Upendo Wa Kweli

"Do we have to do this right now? It's been barely three hours since the accident. None of us have processed this."

"I'm afraid it's necessary, Mrs. Raoulin."

"Necessary for what? Agent...Roberts, was it?"

"Yes, ma'am. You have to understand that your husband was one of, if not the richest men on the planet Earth. We just want to make sure that everything about his death was exactly what it seemed."

We are sitting in the gigantic living room of the Raoulin mansion outside of Manhattan. One of twelve similar houses, I've been told. The room is warm and the chairs we sit in are comfortable, but the air turns freezing as she nails me with a cobalt-blue glare.

"Roberts, if you believe that my husband's death was an attack, you may be right. However, it is highly unlikely that that was the case. My husband brought at least four bodyguards with him at all times. Last night was a Tuesday, so it would have been Phillipe, Eli, Victoria, and George. I read the reports, there were six bodies in the wreck. Let's count, shall we? Nico, the driver, my husband, and the bodyguards."

"Mrs. Raoulin...?"

Her face betrays her amusement and she laughs. It seems to be slightly deprecating, but I ignore it. It shouldn't be shocking that she's read the classified federal reports. She is the widow of a very well-connected man, and now has all of his assets within her reach.

"Come now, Lukas. My husband just died while in the company of five close friends of mine, as well as highly trained combatants. Either this really was an accident, or something else happened here. My only issue is that the police force, bless their dull souls, will be far too distracted with the life insurance payout and my motives to actually investigate. They will waste their time chasing after me, and trample any real evidence or leads in the process."

I'm about to protest, but I know it's true. The Manhattan police force is mighty in numbers and strength, less so in intelligence and reasoning. I'm less concerned with the fact that she knows classified case information, and more concerned with the fact that she knows my first name, though I never told her. A little intimidated but no less interested in her and her life, I say nothing.

Her points are sound. I shouldn't be surprised that Kinaya Raoulin found out classified information. And honestly, the more I think about it, the less and less indignant I become. She is a smart woman, she knows what an investigation into her possible motives would turn out. A woman, married to a billionaire, with a life insurance payout of nearly fourteen million dollars.

Her eyes warm slightly and soften.

"My husband was a wonderful person. Really. And everyone in his family and even some of my own closest friends, say that I married Jacques for his money. My grandmother says that there is 'no other reason that a princess like me would marry a white man.'"

She laughs and I join her, despite myself and my professionalism. Soon our laughter fades, and her serious face comes back. I'm left with my silent questions and aspersions.

"Spit it out, Lukas. I don't have all day, and my feelings aren't able to be hurt by anything that you have to say."

"Mrs. Raoulin-"

"I will call you Lukas, and you will call me Kinaya. I will have none of these formalities or this tip-toeing around me because you're scared of hurting my feelings. I don't have any left to hurt, so stop wasting my time."

"Kinaya, then. All due respect, ma'am, but did you?"

She looks at me, and her glance is sad, not angry.

"No."

She stands and walks to the nearby window, looking out over the sprawling hills of the Raoulin property. Her collar and cheekbones glow in the moonlight. Her dark skin is illuminated.

"Did you hurt your husband, Kinaya?"

"No. I couldn't, even if I wanted to."

I believe her. Sitting here in her mansion, with her dogs and her sparkling diamonds glistening on her neck, with her three gorgeous children asleep in their beds and her thirteen point eight million dollar inheritance, I believe her. I don't know how or why, but I just do. My instincts aren't often wrong, so I trust them.

"Lukas, have you ever been in love?"

I observe her face closely in the dimness of the room and I observe that she is crying.

"Yes, ma'am. Once."

"Do you still love her?"

"Him. And yes. I think about him every day."

She smiles and wipes her face. Her dark skin shines as she turns back to me and sits down in her chair again.

"Are you two still together?"

"In a way. He died in a car accident when we were nineteen."

She smiles sadly.

"Is there any hope? Will I ever be okay again?" She starts to cry again, and this time she doesn't wipe it away or try to blink through it. She just lets it out, and my suspicions are confirmed.

Firstly, this woman had absolutely no hand in her husband's death. Secondly, somehow, someway, she fell completely and truly in love with the man that owns half of the world. These tears aren't forced or fake. They are the tears of a woman who is only half of herself, a woman who has been dragged away from all hope. This is the sadness of a woman who has lost her soul mate, and there is nothing that I can say to help.

"Honestly? Probably not. I still see his face everywhere. I still can't eat peppermints because they were his favorite and it feels wrong to taste them without him. But I also still give my best. I still go to work and go to school and date and give my love to people who probably don't deserve it. Not necessarily because I want to, but because that's what he would want me to do. And because it makes me human, and that's what the world needs me to be."

She folds her legs into her chest and tucks her head down. Her tears have silently intensified, shaking her entire body with the force of her sobs.

"What am I supposed to tell them? I will find out what happened, but what if it wasn't just a car crash? I read the reports. There was nothing super unusual about it, it just seemed to be a really bad car crash. And maybe it's good that that's all it was. But if it wasn't, what do I tell Kamari and Eleywa and Issa?"

We spend a few minutes in silence because I have no answers for her.

"You know what the worst part is, actually? I think it was just a car crash. He's dead, and it was probably just a fucking accident. Do you understand how completely disgusting that is? If one small thing had been fixed or paid attention to, he'd be here right now. It's just so underwhelming. My husband was a god. He deserved to go out like one."

