Mindy gasped. She hadn’t intended to hurt him. She just wanted to get him out of her space. She held up the box cutter again as though it were a weapon, but Caprico was already grabbing his forearm and yelling as though she had just cut through an artery.
“You!” Caprico shouted. He stood up and drew his foot back. “You can’t attack an officer of the law!”
Mindy might have said that Caprico wasn’t an officer of anything but himself, but she was too flailing about on the ground trying to keep her hands from taking the full brunt of Caprico’s kicks. Despite her squirming, he managed to kick her hand. The box cutter went skittering across the floor and wound up beneath a rack of costumes. Mindy’s hand throbbed from the hit and she rolled sideways to try and get away from Caprico.
But Sergeant Caprico was having none of it. Lunging toward her, he managed to catch hold of her foot. He hauled her back toward him and stomped on her leg in the process. Shooting pain went from Mindy’s ankle to her knee. Her vision darkened, blackening and curling at the edges as though her field of vision was nothing more than charred paper. She was going to pass out. It was going to happen and that would be it. Caprico could say whatever he wanted and get away with it.
The thought sent a shot of pure adrenaline through her veins. Mindy’s vision cleared and sounds came roaring back into focus. There was shouting somewhere in the shop. The other employees. Yes. Grace and Justin. They had seen everything.
“Let her go!” Grace called out. “You kicked her! What are you doing? You can’t just come in here and kick her! I don’t care if you are a cop!”
Caprico grabbed hold of Mindy and yanked her to her feet. Her leg was throbbing. Her hand was throbbing. And maybe the combination of the two was so confusing to her body that it didn’t know what to focus on. Mindy sagged against Caprico. He shoved her to her feet once again.
“You’re hurting her,” Justin told Caprico. “Let her go. She hasn’t done anything but ask you if you needed help with the T-shirts.”
But Caprico looked incensed. He shook Mindy like a naughty puppy. “That’s not true! She assaulted me with a box cutter.”
“Where?” Justin shouted back. “I don’t see a weapon. She was folding T-shirts. What is this? Assault by cotton blend?”
Caprico dragged Mindy toward Justin and Grace and glared them into silence. “You need to be careful or you’re going to be next. Do you understand what I’m saying to you?”
Both of them piped down. Mindy tried to smile at them. To thank them. She had a feeling their observations were going to come in really handy later on when Caprico wrote what was almost certainly going to be a report full of lies.
“Mindy Hall, you are under arrest for assaulting an officer of the law with intent to harm.” Caprico made this sound like a death sentence. As if it was the worst thing she could have possibly done. And perhaps, if the officer had been someone else, it might have been. “You have the right to remain silent…”
As Caprico did a piss poor job of reciting the Miranda rights, which he could not seem to recall even though he was supposed to have memorized them long ago, Mindy spotted Kevin. He was on the other side of the gift shop not far from the narrow side door that led to his office. There was a smirk on his face. He’d been part of this. Mindy knew it. She just wasn’t sure why. Simple retribution? Jealousy? A desire to make her pay for being part of his humiliation the other night? Or was it something else entirely. Something closer to Caprico’s growing list of crimes.
It did not take Caprico long to drag Mindy from the gift shop, through the entrance hall, to the exit. But he made a damned spectacle while doing it. The man nearly plowed over two different groups of tourists. He loudly shouted the words “criminal coming through” and made sure everyone knew Mindy was an employee going up to jail for a laundry list of crimes.
“Mindy?” Grace had followed them at least to the front doors of the mirror maze castle complex. “What should I do?”
“Call Rock Wolf Investigations,” Mindy called back to Grace. “Ask for Ash.”
And that was it. Mindy was unceremoniously piled into the back of a police car and Caprico got into the driver’s seat. Of course, once inside he seemed in no hurry. He just sat there with his lights going, flashing blue and red onto the castle façade, and turning everything a sickening shade of green against the darkness.
