“That child…” Joe spins the can in his hands. “He doesn’t lie, Ed. If he’d hit Vivi, he would have told us.”
“Why was he going over to the Howes’ place so early on a Saturday morning?” the Chief says. “Seven fifteen? I asked him but he didn’t answer.”
Joe says, “I take it he and Leo had a fight. Something must have gone down the night before—that happens around graduation, emotions are high, people say things they don’t mean. Cruz hasn’t seen Leo since the hospital. I could barely get him to go to the memorial service.”
“Cruz was very emotional at the station, and I wondered if something else was going on,” the Chief says.
“Vivian Howe was, for all intents and purposes, Cruz’s mother. He loved her.” Joe clears his throat. “Vivi was very good about making him feel like a part of things, about taking care of him the way only a mom can. Vivi’s death is a big loss to my boy, and to me as well. But Ed, he didn’t hit her.”
“Okay.”
“You’re not convinced?” Joe straightens to his full height, and suddenly the room grows smaller. “You think he’s hiding something? Lying to you?”
“He has a lot to lose.”
“Damn straight he has a lot to lose,” Joe says. “The kid has achieved beyond anyone’s wildest dreams. I don’t understand why Cruz is being treated like a suspect rather than a heartbroken kid who happened to be the first one to find the woman. Or is he a suspect because he’s Black, and when someone Black is close to the scene of a crime, he must have committed it?”
The Chief recoils. “This isn’t about race,” he says. He sits with his discomfort and checks himself. Did Falco actually see Cruz or was there some other Black kid driving a white Jeep? Did Falco notice Cruz primarily because he was Black? Was it easier for the Nantucket community to say that Cruz DeSantis did a bad thing because he was Black? The Chief will not lead a department where Black citizens are treated differently than white. He has learned, however, that racism is systemic. It’s often so deeply buried that you can’t even see it, but it’s there.
“I like you, Ed. I count you as a friend. I would never take advantage of that friendship. But my son didn’t hit Vivi. He’s the kind of kid who would have confessed right away and presented his wrists for the cuffs. He loved Vivi Howe so much that he would never forgive himself. Now, I know there’s something unresolved between him and Leo Quinboro. I can see that on his face without even asking. But what I don’t see is guilt over killing a woman. He has been very patient while you check his car. He’s been riding his old bike to work without complaint—because he trusts the system. But I’m not going to stand by and let you make him a scapegoat because you need a conviction in this case. Cruz didn’t hit her, Ed.”
These words land, and in that instant, the Chief knows in his heart that Cruz DeSantis didn’t hit the woman. Someone else hit her and ran, probably only a few seconds before Cruz found her.
“I’ll release the car this afternoon,” the Chief says.
“Thank you, Ed,” Joe says, and the men shake hands.
Vivi
Vivi is relaxing on the velvet chaise when Martha enters through the green door, holding her clipboard. “There are some lovely posts on your memorial Facebook page,” she says. “Would you like to take a look?”
“Are they all lovely?” Vivi asks. If there’s one thing she’s learned about Facebook, it’s that people think it’s just fine to post things that they would never dream of saying to someone’s face. In recent years, Vivi had become something of an online manners stickler: If you don’t have something nice to say, keep scrolling!
“Well,” Martha says.
Vivi’s interest is piqued. She takes the clipboard.
Vivian Howe Memorial Facebook page
Please share your thoughts and memories of Vivian Howe below. We encourage you all to stay positive! Vivian’s family and close friends will look at this page as a way to seek solace from her readers. Thank you.
This past winter, I was diagnosed with stage two triple-positive intraductal carcinoma and underwent eighteen rounds of chemotherapy at MD Anderson in Houston. I brought a Vivian Howe novel to each of my three-hour appointments. My chemo nurses always asked how I was enjoying the book and this gave us something to chat about other than