Look Again - Lisa Scottoline [24]
Ellen reddened, angry. “You know, that’s insulting.”
“Whatever. We need to talk about the think piece.” Sarah straightened up at the sink. “Do us both a favor and use my lead. Call Julia Guest. My job’s riding on this, and I’m not about to let you screw me up.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll do my part, you do yours.”
“You’d better.” Sarah brushed past her for the door, and Ellen heard her mutter under her breath.
Ironically, they were saying the exact same thing:
Bitch.
Chapter Nineteen
Ellen worked on the homicide piece through lunch, reading Sarah’s notes and doing her own research before she made any contacts, but she found it almost impossible to concentrate, distracted by thoughts of Karen Batz. Tonight she’d find the file on Will’s adoption, and it had to help fill in some of the blanks. She’d already called Connie, who’d agreed to stay late.
Her gaze returned to the notes on her desk, and she told herself to focus on the task at hand. She had to look busy, too, aware that Marcelo was in his office, holding meetings. She glanced up, and at the exact same moment, Marcelo was looking at her through the glass.
Ellen smiled, flushing, and Marcelo broke their eye contact, returning to his meeting, gesturing with his hands, his shirtsleeves folded carelessly over his forearms. She put her head down and tried to focus. She had only a few hours of daylight left.
She picked up the phone.
Chapter Twenty
Night came early to this neighborhood, the sun fleeing the sky, leaving heaven black and blue, and Ellen circled the block, scribbling notes as she drove. Trash blew in the gutters, swept along by unseen currents, stopping when it flattened against older cars. Sooty brick rowhouses lined broken sidewalks; some houses had graffitied plywood where windows used to be, and others had only black holes, unsightly as missing teeth. Porch roofs sagged, peeling shutters hung crooked, and every home had bars covering its doors. One house had encased its entrance in bars, curved inward at the top like a lion’s cage.
A boy had been shot to death on this block of Eisner Street, only two weeks ago. Lateef Williams, age eight.
Ellen turned right onto Eisner, where only one streetlight worked, and it threw a halo over a pile of trash, rubble, and car tires dumped on the corner. She stopped at number 5252, Lateef’s house, and his memorial out front was bathed in darkness, the shadows hiding a purple bunny rabbit that sat lopsided against Spider-Man figurines, crayoned drawings, a king-size box of Skittles, sympathy cards, and a mound of spray-painted daisies and sweetheart roses, still in plastic wrap. A sign handwritten in Magic Marker read WE LOVE YOU, TEEF, and a few candles sat around it, unlit in the cold and wind. Lateef Williams was denied the smallest measure of warmth and light, even in death.
Ellen felt a wrench in her chest. She didn’t know how many children had been killed in the city last year, but she could never get used to the idea. She never wanted to get to the point at which a child’s murder was old news. She fed the car some gas and pulled into a parking space, then gathered her things to meet Lateef’s mother.
Laticia Williams was twenty-six, with a slim, pretty face, narrow brown eyes, high cheekbones, and a prominent mouth, devoid of lipstick. Long earrings with wooden beads dangled from her earlobes, showing just under chin-length hair colored reddish. With her jeans, she wore an oversized black T-shirt that bore her son’s photo and the caption, R.I.P. LATEEF.
“I appreciate you coming,” Laticia said, setting a mug of coffee in front of Ellen as they sat at her round table. The kitchen was small and neat, the cabinets refaced with dark wood and the Formica counters covered with Pyrex oblongs of cakes, cookie tins, and two pies covered with tinfoil, which Laticia had said were “too ugly” to serve.
“Not at all, I appreciate your talking to me at a time like this,” Ellen said, having already expressed her condolences. “The only thing