“Mindy, Mindy, Mindy,” Caprico said, his voice dripping sarcasm. “What am I going to do with you? A whore. A paid one at that. A drug dealer. And now we can add contributing to the delinquency of a minor to your list of crimes.”
“What?” Mindy tried to stop herself from rising to his bait, but it was impossible to keep quiet. “I didn’t contribute to Darren’s delinquency. You did that quite well on your own, Sergeant.”
“You had better keep a civil tongue in your head, young lady,” Caprico said in a lazy tone of voice.
What were they waiting for? It was so odd. Like he was deliberately waiting for someone else to show up or something to happen. Then his radio crackled. She could not catch what they were saying. It was garbled and the words were coated in static.
“Copy that,” Caprico responded.
Then he turned around and he stared at her for a moment or two. Mindy felt her heart speeding up again—if that were even possible at this point. She searched for something to make it seem as though she wasn’t bothered.
“I’m confused, Sergeant Caprico,” Mindy told him suddenly. “Why is it that you wear a suit during the day when you’re hanging out with Detective Sellers and then you wear a uniform at night when you’re sinning all over town on your own?”
He glared at her in the rearview mirror. “I work two different beats. It’s all part of my job.”
“Sorry, but arresting people on trumped up charges and assaulting them is not part of your job. At this point, the public defender will be thrilled to hear that I’ve got something more than the usual I-didn’t-do-it, thing to tell her.”
Caprico only smirked. That was odd. Why was he smirking when he had to know that she was right? Public defenders were supposed to defend their clients against police brutality and inappropriate interviewing techniques. This qualified.
“That was a confirmation from the hospital,” Caprico said loudly. He put his police cruiser in gear and they started to roll away from the mirror maze castle. “Your brother had a seizure about two hours ago.”
Mindy’s gut clenched tight. What? How had she not known about this? Why hadn’t they called her? What was going on? Was he lying?
“That was just the dispatch letting me know that your brother died. That way, I can charge you with his murder.” Caprico did not even try to hide his glee. “And next time, don’t try to play double agent and work with someone like Detective Lowell on a case against me. It will never end well.”
Mindy could not speak. She could not even process what was happening. She had murdered her brother? That’s what Caprico was going to tell them? He was going to charge her with murder? Mindy hadn’t done anything. She hadn’t put the pills in his mouth. She didn’t even know what Darren had taken. Surely, he hadn’t taken the entire bag. Even in his semi-drugged, desperate state he would have known that would mean instant death. But who was going to believe her now? She had gone from nerdy goody two shoes to bad girl without even a change in her behavior.
Chapter Twenty
Ash smiled at the girl behind the counter of the mobile phone outlet and hoped she was going to be helpful and not too worried about bending the rules. He took out the little folder that held his private investigator’s card and flashed it quickly as though it had a badge in it.
“My name is Ash Forbes,” Ash told the young woman. “I’m investigating a recent drug overdose and I need some help.”
The young woman’s features moved from helpful to sympathetic. “That’s just awful! You said your name was Ash? That’s so unusual.” She batted her eyelids at him.
Ash huffed out a little breath a
nd decided that it might not be too bad to use his looks to his advantage in this situation if it really got him what he wanted. He could ask for forgiveness later. The nametag on the woman’s black and yellow polo shirt said TRUDY. Who on earth named their kid Trudy these days? But that was not what Ash was here to wonder.
“Trudy, I’m so glad you’d like to help. My name is actually Ashton. But I shortened it a long time ago, for the obvious reasons.” Ash gave her a conspiratorial grin designed to make her feel he had just let her in on a huge secret.
She put her hand over her heart. “Oh my word! That’s such a beautiful name!”
“Well, the name that I need you to look up for me isn’t Ashton,” he said, gently bringing her back to the point. “It’s Hall. Mindy Hall.”
“Do you have Mindy Hall’s phone number?” Trudy got on her computer and started typing at the speed of light. Ash rattled off Mindy’s phone number and Trudy entered the information. “Okay, so I see her here. Oh. It looks like she forgot to pay her bill.”
