Detective Wade Jackson Mystery - 01 - The Sex Club

by L. J. Sellers

  Seconds later, his desk phone rang.

  “This is Sophie Speranza with the Willamette News. I understand you’re investigating the death of Jessie Davenport. Do you have any leads?”

  This was the reporter’s second call. The seasoned television newscasters had been calling the department’s spokesperson, knowing that no one else in the department would talk to them, but Sophie was young and ambitious and looking to break the story.

  “We’re following up on several leads,” he said finally.

  “Is it the work of a psychopath? Should parents be concerned about the safety of their young daughters?”

  “It’s too early in the investigation to draw any conclusions. But parents should always be concerned about the safety of their children.”

  “Is the autopsy report completed? Do you know the cause of death?”

  “Not yet. I have to go.”

  Jackson arrived in the conference room early, so he could update the case board, which still looked pretty thin. The sky had turned dark with clouds, so he turned on all the overhead lights. By 3:45, the other three detectives had rolled in. Evans was the only one who didn’t have dark circles under her eyes or the glassy stare of the sleep deprived. Jackson studied her face for traces of heavy makeup but didn’t see any.

  “What’s your secret, Evans? Why do you look so fresh?”

  “Provigil.” She smiled. “And thanks for noticing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s a prescription drug. It was developed for narcolepsy, but of course, it will keep anyone awake. The military gives it to pilots and special forces on long missions to keep them alert.”

  “And your doctor just wrote you a prescription for it?” Schak was skeptical of all drugs and most medical procedures.

  “Yep. She likes to keep me happy.”

  Jackson could have used one of the pills, but he would never ask her in front of the others. “What have you got to report?”

  “Mrs. Davenport seems a little schizophrenic. On the one hand, she’s grieving for the loss of her daughter. Yet”—Evans made a face—“I don’t think she liked Jessie all that much.”

  “How so?”

  “Weird little criticisms kept popping up. Jessie’s bad taste in color choices for clothes. Jessie’s inability to be honest about her feelings.” Evans consulted her notes. “And, at one point, she said with some disgust, ‘Jessie likes to flirt with older men.’”

  “Did she mention anyone in particular?”

  “I asked her that, and she rushed into a discussion of Jessie’s father.”

  Jackson turned to McCray, who looked as if he had aged overnight. “What did you find out about Paul Davenport?” Jackson wasn’t ready to talk about the mayor yet. He wanted someone to come up with a different suspect.

  “Well, for starters, he didn’t know his daughter was dead.” McCray took his glasses off and rubbed his eyes. “Apparently his ex-wife didn’t bother to call him and tell him. Davenport became distraught when he heard about Jessie and had to get off the phone. I mean he cried like I have never heard a man cry before. I called him back an hour later. He said he was at work all day Tuesday. Two other employees at McFarland Insurance confirmed his alibi. He also says he does not know of any boyfriend. But he’s driving down from Seattle tonight, so you can interview him yourself tomorrow.”

  Jackson put a small check next to Paul Davenport’s name on the board. “How long will he be here?”

  “I don’t know. Probably until after the funeral service.”

  “Thanks, Ed. After this you ought to go home and get some rest.”

  “I’m okay.”

  The door opened and the district attorney rushed in. Slonecker had thick black hair and eyes so dark his pupils disappeared, making him seem imposing even though he was only five foot ten. His charcoal pinstripe suit and maroon tie looked expensive and gave the impression of a successful, confident man on his way up. Jackson expected him to be the state attorney general some day.

  “Thanks for coming.” Jackson shook his hand, not sure why. He didn’t need to schmooze. He and Slonecker had worked well together in the past.

  “You made it sound important.”

  “It is. I think we have a second suspect.”

  The other detectives looked up expectantly.

  “Unit five of the Oakwood Apartments is rented by Mariska Harrison, who is Mayor Fieldstone’s assistant. The apartment is for the mayor, as a place to take breaks occasionally during his long workday.” Jackson paused to let that soak in, then continued. “The mayor also placed four calls to Jessie’s cell phone in the last month and received three from her.”

