Sex, Lies & Black Tie

by Kris Calvert

  “There’s no reason to threaten, Agent Callahan. Believe it or not, I hate myself for this. I’ve always hated myself. I’m going to do the right thing. For the kids, for me, for everyone.”

  Standing, I sized him up from head to toe. A used-up old man. What he said was true—he’d never be remembered for the things he did accomplish as a senator. He’d be judged for this one act. “Twenty-four hours,” I said.

  He nodded and I walked away, hoping he would keep his word. I didn’t want to have to keep it for him.

  Arriving at the Four Seasons, I walked through the lobby carrying the plastic bag from my latest pre-paid phone purchase and a bottled water. Sitting in the lobby, waiting by the elevator was none other than Agent Fuller.

  I stopped when he stood to meet me. “What are you doing here?”

  He shrugged. “I made sure the exchange went well this morning then followed them back here. They’re in suite 1555.”

  “I’m aware. Did you happen to see anyone or anything to tip you as to who dropped her off?”

  Fuller shook his head. “She wandered into Union Station like a kid off the street. Honestly, if Elias hadn’t known exactly what she looked like from every angle, none of us would’ve realized it was her. I watched him explain to her who he was and she nodded and went with him.”

  I looked to the elevator and back to him. “Anybody in or out?”

  “No.”

  “Well,” I said, walking away. “I guess you best come with me so you can see Micah. You’re not going to leave until you do, are you?”

  He looked to his shoes, digging his hands deep into his pants pockets and shook his head. “No.”

  “C’mon with you then. I sure as hell don’t know who to trust anymore, but if you’ve stuck with us this long without a directive from the office, then I suppose you’re doing all of this because you care.”

  He nodded again and the elevator door opened. Slapping him on the back, I urged him inside. “One thing, Fuller.”

  “What’s that?”

  “If it’s Micah you’re after, you need to know something.”

  “Yeah?”

  “She likes her men the way she likes her coffee.”

  “Sir?”

  The elevator rang out and I stepped onto the fifteenth floor, turning back to see his face flush with embarrassment. “Hot, strong, and able to keep her up all night.”

  Fuller swallowed hard. “Shit.”

  “Kudos to the man who can handle her. I’ve known many who’ve tried. But I have to say, Fuller, I’ve never seen anyone stick by her like you have these past few days. So…”

  “So now what?” he asked as I knocked three times.

  “So now’s not the time to back off.”

  Elias opened the door and stepped away. Fuller and I both entered to find the living space of the suite bright with the light of four laptops and a table filled with half-eaten food from room service. “How’s it going in here? Okay, I gather,” I said looking around the suite.

  “Better than just okay,” Rory chimed in. “And thanks for the food, by the way.”

  Leftover fries and remnants of a destroyed cheeseburger lay on the mussed room service cart. “You boys have something against biscuits and gravy in the morning?”

  “I’ve been working and lover boy over there has been helping a little bit, but mostly he’s been watching Frankie sleep. We haven’t been to bed. That was dinner.”

  “Shut up, Rory,” Elias said, shoving him in the shoulder and taking him off balance. “I’m not watching her.”

  “The hell you aren’t. Anyway,” Rory said with a satisfied grin. “I’ve hacked into darkcloset.”

  I was at once impressed and my perturbed attitude faded. Finally, I felt as if leaving Sam behind to fend for herself in the middle of this shit show was going to prove its worth.

  “We have to give some credit to his dad,” Elias chimed in.

  “True,” Rory agreed. “The NSA software is solid. Anyway, now that we have a list of some of their customers, I’m feeling a little—you know—like the crew who hacked into that notorious hooker site and outed all those famous sanctimonious dicks and their hoes. I mean, this is exciting on so many levels.”

  “Save everything and don’t tell anyone what you’ve got. And I mean no one. Got it?”

  “Dude,” Elias said, bringing his voice down. “You don’t have to tell us to be on the down low. We live there.”

