Credo's Fire, page 22
Chapter 16
Two days later, as Casey and I were driving out of the parking garage, Ruthanne came on the radio and asked us to meet her behind the bank at Twenty Second and Alvernon. She was already there by the time we arrived. Her vehicle was backed into a parking space at the rear of the lot and as Casey pulled up beside her Ruthanne rolled down her window so we could talk. Gail was sitting in the passenger seat holding a large cup of coffee that looked really good right about then. I was still running on less than five hours of sleep thanks to Mr. Myung’s second visit in the wee hours of the morning.
Ruthanne shook her head. “That was one hell of a scene the other day. Thank God Gia had so much security there or she’d a been dead meat.” I felt the heat rise in my cheeks and chose to look out my window instead of biting her head off. She must have realized her mistake because she began to backpedal. “I didn’t mean it like that, Alex. I’m sorry. I haven’t really taken off my detective hat and that just popped out.”
I mumbled into the window, “Don’t worry about it.”
Casey poked me on the arm. “C’mon, Alex. Normally, something like that would be just another part of our conversation and you wouldn’t think twice about it. It slipped out, give her a break.”
She was right and I knew it. I took a deep breath and turned to face the three of them. Ruthanne raised her eyebrows and I nodded to let her know it was okay. I didn’t really want to talk about the shooting, and since Gail was here, I guessed that wasn’t why they’d asked us to meet up with them.
Casey must have thought the same thing. “So, what’s up?”
Ruthanne and Gail exchanged glances. After a few seconds, Gail spoke up. “We wanted to bounce something off you guys. Something about Jason’s case just doesn’t feel right.” She stopped and focused on the parking lot behind Casey and me. “Isn’t that Kate’s car?”
Both of us turned as Kate pulled into the space next to our car. Casey backed up so she and Ruthanne could open their doors to get out and we all met Kate in front of her car. She leaned against the hood and propped one foot up behind her on the grill. “I heard Ruthanne call you two over to talk.” She looked at Gail. “Mind if I listen in?”
Gail and Ruthanne looked at each other again and when Ruthanne shrugged, Gail repeated what she’d told us so she could bring Kate up to speed. “I was just saying, something about Jason’s case doesn’t feel right.” She looked down at her shoes and then back up at Kate. “The reason we asked these guys to meet us out here is because we needed to bounce something off of them and…well, it might not be exactly politically correct as far as the department’s concerned.”
Kate smiled. “Anything you say will stay right here. You know me well enough to realize I’m not the type to go running my mouth off about things.”
“Well, it’s just that Captain Emery is keeping a very close eye on everything Ruthanne and I do. It seems like we can’t turn in a circle without him asking why we’re doing it.”
Kate nodded. “I can understand that. It’s a fairly high-profile case since Jason is Captain Buelow’s son.”
Shaking her head, Ruthanne put in her two cents. “No, it’s more than that. Every time one of us comes up with an idea, he makes it seem like we don’t know what we’re doing. Other detectives have told us that he belittles our investigative techniques behind our backs and actually makes fun of us when he’s around the guys in the unit.”
When Kate didn’t say anything, I spoke up. “He knows you’re one of the best detectives on the department, Gail. Why’s he being such a jerk?”
Casey took a piece of bubble gum out of her pocket and began to unwrap it. “He’s insecure.”
Ruthanne snorted, “Emery? He’s the most conceited Captain on the department. Never has a hair out of place, always checking himself in the mirror when he walks by. I don’t think that’s his problem.”
Kate folded her arms across her chest. “Actually, Casey’s right on the mark.” She looked each one of us in the eye. “Look, I’m going to talk about something that could get me into hot water if it ever got back to the department.” All of us nodded, indicating that we realized this was an off the record conversation. “He didn’t want the two of you on this case. He has a couple close detective friends. He fought to give them this assignment because if it’s handled right, it would have been quite a feather in their cap. Assistant Chief Robards more or less forced you guys on him.” She paused for a second, then continued. “So, you all know Captain Emery’s gay, right?”