  “Shit.” Slonecker and Evans said it simultaneously.

  The fax machine on the other side of the wall started a noisy printout.

  “That’s probably for me.” Schak popped up and ran to retrieve it.

  “Have you talked to Miles yet?” the DA wanted to know.

  Jackson cringed. Slonecker was on a first-name basis with the mayor. “I wanted to confer with you first.”

  “You have to give him a chance to explain,” Slonecker said. “This could all be harmless coincidence.”

  “If he’s innocent, an interview will clear him. No harm done.” Jackson gave a small shrug for effect. “But if he’s our man, an interview will tip him off, give him a chance to clean up after himself and talk to a lawyer.”

  Schakowski rushed back into the room and thrust a paper printout at Jackson. “Fieldstone’s on the list of people who attend First Bible Baptist.”

  “It’s probably where he met her,” Jackson said.

  “And could innocently explain the phone calls between Miles and the girl,” Slonecker offered.

  “I’m still hoping for some physical evidence.”

  “What does the autopsy say?”

  Jackson fought to keep his frustration in check. “No signs of rape. No semen in the vagina, likely washed away by a vinegar douche, but semen in the anus. Death by asphyxiation, probably intentional, but no bruising and no signs of struggle, except some binding marks on her wrists. All together, it looks like a homicide, but Ainsworth won’t give me a homicide ruling, yet. I’m still waiting for DNA analysis on trace evidence. Meanwhile, we need a search warrant for body standards from the mayor.”

  Slonecker snorted. “You won’t get one. Not for the mayor. Not with what little you’ve got.”

  Jackson handed him the paperwork he’d prepared before the meeting. “Then we need a warrant to search the apartment. I think Cranston will sign it if he knows you support it. Fortunately, judges here are elected, not appointed.”

  Slonecker looked over the form. “This is pretty broad. I’d like to rework it.”

  “We don’t have time,” Jackson argued. “I talked with Harrison, Fieldstone’s assistant, last night. I’m sure she told the mayor that she told me about the apartment. He could be there right now destroying evidence.”

  “Hey,” Evans cut in. “I didn’t finish my report earlier. I’ve got something else.” She glanced at her notes. “Randi Arnell, one of the Oakwood tenants I had to get back to, recognized Jessie’s photo. She says she saw Jessie outside apartment number five a couple weeks ago. She couldn’t pin down the day, but she knew for sure it was in the afternoon around 3:30 because she was going out to meet her kid at the bus stop.”

  They all stared at her.

  “Then we’d better search it,” Slonecker said. He didn’t look happy. He slid the warrant into his briefcase. “I’ll call you as soon as I have a signature. We’ll meet at the apartment.” He looked at Jackson. “You handled this well. Thank you.”

  “It could still get ugly.”

  Slonecker snapped his briefcase shut. “That’s inevitable. But for now, not a word about the mayor gets to the media. Not a hint.” He made eye contact with everyone, individually.

  “Not a chance,” Jackson promised.

  After Slonecker left, the energy in the room int
ensified.

  “Fieldstone. I don’t believe it,” Evans said. “I met him at a community policing meeting. He seemed like a decent guy—for a Republican with serious political aspirations.”

  “What about prints?” McCray asked. “Did we get anything from Jessie’s clothes or backpack?”

  “Good question. Why don’t you go over to the print lab and find out?” Fingerprints and photographs were the only evidence they had the technology to process onsite. “Even if they don’t have anything yet, run the mayor through the database and see if he’s on file anywhere. Who knows? Maybe he has some petty conviction from when he was nineteen and his prints are available for comparison.”

  After McCray left, Jackson said, “Let’s get over to Fieldstone’s apartment now and wait for Slonecker’s call.”

  Thursday, October 21, 3:47 p.m.

