She opened her oven. The smell of cinnamon became stronger and sweeter. With a pot holder, she removed a pan. Now I could see she'd been making cinnamon rolls.
She set the pan on the top of the oven. "Won't you have a seat? I'll get you some milk and a fresh cinnamon roll. Do you like cinnamon rolls?"
"I do," I said and I took a seat at the kitchen table. If she was sitting me down, she had a lot to say. That was good and bad, I figured. Probably she was going to bore me for the next hour with tons of useless info, but there was always that chance that she might know something helpful.
She set a little paper plate in front of me with a steaming cinnamon roll on it. Then she set a tall glass of milk in front of me too. She took a seat opposite of me.
"Be careful not to burn yourself. They're hot when they've just come out of the oven," she said.
Like I couldn't see the steam rising myself. "Yes ma'am," I said and smiled.
"So, what do you want to know about Carlie?" she asked sweetly.
"I can't get her to talk to me," I said.
"Why? Did she do something bad?" She cocked her head to one side.
"I don't know," I said. "Does she do bad things?"
She gave me that sly smile again. "I've seen some things," she said. "I've seen some odd things."
"Like what?" I asked.
"She leaves her girl at home at all hours."
"Her girl?" I was unaware that she had a daughter.
"Yes, the younger one that lives with her."
I nodded. She was talking about her younger sister. "Please, continue." I picked up the cinnamon roll and took a small bite.
"Is there a reward if we solve the crime?" she asked.
"Well, no," I said. "But there is the satisfaction of getting to the truth."
"All right," she said. "Does this have to do with her night habits?"
"Probably," I said with my mouth full. I was merely trying to lead her on to talking more. More than anything, I needed leverage. I needed something to get Carlie talking.
"She leaves the little girl home alone. Sometimes she's gone all night."
I had no idea how this lady would know that, but I thought I'd play along for the moment. "She's gone all night?"
"All night, but not always."
"Do you know what she's doing all night?" I asked.
"I'd guess it's the same thing she does when she stays home and is up all night."
"And what is that?" I asked.
She leaned forward and whispered. "She's a sex maniac."
"A sex maniac?" I said in a normal tone.
She looked shocked and covered her mouth. "Shh. I saw a program about it on TV. And she's definitely one of them."
"So, she had people over, and they spend the night?" I asked.
"And it's not only men," she said. She looked so pleased with herself. "She has women too. Imagine that."
Actually, what I found interesting was that she had men over. I had her pegged as a lesbian, but I was wrong. "So, she has men and women over," I said.
"They don't close the curtain," she said. "The bedroom curtain. They leave it open. I've seen some things."
I didn't really know if I wanted to know the answer to this question. "What have you seen?"
"They get rough with each other," she said. "I've seen them tied up, and I've seen them with masks on."
"You've seen all this through the window?" I asked.
She nodded. "Drink your milk." She pointed to the untouched glass she'd set out for me.
I drank some.
"And I've seen them choking each other and putting bags over their heads."
I choked on the milk. It took me a minute to clear my throat. "Wait," I said. "You've seen choking and bags on heads? Are you talking about suffocation with bags?"
"That's what it looked like," she said. "Does that help you?"
"It might," I said. Kelly Brandt had died after seeing Carlie. She died with a bag over her head. That seemed awfully coincidental now.
"I went to the library to use a computer. I've taken computer classes," she said. "So I went to the library, and I checked this out. It's a practice called erotic asphyxiation. Very rough." She nodded confidentially at me and seemed quite pleased with herself.
She rattled on about other things for the next thirty minutes. I only heard little bits of it. Nothing she said was worth anything, and besides I was thinking about Carlie and Kelly.
Could it be as simple as rough sex gone too far? She wouldn't talk to me because she was afraid of the truth getting out? If that was true, it wasn't murder, but it would still be manslaughter.
Yet, Macy had talked about an exit bag. How did she know that? Did an exit bag have a specific look to it? Or had a bag just been found over Kelly's head?
I needed to do some research, and I interrupted my hostess in mid-sentence.
"Thank you," I said. "It's been lovely, but I have another appointment I must be on time for." With that I excused myself and headed for the building my office was in.
My actual office had been blown to bits, but I'd gotten a message that the landlord was being kind enough to give me a loaner space until my private office was back up to workable standards.
The landlord had also left me a message that my small safe was secure. I kept a small safe in my office, and apparently it had survived the bomb blast fine.
I wouldn't have gone up to my old, bomb blasted office, except that it was time to dye my hair again. I only look like a dark-haired Italian because I used black hair dye and bronzed my skin to look more olive color by using sunless tanning lotion.
My wife had no idea. She really thought I was Italian. The funny thing was my skin was very fair and my hair was a chestnut brown. Well, it was if I let it be that color.
I didn't. I was due for a hair coloring, and I kept that stuff in my safe. Only at the office did I use that stuff. It was my secret.
My ability to be someone else had kept me alive for years after my major indiscretion, and I wanted to keep myself alive.
My temp office was on the main level, but I went up to my second floor office.