"Your husband was a man, Kinaya. And like a man, he was not invincible."

She scoffs at me. "My husband was not a man, you fool. He was an angel."

"Would you tell me about him? I prefer to build my profile off of first-hand information instead of those dry files that they give us at the Bureau. You can tell me significantly more about what kind of a man your husband was with fewer words and better meanings. "

She smiles nostalgically and nods.

"The thing that you have to understand about Jacques was the things that he did. I don't know how much digging your people did into his banking accounts and donations, but he donated five hundred thousand dollars to charity in New York."

"Well, that's noble, but-"

"All of them."

"What?"

"Every single charity in the state of New York received a five hundred thousand dollar donation this year."

"Shit."

"This past Christmas, we drove past downtown in our limo and saw all of the homeless men and women in the streets. Jacques bought an entire warehouse and filled it with workers who brought the homeless in for the night, giving them all sleeping bags, pillows, and a warm meal. Do you know how many homeless people are in New York?"

"78,604."

"Why do you know that."

"I do my homework."

"Impressive. Ish."

"Kinaya, you just told me a lot about what your husband did. Not necessarily who he is."

She is silent for a moment and then she looks me in the eyes.

"When we were twenty-three and his business was just beginning, we lived in an apartment in the Bronx. We were going to school near there and I was pregnant with Issa. We had a nice life and a nice house and nice friends. I sometimes miss that life. Before we were wealthy, all our friends were loyal and not everything was about power and politics. We were happier then, and less weighed down by the weight of the world around us.

"One weekend, we were vacationing in California with his sister and her husband. It was storming outside, and the rain was hitting hard on the roof of our little beachside rental. I thought it was going to fall down on top of us. I was scared, though I was trying hard not to show it. It may have been the hormones or whatever. But my husband, my beautiful Jacques, made it so much better. He made me a fort out of blankets and chairs and he made my favorite food, Mongolian beef, and a chocolate-peanut butter milkshake. He bought my favorite movie and we watched it in our little fort by the ocean, and he rubbed my back where it was sore. Keep in mind that I was pregnant, cranky, and bitchy. And this wonderful man sat through the entire movie, The Little Prince, and he actually liked it. I'd never told him before, but that movie was my test of character when I went on a date with a boy. I made him watch The Little Prince and if he sat through the whole thing, he was approved. Bonus points if he cried. And Jacques not only sat through the whole thing but also cried at the sad parts and actually made me pause it so he could cry and not miss anything.

"At the end of the movie, he wouldn't stop asking questions. He asked me about the aviator and the prince. He asked me about the stars and the rose and the fox and the snake. He was so utterly in love with this story, and I with him. I explained to him that it was originally a book, and, in the midst of the wind and rain and storm, he dragged me out of the house and to the nearest book store. We found a copy or three and then drove home. I remember that he spent the rest of that night reading this book that had so enraptured him, and I'd never felt more in love and awe. He redefined my definition of love.

"You have to understand how love was defined for me before I met Jacques. Back home in my little village in Tanzania when I was just a teen, love was who could provide for you, or who would be kind to you. It wasn't about feelings or emotions or connections. It was who could help you or who your parents approved of. And then I came to America and found a different kind of thing. Love was lust or it was chemistry. And I had boyfriends there and I had boyfriends here too. But love became sick and twisted, a thing to be used against me. At least, that's what tended to happen in my case. And then I met Jacques, and it was something different, something beautiful. He taught me what I was worth, he taught me about beauty and empathy and compassion. He taught me that love is not about power.

"I think about that day in the rain a lot. And every time it rains I remember why I love him so much. The fact that he's gone now... is so perversely wrong that I can't even describe it. How do you live in a bubble of nothingness? He was my world, and now I have no ground to stand on, no air to breathe. No sun to shine down on my face. He was my world, my air, my sunshine. I don't know how to be a mother without him. I don't know how to run an entire company. I don't know anything."

She once again dissolves into tears. I don't understand how it happened, but she found real love in a man that society saw only as a rich snob. I see now, that he was the kind of man to have enemies, not only from his money but because he is the type of man to go against his better judgment to save and help people. Her story clears a lot up. There is an endless list of possible killers here. But I was at the crime scene. I picked through the wreckage myself.

There is an overlying possibility that this was, in its entirety, just a very bad car crash. A fault of a driver, a fault of a man. Somehow, this explanation seems impossible. Jacques Raoulin is not a man who could just be...killed. Could he?

I talk with Kinaya for a while longer, and she tells me stories of her husband. A few times, I smile or laugh. Once, I let a tear roll down my cheek. After what feels like minutes but is really hours, my partner calls and says it's time to leave. I say my goodbyes.

As I make to walk out of the house, Kinaya calls out to me.

"Lukas."

"Yes, ma'am?"

"Am I going to be okay?"

"Yes. You are."

"How do you know?"

"Because your children need you to be. Because your husband needs you to be. And because you need you to be. Your husband loved you very much. I know that. So for him, for his memory, you need to be strong."

As I leave, I think about the report that I will submit on Mrs. Raoulin. I think that maybe I won't make a report at all. There is nothing to report on. Just two people who found something special in a world where true love is almost nonexistent. And that is a beautiful thing.