“And Chelsea?”
“She was easy. Cute face, good tits, virgin. I felt five grand practically sitting in my pocket when she walked by.”
“So what happened?”
“Nothing out of the ordinary. Like I said, she was practically a dream come true: a runaway who was pissed at her parents but had nowhere to go and no money. And no experience.”
Mike seethed at the smugness of the man sitting across from him. Not an ounce of remorse in his body.
“She faltered a bit, though,” LeBaron continued. “Waffled back and forth, you know? Took a bit of work.”
“How so?” Mike tried to sound casual.
“Pffft,” LeBaron sighed, slumping back in the metal chair, trying to get comfortable. “She kept going back to her folks. Luckily, she had some blowup with her mom and finally came with me.”
“Was she still a virgin?”
“When she came with me? Yeah,” LeBaron smirked and nodded.
“And when you introduced her to—”
“Fuck no! Gotta try out the goods before I sell ‘em!” The man roared with laughter.
“And then what?” Mike asked. He wanted so badly to reach across the table and beat this asshole to a bloody pulp. Instead, he slowly took a number of deep breaths in and out in an effort to keep himself calm.
“Oh, shit. It was easy after that,” LeBaron guffawed. “She’d already met most of the guys and was hooked on the lifestyle, if you know what I mean.”
“No, I don’t know,” Mike replied, keeping his hands under the table so that he wouldn’t wrap them around this prick’s neck and squeeze the life out of him.
“The booze. The drugs. The—” LeBaron listed
“Sex?”
“Attention,” the in-custody smugly corrected. “They all do.”
“Is that what you call it?” Mike pushed.
“Sex has such…uh, negative connotations, wouldn’t you agree?” LeBaron looked over at Sal. “When was the last time you were upfront with a girl about just wanting to fuck her when you took her out to dinner, officer?”
“And so…?” Mike pushed the words through his clenched teeth.
“And so, after that blowup with her mom, she called me—”
“On her cell phone?” Mike said.
“I guess.”
“So your number would be on those phone records?” Sal asked, giving his partner a few moments to calm himself down.
“Dunno. Doesn’t matter. I always use disposables.”
“Kinda like the girls, eh?” Mike spat.
“Ha! Yeah. Never thought about it like that, but you’re right. Funny guy, Mr. Pig. Funny guy.”
“So then what?” Mike fought to regain his composure.
“So she calls me, says she’s ready to move in with me.” LeBaron sighed as he leaned back to stretch in his chair. “I bring her back to the place—”
“It’s not your place?”
“Fuck, no!” LeBaron sat up abruptly. “I wouldn’t live in a dump like that, or with that crazy bitch who lives there.”
“So she’s not your mother?”
“Oh, fuck. Wash your mouth out!” LeBaron laughed. “My folks live in a condo downtown that was worth a couple mil when they bought it five years ago. How the hell do you think I can afford the lawyer I got now?”
“Fair enough,” Mike said. “So then what?”
“So I take her to the crazy bitch’s place, we party a bit more, and then I introduce her to her handler.”
“Who’s that?”
“I dunno. They come and go.”
“Why’s that?”
“Not much scratch in it for them, I guess. They only have the girls for a couple of days. Just long enough to make ‘em believe they’re the love of buddy’s life and that they owe him, and then they’re out of the picture.”
“What happens next?”
“They get packaged, priced, and put on the shelf. Are we almost done? I’m getting tired and I gotta piss.”
“What does that mean ‘packaged, priced, and put on the shelf’?” Mike asked.
“You know. Fucked until they don’t take it personally any more, maybe worked with if they have any special aptitudes, and then an ad goes online. I really gotta take a piss.”
“Where are the girls kept?”
“Here and there.”
“Where?”
“Fuck, I dunno.” LeBaron shrugged, looking over his shoulder as he considered whether or not he had given enough to keep him out of jail before calling the guard again. “They move ‘em around, and when the demand for a particular girl starts to drop, they take her to the Falls or to Buffalo and shuffle her around a bit until she burns out.”