  “I need to wake Frankie and ask her some questions before paying a couple of folks an unexpected visit.”

  “Really? Who are we taking down?” Elias asked.

  “We aren’t taking down anyone. The less you know, the better.”

  “I got news for you, Mac. I know too much already. And so do you.”

  The double doors into the bedroom opened, and Micah appeared in jeans and a black sweater that sported a cat wearing an eye patch. She was groggy as she sauntered into the room pulling her hair up on top of her head. It was one of the girly things I noticed after falling in love with Samantha. I never paid much attention to the habits of women before falling for her. After, even something as simple as piling her hair on top of her head was sexy.

  Glancing at Fuller, I could tell he was about half undone at the sight of Micah, but I stepped in to hug her anyway. “How you doin’, Momma Bear?” I squeezed her tight.

  “Mac,” she began with a hitch in her voice. “I don’t know how to thank you.”

  “You’re doing it right now.”

  Pulling away, I squeezed her hand and immediately nodded toward Fuller. “Agent Fuller here was keeping watch this morning to make sure everything went off without a hitch. And thankfully it did.”

  Micah gave Fuller a tired smile. “You did? Really?”

  He nodded and shrugged at the same time. “Mac wanted you to have back up.”

  Astonished he gave me the credit, I looked him in the eye and grimaced, silently chastising him for not taking the initiative.

  “Thanks, Mac.”

  “Honestly, it wasn’t my idea at all. I didn’t have the authority to bring in the Feds. After all, I’d just illegally purchased a girl online from a dark web sex slave site without the blessing of the Bureau. That’s not something they’d condone. Fuller put his own ass out on the line this morning.” I turned back to him. “So thank you.”

  Frankie appeared in the doorway in one of the hotel robes. Running her hands through her long dark hair, she looked to the floor and then back to me. “Mac, thank you for getting me out.”

  I took deliberate steps toward her and wrapped her in my arms. All I could think of was my own Katy. How would I protect her in the future? And what would life look like in seventeen years when she was Frankie’s age?

  Stepping away I looked at the ragtag team that made it all happen. “Have you met the folks who figured out where you were and made the arrangements to get you back?” I asked Frankie, not expecting an answer. “This is Rory. Rory was able to get inside the website and find you based on your tattoo. He’s very handy.”

  “Thank you, Rory.”

  “This is Agent Fuller. He’s been working on the inside at the Bureau and stuck his neck out to oversee your drop off this morning. On his own.”

  “Thank you, Agent Fuller.”

  “Please, call me Jason.”

  “Yes,” Micah chimed in. “Thank you, Jason.”

  The redhead blushed at her words and I quickly moved on to embarrass someone else.

  “And finally, this is Elias Warner. He’s been the mastermind who broke into your computer and figured out who you were meeting and virtually everything else about you. We may have never found you, Frankie, if it weren’t for Eli.”

  Suddenly demure in her posture, she clasped her hands behind her back and swayed in either embarrassment or happiness. I wasn’t tuned in enough to the body language of teenagers yet to know the difference.

  “Thank you, Eli.”

  I nodded at each of the couples
and then looked to Rory, in the corner tapping away on his computer.

  “Frankie, I need to ask you some questions.”

  She nodded.

  “I’m going downstairs to buy you some clothes, Frankie,” Micah said, slipping on her shoes.

  “Are you sure you want to go alone?” Fuller asked.

  She smiled at him. “Don’t worry about me. I can handle myself.”

  Taking a key card from the desk, Micah was out of the room in a flash and I was just as anxious to debrief Frankie.

  “Come and sit,” I said, taking her into the bedroom and away from the boys. If she needed to explain any information that was sensitive, I didn’t want her to feel embarrassed in front of them.

  I took a seat on the couch in the bedroom and she sat on the bed, facing me. “I know you probably don’t want to do this now, but—”

  “No—I want to. I want you to find these people. There are so many others.”

  “How many?” I asked, placing a recording device on the table.

