by M. S. Parker
“What joke?”
His eyes shifted, and he looked paler than only moments ago. “Just let it go. When these girls is gone, they gone.”
“I’m losing my patience, and that doesn’t bode well for you, Shawn.” I took my phone out of my pocket. “Maybe I should call my friend at the FBI.”
His entire face morphed into panic. “You don’t have no–”
“I do,” I said while tapping buttons. “Keep giving me the runaround and you’ll meet him up close and personal.”
“All right, all right.” He held up his hands. “I’ll tell you everything. You said you ain’t a cop, right?”
“I’m not.”
“My supplier got locked up almost a year ago, so I started looking for another one. I found this guy who had primo stuff. Except after a couple weeks, he didn’t want money. He wanted something I could get him. Girls.”
My free hand clenched into a fist. Girls. Plural. I realized that he’d said that before too. I just hadn’t caught it until now.
“Him and his guys wanted girls that no one would miss. They didn’t need to be pretty or skinny or anything. Just high schoolers. And losers. Not so many that people would notice, but whenever they said they wanted one, I had to do it.”
“Hate to tell you, but a whole lot of people noticed Meka was missing.”
“Yeah, I fucked that up.” He scratched the back of his head. “That last night, I made everything perfect. Dinner. Flowers. I shelled out serious cash. And she still said no. Bitch needed to learn a lesson, and they needed a girl.”
“You gave your girlfriend to human traffickers because she wouldn’t have sex with you?”
He scowled. “It sounds all kinds of shady when you say it like that.”
“It’s pathological, you moron,” I snapped. A couple pieces clicked into place. “Did you tell them that I was looking for her?”
He shrugged yet again, but the guilt was plastered on his face. Now I knew why I’d been attacked, and how they’d known where I was. He was lucky I was more concerned with Meka than my own safety.
“Where is she, asshole?”
“I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Seriously. I take the girl to meet the guys. I get my stash. They get the girl.”
I reminded myself that it wouldn’t be a good idea to knock Shawn out. Delivering him to the cops would have to be justice enough.
“Where do you meet them? The same place every time, or do you go somewhere different?”
“It’s one of those storage places,” he said. “On the edge of the city.”
I pulled my notebook out of my pocket. “Address. Now.”
He hesitated, then rattled it off. “Just don’t tell them you got it from me, okay? You might not be a cop, but they don’t like people sticking their noses in their business, you know?”
Oh, I knew. And I had no doubt that they were going to be royally pissed when they figured out I wasn’t just coming for Meka. I’d get her, but then I was going to burn the whole damn thing to the ground.
But first, this asshole was going to jail.
Eighteen
This was a bad idea. I knew it was a bad idea. Hell, a six-year-old would’ve known this was a bad idea. I was by myself, still healing, and didn’t really know what I was about to find.
But I’d be damned if I let Meka be missing for a single second longer if I could find her now.
Which was why I parked my car at one of the first storage units, then walked down to the unit number Shawn had given me. The guy in the booth at the front had barely looked up when I pulled in, so I doubted he’d even notice that I hadn’t gone inside that first unit, or that I’d started down toward the other end.
Once I was out of sight, I kept to the shadows, my heart pounding harder with every step I took. The adrenaline coursing through my system was in part due to the highly stupid thing I was doing, but another part was the anticipation of doing something important. Finally. The sort of work I’d always thought I’d do with the FBI.
I’d done a couple cases with Adare, but none of them had been the sort of cases that made a difference like this one. Cheating spouses. Missing pets. Deadbeat parents who owed child support. Those were the bread and butter of private investigators. Something like this, where it wasn’t just about finding a single missing girl. If what Shawn had told me was true, this could make a huge difference in so many lives.
I was only a few yards away when I saw the black van parked around the far side of the building. Probably not empty then. I’d taken a couple hours to do some research on the place, and I knew there were a total of three entrances. The giant double doors where people could take things in and out. The main door to the office. And an emergency exit in the back.
It was that door I went to now.
A few months before my uncle died, I’d come home from college for a long weekend and found the two of them, half-drunk, trying to pick every lock they could find. I hadn’t joined in the drinking – between being underage and Clay being an FBI agent, alcohol seemed like a bad idea – but I had listened and learned. The three of us had brought it up again when they were sober, and the lessons had gone on a couple more times.
Which meant when I came to the emergency exit, it didn’t take me long to see it was locked from the outside but unlocked on the inside. I took my lock-picking kit out of my pocket and got to work. I was technically breaking and entering, and if I’d been a cop or FBI agent, that would’ve been an issue. Now, I could go to jail if someone reported me, but I was sure I was going to find one of two things: nothing at all, or people doing things a hell of a lot more illegal than I was.
I let out a breath as the pins clicked into place and then slowly eased the door open. I paused, listening before I went inside. For a few seconds, I couldn’t hear anything, and then I heard a soft sound. Soft sounds. More than one. Girls were crying.
Shit.