  Kera drove to the clinic, her mood as dark as the sky had become. As she crossed the parking lot, she could feel the negative ions in the air and goosebumps popped up on her arms. A storm was rolling in.

  Once she was back at work, she didn’t have time to brood about her failure at the middle school. Time flew by in a rush of walk-in appointments, calls to clients about their lab results—including one to a twenty-year-old woman who had tested positive for AIDS—and a protracted search for a missing chart. She stayed an extra hour, re-filing charts to make up for some of the time she had been out at the school that afternoon. The filing was fairly mindless work, and it gave her time to think about the design and wording of the flyers she planned to post around Kincaid.

  Her instinct was to be direct, something along the lines of “Are You Sexually Active?” as a headline. But now that she knew she was up against the Conservative Culture Alliance, she would have to be more careful. Still, she found it difficult to talk about sex without actually mentioning sex. Euphemisms were not her style. Maybe she needed a focus group of young people to consult.

  When she finished the filing, Kera grabbed her purse and headed across the lobby toward the front door. She could feel a cold wind whistling in around the plywood covering the front window area. As she glanced over at the damage, her eyes caught sight of a small brown package under the chair near the reception desk.

  She froze.

  No one was in or near the chair, but a young Hispanic woman was seated against the opposite wall. A small boy sang quietly to himself as he played with a puzzle on the floor near her.

  What if it’s a bomb?

  Kera’s heart rate picked up. For a moment, her body relived the powerful tremor that had shaken the building on Tuesday.

  Panic raced through her system. She fought to keep herself from running out the door. There were clients and staff members to alert and protect. Kera moved quickly to the reception desk.

  “Roselyn.” Her tone was sharper than she intended.

  “Yes?”

  “There’s a small brown box sitting under one of the chairs in the lobby. Was a client seated there recently?”

  “Uhhh.” Roselyn’s eyes danced with emotion as she processed the information and what it could mean. “I don’t think so. Besides those two,” she nodded toward the woman and child, “there’s only one client in the building. She came in with those two and now she’s back with Julie.”

  Kera’s mind skittered around as she tried to determine the appropriate steps to take. Her instinct was to call the police and clear everyone out of the building. But if the package belonged to a client—and was likely harmless—there was no need to freak everyone out.

  “Where is the security guard?”

  “He went home at 5:30,” Roselyn responded.

  Some security. Kera walked over to the pretty, dark-skinned woman and calmly asked, “Is that your package?”

  The woman looked blank, then said with a Spanish accent, “No English.”

  Great. Kera smiled, pointed at the package, and asked, “Is that yours?” She hoped the tone of the question would convey its meaning.

  It did. The woman shook her head.

  “Gracias.” Kera hurried back to the receptionist. “What’s the name of the client with Julie?”

  Roselyn clicked a few computer keys, then said, “Eva Rios.”

  “I’m going to go ask her if she left anything in the lobby.” Kera spoke slowly and deliberately. “Meanwhile, call the police and quietly alert them to our situation. Stay on the phone with them until I get back.”

  “Do you think it’s a bomb?” Roselyn whispered.

  Deep breath. Friendly smile. “Probably not. We’re just playing it safe.”

  Kera moved quickly to exam room two. She knocked, and before Julie could respond, Kera said, “This is important. I must speak to Eva right away.”

  In a moment, Julie opened the door a few inches. “What’s going on?”

  “Suspicious package in the lobby. I need to know if it belongs to Eva.”

  The nurse’s eyes widened in alarm, and she turned back to her client, whom Kera could not see, and said quietly, “Did you leave anything in the lobby?”

  Kera heard a young woman say “No.” She reached through the open door, grabbed Julie’s arm, and squeezed. “Get out of the building as quickly as you can. Take your client and go out the back door.”

  Kera raced toward the lab area. Two staff members—both female college students—were hunched over some paperwork.

