by R. Lee Moore
“I wasn't kidding about not having any patience left,” Tamina prompted.
“Someone killed Amy?” Carly said. It all came out in a rush.
Tamina sighed somberly.
“Her and at least one other,” she said. “Maybe a third. Don't know yet. I got pictures, but I'm sure it's not something you want to see. Pretty certain you wouldn't be able to handle it anyway. You know her?”
“Not really,” Carly said shaking her head. “I've seen her around, said hi once or twice, but that's about it.”
“So you didn't work with her then?” Tamina asked.
Carly's eyes widened a bit, and she actually laughed. There wasn't amusement in her voice, though, only bitterness.
“Amy was into the whole vampire thing,” she said softly. “Way above my level. I'm just starting out, but even if I wasn't, it's two different worlds know what I mean? Even if they could find a willing vampire, no one's going to pay to see them fuck a mutt. Not when people like Amy are around.”
That explained a lot, Tamina thought to herself. Werewolves didn't generally refer to themselves that way. A mutt was seen as being the lowest of the low as far as werewolves were concerned. They were the wannabes and hipsters of the supernatural world. People who thought it was cool to be supernatural and were following a trend. Nobody saw them as real werewolves. Just pretenders. Pretenders who suddenly found themselves in an uncomfortable legal status that most of them didn't seem to appreciate when they got themselves turned.
It sounded like Carly had only recently found out about what all that meant for her and her life. Now Tamina felt really sorry for her. It wasn't going to be easy for her. Not much could do to change that though. All she had to look forward to was a lifetime of being used and abused, or ending up just a slab of meat for someone to gnaw on. The supernatural world was cruel that way.
“I was told she only worked with vampires,” Tamina said. “You ever hear anything that said otherwise? Anyone ever talk about her doing a wolf?”
Carly shook her head.
“No, she didn't like people like me,” she said. Her eyes widened, and she quickly began sputtering out corrections. “I mean, not like in a racist way or anything. No. No, Amy wasn't like that. She was like the nicest person I'd met since I got out here. She just wasn't, you know, into that sorta thing. Amy only did what turned her on, and that was vampires. Can't say I blame her there. I seen her work a few times.”
“That's not answering the question,” Tamina prompted.
“Oh, no. No,” Carly said firmly. “She'd made that very clear on multiple occasions. Adamantly so. I mean, Jen kept trying to get her to change her mind and all that, but Amy wouldn't budge. Should have heard how loud it got sometimes. They were offering her and a few others a lot of money. I would have taken it, but they never asked.”
That was interesting, Tamina thought. The executive producer and co-owner of the production company getting into arguments with one of the victims over being with werewolves. It was starting to make sense why the production company was stonewalling Decker on his requests. Probably trying to figure out a way to keep that little tidbit out of the whole thing. Typical, Tamina thought, a sleazy industry tended to attract sleazy people who took advantage of others. What else was new?
“Really don't want to ask this,” Tamina said slowly. “But I got pictures of two other girls that I'm trying to get information on. One of them is pretty gruesome.”
“Will it help find the person, the wolf who killed Amy?” Carly asked.
“It might,” Tamina offered. “No guarantees though. Haven't had much luck so far.”
“Let me see,” Carly said.
Tamina gave her a hesitant look, which only made Carly repeat her demand. Well, she thought, she did warn her. She dug her phone from her pocket and pulled the pictures up and handed it over to the girl. The moment Carly saw the pictures, she paled and turned away with a choking gasp like she was about to be sick. Tamina could see the abject horror in her expression. It was likely the first time the girl had seen anything like that. It was a hell of an introduction to the real world, Tamina thought.
She watched Carly take a deep breath and turn her eyes back to the phone, and tears started forming around the corners of her eyes.
“That's Albira,” she said with a soft cracking voice. “Doesn't work here. Was freelance. She was just starting out same time as me. Only met her once at this shoot out in the hills. Don't know the other one. I'm sorry.”
“It's okay,” Tamina said gently as she took her phone back.
Well, Tamina thought, that theory had been confirmed. There was a connection between the two victims, and considering who'd given her the third name, probably Hailey Keene as well. That narrowed things down considerably. Somewhere out there was a werewolf who had a taste for porn stars. Whoever it was probably was a psychopath even before they got turned. Being made a werewolf tended to amplify and bring those kinds of things out of people.
Her thoughts were interrupted by Jennifer King's hesitant arrival. She was holding stacks of paper in shaky hands, and only very hesitantly walking close enough to hand them over. Tamina fixed her with a very unfriendly gaze. Considering what she'd just heard about the woman, Jennifer King was lucky she didn't have a hole where her face used to be right about now.
“This-this is everything we have on Amy,” she said haltingly. “Name, address, financial records. Everything.”
“Two copies of everything?” Tamina asked with a feigned sweetness.
“Y-yes,” King said miserably.
Tamina snatched the papers from the woman's hands and promptly handed them off to Carly.
“Hold these for me a sec would ya?” Tamina said.
Carly froze, but took the papers shoved into her hands regardless. Even if she did do it a bit nervously, she at least had the instinct not to go against Tamina. The girl was smart like that.