“When was it due?” Ash was just hoping that the phone hadn’t been cut off. That would shoot his theory out of the water.
“Just today.”
“Ah.” Ash gave a very grave nod. “That’s because Ms. Hall has been at the hospital with her brother. As I said, he overdosed. It’s very tragic.”
“Of course!” Trudy banged on the keys. “I put a note on the account so we can forgive the late charges and not shut the phone off. She’s been a very good customer. It looks like she comes in every single month right on the nose and pays her bill in cash.”
Ash felt a smile tugging at his lips. Unfortunately, for now it was safer to let Trudy believe Mindy Hall was a little old lady if that’s what the girl wanted to think. “That sounds like her. Can you see the other phone number on her account? That’s the one I’m interested in. I’m hoping your computer has a record of texts that were sent to and from that phone last night.”
Trudy bit her lip. She was a cute enough girl in a very sales clerk sort of way. Meaning she had tried very hard to put on enough makeup to make herself look bright and cheery and perpetually happy. Her work uniform wasn’t flattering, but she seemed to have a good enough figure and she certainly acted as though she was used to men hitting on her. But as she batted her blue eyes at Ash, he felt nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not even a speck or hint of interest in any way. It could have been her giving him the middle finger for all the interest it sparked in him.
Right now, the only thing he was interested in was Mindy. Getting this information and helping her out. That was all that mattered. So, he did his best to smile pretty for Trudy as she worked her computer magic and did her best to find out for him what he needed to know.
“Here they are.” Trudy murmured the words rather distractedly. Then she pushed a button with enough force to make the keyboard move on the counter. “Here. I printed it. I think that will make it easier for you.”
“Thank you!” At least he didn’t have to work hard to get that smile to beam right at her. “I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you helping me in this case.”
“Oh, of course!” Trudy gushed. She turned and went to the printer. “We’re always bound to help in a police situation.”
Sure. Except that right now the police were the ones trying to hide the true facts. But Trudy didn’t need to know that right now. But Ash had to say something. So he went with something lame. “Such a wonderful thing to have such competent and cooperative people at a cell phone company store.”
Trudy was now beaming. She reached for a comment card. “If you don’t mind? I would really appreciate a shout out. We get paid bonuses if we get good reports.”
Ash was holding in his hand a printout of Darren’s texts from the night before that might explain why a trashed out seventeen-year-old had managed to quietly sneak an entire bag of drugs out from under his sister’s nose. But right now, he had to smile big and take the pen she offered him.
“I would be happy to fill out a comment card!” Ash told her with about as much eagerness as he could muster under the circumstances. “Trudy, you’ve been such a huge help to me.”
Ash gave her five stars for her service, scribbled a few comments and prepared to leave. If an actual manager showed up, there was likely to be a big hoopla about the fact that Ash wasn’t exactly law enforcement. He had been. Once upon a time. But in Ash’s opinion, law enforcement credentials didn’t mean a hill of beans. You were either honestly investigating something or you were sweeping it under the rug and there wasn’t much place in between.
Ash held up the printout and beamed at Trudy one last time before leaving the store. He needed to make sure he preserved this relationship. Who knew how it might come in handy on another case. The first rule of investigating: Never alienate those you might have to ask for help later on.
It was hard to keep that printout in his hand and walk all the way to his truck without ripping it out and reading it. Ash was desperate to confirm his suspicions. He just could not believe there had been enough brainpower and lucidity left in Darren Hall to go digging quietly through his sister’s stuff. Ripping and tearing? Yes. That would make sense. But who had woken him up and told him to go look in the first place?
Ash settled into the driver’s seat of the truck. He started the engine up so he could turn on the air conditioning and avoid sweat sticking him to the leather seats. He perused the printout in the glow of his overhead map light and tried to be calm and rational.