  “Leave the building immediately. Go out the back door.” Kera did not stay to explain, and the women, responding to her tone, did not hesitate or call after her with questions.

  She made a hurried sweep of the clinic, finding only two other staff members. Both Andrea and Sheila were gone for the day, so there was no one to report to, no one else to manage the emergency.

  Charging back up the hall to the front of the building, Kera hoped like hell she was handling this correctly. Roselyn was still on the phone, as she had directed. Kera took it from her and spoke quickly. “The package does not belong to anyone who is currently in the building. I’m getting everyone out now.”

  “Good. A bomb squad is already on the way.”

  Kera hung up and turned to Roselyn. “Please tell the woman in the lobby, in Spanish, that she has to leave. Tell her Eva is already outside.”

  Roselyn started to move around the counter, but Kera stopped her. “Tell her from here, then go out the back door. I don’t want you anywhere near that package.”

  Roselyn spoke loudly in Spanish. The woman didn’t move. Finally, the receptionist yelled, “Vamos.”

  The client grabbed her child and swore softly.

  Just then a loud boom reverberated through the lobby.

  Chapter 15

  Kera jumped, and Roselyn screamed. But it was only thunder. The lobby, still intact, soon flashed with lightning. A moment later rain pounded the roof. The storm was in full velocity.

  The women looked at each other, then ran for the back door. They would take their chances with the weather.

  Kera waited in her car for the police, rain pounding the roof and keeping her on edge. She had sent everyone else home and moved her car to the street. It was a small package, but that didn’t mean it couldn’t blow the whole building. The police bomb unit arrived and told her she should leave. After they went inside, she drove to KFC, picked up some chicken, and came back.

  The squad members were now in the parking lot, and the rain had let up some. From her spot on the street, Kera watched them blast the package with a water canon. Nothing happened. Relief washed over her. It had not been a bomb. For a few minutes, she watched the officers examine the debris. Curiosity drove her out of her car and into the rain. She jogged up to an officer, still wearing his protective gear, and asked him, “So what was it?”

  He smiled. “We think it contained Girl Scout cookies.”

  Kera laughed out loud for the first time in days.

  When she got home, Kera did fifty minutes on her elliptical cross trainer to burn off the stress and the fried chicken. After a sh
ower, she settled into her daily online routine. She checked her e-mail: nothing from Daniel, but one from her mother, who had forwarded a petition for the federal legalization of medical marijuana. It made Kera smile.

  She’d spent the first twelve years of her life in a commune fifty miles north of Redding, California. Her parents—Mariah and Keith Demaris—had been hippies before it was popular to be hippies. In the early sixties, they’d left college in San Francisco and joined a group living off the land upstate. Her mother wrote political essays while her father made handcrafted cedar chests. They each earned a little money for their efforts, but otherwise lived off the vegetables, goats, and chickens raised in the commune.

  Kera had been born at home a few years later. At the age of three, her family had made a hurried, worried trip to the hospital in Redding for the birth of her sister Janine. It was the first time Kera had seen the city. She was happy to leave it and return home. Her childhood had been simple, quiet, and happy, and she hadn’t known what she was missing until her parents left the commune when she was twelve. They never talked about it, but Kera suspected her father had had an affair that caused a lot of turmoil in the community and in their family. But the marriage had survived, and her mother had become an activist for every hungry child, mistreated woman, and abused animal. And Mariah Demaris was still going strong.

  Kera added her name to the petition, forwarded it to a few like-minded friends, and went back to her browser in search of her favorite breaking news site. More explosions in Iraq, but no new hostages.

  The news could not hold her attention. Too much was happening in her own little corner of the world, and Kera couldn’t pull her mind away from it. Today’s episode only served to remind her that the clinic bomber was still out there, probably plotting his next attack. Jessie’s killer had not been apprehended either. For a moment, Kera wondered if they were the same person. But that seemed unlikely. In law enforcement terms, they probably had very different profiles, very different motives and methods.