To my surprise the door was open. I figured there must be some workmen inside fixing something, but there were no workmen.
Inside I came face to face with Mickey Richardson and some other guy who was holding a torch and had some portable gas tanks with him.
Mickey looked embarrassed.
I started reaching for my concealed gun. Mickey saw my movement and held his hands out, palms facing me.
"Hey, sorry. We aren't here for trouble," he said. The guy who was with him let the torch go out.
It was then that I saw they'd cut my safe open. Not only that, but they had emptied it.
Sitting on the floor next to it was several bottles of my tanning lotion and some boxes of jet black hair dye.
"Why?" I asked.
"Honestly, I'm trying to figure out who you really are."
"Again, why?" I said. I felt myself getting agitated.
"You're not normal. No offense," he said apologetically. "I want to know who I'm dealing with."
"You realize I could shoot you both right now," I said. "And I'm tempted."
"Let's stay level headed here," Mickey said.
"You know, I really don't like you," I said. "Really don't like you."
"Look, it was a mistake coming here. We shouldn't have done it. I'm sorry."
"Dude," I said. "Your mistake was having this place blown up the first time. Your mistake was coming after me. You have no idea who you are playing against here. No idea at all."
"I know," he said quietly. "I'm sorry. And I still don't know who you are." He pointed at the stuff from the safe. "But you're somebody who is hiding. That much I can figure out."
My agitation was growing. If this moron blew my cover here, I could get killed. This idiot, Mickey, had no idea.
"Who are you, Ray? Who are you?"
"Get out of my life and stay out," I
said.
Mickey nodded for the other guy to leave. He did.
"Look," Mickey said. "You've got leverage on me. You figured stuff out. That's uncomfortable."
"I figure so," I said.
"So, I think you should keep that stuff to yourself. If you do, nothing more happens. If you don't, I'll keep digging to find out who you are hiding from. I don't think you want that."
I stared at him. He had no idea how lucky he was. The old me, the me before I had found my faith would have blasted him right there, but I couldn't do that now.
It wouldn't be right.
"Get out," I said.
"I need your word first," he said.
I rubbed my forehead. "On one condition," I said. "What's the deal with the deleted Kelly Brandt video?"
Our eyes met, and he stared intently at me for a while.
"I'll be honest. Okay? Like a show of good faith, okay?"
"Give it to me straight," I said.
"Okay. I took the video down after I heard she died. You pointed out that the page minus the video was still up. I was trying to get it all down before I got any attention."
"Law enforcement attention?" I asked.
He nodded.
"You're a creep," I said.
He shrugged.
"Did you have her death on tape?"
He shook his head. "I wish," he said. "But no, I shut the feed off after her and the woman finished."
"So, no footage of what happened afterward?"
Again he shook his head. That agreed with what I'd seen of the recovered clip from his computer.
"Fine," I said. "Now get out."
"So, you'll keep quiet?" he asked.
"Get out," I said. "And I promise not to kill you right now."
"You wouldn't," he said.
I pulled out a semi-automatic pistol. "Want to test that theory?"
He bowed his head slightly. "I'm leaving," he said. "But remember what I said."
After I was sure they were gone, I went to the men's room. There, I dyed my hair to get the roots black. and I rubbed some more of the sunless tan lotion all over my body. When that was complete, I went to the temporary office. In actuality, it was a closet that had been cleared out for me.
All the same, it was better than nothing. I pulled up websites like Facebook.com and Myspace.com and some other lesser known ones as well. I was looking for Carlie Smith. Eventually, I found her on a page. She had a profile that was public on one of the lesser known social networking sites.
She hadn't updated the page in a while. In fact, it gave her last login date as two years ago, but I found something interesting. Three years ago, she posted some comment about erotic asphyxiation. There it was.
Chapter 22
I started to get this feeling. It's this feeling I get when I'm about to piece together a puzzle. Another thing further down caught my eye. She linked to an online classified ad site. Her posting on the social network site said to go there to find her ad and hook up with her for a good time.
I clicked the link. The ad had expired long ago, and the website told me that. So I searched more recent ads, and I found one that was signed by a csmith1989.
Quickly, I went back to the social network site. She had her birthday listed as March 19, 1989. I had a good hunch csmith1989 was her. Back at the classified ad site, I clicked the ad.
It was an ad advertising for "casual sexual partners". It mentioned that she was into BDSM. The ad that I was looking at had been posted only a few days ago.
I called up the police department and got transferred to records.
"Gracie?" I asked.
"Yo', who's this?"
"Ray," I said.
"Dude," he said. "Are you hitting me up again so soon?"
"I am," I said sheepishly.
"So, what do you need, bro?" he asked.
"I'm in need of the autopsy report on Kelly Brandt. I looked at the photos of her before," I said.
"I can't actually give it to you, but I might be able to give you some info if I knew what you were looking for."
"Right," I said. "How exactly did she die? Suffocation? Or was there a gas involved?"
"A gas?" he echoed.
"Yeah, something inert," I said.