  “Twenty or so?” she replied, fidgeting with her hands to pick at her fingers. Her eyes glistened with tears as she recalled it all. “In the few days I was there, boys and girls—you know—women came and went each day. Some came back, some never did.”

  “We found a name on your computer. You’d been chatting with a guy named Bull? Was that a nickname?”

  “I don’t know,” she said sheepishly.

  “Look,” I began. “I’m not here to judge or chastise you for talking with this man online—or even going to meet him. I just need the facts. I know you feel bad about it, but let’s get past that up front, okay?”

  She nodded.

  “Tell me about Bull.”

  “His name was Bull Gaines. At least that’s what he told me online. He was supposed to be twenty-one and from the University of Georgia. You know—a real southern guy. We met in a social media group for college kids interested in art. He was sweet and nice and he was going to be in New York the same time I was—on a trip with his family—at least that was what he said.”

  I nodded. “Okay. And did he contact you after you’d mentioned you were coming to New York? I mean, did you post something about the trip first?”

  She took a deep breath. “I don’t remember. Maybe. There were a bunch of us in the closed group talking about it. He just chimed in. Then he private messaged me and we started talking. One thing led to another and we made plans to meet for dinner in Queens—because he said that’s where his family was staying—you know—with more family.”

  “Did he ever send you any photos?”

  “Yes. But when I got to our meeting place. He wasn’t there and the man who grabbed me wasn’t him.”

  “What did he look like?”

  “Tall. Dark. He wore a hoodie and covered my mouth with a bandana. That was the last thing I remember.”

  “Yeah, they knocked you out. I saw it on the footage we obtained from the bodega owner. What do you remember?”

  “I woke up and I was hanging from the ceiling naked,” she said as tear fell from her eye.

  “Look, I know this is hard but let’s just plow through it, okay?”

  She nodded, wiping the tears away and taking a breath. “They took photos of me and then they shot me up with something that made me feel groggy. When I woke up, I was in an old rundown motel room with five other girls. Some of them spoke English—some of them didn’t. I was the only American and the girl who’d been there the longest—Charity—”

  “Was that her real name?” I asked, interrupting her story.

  “I don’t think so. They gave us all new names. Mine was just a number—four, seven, seven,” she said holding up her hand to show me the tattoo that helped us identify her. “We weren’t allowed to look them in the face. One girl did—she asked a question in Spanish—and they slapped her and beat her with an extension cord that was just randomly in the room. They told her to shut up and to keep her eyes down.” Frankie paused as if she was reliving the ordeal. “We always had to keep our eyes down.”

  She said the words and I remembered my first meeting with Brady Kurtz—how he only looked to the floor. “Do you remember anything about the men? Anything at all?” I asked.

  “She shook her head. We were forced to wear bags over our heads whenever someone would come into the hotel room. I never saw anyone, but heard—”

  “What?” I asked.

  She looked away. It was obvious she’d reached her limit. I need to back off.

  “It’s nothing. I never saw a face, only heard what he was—you know—doing.”

  “Doing? Don’t hold anything back, Frankie. Even the smallest detail can be helpful.”

  A knock came at the door and Micah walked in, handing a bag of clothes to Frankie. “Why don’t you get dressed? You’ll feel more like yourself,” she said.

  Frankie looked to me and I gave her the go-ahead. She couldn’t have been comfortable sitting in a robe talking to a grown man. I felt bad for not waiting for her to get dressed, but at the same time, we were working against the clock.

  Rory stuck his head around the corner and shouted my name. “Mac! You need to see this.”

  Walking into the other room, I found Elias glued to the television. “What is it?” I asked.

  They both pointed to the screen as a news story unfolded. Rory picked up the remote, turning up the volume.

  “We have breaking news to report. Our nation’s capital is shocked and grieving today. Senator Jeremiah Storm of Arkansas has been found dead in Lincoln Park just east of the Capitol building. Authorities on the scene are stating the fifty-nine-year-old senator who’d served four consecutive terms and headed the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations was apparently shot and killed sometime before eleven this morning—a victim of an apparent mugging. We will bring you more information as it becomes available. For this story and more, stay with us at NBC4.”