I went inside, moving slowly despite the urgency building inside me. I didn’t know what was waiting for me up ahead, and I couldn’t let my emotions rule my behavior. I might not have to worry about preserving chains of evidence and getting search warrants, but if anyone got hurt because of my impatience, I’d never forgive myself.
When I reached the end of the short corridor, I was at the corner where a small office and single stall bathroom sat to the left, the main area to the right. The room was full of large, unopened boxes, giving me cover as I moved toward the sounds.
Then I saw them.
Five girls of high school age were huddled together, sniffling and crying. From where I was hiding, I couldn’t see all of their faces, but I could see the profile of the girl who was above the others. The girl who had placed herself on the outside of the group and kept looking over toward where my peripheral vision had registered a handful of armed men.
I’d get to them in a moment.
I needed a moment to let it sink in. I’d found Meka. She was alive, and it appeared, unharmed. She was dirty and looked like she’d been crying during the time she’d been here, but her clothes were on and not ripped.
I hoped that meant good things.
Then it was time to figure out how to handle things from here because I counted at least four men with weapons. I’d never be able to get all of the girls out of here safely. Not by myself.
Shit. Shit.
I looked down at my phone and tried to power it on, but the screen remained as black as my hope. The battery was dead. I couldn’t call for help, so I needed to go back to the police station.
Dammit!
“What do you mean you let him go?”
The desk sergeant sighed. “Look, all I know is that his dad showed up with a lawyer, and ten minutes later, they were all leaving together.”
“He’s been giving girls to sex traffickers in exchange for drugs, and he just walked out?” I was getting louder, but I didn’t care. Shawn had told me exactly what he’d done, and I’d given his statement to the cops, along with an audio file of
the recording I had of the conversation.
“Miss, I’m not one of the officers on the case. All I know is what I told you.”
“Who were the officers on the case?” I asked.
“Who’d you speak with before?”
I pinched the bridge of my nose and reminded myself that he was just doing his job. “Officer Lennard.”
“Lennard’s still here.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. When he saw the surprised look on my face, he added, “Guy’s a pain in my ass. Someone needs to bug him for a change.”
“Glad to help,” I said as I walked past the sergeant.
After a few feet, I was able to recognize the stout, middle-aged man I’d talked to before. Before, I’d assumed that the vibe I’d gotten off him was his disgust at what Shawn had done, but now I wondered if he had an issue with work, or with me.
“Officer Lennard?”
He raised his head, scowling as he saw me. “That kid’s family is going to sue your ass off and don’t think for a minute I’m going to defend you.”
“I don’t care about him right now,” I said. I didn’t add that I’d make sure someone heard about it later, but for the moment, Shawn wasn’t foremost on my mind. “I found Meka Ludwick.”
“Who?”
“The fifteen-year-old who’s been missing for a week,” I said, grinding my teeth together. “The one that kid gave to sex traffickers because she wouldn’t sleep with him.”
“There’s no evidence he did anything,” Lennard said, “and some half-assed, forced confession doesn’t cut it. Tomorrow, I’ll probably be arresting you on attempted kidnapping and other charges.”
I made a dismissive gesture. “You’ve got to be kidding me.” I blew out a harsh breath. “Listen, I found Meka and at least four other girls being held prisoner by several armed men. We need to go rescue them now before they’re moved.”
“And how did you come about this information?” He leaned back in his chair, as if he needed to make it more obvious that the concept of actual police work was foreign to him.
“It doesn’t matter,” I snapped. “This isn’t about search warrants or anything like that. These girls are in serious danger, and I’m reporting it to you in the hopes that you’ll get off your ass and get them.”
He leaned forward then, round face flushing. “Listen here, you can’t come in here making all sorts of wild accusations and insulting officers of the law. I know who you are, Rona Quick.”
“That’s good,” I fired back, “because I know who you are too. You’re the one I’m going to tell Theo Ludwick to sue if anything else happens to his daughter. For all you know, Shawn could’ve called his buddies as soon as he left here, and they’re in the process of moving the girls somewhere more secure.”
He shook his head, a smug smirk curling his lips. “No, you don’t get it. I know who you are. You see, I have a buddy in Denver who called down here a couple hours ago to tell me I had some wanna-be FBI agent going rogue on my turf.”
“I’m a private investigator,” I said, keeping my face carefully blank. “I have a license, and I was legally hired to find Meka Ludwick because someone here didn’t want to do their job. If you would’ve done the work in the first place, I wouldn’t have been involved.”
“If you think I’m going to let someone the Feds kicked out of training tell me how to do my job, you got another thing coming.” He pointed at me, then slammed his hand on his desk. “Girls like that get themselves into trouble. We have more important cases to work than some girl who slept with half the school.”
“‘Girls like that,’” I repeated. “I thought you didn’t know who Meka was, or the rumors about her.”
His face was starting to turn a disturbing shade of red, and I wondered if I’d be legally obligated to do CPR if he had a heart attack.
I cursed my phone and its dead battery, then cursed myself for not thinking to charge it. None of this would be happening if I’d been able to just call 911. I said as much to the asshole in front of me.
