Chapter 37 Dominique
Dominique
I couldn’t sit still. After getting off the phone with Kobe, my focus was shot.
Cosette wanted to play, but I was hopelessly disengaged, drifting into my own world countless times.
The context of the phone call cycled on an endless loop.
My brain ran in overdrive, thinking about Kobe and the situation, hearing everything he said and everything he didn’t.
What did “Yates acted inappropriately” mean?
That it got physical? Physical with whom?
Jolie? Kobe? Had Yates gone after the girl?
Had he hurt her? What happened to feeling guilty?
What happened to self-reproach? What happened to doing better and righting wrongs?
His whole, I have a daughter and see the error of my ways. Was it bullshit?
I knew the words were meaningless. This was proof. Yates was out for himself. He had always been out for himself.
The four walls of the house pressed in on me. I had to do something. It would likely be impossible to steer Kobe off this path. Did I dare try? I had told myself that whatever he chose, I would live with it. It could bring us closer together or tear us apart.
I thought of three university boys taking advantage of a girl who was practically a child. Of a doctor who didn’t care and a police officer who called her a whore.
Fucking Yates.
For whatever reason, Kobe hadn’t connected the last dot. He didn’t see that Yates would be a victim too. Yates was part of it. His days were numbered.
If Kobe turned his back, Yates wouldn’t walk away alive.
And yet, I couldn’t find an ounce of humanity within me to care. Yates had made his bed. The world would be a better place without these awful men. In death, they couldn’t destroy anyone else’s life.
Kobe felt the same. I saw it in his clenched fists and tense jaw when he mentioned his theory.
I heard it in the way he spoke so venomously about the law failing those university girls whose screams for help were ignored.
I saw the disgust in his eyes when he looked at the bodies and considered what they’d done.
I should sit with Cosette. I should wrap her in my arms and kiss her soft hair and thank god she was with me. I could have lost them both. It had been Angelique’s choice, and she’d chosen to give the baby a chance at life. She’d entrusted her to me.
I should hold her in my arms and pray that she was never subjected to the wrath of cruel men like Jesse, Ford, Malik, Navid, and Ari fucking Yates.
But I didn’t.
I made a phone call.
It took forty minutes for a babysitter to arrive. I spent it in my office, staring at an innocent child with a dandelion gone to seed clutched in her hands, her bow lips puckered to blow, her eyes squinting with the effort.
What did you wish for, ma belle?
I opened the laptop and logged in.
Kobe hadn’t connected the pieces. He didn’t know Yates was a target. How long until he sorted it out? Warned him?
But I knew.
Jolie’s arrival would have propelled the narrative of Kobe’s case.
He would be delving deeper into her story, unraveling all the elements he could find as he summoned the courage and strength to make a difficult decision.
He would find out all he could about Jolie and her friend and the boy who accompanied them on that terrible night.
Kobe was smart and focused when he had to be.
But he would not be thinking about Yates. He took off, Kobe had said.
He was out there. Alone.
I hoped I could get to him on time.
The sun had set, and the city was unnaturally still. New Year’s Day was coming to an end. Most shops were closed, but the odd restaurant along Elgin remained open, including the Irish pub Ari Yates had entered less than ten minutes ago.
When I didn’t find him at home, I drove to the precinct.
Kobe had mentioned Jolie’s statement. Had he ordered the man to come back in?
Neither he nor Kobe was there. I drove aimlessly around the neighborhood for a while, wondering if Yates would head home, wondering if fate was friend or foe, and if I should give up and let the pieces fall where they may.
I was about to turn around and head home when I caught sight of his car heading in the opposite direction on the vacant street. Pulling a U-turn at the next intersection, I followed at a distance until he turned into the parking lot of an Irish pub.
The lack of cars suggested the establishment should have kept its doors locked for the holiday.
Four or five customers at most, and that was a generous guess.
I parked down the street, got out, and aimed for the restaurant, scanning intersections and alleys as I went.
No one was about on this cold January night.
How easy it would be for Yates to vanish. The only witnesses to his demise would be a brisk north wind and the promise of snow.
The restaurant was warm and dimly lit, featuring dark wood and vintage decorations.
A fire roared in an ancient fireplace, the scent reminding me of the Apothecary and smoky Morticians.
Retro tin signs with cheesy Irish slogans decorated the walls.
Others advertised Guinness and Carlsberg.
Irish folk music played from a speaker system. It felt unnecessary and kitschy.
Tall, padded barstools lined an intricately carved wooden counter.
The elderly server wore a black polo shirt with the pub’s name embroidered on the breast. His unsightly moustache curled at the ends and was as waxed and shiny as his carefully styled salt-and-pepper hair.
He was in conversation with Yates, who had deposited himself at the end of the bar.
A freshly poured Guinness with a generous head sat on a coaster within reach.
I checked the time, debated texting Kobe to see where he was and what he was doing, then shoved my phone back into my pocket instead. Kobe was busy solving a case and making decisions that would impact his life forever. This oversight was mine.
I approached Yates and slid onto the stool beside him.
“Evening,” I said to no one in particular.
The bartender nodded in greeting, and I indicated Yates’s drink. “I’ll have what he’s having.”
Another nod, and the bartender zipped off to pour my beer.
Yates stared at the side of my face.
I glanced over, offering a tight smile.
Momentary recognition crossed the man’s face, but it was swiftly followed by confusion. “Do I know you? You look familiar.”
“Yes, but not directly. Forensics.” I offered him my hand. “Dominique Chevalier. Recent transfer.”
“Oh, right.” His grip was firm. “Ari Yates. OPD.”
“I know who you are.”
“You do?” More confusion.
“Yes. You’re the shitty cop who didn’t listen to the pleas of a fourteen-year-old girl when she came begging for your help, telling you she was raped.”
His drink had been halfway to his mouth. Yates put it down and blew out an irritable sigh. “Fuck this night. What the hell do you want?”