The texts were mostly a jumble of ridiculous words and partial words used to make up text speech for most of the younger half of the population. It wasn’t difficult to make out a pattern. There was most definitely a dealer situation going on here. For a guy who sold the stuff, Darren seemed to have a dealer that he bought from as well. And then at the beginning of this last week, Darren seemed to have run out of money. He had begged for freebies. Agreed to sell and give his cut to the dealer for more drugs. And then finally, Ash got to the night of Darren’s overdose.
There was an incoming text at one o’clock in the morning to Darren’s phone. It had evidently woken him up. Ash could imagine that by then, the sound of his phone’s text alert was like a heavenly chorus to Darren when he’d been begging for drugs with no response for nearly the entire day.
The texter had informed Darren that there was a bag of the “stuff he needed” right outside his bedroom door.
Ash found himself staring down at the page in total confusion. What? Outside his bedroom door? How was that possible? Mindy had left the bag of pills in the duffle and she swore she had tucked it beneath an end table. Ash found himself believing her. She was just that sort of person to know exactly what she’d done. It was the way she did things.
There was only one logical answer to this puzzle but who had broken into their apartment and placed a bag of Darren’s drug of choice right outside his bedroom door? That would have been minimal effort. Getting out of bed. Yes. That would be hard, but the excitement of a fix would have been enough. And then what? Had the stuff been spiked? Had it been more than Darren realized?
Ash was still staring at the print out of texts trying to reason through the list of suspects in his head. There were several who had a motive. Some were definitely more obvious than others. It was just a matter of waiting for someone to show their hand. Eventually, they would.
The buzzing of Ash’s phone drew him out of his deep thoughts. He glanced at the display and immediately answered. Titus Holbrook was not the call you ignored. Not if you wanted to continue working for him.
“You’re not going to believe what I have in my hand right now,” Ash said immediately.
There was a brief pause, and then Titus made a grunting noise that sounded a whole lot like irritation. “Well, I hope it’s something to do with that Darren Hall kid, because the hospital just called and the kid died about a half hour ago. His sister isn’t answering her phone and they don’t know who else to call.”
A
sh didn’t know what to address first. The death of Darren Hall—which was tragic, but not necessarily unexpected—or the fact that Mindy wasn’t answering her phone. “Mindy went to work. She had to. But she gave the duty nurse her phone number. The plan was for the hospital to call her and then her to call me. That way, I could give her a ride down there if something happened. Why the hell didn’t they call her when it started to go south?”
“It didn’t sound like there was time to make that call.” It sounded as though Titus was driving. From the sound of it, there were a dozen or more cars roaring past in the background. Maybe Titus had pulled over to call. “I guess the kid had a seizure maybe an hour ago. From what the nurse said, it would have left him braindead anyway. But he went into cardiac arrest and that was it. They worked on him for maybe an hour but there was no bringing him through it.’
“Okay.” Ash abruptly made an illegal U-turn. Horns blared and cars slammed on their brakes as he cut through the traffic on the strip and veered off onto a side road that would bypass the tangle of cars and trucks heading down Route 76. “I’m going back to the mirror maze. That’s the last place I saw Mindy. I know she was late paying her phone bill, but the lady at the store said they didn’t shut it off. Extenuating circumstances and all that.”
A car door slammed. Where was Titus? “How in the hell do you know whether or not she paid her phone bill?”
Ash sped down a back street and hung a hard right at the stop sign. He floored it down two more blocks and steered toward a huge parking lot so he could cut through back to the strip. “That’s what I was trying to tell you. Mindy didn’t know what happened to Darren’s phone. But he always had it on him. So, I went to the mobile phone store and got a printout of his texts the night he died. Someone texted him and told him to look outside his bedroom door for what he needed.”
“What the hell? His bedroom door?” Titus trailed off for a moment. “Then there had to be someone else in that apartment. Someone skilled at sneaking around. And I bet you that phone has conveniently gone missing too.”
Rock Wolf Investigations: Boxset Page 86