by Kara Lennox
“I bet you’re just being modest.”
“No, I’m not. If I’d been any good, my father never would have let me quit.”
“I was so bad, they kicked me out of the church youth choir.”
Now it was Elizabeth’s turn to laugh. “Sorry, but I just don’t picture you as a choirboy.”
She expected him to join her in laughing, but suddenly he got very serious. “I think someone’s following us.”
“Really?”
“No one was following me before I picked you up—I made sure.”
“Which means I’m the one under surveillance?” That did not sit well with her. Despite the initial questioning by the police, she didn’t believe she was truly a suspect. It was only if they found out where she’d been Saturday night that she risked turning mild suspicion into an arrest warrant. “Can you tell who’s following?”
“It’s a white Subaru. Not a typical cop car.”
“I don’t know whether to be relieved or more worried.”
“Who else might be following you?” he asked. “Any jealous boyfriends in the picture?”
“No! Of course not. I live a very quiet life.”
“What about your clients? Any of them have a beef with you?”
Her thoughts flitted briefly to Tonda’s pimp, Jackson. He’d confronted Elizabeth once, about a year ago, when she’d first started counseling Tonda, trying to convince her to give up “the life” and get a legitimate job. He hadn’t appreciated Elizabeth interfering with his livelihood. But he hadn’t bothered her since then, and Elizabeth had finally realized that she couldn’t make Tonda quit. Of course, with the baby coming, Jackson might be more worked up than usual, especially if he thought Elizabeth had talked Tonda into keeping the baby.
Still...Jackson wouldn’t be caught dead in a Subaru. He leaned toward Lincoln Continentals as big as a barge, with custom chrome wheels. “I don’t think anyone from work would bother me. But I just remembered something I wanted to tell you.
“One of my clients thinks she knows Jazz, your mysterious prostitute. Or at least knows of her.”
“Liz. Daniel said you shouldn’t investigate on your own, and I agree.”
“Who else is going to question my client? You? You think she’s going to open up to a cop, a former cop, a lawyer or anything that resembles any of the above? Don’t even think about it. Anyway, it’s not like I’m running around with a gun knocking on strangers’ doors. She’s my client, someone I’ve known almost a year. She would never hurt me.”
“Yeah, but if she mentions your conversation to the wrong people— Let’s just say, we don’t want to tip our hand. We could scare our killer away, as well as any witnesses. We could also provoke the killer into doing something rash. Something else rash.”
Elizabeth hadn’t thought of it that way. “I told her these were dangerous people and not to mention the matter to anyone else. I trust her.” But Tonda was only nineteen and not always prone to the wisest decisions.
“So...what did you find out?”
“Jazz might actually be Yazmin. She used to work for a pimp named Carlos, or King C, but then, according to Tonda, she broke away. Went on her own. Internet call girl.”
“Hmm.”
Elizabeth had expected a more positive reaction than that. “That’s not helpful information?”
“It’s just that I’ve been poring over internet sites, looking for her, making calls. I haven’t seen or encountered a Jazz or a Yazmin or anyone who looks or sounds like her.”
“Maybe she’s lying low.”
“Maybe. Or something happened to her. Your father could have been attempting to bribe her, buy her silence. When that didn’t work...”
“You always go for the darkest explanation. My father didn’t kill her.”
Hudson didn’t argue. He pushed a button on the steering wheel. “Call Mitch.”
Using the sync, the car dialed his phone.
Mitch’s voice came over the speakers almost immediately. “What’s up, Hud?”
“My missing prostitute might be going by the name Yazmin.... The spelling?” He shot Elizabeth a questioning look.
“Y-A-Z-M-I-N, I think,” she supplied.
“She might have a pimp, or former pimp, named Carlos or King C,” Hudson said.
“I’ll get on it.”
“Also, can you run a plate? White Subaru. Victor Alpha Charlie 288.”
“Sure.”