“And after that?”
“They get rid of her. I don’t know.”
“What does that mean, ‘get rid of her’?”
“You know. Either sell her off to some other syndicate—usually the ones that handle Northern Ontario or the armpits around Buffalo—or just, you know, knock her off if they can’t sell her.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Stop playing me, man. I really gotta piss.”
“So let’s get back to where they keep them when they’re in Toronto,” Mike continued.
“I told you. I. Don’t. Know.”
“How about the Falls? Or Buffalo?
“Dunno.”
“But you do know Chelsea Hendricks.”
“Yeah. I guess. Sure.” LeBaron began to twitch.
“And you do know Britney George?”
“Maybe. They don’t always tell me their names.”
“How many people are involved in this ring, including you?”
“Five? Six? And probably a couple of people at the other end.”
“Do you know their names?”
“Nope.”
“So nothing you’ve told us tonight is gonna do you any good at all.”
“What the fuck?” LeBaron began to scratch his arms and shoulders.
“It was a beautiful story, my friend, but there’s nothing I can hang my hat on. I think it’s time to call the guard.”
“What do you mean? I told you everything!”
“You told me a nice little fantasy, Teddy. Nothing I can work with,” Mike smiled warmly, knowing that he was turning the screws on this asshole.
“So what do you want?” LeBaron’s whole body began to shake.
“I want to know where they keep the girls. The girls they have now.”
“I told you. I don’t know.” LeBaron’s voice cracked.
“Okay, I believe you. Sal,” Mike looked casually over at his partner, “you ready to go?”
“Yep. I’m good,” Sal nodded. “Want me to call for the guard?”
“Wait. No,” LeBaron pleaded.
“We don’t have time for bullshit, Teddy. And neither do you. You gotta piss, don’t you?” Mike reminded the agitated man before looking over at his partner. “Anything else you can think of that I forgot to ask, Sal?”
“No, I think you’ve pretty much covered it. I’ll just go over and get the guard.” Sal got up and walked past LeBaron towards the door. “Must be so annoying to be called out to all the time.”
“I don’t know the street address, but it’s in that high-rise apartment on Dawes Road,” LeBaron blurted out.
“Lots of apartment buildings near there, Teddy. We’re gonna need a bit more.”
“The one near the coin laundry. The apartment number is 304.”
“You know what he’s talking about, Sal?”
“Nope. I think I see the guard.” Sal peered through the tiny bulletproof glass window of the metal door.
“Honest to fucking God, guys, that’s all I know!” LeBaron screamed.
“Okay. We’ll let you know how it pans out,” Mike said. “Thanks. Sal?”
“Guard!” Sal called out.
The guard opened the do
or immediately and had Theodore LeBaron in handcuffs and out of the room within a minute. LeBaron looked over his shoulder to see Mike pocket the tape recorder as he and Sal stood up.
“Hey, you forgot to turn it off,” the big man advised.
“No, I think I forgot to turn it on,” Mike said with a beatific smile. “Good luck with your trial and keep that expensive lawyer on retainer. You’ll be hearing from us shortly.”
“Wait. You fucking tricked me!” LeBaron screamed as the guard hustled him down the hallway. “That’s not fair! You fuckers lied!”
“You never told a lie, Teddy?” Sal called out as another guard escorted him and Mike out in the opposite direction.
*****
“Did you have a little nap in our absence?” Sal asked Julia as they picked up their belongings from the metal tray.
“Oh, most definitely. I feel fresh as a daisy. Can’t you tell?” she said grumpily, Sal’s comment reigniting her annoyance. “I took the time to make some calls. A couple of the addresses Ama— uh, my source gave me sound promising.”
“Is there anything on Dawes Road?” Mike asked as he nestled his snubby back into place in his waistband.
“Funny you should ask.” Julia began to gather up her belongings from the two seats next to her that she had commandeered. “Asshole give you an address there, too?”