  “But…” Rory muttered. “That was our guy.”

  I took a deep breath and exhaled, “Well, shit.”

  23

  SAMANTHA

  I stared at the television after receiving the urgent email. Senator Jeremiah Storm—a man on our guest list—was dead. I dropped my head into my hands and wondered if this had anything to do with Mac’s investigation. I sat with the idea and nothing felt right.

  When Lone Oak was chosen as the back-up plan, I had been so honored and proud to host the gala. Now, after everything that had gone down in the last couple of days, I thought it was more of a curse than a blessing. Between learning of the poor souls caught in the trafficking ring, the house being bugged, Mac leaving me here alone to deal with everything and shipping the children off… now I had a dead senator on my guest list.

  Panicked, I picked up my phone and dialed Mac, hanging up immediately. I had no way to reach him. I felt an anxiety attack coming on and rushed out the front door looking for fresh air. Two steps onto the porch, I was met with a Secret Service agent. It seemed everywhere I turned there was either a person or a camera I needed to be aware of. Part of me wanted to scream. Instead I gave him a gracious nod and shut the door again. Hurrying to the back door, I was met with the same.

  “Everything okay, ma’am?” the man in black asked.

  Again I nodded, walking away from the house without looking back. The party was happening no matter who was dead. I only hoped Mac wasn’t involved. My gut told me otherwise.

  I stumbled down to the tent and gazed upon it in all its glory. Outside, the world was chaos. But inside, it was magical. The bandstand had been set up—the initials of the band leader. L.L. emblazoned upon each of the music stands. The parquet dance floor had been laid with care and each of the tables had its eight chairs in place. All the linens were folded and on the tables, ready to be set tomorrow before the party. The flower arrangements were finished and lined up along one side of the tent, just waiting to be placed perfectly in their designated spot.

  “Samantha?”

  I tu
rned to find Shelia, the party planner. “It looks beautiful, Shelia,” I said, tearing up from the exhaustion and angst.

  “Aw,” Shelia whined. “Don’t get all emotional on me, or I’ll have to cry with you.”

  “I’m sorry. It’s just a lot. Did you hear about Senator Storm?”

  “No.”

  “He was…he was shot and killed this morning in Washington. They think he was mugged.”

  “Where was his security detail?” she asked.

  I shrugged my shoulders.

  “This is terrible.”

  I nodded.

  She narrowed her gaze as she listened to someone in her ear piece and then held the button clipped to her shirt to answer. “I’ll be right there.”

  “Okay,” she said, clapping her hands together. “You have enough on your mind. Don’t worry about any of this. We’ve got everything under control and if you need me,” she said taking out her phone, “You know exactly where to find me.”

  “Thank you, Shelia.”

  I left the tent as the original crew arrived to put up the connecting walkway and red carpet to the main event from the back of the house.

  Walking into the kitchen long enough to get my keys and wallet, I climbed in my car, leaving Lone Oak and everything else behind. I had a couple of mindless errands to run and I prayed it was exactly what I needed while I waited to speak with Mac. My first stop was my former residence, Mimi’s house.

  I took a deep breath as I opened the door to the old plantation home, then disarmed the alarm. I missed this old house. It was so much a part of my past, having practically grown up here. After Daniel’s death, it was my future with Dax. I stood in the front entrance and thought of the days I spent there with my baby boy and my best friend, Polly. Polly, who I missed like crazy—but even she had moved on with her own exciting life. Still, I felt a sense of peace and calm. It was just what I needed.

  I turned on the lights as I walked through the house. It was in pristine condition, as always.

  I climbed the stairs to her master bedroom, the room I’d also called my own. One of my favorite things about the house was that even though Mimi had given it to me, she’d left behind so many of her belongings it seemed as though she had never moved out.