Hudson was silent awhile, his brow furrowed as if he was working something out. Finally he asked, “Doesn’t it bother you, associating with prostitutes?”
“It’s not like we go out drinking together. I counsel these women. I know exactly what their lives are like, and no, it doesn’t bother me.”
“When I was in Vice, I talked to them all the time.”
“I’m sure you did. But the women trust me. They know they can tell me anything and I won’t get them in trouble.”
“Do you try to get them to quit? I mean, I get how young girls might be victimized, but adult women—surely they can make better choices.”
“Not if they’re hooked on drugs. Their pimps control when and how much of the drug they get. In return they have to do what he tells them to do. And even if they’re not drug users, a lot of them have kids, and turning that next trick might allow them to feed those kids the next day.”
“Yeah, yeah. I’ve heard the same arguments from defense lawyers and social workers a zillion times. But that’s not my concern. I’m supposed to arrest people who commit crimes, thus making our community safer for all those people who do manage to raise their kids without breaking laws. It’s your job to help them fix their lives, not mine.”
“I do try to get them into better situations,” she said. “Most of them have tragically low self-esteem. It’s difficult to convince them they’re worthy of a better life. They’re brainwashed to believe they deserve to be abused, degraded—”
“Okay, okay, I get it. I guess I just see things from a different perspective. I see this whole continuum of crime, everything from graffiti to burglary to drugs to murder, and most of it I can lay at the feet of the gangs. Prostitution is just another cog in that big crime machine. It’s not that I don’t feel for those women. I do. But I can’t spare too many tears when any day they could walk into a police station and provide evidence that would help us put away their pimps, their drug dealers.”
“Yeah, and get them killed.” No matter what he said, he really didn’t get it. But then, most law-and-order types didn’t.
“I’d rather spend my energy protecting the real victims—the convenience-store worker who gets shot in a robbery, the little kid that gets killed by a stray bullet in a drive-by. Not to mention you and me. You lost your father, who some part of you loved even if he was a bastard. And now some dirtbag is out there running free while you and I are suspects.”
“It’s not like I feel sorry for the murderer.”
“Are you sure? Maybe he came from a broken home. He could have been trying to rob your father for money to feed his starving children, and the gun went off accidentally—”
“Look, just because I show some compassion for people who make mistakes doesn’t mean I think murderers shouldn’t be caught and brought to justice. You’re deliberately skewing my beliefs for your own amusement. Stop it.”
He said nothing more, but she could tell he was biting his lip.
She turned to look out the back window. They were on busy Gowan Street; all she could see were lots of headlights. “Is the Subaru still back there?”
Hudson glanced in the mirror. “Yeah. I could lose him, but if it’s a cop, and I start driving like I’ve spotted the tail, he’ll know I’m a cop. Which pretty much narrows down my identity.”
“I guess I see what you mean.”
“If we just act oblivious, as civilians would, our friend doesn’t know who I am. You’re just out on a date with some anonymous guy named Lester.”
“Lester?”
<
br /> “That’s who the car’s registered to. Lester Holmes.”
“Is he a real person?”
“I don’t think so. Project Justice has a few fictional constructs. A casual background check won’t raise any red flags.”
Elizabeth just shook her head. She’d been around wealth and power her whole life, but Daniel Logan’s influence knew no bounds. At least he tried to accomplish something meaningful with his wealth. Unlike her father, whose only goal was to accumulate more, more, more of everything—money, possessions, people, power, influence, whatever.
Still, he’d donated a lot of money to charity. He wasn’t all bad. No one was all bad.
“So we just keep letting this dude follow us?” she said. “It creeps me out.”
“I bet you anything it’s a reporter.”
“Well, isn’t there some way to lose him without looking like we’re trying to lose him?”
Hudson thought for a minute, glanced at the GPS screen. “Oh, I know. Perfect timing.”