“He gave us a unit number but no building address. Said it’s the building beside the coin laundry,” Mike replied, looked over at Sal as he holstered up and then gently replaced the knife in his sock. “Who the fuck carries a knife anymore?”
“Me. Why?” Sal replied, shaking his leg to adjust the concealed knife as he walked.
“Wouldn’t happen to be unit 304, would it?” Julia continued, adjusting her coat over her re-holstered handgun.
“Yeah. What do we have on the place?” Mike nodded back to the front-desk guard to buzz the three of them out of the building.
“Lots of drug arrests and a few firearms warrants executed out of there,” Julia said, pulling her coat up tight against her neck to keep off the pelting rain that hit them as soon as they emerged from the jail.
“I hate rain,” Mike grumbled, pulling his leather jacket collar up.
“How can you hate rain? You’re Irish!” Julia exclaimed.
“My parents are Irish. I’ve never been,” Mike replied, making a beeline for their car, clicking the doors open with the remote as he ran.
“How about you, Sal?” Julia asked. “Where are you from?”
“Anywhere she wants me to be from,” Sal laughed as he piled into the back seat of the car.
“Always working it, eh, Sal?” Julia laughed, jumping into the front passenger seat. Grimacing, she ran her fingers through her wet hair before doing up her seatbelt.
“You never know…” Sal began.
“Yeah. Lot of opportunity here in the parking lot of a jail in the middle of the night. Glad to hear you’ve got standards there, partner,” Mike jabbed, starting up the car. He shifted gears abruptly and said, “I think we should do a drive-by.”
“Great idea,” Sal agreed. “First thing tomorrow.”
“No, now. Where there’s drugs and guns, there’s sex.”
“You checked your old-man watch lately, Mikey? We’re starting to run into some serious overtime, and besides. I’m beat.”
“Beat? Why are you so tired, Sal? You live alone.” Julia laughed as she looked over her shoulder into the backseat.
“That’s why,” Sal said with a wink.
“Got a promise there, Romeo?” Mike asked.
“If I did, I wouldn’t be telling you two.” Sal smiled, stretching himself out to take up almost the full width of the back seat.
“Sadly,” Julia had to admit, “he’s right about the timing. Even if we go back to the office and pick up our cars now, we’ll only have a few hours before we start again in the morning, and I have to drive all the way to Hamilton. In this.”
“You could always sleep in the quiet room at the office,” Mike suggested, buzzing the guard to let the car off the property.
“No. Absolutely not,” Julia stated. “I have seen that cot, and I can only imagine what has happened on it. No. Just no.”
“I’ve got a couch in my living room. You could crash there,” Sal offered.
“Still no. Even more no. Absolutely and beyond-a-doubt no. Ugh. I have to clear that thought from my brain before I see something I’ll never be able to unsee. If that cot has stories, your couch must…ugh. Stop me before I go too far.”
“What? It’s not like we’re sharing a bed—”
“I am vomiting in my mouth now, Sal. Stop!” Julia shuddered.
“She’s probably right,” Mike had to admit.
“Huh?” Sal exclaimed.
“About getting a good solid few hours’ sleep. Tomorrow is going to be a busy day.”
“She’s probably right? It was my fucking idea,” Sal objected.
“No. It was Julia’s idea to go home and get some sleep. I don’t want to know what you’re going home to do.”
“Don’t kid yourself, Mike,” Julia smirked. “He’s probably going to have a few beers and play videogames in his underwear all night.”
“Don’t judge!” Sal laughed, half-seriously considering her suggestion.
“First thing tomorrow, we’ll check out this Dawes Road address. Might be something, might not,” Mike said. “And then we’ll—”
“And I want to check out that Burning Schoolhouse thing you were talking about,” Sal interrupted. “Sounds like it’ll be amazing, especially if they torch the place at the end.”
“What were you going to suggest, Mike?” Julia asked.
“That we just start kicking in doors if Dawes comes up short. We gotta find these girls before they slip across the border.”