"Dude," he said. "You lost me."
"I want to know if there was a gas dissolved in her bloodstream," I said.
"Okay," he said. "I'll look for you."
"And, were any tanks on the scene?"
"Tanks?"
"Right, of gas," I said. "Helium perhaps."
"I'm making a note of it," he said. "I'll check."
"What am I going to owe you?" I asked.
"Seriously?"
"Yes, I've got to owe you something for this," I said.
"Well, dude, I've been wantin' some good wings and beer, you know?"
"I'll take you out for dinner tonight," I said.
"Dude, what about your wife?"
"She's out of town," I said.
"Word, bro," he said. "See you tonight at Juno's."
We hung up.
This was going to drive me crazy. I was so close I could feel it. If there were gas tanks, then that would make it more likely that it was a suicide. That was how an exit bag was done. You put your head in a bag and piped in some gas, like helium. Then you tied the bag shut. You die.
But without gas tanks, it wouldn't look like a suicide at all. That would make it point at Carlie. Probably not on purpose, but it would still be Carlie that killed her. Something went wrong during some rough sex.
Right now it was a waiting game. I had to wait to hear from Gracie. In the mean time, I needed to do something to get my mind off it so I wasn't driven crazy waiting to hear.
I decided to go grocery shopping.
Once I arrived at the store, I realized I had no idea what to buy. I didn't know what we were low on. My wife always did the shopping. For a bit I wandered around aimlessly. Perhaps something would come to me.
Walking down the cereal aisle, I saw someone I recognized. It was the maid, Maria Vasquez. Quickly, I walked over to her; she didn't see me coming.
"Maria?" I said.
She spun around. Then she frantically looked up and down the aisle. There was no one. Quickly she started pushing her cart away from me.
"Maria?" I called out after her, and I ran to catch up.
"No English," she said.
"Yes you do," I said. "Talk to me."
She shook her head and left her cart. I watched as she exited the store. What was it with her?
Why would she leave her groceries to avoid talking to me? I knew where she lived, and I decided to follow her home. So, I did.
By the time I arrived in front of her apartment building, I saw that the vehicle she drove was parked there. That was good.
I went up to the door and knocked. A Hispanic man opened the door.
"Hi, is Maria available?"
"You know Maria?" he asked with a slight accent.
"Yeah," I said. "I need to talk to her."
"She didn't tell you about me?" the guy asked.
"She didn't say much of anything to me," I said.
"I'm her husband, you know," he said.
"Glad to meet you," I said. "Could I talk with Maria?"
"Maria?" he called loudly. "Maria?"
Maria came, but shrunk back when she saw me. He asked her something in Spanish, but she shook her head. Loudly he demanded something else. She shook her head even more violently no.
"She doesn't know you," he said to me.
"Yes, she does know who I am," I said. "She used to work at the Sleep EZ Inn."
"You met her there?" He seemed a little threatening.
"No, I met her in a store," I said.
He turned and yelled at Maria. She recoiled from his verbal barrage.
"You need to leave," he said to me and shut the door. For a moment I stood on the steps. Then I started to walk down.
A sound from inside made me stop. Someo
ne was hitting someone. Judging from who was screaming, he was hitting her. It made sense then. The guy was a jealous, control freak. She was afraid to talk because she didn't want this to happen. She didn't want word getting around to her husband that she was seen with a guy, me in this case, because then he'd beat her.
Just like he was doing now.
And she was getting beat up because of me. I walked back up the steps. My cell phone rang. I recognized the police station phone number. I answered. It was Gracie. I told him to call back and leave it as a message because I was busy at the moment.
Then I pounded on the door. They didn't hear it the first time. She was screaming, and he was yelling. Also, there were the dull thuds of impact whenever he struck her. Followed by a fresh scream from her.
I beat my fist on the door long and hard. The noise stopped inside. Moments later the door opened. The guy poked his head out.
I didn't say anything. Rather I shoved my way in, knocking him backwards. Maria was there in the little kitchen. She was bent over, but I could still see red marks all over her exposed skin.
He was breathing heavily, and she was weeping.
He said something unpleasant in Spanish towards me.
"Hey," I said. "Are you hitting her because of me?"
He looked murderously at me but said nothing. In the back of my mind, I had this fleeting thought that I better leave. Domestic disputes were the worst situation of any violent encounter, but I felt that I couldn't leave Maria to this fate. Especially because it was my fault in the first place.
"Answer me," I said. "Why are you hitting her?"
"She wants you," he said mockingly. "The whore wants you."
"I don't think so," I said. "She tried her hardest to avoid me. And I'm guessing because she knew what a weenie you are. What kind of a spineless creep beats up a woman?"
"You want some, punk?" He moved aggressively towards me.
Maria slumped down further in the kitchen and continued weeping.
"Really?" I asked. "Think you can handle me?"
Lightning fast, he closed the distance and punched me. I didn't see it coming. He caught me full in the face.
I stumbled back. My lip was bleeding, and I swear I could already feel it getting fat only a second after getting hit.
Death of an Escort Page 17