They’d been driving the surface streets out of downtown, through the pleasant Midtown, a thriving, mixed-use urban area with some of the most prized real estate in the city, but he made a sharp turn onto McGowan and zoomed under the freeway.
“What are you doing?”
“There’s a busy railroad crossing on Lawndale—it’s sort of on the way to where we’re going. If we time it just right...”
Elizabeth didn’t like the sound of this. Her fears must have shown plainly on her face, because Hudson tried to reassure her.
“I won’t put you in any danger. Promise. I used to do this all the time when I was a teenager.”
“Oh, that reassures me.”
CHAPTER NINE
ELIZABETH WASN’T QUITE sure where they were; somewhere south of downtown. As they approached the crossing, there was no sign of any train. Hudson slowed down and pulled over to the curb. Elizabeth glanced nervously behind her. The Subaru pulled past them—then quickly pulled into a parking lot. Hudson looked at his watch again. “Wait for it...wait for it...” He watched the warning lights, then cracked his window and listened. “That’s it.”
He pulled back into traffic at the exact moment the red warning lights started flashing and the bell clanged. Just as the gates started to drop, he whipped into the left lane and zoomed across the tracks, missing the dropping crossbar by inches.
Moments later the train rushed past behind them.
Hudson whooped in victory and Elizabeth hyperventilated. “Was that really necessary?”
“Awwww, it was textbook! He’ll never know we spotted him—he’ll just think I’m a bad driver.”
“You could have gotten us killed.”
“Nonsense. Didn’t you ever play chicken as a teenager?”
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t it against the law to ignore railroad warning lights? Doesn’t that put us in this criminal continuum you mentioned?”
“It’s not the same,” he mumbled, but she knew she’d scored a point.
She craned her neck and peered out the back window. The train still blocked the intersection, while Hudson left the Subaru far behind. He turned left on a random street, under an overpass, then right again onto another well-trafficked avenue. They were in the Third Ward now, an urban neighborhood known for its high crime rate.
“If you didn’t play chicken,” Hudson asked, “what did you do for fun when you were a kid?”
“I went to movies. I used to go swimming a lot in the summer. My friends and I used to...” What did they do? Usually organized activities, well chaperoned by parents who’d been thoroughly vetted by her father. “You’re right. I didn’t have much fun.” Suddenly she smiled. Maybe she wasn’t in the best situation of her life at the moment, but this was an adventure. When else would she ride in the passenger seat of a luxury car with a dashing rogue at the wheel, evading a determined reporter or maybe even a cop?
She tried to stop grinning, but she couldn’t help herself. Hudson’s exuberance was infectious. They were Burt Reynolds and Sally Field in Smokey and the Bandit.
“What’s so funny?” he asked.
“Oh, nothing.”
He sobered. “We’re in our target neighborhood now. We better keep our eyes open.”
“What, exactly, are we looking for?”
“Jazz. Or Yazmin, whatever. Also Fish Tattoo man.”
Hudson’s phone chimed over the car’s speakers, and he pushed a button on the steering wheel. “Yo.”
“Hudson. I think I found her. I’m forwarding you a picture.” It was Mitch’s voice.
The screen on the dashboard, where the GPS had its map, suddenly filled with the image of an attractive Hispanic woman with long dark hair. It was a mug shot, but her natural beauty shone through despite her smeared makeup and sullen expression.
“That’s her!” Hudson was as excited as a little kid at his first baseball game. “You got an address?”
“Her name is Yazmin Cortez. Address is more than a year old but I’ll give it to you. I did some cross-checking, and a lot of other names are associated with that same address—including one Carlos De Lugo, who has a long record that includes some pandering charges.” He paused before delivering the zinger. “Street name King C.” Another picture flashed on the screen next to Yazmin’s, of a tall, thin Hispanic man with a shaved head. The long scar on his cheek could only have come from a knife.
Elizabeth shivered. Could this be the man who had killed her father? He looked like someone capable of murder, though by now she ought to know better than to judge someone’s character strictly by a photo.