The other three nodded but I’d never been around him enough to really know one way or the other.
Kate stopped to gather her thoughts. “There are a lot of gay men on the department who are completely secure in their sexuality. He’s not one of them. He’s a little effeminate, and knows it, and to be honest, he’s intimidated by strong women. You two scare the heck out of him. Add to that the fact that he couldn’t bring his buddies onto the case, and you’ve got a situation just like you described. He’s insecure, so he’s going to make life miserable for the two of you.”
“I know. That’s what’s so frustrating.” Gail’s voice rose a few decibels. “This is an incredibly important case and he can’t get past the fact that he’s stuck with two very competent women who know what the hell we’re doing. I don’t want to screw up this case because he’s playing games. Honestly, Kate? I don’t think Jason did it, but both times I’ve said that to him, he completely shuts me down. He’s not willing to listen to my reasoning. He’s already made up his mind that Jason’s guilty as sin.”
Something wasn’t adding up. “Wouldn’t you think that since he’s gay he’d be more inclined to keep an open mind about the possibility that Jason, another gay man, might not have gone to a homophobic bar and raped a woman?”
Ruthanne shook her head. “No, it’s almost as though he has to prove his manliness by distancing himself from the fact that Jason is gay.”
If there was one thing I admire about Kate, it’s that she rides a case to its proper conclusion, regardless of the implications politically or personally. She reached over and put her hand on Gail’s shoulder. “Make sure you don’t let his insecurity dictate the parameters of the case. If you think Jason is innocent, prove it beyond any doubt. Luckily, neither of you have to work for Emery once this case is wrapped up. So, what exactly is it that makes you think Jason is innocent?”
We all watched as a patrol car drove into the lot and pulled up to the drive through ATM. Ruthanne must have known the officer because she waved at him before turning back to answer Kate’s question. “Unfortunately, his alibi is pretty weak. He and Marcos drove up to a nightclub in Phoenix, The Sistah’s Club. They’d never been there before and didn’t know anyone, didn’t particularly talk to anyone. Gail and I went up there and asked around. It’s a big club and no one remembered seeing either one of them there.”
Gail took up the narrative. “My biggest problems are the people at Fernando’s Bar. No one can really describe Jason. Two of the three people who originally said they saw him couldn’t pick him out of the lineup. Fernando told Alex that we should speak to Justíno, but no one has seen him and when Alex and Casey went to his apartment it was a torn up bloody mess.”
“Here’s the real kicker.” Ruthanne glanced around at all of us as she spoke. “Two years ago, vice arrested the victim for prostitution, but she was never charged.”
When Kate heard this, she nodded. “Which suggests they either turned her for information or let her go in exchange for help sometime in the future. What did the Vice guys say?”
“Dario Santana was the arresting officer. He doesn’t remember her, but his notes say they released her and put in the paperwork to use her as a C.I. They never actually got around to it.” When Gail finished speaking, she motioned to Ruthanne who picked up the story again.
I interrupted before she could begin. “What’s the victim’s name?”
Ruthanne pulled a notebook out of her back pocket. “She gave her name as Sally Jessup. We’ve been trying to talk to her again, but we haven’t had any luck finding her.”
Everyone was quiet while we thought about the case. Finally, Kate asked. “Okay, where’s the smoking gun? You said Emery was convinced Jason did it. Why?”
Both Ruthanne and Gail shook their head while Gail answered. “That’s the fly in the ointment. Sally said he used a condom and a condom was found buried in the trash right outside the front door. It had a small amount of Jason’s semen in it and vaginal fluid from Sally on the outside. They got her DNA when they did the rape kit on her.”
Casey scratched her head. “Ouch.”
“Ouch is right. You guys haven’t been able to talk to Jason because he lawyered up, right?” Kate asked absently, not expecting an answer. “I’d suggest talking to Marcos again. Find out if Jason even uses condoms, and if he does, find out what brand. I know Marcos isn’t being helpful at all but let him know how important this is. And you absolutely have to track down Sally Jessup and Justíno. Without them, you don’t have a case, whether it was Jason who raped her or somebody else.”