With her hands free, Tamina balled up her fist and snapped a wicked jab into the side of Jennifer King's jaw that snapped her head back and sent her staggering backward. Tamina didn't give the woman a chance to recover. She rocketed a pair of follow-up strikes that send the other woman whirling around and face-planting directly into the concrete floor below. That wasn't enough though, Tamina thought darkly. Not by a long-shot.
She dropped her knee to the small of the woman's back, snatched a handful of her hair, and jerked her head back viciously. Tamina made a point to make it as painful as possible, and it did exactly what she wanted it to do. The woman screamed out in both pain and terror. She was panicking like a cornered rat and was desperately flailing and struggling to get herself free. It was a good starting point, but Tamina wanted more.
“You ever hear the expression no means no?” she whispered into the woman's ear. “When a woman, or hell when anybody tells you they don't want to do something, you should probably just drop it and leave it at that.”
“What?” King cried out shrilly.
“If I ever hear about you trying to pressure any of your performers into doing something they don't want to do ever again,” Tamina continued after a sharp flat-hand smack to the side of the woman's face. “No matter how much money you offer them, I'm going to hunt you down and open you up just so that I can show you your own insides. Then I'm going to toss you into the biggest ghoul nest I can find just so I can hear you scream like a little girl when they start eating you. You understand what I'm saying? Learn to take no for an answer bitch.”
With that said, Tamina mashed the other woman's face down hard into the concrete and got back up to her feet. She took a deep breath and felt her whole body relaxing. All the tension had drained itself out, and she was actually starting to feel better because of it. That last part probably wouldn't last, and she was probably going to regret everything she'd done to her body tonight, but for now she was feeling pretty good. A win was a win.
“You should probably find another place to work,” Tamina told Carly as she retrieved the
papers from her. “Hopefully with someone that's got higher standards than filming in a place like this. Not sure if you're going to be all that welcome around here after tonight. Sorry about that. Don't mean to make your life harder than I'm sure it already is.”
Carly sighed a little, but there was a hint of a smile there somewhere hidden down deep.
“It's okay,” she said softly. “You're probably right anyway. I've got to make the best of things right? If I'm going to do this I have to take care of myself. You probably did me a favor.”
“One way to look at it,” Tamina replied. “Let me give you my number. You think of anything else you think might help, give me a call.”
“Okay,” Carly replied. “Hope you find the one who did this. Amy was–she was one of the good ones.”
Tamina was already on her way out after giving Carly her number, and maybe a few kicks to Jennifer King and the man still curled up on the floor, when LAPD finally arrived. They'd drawn down on her the moment they saw her. Even after flashing her badge at them, it took a bit of convincing and finally threatening before they'd decided on discretion over stupidity and let her get back to her car.
She'd handed off one of the stacks of papers King had given her to one of the officers with strict instructions to make sure that Decker got it as soon as possible. After that she grabbed up the bottle from the center console and finished off what remained of it in a single gulp. She fired off a text to Decker letting him know to expect Amy Lynn's information and giving him the name of victim number two. No need for a warrant anymore. After that, she sat in her driver's seat staring down at her phone fighting with herself over the urge that welled up inside her. She finally gave in and sent Giovanni a text containing a single word.
“Anything?”
She tossed her phone onto the passenger seat and cranked on the engine. She wasn't going to wait for an answer. Hell, she thought, she wasn't even sure if she wanted one or not. Not without more to drink in any case. Talking to Giovanni again was more of a risk there than she was willing to entertain at the moment. Aside from that, she wasn't going to last much longer tonight. She was already tired, and the aching in her body from Nandi's expert hands was starting to return. She needed sleep. Everything else could wait until then.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Tamina came to the next morning in a tangled mess draped over her couch. She hadn't even made it to her bed, and every muscle and joint in her body felt as if at some point during the night rigor mortis had set in. Drinking herself into a stupor and passing out probably hadn't been her brightest idea, she decided miserably.
Still, it had been a good night all things considered. Granted, there were probably a few people who might disagree, but she'd gotten the job done, and gained some new information in the process. Everything else would work itself out in the end. Or it wouldn't. Tamina didn't particularly care at this point.
She still hadn't decided if she was going to get up or not when she became aware of the muffled sound of her phone going off. There was a brief thought of ignoring it and going back to sleep, but it might have been something to do with the case and her mind wouldn't let that go. She fumbled around the couch, the floor, and the pile of clothes strewn from the door to the couch to find out where the ringing was coming from. She found it half out of her jacket pocket wedged beneath one of the couch cushions. Flicking on the speaker, she answered with a sleep-deprived voice laced with twinges of pain that she didn't even bother trying to conceal.
“You're a goddamn natural disaster. Anyone ever told you that?” the gravelly unpleasant voice on the other end of the line said.
“Oh hey Decker,” Tamina responded. “Yeah, I've heard that a time or two. What's up? Someone drop another body or something?”
“Not yet,” Decker's voice replied. “You know I was waiting for a warrant right? We got this funny little thing you might have heard of called proper procedure down here among us little folk.”