“Thanks—I owe you,” Hudson said. “I’ll check it out.”
“You shouldn’t go by yourself,” Mitch warned. “Call Kinkaid.”
Hudson grinned. “I think I can handle a pimp. What about the plates?”
“Registered to a Michael Sousa. Elementary-school teacher. No record.”
“Hmm.” Maybe the car hadn’t been following them after all. He thanked Mitch again and ended the call.
“He’s right,” Elizabeth said. “You shouldn’t confront any of these bad boys alone.”
“I used to patrol all the time by myself. Sometimes the budget just wouldn’t stretch far enough for us all to have partners. It’s no big deal.”
“You’re not going now, are you?” she asked with some alarm. She might have sympathy for some of the hard cases she encountered, but that didn’t mean she wanted to meet them face-to-face in a bad part of town.
“We’re just gonna drive by the address. Maybe pull over and watch for a while.”
“I’m not sure you should park this car in this neighborhood.”
“It’ll be fine.”
Elizabeth had a bad feeling about this. Sure, Hudson was used to this type of situation. But before, he always had the power of the badge behind him and backup just one radio call away. Bad boys didn’t mess with cops. Right now, she and Hudson looked exactly like the kind of clueless, wealthy people who made perfect targets—cruising in a really nice car into a bad part of town. She could already feel people on the street watching them, curious.
“Hey, you think this Carlos guy could be the Fish Tattoo man?”
“It says he’s six-two and one-eighty. The housebreaker seemed more short and dumpy, but it was dark and I was scared.”
“Sometimes baggy clothes can make someone look shorter and dumpier.”
“Then I guess if we find him, we should look at his arms.”
* * *
“ARRIVING AT ADDRESS 3447 Bellows Street,” the GPS voice cooed.
Hudson turned off the device, but he left the screen on with the pictures of Jazz and Carlos, so Liz could refer to them if needed. He didn’t have to; he had both of their faces memorized.
His first pass, he just looked over the building, driving by at a normal speed. The apartment once leased to Carlos and/or Jazz was typical of this neighborhood, a boxy, beige brick building sitting on a half-acre plot of d
irt—no grass, no plants, and only one lonely tree that had lost most of its leaves.
“That’s grim,” Liz commented.
“Look. On the corner.”
“Couple of working girls.”
One was blonde and fair, one possibly Hispanic. “Check out the dark-haired one.”
“It’s not Yazmin.”
Neither woman paid much attention to the car. They knew better. There were fine lines the working girls wouldn’t cross if they didn’t want to get busted. They let the customers come to them; they let the customers make the first mention of cash for sex. A cop wouldn’t do that because it was considered entrapment. They could only arrest a prostitute if he or she actively “solicited” money for sex.
“I don’t really expect to see her here,” Hudson said as he turned a corner and rejoined traffic on a busier street. “Your client said she was a call girl. Since she was last seen in Conroe, that’s probably where she lives now.”
“She could be anywhere,” Liz reasoned. “She probably knows you’re looking for her, and she doesn’t want to be found, so she won’t be where you’d expect.”
Hudson made a few more turns. “There, at the Quikki Market. Two more.” One prostitute lounged against the wall talking on a cell phone; the other was leaning into the passenger window of a souped-up Mustang. “If only I had some flashing red lights, I could scare that guy to pieces. Or do you think the johns are victims, too?”
“You don’t have to agree with me on everything,” she said hotly. “But I don’t appreciate being ridiculed. No, I have no sympathy for the johns.” She shuddered, recalling a dozen stories she’d heard from her clients of violence and depravity. “Arrest as many of them as you want. Post their pictures in the newspaper. Make sure their wives and girlfriends know what they’re up to so they can have themselves tested.”
“I’m sensing a double standard.” At her outraged expression, he had to laugh. “Sorry, I’m just giving you a hard time. We’re on the same page regarding the johns.”
“Oh, my God.”