Ruthanne turned to Casey and I. “Marcos won’t talk to us. He made that perfectly clear, but maybe if you guys tried…”
Casey glanced at Kate who shrugged. Apparently, she didn’t care who got the information as long as we got it. We finished our meeting and Kate said she was going back the office. Ruthanne and Gail left to work on finding Sally and Justíno and when Casey and I got back into the car, she asked. “Where to?”
“I’d like to go back to the hotel where the Lithuanians stayed. Maybe Angel or the hotel owner can tell us where to find this Sally Jessup.”
“Have you ever heard of a hooker named Sally?”
“That’s what’s bothering me.” I reached into the back seat and grabbed her briefcase. I pulled out the notebook where she kept the names of all the known hookers, drug addicts and dealers she ran into during the course of her various investigations. Sometimes I thought she kept better intelligence than the detectives in the Special Investigations Unit. “Okay, let’s see.” I thumbed through every page and every mug shot she had. “Nope, no Sally, let alone a Sally Jessup. Let’s see if Angel can give us any help.”
A short time later we pulled into the hotel parking lot. The owner was outside emptying the trash bags from individual garbage cans into a large rolling container. He greeted us when we walked up. “Detectives! Long time no see.”
“Yeah, what, two days?” There were maggots crawling in and out of the larger container and I walked over to take a peek. A dank stench hit me full in the face. “Ugh, what the hell do you have in there? That’s disgusting.”
“I know, right? The garbage pick up is Friday. Last Sunday, some schmuck dumped a bunch of old meat into one of my cans after he checked out. I didn’t discover it until the maggots started crawling out. Pretty disgusting, huh?”
“No body parts?” I really hoped he’d already checked, because I certainly didn’t want to.
“No, just some old meat he had in the fridge. They were still wrapped in the paper from the grocery. People do that, check in for a few days, go to the store to buy some food so they don’t have to eat out all the time. I let ‘em use the barbecue over there by the pool.” He pointed to a large fenced in swimming pool in the center of the lot. I expected it to be full of green sludge, but the water actually looked sparkling clear. It would have even looked inviting if it wasn’t seventy degrees out and probably forty-five in the water. He began pushing the fly and maggot infested barrel around to the side of the hotel complex where there was a three-sided bricked-in containment area for the dumpsters. He wheeled the container onto a small platform, strapped it tightly against some pipes and hit a button that raised the platform high enough that when it tilted backwards, the container dropped all the garbage into the dumpster.
When he’d finished, he held his hands away from his body and we followed him back to his office where he immediately disappeared for a few minutes, presumably to wash the stench off his hands. He came out drying them on a paper towel. “Okay, so how can I help you today? Those men haven’t been back since you guys were here the last time.”
Watching him dry his hands made me feel like I had some maggoty goo on me, and I involuntarily wiped my hands down the front of my pant legs. “I know you get a lot of hookers coming and going around here. Have you every heard of somebody named Sally Jessup?”
I was surprised when he didn’t even try to deny the type of clientele his hotel catered to. “Nope, never heard that name come up.”
“Is Angel still hanging around here?”
He pointed off to the right. “Yeah, she’s in room sixteen. She’s pretty fucked up most of the time. Pays the going rate on the room though, so I let her stay.”
“Do you know if she has a john with her right now?”
He shook his head, so Casey and I walked over to the last room on the right side of the first floor. We listened a second. Everything was quiet. Too quiet really. I knocked several times, each time progressively louder in case she was in some kind of drugged stupor and needed a little extra stimulation. In the meantime, Casey had gone back to get the master key from the owner. When she returned, she unlocked the door and gave it a shove. As the door swung open, both of us leaned around the corner of the doorframe to see if Angel was inside. The curtain was pulled closed so it was too dark to really make out who the person lying on the bed was. I stepped inside slowly. “Angel? It’s Detective Wolfe. Are you okay?”