“You do that, and I’ll arrest you for obstruction, filing a false police report, and anything else I can get to stick.” He pointed toward the door. “Get your ass out of here before I decide to arrest you right now.”
I looked around the room, but the handful of other police who were here all had their eyes on their desks like whatever they were working on was more important than whether or not I had vital information. I knew that not all of the police in the city were like Lennard or the ones who wouldn’t even look at me, but these were definitely leaving a bad taste in my mouth.
But now wasn’t the time to deal with them. I had to find someone who would listen to me. Someone who’d help get Meka out, no matter what. And as much as I hated it, there was only one person I could think of who’d forgive me for knocking on his door at five in the morning and who had the sort of power that I’d need to rescue the girls. At least someone who wasn’t two hours away. I needed help now, and I didn’t know how long it’d take Clay to round up the cavalry.
Shit.
I really did have only one choice.
And I really didn’t want to talk to him, but the alternative wasn’t an option I could live with.
Dammit.
Nineteen
I took a deep breath as I ran up the steps to the front door of a beautiful, sprawling house. Only a few streets over from where Jenna and Rylan lived, I now realized I hadn’t fully appreciated how rich Jalen was until this very moment. It was one thing to know that he’d sold his first company for a large, undisclosed sum. It was something else entirely to see what he’d been able to do with the money.
Fortunately, that just made me feel even better about what I was doing now. He had the sort of money and public face needed to get things done. Since he was the one who hired me, I didn’t feel guilty about talking to him before telling Theo I’d found Meka. Besides, if something went wrong, it would crush Theo if I gave him hope that the worst was almost over.
I knocked on the door and waited. I twisted my fingers together as I mentally ran through what I wanted to say. Because of how things had gone the last time we’d been together, I knew he’d most likely tell me to get lost, which meant I needed to get him to understand that I wasn’t here for me before he slammed the door in my face. Those girls couldn’t afford for more time to be wasted.
I had my mouth open, ready to give Jalen a rapid-fire list of all the reasons he needed to help me, but when the door opened…it wasn’t Jalen.
She was tall, but not quite as tall as me, slender, almost too much though, but none of that was my business. It didn’t matter that I now recognized her as a model I’d seen on billboards and magazines all over the country. Elise Marx, if I remembered correctly. Long, chestnut brown hair, the sort of dark eyes that men wrote about. She was gorgeous.
“Who are you?” She crossed her arms as if my being here was interrupting something important. Her beauty sleep, no doubt. Although from the looks of her, she didn’t need much of that.
I ignored the fact that, for all Jalen’s talk when he’d seen Clay, it hadn’t taken him long to fill his bed. That wasn’t why I was here though. He was an ass, and I didn’t want that drama in my life. I wasn’t here for me, or even for Jalen, really. I was here for Meka and the other girls. Jalen was a means to an end.
“My name’s Rona Quick. Jalen hired me to find…hired me to do some research for him. Is he here?”
She gave me a tight smile. “My husband isn’t available right now.”
Husband?
Okay, now I was pissed. That asshole had made me part of an affair. But again, not the point of me being there. I could be furious with him later, when this was all done.
“I need to talk to him.”
“What you need is to walk your ass out of here and never even look at my husband again.” She gave me one of those up and down looks that women like her always used on women like me. “I don’t care what promises he made you or how special you thi
nk your connection was. He’s mine, and nothing’s going to change that.”
I took a slow, deliberate breath, and then let it out. “I need to speak to Jalen about his case. It’s urgent.”
“Elise.”
Jalen’s voice came from behind her and color flooded her cheeks. “I’m taking care of it, Jalen.”
“I need to talk to you about Meka.” I raised my voice so that he’d be able to hear me.
“Who’s Meka?” Elise snapped. “Some other woman you’ve been fucking? The three of you, all together? Is that what you’ve been doing?”
“Meka’s none of your fucking business, Elise.” Jalen appeared at her side. “Don’t you have somewhere else to be?”
Damn. I didn’t like the woman but seeing how coldly he was treating her actually made me have some sympathy. At least I knew it wasn’t just me he behaved like that with.
After he helped me get the cops involved, I planned on never seeing him again. He’d get my invoice in the mail, with a request to drop the check in the mail rather than bring it to the office.
“Jalen.” Elise’s voice had taken on a whiny quality that she was far too old to be using. She was probably only a few years older than me, but I was about twenty years too old to talk like that.
“Now, Elise.”
“I need my purse before I can go.” She stormed back into the house.
“You said you’re here about Meka?” Jalen looked in my general direction, but not directly at me.
If I’d cared, I would’ve thought that he looked embarrassed.
But I didn’t care, so there was that. I didn’t care that he was wearing a pair of flannel pants and a t-shirt that made him look far too good for this early in the morning. Or that just the sight of him made me remember what it had been like to have him inside me.
“I am, but if you’re busy–”
“Come inside. It’s cold out there.”
I stared at him. What the fuck? He was acting like the other night hadn’t happened.
Then Elise shoved past us both, and I reminded myself to keep my focus where it belonged. On Meka.