Tamina rolled her eyes and buried her head back into the couch.
“You got the information then?” she said.
“Pulling up to the apartment of one Amy Parker as we speak,” Decker replied. “Nice enough place that I'm starting to think I'm in the wrong business.”
“So I saved you some time,” Tamina said a bit more snidely than she'd intended. She was hungover. Wasn't her fault. “What's the problem? Need me to meet you out there?”
Decker laughed for a good solid thirty seconds before he was able to answer.
“Oh hell no,” he said firmly. “I want you staying as far away from this as possible right now. Barely got out of having to deal with that shit-show you pulled last night. Passed that little grenade on to your boss. So, have fun with that. Wouldn't think you're all that popular right now.”
Tamina forced herself to sit up. It was painful, and it took a bit of doing, but she managed.
“Never am,” she replied. “Whatever. Let me know if you find anything. Told you this was all connected somehow didn't I.”
Decker snorted derisively.
“Yeah,” he said curtly. “I'll keep you in the loop, here and at Albira Adams place when we get to it. You've kept up your end so far.”
Tamina found herself forced to rifle through the hazy fog of her memory to figure out who the hell Decker was talking about. When it dawned on her, she groaned slightly. Right, she thought, the second victim.
“Thanks Carly,” she whispered. The girl had been more help than she might have known.
She hadn't thought about the phone still being on speaker when she'd spoken out loud, and found herself having to explain the whole thing to Decker just to get him to shut up about it. His voice was already giving her a migraine. Though, that might have been due to other factors. She hung up anyways just to be sure.
After putting on a pot of coffee to brew and sending a text out to Giovanni, with no response, Tamina put herself into the hottest shower she could stand. Her muscles were sore and stiff, and if she wanted to get anything done, she was going to have to do something to get herself moving properly. She was out of alcohol, so a hot shower and a handful of painkillers was the only option she had left. Eating painkillers like candy always came with the job eventually.
She was dressed and already greedily slurping down her third cup of coffee and skimming over the stack of papers she'd gotten from the Jennifer King waiting for the pills to kick in when her phone started ringing again. It was going to be one of those kinds of days apparently.
She let it ring until it stopped, and just when she thought she could go on with her day, the damn thing started ringing again. The only response she gave was to sit there glaring at the evil little thing until it clicked off a second time. Then it started ringing again.
“I'm in hell,” she grumbled.
She picked up the phone and thumbed the answer button. Before she could say a word, Mendoza's irritated voice was already chiding her.
“When I call you, don't just sit there and ignore it,” Mendoza said. “Wasting my damn time when I got things to do. Transferring you to Captain Harris' office.”
Tamina winced. This should be fun, she thought. She was about to get yelled at, maybe suspended. Wouldn't be the first time for that, but she'd only been in Investigations for a few days, so someone might be taking all the trouble she was probably causing a bit personally. She didn't really think they'd fire her, but you never knew.
“Tamina,” Captain Harris' voice came over the line. “You've been busy haven't you?”
Tamina winced again. She couldn't think of a single conversation that started like that ending well.
“Yeah, about last night,” she started.
“Did you get what you were after?” Harris asked cutting her off.
“Yeah,” Tamina replied warily. “Took a bit of doing, but I managed to put a few pieces together I think.”
“Excellent,” Harris crowed. “A few notes though. Was discharging your service weapon entirely necessary?”
“Got the job done,” Tamina replied.
There was a slight pause.
“It would be best perhaps if you were a bit more mindful in the future,” Harris finally said. “Not to disparage your marksmanship skills or anything, but accidents do happen. And you know the cardinal rule of firearm safety. Never draw your weapon unless you are going to shoot someone. I'm paraphrasing obviously.”
I was going to shoot someone though, Tamina thought. She kept that to herself. She was still trying to figure Harris out, and who knew if he'd appreciate her openly admitting something like that or not.
“Okay,” was the only thing she could think of to say instead.
“Not too sure you needed to assault those people so severely either,” Harris continued. “Then again I wasn't there, and I'm sure you have far more experience in that than I do, so I'll leave that up to your judgment. Legal is having fits, but I'm sure they'll be fine. Just try to make sure anything like that is necessary and unavoidable if you can. The Mankiller laws are a tool, not a directive.”
“I can try,” Tamina offered. It was the best she could do without outright lying to the man. Holding back wasn't usually her thing.
“Excellent. And don't worry about Mrs. King's lawyers. They see very upset going by the several calls I've had to take with them already. But I'll deal with them and their threats never fear,” Harris beamed over the phone. “So what have we learned?”
Tamina still wasn't sure Harris was on the level or not, but she decided to take a leap of faith and see where that took her. She filled him in on everything that had happened and that she'd learned so far. From her trip to the Preserve, her theories on what was going on, and everything she'd gotten from Carly and Jennifer King. There still wasn't much there, and it was all pretty much bare-bones. Yeah, they had the two victims names and somewhat of a confirmation as to a connection between the two, but that was about it. She even mentioned reaching out to Giovanni without giving up his name because it was relevant. Still didn't leave her with much of a path forward though.