“Border Security will hold the van if they try,” Julia said, rubbing her eyes, which were becoming increasingly irritated by the headlights of the oncoming traffic.
“If they use that van,” Mike pointed out.
“Mike, we don’t end every project with arrests,” Julia reminded him, no longer able to suppress a yawn. “Sometimes all we can do is hand off our intel and move on to the next case.”
“You’ve only been on this one for a few months, Julia. I’ve been working the Chelsea Hendricks case for two years to get to here. I’m not going to let her slip through my fingers just because my lounge-lizard partner wants to get laid and watch shit get blown up.”
“Hey, there are worse hobbies, Mike,” Sal laughed.
“What if the girls aren’t going to be moved tomorrow? Or what if they’ve already been moved?” Julia suggested, reaching into her purse to pull out some tissues to wipe her eyes.
“Are you going to be okay?” Mike asked, looking sideways at her.
“Just the lights. Hoagie and I usually drive in together, and he always drives when we’re working.”
“Must be shitty when the work wife’s needs are pushed aside by the real wife,” Sal quipped.
“The only reason you’re not outshone daily is because I don’t have a wife, Sal,” Mike shot back. “Hell, you’d be outshone if I had a hamster!”
“Ooooh, I feel the love,” Sal laughed.
“Either way, we can only do so much, and talking about it isn’t getting me any closer to my bed,” Julia reminded them.
“Or mine,” Sal said. “Uh, I mean me in mine. You in yours. Alone. Without me. With Keith. Or not.”
“Shut up, Sal,” Mike and Julia said in unison.
“So tomorrow…oops, make that today, aim to be in for noon. I’ll be in earlier and bring Robby up to speed,” Mike said as he turned the car into the deserted parking lot in front of their office building. “And make sure you have a pair of clean jeans on, okay, Sal? That chicken wing sauce stain is disgusting.”
“I told you, these are the cleanest of my dirty jeans, and all of my jea
ns are dirty right now.”
“Well, at least wear clean underwear,” Mike sighed.
“Why? In case I get hit by a car?”
“You’re a disgusting little man, Sal,” Julia said as she hoisted her purse with one hand and got her car keys ready in the other. “Gentlemen, God willing, I will see both of you in a few hours.”
The clicking of Julia’s heels echoed in the poorly lit parking lot as Mike and Sal stood in the cold rain watching to make sure she got safely to her car. Mike never let himself forget that, cop or not, Julia was still a woman, and as annoying and childish as Sal was, both he and Mike were still gentlemen. Once they heard her car door slam shut and the engine start and saw her lights flashing at them as she drove towards the exit, the partners headed off in different directions, one headed home for a good night’s sleep, the other to crack open a few beers and play videogames for a while.
Chapter Nine
Monday, October 31st, 2005 - 1:30 p.m.
“I feel like shit,” Sal moaned, flopping himself into a chair at the conference table. He was more unshaved than usual and was wearing the same dirty clothes as the night before.
“A hot date or did some twelve-year-old beat your ass at whatever online videogame you play?” Mike laughed as he took a big gulp from the grungy coffee mug he kept at work. He was looking not much fresher himself, but at least he was in clean clothes.
“Neither. I think I’m coming down with something.” Sal sniffled, then reached into his pant pocket for a large bag of sunflower seeds.
“Save that thought until tomorrow,” Mike advised as he rifled through a folder of reports, police record printouts, mugshots, and envelopes stuffed with bits and pieces of info that he’d pulled together in the past couple of hours.
“This is our last chance to close this project. Robby said we have to shut it down today, regardless. He’s not authorizing any more overtime unless we come in with a couple of arrests. And you’re not eating those fucking seeds in here.”
“You talked to him?” Sal asked, stuffing a handful of seeds in his mouth.
“Yeah. I told you and Julia that I was coming in early, remember?”
“Do you ever sleep?” Sal mumbled, looking for a discreet place to spit the shells.
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