I reached to the side and pulled on the little string that opens the curtains. Sunlight streamed into the room making it easy to see why Angel hadn’t come to the door. She lay sideways on the bed, wide eyes moving back and forth as though she had front row seats to her own private tennis match. Now that I could see her lips moving, I realized she was also mumbling something very softly to herself.
Casey pulled on some gloves and handed me some as well. She felt for a pulse on the side of Angel’s neck. “Really slow, but steady.” She pointed to a syringe that was partially covered by a pillow. “She probably just now shot up.” She retrieved the syringe, then walked over and set it on the filthy, grime encrusted windowsill.
I held Angel’s chin to see if I could focus her at all. “Angel. Look at me.” Her gaze tracked across the room and lit on my face for a second. I saw that little ghost of a smile I’d seen the last time we’d spoken. “Can you talk to me?”
Her voice was dreamy and disjointed when she answered. “Can…always…talk. Don’t always want…to.”
I let go of her chin. “Angel. We’re looking for a hooker named Sally Jessup. Do you know her?” I repeated it in hopes that some of my words might penetrate the heroin haze. “Sally Jessup?”
She giggled and started quietly singing what sounded like a nursery rhyme, the kind little kids might sing while they jumped rope. Her voice was barely above a whisper. “You saw her, you saw…her. Said you’d seen her naked, naked, said you’d seen her naked.”
Casey and I exchanged frustrated looks. I pulled off my gloves and headed for the door. “This is getting us exactly nowhere. C’mon, it was a stupid idea. Let’s head back to the station.
Angel seemed to be stuck in a repeating reality. “You saw her, you saw…her. Said you’d seen her…”
Just before Casey pulled the door shut, a picture flashed through my mind. “Oh damn.” I pushed the door open again and returned to the bed. I pulled on another set of gloves while I listened to her singsong voice.
“…naked, naked, naked.”
I grabbed her face between my hands and made her focus. “Angel, does Sally have a street name?”
A sloppy smile spread across her face. She whispered. “Naked…”
I shook her head a tiny bit. “Focus here a minute. What is Sally’s street name?”
Her eyes started to close, which was typical of a heroin addict on a high. I’d known them to actually go to sleep midsentence or while they were bringing food up to their mouth to eat. I yelled so loud she actually jumped. “Angel!”
Her eyes cleared slightly, and she whispered something I couldn’t hear. I really didn’t want to get any closer, but apparently the feedback loop in her brain had her repeating everything she said and the second time around she spoke a little bit louder. I was pretty sure I knew what she was going to say, so I was finally able to catch her whispered words. “She’s naked, naked, naked, Tanya’s naked now.”
I let go of her face and straightened up. Casey raised her eyebrows, silently asking if I’d been able to hear what Angel had said. I nodded. “She said, Tanya’s naked now.” I stared at her to see if the penny would drop. The only reason I understood what Angel meant was because we’d talked about Tanya the last time I’d seen her. I repeated the name to Casey one more time. “Tanya? Remember, Ruthanne showed us those pictures of the hooker who was beaten to death a few days ago?”
It was obvious when the light bulb went off. She straightened up and looked over at Angel. “The guy left her naked. He beat the shit out of her, then left her lying naked on the street where everyone would see her.”
I reached behind my back and pulled my radio off my belt. “I’m gonna call the paramedics. She’s too wasted, and I don’t feel right leaving her behind like this.”
It took the paramedics another forty-five minutes to get Angel packed up and ready to transport. By the time they’d driven out of the parking lot, a small but enthusiastic crowd of rag tag onlookers had gathered. I’d been standing by the door to Angel’s room talking to a toothless meth addict. Well, to be perfectly accurate, he wasn’t exactly toothless, but he was definitely tooth challenged. He’d filled me in on pretty much everything I had absolutely no interest in. Casey had been sitting in the car doing paperwork, so I said my goodbyes and climbed into the passenger seat. “Did you call Ruthanne and Gail to tell them what we found out?”
