffed him. In a few minutes he’d be back in an orange jumpsuit. His attorney was packing up his briefcase. Calvin opened his mouth and appeared to say something, but Kaiser couldn’t hear him above the din. He walked over.
“Are you trying to say something to me?” he said.
The two men weighed about the same and had similar builds, but Kaiser was an inch or two taller. Funny to think that when he was sixteen and Calvin was twenty-one, Georgina’s boyfriend had seemed so much bigger, so much stronger, so much more intimidating. Now he was just a man. A murderer, yes, but a man growing older like the rest of them, with no special skills or training, just a lust for hurting women in the worst way possible.
In a fair fight, Kaiser was 98 percent sure he could rip Calvin’s throat out.
“I said I was surprised they didn’t give me the death penalty,” Calvin said.
“That’s a conversation for your lawyer.” Kaiser glanced over at the defense attorney, who was already talking on his cell phone, then back at Calvin. “Would you have preferred that? I know I would have.”
The bailiff had Calvin by the arm and was beginning to move him toward the side door that led to the holding cells below. From there, he would be transported to Walla Walla, Washington, where he would spend the rest of his life in prison.
“People like me shouldn’t exist,” the Sweetbay Strangler said, looking over his shoulder. “You hear me, Kaiser? People like me should not exist.”
***
Kaiser’s phone pings, bringing him back to the present. There’s an email about the DNA results on Emily Rudd. Confirmed: She’s Calvin’s biological daughter. It’s the least surprised he’s felt since this all began. And it also confirms another important fact: Despite the few dubious sightings of the Sweetbay Strangler across the globe over the years, Calvin James has been in the Seattle area at least twice since his escape from prison, long enough to have fathered two children.
That’s two times the serial killer has been close enough to catch, and two times that Kaiser didn’t catch him. He heaves a long sigh and rubs his temples, feeling the onset of a headache.
Kim is at her desk across from his in the precinct, working on something unrelated to the murders. TV shows make it look like copswork one case at a time until it’s solved and the bad guy—or girl—is arrested, tried, and convicted. In real life, it doesn’t work like that. Kaiser juggles multiple cases. So does Kim. Sometimes they work cases together. Sometimes they don’t. She senses his eyes on her and looks up. He looks away. When he glances back again, she’s up from her desk and heading toward the break room, presumably to get away from him.
He’s not angry she’s back with her husband, especially considering she and Dave were never really apart. He’s not even upset that she didn’t talk to him about it first. Kim doesn’t owe him anything; Kaiser knew the drill when they first hooked up, when things morphed from work to friendship to sex.
But still, the sense of loss is there. He understands now how you can feel loss at the absence of something you never even really wanted in the first place. Kaiser was never fully invested in his personal relationship with Kim, and therein lies the problem. That space—that in-the-middle place somewhere in between being fully invested and not caring—simply isn’t worth it. When you’re in a relationship like that, it’s rarely fulfilling, and all you can see is everything wrong with it. But when it’s over, it stings, and you still somehow feel like you’ve lost.
His relationship with Georgina, however, is the exact opposite. There’s no in-between with her, no gray area. There’s no way to be with her just a little bit—he’s either all in, or all out. And after yesterday, he knows he’s all in. He has no choice, really. Georgina is the woman he’s loved since he was fourteen, and nothing—no amount of years, distance, or criminal activity—can make that disappear. And it’s fitting, really. Kaiser has a history of picking the wrong women. Georgina fucks with his head and his heart, she diminishes his capacity for good judgment, she brings out all his protective instincts. The fact that she’s an ex-convict is the least of his issues with her.
